Involuntary dedication? Continuing home help work for older people in France at the start of the Covid-19 pandemic

Abstract Did home help workers during the first lockdown in France have no choice but to continue working, and did they do so against their will? Sociological analyses which consider that the health crisis merely reproduced previous inequalities in working conditions and relations of domination suggest as much. However, by reconstructing the context in which the continuity of work was implemented in France, based on interviews and written sources, this article shows that home help workers continued to work, sometimes with an explicit sense of ‘choosing’ to do so, sometimes more with a sense of inner obligation, but always of their own free will and in a more thoughtful way than usual. Their dedication at the start of the pandemic is the result of a difficult decision taken in a situation where they could legally and factually stop working, and where they were in fear of Covid-19 infection.