The Work-Life Balance I New gendered relationships in Spain: the other in the care triangle

Abstract

Spanish couples have found new ways of organising their productive and reproductive lives within the domestic sphere. The increasing role of women in the labour market provides the basis for these new domestic structures, yet few social policies have been advanced to create greater compatibility between the worlds of work and home. Mothers of the new generation have to think of strategies to reconcile their labour and family life, with the employment of domestic service emerging as one of the most significant alternatives in recent years. On the other hand, immigration has suffered many changes, the most important being its increase and its feminisation. This is the result of the transformations experienced by the countries of origin of the migrants, including free-movers from the European Union, as well as the consequence of the creation of a new demand for workers in the receiver countries. Female employers and domestic employees meet each other in one home that of the working Spanish mother now characterised by ethnic or cultural diversity and the permanent negotiation of individual, familial and group identities. The article analyses the discourse of working mothers who employ domestic service to care for their children, as well as the discourse of female migrant/immigrant domestic workers from Eastern Europe, North Africa and Latin America.