Sex Roles (2016) 75:4–14

DOI 10.1007/s11199-016-0582-5

ORIGINAL ARTICLE

Is the Stay-At-Home Dad (SAHD) a Feminist Concept?

Published online: 1 February 2016

Abstract This article is a critical examination of the stay-at- Keywords Stay-at-home fathers . Breadwinning mothers .
home dad (SAHD) as a concept and set of practices in Canada Feminism and families . Paid work and care work .
and the United States (U.S.). It is informed by a feminist Genealogies of concepts . Relational sociology . Qualitative
relational approach to practices of work and care, a genealog- methodologies
ical approach to concepts, and by case study material from a
14-year qualitative and longitudinal research program on stay-
at-home fathers and breadwinning mothers primarily in Can- Introduction
ada, but more recently in both Canada and the U.S. I take up
three theoretical and conceptual issues. First, I explicate the Over the past decade, there has been more and more media,
concepts of work, care, and choice that underpin the SAHD public, and scholarly attention to stay-at-home dads (SAHDs)
concept and I explore how these are taken up in government in Canada and the United States (U.S.). Headlines such as B5
reporting and some research studies in Canada and the U.S. Reasons Dads Shouldn’t Work Outside the Home^ (Lesser
Second, drawing from my longitudinal research on stay-at- 2014), BMore Fathers Staying at Home by Choice^ (Miller
home fathers, I apply feminist and relational theoretical ap- 2014), and BMen Choosing Fatherhood Over Careers^
proaches to work, care, and choice and argue that this ap- (Landes 2012) have appeared in leading media outlets such
proach leads to specific theoretical and methodological impli- as Time magazine, the New York Times, and Forbes. Govern-
cations for the study of SAHDs. Finally, I attempt to answer ment statistics cite growing numbers of SAHDs (Livingston
the question: Is the SAHD a feminist concept? I argue that 2013; Statistics Canada 2012; U.S. Census Bureau 2013)
while studies on SAHDs can offer important glimpses into along with a correspondent rise in numbers of breadwinning
possibilities of egalitarian family relationships and are fruitful mothers (Kramer et al. 2013; Meisenbach 2010; Statistics
sites for feminist analyses of family relationships, the SAHD Canada 2009; Sussman and Bonnell 2006; Wang et al.
concept is located in a conceptual net that includes binaries of 2013). In light of these changes, more and more researchers
work and care and individualized conceptions of choice. I thus are studying SAHDs in Canada and the U.S. (e.g., Chesley
question the utility of the SAHD as a feminist concept since 2011; Harrington et al. 2012; Latshaw 2011; Medved and
the binaries that inform it have long been contested by femi- Rawlins 2011; Ranson 2010; Rochlen et al. 2010; Solomon
nist scholars. 2014), as well as in other countries, such as Belgium (Merla
2008), Chile (Olavarria 2003), and Australia (Stevens 2015).
As discussed below, most studies define a SAHD as a father
who leaves full-time paid work for intermittent or extended
periods of time. Studies on SAHDs can offer important
* Andrea Doucet glimpses into pathways, potential, and possibilities of egali-
[email protected]; [email protected]
tarian family relationships and are fruitful sites for feminist
analysis of family relationships. Yet, little attention has been
1
Brock University Niagara Region, 500 Glenridge Ave., St. given to the conceptual underpinnings of the SAHD or to how
Catharines, ON, Canada L2S 3A1 these cohere with approaches to work, care, and choice by
Sex Roles (2016) 75:4–14 5

feminist scholars (e.g., Ferree 1990, 2010; Folbre 1994, 2012; analysis of concepts as Bwords in their sites^ (Hacking 2002,
Garey 1999; Williams 2010). Indeed, questions about the fit p. 24), or within Ba conceptual net^ or Bconceptual configura-
between feminism and SAHDs have remained largely unex- tion^ (Somers 2008, p. 267); that is, concepts are Bnot only
amined. As more and more feminist and family scholars focus related to each other in the weak sense of being contiguous;
on SAHD families in their research, this paper calls for a they are also ontologically related^ and Bfit^ together B(l)ike a
conceptual rethinking of the SAHD. While rooted in research point and a line in basic geometry^ (Somers 2008, p. 267). In
on Canadian and U.S. families, it has important lessons for this paper, my focus is on the fit between concepts of the
other countries where fathering and mothering practices are SAHD, work, care, and choice.
