Front Matter....Pages i-xi
Introduction: Path-dependencies and Change in Child-care and Preschool Institutions in Europe β Historical and Institutional Perspectives....Pages 1-22
Public Child Care in Europe: Historical Trajectories and New Directions....Pages 23-42
How and Why Belgium Became a Pioneer of Preschool Development....Pages 43-56
Public Child Care and Preschools in France: New Policy Paradigm and Path-dependency....Pages 57-71
Child Care in Spain after 1975: the Educational Rationale, the Catholic Church, and Women in Civil Society....Pages 72-87
The Paradox of Public Preschools in a Familist Welfare Regime: the Italian Case....Pages 88-104
Public and Private: the History of Early Education and Care Institutions in the United Kingdom....Pages 105-125
Danish Child-Care Policies within Path β Timing, Sequence, Actors and Opportunity Structures....Pages 126-141
Child Care as an Issue of Equality and Equity: The Example of the Nordic Countries....Pages 142-156
The Politics of (De)centralisation: Early Care and Education in France and Sweden....Pages 157-179
Slow Motion β Institutional Factors as Obstacles to the Expansion of Early Childhood Education in the FRG....Pages 180-195
Private Family and Institutionalised Public Care for Young Children in Germany and the United States, 1857β1933: An Analysis of Pedagogical Discourses....Pages 196-209
Maternalism and Truncated Professionalism β Historical Perspectives on Kindergarten Teachers....Pages 210-221
Money Matters β Experiments in Financing Public Child Care....Pages 222-233
Basic Legal Principles of Public Responsibility for Children....Pages 234-246
Back Matter....Pages 247-249