The informal sector of welfare: a crisis in caring?

The informal sector is the major provider of informal care for dependent people and everyday care for able-bodied people in Britain. A large and complex sector of care, it has come to occupy a central place in British government policies for health and welfare. Through the 1980s, the informal sector was increasingly identified as a solution to problems in the formal systems of care. The paper reviews the concept of informal care and the welfare philosophies which informed the development of these policies, arguing for a broader and more critical perspective which locates informal care within the context of the wider caring work that goes on in households. Seen in this context, structural features of caring that are celebrated as strengths (its base in kinship relations where carers are unpaid, for example), can be experienced as problematic by those involved in caring. As a case study, the paper focuses on the experiences of mothers caring for children on low incomes for insights into some of the contradictions of caring.