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Capabilities Eroded And Childcare Dilemmas: A Phenomenological Study Of Low-Income Single Student Mothers In Higher Education In The United States And Germany, Katja Robinson

Master's Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

The purpose of this phenomenological study was to explore the lifeworlds of low-income, single student mothers in two contrasting welfare regimes, the United States and Germany, to understand how their individual experiences as students and as mothers at the micro-level were shaped by policies regarding childcare and financial support at the macro-level. As single mothers represent a marginalized constituency, the capabilities approach in combination with the concept of defamilisation was used as an analytical framework that focused on their individual and social well-being. The objective of this cross-national study was to provide a deeper understanding of how the issues of …