Fine, Michael

Research and theory on ‘dependency’ and ‘care-giving’ have to date proceeded along largely separate lines, with little sense that they are exploring and explaining different aspects of the same phenomenon. Research on ‘care’, initially linked to feminism during the early 1980s, has revealed and exposed to public gaze what was hitherto assumed to be a ‘natural’ female activity. Conversely, disability activists and writers who have promoted a social model of disability have seen the language of and the policy focus upon ‘care’ as oppressive and objectifying.

Informal care provides the often hidden foundations of policies promoting care in the community and Ageing in Place. This paper examines the current impasse concerning those who are employed and seek to provide care, canvassing current and future possibilities for finding a way through the existing conflict between sustaining employment and providing informal care in the home. Focusing on the issues that emerge regarding support of older (aged) care recipients, the paper first considers the demographic, economic and democratic and governmental policy causes of the current problems.