This article presents evidence on working time flexibility and the experience of work and family conflict in the Netherlands, Sweden and the UK, using data from a comparable questionnaire. We find that the experience of balancing work and family life in the different countries yields some surprising and paradoxical results. This is particularly the case in Sweden where, despite the establishment of gender equality and work-family reconciliation policies, we find that higher proportions of both mothers and fathers than in the other two countries report a conflict between their work and family lives. In the Netherlands and the UK it is fathers rather than mothers who are more likely to report conflicting pressures between work and family life. In each country these experiences are related to the hours of work of women and men, but in the context of different working-time regimes and with different compromises and solutions to the unresolved tensions surrounding the conciliation of work and family life.

This article provides a comparison of three West European countries with five Central East European countries in respect of working time and the integration of work and family life. The countries are the Netherlands, Sweden and the UK in West Europe and Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Romania and Slovenia in Central East Europe. As well as providing an East-West comparison, the article also takes into account the differing institutional and policy contexts in the selected countries and the different routes to flexibility. A further aim of the article is to extend our understanding of the culture and values which underpin the organization of family and work in each country. Whilst there is a clear East-West divide, all eight countries demonstrate diverse routes to flexibility and different mixes of social policies and gender cultures which have lead to considerable differences in the integration of work and family life.

The political transformation of Spain into one of the world's leading democracies is well established, yet little is known about the differences between men and women's behaviour, experience and achievements during that process. How much did the women's movement contribute to this transformation? How far have policy advocates successfully integrated gender equality into key spheres of public life? Have power relations between women and men been re-balanced? Gendering Spanish Democracy adopts an innovative approach, critically reviewing key institutional processes, policies and systems to reveal the way they function to promote or obstruct gender equity. Both the transition to democracy, equality law reform, and the social welfare re gime are put to the test. The groundbreaking efforts of policy-makers to combat the violence, sexual harassment and low political participation that are intrinsic to women's experience are scrutinised, and the constraints on equality in the field of employment and the family critically investigated.The authors conclude that the recent re-balancing of the gender order in Spain is unexpected and contradictory, being ultimately more effective in political rather than socio-economic arenas.Gendering Spanish Democracy breaks new ground in applying a systematic gender perspective to the analysis of established democracies, and is the first book in English to reveal the unique features of contemporary Spain's evolving gender order. Gendering Spanish DemocracyThe political transformation of Spain into one of the world's leading democracies is well established, yet little is known about the differences between men and women's behaviour, experience and achievements during that process. How much did the women's movement contribute to this transformation? How far have policy advocates successfully integrated gender equality into key spheres of public life? Have power relations between women and men been re-balanced? Gendering Spanish Democracy adopts an innovative approach, critically reviewing key institutional processes, policies and systems to reveal the way they function to promote or obstruct gender equity. Both the transition to democracy, equality law reform, and the social welfare regime are put to the test. The groundbreaking efforts of policy-makers to combat the violence, sexual harassment and low political participation that are intrinsic to women's experience are scrutinised, and the constraints on equality in the field of employment and the family critically investigated.The authors conclude that the recent re-balancing of the gender order in Spain is unexpected and contradictory, being ultimately more effective in political rather than socio-economic arenas.Gendering Spanish Democracy breaks new ground in applying a systematic gender perspective to the analysis of established democracies, and is the first book in English to reveal the unique features of contemporary Spain's evolving gender order. Special thanks are due to the Spanish women's movement activists who launched the wh...

English This article reviews contemporary discussions of the concept of social exclusion in Europe and examines different paradigms of inclusion and exclusion in selected European countries. A central concern of the article is to link the literature on social exclusion with the debate on welfare regimes and labour market structures and mechanisms of social protection. Drawing on recent comparative analyses the article also considers how women and ethnic minority groups, as well as different social classes, are included or excluded in different welfare regimes.

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