Fathers and mothers: dilemmas of the work-life balance

This book presents a comparative analysis of the dilemmas faced by working parents with young children in four European countries - France, Italy, Ireland and Denmark - each of which represents a different "experience" of the evolving gender role process. It was the aim of the study to identify the key issues concerning the reconciliation of work and family roles, with particular emphasis on examining the barriers to men's greater involvement in domestic and family activities. A major purpose of the study was to develop new social indicators to measure issues of work life balance, which could be utilised in other national and cross-national studies. The book provides an overview of the latest research findings in the four countries, as well as a comparison and synthesis of the situations in these countries. It then presents the results of a survey carried out simultaneously in France, Italy, Denmark and Ireland and a comparative analysis of people's dilemmas and coping strategies in these countries. The research identifies which factors in the workplace, the home and society at large are associated with ease vs. difficulty in combining work and family life and with parental well-being. The comparative results contribute to a better understanding of the realities of life of young working parents and also highlight the critically important role played by public social and family policies in facilitating equal opportunities and quality of life for this group of workers. Reconciling work and family is now on the social and political agenda. It is to be hoped that the EU, national governments and individual workplaces will continue to develop new and better policies to promote work-life balance for men as well as women, for - as the data in the study clearly show - people's well-being very much depends on it.