In recent decades, many OECD countries have adopted the notion of "social investment" to reframe traditional approaches to social welfare. Social investment strategies and policies focus on employment rather than welfare and promote public expenditure on skills and education throughout the life course, starting with early childhood…

This article explores discourses of economic investment and child vulnerability that have become dominant under New Zealand's National-led Government as a rationale for policy directions in early childhood education. It highlights the need for explicit values about children and childhood to be a basis for early childhood policy development, with a…

This article qualitatively explores women's experiences of choosing quality long day care in a regional community. The study complements recent quantitative research on the quality implications of increased for-profit childcare provision. It also adds to our understanding of current childcare policy by focusing on the experiences of women in a…

This paper is a keynote speech delivered at the National Symposium of Early Childhood Education) held by the Ministry of Education, December 16-19, 2004. In this paper, Jiang Jin first analyzed the difficulties and challenges that China faced in the development of early childhood education (ECE), including the partially dissolved ECE system,…

This article uses an ethical audit framework proposed by Cribb and Ball to critically analyze the possible implications of the rapid growth of corporatized childcare in Australia. In particular, it seeks to examine how corporatization affects childcare service provision and whether it conflicts with other social goals. Noting the paucity of…