The STI Experts Meeting Elevating Fatherhood: Policies, Organizations and Health and Wellbeing, has led to the recent Springer publication of the volume Engaged Fatherhood for Men, Families and Gender Equality: Healthcare, Social Policy, and Work Perspectives.
Co-edited by the meeting’s academic leaders Marc Grau, Mireia las Heras and Hannah Riley Bowles, the book reveals how the interplay of numerous factors contributes to achieving the maximum benefit for individuals, families and society. When policy (governmental and institutional) and practice come together to support and enable fatherhood engagement, everyone wins in myriad ways both tangible and intangible.
In Grau’s words, “Fatherhood is in transition. Many social actors – policy-makers, organizations, and healthcare providers- can support fathers in this transition towards an engaged fatherhood that is good for children, partners, fathers themselves and their organizations. This book offers novel insights from qualitative and quantitative studies around the world, as well as strategies and principles for overcoming barriers to engaged fatherhood.”
The essays are grouped into three primary sections: health and wellbeing; social policy; and work and organizations, and are brought together in a chapter of conclusions.
Chapters in the first section elevate the significance of fatherhood engagement for infant health, child development, maternal welfare, and men’s own health and adult development. They also demonstrate important gaps in the scientific and clinical understanding of fathers’ influence on perinatal health and early child development.
The social policy section highlights aspects of family leave policies that increase fathers’ participation in infant caregiving, using evidence from a cross-national comparative review, and reveals how cultural norms and socio-economic factors influence policy and practice, and vice versa. Again, significant differences become evident.
The section on work and organizations invites readers into conversations with fathers from France, Australia, and South Africa, including perspectives from white-collar, blue-collar, and precariously employed fathers. These chapters also include reviews of research and analyses of data from eight countries across the Americas regarding the significance of workplace resistance or support to men’s capacity for fatherhood engagement.
“Social changes have resulted in new role expectations and identities,” explains Mireia Las Heras. “This book dives deeply into one of these roles of key social relevance: fatherhood. In the book, experts offer us insights to understand the benefits and risks, as well as the enablers of and hindrances to engaged fatherhood. Each chapter offers evidence-based research, grounded in sound theoretical frameworks. Altogether, this collection offers a clear picture of why and how to help and support this transition toward a new fatherhood”.
