Towards Caring Economies? Feminist Economic Visions and COVID-19 Recovery in Germany, Canada, and Finland

Abstract

Feminist economic and feminist political economy approaches have long critiqued the gendered division of labor that relies, in part, on women’s underpaid or unpaid care work in public and in private. The COVID-19 pandemic breathed new life into these ideas, creating a potential critical juncture for transforming economic models. This article uses feminists’ COVID-19 recovery plans to develop a template for analyzing whether and to what extent governments’ policy responses mirrored feminists’ ideas about a care-led recovery. We apply this template to three cases: Germany, Canada, and Finland. We find that only Canada took initial steps toward a caring economy.