Regulating Long-Term Care: Stability or Transformation In Turbulent Times

Care regimes developed within and by different countries, regions and regime types can currently come under significant pressure, even in world regions where they are well established. Pressure driven, for instance, by migration flows, demographic ageing, wars, or climate change— exert social, political, legal, and financial pressure and question the existing organization of care regimes between family, state, communities and/or markets. A crucial dimension for analyzing possible transformations or stability of care regimes is formed by the underlying institutional and/or normative regulations embedded within structural conditions. These regulations concern, for example, the allocation of long-term care responsibilities to different societal sectors, the organization, financing, or also the professional definition of long-term care work.

We are interested in contributions that examine the regulations separated or in their interplay and are able to demonstrate and/or explain their stability or transformation in turbulent times. We invite empirical and theoretical grounded research contributions that link existing and changing regulations with outcomes or address the policy processes. Outcomes can, for example, be considered from the perspective of care receivers, formal and informal carers, or by the evaluation of care work in society or at the community level. An important question in this context concerns inequalities based on gender, social class, ethnicity, etc., and their intersection, which develop embedded within existing regulations and can be intensified or mitigated during processes of transformation. We are interested in contributions from different countries based on single cases or cross-country comparisons.