Children of the Welfare State: Individuals with Entitlements, or Hidden in the Family?

Abstract

‘Feminist’ social policy has done an important job in developing new concepts for studying welfare state variation. But just like ‘mainstream’ social policy, gender-sensitive analyses have their blind spots. This article argues that differences in policies towards children remain an understudied area, and that developing concepts for varying policy approaches to children can increase our understanding of social political differences. Two countries – the UK and Norway – are juxtaposed in the empirical analysis, which centres on policies towards children living with one parent and the development of universal child benefits. The empirical discussion suggests that the UK traditionally has been closer to an ‘organic’ view of the family, while Norway has been closer to an ‘individual’ view. Two dimensions are highlighted: the separation of parenting and partnering for the purposes of social benefits, and the extent to which the ‘worthiness’ of the parents determine transfers to children. Both these dimensions have the potential to influence strongly distribution between families with children, as well as the legitimacy of the benefits. They should therefore be of crucial importance in comparative studies of family policy and social policy.