changing, where neoliberal policies are eroding family poli- This paper is divided into three sections. The first section
cies and supports, and where more and more researchers are provides a brief overview of informing literatures, including
focusing on fathering and primary caregiving. selected feminist insights on work, and care, and choice, and
This paper is a theoretical and conceptual one that is in- research on SAHDs. Using these literatures as theoretical
formed by feminist approaches to work, care, and choice and lenses, I then review how research studies and well-cited sta-
by a 14-year qualitative and longitudinal research program on tistics on SAHDs in Canada and the U.S. define and research
stay-at-home fathers and breadwinning mothers primarily in SAHDs. The second section of the paper builds from my own
Canada, but more recently in both Canada and the U.S. I take case study material collected over 14 years on SAHDs and
up three theoretical and conceptual issues. First, I explicate the applies a feminist and relational approach to concepts of work,
concepts of work, care, and choice that underpin the SAHD care, and choice. I argue that this approach leads to a rethink-
concept and I explore how these are taken up in government ing of current methodological and theoretical approaches to
reporting and research studies in Canada and the U.S. Second, SAHDs. Finally, the third section addresses the question of the
drawing on case study material from my longitudinal research SAHD as a feminist concept. Unless otherwise noted, the
on stay-at-home fathers, I apply feminist theoretical ap- literature reviewed in this paper, the studies cited, and the
proaches to work, care, and choice and argue that this ap- informing case study material, are from Canada and the U.S.
proach leads to specific theoretical and methodological impli-
cations for the study of SAHDs. Finally, I attempt to answer
the question: Is the SAHD a feminist concept? Feminist Approaches to Work and Care
My attention to the SAHD as a concept is informed by a
relational approach to practices of work and care and a genea- Since the 1980s, feminist scholars have amply explored inter-
logical approach to concepts. In terms of relationality, it is root- relationships between home and work, paid and unpaid work,
ed in a transdisciplinary and diverse field of relational theory, and public and private spheres for women (e.g., Ferree 1990;
and some of its theoretical strands, including feminist theories Glucksmann 1995, 2009; Lamphere 1987; Zavella 1987).
on the ethics of care with their focus on relational ontologies Feminist approaches to gender, paid work, and care work have
(e.g., Held 2005; Kittay 1999; Lynch 2007; Ruddick 1995; highlighted interconnections between families and other so-
Tronto 2013) where Brelations of interdependence and depen- cial institutions, including workplaces, state policies, and
dence are a fundamental feature of our existence^ (Robinson communities, so that families are viewed Bnot as a separate
2011, p. 12); relational sociology with its view of everyday sphere at all, but as only one of a number of interlinked insti-
practices as Bdynamic, continuous, and processual … unfolding tutions where gender relations are constructed, reproduced,
relations^ (Emirbayer 1997, p. 281; see also Powell and and transformed^ (Ferree 2010, p. 421). As Lynn Uttal
Dépelteau 2013; Somers 1994, 1998); and work influenced (2009, p.134) notes: BOne of the fundamental, yet under-
by feminist science studies and their contestation of binaries acknowledged contributions of feminist thought to family
(e.g., Haraway 1991, 1997). By binaries, I am referring to what studies is its attention to how families are intertwined with
Clarke and Olesen (1999, p. 17) call Btwo-sided frameworks^; communities and contexts^ (see also Goldberg 2013; Perry-
while these binaries are commonly posited as relating to, for Jenkins et al. 2013).
example, male/female, subject/object, and nature/culture, these Parallel to this attention to linkages between families and
efforts at Bcomplicating the binaries^ (Clarke and Olesen 1999, other institutions, there has been a contestation of clear divi-
p. 8), they have also been taken up in rethinking separations, sions between paid work and care work. Garey’s (1999, p.
divisions, and binaries of work and care (Bowlby et al. 2010; 164) work on how mothers weave together work and care is
Doucet 2013a; Krull 2011). especially instructive here in that rather than viewing parent-
With regard to genealogies, this paper and its conceptual hood and paid work as Bopposed categories,^ she views these
project are informed by Margaret Somers’ (2008, p.172) in constant relationship with one another and in Bchanging
Bhistorical sociology of concept formation,^ which is the Bwork patterns over the life course.^ While feminists have sought
of turning social science back on itself to examine often taken- to make the interconnections between work and care and mul-
for-granted conceptual tools of research.^ This entails an tiple institutions and family life visible, this theoretical
6 Sex Roles (2016) 75:4–14

approach, as I argue in the next section of this paper, has (see Doucet and McKay 2016). This information about
largely fallen flat in the study of SAHDs. childcare and parental leave help to contextualize men’s
work-care patterns and their choices to be at home.
