Visual representations of care work on the websites of Polish recruitment agencies targeting the German elderly care market1

Report from the Polish-German research group within the Image-e project

Anna KordasiewiczUniversity of Economics and Computer Sciences, Olsztyn / University of Warsaw

(anna.kordasiewicz@gmail.com)

Abstract

There has been much debate about how to define the relationship between a domestic and care worker

and her/his employer. It has been argued that the preferred definition by workers themselves is one that

centres on work (Anderson 2000). In contrast, “fictive kinship” appears to be the employers’ almost

universal strategy, which is usually portrayed in the literature as an exploitative practice (Anderson

2000, Constable 2003, Lan 2006, McDowell 2006, Romero 1992 and Parreñas 2001). One may argue

that the “work” definition is of a modern kind, while the “family” definition refers to a pre-modern

social order.

Recruitment agencies are recent modern institutions active on the domestic and care labour

market and are a sign of the “modernization process” within this sector. The question is, to which

definitions do these agencies make reference through their websites? Is it a modern “work” definition

or rather a traditional “family” frame? Do they support workers’ independence or do they rather

strengthen the ideology of the family?

Drawing on a piece of Polish-German research within the Image-e project, this paper looks at

the visual representations of care work on the websites of Polish agencies targeting the German elderly

care market. The thesis of the paper is that, even though recruitment agencies are a modern labour

market instrument, currently the prevalent visual representations of care work on their websites

paradoxically support the traditional familial ideology rather than the professional frame. The agencies

are leaning towards the employers’ interpretations and therefore align themselves with them rather than

with the workers.

Introduction

There is a variety of discourses or definitions of the role of domestic and care workers, and of care and

domestic work itself. In the literature some kind of negotiation or struggle over role definitions is often

depicted. Role definitions matter because the degree of autonomy, the task list and the workload all

1 In preparing this paper I have profited greatly from the discussions with Dr Kyoko Shinozaki, Goethe University, Frankfurt am Main, for which I express my deepest gratitude. Any errors and omissions are of course my own.

depend upon how one defines the role of a domestic or care worker.

It is important to study the representations of care work that appear on the agencies’ websites

because they play a role in the signifying process of care, they shape the overall representation of care

workers and as such they may influence processes of interpretation and everyday interactions,

contributing to or opposing the polarization of the statuses of employers and employees. In the Polish

context, representations on agencies’ websites seem to play an especially important role, due to the

scarcity of other representations.

If we take welfare regimes into consideration, we discover that Poland represents a familized

context. To a great extent, the care of dependants is the domain of family (Wóycicka 2009). In a 2007

study it was found that 83% of the care of dependent adults was provided by household members,

another 14% was provided by informal unremunerated work by relatives or other caregivers, 2% of

households placed their dependent relative in a private or public nursing home, and only 1% hired a

paid caregiver (in big cities this rises to 5%) (Wóycicka and Rurarz 2007). The family-centred model

of care is connected with the heritage of the communist era, i.e. inadequate state provision and a

notorious burdening of the family with care work.

In Poland it is not popular to hire a caregiver. There is also no public debate about elderly care

work. Long-term care provision is not a hot issue in the Polish public debate (as it is, for example, in

the UK, the USA and other developed countries). One may suspect that care workers are not part of the

Polish social imagination. The result is that there is no clear representation of elderly care work in

Poland. So in fact the agencies turn out to be amongst the few, if not the only, “producers” of

representations. Therefore, it is important to consider in detail how the agencies represent care work, as

this probably also influences the meaning-making process of prospective care workers and those who

hire them.

The agencies do not represent care work in a neutral way. They engage in a persuasive

communication and shape care work according to their business goals. Their goal is to convince the

largest possible number of prospective care givers and care receivers about the agency’s quality. We are

dealing here with encoded persuasive communication. The scope of the analysis is to decode these

encoded representations by means of three steps: (1) identifying the main elements (signs), (2)

attributing meaning (concepts) to the signs, and then (3) making reference to meta-language or myths

(Barthes 1972) or representations (Hall 1997) of care work. The meta-language will be interpreted

against the wider social context.

