Household Labor as Care: Care Practices and Gender among Swedish Couples expecting their First Child

The literature suggests that gender ideology-how a person identifies herself or himself in terms of marital and family roles traditionally linked to gender-is related to the division of labor in the home. In this article I assert that it is not sufficient to merely examine the main effects of wives' and husbands' gender ideologies. Rather, it is essential to consider the interaction between the ideologies of wives and their husbands in order to understand how a division of household labor emerges. I hypothesize that a husband's gender ideology will not be related to the division of household labor for men married to traditional wives, but that it will be for men with egalitarian wives. An empirical test using data provided by 2,719 married couples from the National Survey of Families and Households confirms this hypothesis. Even after controlling for measures of market- and marital-specific capital, wives' and husbands' gender ideologies interact in terms of their effects on the division of household labor. Husbands do relatively little domestic labor unless both they and their wives are relatively egalitarian in their beliefs about gender and marital roles. Gender-based inequality in the division of household labor has become a key issue for scholars of marriage and the family. One of the more intriguing findings in this literature has been the relative insensitivity of the division of household labor to recent increases in labor force participation. Even though married mothers are more than twice as likely to be employed full-time today as in 1970, the division of household labor seems to have changed hardly at all: Married men still do relatively little domestic labor. Although it appears that husbands of employed women contribute more hours of household than do husbands of nonemployed women, these differences tend to be relatively small. Demo and Acock (1993), for example, found that although husbands of employed wives contribute on average 4.3 more hours per week to chores than do husbands of nonemployed wives, the division of household labor remains strikingly unequal: Employed wives' proportion of total hours spent on household chores is still about 72%, compared with about 81% for nonemployed wives. The consensus of the empirical literature is that the division of household labor tends to be relatively traditional-that is, the wife performs a far greater proportion of household tasks than does her husband-in households where the wife earns more than her husband (Atkinson & Boles, 1984) and even in households where the husband is not employed (Brayfield, 1992). This combination of market and nonmarket is likely to force married women into working what Hochschild calls the second-shift (Hochschild, 1989b). Not only do married women perform far more household labor than their husbands, but the kinds of household tasks performed by wives and husbands differ. Many researchers (for example, Blair & Lichter, 1991; Brayfield, 1992; Lennon & Rosenfeld, 1994; Mederer, 1993) note that household labor remains highly segregated by sex. Those tasks that have been traditionally thought of as women's work (for example, cooking, laundry, housecleaning) are performed primarily by women, and tasks such as yard and auto maintenance are done primarily by men. Lennon and Rosenfeld report that men do about 70% of the traditionally male tasks, and women perform about 75% of the traditionally female tasks. To explain these inequalities in task allocation and in task type, social scientists have developed at least four major conceptual approaches. The relative resources (or resource bargaining) approach takes an exchange-based perspective. The division of household labor is seen to result from implicit negotiation between spouses over inputs (e.g., earnings) and outcomes (e.g., who does the housework) in the household. In general, the research literature supports this perspective (see, for example, Blair & Lichter, 1991; Ferree, 1991; Kamo, 1988). …

Welfare state attitudes make up an interactive feedback loop of defining popular legitimacy and future policy trajectories. Understanding attitudinal drivers is thus essential political knowledge. However, as existing research is mainly based on the work-nexus of welfare, this article expands the literature to the welfare state’s care-nexus, examining drivers of family policy attitudes. We argue that conventional attitude predictors of self-interest and ideology are insufficient to explain the attitudinal cleavage in family policy. Instead, justice perceptions in the division of physical and cognitive household labour represent an important normative battleground. We test this with Norwegian survey data (N = 3500), using a unique vignette experiment to operationalise justice perceptions. Findings show that individuals who do not perceive a disproportional household labour division as unfair prefer optional familialism within family policy. Individuals who do perceive unfairness in a disproportional household labour division prefer de-familialism, which facilitates gender equality in public and private spheres. This is consistently found for the physical division of labour, while the cognitive dimension seems less politicised. We conclude that the battleground for different family policy approaches is fundamentally normative and linked to justice considerations on gender roles.

