Women often play two roles: as mothers, they are expected to take the main responsibility for childcare and as workers, they ensure their family’s economic survival. Not only do these two roles conflict with each other, they also influence one another. The gendered perception of care responsibilities in a society shapes the employment opportunities of women in the labor market as well as guides the development of family policies that support mothers in paid labor. Conversely, the unequal treatment of women workers shapes family’s decision about the division of childcare responsibilities. Women in the Global South face greater challenges to reconcile childcare and paid labor in comparison to women in the Global North. Due to the prevalent poverty and even starvation in the Global South, mothers are forced to engage in paid labor despite their childcare responsibilities. States in the Global South also fail to provide support through parental leave, public childcare, and family allowance to the majority of women workers. This seminar will provide an overview of economic opportunities and women’s family position in the Global South, and explore the demographic and economic variables that shape women’s two roles.

In this seminar we will discuss classic texts that analyse the problem of unemployment. An introduction to most relevant theories on labour markets and the political consequences of dualisation is given. We will explore most recent drivers of labor market changes, namely digitalization and globalization. We will mirror different approaches of labour market policy in a comparative perspective. Moreover, we discuss minimum wage policies in Germany and the EU.

The seminar offers an introduction to qualitative methods in the social sciences. It deals with the foundations of qualitative research as well as the various phases of a qualitative research process (including the development of research questions, case study designs, methods of data collection and data analysis). Building on this, the students will carry out their own qualitative research project in small groups.