Before beginning my analysis of the visual representations present on the websites, I will briefly

present the context of the research, namely the role of agencies in migrant care and domestic work and

specifically in the context of Polish-German migration. This will be followed by a description of the

methodology of data collection and analysis.

Context: role of agencies in care and domestic work migration

The takeover of domestic housekeeping and elderly care services by an immigrant workforce is a

global phenomenon manifested in a variety of ways. Poland is part of a global chain of care: an

“exporter” of caregivers to Germany and other European countries, and an “importer” of care workers

from Ukraine. Germany relies heavily on foreign caregivers.

Bridget Anderson identifies “four basic routes by which international migrants enter

employment as domestic workers in private households. (...) 1) individuals with no contacts (…) 2)

informal networks (…) 3) agencies (…) 4) accompanying employer” (Anderson 2000: 30-34, emphasis

added). The focus on agencies during the Image-e project shed some light on the contemporary

migration of Poles to foreign countries as care and domestic workers, highlighting situations that

differed from those most frequently depicted in the literature (irregular migration).

Agencies are only one type of formal “migrant institution” (Goss and Lindquist 1995), which in

addition to domestic work recruitment and placement also include travel and remittance agencies. The

Polish agencies investigated in this study were both recruitment and placement agencies. The

importance of agencies to migrant workers varies. In some countries, such as the Philippines, they are

highly relevant (Parreñas 2001, Anderson 2000), whereas in Poland the proportion of workers placed

by agencies appears to be rather low. Some of the literature presents the practices of at least some

agencies in a negative light: total dependence on the agent combined with debt-financed migration,

connections to organized crime (Anderson 2000), racialization (Bakan and Stasiulis 1995) and

ethnicization (Cox 1999) of domestic work, and the circumvention of labour laws even in cases of

official operation (Anderson 2000, Parreñas 2001: 44). In short, there is some concern about how these

agencies operate. What has been repeatedly shown is that these semi-legal practices appear where

immigration laws are strictest (i.e. false travel agencies that obtain false document and bribe officials,

Anderson 2000, Parreñas 2001: 44). It is interesting to contrast these agencies with those operating in

an environment where there are no constraints on the movement of individuals, such as within the EU

and Schengen area, but there is a ban on undertaking economic activity, as was the case in Germany for

Poles from 2004 to 2011.

Context: specificity of Polish-German migrations

Contemporary, postwar migration between Poland and Germany has been shaped by three main factors:

the shift in state boundaries after World War II, the formation and expansion of the European Union,

including the recent opening up of the German labour market on 1 May 2011, and the consistent

economic superiority of Germany.

After WWII, the borders of Poland were generally shifted westward so as to include regions that

were formerly part of Germany and to exclude former eastern regions. As a result, there was a large

German population left in the newly-claimed post-war territory, who subsequently emigrated to

Germany (Iglicka 2001a). Some native Germans remained, retaining dual citizenship, and those who

migrated maintained bonds with family and friends left behind (Jończy 2007, Solga 1999, 2002).

Hence, there are strong social networks between Poland and Germany, especially in the formerly

German areas of contemporary Poland. These networks help to explain the popularity of Germany as a

destination for Polish migrants looking for work. Among the Polish agencies that were investigated,

some were located in these territories and this fact was underlined during the interviews. Moreover, the

largest numbers of workers have been sent to Germany precisely from these regions.

The European Union dates back to the European Coal and Steel Community (1951), and was

finally established in 1993. The principal objective of the European Economic Community (EEC,

established in 1957, one of the predecessors of the EU) was the development of a common market

offering the free movement of goods, services, people and capital. By definition, the free movement of

people includes potential workers and non-workers alike.

West Germany was part of the European unification process since its beginning, while East

Germany was granted access after the successful unification of Germany in 1990. The accession of

Poland to the EU in 2004 allowed for participation in the common market, with some restrictions

imposed. Some countries, like Germany and Austria, imposed restrictions on access to their labour

market, i.e. on the freedom of movement of workers. The maximum period for the limitation was set at

seven years. In the meantime, all other freedoms were supposed to be observed. Poland was granted

access to the Schengen area (European Union policy on the abolition of internal borders) on 21

December 2007 (Germany in 1995).

