Freedom, desire and power: Gender processes and presumptions of shared care and responsibility after parental separation

SynopsisThis paper reports the findings of a small empirical study of separated couples who share the care of their children in a fifty-fifty arrangement of time. The study is set against a backdrop of family law reform in Australia over the past decade which has shifted legal and custodial frameworks towards a presumption of ongoing joint (shared) parental responsibility for children post-separation and divorce. It examines the relationship between separated parents' attitudes to parental responsibility and their sharing practices, and reveals that, despite suggestions to the contrary, attitudes towards responsibility and sharing practices remain highly gendered. In negotiating what constitutes parental responsibility and care, a fifty-fifty sharing of time does not simply translate into an equal sharing of parental responsibility.