The College of Humanities and Social Science is contributing to a major European research project investigating the diversity of family forms, relationships and life courses in Europe in relation to policies. Dr Alison Koslowski and Dr Ingela Naumann, based in Social Policy within the School of Social and Political Science, will be mapping the multiple sources of childcare provision across Europe. They’re part of a wider team of researchers from 25 leading universities and research institutes in 15 European countries and three transnational civil society organisations. They will work together within the project entitled Families and Societies - Changing families and sustainable societies: Policy contexts and diversity over the life course and across generations. The project has secured a grant of €6.5m from the EU’s Seventh Framework Programme for a four-year period. Our approach is multidisciplinary combining a wide range of expertise in social sciences, law and the humanities. We will conduct comparative analyses applying advanced quantitative methods to high quality register and survey data, and also conduct qualitative studies. Livia OláhProfessor at the Stockholm University Demography Unit and coordinator of the project The research being conducted by Dr Koslowski and Dr Naumann uses quantitative and qualitative methods. It aims: to document the full landscape of childcare options in 6 European countries (Estonia, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Sweden and the UK) to explain why different groups parents have recourse to different sources of childcare, and considers the parental labour market outcomes associated with differing access to multiple sources of childcare. It takes a bottom up approach, asking key stakeholder organisations how parents interact with and negotiate the childcare options available to them. to arrive at a more complete conceptualisation of the multiple sources of childcare that parents may draw upon and to evaluate the potential policy mismatch on the basis of these care realities to further knowledge in the area of family policy to provide invaluable information into how labour market choices are made, and into fertility decisions Related links More information about the Stockholm University Demography Unit Publication date 15 Oct, 2015
