So what do the findings of these research projects enable us to say about the entanglements of economic and intimate citizenship in contemporary Europe? In bringing the findings of these projects into dialogue, we became interested in the paradoxes of the individualization process (Beck and Beck-Gernsheim 1995).
36
The evidence from our FEMCIT research would seem to suggest that the two distinct and highly gendered processes discussed by social theorists of individualization – the
flexibilization of labour markets and the detraditionalization of intimate life - can be
identified empirically, but that they do not sit comfortably together and, indeed, that there are inherent tensions between the development of what Beck calls the “flexible”
employment model and the ability of individuals to live a “life of one’s own” in the sphere of intimate relationships.
We wish to underline that we are not saying that economic citizenship and intimate citizenship map straightforwardly onto each other, or that economic resources alone can predict the degree of self-determination in intimacy; we do not wish to resurrect a Marxist notion of ultimate determination by economic forces. The intimate citizenship project interviews were replete with accounts of less than full intimate citizenship across the spectrum of educational backgrounds and occupational groups – of oppressive, discriminatory, or marginalizing experiences that impinged upon or violated our interviewees’ integrity and personhood as gendered intimate citizens (see Roseneil, Crowhurst et al. 2012). Likewise, the economic citizenship interviews contained tales of determination and courage in the realization of aspirations for a non-conventional intimate life, despite the precarious nature of the elder care jobs on offer in a particular national or local context.
But, that said, our research does suggest that it is difficult to flourish as an intimate citizen – to experience a sense of agency and choice, to be able to exercise relational autonomy and self-determination in intimate life – without enjoying a degree of economic autonomy. Subjective experiences of intimate citizenship appear to be considerably more positive
37
amongst those with higher education and those further up the occupational hierarchy, as well as in the richer countries and those with more regulated labour markets. Our research would thus seem to suggest that the new emphasis placed on the inclusion of women in the “adult worker” model of citizenshipxx alongside the simultaneous deregulation of large sectors
of the European labour market (particularly the most highly feminized, as is evident in elder care), may hamper rather than foster the “detraditionalization” of intimate life. Contrary to any idea of the inexorable advance of individualization processes, the “renewed jointism” (Daly 2011: 16) that is enacted by policies aimed at promoting the widespread adoption of the “adult worker model” fails to accommodate and support individuals (particularly
women) living outside the couple form. As long as they are in a position to command access to sufficient autonomous economic resources, individuals may indeed be in a position to adopt independent or non-conventional living arrangements and to experience these in terms of self-realization and authenticity. However, in many countries, women working in the most “flexible” or deregulated sectors of the elder care labour market are faced with what might seem like the material impossibility of surviving beyond the couple frame. Our studies also point to the particular additional vulnerabilities and suffering that face some of those who are living individualized intimate lives outside heterosexual partnerships, but who have not achieved the hallowed status of “adult citizen worker”, and who do not have access to the resources of the ideal reflexive, self-realizing citizen of late modernity (Ehrenberg, 2010). Contrary to the expectations of those who would see processes of individualization as proceeding untrammelled across contemporary Europe, the
reconfiguration of work and welfare is clearly failing to deliver the freedom from “status fate”, “traditional commitments and support relationships” (Beck 2002: 202-203) that women could legitimately expect to reap, in exchange for their increased confrontation with the “constraints of existence in the labour market” (Beck 2002: 203).
38
Whilst we do not endorse what might be seen as the “patriarchal pessimism” (Roseneil, 2007) of one leading theorist of individualization - Zygmunt Bauman (2003) – who often seems to express nostalgia for the days of secure male employment and traditional families, our research does support Bauman’s identification of “the main contradiction” of the age of individualization: “the yawning gap between the right of self-assertion and the capacity to control the social settings which render such self-assertion feasible or unrealistic” (Bauman 2002: xix).
However, our research also highlights how particular welfare regimes might mitigate this contradiction. Contrary to Beck’s affirmation that the nation state no longer represents the most effective site of political action (or, indeed, the most pertinent object of sociological enquiry) (Beck 2000), our research serves to underline that societal level political choices and policies can intervene to alter the (dis)entanglements of economic and intimate citizenship, even under the conditions of globalization and the diffusion of “activation” objectives in European social policy. If, as social scientists, we wish to develop better understandings of contemporary conditions and experiences of citizenship, we need to attend both to the distinctive and irreducible concepts of economic and intimate citizenship and to their complex, potentially contradictory entanglements and processes of co-
production. But we also need to remember the difference that social citizenship - national or local level social welfare policies - can make in shaping processes of individualization and the contours of gender (in)equality in economic and intimate life. As Bauman says: “through trial and error, critical reflection and bold experimentation, we must learn to tackle [this
contradiction] collectively” (Bauman 2002: xix). As economic crisis and the politics of austerity grip Europe, this task presents a huge feminist challenge for the future.
39
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