"Markets in care: Are there critical lessons for Nordic countries?"

Over the last two decades, there has been growing debate about the role of markets mechanisms and private providers in eldercare provision in the Nordic countries. Proponents have argued that private provision and competition will save public money and improve the quality of services, while critics are concerned that marketisation threatens the Nordic universal care model. In many other countries, in particular in liberal states, private provision and market mechanisms have long played a role in eldercare. What can Nordic countries learn from this much longer experience? In this seminar, leading academics from the UK, the US and Canada, with long experience of researching different dimensions of privatisation in eldercare, reflect on the challenges of maintaining quality – and equality – in care markets.  

Presenters:
Sue Himmelweit, Open University, Milton Keynes, UK: A feminist economist’s perspective on theories of markets in care

Charlene Harrington, University of California, San Francisco, US: Quality differences in for-profit and not-for-profit nursing homes

Pat Armstrong, York University, Toronto, Canada: Privatisation, regulation and control

The seminar is organised by Normacare, a researcher network funded by NordForsk and FAS; see www.normacare.net.
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For enquiries, please contact info(at)normacare.net

The presenters
Sue Himmelweit is professor of economics at The Open University, Milton Keynes UK. She researches the economics of caring, including the macroeconomics of caring and explanations of caring behaviour at the micro-level. Her work includes: The prospects for caring: economic theory and policy analysis, Cambridge Journal of Economics, 2007, 31(4): 581-599. The marketisation of care: rationales and consequences in Nordic and liberal care regimes, Journal of European Social Policy, forthcoming, 2012 (together with D Brennan, B Cass and M Szebehely).

Charlene Harrington is professor of sociology and nursing at the University of California, US, and an international expert on quality, ownership and regulation of long-term care. Her work includes: Does investor-ownership of nursing homes compromise the quality of care? American Journal of Public Health, 2001, 91, 1452–5 (together with S Woolhandler, J Mullan, H Carrillo and D  Himmelstein). Nurse staffing and deficiencies in the largest for-profit nursing home chains and chain owned by private equity companies, Health Services Research, 2012, 47, 106-28 (together with B Olney, H Carrillo and T Kang).

Pat Armstrong is professor of sociology at York University in Toronto, Canada. She is the PI of a large comparative project, Reimagining long-term residential care, including Canada, US, UK, Germany, Sweden and Norway, and has extensively researched the gendered nature of care work and the organisation of care services in for-profit and not-for-profit eldercare. Her work includes: Public and private: Implications for care work. Sociological Review, 2005, 53:2, 167-187 (together with H Armstrong). Critical to Care: The invisible women in health services, 2008, University of Toronto Press (together with H Armstrong & K Scott-Dixon).