MDWECR · Migrant Domestic Workers in European Care Regimes

Final Activity Report Summary - MDWECR (Migrant Domestic Workers in European Care Regimes)

The focus of this project was to investigate the experiences of migrant workers who are employed to do home-based domestic work and child care, and of parents who employ such workers. The research fellow carried out over 100 interviews in London, Madrid and Stockholm with 'employees: generally au pairs, nannies and domestic workers, employers ' parents who employ them; and managers and workers in employment agencies and advocacy organisations. These three EU countries were chosen because they represent different 'care regimes' with contrasting histories in relation to women's employment, child care policies care for working parents, child care practices, and different migration histories and policies. The increase in working women has been for Spain and the UK a challenge to existing child care provision. The project aimed to investigate cross-nationally the cultural and moral meanings attached to this form of child care provision through the experiences of employees and employers in the three cities, and to understand its variable development in the three countries. Spain, with rapid recent female employment, less available child care provision but a subsidy for working mothers, has an explicit migration policy that favours the employment of migrant women as child carers, and there is an implicit normalisation of the practice for many working mothers. In Sweden, a social democratic woman-friendly state, such employment is the subject of intense moral disapproval, yet there are signs that wealthier parents are beginning to buy in domestic and child care services. The UK lies somewhere in between, with a shift towards more available child care in the mixed economy of care, child care tax credits, a growing practice among middle class dual earning households favouring the buying in of care and domestic help, and migration opportunities that indirectly serve to meet this demand. The cultural preference for one-to-one child care in these social groups in London and Madrid also influenced this practice. In all countries the key group of employers was women working as accountants, lawyers, doctors, business persons, mostly in the private sector. In Sweden and UK, EU enlargement has accelerated the movement of Eastern European women into this area of work. The research found many difficulties associated with this practice. First, the unregulated and invisible world of domestic and care work is usually not covered by mainstream employment protection or anti-discrimination legislation. While many workers migrate as a stepping stone to improve their economic situation, their economic and social citizenship rights are often restricted by their vulnerability as migrants, and by contracts which can be highly exploitative of time and labour. Furthermore, the nature of the work, which involves caring skills and the ties of affection, and which is carried out in the employer's home, creates many tensions over boundaries of privacy and space, over obligations, and over child care practices. The ensuing power relations between employers and employees were often articulated implicitly and explicitly in terms of racialised and national stereotypes and reflected in differential rates of pay. Employers in Sweden and UK felt considerable anxiety about a relationship that was based traditionally in notions of servitude. In all countries, employers turned to home based care often because it filled the gaps not covered by formal provision, and also because, especially in relation to au pairs and domestic workers, it was low cost. This research is an original contribution to our understanding of the relationship between the rise in women's employment, child care policies and practices and migration regimes. It examines the complex inequalities around gender, ethnicity and nationality in this kind of care work. It highlights the need to examine geo-political inequalities underpinning current work/life balance policies in the 'adult worker welfare model' in Europe, and the need to prioritise strategies for child care in ways that enhance the conditions and opportunities of all those, regardless of nationality, who provide care services and those who use them.

Текст от CORDIS, на английски · Данни: CORDIS, © Европейски съюз