Caring about care: Reasserting care as integral to early childhood education and care practice,politics and policies in Canada

Abstract

Care and education have deep historical divisions in the Canadian policy landscape: care is traditionally situated as a private, gendered, and a welfare problem, whereas education is seen as a universal public good. Since the early 2000s, the entrenched divide between private care and public education has been challenged by academic, applied and political settings mainly through human capital investment arguments. This perspective allocates scarce public funds to early childhood education and care through a lens narrowly focused on child development outcomes. From the investment perspective, care remains a prerequisite to education rather than a public good in its own right. This chapter seeks to disrupt this neoliberal, human capital discourse that has justified and continues to position care as subordinate to education. Drawing upon the feminist ethics of care scholarship of philosopher Virginia Held, political scientist Joan Tronto, and sociologist Marian Barnes, this chapter reconceptualizes the care in early childhood education and care rooted through four key ideas: (1) Care is a universal and fundamental aspect of all human life. In early childhood settings, young children’s dependency on care is negatively regarded as a limitation, deficit and a burden. In contrast, in educational settings, older children’s growing abilities to engage in self-care and self-regulate is viewed positively. We challenge this dependence/independence dichotomy. (2) Care is more than basic custodial activities. The premise that care is focused on activities concerned with the child’s body and emotions, while education involves activities concerned with the mind, permeates early childhood education and care policy. Drawing on Held’s definition of care as value and practice, we discuss why this mind-body dualism is false. (3) Care in early childhood settings can be evaluated as promoting well-being or, in contradiction to the meaning of care, as delivering poor services that result in harm to young children. We will explore the relevancy of Barnes’s contention that parallel to theorizing about good care in social policy, “we need to be able to recognize care and its absence” through the cultivation of “ethics sensibilities and skills applied in different practices in different contexts.” (4) Care must be central to early childhood education and care policy deliberation. Using Tronto’s concept of a “caring democracy,” we discuss how such deliberation can promote care and the caring responsibilities of educators in early childhood settings, thereby redressing long standing gendered injustices. We argue that these four ideas can be framed in advocacy messages, in ways that bridge the silos of care and education as separate domains and which open up the vision of an integrated early childhood education and care system. A feminist ethics of care perspective offers new possibilities for practitioners, advocates, researchers, and decision-makers to reposition and reclaim care as integral to the politics and policies of early childhood education and care.

In the Canadian policy landscape, care and education have deep historical divisions. Policies related to care have traditionally been constructed as private, gendered, welfare problems, whereas education is conceived as a universal public good. The divisions between care and education can, in part, be attributed to Canada’s welfare state regime. While Canada is often viewed as progressive in its social policy architecture, it is a liberal regime. Liberal regimes are characterized by some redistributive policies, but retain a strong preference for services and supports—particularly those requiring significant investments in affective care such as childcare —provided by markets, the third sector, and even by parents themselves. Currently, upward of 97% of childcare services in Canada operate within a private, market system (under fees for service and little public funding), despite the fact that all Canadian children have access to a public school system beginning at age 4 or 5 (Friendly et al., 2015). Since the early 2000s, expanded state interest and investment in childcare has been articulated and justified predominantly via human capital investment arguments. This perspective considers early childhood education and care (ECEC) ¹ through a lens narrowly focused on child outcomes, wherein care is seen as a prerequisite to education. This neoliberal human capital discourse continues to frame care as subordinate to education.

Drawing upon the feminist ethics of care scholarship of philosopher Virginia Held (2006, 2014), political scientist Joan Tronto (1993, 2013), and sociologist Marian Barnes (2012), we understand care as integral (rather than subordinate to education) to analyses, practices, and policies in ECEC. In an effort to disrupt the neoliberalizing human capital approach to ECEC that flows into and informs practice, politics, and policy, we propose reasserting care in ECEC. Our argument is rooted in four key premises: (1) care is a universal and fundamental aspect of all human life, (2) care involves more than basic custodial activities, (3) care practices can be evaluated; and (4) care must be central to democratic deliberation of ECEC policies. In our view, these four premises cut to the underlying reasons for the devaluation of care in ECEC. We claim that reasserting the premises offers new possibilities for advocates, academics, practitioners, and politicians to reclaim care as integral to the practices, politics, and policies of ECEC.