The opening up of the German and Austrian labour markets on 1 May 2011 was expected to

induce massive migrations. BNP Paribas forecasted an outflow of 500,000 workers in one year,

whereas in fact it has been very moderate. Some predictions now estimate 30,000, but each month it

has been closer to 2-3,000 more than during the same month in the previous year (BAMF data,

Duszczyk 2011). Although there were concerns on both the Polish and German sides of the equation,

the predicted mass migration has simply not happened. From May to August 2011 there were 10,000

new people registered but 30,000 new employment contracts (Duszczyk 2011).

To put the Polish-German migration into perspective, the earnings gap between the two

countries is worth mentioning. The average monthly earnings of blue collar workers in Poland are still

less than one quarter of their German counterparts (Duszczyk 2011):

Poland Germany

2004 572 euro 2527 euro

2009 775.7 euro 3111 euro

In short, there are several historical and contemporary pull factors that attract Polish economic migrants

to Germany.

Information about the research

During the course of the project, two field trips were undertaken: in March 2010 and February 2011,

jointly by Dr. Kyoko Shinozaki, Dr. Ewa Kępińska, and Dr. Anna Kordasiewicz (Ph.D. student at the

time of the research).

We conducted a total of 10 interviews in Poland:

• two with two different associations of recruitment agencies

• one with the Ministry of Labour and Social Policy

• one with the Masovian Regional Labour Office

• one with the state-led organization Voluntary Labour Corps (pl. OHP), partner of the German

“domestic helpers programme”

• five with the recruitment and placement agencies, where we talked with eleven agency

employees altogether.

It is worth stressing that, by the end of the research, nine agencies that had been contacted had not

participated in the study. In one case there was a probable health situation of the would-be interviewee,

but in the other eight the request was declined either because of confidentiality issues or an inability to

schedule an interview due to lack of free time.

Inquiries made at the Regional Labour Offices about the operation of various agencies were also

part of the investigation. These yielded more specific data than the general Ministry of Labour reports

provide, although the dataset is still not complete, since it is missing data from two regions.

Material used for the analysis of visual representations was taken from the websites and printed

materials of the interviewed agencies as well as those of others not investigated by means of interview.

We want to underline that our interviewees only included official and agency representatives, so

our picture does not include the workers’ perspective, which will have to be explored in future research.

Analysis of the websites: methodology and theoretical background

As far as the analysis of websites is concerned, there were 15 agencies analyzed; one of the agencies

contacted during fieldwork did not have a website, while five of them had parallel German websites,

which were analyzed as well, so altogether there were 19 agency websites analyzed. The analysis was

performed between November 2011 and January 2012.

Before discussing visual representations, I will briefly summarize the main characteristics of the

agencies and their websites. Among the 14 agencies whose websites were analyzed, eight were

exclusively or almost exclusively devoted to care and domestic work (CDW) in Germany, whereas six

were of a more general profile. General agencies differed in respect to the exposure of CDW content –

most of them included information about their CDW activity on the main page, only two did not. All of

the six had dedicated CDW web pages. Among the six general agencies, two had German versions of

web pages devoted exclusively to CDW content.

Most of the visual representations are photographs of people and objects. Drawings are rare.

Eleven websites contain no more than three photographs, three websites are especially abundant in

pictures and contain 14-15 pictures each (German versions of Carework and Interkadra websites and

the Polish site of Workexpress). Altogether across the websites there were 85 photographs depicting

elderly care work.

Theoretical background - websites as representation

The regulatory channels that agencies use are quite complex and at least some of them have been

labelled “semi-legal” (Döhner et al. 2008: 9), even though on almost every agency website there is an

explicit claim that what they offer is completely legal and regular. It is therefore interesting to see how

agencies advertise their own activities, and how they try to convince prospective caregivers and care

receivers that they are trustworthy. Visual representations play a vital role in the process of creating a

good image for an agency. We question what visual means they apply. Upon what symbols do they

draw in order to build trust and convince potential clients to use their services? How do they visually

construct their own activities, and more specifically care work, if they place workers in multiple

sectors?

