http://www.unrisd.org/rss_gender_en.xml 225 55 http://www.unrisd.org/80256B42004CCC77/rsslogo.png http://www.unrisd.org/ en feedback@unrisd.org 11 Mar 2010 120 http://www.unrisd.org/80256B3C005BCCF9/search/F4E650DD8BEB3175C12576DB003CDFA3?OpenDocument In March 2009 Member States of the United Nations met in New York at the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) to discuss, among other things, the priority theme of “The equal sharing of responsibilities between women and men, including care-giving in the context of HIV/AIDS”. This meeting provided an unprecedented opportunity to focus the international community’s attention on care issues and to generate Agreed Conclusions that would lay out a roadmap for care policy, potentially influencing national legislation, policies adopted by UN entities and future international agreements. Using interviews with participants and an overview of official documentation, this paper seeks to summarize the achievements of the 2009 CSW, and to suggest where policy conversations about care might usefully focus next. 3 Mar 2010 http://www.unrisd.org/80256B3C005BCCF9/search/25697FE238192066C12576D4004CFE50?OpenDocument Care work, both paid and unpaid, contributes to well-being, social development and economic growth. But the costs of providing care are unequally borne across gender and class. Families in all their diverse forms remain the key institution in meeting care needs. The challenge is to forge policies that support them and are grounded in certain key principles: recognize and guarantee the rights of care-givers and care-receivers; distribute the costs more evenly across society; and support professional, decently paid and compassionate forms of care. Care underpins social and economic development, yet arrangements for its provision in developing countries have been little studied. UNRISD research has begun to fill this gap. 25 Feb 2010 http://www.unrisd.org/80256B3C005BCCF9/search/D5AB457FD8E11129C12576BD0035EA21?OpenDocument This is the Japanese Research Report 4 for the Political and Social Economy of Care Project. It explores working conditions and wages of elderly and child care workers in Japan. 4 Feb 2010 http://www.unrisd.org/80256B3C005BCCF9/search/D587F19384BBED40C12576B9004C96BC?OpenDocument L’organisation des soins et leur répartition entre le ménage, le marché, l’Etat et des organismes à but non lucratif ont des incidences importantes sur l’accès à des soins satisfaisants et sur ceux et celles qui en assument la charge. Universitaires et militantes féministes ont souvent répété que la division actuelle du travail dans ce domaine était loin d’être équitable. Le problème qui se pose est plutôt celui de “l’absence de contrepartie” pour reprendre l’idée de certains économistes: en effet, certains individus et groupes sociaux (dans leur grande majorité, des femmes et des filles, surtout celles des ménages économiquement faibles) font le gros du travail tandis que le reste de la société profite des fruits de ce travail. Le fait que la majeure partie de l’assistance aux personnes n’est pas rémunérée ne veut pas dire qu’elle n’entraîne pas de frais. Les femmes et les filles qui assument la plus grande part des soins non rémunérés, ont moins de temps à consacrer à un emploi rémunéré, aux soins de leur personne, aux loisirs, à l’organisation et à la vie politique. L’économie politique et sociale des soins est donc centrale pour l’égalité entre hommes et femmes. 28 Jan 2010 http://www.unrisd.org/80256B3C005BCCF9/search/2B5879FBCD1DBD3FC12576A200470FA3?OpenDocument This paper applies the idea of the “care diamond”—a conceptual framework used to understand how care is produced and provided by the state, market, family and community—to the political and social economy of care in the Republic of Korea. It argues that the institutional arrangements that make up the care diamond in Korea have changed quite noticeably since the 1990s in response to the country’s evolving political, economic and social contexts. Using the case of family/work harmonization policy reforms, it discusses the reconfiguration of the care diamond and the significance of this for gender. The first section of the paper describes the social policy regime in Korea and how this relates to the idea of the care diamond; the second section highlights key findings from the time use survey analysis based on data from 1999 and 2004; and the last section discusses the political economy of policy change through an in-depth examination of the care regime configurations and social policy–making processes in Korea since the 1990s, and considers the implications for gender. 6 Jan 2010