Carefair: Rethinking the Responsibilities and Rights of Citizenship - Hardcover

We often think that care is personal or intimate, whereas citizenship is political and public. In Carefair, Paul Kershaw urges readers to resist this private/public distinction by interrogating care in the context of patriarchy, racial suppression, and class prejudice. The book develops a convincing case for treating caregiving as a matter of citizenship that obliges and empowers all in society – men as much as women.

Carefair is motivated by the rise of duty discourses across neoliberalism, the third way, communitarianism, social conservatism, and feminisms, all of which urge renewed appreciation for obligations in civil society. Although unabashedly feminist, Kershaw argues that convergence between these discourses signals the possibility for compromise in favour of policies that will deter men from free-riding on female care. He recommends amendments to Canadian parental leave, child care, and employment standards as part of a caregiving analogue to workfare – one invites us to rethink the place of care duties and entitlements in our daily lives, public policy, and perspectives on citizenship.

A welcome addition to the literature, Carefair explores the place of private caregiving in social inclusion, the possibility that privileged breadwinners suffer some exclusion, as well as a detailed blueprint for more public investment in work-family balance. It will appeal to policy makers and activists interested in ideas, as well as to theorists with a pragmatic bent, especially students of citizenship, the welfare state, and the sociology of the family.