Abstract
This paper, which is based on qualitative research conducted in Austria, focuses on current gender inequalities between parents in fulfilling their parental responsibilities, which means reconciling the responsibilities of childcare and earning a living. Austria is characterized by a substantial gender gap in men’s and women’s labor force participation and a system that provides particularly long parental leaves. These foster long-term gender inequalities in parents’ careers and involvement in family life after their transition to parenthood. Against this background, we analyzed constructions of parental responsibilities parents face at their workplaces, and how these constructions shape parents’ decisions on sharing parental responsibilities. The findings demonstrate the relevance of parental norms that comprise a father’s main responsibility as breadwinner and a mother’s primary responsibility as a caregiver, constructed and reproduced by parents’ colleagues and employers. Consequently, for parents who try to share their breadwinning and caregiving in a non-normative (and more gender-equal) way, both parents are forced to find strategies in dealing with normative constructions. These strategies range from making a ‘conscious decision’, insisting on the original plan, and challenging predominant norms at workplaces, through quitting the job and looking for another employer, to modifying or giving up the originally planned arrangement.
Highlights
Recent decades have seen an increase in mothers entering the labor market in Austria, predominantly on a part-time basis, and fathers increasing their contributions to childcare and housework
Sci. 2019, 8, 250 workplaces, which have been identified as crucial sites for work-care arrangements and dual-career planning of both men and women after their transition to parenthood
Based on qualitative data from Austria comprising parents’ narrations on their personal experiences at their workplaces, we explored these constructions and their significance for parents’ work-care arrangements and, in conclusion, the relevance and agency of employers, companies, and workplaces in hindering or promoting women’s continuing participation in the labor market after the birth of a child and men’s engagement in childcare by means of parental leave or part-time work
Summary
Recent decades have seen an increase in mothers entering the labor market in Austria, predominantly on a part-time basis, and fathers increasing their contributions to childcare and housework. Based on qualitative data from Austria comprising parents’ narrations on their personal experiences at their workplaces, we explored these constructions and their significance for parents’ work-care arrangements and, in conclusion, the relevance and agency of employers, companies, and workplaces in hindering or promoting women’s continuing participation in the labor market after the birth of a child and men’s engagement in childcare by means of parental leave or part-time work. We focused on fathers and mothers who planned to reconcile their employment and their childcare duties in ways other than the culturally determined gendered norms and their strategies in the sphere of their workplace This enables conclusions for promoting such work-care arrangements and for increasing a more gender-equal sharing of parental responsibilities in the future
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