Teaching and Learning Guide for: Fairness and Power in Family Organization

The European Union (EU) has been characterized as a “gender regime” with its distinctive patterns of gender (in)equalities and path dependencies. Gender equality policies have developed as a genuine policy field over the past decades from a single treaty article to a comprehensive legal and political framework dealing with multiple sources of discrimination. Besides, gender equality policies are frequently linked to other political projects and policy goals. Gender equality is often presented as a foundational value of the EU with reference to the Treaties of Amsterdam and Lisbon. Research has pointed out that it is an important aspect of the foundational myth of the EU. The development of gender equality policies has been characterized by alternations between progress and stagnation. These policies are also met by resistance. However, a general conclusion is that EU institutions have been important catalysts in shaping women’s economic, political, and social equality in Europe and in putting equality rights into effect. Historical, political, and sociological interpretations of the EU’s gender equality policies illustrate these dynamics. Gender equality policies are described in terms of the following phases: the 1970s (associated with women’s civil and economic rights and equal treatment), the 1980s (equal opportunities, positive action), and the 1990s (gender mainstreaming in the whole union and for all policy areas). Since the 2000s, a fourth phase of new policies against multiple discrimination has been developing. These different stages of EU gender policy continue to coexist. When the Treaty of Amsterdam entered into force in 1999, the EU committed to a new approach to work for gender equality through mainstreaming. Gender equality and nondiscrimination became guiding legal principles of the union. The Treaty of Lisbon reflects core vaues of the EU such as democracy, human rights and gender equality. One can approach gender equality policies as situated between concerns for gender equality and multiple discrimination on the one hand and priorities of economy and finance on the other. Critical voices in the literature have pointed out that these priorities have outperformed ideas about gender equality. In the aftermath of the financial crisis, EU austerity policies represent a “critical juncture” that could undo the long-term progress achieved in gender equality in Europe. Besides, gender equality policies suffer from a gap between institutionalization on the one hand and a lack of consistency and full political commitment on the other. In a context of a more permanent crisis scenario in the EU, gender equality policies are undergoing transformations and they are subject to change to the worse. A key point is that dynamic gender relations, multiple discrimination, and women’s various roles in society matter for understanding the EU and European integration. This raises questions about the EU’s role as a driving force for gender equality and against multiple discrimination. What happened to gender equality policies and to gendered effects of other policies as a result of the various crises in the EU?

This dissertation aims to provide contextual understanding of the persistence of gender inequality at home from a comparative perspective. Although the equality between men and women has been considered desirable and mostly achieved in the domain of paid labor in most industrial societies, unpaid labor in the domestic sphere is one of the most obstinate realms of gender inequality. Previous comparative research on housework provides valuable insights into the mechanism underlying the gender division of household labor and has revealed that both micro- and macro-level gender equalities play a key role in explaining the gender division of household labor. Building on prior empirical research and theories explaining cross-national variations in gendered housework and family life, I argue that the shift toward greater gender equality at both individual- and country-levels is the key in leading to the equal division of household labor, reducing work-family conflict, and achieving satisfactory family life. To achieve this goal, this dissertation investigates the relationship between the division of household labor, work-family conflict, and family life satisfaction across countries, with a particular emphasis on individual- and country-level gender equalities. The findings overall demonstrate that gender equality at both levels is an important factor in configuring lower levels of work-family conflict and higher levels of family life satisfaction, and that the relationship between housework, work-family conflict, and family life satisfaction varies by country-level gender equality. This dissertation contributes to the comparative housework literature and also provides support for the argument that societal and political development should be in line with greater gender equality.

The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the division of household labour could continue to lock down or start to break gender roles. Using time-use data of n = 473 individuals collected during the lockdown restrictions in Belgium from March to May 2020, we analyse the gendered division of routine and non-routine household labour in absolute time use and relative shares. We compare against the Belgian time-use data of 2013 for the same time period (n = 678 individuals). A time-demanding work and living situation associate with an increase in men's time spent on household labour during the lockdown but not with a change in women's time use. The gender gap closes in absolute time but not in relative shares of routine and non-routine household labour. The limited impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the gender division of household labour indicates a temporal rather than a substantial change in gender roles.