Central to our conceptual work is the objective of deepening an understanding of care itself. Reflecting in part disciplinary mistranslations, there is relatively little global scholarly consensus on what constitutes care and how best to define and understand it (Barclay et al., 2016; Eichler et al., 2010). Even in classic pieces like Jenson and Sineau’s (2001), Who cares?: Women’s work, childcare, and welfare state redesign, which provide thoughtful gendered analyses of care as “a window onto the modifications occurring in the relationship between the citizen, and the state,” as well as a measure of the (im)balance of responsibility among state, market and community, “care,” itself remains undefined (p. 8). Many scholars assume a shared understanding of the concept and agree that care is relational, usually unequal, and almost always gendered; it is paid and unpaid, affective, and imbued with power relations along various axes (Bezanson, 2015). Care is viewed as a personal and professional practice, a policy puzzle and a necessary aspect of the social reproduction of economic systems. But these agreements often bypass discussions of what care exactly entails. The concept of care is thus vexing, because it operates at many levels and in many settings; we often recognize it when it is absent such as when a child is taken into “care” by child welfare agencies, but its definition is difficult to pin down.

For these reasons, we have turned to feminist ethics of care scholars for their in-depth theorizing of care in everyday practice and its implications for ECEC politics and policy. Held (2006) locates the origins of feminist ethics of care in the 1980 essay written by American philosopher, Sara Ruddick. Ruddick (1995) argued that mothering yields a distinctive moral outlook. But she was cautious about generalizing maternal thinking to other practices, stating that “[there are] distinctive kinds of thinking [that] arise from these different activities” and “it is disrespectful to each kind of thinking and to the rationality of care as a whole to combine the varieties of thinking without attempting to describe them individually and mark their connections and differences” (Ruddick, 1995: 47). Following Ruddick’s recommendation, and drawing on feminist ethics of care scholars, we are interested in how we can rethink care and revalorize its importance in ECEC. We maintain that the concept of care requires more nuanced elucidation in order to position and claim it as integral to the practices, politics, and policies of ECEC.

Care is a universal and fundamental aspect of all human life

All care scholars agree that care of dependent others is a universal and fundamental aspect of all human life (Barnes, 2012). Held (2006) states that

the ethics of care recognizes that human beings are dependent for many years of their lives, that the moral claim of those dependent on us for the care they need is pressing, and that there are highly important moral aspects in development the relations of caring that enable human beings to live and progress. (p. 10)

However, human dependency is usually regarded in contemporary society as a “flawed condition or problem” (Tronto, 2013: 31). Inheriting a moral frame stemming from a British Poor Laws approach to work and concomitant states of “legitimate” dependency, liberal regimes construct people as independent and autonomous actors with undesirable dependency being seen as a transitory condition to be remedied. This paradigm is consequential in early childhood educator practice. Many educators focus on ensuring that highly dependent children become independent over time through developmental progression. Thus, in early childhood settings, young children’s dependence on care is often regarded as a limitation, deficit, and a burden. Many features and tools from age-segregated groupings to developmental checklists reflect the goal of independence for young children.

The care on which children depend is rendered largely invisible, undervalued, and “naturally” and inevitably assigned to adult women (Picchio, 1992). Unequal relations of care inflect the image of early childhood as a dependent state, dichotomously contrasted to the independence often desired or expected to come with “education.” Young children are expected to outgrow the need for care as they transition from ECEC settings into primary education. Older children are expected to engage in self-care and to self-regulate so that educators can focus on their minds. Resonant with neoliberal social and policy norms, this focus on independence strips care of its status and sublimates its value for human beings at all times in their lives.

