Week 8 - Nancy Fraser Crisis of Care? On the Social-Reproductive Contradictions of Contemporary Capitalism

Question 1

Crisis of care

Answer 1

An expression of the social-reproductive contradictions of financialized capitalism. Refers to the pressures from several directions that are currently squeezing a key set of social capacities: the capacities available for birthing and raising children, caring for friends and family members, maintaining households and broader communities, and sustaining connections more generally.

Question 2

Social reproductive contradiction

Answer 2

On the one hand, social reproduction is a condition of possibility for sustained capital accumulation; on the other hand, capitalism’s orientation to unlimited accumulation tends to destabilize the very processes of social reproduction on which it relies. This “social-reproductive contradiction of capitalism” lies at the root, I claim, of our so-called crisis of care