Gleichstellungspolitik in der Schweiz: Einführung in ein umstrittenes PolitikfeldFuchs, GesineOpladen, Verlag Barbara Budrich (2019), 263 p., ISBN 978‐3‐8474‐0

The influx of married women into the labor force has made dual-earner couples the norm rather than the exception. In 1960, 30.5% of married women were in the labor force; in 1989 nearly 58% were employed, the majority working full-time (U.S. Department of the Census, 1991). In contrast to this change in family work roles, research suggests that at least one characteristic of family life has remained quite stable--the division of household labor. Even when both spouses are employed full-time, wives continue to perform the majority of household an inequity which has sparked considerable interest on the part of family scholars (Berk, 1985; Pleck, 1985). Much research on the division of household labor has documented gender differences in ideas and values surrounding housework, and has examined differences in how the division of family work relates to women's and men's views of their marriage (reviewed in Thompson & Walker, 1989). More recently, Thompson (1991) has proposed that to truly understand the division of family labor and its consequences, more attention must be paid to women's and men's sense of fairness about family work. She suggests that understanding gender-specific beliefs about family work and fairness will shed greater light on how the division of labor affects marriages. Although gender has been examined extensively as it relates to issues surrounding family work, less attention has been paid to social class and the way it too may serve to socialize expectations about marriage and the fairness of the distribution of family work. Research by Ferree (1987, 1990) and Komarovsky (1962) would suggest that social class may, in fact, moderate the linkages between the household division of labor, spouses' perceptions of equity, and the marital relationship in dual-earner families. This study examines how both the division of household labor in dual-earner families and perceptions of its fairness relate to marital conflict and satisfaction. This relationship is examined separately within gender and social class groups. In doing so, we hypothesize that the relationships among dimensions of marriage, the division of labor, and perceptions of equity, will not only be different for husbands and wives, but also different for those in a working-class versus a middle-class context. This research also provides us with the opportunity to test some of Thompson's speculations regarding fairness by explicitly examining the linkages between the division of labor and equity and, in turn, examining how these two factors affect women's and men's assessments of their marriages. CAUSES AND CONSEQUENCES OF INEQUITY IN HOUSEHOLD WORK Although the question of how women's employment affects the household division of labor has been addressed by many researchers (see Spitze, 1988, for a review); the answer remains ambiguous. For example, research has shown that husbands of employed wives do not spend significantly more time in housework than husbands of nonemployed women (Ferber, 1982). Pleck (1985), however, suggests that men's involvement is slowly increasing, with a greater rise in child-related tasks versus household work. A consistent trend in this literature shows that women continue to spend the majority of their time in feminine tasks, tasks that, unlike traditionally masculine chores, lack a defined time frame, allow little discretion for when the task needs to be done, and lack a leisure component (Thompson & Walker, 1989). With regard to income, some have found that relative shares of housework are related to husbands' and wives' earnings (Berk & Berk, 1978; Maret & Finlay, 1984); however, other researchers report no relationship between spouses' income level and the division of labor (Berardo, Shehan, & Leslie, 1987). Using a slightly different approach, Ross (1987) found that the difference between spouses' earnings was related to the division of household labor. …

ABSTRACTResearchers have thoroughly documented the various factors that influence couples’ division of household labor. Although numerous approaches have been taken to explain these factors that influence the division of household labor, perceptions of the decision-making process of dividing household labor within a marriage is seldom considered and is therefore the focus of this study. Qualitative interviews were conducted with 20 heterosexual, dual-earner couples. Data were analyzed with grounded theory methodology. Findings included that couples viewed themselves as first attempting to divide household labor in ways that they perceived as being the most beneficial for them as a couple. When issues arose with a particular task or arrangement, or with the division of labor more generally, they made adjustments intended to minimize the negative impact of those issues. Findings are contextualized within the major theories surrounding quantitative data on household labor (i.e. time availability, relative resources, and gender ideology perspectives). Implications for family researchers, educators, and practitioners are discussed.

Division of household labor is associated with marital satisfaction among Chinese populations. However, little research has compared rural and urban regions in Chinese societies, which have traditionally had significant cultural differences. This study compared the level of division of household labor and the relationship of division of household labor and marital satisfaction between the urban and rural regions of China. ANOVA results indicated that there were no urban-rural differences in the division of household labor among males and among females. Overall, the division of household labor was significantly associated with marital satisfaction, and invariance testing using SEM revealed the strength of the relationship between division of labor and marital satisfaction did not differ among urban and rural regions in China. Females reported higher levels of household labor in both rural and urban regions, but there were no gender differences in the relationship between division of household labor and marital satisfaction.