This valorization of independence is also evident in parental attitudes. Dill (2015) opens his article in Society with the declaration that “parents want independent children” (p. 150). He explains that parents’ desire for independent children is an indication that they seek to instill autonomy, independence, and self-fulfillment in their children in order to prepare them for “an individualistic age” (Dill, 2015: 150). Schools and “proper parenting” are expected to take children from a state where they are in constant need of care, to one of independence, in which they have the ability to think and care for themselves. ² Dill (2015: 150) explains that many parents “hold an ideal of American individualism understood as expressing yourself and being happy. The child-as-individual should be the arbiter of what this happiness is and how to achieve it.” Rubin (2012) makes a similar statement, broadening to argue that democratic cultures champion the values of self-discipline, responsibility, and independence. He adds that the denial of autonomy “fuels feelings of helplessness” (Rubin, 2012: 43). When done well, “proper schooling” by skilled educators is, then, seen as the vehicle for the move from early childhood dependence on being cared for by (unskilled/nurturing) others, toward independence, self-reliance, and ultimately, happiness.

In contrast to the championing of persons as independent and autonomous beings, feminist ethics of care scholars, such as Held (2006), characterize “persons as relational and interdependent, morally and epistemologically” (p. 13). Held (2006) continues: “every person starts out as a child dependent on those providing us care, and we remain interdependent with others in thoroughly fundamental ways throughout our lives” (pp. 13–14). In naming dependency as fundamental to the human condition (Barnes, 2012), we must then question why the care and education divide persists. If we are all dependents in need of care across our lives, it is the period of purported autonomy and independence that is the exception. ³ The disability rights movement captures this awareness in their notion that some of us are “temporarily able-bodied.”

Tronto (2013) expresses something similar: the “quality of being needy is shared by all humans” and we all have an “equal capacity to voice needs” (p. 29). Based on this perspective, it is not possible to claim that caring for the needs of children ceases when they enter formal schooling. The notion that older children in schools are independent is simply false. In reality, like all human beings, they have an “interdependent reliance” on educators ⁴ “to help them meet their caring needs” (Tronto, 2013: 29). In connecting care and education, educational philosopher, Nel Noddings (2016) sets out four major components of caring for children: educators model care, educators and children dialogue about caring, educators and children practice care, and educators engage in confirmation—“the act of affirming and encouraging the best in others” (p. 232). Noddings (2016) summarizes the vision of a caring education as follows:

The ethic of care rejects the notion of a truly autonomous moral agent and accepts the reality of moral interdependence. Our goodness and our growth are inextricably bound to that of others we encounter. As teachers, we are as dependent on our students as they are on us. (p. 237)

Noddings’ vision reinforces and understanding that dependency does not cease at the arbitrary threshold between care and education. This understanding shakes up the entrenched notion that the care of dependent children is unique to early childhood. The implication is that the care needs of young children like those of older children and adults warrants serious public attention and deliberation. Central to these deliberations are the purposes of early childhood services and how they can be sufficiently achieved. One such purpose is the provision of care that holistically fosters the well-being and flourishing of children. We, therefore, turn to an exploration of the nature of this care.

Care involves more than basic custodial activities

Custodial care is defined as assistance with the activities of daily life for children who are unable to fully do these activities without help. While we recognize that such care is necessary for children’s well-being, we challenge the myth that care in early childhood settings is predominantly focused on activities concerned with children’s bodies and emotions, whereas education involves activities focused on the mind. Additionally, we dispute the narrow concept of children’s needs as primarily related to bodies and emotions in early childhood settings. Rather, we conceptualize children’s needs more broadly to encompass their bodies, feelings, ideas, goals, concerns, and desires. Feminist care scholars’ descriptions of care as value and practice show why the mind–body dualism is problematic and incomplete.

