Tracing Care in Everyday Life
Turkey Care Culture: Norms, Rituals, and System Transformation is an exploratory study that seeks to understand how care is organized in everyday life. Rather than approaching care solely through services, policies, or statistics, this report examines the cultural norms, habits, expectations, and daily rituals that shape how care is practiced and experienced.
This study explores why care responsibilities so often become concentrated on certain individuals, who is expected to provide care, which behaviors are perceived as natural, and how care is continuously reproduced through everyday social practices.
Rather than focusing primarily on major policy debates, the report looks at recurring patterns embedded in daily life. It examines questions such as who leaves the dinner table first, who is contacted first in times of need, the invisible labor of coordination, why asking for help can be difficult, and the quiet responsibilities that people take on without recognition.
The report explores:
- The norms that shape care culture in Turkey
- Everyday care rituals and practices
- The transformation of the social structures that sustain care
- Emerging tensions, shifts, and possibilities within care culture
The report does not claim to represent every care experience in Turkey. Instead, it aims to identify, name, and open discussion around recurring patterns that shape how care is organized and understood.
At İhtimam Association, we see this report not as a conclusion but as an invitation. We invite readers to rethink care not merely as an individual responsibility or a family matter, but as a shared social issue that shapes how we live together, practice solidarity, and imagine our collective future.