There is a brilliant analysis of two migrant care workers’ identities: “Professionals and saints”

by Cinzia Solari (2006) that we found relevant in the course of analysis. Both these identities help to

escape the label of “servant”: the former by means of distance and expertise, the latter by underlining

selflessness and the importance of a familial bond. The identities identified by Solari resemble Bridget

Anderson’s distinction between buying labour power and buying personhood (2000: 85).

Visual analysis of care and domestic work is not widely applied; as an exception, a study

conducted by Fauve-Chamoux (2006) may be mentioned. This study examines paintings and drawings

representing various types of servants across centuries and cultures, which serve as a testimony to their

role in history, with some references to them in particular texts. The same book contains a chapter on

domestic service in Norway by Lise Widding Isaksen (2006), where an advertisement for elderly care

service is analyzed, but not reproduced (see appendix). It is also worth mentioning Robyn Rodriguez’s

study in which she also pays attention to the visual manifestations of the Philippine government’s

practice that she labelled the brokering of the labour force, including the care labour force.

Since the websites of commercial agencies contain a persuasive kind of communication, we

have drawn inspiration from the analysis of advertisements, namely from Erving Goffman (1978) and

Judith Williamson’s (1978) studies, as advertisements also communicate to us persuasively. According

to Goffman, advertisements are condensed social representations that, thanks to their intensity and

stereotypical basis, allow for immediate reading by the receiver.

In our analysis, we were drawn to Goffman’s notion of gender displays. Particularly effective

was Goffman’s focus on the arrangement of figures, their relative characteristics (i.e. height, age, social

position) and touch. Following Goffman, we paid attention to and interpreted the relative

characteristics of the people depicted on the websites we analyzed, aiming to identify care displays.

We also use a symbolic analysis as presented in Ball and Smith (1992: 31-54), and make

reference to the “decoding advertisements” approach of Judith Williamson (1978). Like Williamson,

we treat the representations “as assemblages of signs that produce meanings that help to sell products”

(Ball and Smith 1992: 48), which in this case help to convince prospective customers of the reliability

of the agency. The websites, like advertisements, are symbolically encoded – symbols stand for

something other than themselves – and require decoding, in order to see the meanings behind the

symbols.

At the beginning of the analysis, we tried to understand the sheer content of the representations:

who and what is represented:

• People?

• Elderly people?

• Caregivers?

• Others?

• jointly or separately?

• What are the characteristics in terms of age, gender, clothing and ambience?

• Symbols? Objects?

• What symbols/objects?

Let us now summarize the prevalent representations that commonly appeared across different

agencies’ websites. The most popular depiction was of an elderly female accompanied by a young

female, presumably the caregiver2. Most of the pictures were posed, most commonly the gaze of the

figures was directed at the cameraman, which means that the figures are arranged for the photograph

and not “caught” in the middle of everyday life activities. They display proximity, and often the figures

are touching each other in a way that implies a personal bond (autotelic touch) rather than some sort of

mutual activity (instrumental touch)3, in a harmonious atmosphere, sometimes bearing smiles. Most of

the people depicted are women.

As one might guess, there is a notable age difference between the caregiver and care receiver –

in all of the pictures the age of the caregiver does not seem to exceed approximately 40 years of age,

and is commonly portrayed as someone between the age of 20 and 30. This is reflected even in cases

where only hands are visible: one palm is visibly old, the other young. The same tendency is present in

the German materials of the “domestic helpers programme.” An example with most of these features is

presented below.

Interestingly, this representation stands in sharp contrast to the actual age of the majority of

caregivers (according to data from the “Domestic helper programme”) and to what the agencies state:

that they specifically target women over the age of 50.

