The Business of Fatherhood: Professional Fathers\u27 Parental Leave Experience in the U.S. and Sweden

This project examines the cultural differences and similarities between middle class professional fathers in the U.S. and Sweden. These men face extremely different state structured programs, which may or may not provide benefits to ease the pressures of the early years of parenthood. We might expect that differences in welfare state policies result in differences in how people experience parenthood. On the other hand, some welfare state policies of more recent origin may reflect common gendered dynamics. Although experiencing different cultural norms and structures, these fathers’ experiences look relatively similar, their experiences with the family, their descriptions of their role as fathers, and the everyday tension between work and home. Their experiences diverge more in the time taken off work and therefore what they do in the more or less extended time and also the systems of support on which they rely. In order to combat the conflicting cultural expectations of their identities of father and worker, men in both countries use traditionally masculine business-centric language to rationalize their parent- and work-decisions