Most statistical analyses and qualitative research studies of
Feminism and Stay-At-Home Fathers SAHDs in Canada and the U.S. are informed by the assump-
tions that SAHDs do not work, do not have a connection to the
Feminism’s attention to fathering has slowly evolved, begin- labour market, and that, as a group, they can be divided be-
ning in the 1980s with growing calls for men to take an active tween fathers who are home by choice and those who are
part in caregiving, which was informed by the view that home through forced choice or the termination of employ-
women’s socio-economic equality with men is dependent on ment. Government statistics in Canada and the U.S., for ex-
men’s participation in domestic life (e.g., Ruddick 1995; ample, are informed by specific concepts of the SAHD that
Young 1984). This sustained attention by feminist scholars have an implicit, and sometimes explicit, assumption that fa-
on the importance of men’s involvement in care work has thers who are home have chosen to care for family rather than
led to a burgeoning body of fathering scholarship by feminist to engage in paid work. Canada’s main government statistical
and family scholars (e.g., Dermott 2008; Dowd 2012; body, Statistics Canada, defines a SAHD family as a married
Featherstone 2009; Kaufman 2013; Miller 2011; Williams couple with at least one dependent child where a mother is
2010). Within this body of work, there has been a small but employed and a father is not employed for 1 year (i.e., not
growing focus on SAHDs, as these households provide im- going to school and not looking for work but able to work)
portant lessons on shifting gender relations and the possibili- (Statistics Canada 2011). According to their definition and
ties and difficulties of achieving gender equality in paid and conceptual approach, in 2010 there were 60,875 Canadian
unpaid work. Yet some of these studies inadvertently rely on SAHDs, which means that men constituted 13 % of all stay-
binaries between work and care, on concepts of choice as at-home parents (Statistics Canada 2011).
separate from the contexts within which they are enacted, The U.S. Census Bureau and Current Population Study
and on methods that further entrench the idea that men’s data define a SAHD in a similar way to Statistics Canada: as
choices can be individualized and studied apart from the rela- a married father with children, who has been unemployed and
tions within which these choices are constituted. These points not looking for work for more than 1 year because he is taking
can be demonstrated by looking at selected recent statistics care of his home and family (Kramer et al. 2013; U.S. Census
and the studies on SAHDs that draw upon these statistics. Bureau 2012). These definitions underestimate the numbers of
In contextualizing the statistics and studies that are fathers who are caring for children on a regular basis as they
reviewed here, as well as the informing case study material are underpinned by a binary between paid work and care
below, it is important to provide the socio-cultural contexts for work; notably, they exclude fathers who have some connec-
this paper. As indicated in the Introduction of this article, both tion to paid work, including men who work part-time or in
Canada and the U.S. have seen significant rises in SAHDs and irregular or flexible work, as well as fathers who work at
breadwinning mothers. Both countries also lack a national home, are unemployed job seekers, are underemployed and
childcare program (see Langford et al. 2016; Warner 2013), discouraged workers, and fathers who are students (see
with the exception of the Canadian province of Québec, which Latshaw 2011). Moreover, these government statistics, which
has a government-subsidized childcare program. Canada and fuel many research projects in both Canada and the U.S., are
the U.S. differ, however, in their approach to parental leave hetero-normative and nuclear family-centric in that they ex-
provisions. The U.S. Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993 clude lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ)
grants eligible employees (both male and female) 12 weeks of families, as well as men who are single, divorced, or living in a
unpaid leave following the birth or adoption of a child; how- cohabiting union. According to this definition, in 2012 there
ever, the Department of Labor estimates that only 60 % of the were 189,000 SAHDs (compared to 105,000 in 2002), which is
U.S. labour force is covered by this policy, leaving many 3 % of all stay-at-home parents (U.S. Census Bureau 2013). It is
without access to protected family leave (Rehel 2014). Canada worth noting here that the percentage of fathers in comparison to
has a more comprehensive parental leave program, and since all stay-at-home parents is lower in the U.S. than Canada be-
2001 many Canadians in standard full-time employment have cause the U.S. Census Bureau collects data on the reason that
access to 15 weeks of maternity benefits and 35 weeks of fathers are at home and distinguishes between fathers who could
parental leave benefits (with varying rates of leave time and not find work and fathers who state that they are home caring for
pay depending on province) (see Doucet et al. 2015). While their children. Statistics Canada, on the other hand, only collects
this appears to be a generous provision, a full quarter to a third data on fathers who are not employed and not looking for work.
of Canadian mothers and an unknown number of fathers (as A wider, but still limited definition of a SAHD is the one
Statistics Canada does not collect data on the ineligibility of used by the U.S. Pew Center, a nonpartisan U.S. think tank,
fathers) are consistently ineligible for parental leave benefits which has published major reports on SAHDs and
Sex Roles (2016) 75:4–14 7

breadwinning mothers, bringing widespread public and media some, there are possibilities of what has been called a choice
attention to these issues (Livingston 2014; Wang et al. 2013). biography (Beck 1992), an individualization thesis (Beck and
The Pew Center’s definition includes men not employed for Beck-Gernsheim 1995), and a reflexive project of self
pay at all in the prior year and living at home with dependent (Giddens 1991), in which people reflexively enact their iden-
children younger than 18. Unlike the Canadian and U.S. gov- tities. These ideas have, however, been heavily critiqued by
ernment statistics, the Pew Center data includes ill and dis- family and feminist sociologists (e.g., Bauman 2001; Brannen
abled fathers and fathers who are looking for work. This is a and Nilsen 2005). Brannen and Nilsen (2005), for example,
wider and more inclusive definition as it is not contingent on drawing on the classic sociological arguments of Mills (1959),
marital status, having a spouse or partner of the opposite sex, point to how people’s lives and the narratives they tell are
or on the work status of the spouse or partner. At the same often Bcharacterized by being unable to make sense of the
time, it excludes fathers who engage in some paid work. Ac- connections between their own personal lives and the struc-
cording to the Pew Center definition, there were over 2 million tural forces that shaped their lives^ (Brannen and Nilsen 2005,
SAHDs in the U.S. in 2012, constituting 16 % of all stay-at- p. 423). This does not mean, they argue, that these structural
home parents. forces are not in play, but rather that Bthe structural side of life
A third definition is one that appears in many qualitative is more often expressed in the silences which punctuate
research studies where the focus is on fathers who choose to narratives^ (Brannen and Nilsen 2005, p. 423).
