Families and Social Care in Europe
The SOCCARE Project (2000-2003) was a project funded by the European Commission, Framework Programme 5, that studied social care arrangements of European families in five different socio-economic and cultural environments that represent the variety of European welfare states (Finland, France, Italy, Portugal and the UK). It focused on four key family types that all are heavily affected by the ongoing demographic, socio-economic and structural changes within European societies: 1) lone parent families, 2) dual-career families, 3) immigrant families and, 4) “double front carer” families (that have young children and, at the same time, elderly family members in need of care).
The project interviewed almost 400 European families in detail about their opportunities and difficulties to make flexible and responsive care arrangements and to combine these with participation in paid employment. These interviews were made in national languages by five national research teams. The interview data was analysed mostly at the national level and reported in national workpackage reports. Moreover, care arrangements and their in/flexibilities were compared in the five European countries (reports of the SOCCARE Project are freely available at its web site http://www.uta.fi/laitokset/sospol/soccare/).
The final aim of the project has been to provide a major contribution towards shaping a functioning framework for future policies on social care in Europe. Accordingly, the SOCCARE Project gave a number of policy recommendations. Specific recommendations were based on particular findings from the workpackages but the main recommendations were based on the evidence from the whole project. Recommendations were given for policies on formal care, policies on informal care, labour market policies and other social policies including, in particular, social work.
This paper presentation will deliver the main results and the main recommendations of this major European research project.