From Held’s perspective, the valuing and practice of care can only exist within relations with others. Held (2006) contends, however, that it is insufficient to just “observe and describe” care; rather, we need an ethics of care so that “various aspects and expressions of care and caring relations are subjected to moral scrutiny and evaluated” (p. 11). In caring ethically, we regard the child as a unique person and rely in our responses on a dynamic understanding of the child’s needs rather than on universal rules and their implied duties (Held, 2006: 20). Care is thus always relational, and in early childhood settings can be seen as the multiple interactions between early childhood educators and children that take place all day, every day. In this way, care flows into and out of every interaction, and it involves children’s minds as well as bodies. Care is the early childhood educator’s way of being and acting, and, in this state, care and education become synonymous (Moss, 2014). Care, therefore, involves much more than basic custodial activities that are only concern children’s physical (bodies) and emotional needs. This rethinking of care counters “the hierarchical position in which children gradually ‘grow out’ of a more primitive stage of physical care to enter the more ‘human’ world of learning” (Van Laere et al., 2014: 237). Van Laere et al. (2014: 237) maintain that the mind-body dualism has serious material and societal implications for early childhood educators given that the “divide exists between highly qualified and better-paid women who are responsible for the ‘mind’, and lower-qualified women with a more invisible position and who are responsible for the ‘body’.” Countering this divide, care scholars argue that both the intellect and the body are engaged in ethical care. Held (2006: 26) writes that prior to the emergence of ethics of care literature and theorizing, in the early 1980s, women were portrayed “as reacting emotionally … they were not associated with reasoning and thinking, certainly not with the possibility that there might be distinctive and valid forms of moral thought to which they privileged access through their extensive experience with caring.” With the development of care ethics as a moral theory, reasoning and thinking in care has assumed a greater importance.

For Held (2006), emotions such as “sympathy, empathy, sensitivity and responsiveness” are central to an ethics of care (pp. 10–11). But ethical deliberation involving practices such as consideration of the particular context for care and communication with the care receiver about their needs and goals is also necessary because emotions can become “misguided” and potentially lead to paternalism and excessive control. Pettersen (2008) also emphasizes that the caring response is not simply a “spontaneous and affective reaction” based on “selfless” care (p. 59). She states that

mature care is based on a reflection of how to act in order to prevent harm or restore health and promote well-being and flourishing in human interaction. Mature care can be understood as a cultivatable, relational virtue with social, intellectual and moral aspects. (Pettersen, 2008: 59)

As Hamington (2015) describes it, care is embodied action through which we physically, emotionally, and intellectually care for others. Pacini-Ketchabaw et al. (2015) eloquently put it another way: early childhood “practice … calls for total engagement of heart, mind and spirit in intensely relational encounters” (p. 173). This engagement should not stop in the early years but flourish throughout the full arc of childhood.

In practicing care, scholars particularly highlight the need for dialogue and inquiry in the giving of care. Communication in care interactions is necessary because the perspective of the caregiver and the care receiver are equally important. Moreover, in evaluating an early childhood educator–child interaction as care or as completed, the child, viewed as a competent agent, must respond positively to the care in some way. An early childhood educator must recognize that a child could reject the care and that flexibility and an openness to change is necessary for future caring relations with the child. According to Barnes (2012), when a care receiver rejects care, it “cannot be completed” (p.170) and cannot be regarded as care. Such an outcome reinforces the need to intentionally evaluate caring practices.

Care practices can be evaluated

Evaluating care practices is critical in a field in which the care of young children is taken-for- granted, and simply regarded as something given or delivered to children by women who naturally possess caring abilities. One observer ruefully observed that early childhood providers are too-often seen simply as “nice ladies who love children” (cited in Cook et al., 2017: 45). This care is unquestioningly regarded as “good,” because “bad” care is generally only assessed as the absence of care (we often think of “no care” as the only form of “bad” care). From Barnes’ (2012: 6) perspective, “we need to be able to recognize care and its absence” through the promotion of “ethics sensibilities and skills applied in different practices in different contexts.” Noddings (2016: 73) explains that care can be given, but it may not necessarily be “caring,” as described in care ethics. For this reason, the intention of the evaluation of care is not to layer notions of quality on it or measure it in some way but rather for educators to individually and collectively consider why and how care can be central to their interactions with children across all activities. This implies thoughtful consideration of the relationship between the complexity of interactions in an activity (i.e. from pedagogical to assisting children with conflicts) and the richness of the care provided. In other words, when an activity fully involves children, takes their perspectives, goals, and needs seriously and encourages sustained educator–child interactions and communications, there are many more opportunities for deeper kind of care described by care ethicists.