2 I use age terms as follows: young means roughly 20-40 years old, middle-aged 40-60 years old, elderly is above 60. Ethnomethodologically, we assume the younger person to be the caregiver and the elderly person to be the care receiver, as a part of the interpretative process of standardized relational pairs ascription (Sacks 1972). A comment on the gender aspect is available in the appendix.3 I make a distinction between autotelic and instrumental touch, where instrumental touch means body contact connected

to a particular task like bathing, dressing or hair combing, whereas autotelic touch means a “touch for the touch”, a body contact that has no apparent functional dimension and is usually connected with the expression of emotions.

When it comes to objects/symbols/motifs, we noticed that there were five recurring images

applied:

• a heart as a symbol of love

• hands as a symbol of bonding and helping

• also: hands forming a heart

• autumn leaves – a symbol of life’s autumn, namely old age

• flowers as a symbol of good cheer and perhaps a reference to gardening, a common hobby for

elderly people in Poland

• a “24” motif: many agencies carry “24” in their names, indicating they will provide 24-hour,

around-the-clock caregiver services (i.e. Heart24, Promedica24).

Objects and symbols present on the websites: hearts, hands, hands forming a heart-shape and autumn

leaves, and their combinations:

Among the objects depicted in the photographs were:

• items connected to disability and assistance, such as walkers, wheelchairs, eating trays, walking

sticks, hearing aids, hygiene products, food.

• items connected with activities: gardening items, bicycles, a paper plane, a gymnastic device, a

ball and a laptop.

These may be said to refer to two “visions” of old age: one disabled, the other active.

[Caring with heart]

Semiotic analysis

The above delineation of the elements present in the photographs was the first step of the three-step

semiotic analysis, the remaining steps being: (2) referring the elements depicted to the concepts that lie

behind them (which was partly done above for the symbols), and (3) referring these concepts to general

visions of care work – meta-language, myths or representations of care work (Barth 1972, Hall 1997).

Let me exemplify the analytical procedure. In the example below, the following elements may

be discerned: one elderly woman, one young woman, the clothing is casual, there is autotelic touch

involved, there are smiles on their faces, the picture is posed in the sense of the bodies’ arrangement

and the gaze that is directed towards the camera. Each of the listed elements calls for an interpretation,

which I present below.

(1) Casual clothing – (2) cozy atmosphere – (3) familial representation of care work

(1) Autotelic touch – (2) emotional bond – (3) familial representation of care work

(1) Smiles – (2) positive image – (3) familial representation of care work

(1) Posing and age asymmetry – (2) resemblance to a family photograph – (3) familial representation of

care work

Similarly, I will interpret such things as uniforms (esp. white) as a sign of the medical professionalism

of the caregiver and this as a reference to a professional, medical representation of care work, and

images such as a depiction of the activity of bathing the elderly person as a sign of the professionalism

of the caregiver and a reference to a realistic professional representation.

Visual representations of care work

The extended scope of the research and a more detailed analysis (after a presentation in Tokyo) yielded

a more complex picture of the representations of care work. It appears that, in reference to Polish

agencies’ websites, it makes sense to talk about three main semantic fields of care work:

• family field (the most common)

• professional field

• including as a subtype medical images, and

• a field utilizing invisibility in order to sustain independence for an elderly person.

The complexity of the situation stems from the fact that the semantic fields are rarely seen in a

pure form (the exception being the family field); rather, they combine and form hybrid forms (e.g. a

medicalized – familial representation). I will begin the presentation of the models with the familial

representation, the one that is most common and most coherent.

Familial representation of care work

(Interkadra, Workexpress, Timework, Leaderservice, Heart24, Gowork, Helper 24, Intekadra –

German, Centrum adiutor)

Case study: Interkadra

As has already been mentioned, some agencies send workers to different sectors, not only to work in

domestic service, but also to the Polish labour market. Interkadra is an employment agency that deals

with many kinds of work. On the main page of Interkadra care work is not mentioned, but there is a

dedicated sub-page. There is a significant difference between the image of the agency presented on the

general website and on the page dedicated to care work (formal, businesslike vs. informal):

