| Abstract: | This article suggests that it could be fruitful to approach women's employment in the context of the labour market rather than the household. In Finland until World War II, the public‐work schemes and relief work were the preferred policies concerning unemployed men and women. Women eligible to relief work were taken to work in mainly textiles in non‐residential workhouses. The difficulties faced in applying the ‘workfare’ policy to unemployed women paved the way for cash benefits in post‐war Finland. It is suggested that the Finnish case opens up a wider perspective on the relationship between the ideology of workfare and the rise and fall of the hegemony of wage labour. |