be at home; this definition is used, for example, in a highly In feminist scholarship on families, work, and care, there
publicized 2014 report by the Boston College Center of Work has been ample attention to the limitations of a focus on
that focuses only on fathers who had chosen to be at home choice. Garey’s (1999) work is noteworthy again as she high-
rather than fathers who were B‘forced’ into the role of primary lights how women’s employment reflects Ba pattern not of
caregiver^ (Harrington et al. 2012, p. 8; see also Farough their choosing^ (p. 106). In her view, Bthe metaphor of ‘weav-
2015; Solomon 2014). Other studies draw a distinction be- ing’ better represents the actions and intentions of employed
tween SAHDs who are home by choice and those who are women with children than the current dominant model of in-
forced to be at home through job loss and include both groups dividual orientation that pervades discussions of work and
of SAHDs in their research (e.g., Chesley 2011; Kramer et al. family^ (Garey 1999, p. 192; see also Damaske 2011; Ferree
2013; Livingston 2014). Yet, this distinction between SAHDs 1990; Stone 2007, 2008; Williams 2010).
who choose to be at home and those who are home through
forced choice continues to inadvertently hold in place binaries
of work and care. Moreover, this distinction is also premised A Feminist and Relational Approach to Work, Care,
on the conception of a seemingly unstructured choice made at and Choice: A Case Study Example
one moment in time rather than viewing choices as unfolding,
relational, and shifting processes across time. As I argue be- This section of the paper draws on case study material from a
low, this approach is at odds with a broad body of feminist and 14-year-long qualitative and longitudinal research program
sociological scholarship on choice. conducted mainly in Canada, but also recently in the U.S., that
included in-depth interviews with breadwinning mothers and
fathers who partially or fully self-define or are defined by their
Feminist and Sociological Perspectives on Choice partners as a SAHD (Doucet 2004, 2006, 2013a, b, 2015). The
longitudinal case study material that informs this article is com-
Feminist scholarship and critical sociological scholarship prised of two interlocking research projects wherein 134 inter-
have problematized the concept of choice as a way of theoriz- views (97 individual interviews and 37 couple interviews) were
ing people’s actions and everyday practices, pointing to how a conducted with 112 individuals. The two studies are: (a) Study
focus on choices can downplay the structured constitution of A, a qualitative research study (2000–2014) with 70 Canadian
these choices. These critical interventions on choice are cross- stay-at-home fathers (at home for at least 1 year) that included
disciplinary ones. In feminist economics and feminist philos- interviews with fathers and couples (father/mother) interviewed
ophy, for example, there have been critiques of rational choice between 2000 and 2004, and follow-up interviews between 9
theory and liberal theory, including liberal feminist political and 14 years later with six households (for details see Doucet
theories that emphasize autonomy, choice, and Bthe extreme 2006, 2015); and (b) Study B, a qualitative research study
individualism embedded in the rational actor^ model (Folbre (2008–2014) of primary breadwinning mothers in Canada
1994, p. 28; see also Friedman 2000). and the U.S. that included in-depth interviews with 14 bread-
In sociological theory, longstanding debates about the rela- winning mothers and their husbands/partners who self-
tionship between structure and agency have led to reflections identified as SAHDs (individual and couple interviews), and
on the loosening of the structural conditions of choices in late follow-up interviews 3 to 5 years later with six of these mother/
twentieth and early twenty-first-century societies, so that, for father couples (individual interviews and couple interviews)
8 Sex Roles (2016) 75:4–14

(Doucet 2013a, 2014, 2016). The samples for both studies were more than one work and caregiving pattern at any one time
mainly white and middle and lower-middle class, but there was (see Doucet 2013a, 2014, 2016). Nevertheless, while my ap-
also some diversity of class, ethnicity, and sexuality. I person- proach to the categories has changed, what has stayed firm is
ally conducted all 134 of the research interviews for these stud- my argument from the analysis of my research interviews that
ies with the informing view that research interviews constitute all SAHDs in both Canada and the U.S. maintain some formal
Bprivileged moment(s)^ of knowledge construction (Bourdieu or informal, firm or loose connection to the labor market or
et al. 1999, p. 615). All interviews lasted between 60 and they are in a class position that allows them to relinquish that
90 min with return visits to households taking 3 to 5 h for connection for a short time. Moreover, my longitudinal re-
individual and couple interviews. This research program was search (in both Studies A and B) has led me towards a more
informed at the outset by feminist theoretical insights on paid fluid and mobile conceptualization of the relations between
and unpaid work; across 14 years, my evolving feminist, rela- work and care and the recognition that most fathers’ (and
tional, and genealogical approach to concepts led me to critical mothers’) work-care patterns shifted over time so that there
insights on work, care, and choice. I explore some of those was a weaving between care and work patterns for individuals
insights below. and between partners.
