Introduction
This paper draws on data collected for an ESRC-funded project which explored the
engagement of working class families with childcare provision. The focus of this
paper is not on childcare per se, however, but rather on the mothers’ negotiations and
identity work around the competing tensions between their responsibilities to their
children and taking up a role within the labour market. Research on mothers and
employment and especially the literature on working class women, commonly
emphasise their prioritising of mothering over engagement in paid work (e.g. Jordan
et al. 1992; McMahon 1995; Hays 2003; Crompton 2006a). However, within the
wider UK social policy context, policies such as the New Deal for Lone Parents and
the introduction of Tax Credits, as well as proposed changes to Income Support
eligibility criteria for mothers of school-age children (DWP 2007) clearly construct a
‘good’ citizen as a working citizen (see also Mink 1998). This conceptualisation,
which impacts on mothers’ sense of self and their role both within the family and in
the broader public sphere, has also been observed in neo-liberal policy contexts in
other countries (Korteweg 2002, Power 2005). Simultaneously, parenting itself has
become a topical issue, emphasising parental responsibilities and stressing parents’
accountability for all aspects of the behaviour of their children vis-a-vis schools and
the wider community. A number of researchers have observed that in this public and
policy debate, it is in particularly working class parents who are often understood to
be in need of guidance, intervention and ultimately coercion with respect to the
‘proper’ public conduct of their children (Gewirtz 2001; Gillies 2005a; Gillies 2005b,
Lister 2006). Thus mothers are faced by two imperatives: to be a ‘good’, self-reliant
worker-citizen and a ‘good’ mother of well-behaved, achieving children. Whilst all