In today’s Irish Times Breda O’Brien summarises proceedings at our conference this week on women, home and work concentrating in particular on what Jonas Himmelstrand had to say about day-care in Sweden.
Breda writes: “Scandinavia, and particularly Sweden, is regularly presented as a
kind of social Utopia, especially for women. A headline from May 7th
last in The Irish Times – “It’s yummy to be a mummy in Scandinavia” –
sums up the general view. The article mentions research that shows
Norway and Sweden are the best places to bring up kids.
“On
Thursday, at a seminar at the Iona Institute (of which I am a patron),
two people raised serious questions about that picture. Jonas
Himmelstrand, a Swede, concentrated on negative outcomes for children,
and the virtual eradication of the choice to be a full-time carer for
your own children.” (The other speaker was, of course Dr Catherine Hakim, our keynote speaker).
Jonas told the conference of the negative impacts of day-care on Swedish children. He discussed growing mental health problems, juvenile delinquency, falling educational standards etc.
He didn’t emphasise the high levels of family breakdown in Sweden, its high levels of cohabitation, births outside marriage, high divorce and low marriage rates. These must certainly contribute heavily to the problems faced by many Swedish children.
Dr Catherine Hakim also mentioned Finland as having an alternative model to the Swedish one in that Finland gives families a direct home-care allowance which they can then use to allow one parent to stay-at-home to mind their children or else to subsidise day-care.
In other words, the Finnish model is pro-choice in respect of home and work and is not almost compelling women into work and children into day-care, which the Swedish one does.
In any case, Breda’s article gives a good flavour of the day.