An excellent example of this inter-weaving between pat-
A Weaving of Work and Care Across Time terns of work and care and between partners comes from Theo
and Lisa from Ottawa, Canada. They are both engineers and
From the longitudinal research program and its two connected parents of four children, all 1 year apart in age; they were
studies, I identified three categories for father’s approaches to interviewed as part of Study A in 2004 and then again in
paid work. These three categories of SAHDs are: 2014. When I interviewed them the first time, Theo had taken
three different parental leaves for their first three children
(a). Fathers in transition. This category included fathers (6 weeks, 10 weeks, and 25 weeks). His job was about to be
who were laid off, re-thinking their career path or jobs, phased out and so he took his full parental leave entitlement
re-training/studying, or who had left work as they were (35 weeks) with their fourth child, and then took a severance
in low level or unsatisfying jobs that did not justify the package. He was at home for the next 5 years. During that
high cost of childcare services. They were choosing or time, he was the coordinator of a local playgroup, a volunteer
willing to be the home-based parent for a period of time. in his children’s classrooms and at extra-curricular activities,
(b). Fathers working flexibly, at home, self-employed, and he also kept up his connections with his engineering col-
freelance, in part-time jobs. This group of fathers leagues, so that by 2006 he had laid the groundwork to launch
remained tied to the labor market in flexible, part-time, his own company. He also did renovation work on their house,
or intermittent ways. They were the household’s supple- which they then sold before moving into a larger house, where
mentary earners and made their earning capacity a sec- Theo took on more renovation work as a way of increasing
ondary priority while they gave more attention to the their home equity and long-term financial security. When
household’s caring responsibilities. Theo returned to full-time work in 2006, Lisa began to take
(c). Fathers taking a break from paid work. These fathers 2 months of unpaid work each summer so as to have a home-
had achieved at least some of their career goals and were based parent in the summer months. They thus moved from a
looking for other forms of fulfillment, including caring for SAHD/work-at-home dad situation to one where he worked
their children, alternative work, or leisure interests (e.g., full time and she worked more flexibly around the children’s
travel, sports, writing, or blogging). There was class privi- needs and schedules (Doucet 2014, 2015).
lege inherent in this category in that these SAHDs could
afford to have one parent at home without pay for a time or Fathers’ Choices: Relational, Structured, Unfolding
a sudden inheritance had made it possible to reconsider Processes
work commitments. Fathers with illnesses or disabilities
were also included in this category, thus indicating that Across 14 years of studying SAHDs, I have asked 84 stay-at-
these can be temporary or permanent positioning. home fathers BHow did you come to be here?^ and in follow-
up interviews, I asked BRemind me why you made the deci-
While these three categories have been consistent ones sion you did?^ In my interviews with the female partners of
across my 14-year research program, my approach to these SAHDs, I asked them about their family choices with regard
categories has shifted. That is, while my earlier work identi- to why they had arranged their lives as they did, with her
fied, and argued for, three distinct categories of fathers’ work- working and him being at home or more home-based. The
care patterns (see Doucet 2004, 2006; Doucet and Merla final question I asked in all my interviews was BIn your ideal
2007), my more recent work argues that these patterns shift world, what would your working and parenting life look
and change across time so that the majority of fathers fit into like?^ My research has highlighted how, as both individuals
Sex Roles (2016) 75:4–14 9

and couples, parents had a complex series of reasons consti- of decision-making was also highlighted by how narratives
tuted by relational and structural entanglements that attempted were constituted within larger sets of structural relations.
