Sara Eldén
Professor

Presentation

My research focuses on close relationships, care, and social reproduction. I am particularly interested in how transformations of the Swedish welfare state over recent decades, through privatization, retrenchment, globalization, and the growth of precarious work, have created new inequalities in everyday care practices, shaped by gender, class, and ethnicity. Empirically, I have studied family practices in households employing au pairs and nannies, the marketization of eldercare, and intergenerational care relations. I also research sibling relationships, including the experiences of younger siblings in criminalized environments and sibling narratives across the life course. In addition, I have contributed to the development of theories and methodologies for understanding and capturing the complexity of care, not least from children's perspectives.