In the context of early childhood settings, Dahlberg and Moss (2005) note that early childhood educators make ethical judgments in their pedagogical (broadly understood as everything in a program) work that can and should be nurtured and improved. They explain that judgment “is a quality constantly to be worked upon, not a technique to be mastered” (Dahlberg and Moss, 2005: 90). Dahlberg and Moss’ (2005) use of judgment indicates that even good care is provisional, understood as particular to context, and reflective of the early childhood educator’s negotiated interpretation of children’s needs, goals, and ideas. Such care always remains open for further discussion within caring relations. This evaluative stance is particularly important because care relations between adults and children are asymmetrical in terms of need and ability to exercise power. This asymmetry plays out in early childhood educators’ misreadings and misinterpretations of children’s needs, interests, concerns, and goals, and in missed opportunities for early childhood educators to fully and genuinely give care and for children to meaningfully respond to the care received. Barnes (2012: 172) reminds us, however, that in evaluating care we need to be mindful that early childhood educators deal with a range of institutional constraints. This can include policy contexts that do not reflect the values of care that make care even harder to do than it already is.

Tronto (2010: 165) sets out the criteria of attentiveness, responsibility, competence, responsiveness, solidarity, and trust by which we can judge care itself as well as caring institutions such as early childhood settings. She identifies seven warning signs that institutions are not caring well, two of which are particularly relevant to our discussion: the perspectives of the care receivers (the children) are not considered and care is reduced to the simple giving of care without ethical deliberation. However, Noddings (2016: 83), in some disagreement with Tronto, states that institutions cannot care directly—caring, in other words, is always interpersonal. Nevertheless, Noddings (2016) indicates that institutions can “provide and support the conditions under which caring relations can prosper” (p. 83).

In these last two sections, we explore the nature of ethical care practices and the evaluation of these practices in early childhood settings. From our perspective, the importance of providing a rich account of what ethical care is and looks like in early childhood settings cannot be underestimated. If the care of young children is to be taken seriously by the public and government we need to be able to explain the complexities of ethical care. Furthermore, we have to be able to articulate the ethical significance of the presence and absence of care in practices and institutional settings. Without these accounts in ECEC policy deliberation, old and stale views about care in ECEC will remain.

Care must be central to ECEC policy deliberation

That care is much more than simply custodial/bodily maintenance and is in fact a central component of the human condition instantiates opportunities and challenges for policy/political deliberation. In the contemporary Canadian context, ECEC policy has been very much entwined with the neoliberal human capital frame—a political conceptualization of care philosopher Joan Tronto’s (2015) challenges. Tronto’s (2015) call for a “caring democracy” extends her earlier work describing the process of care (caring about, caring for, care-giving, and care-receiving), to include caring on a macro level through introducing the concept of caring with. In Tronto’s (2015) own words, caring with necessitates a commitment to “justice, equality and freedom from all” (p. 23), whereby a

free society makes people free to care … an equal society gives people equal change to be well cared for and to engage in caring relationships … and a just society is one in one whereby economic life supports care rather than the other way around. (p. 170)

She claims that democratic caring is “better caring” (Tronto, 2015: 155) in that it benefits by being done by more people, fosters a sense of common purpose and responsibility among citizens and create a less hierarchical (therefore more responsive) care experiences on the micro and macro level.

Congruent with Tronto (2015) who emphasizes the centrality of caring to a democratic social order, Barnes (2012) situates an ethics of care perspective as central to the policy process. Barnes (2012) problematizes traditional theories of democratic deliberation based on the rational, “competent” political actor. Instead she advocates for “care full” deliberation wherein political actors are conceptualized as interdependent, affective beings who are embedded in existing (and often hegemonic) power relationships. Barnes (2012) asserts that competence in political deliberation be extended beyond the rational, cognitive model to include affective competence—“the way in which we express our awareness of another’s hurt, shame and needs in the context of deliberation about policies that are intended to response to such experiences” (p. 164).

