"Considering that the NextGenerationEU fund was set up precisely to help member states repair the immediate socioeconomic damage brought about by the coronavirus pandemic, whilst enhancing their post-pandemic resilience, this policy study applies a feminist reading to explore how care is addressed in this historic EU fiscal stimulus tool. By engaging with the feminist literature on care to analyse the resulting national recovery and resilience plans (NRRPs) across eight EU countries (Austria, Belgium, Czechia, Germany, Finland, Italy, Latvia and Spain), the ambition is to understand to what extent the NRRPs have adopted a care-led approach in response to the care crisis undeniably exacerbated by COVID-19. An in-depth qualitative analysis of the national plans, complemented by a quantitative assessment, offers several elements of response. Firstly, the analysis shows that, despite the limited incentives to foster a care transition, the national plans studied all address care, although to a significantly lower extent than other spending priorities, such as those linked to the green and digital transitions. Secondly, the scope of care measures in the NRRPs mirrors the pre-existing care regimes in place to a significant extent. The third major finding reveals that there is a general convergence towards similar solutions, with the institutionalisation of childcare and the deinstitutionalisation of long-term care, but the recognition of the underlying problems behind care imbalances is framed in contrasting ways. The majority of countries present care responsibilities as a cost or burden, but some countries follow a different path, presenting care as valuable in itself and positioning it as a central issue, connecting care measures more explicitly with concerns for inclusiveness, social fairness and welfare protection. Fourthly, examination of the NRRPs reveals a broadly shared tendency to adopt a life-cycle perspective, giving at least some degree of consideration to all phases of care, although – apart from some notable exceptions – most NRRPs fail to acknowledge the inherently intersectional and cross-border dimension of care best exemplified by the absence of consideration for domestic care. Although the predictive capacity of these results on the actual implementation phase of the NRRPs must be treated with caution, since care is such a complex social good, they tend to corroborate the idea that the recovery can serve as a genuine springboard for a care paradigm shift. This applies, in particular, to countries with lower levels of family support. Yet, considering the limited EU-induced incentives for care investments and reforms in the Recovery and Resilience Facility, it still relies heavily on political will at the national level. "

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ISBN (PDF) : 9782930769950