Work–family reconciliation policies without equal opportunities? The case of Austria

Abstract

This paper explores the main public work–family policies in Austria (parental leave in connection with the Childcare Benefit, parents’ entitlement to part-time work, the extension of the childcare infrastructure) from the perspective of social justice using the normative concepts of gender equality, recognition, and choice. The main results show that for the most part, these policies offer affirmative recognition of maternal care and limited employment of mothers but offer little support for transformative recognition, particularly in terms of increasing the social status of working mothers and fathers as carers. Austrian work–family policies also do little to redistribute incomes and career opportunities from men to women and childcare from women to men; instead, they grant only limited freedom to choose between parental duties and employment, and the (financial) support they do offer is strongly concentrated on early childhood. All in all, the construction of the parental leave system (together with the Childcare Benefit), the entitlement to work part time, shortfalls in public childcare structures, and the lack of awareness of gendered (cultural and material) structures on the labour market and within families do not actively encourage gender equality. Some aspects of these policies even stabilise and deepen gendered structures on the labour market and in families.