five - Lone parents and employment in Norway

Summary

Introduction

During the 1990s, a number of changes have taken place in the benefit system for lone parents in Norway. The aim of this chapter is to give an outline of these changes, and to discuss their background in terms of historical developments, demographic changes, and the prevailing discourse on mothers and employment. Since the most important changes were introduced in January 1998 and phased in over a three-year period, it is still too early to give a full review of the consequences of the reforms.

‘Activation’ was the central keyword in Norwegian social policies in the 1990s. All social benefits, including those for lone parents, were to be redesigned in the light of the activation principle (cf Hvinden, 1999; Drøpping et al, 1999). Paid employment was to be the “natural first option” for people of working age, and social insurance benefits should only be paid to those who were unable to work due to “circumstances related to health or social situation” (St meld no 35, 1994-95, p 17). For lone parents, this new principle came to imply a controversial redefinition of their responsibilities as earners and carers. The key question was, under what circumstances is being alone with a dependent child a ‘social situation’ that requires an exception from the general duty to work outside the home? As I will show below, Norwegian politicians dealt with this question by introducing a relatively strict division between ‘lone parents as carers’ and ‘lone parents as workers’, with the age of the youngest child as the crucial dividing line. Lone parents with children younger than three received more financial support by the end of the1990s than they did in the beginning, while those with older children received far less. A second important question was what are we to do about those lone parents who must be expected to work, but who are unable or unwilling to do so? In answering this question, little if any weight was placed on the creation of financial incentives, which would make employment more tempting in financial terms. Rather, this concern inspired an innovative move in the form of local ‘help to self-help’ groups, whose chief aim was to motivate and enable lone parents to take up education or employment.