Care, Unpaid Care Work, Fatherhood and the Care Economy
Over the past 20 years, much has changed in different parts of the world with regard to trends in fatherhood, caregiving and unpaid work. Yet, women are still doing from two to 10 times the amount of caregiving that men are, and this despite making up 40% of the paid workforce. Although traditional definitions of men’s roles as breadwinners and providers are changing, caregiving and domestic work still remain inequitably and overwhelmingly placed on the shoulders of women.
Trends in patterns of care, the unpaid care economy and gender dimensions to care-giving, including men as caregivers, all impact on both the distribution of paid and unpaid labor between men and women and on the way men and women relate to one another in intimate relationships and in the workforce.
View key evidence for this theme in our document library
Case studies
MenCare in Latin America: Challenging harmful masculine norms and promoting positive changes in men’s caregiving’, EMERGE Case Study 5
Learning aims
- Understanding the broad shifts in caregiving and unpaid care work
- Evidence on how institutions have evolved, playing roles in these processes including through the social provision of childcare
- Evidence on men’s and boys’ actual roles (and behaviors) with respect to increasing their participation in caring at home
- Examples of apparently successful policy solutions, political or programmatic approach policies to support changes, including those that focus on women and girls, parental leave provision, and other policies that regulate/stimulate private/public provision of care
