300457 Care, Capitalism, and Crisis: Political Economy of Social Reproduction (S) (SoSe 2026)

Care, sometimes described as “love labor,” is often treated as part of the private sphere. Yet as women’s labor force participation has risen, care has increasingly become a public concern, visible in low fertility and growing needs for long-term care, often discussed as a global care crisis. Feminist scholars argue that care work, performed largely by women, has always been essential to societies (just like paid labor) while being historically undervalued and frequently subject to state regulation. The rise of capitalism contributed to the devaluation of unpaid care: housewives were excluded from labor statistics, and domestic labor was framed as secondary to wage work, compensated only indirectly through the male breadwinner’s wage. States also helped institutionalize hierarchies between paid and unpaid labor, reflected in persistent wage penalties in feminized occupations such as domestic work. In response, women mobilized both for equal workplace rights and for recognition of “difference,” including demands to value and compensate domestic labor through measures such as housewife allowances. Yet the extent to which states have rewarded, regulated, or supported care has varied sharply across countries and historical periods. This seminar examines how capitalism and state institutions have shaped the status of care, and why policy responses to care have diverged over time and across countries.