Comparative Perspectives on Work-Life Balance and Gender Equality: Fathers on Leave Alone

272 Pages·2017·3.53 MB·English

by  Margaret O'Brien

Life Course Research and Social Policies 6
Margaret O'Brien
Karin Wall Editors
Comparative
Perspectives on
Work-Life Balance
and Gender
Equality
Fathers on Leave Alone
Life Course Research and Social Policies
Volume6

Series editors
Laura Bernardi
Dario Spini
Jean-Michel Bonvin
Life course research has been developing quickly these last decades for good
reasons. Life course approaches focus on essential questions about individuals’
trajectories, longitudinal analyses, cross-fertilization across disciplines like lifespan
psychology, developmental social psychology, sociology of the life course, social
demography, socio-economics, social history. Life course is also at the crossroads
of several fi elds of specialization like family and social relationships, migration,
education, professional training and employment, and health. This Series invites
academic scholars to present theoretical, methodological, and empirical advances in
the analysis of the life course, and to elaborate on possible implications for society
and social policies applications.
More information about this series at h ttp://www.springer.com/series/10158
Margaret O’Brien (cid:129) Karin Wall
Editors
Comparative Perspectives
on Work-Life Balance
and Gender Equality
Fathers on Leave Alone
Editors
Margaret O’Brien Karin Wall
Thomas Coram Research Unit Institute of Social Sciences
University College London University of Lisbon
London , United Kingdom Lisbon , Portugal

ISSN 2211-7776 ISSN 2211-7784 (electronic)
Life Course Research and Social Policies
ISBN 978-3-319-42968-7 ISBN 978-3-319-42970-0 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-42970-0
Library of Congress Control Number: 2016954922
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This book is dedicated to our friends and
colleagues of the International Network on
Leave Policies and Research from whom we
have learnt so much.
We give special thanks to its founders,
Fred Deven and Peter Moss, who have
encouraged collaborative research between
members of the network, on gender and care,
particularly on fathers and leave.
Thanks also to all the interviewees and
fathers who participated in the eleven
national studies of fathers taking leave
alone.
Contents
1 Fathers on Leave Alone: Setting the Scene ........................................... 1
Margaret O’Brien and Karin Wall
2 The Ethics of Care and the Radical Potential of Fathers
‘Home Alone on Leave’: Care as Practice, Relational
Ontology, and Social Justice ................................................................... 11
Andrea Doucet
3 Fathers on Leave Alone in Norway: Changes and Continuities ......... 29
Elin Kvande and Berit Brandth
4 Fathers on Leave Alone in Portugal: Lived Experiences
and Impact of Forerunner Fathers ........................................................ 45
Karin Wall and Mafalda Leitão
5 Fathers on Leave Alone in Quebec (Canada): The Case
of Innovative, Subversive and Activist Fathers! ................................... 69
Diane-Gabrielle Tremblay and Nadia Lazzari Dodeler
6 Fathers on Leave Alone in Finland: Negotiations
and Lived Experiences ............................................................................ 89
Johanna Lammi-Taskula
7 Fathers on Leave Alone in Spain: ‘Hey, I Want to Be
Able to Do It Like That, Too’ ................................................................. 107
Gerardo Meil , Pedro Romero-Balsas , and Jesús Rogero-García
8 Fathers on Leave Alone in Sweden: Toward More
Equal Parenthood? ................................................................................. 125
Ann-Zofi e Duvander , Linda Haas , and Sara Thalberg
9 Fathers on Leave Alone in Iceland: Normal Paternal Behaviour? ..... 147
Ingólfur V. Gíslason
vii
viii Contents
10 Fathers Taking Leave Alone in the UK – A Gift Exchange
Between Mother and Father? ................................................................ 163
Margaret O’Brien and Katherine Twamley
11 Fathers on Leave Alone in France: Does Part-Time Parental
Leave for Men Move Towards an Egalitarian Model? ........................ 183
Danielle Boyer
12 Fathers on Leave Alone in Switzerland:
Agents of Social Change? ....................................................................... 205
Isabel Valarino
13 Fathers on Leave Alone in Japan: The Lived Experiences
of the Pioneers ......................................................................................... 231
Hideki Nakazato
14 Discussion and Conclusions ................................................................... 257
Karin Wall and Margaret O’Brien
Contributors
Danielle Boyer Department of Research, Statistics Studies and Research Direction,
Family Branch of Social Security , CNAF , Paris , France
Berit Brandth Department of Sociology and Political Science , Norwegian Institute
of Science and Technology , Trondheim , Norway
Nadia Lazzari Dodeler Management Department , UQAR, Rimouski , Quebec ,
Canada
Andrea Doucet Social Justice Research Institute , Brock University , St. Catharines ,
ON, Canada
Ann-Zofi e Duvander Department of Sociology , Stockholm University , Stockholm ,
Sweden
Ingólfur V. Gíslason F aculty of Social and Human Sciences, I celand University,
Reykjavík , Iceland
Linda Haas Department of Sociology , Indiana University-Indianapolis ,
Indianapolis , USA
Elin Kvande D epartment of Sociology and Political Science, N orwegian Institute
of Science and Technology , Trondheim , Norway
Johanna Lammi-Taskula Children, Adolescents and Families Unit , National
Institute for Health and Welfare , Helsinki , Finland
Mafalda Leitão Institute of Social Sciences , University of Lisbon , Lisbon ,
Portugal
Gerardo Meil Department of Sociology , Universidad Autónoma de Madrid ,
Madrid , Spain
Hideki Nakazato Department of Sociology, Faculty of Letters , Konan University ,
Kobe , Japan
ix
x Contributors
Margaret O’Brien Thomas Coram Research Unit , University College London ,
London , United Kingdom
Jesús Rogero-García Department of Sociology , Universidad Autónoma de
Madrid , Madrid , Spain
Pedro Romero-Balsas Department of Sociology , Universidad Autónoma de
Madrid , Madrid , Spain
Sara Thalberg Department of Sociology , Stockholm University , Stockholm ,
Sweden
Diane-Gabrielle Tremblay Management School , Téluq, University of Quebec ,
Montreal , QC , Canada
Katherine Twamley Social Science Research Unit, Department of Social Science ,
University College London , London , UK
Isabel Valarino Institute of Social Sciences , University of Lausanne , Lausanne ,
Switzerland
Karin Wall Institute of Social Sciences , University of Lisbon , Lisbon , Portugal