The ideas of Tronto and Barnes carry significant weight in the context of ECEC policy in Canada. As pointed out above, the outcome of ECEC experiences is too often considered to be “independent individuals,” whereby autonomy, self-discipline, and needlessness become precursors to “success” (defined in solely economic terms). Being vulnerable and receiving care is seen as a deficiency rather than a fundamental aspect of human existence. In this way, young children—who are in need of constant care—are conceptualized as lesser-than, needy, and burdensome. Logically flowing from this, providing care (in this case early childhood educators) in contemporary Canada is understood as a barrier to production rather than the core of production (Bezanson and Luxton, 2006). With these hegemonic and negative understandings of vulnerability and interdependence, there is very little opportunity for progressive public policy pursing high-quality care services where educators are valued.

The problem is made all the more complex by the fact that the space for democratic deliberation has historically, and continues to be, closed off from educators and children in ECEC. Setting aside the fact that children have never been meaningfully included in democratic policy deliberation in Canada, early childhood educators in the formal sectors (who are predominantly female) continue to be extremely devalued, marginalized, and absent in a political sphere, whereby care is conceptualized as counter-to rather than central-to a functioning democracy. The cognitive and communicative competencies described by Barnes as central to democratic deliberation continue to overshadow the affective competences that are essential to giving and receiving care. ⁵ In this way, it is not particularly surprising that early childhood educators are largely absent from the policy discussions pertaining to essential ECEC services. Additionally it is rare that the care and education sectors are brought together to deliberate about what divides them and how policies can reflect an integrated system.

In Ontario, where over 50,000 ECECs are registered with the Ontario College of Early Childhood Educators, the Association of Early Childhood Educators of Ontario—the organization dedicated to bringing the interests of professional early childhood educators to the political sphere—has only 2000 members. A caring democratic approach would instantiate a specific effort on the part of the government to include ECEs and other caregivers in the policy process. Genuine efforts to include ECEC stakeholders would seek to engage educators (and potentially children as care receivers) in creative and innovative ways (i.e. beyond town hall consultations, written submissions) that draw on the strengths and experiences of educators and receivers.

Advocating for the reassertion of care in ECEC politics and policies

The four premises discussed in this article are regularly foregrounded in advocacy frames, in ways that can be understood to assert the centrality of care to ECEC policies. Canada’s childcare advocacy organizations persistently argue for a relational and communitarian approach to childcare policy and practice, although the specific arguments and campaigns have varied over time and across organizations at different scales (Prentice, 2001). Without exception, however, advocates insist that care is universal and fundamental reality (premise 1); that early childhood care and education is much more than custodial practice (premise 2); that it can be evaluated (although forms of evaluation may vary), and should result in high quality (premise 3); and that it can contribute to more equitable, solidaristic, and democratic social relations (closely linked to premise 4). While advocacy groups have not always explicitly asserted the centrality of care, it appears in their analyses and campaigns.

Advocates directly contest the idea that care is a secondary practice and that it can be adequately dealt with by the market. Most obviously, advocacy groups have long campaigned against commercial childcare services (for an overview, see Prentice, 2005). In arguing that “Kids are not for profit” (Prentice, 1988), advocacy groups register their strong opposition to the notion care should be thought of in market and commodity terms. This protest begins with opposition to commercial care, and goes further to argue for a conception of childcare as a public good. A high-profile community-led campaign in British Columbia (BC) is currently advancing a comprehensive proposal for how to reorganize childcare delivery in Canada’s western-most province. Their plan, the “Community Plan for a Public System of Integrated Early Care and Learning,” is nicknamed the “$10aDay Plan.” It calls for ECEC to be integrated into the provincial system of education. The Coalition of Child Care Advocates of BC (2017) has explained that non-profit childcare “is a public service—just like education and health care. It is in the public interest, must be publicly funded and publicly accountable in its governance, and community based in its service delivery.”

