Family, Gender and Labour in the Aging Society
The family is subject to profound and lasting change in all developed industrial societies. This change affects the inner-family gender roles, the dyadic parent-child-relationship as well as the inter generation conflict. These processes have been the subject of scientific family research for some time and they are being discussed under the keywords individualisation and pluralisation of familial life forms and life courses. Recently the economic, socio-political implications of these developments are receiving a broad open reception, because the socio-demographic change and the change of the gender relations change the preconditions and the framework conditions of individual action, that pose new and permanent problems to the state and to society.
The Ruhr-Universität Bochum and the Faculty of Social Science in particular have a comprehensive expertise in a wide number of disciplines in family research. This unique feature of the faculty can be seen in the overview of the family research in Germany and North Rhine-Westphalia. One of the research emphases of this faculty is the regional family research and family report, which is mainly effected by the Zentrum für interdisziplinärer Ruhrgebietsforschung [centre for interdisciplinary Ruhr area research] (ZEFIR). The object of this research is the presentation and analysis of small-scale family and social structure analysis, the prognosis of regional migration movements as well as the correlation between family and social structure.
Another research emphasis is the family economy and the analysis of state family policy. In the area family economy the faculty has a renowned expertise in the framework of decision-theoretical analysis of inner-familial negotiation processes. For the analysis of the political framework conditions the research emphasis lies on the monetary family policy, the family taxation and the influence of demographic change on the system of social security. The third research emphasis is the empiric analysis of the demographic change. A further emphasis of the faculty lies in the area of gender research. Research has been going on for some time comparing gender, family and labour in welfare states. The change of the gender relations influences the changing configurations of home care (used to be done by wives and daughters(-in-law), now also by partners) and professional and voluntary (unpaid) commercial care, divided in the welfare states in varieties of capitalisms and varieties of gender regimes. The faculty is offering a master course in "Gender-Studies".
Important Existing Individual Activities Involved in this Line of Research are:
Längsschnittstudie zur Beziehungs- und Familienentwicklung in Deutschland "Familienpanel" (Prof. Dr. Jörg Althammer und Prof. Dr. Notburga Ott; Beteiligung an DFG-Schwerpunktprogramm und verschiedene Publikationen)
Religion und Familie (Prof. Dr. Jörg Althammer; Beteiligung an nationalem Forschungsverbund und einschlägige Publikationen)
Gesellschaftlicher Wandel und Zukunft des Alterns (Prof. Dr. Rolf Heinze; Stiftung Mercator-Projekt und einschlägige Publikationen)
Research Network Gender, Globalisation and Work (GLOW) (Prof. Dr. Ilse Lenz; Internati-onale Forschergruppe – Förderung u.a. Center for Global Partnership, The Japan Foundation, Japanese Ministry of Education - mit mehreren internationalen Buchpublikationen)
Wissenschaftlicher Beirat für Familienfragen beim Bundesfamilienministerium (Prof. Dr. Notburga Ott (Vorsitzende) und Prof. Dr. Jörg Althammer; zahlreiche Publikationen)
Kommunen im demographischen Wandel – Konzepte und Modellbausteine einer lokalen Politik für Familien unter unterschiedlichen sozialräumlichen Bedingungen (Prof. Dr. Peter Strohmeier; Bertelsmann-Stiftung und einschlägige Publikationen)