Creating caring societies and caring states

The Nordic Welfare states are often seen as caring states in the international literature. However, underfunding, and neo-liberalizing within the Nordic states have created an emerging care crisis, that deconstructs the myth of a caring state. There is simply not enough care, nor good enough care provided. Intensification of work, moral distress, burnout, and permanent recruitment problems are some of its effects. Neo-liberalizing within the state has translated into a logic of details within care, with a high level of standardization, documentation, insufficient time, and little discretion left to care professionals. What are the implications of this? That the Nordic states are perceived as a failed feminist experiment, or alternatively, that the problem is an institutionalized gender insensitive universalism of the Nordics? Reimagining the supposedly caring state to become a truly caring state is no easy task. There are different feminist ideals and strategies at play as well as new paradigms of governance. Within the last three decades we have witnessed intensified political struggles about pay, work conditions of care professionals and the state delegating larger chunks of care to civil society. Drawing on the politics of location, I reflect upon the role of the state in the creation of caring societies. By doing so, I will expand upon the imaginary of a fairer distribution of (elderly) care in the Nordic welfare states that combines the ideal of the universal caregiver (Fraser, 1997) and professionalized care. Professionalized care within the state that supports or replaces care by significant others depending upon needs of care and the competences and wishes of significant others.