There is a pattern of showing an elderly person and a caregiver together, in a posed way. Their clothes

suggest a cozy home environment, as opposed to a medical or nursing home environment:

On the Interkadra website there are only females depicted. There is an appreciable difference in age

between the figures. This may give the potential client the expectation of a possible granddaughter-

grandmother kind of relationship. Together with physical proximity and casual clothing (as opposed to

the white coat that medical professionals would wear), there is an overall harmonious atmosphere,

evoking the image of being part of the family, which was described as being a “saint” in Solari’s

analysis (and has to do with the metaphor of “fictive kin”). Thus we may interpret the labour of care as

being depicted as one of love, while care work provision is about “selling personhood” rather than

selling a labour force (Anderson 2000).

Professionalized representation of care work

(Carework, both Polish and German websites, Interkadra Polish website, Personal Service Ost, both

Polish and German websites, Promedica24)

The professionalized representation is constructed by both visual and verbal means on the websites. For

example, Gowork.eu presents 328 profiles of caregivers that contain a detailed questionnaire about

their experience of elderly care, including: dealing with wheelchairs, changing diapers and

physiotherapy (see snapshot below).

This questionnaire may be interpreted as a means of standardizing (professionalizing) the work of

elderly care.

The visual elements of the professional image are also very interesting. The Polish website of

Carework contains ten drawings that are part of a sub-page dedicated to an online course on the

professional treatment of elderly people. The picture below comes from the section devoted to

changing the sheets of a bedridden person.The websites with professionalized representations offer the

most realistic depiction of elderly care work, writing about and showing everyday care-related tasks:

German version of the Carework website

A subtype of the professionalized representation is the medical professional representation,

outlined below on the basis of a case study of Promedica24.

Medicalized image – case study of Promedica24

The name of the company itself suggests professional, medical connotations. On the homepage there is

a large picture of a nurse in a white uniform, standing alone with crossed arms, which usually indicates

a defensive stance, or distance from the person in front of her:

The pictures accompanying the content related to care work, however, involve two people: an elderly

person and a caregiver. The clothing is less formal than in case of the nurse, but may still suggest a

medical context.

In the picture above we see an elderly male and a middle-aged female; the clothing of the

caregiver is formal and resembles a medical uniform, the bodies are in close proximity, there are

smiles, the picture is posed. The care worker is looking at the elderly person, who in turn looks into the

camera. These elements may be interpreted as follows:

Autotelic vicinity – emotional bond – familial representation of care work

Smile – positive image – friendly/familial representation of care work

Formal clothing (uniform) – medical professionalism – medical representation of care work

Direction of gaze – concern of the care worker for the elderly person – professional but perhaps

also familial representation of care work

As we can see, this picture is a hybrid of the medical professional representation and the familial

representation.

Another example is:

As we see, the clothing “caregivers” wear in these pictures is not a uniform but its colour, white

and light pink, again points to medical connotations. The lady in the picture above is wearing a night

gown, which may suggest a hospital setting. The figures in the pictures are very close to one another: in

the above picture, touching is present. Everybody is smiling. The pictures appear to be posed but, in

contrast to many others, the above picture shows the two women looking at one another, suggesting

their mutual engagement in a relationship.

Although there is touch involved, compared to the pictures shown previously in the familial

representation section, the physical distance between the caregiver and the care receiver is slightly

greater. The relationships these pictures try to imply, then, do seem to be caring. They are not, however,

as emotional and personal as the earlier pictures, which get these feelings across to the viewer through

hugging or taking the elderly person arm-in-arm. In reference to Solari’s distinction between

professionals and saints in care work, Promedica24 can be classified as a company promoting

professionalism but combining it with elements of a familial model as well. In Anderson’s terms,

Promedica24 seems to be trying to sell a professional labour force along with a little bit of the

personhood of the prospective care workers as well.

Invisibility representation

Two websites, namely the German version of Helper24 and Seniovita, may be interpreted as primarily

communicating the independence of an elderly person.

In the above picture there is an elderly couple apparently pausing during a cycling tour across the park.

