Explaining the enduring deficit of public ECEC services in the south of Italy: The case of Reggio di Calabria
International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy
ISSN: 0144-333X
Article publication date: 29 May 2020
Issue publication date: 24 June 2020
Abstract
Purpose
This article seeks to explain why the public provision of early childhood education and care (ECEC) services in Reggio di Calabria – the largest city of the Calabria region in Southern Italy – has remained among the lowest in the country, failing to respond to the growing local demand for such services. Most of the limited formal supply of ECEC services currently available in the city is almost exclusively provided, for a fee, by private – until recently unregulated – day care centres, whereas households who cannot afford them must still rely on family care.
Design/methodology/approach
Based on original research findings, the article explains how such a supply configuration is the result of several concurrent factors – structural, institutional and cultural, on both the demand and the supply side of the service relation – and has been conditioned by both national and local specificities.
Findings
The complex interplay of these factors accounts not only for the enduring absence of an adequate public provision of ECEC services in the city and its region but also for the reproduction of an “unsupported” familistic model of care, while a loosely regulated private supply answers the growing demand coming from the working women who can afford it.
Social implications
The lack of public ECEC, which was significantly aggravated by the 2008 financial crisis, represents a major constraint for women's emancipation and social justice in an already difficult socio-economic context.
Originality/value
The article provides in-depth knowledge on the enduring deficit of public ECEC services in a region and city that are little studied, together with a contextualized interpretation of its causes and implications.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
This article presents some of the findings gathered in the course of a broader research project carried out by the authors from 2012 to 2016 on the organisation and supply of public care services in Calabria and Reggio Calabria in the context of the EU-funded COST Action IS1102 Social Services, Welfare States and Places (www.cost-is1102-cohesion.unirc.it). Special thanks must go to Stefania Sabatinelli and Barbara Da Roit, who prompted us to write the article and provided invaluable feedbacks on an earlier version of it. The authors also wish to thank the anonymous referees of the journal for their very helpful comments. Needless to say, the ultimate responsibility for the contents of the article rests solely with the authors.
Citation
Barillà, S., Martinelli, F. and Sarlo, A. (2020), "Explaining the enduring deficit of public ECEC services in the south of Italy: The case of Reggio di Calabria", International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy, Vol. 40 No. 7/8, pp. 713-731. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJSSP-12-2018-0220
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
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