Currently, families are being subjected to increasing public attention. Interest is focussing on their potential strengths and weaknesses in determining how well children do at school. Alongside such human-development oriented expectations, families are also becoming a focus of attention as a resource for human capital in times of economic crises and criticism of the welfare state. In many European countries, parents and children are at the forefront of the welfare state and socio-educational activities in current programs and policies. The current transformation processes in the welfare state are making the relationship between families and the state more dynamic in general, and they are structuring the discourses on the childrearing, education, and child care services in the fields of both public and private responsibility. The introduction of all-day schooling in Germany also has to be viewed in this context. This is gradually changing the traditional half-day structure of German schools and shifting the borders of public and private responsibility on the levels of education, child care, and childrearing institutions. The attention given to parental childrearing and educational responsibility within the context of current national and international debates clearly underlines the fact that issues in private life are increasingly entering the public discourse and becoming subject to attempts at socio-political control. This raises the assumption of an increasing politicization of parenthood in the (post) welfare state that is focusing more and more attention on the structural conditions of gainful employment and child care as well as on the current relations between the genders. This context particularly emphasizes the time and care regimes that decisively determine the practices in daily family life and the utilization of all-day education settings.

Currently, families are being subjected to increasing public attention with interest focusing on their potential strengths and weaknesses in determining how well children do at school. Parents and children are at the forefront of the welfare state and socio-educational activities in current programs and policies. This book examines the resulting changes in the relationship between families and the state, and the shifting borders of public and private responsibility in education, child care, and childrearing. It discusses the practice of all-day schooling in Germany within this context. It considers international and national debates that underline the fact that issues in private life are increasingly entering the public discourse and becoming subject to attempts at socio-political control. Finally, it discusses the growing politicization of parenthood in the (post) welfare state and the increasing attention being paid to the structural conditions of gainful employment and child care as well as to the current relations between the genders.

Introduction - Sabine Andresen and Martina Richter -The Politicization of Parenthood - Shifting Private and Public Responsibilities in Education and Child Rearing.-

Part I     Families and the Welfare State: the Understanding of Responsibility.-

Val Gillies -Family Policy and the Politics of Parenting: From Function to Competence.-

Nadia Kutscher  -Families, Professionals, and Responsibility.-

Anne Lise Ellingsaeter -Nordic Politicization of Parenthood: Unfolding Hybridization?.-

Brid Featherstone -Can a Crisis Become an Opportunity? Gender and Care in Contemporary Ireland.-

Kristen D. Nawrotzki  -ParentSchool Relations in England and the USA: Partnership, Problematized.-

Andreas Lange  -Family and Welfare State Change: Challenges for Education.-

Nina Oelkers -The Redistribution of Responsibility Between State and Parents Family in the Context of Post-Welfare-State Transformation.-

Part II Child Rearing Between Family Care and Institutional Provisions.-

Tanja Betz -Early Childhood Education, and Social Inequality: Parental Models of a Good Childhood.-

Colette McAuley -Child Well-Being in the UK: Children's Views of Families.-

Carol Vincent,Nicola Rollock, Stephen Ball, and David Gillborn  -The Educational Strategies of the Black Middle Classes.-

Jutta Ecarius -Significance of Family and School, Educational Standards, and Social Reproduction in Education.-

Elke Wild and Sittipan Yotyodying -Studying at HomeWith Whom and in Which Way? Homework Practices and Conflicts in the Family.-

Christine Hunner-Kreisel  -Having to Keep Silent:  A Capabilities Perspective on Growing Up and the Education Process in a Migration Family .-

Part III Meeting Parents' and Children's Needs: Professionals in Schools.-

Erin McNamara Horvat -Pushing Parents Away:The Role of District Bureaucracy in an Urban School.-

Till-Sebastian Idel, Kerstin Rabenstein, and Sabine Reh -Symbolic Constructions, Pedagogical Practices, and the Legitimization of the All-Day School From a Professional Perspective: Tendencies Towards Familialization in All-Day Schools.-

Nicole Börner -Parents' Perspectives on Services to Support Families in All-Day Schools.-

Michael Urban, Kapriel Meser, and Rolf Werning -Parental Involvement in All-Day Special Schools for Learning Disabilities.-

Regina Soremski -Educational or Childrearing Partnerships: What Kind of Cooperation is Needed at All-Day Secondary Schools?.-

Natalie Fischer and Felix Brümmer -School Attachment and Performance: The Impact of Participation in Extracurricular Activities at School,-

Ivo Züchner -Daily School Time, Workforce Participation, and Family Life: Time Spent in School as a Condition of Family Life.-

Sabine Andresen, Lena Blomenkamp, Nicole Koch, Martina Richter, Anne-Dorothee Wolf, and Kathrin Wrobel  -Ideas of Family and Concepts of Responsibility at All-Day School.-

Contributors.