It Takes Two to Be Equal? Middle-Class Men Managing Care and Work during the COVID-19 Pandemic in Poland

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has posed challenges to the organisation of work and practices of care. Lockdown, the introduction of remote working in many sectors, home-schooling, and social isolation required the adoption of new strategies and solutions, resulting in the increased involvement of mothers in caring activities and the reinforcement of the cultural normativity of family. Yet some studies suggest that the share of fathers in childcare has also increased. Based on semi-structured qualitative interviews conducted as part of the 'Men in Care' (MiC) project with men working in international corporations (17) and their partners (7), we consider how the COVID-19 pandemic in Poland impacted men's approach to care and parental roles. We draw on the experiences of male employees and their partners to show how the 'interweaving' of care and work has influenced the involvement of fathers and the division of care between partners. We examine whether the post-outbreak months, when care duties suddenly became delegated almost exclusively to parents, triggered reflections in relation to caring masculinities and challenged existing gender relations. We identified three types of fathers in our sample: task-oriented fathers, supportive fathers, and engaged fathers.

Keywords

• fatherhood
• caring (masculinities)
• organisation
• covid-19 pandemic