'Post-feminist' era of social investment and territorial welfare? Exploring the issue salience and policy framing of child care in U.K. elections 1983-2011

Chaney, Paul ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2110-0436 2015. 'Post-feminist' era of social investment and territorial welfare? Exploring the issue salience and policy framing of child care in U.K. elections 1983-2011. SAGE Open 5 (1) , pp. 1-14. 10.1177/2158244015574299

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Abstract

Earlier work has tended to overlook the formative origins of child care policy in liberal democracies. Accordingly, this study examines mandate-seeking and parties’ envisioning of child care with reference to issue salience and policy framing in party manifestos in U.K. Westminster and regional elections. It reveals a significant increase in issue salience following its emergence as a manifesto issue in the 1980s, thereby confirming it as part of the wider rise of “valence politics.” The framing data reveal that a “post-feminist” discourse of “social investment” has generally displaced the political framing of child care as a gender equality issue. It is argued that this is inherently problematic and reflects parties’ failure to address ongoing gender inequality in the labor market. Notably, the data also illustrate the way devolution is leading to the territorialization of child care in the United Kingdom—no longer solely mandated in Westminster elections, policy is now contingent on the discursive practices of regional party politics and shaped by local socio-economic factors.

Item Type:	Article
Date Type:	Publication
Status:	Published
Schools:	Social Sciences (Includes Criminology and Education)
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > HN Social history and conditions. Social problems. Social reform H Social Sciences > HQ The family. Marriage. Woman J Political Science > JN Political institutions (Europe) > JN101 Great Britain
Publisher:	SAGE Publications
ISSN:	2158-2440
Funders:	ESRC
Related URLs:	Publisher
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	30 March 2016
Last Modified:	16 Nov 2024 08:30
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/70918

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