to explain fathers’ choices to be SAHDs. From multiple inter-
views within households—with mothers, fathers, and cou- The Choice was Made for us
ples—my research demonstrates that there are multiple rea-
sons for the decisions of fathers to forgo full-time paid work The complexities of and constraints on choice did not emerge
for a time. Below I detail three of my key findings about immediately in my interviews with mothers and fathers, but
fathers’ choices. arose through reflections by both partners throughout their
interviews. That is, approaching the question through multiple
Relationally Constituted Choices angles with different viewpoints and across time provided
openings into the complexities of choice within specific and
Fathers’ choices and decisions to be at home were relational constantly moving temporal, relational, and structured con-
ones made in concert with their wives or partners. My earlier straints that bought together household negotiations, state pol-
work on SAHDs reveals that, with very few exceptions, fa- icies, and work/family policies and contexts. In Study B, for
thers mentioned the situation of their partner in the first few example, Christopher, a U.S. SAHD of four living in Massa-
lines of that response. That is, most SAHDs provided open- chusetts (interviewed in 2009 and 2014), mentioned several
ings that began something along the lines given by Joe, a reasons for his choice to be at home: his wife’s career, his
Canadian indigenous father at home with two preschool limited work options, the cost of daycare, and the number
daughters, who started his interview in 2003 by explaining: I (four) and ages of children (infants and pre-schoolers). As he
wasn’t working. Well, she decided. She said, BI’m pregnant, told me in his second individual interview in 2014: The choice
and one of us has to stay at home with the baby.^ She said, BI was made for us. She has the job with benefits. Since college, I
don’t want a daycare.^ I agreed. I said, BOkay, you make a lot have been doing contract work. We had four children under
more money than I can.^ So that’s when it started. (Doucet the age of five. Daycare would have eaten up all her salary. It
2006, p. 216). just made sense for me to be the one at home (Doucet 2016).
More recently, in multiple interviews conducted between Also in Study B, Guillermo, a Canadian-Latino father of
2009 and 2012, the decision to stay at home for Geoff (a three, whose wife is in the Canadian foreign service, also
Canadian laid-off factory worker who became a part-time pointed to how their constant moves and the cost of daycare
school bus driver) was described by him and his wife, Astrid, for three children influenced their choices: [O]nce you’re past
as one based on four inter-related factors: his wife’s permanent the $30,000 or so [for childcare costs], we kind of just say,
job with benefits, his being laid off, their ability (and frugality) well, then it’s just not worth it (Doucet 2014, p. 15).
to live on one income for a short period of time (before he took
part-time work), and the high cost of daycare. In their joint Choices Across Time, Choice as Process
interview in 2009, Astrid, a high school teacher, pointed to the
cost of daycare as a key reason: My revisit interviews with six Study B families brought wider
perspectives to choices and decision-making. Choice no lon-
Part of our decision for Geoff to stay home with them ger seemed to be a stable and singular end product, but rather a
was the fact that … she [their childcare provider] had shifting set of processes and practices. In those interviews, all
informed us when I went on maternity leave the second of the fathers indicated a readiness to return to work, while all
time that she had planned to retire. So we sort of used six women expressed concern about how to balance
her numbers as a basis, and I talked to some of my afterschool care, chauffeuring children to extra-curricular ac-
coworkers about what they paid for [childcare]. And tivities, and the cost of summer camps. As Callista, a U.S.
we knew that it was going to be, you know, significantly finance banker living in a small town outside New York city
more than what she charged. So that played a role in the told me when I returned to interview her 5 years later, having a
decision (Doucet 2014, p. 12). parent at home was greatly valued: I love having him at home
with the kids … I feel like he keeps everything running
Geoff’s account in 2009, confirmed in a revisit interview in smoothly in our lives (Doucet 2014, p. 18).
2012, was that it was a combination of: her career, his job loss, In Study B, 100 % of fathers and mothers mentioned their
and his ability to work part-time in a job that enabled him to partners’ job and breadwinning capacity and 36 % referred to
take both daughters with him (driving a school bus). his job loss or unemployment as two keys reasons for fathers
A striking finding from both research studies was that all of becoming SAHDs. Yet, my research also indicates (see
the SAHDs with partners or wives mentioned their partners’ Doucet 2006, 2014, 2016) that fathers and mothers cited mul-
work and the relational context of decision-making in their tiple reasons for fathers being SAHDs, or the more home-
narrations of their decisions to stay home. The relationality based working parent, and for family decisions to support that
10 Sex Roles (2016) 75:4–14

model of work and care. All of these choices emerged from SAHDs. Most research to date has relied on individual face-
relational processes that drew together both positive and neg- to-face interviews, telephone interviews, or online surveys
ative forces that led fathers to forgo full-time paid work. with fathers only (Fischer and Anderson 2012; Rochlen
et al. 2010; Solomon 2014) or on separate interviews with
Work, Care, and Choice Tapestries: Relationalities Rather mothers and fathers (Chesley 2011; Farough 2015;
than Fixity Harrington et al. 2012; Medved and Rawlins 2011), which
may downplay the relationally constituted and performative
While the points made above, from selected longitudinal case aspects of narratives (see Doucet 2008; Presser 2005). This
study material, focus on work and care, on the one hand, and paper points to the importance of supplementing fathers’ in-
choice, on the other, as two separate tracks of findings, I argue dividual interviews with couple interviews because responsi-
that they are deeply connected as fathers’ approaches to work bilities for care, and choices about work and care, are relation-
and care are entangled with the choices they make and the al processes that require methods that can tap into these rela-
conditions of possibility that structure those choices. More- tional and negotiated processes (see also Bjørnholt and
over, choice is not a singular product but a process of multiple, Farstad 2014; Fox 2009; Lachance-Grzela and Bouchard
constantly intra-acting threads that are constituted in relation- 2010).