In this study, the author compared perceptions of gender-based equality in the division of household labor among Jewish women (n = 60) and Arab Muslim women (n = 62) from dual-earner families in Israel. Guided by theories regarding the division of household labor, the author also explored the impact of 3 sets of variables—resources, gender-role attitudes, and job flexibility (flextime)—on perceived equality in the division of household labor. The findings revealed that the Jewish women tended to perceive the division of household labor as more egalitarian than did their Arab Muslim counterparts. Furthermore, the Jewish women had more egalitarian gender-role attitudes and more job flexibility than did the Arab Muslim women. However, all 3 sets of variables predicted perceived equality in the division of household labor to the same extent for both groups of women. Moreover, for both groups, education level correlated with attitudes toward household labor and with extent of job flexibility. Overall, the findings suggest that education may contribute to improving women's quality of life in both traditional and modern sociocultural contexts.

Background & aim: Given the advancements in science, technology, and cultural globalization, Iranian families has changed in several aspects affecting individual’s perception of justice in division of household labor. Therefore, we sought to evaluate the correlation of gender role attitude and household labor division with perceived justice in couples. Methods: The present correlational study was conducted in 180 couples visiting healthcare centers of Mashhad, Iran, in 2014. The participants were selected through the three-stage cluster sampling method. Data collection tools included questionnaires of gender role attitude, participation in household labor, and perceived justice. Spearman rho and Pearson correlation coefficient were run in SPSS, version 16. Results: A significant correlation was seen between women’s gender role attitude with their involvement in household labor and perceived justice (P=0.04, P=0.03, respectively). But there was no correlation between their involvement in household labor and perceived justice (P=0.83). There was no correlation between men’s gender role attitude and their involvement in household labor (P=0.61), whereas their gender role attitude was correlated with perception of justice (P=0.01, r=-0.13). There was also a direct correlation between male involvement in household labor and perceived justice (P=0.00, r=0.19). Conclusion: Most employed women despite having modern gender role attitudes, had still more involvement in household labor. Almost half of men who had traditional gender role attitudes, reported appropriate involvement in household labor. Men with more involvement in household labor had a higher perception of justice.

There are contrasting views on how gender equality affects fertility in contemporary European societies. This article discusses the Russian situation by asking how tensions in the contemporary gender system relate to reproductive decision-making and identity. How do gendered practices and identities influence womens intentions to have children?In depth interview data gathered during the last decade is used to analyze how the two main gender contracts of the professional women and the working mother relate to family planning, child birth, pregnancies, and mothering. Results indicate that while Russian women experience increasing pressure of the double burden and few signs of increasing gender equality in domestic life, the stable identity of Russian mothering contributes to the birth of at least one child. Childbearing does not depend directly on gender roles and division of labor in households. The decision to have a child and care for small children continues to be womens responsibility even as fertility patterns have modernized and gender equality in couple relations is slightly increasing. However, the type of gender contract influences the process of negotiation concerning reproductive matters and the timing of childbirth.

Organizational gender equality policies must address critical issues in organizations, as well as challenge hierarchies and the unequal distribution of power and resources. At the same time, they are reliant on acceptance by organizations when developing an official course of action. On the basis of a neo‐institutional perspective, this study investigates how gender equality discourses are disciplined so that they fit organizational expectations by maintaining the rationality myth of the organization. The empirical analysis of four Swiss organizations demonstrates that, although they intend to reduce gender inequalities, their gender equality policies are shaped by a logic of appropriateness that leads to a continuous reproduction of heteronormativity within gender equality policies. This study thus contributes to the understanding of how the logic of appropriateness protects the heteronormative matrix in organizations by disciplining gender equality discourses.

Objective Do structural or symbolic pressures, as measured by work‐family transitions, play a greater role in determining the gendered division of household labor? Background Scholars explain gendered divisions of household labor using structural (i.e., resource allocation; time availability) and symbolic explanations (i.e., gender as a social institution; doing gender). We concurrently tested these theories through the lens of major work–family transitions, which have been shown to impact household labor in previous research. Method We used two nationally representative, longitudinal datasets: The Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) and National Survey of Families and Households (NSFH) to understand how work‐family transitions impact male and female partners' household labor hours, as well as the proportion of housework performed by female partners. To do this, we used fixed effects models (PSID), lagged dependent variable models, and first difference change score models (NSFH). Results We found that parenthood and work transitions, transitions that exert structural pressure, were associated with female partners' proportion of housework. On the other hand, the transition from cohabitation to marriage and relationship tenure, measures that are more symbolic in nature, did not significantly impact male or female partners' household labor. Conclusion Overall, the structural pressures underlying work‐family transitions appear to play a larger role in determining the division of household labor as compared to symbolic pressures.