Ökad press på allt fler ensamstående mödrar

Abstract

The article illuminates the situation for single mothers in the ex-communist countries - Poland, Russia (the European part), ex. DDR and in Sweden and West Germany. The purpose is to discuss the mothers' situation with reference to their relation to three spheres - tlie family and social networks, public social policies and the working life. One basic question that is if the situation of single women with children is more exposed tlian that of the married women, and what possible consequences this might have for themselves and their children. How do single mothers differ from married mothers in the respective countries as far as education, incomes, work and views on the future are concerned? Despite comprising economic and social dissimilarities between these countries, comparisons are interesting since we focus the comparisons on married and single mothers with children. Hereby we get a measure of the structures and processes within these countries, and it can be discussed whether these are generally applied or not. An important aspect is to what extent the social policies or other factors lead to different attitudes in the countries. The results show that the transformation in the former communist nations afflict particularly women, and only in a negative manner. Large groups of women are rejected from the labour märket, and end up in a situation of poverty and dependence. The investigations in all the countries show that single mothers are more exposed than married mothers. They run a greater risk of losing their jobs than the married mothers do, and they thus run a greater risk of ending up in miserable poverty - particularly the mothers in Poland and Russia. The situation of single mothers in Sweden is better from a material point of view. In spite of this, many lone mothers feel worried about their economy - a worry that can be expected to increase along with increasing fees for social services, child care, health- and medical care, increased residential costs etc. The results indicate that the largest disability that women have on the labour märket is not the motherhood in itself, nor is it the gender, but the absence of marriage, in combination with being female. Comprising international research shows that poverty and exposition in one-parent families tend to be reproduced to the next generation. There is no automatic relationship in the relation between divorce, one-parenthood and social problems. It is rather the stigmatisation in different forms that is concerned, in combination with shortages in the possibilities of support that can lead to an assimilation of prolems. Via stigmatising treatment, both the mothers and the children lose their dignity and their self-assured identity.