Policy change and partisan politics: understanding family policy differentiation in two similar countries

Abstract

This article looks at how different electoral competition dynamics can result in differentiated party positioning on childcare and family policy. Italy and Spain are compared using a most similar case design. The presence of women in politics, the socioeconomic profiles of the voters of the two main left-wing and right-wing Italian and Spanish parties, and opinions on traditional norms of motherhood explain different policy trajectories and higher incentives for the conservative party in Spain to converge toward the social democratic party in more progressive views of family policy.