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This paper seeks to explore discourses on the possibilities and limitations identified by relevant actors in the sphere of paid work to set up a national agenda on labor-family policies that are compatible with gender equality in Chile. The study is based on in-depth interviews with managers of organizations in different productive sectors, workers' representatives, legislators and officers of the Chilean government. The interviews sought to establish their perceptions on the importance of labor-family balance and policies aimed to promote it, the place of such policies in the political agenda and the conditions necessary to successfully implement them. Two main obstacles to set a national gender-friendly agenda on work-family policies were identified: first, the persistent identification of carework as a female responsibility, thereby, a situation that only affects female workers. Second, the discursive tension between the ideas of productivity and worker's welfare. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A central theme in gender-sensitive citizenship research is the need to reorganize the current social and political institutions so as to include “reproductive" work -i.e, domestic and care work- in the domain of duties of the citizen. This article examines this topic from the perspective of social representations on men's and womens contribution to society contained in four pieces of the Chilean legal discourse that specifically address issues of family organization and childcare. Methodologically, the paper is based on the discursive analysis of the written records of the debates held in the Congress on these legal initiatives, complemented with semi-structured interviews with MP s and government officials. From this analysis it is possible to conclude that, despite important advancements, womens citizenship is still represented as contributing to society mainly through care and, more recently, through their contribution towards overcoming poverty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]