Careful Economics: Integrating Caring Activities and Economic Science

ISBN-13: 9781441953599 / Angielski / Miękka / 2010 / 134 str.

Maren A. Jochimsen

Opis

Much like their authors, the ideas behind books can grow and change on the way from proposal to manuscript. I originally planned to join the discussion on care and economics at a different, more policy-oriented level, hoping to identify the conditions under which caring services are taken to the market. In approaching the task, however, I realized that economic science lacked an overall concept of caring. Economists' notions of caring and their knowledge of its basic elements and structural characteristics were fragmented. Caring activities were treated in the context of household work, unpaid work, or subsistence and informal work. None of the different approaches shared a common frame of reference. This has made it impossible to study caring activities across the various realms of the economy, independent of whether provided in a family setting, purchased on the market, or supplied by the state or society. I therefore found I had to begin my questioning earlier, at the level of basic understandings and concepts.

Spis treści

Preface. Acknowledgements. Part I: 1. Aim and scope of the work. Sketching the ground. The importance of caring as a subject for economic theorizing. Aim of the book. Structure of the book. 2. The analytical frame of reference. Basic characteristics of caring activities. Central conceptual assumptions. Part II: 3. Caring as the result of preferential choices. The conceptualization of caring in the utility-based concept of altruism. The concept of 'household or family commodities'. The scope of the concept. 4. Caring as the result of other choices. The conceptualization of caring within the economic concept of commitment. The scope of the concept. 5. Caring as the result of a caring motivation. The conceptualization of caring derived from motivation. The concept of integrative product. The scope of the concept. Part III: 6. Caring conceptualized as the result of an effective caring situation. The three components constituting an effective caring situation. Basic structures of caring situations. The analysis of caring institutions. 7. Asymmetries and dependencies in caring situations as central categories of analysis. Asymmetry in capabilities and existential dependency. Asymmetry in resource control and material dependency. Caring motivations and motivational barriers to exit. 8. Guidelines for the analysis of caring situations in economics. The integrated frame. Sensitive points in the coordination and institutionalization of caring situations. Directions for policy. References. Index.

O autorze

Maren A. Jochimsen is an economist holding a doctorate from the University of St. Gallen, Switzerland, where she subsequently worked as researcher. Further affiliations have included the University of Cambridge, Harvard University, and the University of Amsterdam. She is co-founder of the Network Caring Economy and founding member of the International Association for Feminist Economics Europe. She has published on ecological economics, institutional economics, and care and economics. Maren A. Jochimsen is currently employed at the Guarantee Bank for Social Economy (Bürgschaftsbank f