There are smiles on their faces, they pose cheerfully for the photograph. On the Helper24 websites,

elderly people are depicted using a laptop, playing with a paper plane, a woman looking out towards

the horizon holding her hat to prevent it from being blown away by the wind, and enjoying a picnic in

the woods. The concept communicated here may be that of the independence and active life of elderly

people. In none of the photographs is there any care worker present (although it is care work that is

advertised). The text in the above picture says: “We will take care of your old age/senility”, and not “of

you”, which may be interpreted as a linguistic means of distancing, of creating a separation of care

from the elderly person. It is not he or she that needs to be taken care of (obviously, if we look at the

picture), at most it is their “old age”.

What kind of care worker do such elderly people need? Perhaps some kind of invisible

companion who could help to sustain their active lifestyle. So the meta-language or myth here is that of

care work as invisible work in order to sustain independence. The invisibility of the people taking care

of dependent persons has also been brought up by Rivas (2003) in her analysis of dependence and

independence in care work.

Differences between Polish and German websites

In five cases there were both Polish and German versions of the websites analyzed. In two cases there

is consistency between the two, and in both of these cases the representation is a professionalized

familial one. In two other cases there is an apparent incongruity between the respective representations.

In the case of Intekadra, the Polish website offers a professionalized familial representation, whereas

the German version presents a purely familial one. In the case of Helper24, the Polish website is about

a familial representation but the German version offers the invisibility frame. In the fifth case

(Gowork), it is hard to compare the representations because the German version contains only portrait

pictures in profile of would-be workers, but the content suggests a more professional focus on the

German website (a standardized list of elderly care tasks), whereas the Polish website offers a familial

representation. So it is not clear whether the familial representation is more targeted towards the

prospective German employers and care receivers or to prospective Polish care workers. After all, in

two cases it is directed at both sides. The case of Helper24 suggests that the independence of the elderly

and the invisibility of workers is communicated to the German side and not to the prospective Polish

workers, who are given the familial picture – one may wonder if this does not create the potential for a

clash of definitions. But the cases are too few to generalize, this concept would need further

investigation.

Concluding remarks

The dominant visual representation of care work on Polish agencies’ websites targeting Germany

appears to be the familial representation. This is sometimes accompanied by elements of professional,

including medical, images; however, these do not appear independently. Another representation is that

of an invisible care worker sustaining the active lifestyle of an elderly person.

The analysis of the websites makes one wonder what in fact is the service or product the

agencies are selling or what kind of person they advertise. The three representations seem to advertise

three different kinds of work and worker: family-like care, embodied by a fake family member; a

professional care service, itself problematic (marketization of care work, Simpson and Cheney 2007),

personified by a professional care worker; and invisible companion. The most commonly advertised

product seems to be “family-like care” with the pre-modern feel of a cosy home environment. So,

despite the fact that the agencies themselves are institutions of a modernizing labour market, they turn

out to sell personhood rather than the labour power of the workers, and thus they reproduce traditional

representations of care work.

The familial representation is part of the renowned “fictive kinship” strategy, which is usually

portrayed as an exploitative strategy (Anderson 2000, Constable 2003, Lan 2006, McDowell 2006,

Romero 1992 and Parreñas 2001). However, sometimes researchers underline that it can be interpreted

as a strategy that helps to overcome some of the tensions and ambivalence in CDW (cf. Anderson

2000). There is some other evidence in research on care and domestic workers that points to alternative

interpretations: in Solari’s (2006) study, an alternative to the professional role was that of a “saint”. In

Poland, the “family frame” is in fact a strategy used mainly by Ukrainian workers who, by means of

establishing a bond between themselves and their employers, try to gain access to their social networks

(Kindler 2009).

The interpretation of the dominance of the familial representation is at least twofold, depending

on which side of the care contract is the focus of attention. If we take it as an employer-centred

representation, one may note that offering “family-like care” for sale might turn out to be exploitative

of the workers, blurring the boundaries between what is and is not work. If, however, we take it as an

employee-centred communication, one may note that the familial representation of elderly care is

consistent with the dominant idea of elderly care in Poland (familial model), and as such it may be

easily read by prospective Polish workers and so seems to be an effective means of communicating

with them about elderly care work.

