Temps parental, parentalité et « parentalisme »

For ten years, significant evolutions have marked the family practices because of demographic changes (increase in the number of divorces and single-parent families), because of social changes (assertion of the status of women, search for equality) and because of institutional changes (crisis of the Welfare State and development of the rights of children). The "parental", i.e. all that concern the child and the relation with its parents, becomes a priority in our society. Thus, from now on, some parental time is specifically devoted to the children by fathers as by mothers, as it is done with other activities: professional work, house work, leisure or physiological time. The survey of the research team "Division Familiale du Travail" of MATISSE carried out in 1999 showed the "parental" for the first time, defined and quantified it1.What is more, the recombination of families show the exercise of new forms of parenthood. These can also be seen in the strategies of the companies. At the junction of the family, employment and equality policies, a new fashion of regulation of the social and family relations seems to appear: this we will call "parentalism", which follows the "familialism" of the "Trente Glorieuses" and the "feminism" of the end of the 20th century.