Abstract
In this contribution to the handbook we consider the concept of ‘opting in’. Opting in is a process through which women seek ways of working on their own terms and creating alternative definitions of success, placing priority on the well-being of themselves and their family. Our analysis and arguments challenge the contemporary and lively debates on ‘opting out’ which have been dominated by debates about women who leave their careers altogether to be with their children. We examine the experiences of professional women who choose to leave high-level careers to pursue specific interests, through the case studies of four women from Finland and the United States. For these women, opting in has involved a journey to new lifestyles where work and other areas of life can be combined, where they have more power over their time, and where they can achieve a sense of coherence, which in turn enhances their well-being.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Notes
- 1.
In Finland all employees accumulate 2.5 days vacation (2 days for individuals who have been employed less than a year) for every month worked. This makes a total of 30 days vacation per year (http://www.erto.fi/tyosuhdeopas/vuosiloma/vuosiloman-ansaitseminen).
- 2.
References
Acker, J. (2006). Inequality regimes: Gender, class and race in organizations. Gender & Society, 20(4), 441–464.
Baruch, Y. (2004). Transforming careers: From linear to multidimensional career paths. Organizational and individualized perspectives. Career Development International, 9, 58–73.
Bauman, Z. (1991). Modernity and ambivalence. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.
Beck, U. (1994). The reinvention of politics: Towards a theory of reflexive modernization. In U. Beck, A. Giddens, & S. Lash (Eds.), Reflexive modernization: Politics, tradition and aesthetics in modern social order (pp. 1–55). Cambridge: Polity Press.
Beck, U., & Beck-Gernsheim, E. (2002). Individualization. London: Sage.
Belkin, L. (2003, October 26). The opt-out revolution. The New York Times Sunday Magazine, Sec 6, 42.
Benn, M. (1998). Madonna and child: Politics of modern motherhood. London: Vintage.
Boushey, H. (2005). Are women opting out? Debunking the myth. Center for Economic and Policy Research, Briefing Paper.
Boushey, H. (2008). ‘Opting out?’ The effect of children on women’s employment in the United States. Feminist Economics, 14, 1–36.
Burrows, G. (2013). Men can do it. Croydon: NGO Media.
Crompton, R. (2001). Gender, comparative research and biographical matching. European Societies, 3(2), 167–190.
Durbin, S., & Tomlinson, J. (2010). Female part-time managers: Networks and career mobility. Work, Employment and Society, 24(4), 621–640.
Elliott, A. (2013). Reinvention. London: Routledge.
Elliott, A., & Lemert, C. (2006). The new individualism: The emotional costs of globalization. London: Routledge.
Frosh, S., Phoenix, A., & Pattman, R. (2003). The trouble with boys. The Psychologist, 16, 84–87.
Giddens, A. (1994). Living in a post-traditional society. In U. Beck, A. Giddens, & S. Lash (Eds.), Reflexive modernization: Politics, tradition and aesthetics in modern social order (pp. 55–109). Cambridge: Polity Press.
Giddens, A. (1999). Runaway world: How globalisation in reshaping our lives. London: Profile Books.
Hirschman, L. (2006). Get to work: A manifesto for women of the world. New York: Penguin.
Hofmeister, H., Blossfeld, H.-P., & Mills, M. (2006). Globalization, uncertainty and women’s mid-career life courses: A theoretical framework. In H.-P. Blossfeld & H. Hofmeister (Eds.), Globalization, uncertainty and women’s careers: An international comparison (pp. 3–31). Gloucester: Edward Elgar Publishing Limited.
Hollway, W., & Jefferson, T. (2000). Doing qualitative research differently: Free association, narrative and the interview method. London: Sage.
Jones, B. D. (2012). Introduction: Women, work, and motherhood in American history. In B. D. Jones (Ed.), Women who opt out: The debate over working mothers and work-family balance (pp. 3–30). New York: New York University Press.
Josselson, R. (1995). Imagining the real: Empathy, narrative and the dialogic self. In R. Josselson & A. Lieblich (Eds.), The narrative study of lives (Vol. 3, pp. 24–27). London: Sage.
Jyrkinen, M., & McKie, L. (2012). Gender, age and ageism: Experiences of women managers in two EU countries. Work, Employment and Society, 26(1), 61–77.
Kerber, L. (1980). Women of the republic: Intellect and ideology in voluntary America. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.
Lane, R. E. (2000). The loss of happiness in market democracies. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Laverty, K. J. (1996). Economic “short-termism”: The debate, the unresolved issues, and the implications for management practice and research. The Academy of Management Review, 21(3), 825–860.
Lyly-Yrjänäinen, M., & Fernández Macías, E. (2009). Women mangers in hierarchical structures in working life. Dublin: European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Condition. http://www.eurofound.europa.eu/publications/htmlfiles/ef08103.htm. Accessed 17 Feb 2012.
