Steppingstones in larger struggles. How can we combine colliding struggles in the care crisis?

Abstract

The question of whether to increase the caregiver benefit is a controversial one among policy experts and movement actors. It is criticized as counterproductive to the emancipation of disabled people and women. At the same time, it becomes the goal of organizing campaigns as it provides immediate solutions, particularly to low-income families. This spotlights two questions: 1. How can activists fight for large-scale, transformative outcomes and achieve real, tangible changes in people’s lives? 2. How can a constituency fight for its liberation without leaving other constituencies behind? Drawing on the analysis of the Hungarian caregivers’ struggle, I reveal prospects for an emancipatory resolution of these two questions. I suggest seeing the struggles of affected constituencies as different dimensions of the care crisis and propose an organizing framework that engages with the deep structural underpinnings of capitalism and takes the issues of power and control inherent in care relations seriously. Received: 05 July 2022Approval: 05 December 2022Published online: Articles in Press, February 2023