The Possibility of Other, Better Worlds : Single mother organising as acts of Homefullness
This chapter proposes that Homefullness has a great deal in common with the imaginative and radical ways of thinking, survival and resistance developed by single mother organising at the margins of society. It begins by describing the experience of a 'un-carefull' present, where children and their mothers are left in destitution in receding welfare states. These accounts are telling of our present times and the forces that need to be challenged if we are to create future cities of Homefullness. Starting from the vantage point of those that are excluded, impoverished and not (yet) counted for, we can start thinking of what inclusive, equitable and sustainable communities should feel and be like. Hereafter it discusses the examples set by two single-mother led organisations that developed alternative ways of delivering services and engaging families in poverty - SPAN in the United Kingdom and Operation Life in the United States. Finally it proposes that these projects should be considered as 'everyday utopias' that challenge hegemonic ideas of self-reliance, independence and capitalist realism.