Paper short abstract:

The paper focuses on new developing dimension of child care sector in post-communist Czech Republic: private agencies mediating care workers to the middle-class families. The paper shows how the care is defined and constructed by these agencies as qualified, specialized and professionalized.

Paper long abstract:

Comparing to Western European countries, paid child care does not have a long tradition in the Czech Republic. Being a communist country, former Czechoslovakia relied on collectivistic care supported by the state. Turn to re-familiarization of the social politics and the changes in demographic situation brought about the new topic into to public agenda: how to deal with reconciliation of work and family life without state and/or kinship support. The agencies mediating child care not only fill the gap in the market by offering a child care. Above all, far from providing the simple supply that reacts to the demand on the market, the agencies create the demand for specific care. Drawing upon qualitative research conducted with owners of these agencies, the paper looks into the ways how the child care is constructed. The issues of qualified, specialized, and professionalized care will be discussed. The paper aims at showing that child care in the agencies is deconstructed as a natural female activity and is reconstructed as a gendered activity requiring particular skills that are submitted to professional screening. The paper contributes to the discussion of delegated child care and brings the perspective from the country where it is a new emerging phenomenon with different history and trajectories that are well described in Western European countries.