Fiona Williams

Bio: Fiona Williams is an academic researcher from University of Leeds. The author has contributed to research in topics: Social policy & Welfare. The author has an hindex of 19, co-authored 38 publications receiving 1974 citations. Previous affiliations of Fiona Williams include University of New South Wales.

In and beyond New Labour: towards a new political ethics of care

Abstract: This article argues for a political ethics of care to balance New Labour's current preoccupation with the ethic of paid work However, care as a practice invokes different experiences, meanings, contexts and multiple relations of power With this in mind, the article traces the development of the concept of care taking up, in particular, challenges and differences raised by disability, ‘race’ and migration These offer important insights for a new political ethics of care whose key dimensions are spelled out in the final part of the article

Gendering citizenship in Western Europe: New challenges for citizenship research in a cross-national context

Abstract: Gendering Citizenship in Western Europe : New challanges for citizenship research in a cross-national context

Converging variations in migrant care work in Europe

Abstract: While the employment of migrant women as care workers in European welfare states is increasing, the rate, extent and nature of this increase vary The article draws on empirical research on migrant

The Intersection of Childcare Regimes and Migration Regimes: A Three-Country Study

Abstract: This chapter argues that migrant Filipino domestic workers in Italy are perpetual foreigners. It includes the story of Valentina Diamante, a woman who has worked in Italy for nearly two decades, to illustrate the experience of being an intimate foreigner. The chapter explains the cultural and structural factors that propel the integration of Valentina Diamante in Italy as an intimate foreigner. It discusses the social realities reflected in the legal status of foreign domestic workers in Italy as perpetual foreigners. The chapter emphasizes how the formation and maintenance of a transnational family underscores the position of Filipino domestic workers as intimate foreigners. Filipino transnational households are in fact similar to those of African American families who migrated from the southern to the northern United States. Most Filipinos in Rome are long term legal residents of Italy. Racism plays a central factor in the occupational segregation of migrant Filipinos, as well as their exclusion from dominant spaces of Italian society.

Migration and Care: Themes, Concepts and Challenges

Abstract: The phenomenon of migrant workers finding domestic and care work in the homes and institutions of countries wealthier than their own uncovers much about social change in the twenty-first century. First, it reveals the consequences of women taking on more responsibilities to earn income but without a significant rebalancing of their care responsibilities either with male partners or through state support. In the poorer regions of the world, unemployment, violence, poverty and aspirations for a better life push some women into emigrating to earn for their families. This also exposes an asymmetrical geopolitical solution to the so-called ‘care deficit’ pursued by richer states, accentuated by the demographics of ageing societies and restructured welfare regimes on the one side, and the care crises in the poorer regions on the other. The transnational movement of (mainly) women into care and domestic work, as well as nurses, pharmacists and doctors into health care saves social expenditure costs while intensifying the lack of care resources in the countries of origin of those migrant workers.

Faces of Inequality: Gender, Class, and Patterns of Inequalities in Different Types of Welfare States

Abstract: Research on welfare states and inequality has tended to be bifurcated, focusing either on class or on gender This paper combines gender and class in an analysis of patterns of inequalities in different types of welfare states in 18 countries Whereas a major dimension of class inequality can be described in terms of material standards of living, in the advanced Western countries it is fruitful to conceptualize gender inequality in terms of agency In analyses of gender as well as of class inequalities, welfare states have been seen as significant intervening variables However, major problems have emerged in attempts to devise typologies of welfare states that are of heuristic value in analyses of gender inequality as well as of class inequality This paper describes the development of gendered agency inequality during the period after the Second World War in 18 OECD countries in the arenas of democratic politics, tertiary education, and labor force participation Class inequality is measured in terms of disposable house income based on LIS data The paper develops a new typology of welfare states based on institutional structures of relevance for gender inequality as well as class inequality The combination of gender and class throws new light on the driving forces behind inequalities and on the role of welfare states in this context Gender inequality is conceptualized in terms of agency The paper presents a new typology of welfare states based on institutional structures of relevance for gender inequality as well as class inequality The combination of gender and class throws new light on the driving forces behind inequalities and on the role of welfare states in this context

Gender in the Welfare State

Abstract: Gender relations—embodied in the sexual division of labor, compulsory heterosexuality, gendered forms of citizenship and political participation, ideologies of masculinity and femininity, and the like—profoundly shape the character of welfare states. Likewise, the institutions of social provision—the set of social assistance and social insurance programs and universal citizenship entitlements to which we refer as “the welfare state” —affect gender relations. Until recently, two broad approaches to gender relations and welfare states predominated: one which saw states contributing to the social reproduction of gender hierarchies, and a second which saw states having an ameliorative impact on gender inequality. More recently, two new strands of research have emerged emphasizing the variation in the effects of social policies on gender.