ABSTRACT
Anyone visiting a bookstore in Western Europe or the United States in the last 10 or 15 years might emerge with the idea that arrangements for nonparental childcare represented a new set of problems. In fact, decisions and arrangements about children’s care and supervision are among the oldest problems faced by human society. The fact that they have not been frequently discussed says more about the failure of the men with political and intellectual power to discuss a women’s issue than about the novelty of the issues themselves.
