ABSTRACT
Each of the preceding four chapters has been concerned with examining the quality of social rights attached to paid work, care and transitions between periods of paid work and care-giving within one of our four country-groupings. Alternative methods of structuring the study were, of course, open to us. Most obviously, we could have elected to examine the four groups concurrently along each of the three dimensions of the policy environment. There is a number of disadvantages inherent, however, in such an approach. Thus, for example, it can impose severe limitations on the depth and detail of a study, particularly when there is a large number of cases. More critically for the present study, it can also restrict the degree to which it is possible to observe individual policies in the context of the complete policy package, and hence to capture interactions between each element of that package. An attempt to overcome such drawbacks was central, therefore, to our decision to analyse each group of countries separately.
