Care biographies: Challenging narratives of declining intergenerational care within strong welfare states

Strong welfare states are often assumed to be lacking in intergenerational family care engagements. This article challenges this narrative by putting conceptualisations of individualisation and autonomy into conversation with theories on relationality and care, relating this to biographical narratives of intergenerational care practices during the expansion of the Swedish welfare state. The research involves in-depth interviews with 63 informants spanning three generations – grandparents, adult children and grandchildren – exploring their lived experiences of care practices and relations across the lifespan. By employing Mason’s framework of relational layers , the study shows the complex nature of intergenerational engagements, suggesting the concept of sentient engagements as a lens through which to understand the increased importance of emotional activities of care in people’s everyday lives. By putting narratives of care at different points in time – the post-war era, the 1960s–1980s and the 2000s – against each other, the study highlights changing practical and sentient engagements. Particularly notable is the growing significance of grandparent–grandchild relationships, which emerge as crucial sites of support – but also ambivalence – in intergenerational care relations.