Changing women's lives: Child care policy in Ireland

Child care as a policy issue has been forced to the center of the national planning agenda in Ireland with the report of an expert working group on ch ild care. As Ireland has broken into the ranks of wealthy Western economies , Irish women have joined the formal workforce in ever greater numbers, dra matically breaking the traditional ideology of women as childbearers and ho memakers. However, women are now carrying the double burden of work that ac companies the lack of any state policy on child care. This article traces t his recent history of the feminizing of the Irish workforce, amidst a fast- changing social context for family life, and the multiple problems confront ing the expert working group of securing an adequate range of policies for the provision of child care in a country which has one of the lowest rates of formal state provision in the entire European Union.