This understanding is widely shared. Since 1981, for example, the Ontario Coalition for Better Child Care (2017) has promoted “universal, affordable, high quality, not-for-profit child care in Ontario” and the Child Care Coalition of Manitoba (2017) advances a vision of “fully accessible, publicly-funded, non-profit” comprehensive and high-quality services, with worthy wages and good working conditions for staff. The Child Care Advocacy Association of Canada (2017) is likewise dedicated to “to promoting a publicly funded, inclusive, quality, non-profit child care system.” These grassroots advocacy organizations assert the right of all Canadian children and families to the care that they need, as do Canada’s professional associations (Langford et al., 2013).

In asserting a right to care, advocates seek to do right by children, by their parents and families and by the educators who provide the early childhood care and education. In classical economic terms, buyers and sellers have antagonistic interests in the caveat emptor market of buyer beware. Advocates for early childhood reject this paradigm, seeing children and parents (“buyers,” “consumers,” or “customers” in neoliberal terms) and educators and administrators (“sellers” in the market model) as constituting a different kind of relationship, one not organized by market relations. As the 2016 Canadian national Shared Framework for Building an Early Childhood Education and Care System for All explained, “ECEC is a public good and a human right, not a commodity” (Child Care Advocacy Association of Canada, 2016: 1).

In their practice, most provincial and national advocacy organizations are increasingly promoting an integrated vision of care and education (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, 2001). In a 2016 joint statement, numerous Canadian equity-seeking organizations endorsed the Shared Framework, which argued for the importance of “seamlessly incorporating care and early childhood education in a strong and equal partnership” (Child Care Advocacy Association of Canada, 2016: 1). In 2013 in Manitoba, the grassroots Child Care Coalition of Manitoba and the professional association, the Manitoba Child Care Association, jointly called for system redesign using this Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) language. They identified the split as a “core weakness” of Manitoba’s childcare policy architecture (CCCM and MCCA, 2013), and called for a provincial Commission to plan the reform. Other advocates have taken a similar tack, including the BC coalition, which has called for childcare to be integrated into the Ministry of Education.

Across Canada, all equity-seeking advocacy groups working to redress the childcare crisis of high fees, poor access, and a patchwork of services have foregrounded the importance of changing the conditions under which early childhood educators provide care for young children. Provincial and national groups stress that quality of the system depends on early childhood educators, who deserve to be well-educated, well-respected and fairly compensated. Under slogans such as “worthy wages for worthy work” and “professional pay and decent work,” they work to link the quality of children’s care to the material conditions of educators. In these campaigns, social movements could reassert the complexities of care work as they seek to build public support for better ECEC workforce policies.

Conclusion

Our aim in this article has been to propose four premises that we maintain have the potential to reposition and reassert care in ECEC. We have described and developed these premises to lay bare and challenge deeply entrenched and negative attitudes about care in ECEC. In questioning notions that dependency is a “flawed condition” (Tronto, 2013), that care is simply custodial, and that care is always good, we have attempted to reverse conventional notions of care. Drawing on feminist ethics of care scholars, we argued that dependency is the human condition. We have illuminated the actual processes of caring ethically for children that go well beyond custodial care and highlighted the need to ethically evaluate this care in order to enhance children’s participation in caring processes and promote their well-being and flourishing. We have argued that this deeper appreciation of care also appears in many Canadian advocacy campaigns.

Shifting from practice to policy, we argued that care should and can be central to ECEC policy deliberation. Canadian childcare advocates have challenged the displacement of care in ECEC and pushed for care’s inclusion in policy deliberation. In proposing four premises, our intention is to find richer ideas, discourses, and messages to assert in advocacy work. Our proposal is motivated by a vision of our country as a caring society. We imagined a time when a young child’s dependency on others is celebrated as preparation for a lifetime of interdependency; when the complex caring work of early childhood educators is visible and obvious; when evaluation of caring practices and institutions reflects the values of ethical care; and when care is an integral part of ECEC policy deliberations. Until that time, we need new ways to reposition and reassert care in ECEC; it is our hope that the four premises discussed here may serve as one way.