Familialization, de-familialization and family policy change in high-income countries

Filetti, Federico ORCID: 0000-0002-7287-1222 (2025) Familialization, de-familialization and family policy change in high-income countries. Social Politics. ISSN 1072-4745 (In Press)

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Abstract

This paper provides country-specific accounts of family policy change in twenty-one high-income countries between 1990 and 2015. It relies on a measure including twelve indicators across three dimensions: financial transfers, childcare services, and leave schemes. Indicators within each dimension are classified using the concepts of (de)familialization, widely employed in feminist social policy scholarship, and two original composite scores – the familialization and de-familialization scores – are constructed to capture the magnitude and direction of family policy change. Against a backdrop of overall policy expansion, the analysis identifies four distinct trajectories mirroring Leitner’s ideal-typical Varieties of Familialism: explicit familialization, optional familialization, implicit (or partial) de-familialization, and de-familialization. The paper further shows that family policy change is largely path-dependent, with countries often undergoing trajectories specific to their family policy regime. In particular, familializing trends are most prominent in Mediterranean and liberal countries, whereas de-familializing trends are observed in social democratic and conservative countries.

Item Type:	Article
Additional Information:	© 2025 The Author(s)
Divisions:	Social Policy
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > HQ The family. Marriage. Woman J Political Science H Social Sciences > H Social Sciences (General)
Date Deposited:	29 Aug 2025 15:42
Last Modified:	02 Sep 2025 09:09
URI:	http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/129317

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