STAY-AT-HOME FATHERING

Abstract

Rooted in two qualitative research studies of stay-at-home fathers (70 Canadian and 21 Belgian) at the beginning of the twenty-first century, this article explores the innovative ways that families seek to create work–family balance in two countries where relevant social policies are still focused on the encouraging of private family-based solutions to balancing paid and unpaid work. At the level of work–family policy, we note that both Canada and Belgium remain relatively weak in the provision of childcare, especially for children under the age of three, as well as in flexible working options that would allow families to effectively balance work and home. In light of these limited options, some fathers who have a weaker employment position than their female partners, or who are reconsidering their current careers, may opt out of the labor market for months or years in order to provide a private solution to an issue which still has little policy support. Nevertheless, while fathers are at home, they only partially ‘trade cash for care’; that is, they also remain connected to traditionally masculine sources of identity such as part-time paid work, unpaid masculine self-provisioning work, and community work that builds on traditional male interests.

Ancré dans deux recherches qualitatives portant sur les pères au foyer (70 installés au Canada et 21 en Belgique) au début du 21ème siècle, cet article explore les stratégies innovantes adoptées par les pères pour équilibrer vie professionnelle et vie familiale dans deux pays o[ugrave] les politiques sociales sont encore largement centrés à cet égard sur l'encouragement de solutions privées. Certains pères ayant une position professionnelle moins avantageuse que leur partenaire, ou qui souhaitent revoir leur implication professionnelle se retirent du marché du travail pour quelques mois ou quelques années afin de fournir une solution privée à une question qui reste peu prise en compte par les pouvoirs publics. Au niveau familial, ces pères ne renoncent que partiellement au travail professionnel au profit du soin des enfants; autrement dit, alors qu'ils sont au foyer, ils entretiennent un lien avec les ressources identitaires traditionnellement masculines comme le travail à temps partiel, le bricolage à la maison, et le travail communautaire fondé sur des intérêts masculins.

Keywords:

• stay-at-home fathering
• Canada
• Belgium
• work-family balance

Notes

1. Since 1998, all employed parents who have completed one year of employment with their present employer (during the last 15 months) can benefit from a paid (flat rate) full-time parental leave of three months, a part-time parental leave of six months or one-fifth parental leave of fifteen months, until the child's eighth birthday. In addition, employees, regardless of their family status, have a basic right to a paid (flat-rate) career-break (public sector) or a paid (flat-rate) time-credit (private sector), allowing them to stop working or work part-time for a year. This period can be extended up to five years by collective agreement negotiated at sector or company level. The number of workers using these flexible working options is constantly rising (+10% between 2004 and 2005). This is largely due to men's increasing uptake (+19%). However, this success is due, in part, to the increasing usage of these systems by people aged 50 and over (mainly men) to retire progressively from the labour market.

2. The Belgian study was explicitly dedicated to fathers who stopped working to take care of their children. Two of them engaged from time to time into part-time work for short periods.