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With her television appearance, she hit a sore spot: At the beginning of the corona pandemic, the sociologist Jutta Allmendinger stated in the talk show “Anne Will” that the daycare and school closures a few weeks earlier had led to a stronger return to the classic role allocation of women and men. Whether this is true is still a matter of debate.
SPIEGEL:
Ms. Allmendinger, Ms. Will asked in May 2020 "Has the pandemic set women back?" You answered: "Yes, women are suffering a terrible re-traditionalization." Looking back, how do you assess your assessment?
Allmendinger:
Ms. Will surprised me with this question at the time. Today I would give the same answer, but probably justify it in more detail.
First of all: The pandemic has revealed what had actually been known for a long time.
In the past decades we have not tackled many tasks with enough determination.
Germany is not a modern society when it comes to equality.
SPIEGEL:
What do you base that on?
Allmendinger:
Politicians have decided to close daycare centers and schools very quickly.
This was possible because we knew that mothers mostly worked part-time and would somehow balance work and childcare even when the children were at home all day.
How natural that was is also shown by the fact that the closure of day care centers and schools was hardly discussed at all in the beginning.
In other countries it was very different.
SPIEGEL:
Other countries have also closed their schools.
Allmendinger:
The implicitness with which this serious step was taken very early on in Germany did not exist elsewhere.
I was asked to explain in the French, British and Swedish embassies why Germany ticks the way it ticks.
Nor did anyone understand why politicians did not have to explain themselves in detail.
School closures were often notified in the form of succinct e-mails, while elsewhere the presidents had to justify themselves.
That was perceived as enormous disrespect - probably also by German mothers.
SPIEGEL:
How do you explain this approach?
Allmendinger:
Structures and cultures are closely related.
As long as we in Germany do not have enough childcare places for children under the age of three and far too few all-day schools, there will be bad mothers - and vice versa.
In Germany, especially in the west, the mothers belong to the children and the children to the mothers.
The idea persists that children would develop deficits if their mothers returned to work too quickly.
SPIEGEL:
In the public debate, retraditionalization was initially tied to the distribution of tasks between mothers and fathers.
Allmendinger:
Of course, that is the starting point of the so-called “gender care gap”, which was over 100 percent in certain age groups before the pandemic.
On average, mothers with young children spend more than twice as much time on care work as fathers.
During the crisis, they continued to increase their unpaid parental leave.
Fathers have also increased, but the imbalance has not corrected itself.
The very short working and parental leave during the pandemic, which was taken longer than planned, slowed down many mothers in a very important phase of their career.
In addition, if we simply calculate care work in hours and minutes, as the »Gender Care Gap« does, we are trivializing what is happening.
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SPIEGEL:
In your opinion, what is left out on the bill?
Allmendinger:
Responsibility cannot be calculated in time.
The psychological stress, the mental load, is not taken into account at all.
New studies show that the stress level of mothers has increased rapidly and consistently compared to fathers.
One of the reasons for this is that most of the organizational work is left to mothers.
SPIEGEL:
Many fathers say that during the crisis they got more involved in family work than before.
So far, a number of articles have appeared that reject your thesis of a relapse into the classic distribution of roles.
Most recently, the "FAZ" wrote about the "new fatherhood" and asked: "Does the new life situation make better fathers out of men?"
Allmendinger:
These texts usually refer to certain constellations between mothers and fathers in lockdown.
If mothers work on site in systemically relevant professions as nurses or doctors, while fathers work from home, the fathers could not avoid taking on more care work.
After the lockdown, the old conditions quickly returned.
Overall, mothers invested significantly more time and psychological energy in childcare than fathers.
In addition, the re-traditionalization is also about normative attributions, keyword raven mother.
SPIEGEL:
According to a survey by the German Institute for Economic Research, the statement that a working mother can take care of her child just as well as a non-working mother receives less approval than before the crisis.
Allmendiger:
Unfortunately yes.
This finding is also clearly about a “back” to old traditions.
SPIEGEL:
Nevertheless, articles such as “Nothing Has Been Except for Theses” appear.
Allmendiger:
Articles like this often make me happy.
SPIEGEL:
Please explain.
Allmendiger:
Most of these articles are about the fact that fathers can also be found on the playgrounds, changing diapers, getting involved here and there.
That's progress.
The data show that this is far from enough and that we are a long way from an equal distribution of care work.
But when men emphasize that we care after all, that is the prerequisite for their actions to change as well.
This is a very important first step.
Hence the joy.
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Jutta Allmendinger
It only works together!
How we can finally achieve gender equality
Publisher: Ullstein Paperback
Number of pages: 144
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Number of pages: 144
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SPIEGEL:
According to studies, many young men would like to be "active fathers."
That would rather speak against a re-traditionalisation.
Allmendiger:
Before starting a family, many couples want to share the care work.
When the time comes, however, the traditional division of labor shows up again.
It creeps slowly and steadily into household routines.
At some point there is no turning back.
SPIEGEL:
In your book you describe »It only works together.
How we can finally achieve gender equality” is also due to incentives such as spouse splitting.
Allmendiger:
The spouse splitting sets completely wrong incentives.
Together with the free co-insurance and marginal employment, it tempts you to think in the here and now and completely ignore the consequences.
Non-insurable work and part-time work slow down career development and result in fewer pension points.
It is almost always the women who have to make serious financial cutbacks.
It is particularly difficult when partners separate.
SPIEGEL:
One way out is for women to work full-time.
Allmendiger:
Somehow we have to close the many gaps in the life course between men and women.
It can't go on like this.
Most of the time, without further discussion, we then assume that women will adapt more and more to the course of men's lives, i.e. will also be in full-time employment.
Reference is then made to the demographic upheavals and the associated shortage of skilled workers.
However, I am rather skeptical about uninterrupted full-time employment by both parents.
SPIEGEL:
You advocate a 32-hour week for both parents.
Allmendiger:
If both parents work full-time, it doesn't work well, at least with small children.
Children get sick, have long holidays and need time.
But there is much more at stake.
We need time for our own parents, for social commitment, for our friends, for ourselves. In the end, the day only has 24 hours.
I therefore advocate a lower full-time or a higher part-time for everyone.
On average, women then work more, men less.
This could then also be implemented in a four-day week, which is used slightly staggered by mothers and fathers.
This would make it much easier to live with compatibility.
In other words: Now finally the men have to move, the women have shown them how to do it in the past decades.
SPIEGEL:
The declared goal of the new family minister, Anne Spiegel, is for family chores to be shared equally in a partnership.
Doesn't that fuel hope that there will be lasting changes?
Allmendiger:
In my opinion, the coalition agreement is weak when it comes to the really central question of sharing care work between partners.
For example, the newly introduced free weeks immediately after the birth of a child for the second parent are important, but do not necessarily have consequences for the future division of care work.
In addition, the partnership months for parental allowance have only been increased from two today to three in the future.
That's less than in other countries, and to be honest, I expected a lot more there.
SPIEGEL:
According to the coalition agreement, however, the "traffic light" wants to "further develop the family taxation" that you have criticized.
Allmendiger:
The coalition does not mention the marriage splitting, a really harmful relic of our tax and family policy.
The paragraph on family taxation remains downright nebulous.
Not to forget: The unhelpful mini and midi jobs will also remain with us.
Yes, the coalition agreement is doing something to improve the compatibility of work and family for mothers.
It is not a sign of departure towards a world in which women and men share paid work and family work fairly.
It remains to be hoped that Anne Spiegel will still have creative power.
I bet on her.