Mainiero, L. A., & Sullivan, S. E. (2006). The opt-out revolt: Why people are leaving companies to create kaleidoscope careers. Mountain View: Davies Black Publishing.
Maynard, D., & Feldman, D. (2011). Underemployment: Psychological, economic and social challenges. New York: Springer.
McKie, L., & Callan, S. (2012). Understanding families: A global introduction. London: Sage.
McKie, L., Biese, I., & Jyrkinen, M. (2013). “The best time is now!”: The temporal and spatial dynamics of women opting in to self-employment. Gender, Work and Organization, 20(2), 184–196.
Miller, D. C., & Salkind, N. J. (2002). Handbook of research design and social measurement (6th ed.). Thousand Oaks: Sage.
Misra, J. (2012). Care work and women’s employment: A comparative perspective. In B. Jones (Ed.), Women who opt out: The debate over working mothers and work-family balance (pp. 137–147). New York: New York University Press.
Organisation of Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). (2012, May 23–24). Gender equality in education, employment and entrepreneurship: Final Report to the Meeting of the OECD Council at Ministerial Level, Paris.
Parent-Thirion, A., Fernández Macías, E., Hurley, J., & Vermeylen, G. (2007). Fourth European work conditions survey. Dublin: European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions. http://www.eurofound.europa.eu/publications/htmlfiles/ef0698.htm. Accessed 25 Jan 2010.
Percheski, C. (2008). Opting out? Cohort differences in professional women’s employment rates from 1960 to 2005. American Sociological Review, 73(3), 497–517.
Ragin, C. (1987). The comparative method: Moving beyond qualitative and quantitative strategies. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Sennett, R. (1998). The corrosion of character. New York: W.W. Norton & Company.
Sennett, R. (2006). The culture of the new capitalism. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Statistics Finland. (2013, June). Labour Force Survey. http://www.stat.fi/til/tyti/2013/06/tyti_2013_06_2013-07-23_tie_001_en.html. Accessed 1 Aug 2013.
Stone, P., & Hernandez, L. A. (2012). The rhetoric and reality of opting out: Toward a better understanding of professional women’s decisions to head home. In B. D. Jones (Ed.), Women who opt out: The debate over working mothers and work-family balance (pp. 33–56). New York: New York University Press.
Stone, P., & Lovejoy, M. (2004). Fast-track women and the “choice” to stay home. Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 596, 61–83.
Sturges, J. (2013). A matter of time: Young professionals’ experiences of long work hours. Work Employment & Society, 27(2), 351–367.
Sullivan, S., & Mainiero, L. (2007). Women’s kaleidoscope careers: A new framework for examining women’s stress across the lifespan. In P. Perrewé & D. Ganster (Eds.), Exploring the work and non-work interface (Research in occupational stress and well-being, Vol. 6, pp. 205–238). Bingley: Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
Tomlinson, J. (2011). Gender equality and the state: A review of recent EU developments’, Special issue: Bringing the state back in? The state and human resource management. International Journal of Human Resource Management, 22(18), 3755–3774.
Walby, S., Armstrong, J., & Humphreys, L. (2008). Review of equality statistics. Equality and Human Rights Commission. http://www.equalityhumanrights.com/uploaded_files/research/1__review_of_equality_statistics_241008.pdf. Accessed 1 Aug 2013.
Warner, J. (2005). Perfect madness: Motherhood in the age of anxiety. New York: Riverhead Books.
Williams, C. L. (1991). Case studies and the sociology of gender. In A. Orum et al. (Eds.), A case for the case study (pp. 224–244). Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.
Williams, J., & Boushey, H. (2010). Three faces of work-family conflict. The poor, the professionals and the missing middle. Washington, DC: Center for WorkLifeLaw.
Williams, J. C., Manvell, J., & Bornstein, S. (2006). ‘Opt-out’ or pushed out?: How the press covers work/family conflict, work life law report. San Francisco: UC Hastings College of the Law.
Wolf, A. (2013). The XX factor: How working women are creating a new society. London: Profile Books.
World Health Organisation. (1946). Preamble to the Constitution of the World Health Organization as adopted by the International Health Conference, New York, 19–22 June, 1946; signed on 22 July 1946 by the representatives of 61 States (Official Records of the World Health Organization, no. 2, p. 100) and entered into force on 7 April 1948.
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank Lidia Galabova, Technical University, Sofia, Bulgaria for her insightful comments on the varied and multi-faceted meanings of success for professional men and women.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2016 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Biese, I., McKie, L. (2016). Opting In: Women in Search of Well-Being. In: Connerley, M., Wu, J. (eds) Handbook on Well-Being of Working Women. International Handbooks of Quality-of-Life. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-9897-6_29
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-9897-6_29
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-94-017-9896-9
Online ISBN: 978-94-017-9897-6
eBook Packages: Social SciencesSocial Sciences (R0)