Equal status and equal opportunities for individuals caring for children in labour relations in the Czech Republic and selected European countries

1 Summary The focus of the thesis are the issues of equal status and equal opportunities for individuals caring for children, i.e., mothers and fathers, as this is an important topic of the current society and working relationships. The reason for that is the gradual transition from the classical family model of the father-breadwinner and the mother-caregiver to a modern dual-breadwinner model, with a significantly more equal position of women in society, in which both parents want to be involved both in the care and upbringing of their children as well as in the working environment. This work compares legal regulations of the Czech Republic and the Nordic countries, namely Finland, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, and Iceland, whose family policies are described in the introductory chapters. Nordic countries have a rather specific approach in the area of family policy leading to a gender-neutral state where gender plays almost no role. They are focused on creating a fairly equal society with a pro-father approach in the form of a strong involvement of men in childcare and education. The other side of such equality is the emergence of discrimination, described in detail in the third chapter. The support of families and their involvement in working life has given rise to a new discriminatory reason in labour law..