XIX ISA World Congress of Sociology (July 15-21, 2018)

139

Children in Welfare States and Family Policy Analysis

RC06 Family Research (host committee)

Language: English

In family policy and welfare regime research the child perspective (understood here as children’s position and entitlements, and the underlying normative conceptions of childhood) has been largely overlooked. Care-related welfare and family policies are mainly targeted at adult citizens/workers (especially women, as primary carers) and research has focused on women’s rights and gender issues. Yet, the child perspective is an important analytical framework for these fields, in particular in the context of UNCRC, which established in 1989 children’s right to have their best interests assessed and taken into account as a primary consideration in all public actions or decisions that affect them.

Studying the inequalities that children face in family and social policies becomes increasingly complex because of major contemporary trends such as the diversification of family forms, and processes of civic stratification in response to migratory flows. Shifting the focus from adult citizens/workers’ right to give and receive care, to children's own right to be cared for, provides a useful lens to study these inequalities. We therefore invite papers on topics such as:

• Inequalities in children’s access/eligibility to care-related schemes due to non-standard family models or non-standard citizenship status of parents ;
• Inequalities in access/eligibility and generosity of care-related schemes according to birth order;
• The role of grandparents in childcare and their access to childcare-related schemes;
• Reconsidering welfare regime and family policy typologies in view of new criteria formulated within the child perspective
• Combining the child perspective with gender equality