WORKING AND MOTHERING: Women's strategies in Spain

The article looks at the relationship between family and employment from the perspective of working mothers. In a context of increasing convergence of women's activity all over Europe what makes a difference between countries is the extent to which women's new roles in paid work are being acknowledged through new practices in the family, social policies, perceptions and symbols. The concept of strategy is used as an analytical tool to understand how women manage their double role in everyday life. Working mothers' strategies to cope with both worlds can be considered as an indicator of the social recognition of women as workers. This hypothesis is examined taking the case of Spain as an example of an extreme contradiction between the new position of women in the labour market and the traditional social organization that does not seem to be concerned by the change. Spanish working mothers, most of them working full time, are developing a wide range of private, individual strategies to make their jobs compatible with family responsibilities. The main strategies are based on substitute mothers, who are either relatives - very often the mother of the working mother - or somebody hired to take care of the children. These kind of strategies raise, among other questions, the issue of the extent to which the organization of domestic life continues to be based on the traditional gendered family or if they can be a model for the future. Complementary strategies to do with the organisation of time, reducing distances between home, work and school, collective childcare and the help of men are also studied, as well as extreme strategies - taking the children to work or leaving them alone at home - and indirect strategies like delaying and reducing the number of children. Primary sources of information, both qualitative and quantitative are used, based on six discussion groups, twenty-five in-depth interviews and a 1,200 cases survey representative of Spanish working mothers.