ships and in shifting temporal, spatial, local/global, and socio-
cultural processes (Garey 1999). My review of feminist liter- Is the SAHD a Feminist Concept?
atures on work, care, and choice and my case study material
leads me to argue that SAHDs’ practices of paid work and care There are at least two concerns that need to be taken into
cohere with feminist scholarship on families, which has noted account when we consider the question of the SAHD and
how women’s lives are marked by an interweaving of work whether it can be regarded as a feminist concept. The first
and care (Garey 1999) and shifting temporalities and relates to questions about gender and the costs of care; the
relationalities rather than binaries of work, care, and choices. second relates to feminist theorizing on models of breadwin-
As Garey (1999) notes in her concept of sequencing, it is ning and care.
important to recognize Bconcepts of continuity and relation-
ship of work and care^ and Bchanging patterns over the life Gender and the Costs of Care
course^ (p. 164). Just as she argued that the women she
interviewed Bwant to combine employment and motherhood^ While there is increasing attention to SAHDs by feminist re-
(Garey 1999, p. 164), these findings should also be extended searchers because of the promise and potential they offer to
to the lives of fathers who do not choose to be at home or to gender egalitarian domestic labour, very little attention has
work, but rather seek to find ways of doing both. Moreover, been paid by feminist family researchers to how to conceptu-
men retain a connection to paid work partly because, as others alize men’s disadvantages and potential loss of (male) power
have argued, earning and breadwinning remain a central part as a result of being at home for several years with little or
of hegemonic masculinities and men’s identities (see Doucet minimal connection to paid work and its socio-economic ben-
2006; Latshaw 2011; Townsend 2002; Williams 2010). At the efits. How should feminist scholars address the issues of po-
same time, men are moving closer to an intertwining of work tential losses for men from prioritizing caregiving when it is
and childcare that has long been associated with women, a clear that men, in general, still reap a Bpatriarchal dividend^
situation that has been made more urgent by shifting economic (Connell 2005, p.77) from not caring. There is a large body of
conditions, the costs of Bconcerted cultivation^ (Lareau 2011, work detailing how the weighing of the balance of household
p. 2), and increasing difficulties to sustain reasonable stan- labour on the side of women has been very costly to many
dards of living into retirement. In short, there is a gap between, women (Budig et al. 2012; England and Folbre 1999), and this
on the one hand, feminist scholarship on interconnections be- has led to the understandable need for sociologists to contin-
tween work and care and on structured choices and, on the ually Bemphasize links between parts of a social system^ and
other hand, scholarship and statistical reporting on SAHDs in to Btrace how gender inequality in jobs affects gender inequal-
Canada and the U.S. ity in the family, and vice versa^ (England 2010, p. 162). Yet,
There are also methodological implications that emerge there has been little attention paid to how this plays out for
from my discussion of choice in this paper. Feminist research men who give up full-time paid work.
calls for a focus not on individuals but on B(h)ow gender One set of feminist lenses that are useful for theorizing
relations structure family dynamics and interactions with oth- SAHDs’ potential disadvantages are intersectionality theories,
er social institutions^ (Allen et al. 2013, p. 139; see also Gold- which arose partly from attending to differences between
berg 2013; Perry-Jenkins et al. 2013). These relational and women, but also from the recognition of commonalities be-
negotiated dimensions of parental choices related to work, tween women and men (Collins 2004; hooks 2004). These
care, and choice raise methodological issues for research on commonalities are present when men and women are both
Sex Roles (2016) 75:4–14 11

caregivers and when issues of gender may be less central than of work and care and individualized conceptions of choice.
Bvulnerabilities^ in carer/cared-for relations when men or The paper makes four key arguments.
women are caregivers (Fineman 2009, p. 107). Moreover, First, I argue that public accounts of SAHDs and recent
significant class implications and their wider consequences academic studies have used a concept of SAHD that is pre-
underpinning the SAHD, as a concept and as practices, have mised on what I refer to as work/care binaries. Counter to this,
remained largely unexplored in research on SAHDs. I argue that all SAHDs maintain some formal or informal
connection to the labour market that is premised on past con-
nections, future aspirations, a likely dependence on a partner
The SAHD and Breadwinner/Caregiver Models
in paid employment, and particular conditions of possibility
that enable or force one parent to forgo full-time paid work for
A second issue to consider when thinking about the SAHD as
a specific time period.
