Strategies for Building and Sustaining a New Care Movement

Abstract

While care theorists have made great headway over the last 20 years in developing a political theory of care, and care advocates have developed numerous public policy proposals for supporting care work, few theorists or advocates have paid much attention to strategic questions about how best to forge and sustain a political care movement. In this article, I outline a number of strategies for fostering the development and growth of such a movement in the United States. I first provide a brief survey of the recent history of care ethics and the rise of care advocacy organizations in this country, and then outline four general strategies for unifying and expanding the care movement. These include proposals for (1) linking particular care constituencies and initiatives to a larger care movement, (2) supporting universal over means-tested programs, (3) working with market mechanisms and business interests, and (4) finding ways to garner greater public support among the American people for care policies. I conclude by discussing several of the unique challenges that face the care movement and offering some ideas for overcoming them.