APPENDIX:

Comment on the gender aspect of representations:

In the representations of care work, female figures prevail over males. Among the elderly people, there

were nine elderly males on 85 photos. Male caregivers were completely absent, apart from one

exception which is analyzed below, and a few male profiles on the Gowork German website. Among

328 profiles there were 20 from males, which accounts for only 6% of the total. This suggests that even

though male care workers are in a minority they do exist, and this fact was also brought up during the

interviews.

The care workers who are deliberately represented by agencies are females and not males,

which is a sign of the discursive over-feminization of care work. The exception appeared in a special

newsletter for care workers that shared stories and recipes as well as giving instructions and pieces of

advice, which was edited by Workexpress agencies4. One particular protagonist presented in the issue

was Mr. Stawirej, formerly a successful businessman who works as a caregiver for elderly Germans

with Workexpress. He is the exceptional male caregiver depicted in the materials:

4http://issuu.com/workexpress/docs/express_news/2

The subtitle says “Caregiver-paraglider. Caregiver as a friend of the family,” and he is depicted

immediately after having landed from a paragliding flight, with a helmet, flight suit and sunglasses.

Our analysis of the picture and an article recounting his story led us to interpret his representation as a

“man with a mission,” who deliberately gave up his lifestyle as a prosperous BMW car dealer in order

to help people when he felt the urge to do so. At the same time, he uses the familial approach, declaring

that as a caregiver he acts as a “family friend.” This case bears some resemblance to the “saint” figure

in Solari’s work, where there is a focus on “help” as a core care activity, and helping is the aspect of

care work that can make it meaningful to both parties.

What is exceptional in the presentation of Mr. Stawirej is that as a care worker he is presented

alone (a rare depiction) and his degree of independence seems very high. It is significant that the only

male depicted as a caregiver is a curiosity rather than a part and parcel of care work. Although there are

some males working as caregivers, according to the agencies, a male caregiver is virtually never

visually represented on the websites – all the depicted caregivers are exclusively women. One might

come to the conclusion that, in such a feminized occupation, it is normal for a woman to appear in a

Workexpress newsletter, without anything extraordinary about her life details being presented. Whereas

for a male presented as a caregiver, his life story, as well as his sheer presence in the newsletter, is

exceptional.

Gender, Care and Globalization as seen from Norway, quotation from Louise Widding Isaksen

(2006):

Since there is also a shortage of flexible public care services for the elderly, firms such as “Human

Omsorgsassistanse (Humane care assistance)” in Stavanger have sprung up. In return for a fee of NOK

200 per hour, they sell “surrogate child services,” i.e. they sell services to people who do not have the

time to accompany their elderly mother or father to the doctor or the hairdresser. According to the

firm’s owner, the market for such services is growing.

“Falken Husvenn (Falken house friend)” is another firm. It markets itself as “a good friend of the

family.” In a full-page advertisement for this firm (BT, 24 November 2001) there is a photo of an old

lady who wants “someone’s company to enjoy, someone to laugh with and someone to help with the

preparations for get-togethers with old friends.” She says that her children visit “quite often,” but she

misses having someone to talk to. Falken Husvenn provides services “in which everything is done to

promote personal contact and assistance.” The services are based on security, care, professional health

services and practical help. The house friends are intended to be “like a friend of the family.”

The most recent addition to such market-based services is “Hjelp (Help) 24”, which is a service offered

by the insurance company Gjen-sidige NOR. They offer help with housework, gardening, cleaning,

preparing meals and changing car tyres. From January 1, 2001, Akademiker-erne’s home contents

insurance (available through membership of the Norwegian Association of Researchers) was extended

to include membership in “Hjelp 24”. The insurance company If Skadeforsikring has recently launched

the service “Handverkeren (Craftsman)” whereby company craftsmen help customers to wallpaper the

bathroom and build a new patio if they should need it (Dagbladet, 3 April 2001).

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