a feminist concept is to ask: How does the SAHD concept
Second, I argue that current conceptualizations of SAHDs
relate to wider feminist debates about gender equality in care-
who are home by choice play down longstanding feminist and
giving and breadwinning? One line of thinking is to draw on
sociological arguments about choices that are structured, or
Fraser’s (1994, 1997) well-known argument against a male
constituted, by state and workplace structures, ideologies,
breadwinner model, which is based on an ideology of separate
and discourses. Fathers’ choices to be at home or to opt out
gender roles with men working full time outside the home and
of the labour market are not unfettered choices but reveal a
women responsible for domestic and reproductive activities.
complex tapestry of decision-making moments across time,
In contrast to this model, Fraser and many other feminist
ongoing family negotiations, children’s changing needs, and
scholars have argued for a universal caregiver model or du-
increases in non-standardized work arrangements in the con-
al-earner/dual-carer model (see also Gornick and Meyers
text of ongoing neoliberal restructuring. Notably, fathers face
2009), which aims at transforming gender roles inside and
different choices in countries such as Sweden where the
outside the labour market by promoting men’s and women’s
SAHD concept does not exist because family and labour mar-
equal or symmetrical engagement in paid and unpaid work.
ket policies support varied combinations of paid work and
I would argue that the SAHD concept is yet another version
care work, including long parental leaves, paternity leave,
of the male breadwinner model; it reverses the gender but
and high quality daycare (Almqvist and Duvander 2014;
leaves the principles and the problem of one breadwinner
Duvander [personal communication, June 11, 2012]). It fol-
and one caregiver largely intact. As I have argued elsewhere
lows from this argument that the focus of researchers should
(see Doucet 2006, 2013b), this can sometimes lead to a situ-
be less on a division between fathers who are home by choice
ation where the mother is the primary breadwinner and re-
and those who are not, but more on the conditions of possi-
mains primary or shared caregiver, thus further exacerbating,
bility that makes choices possible.
rather than alleviating, gender inequalities. That is, while
My third argument is a methodological one. Here, I point to
scholarly research and media reporting often collapse the cat-
the importance of data collection methods and the role they
egories of SAHD and primary caregiver (see Harrington et al.
play in generating narratives of fathers’ choices. Wider re-
2012; Solomon 2014), these are not necessarily synonymous
search that explores multiple narratives, including interviews
(see also Chesley 2011). This complicates feminist attention to
with partners and with couples, calls into question the trans-
SAHDs as a potential pathway towards greater gender equal-
parency of accounts of fathers who may highlight the choice
ity in paid and unpaid work, and works against longstanding
to be at home. Accounts from partners and across time can
feminist arguments against a primary breadwinner/primary
moderate what I have elsewhere called Bheroic narratives^
caregiver model of work and care.
(Doucet 2008, p. 80), in which fathers may seek to emphasize
a positive and intentional SAHD narrative at a time when there
is ample media, public, and scholarly attention to SAHDs and
Conclusions their potential social benefits to families. Greater attention
needs to be given by researchers to the methodological com-
Feminist research on families offers a strong foundation for plexities of generating and analysing stories of individual and
thinking about work and care and multiple social institutions relational choices.
as interconnected and mutually shaping, but these insights My fourth argument is that the SAHD is a specific cultural
have not yet filtered into government accounting of SAHDs and historical construct and a complex one that requires great-
and the growing number of research studies that posit a con- er attention by feminists researching family relationships. On
cept of a SAHD who is at home by choice. Informed by a the one hand, it points to the radical potential for gendered
feminist and relational approach to practices and a genealog- shifts in caregiving responsibilities, as men’s time at home can
ical approach to concepts, this paper posits that the SAHD engender significant personal, political, and ideological shifts
concept is located in a conceptual net that includes binaries in gendered caregiving and breadwinning (see Chesley 2011;
12 Sex Roles (2016) 75:4–14

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Sierra, and Irene Frieze for insightful feedback on this article. Earlier Dermott, E. (2008). Intimate fatherhood: A sociological analysis.
versions of this work were presented at the Work and Family Researchers London: Routledge.
Network (WFRN) Conference (June 2012, June 2014) and at the meet- Doucet, A. (2004). ‘It’s almost like I have a job but I don’t get paid’:
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Roundtable) in Yokahama, Japan, July 2014. The Social Sciences and Fathering: A Journal of Theory, Research, and Practice About
Humanities Research Council of Canada and its Canada Research Chairs Men as Fathers, 2, 277–304. doi:10.3149/fth.0203.277.
program generously funded the projects that inform this article. I am Doucet, A. (2006). Do men mother? Fathering, care, and domestic
especially grateful to the 112 fathers and mothers who shared their stories responsibility. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
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interviewees gave informed consent and ethical clearance was obtained gender differences in parenting. In L. C. McClain & D. Cere
through the host university of the author. (Eds.) What is parenthood? Contemporary debates about the family.
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