"O'Connor, Orloff, and Shaver draw upon `mainstream' and feminist work (including their own earlier and significant scholarship) to provide an extremely well developed, sustained and interesting analysis of gender relations and social policy in four countries that represent the `liberal' world of welfare capitalism." Canadian Journal of of Sociology

"...a book that should move quickly into the canon of welfare state studies, with transformational effect." Lisa D. Brush, American Journal of Sociology

"This groundbreaking book brings together a wealth of information about the gendered effects of social policy in four conutries...This book can and should be read by anyone interested in gendering social policy analyses or in learning more about liberalism and social policy...State, Markets, Families makes a tremendous contribution to scholarship in the areas of gender and social policy, and of social policy more broadly...This volume is destined to become a classic and to inspire new analyses of gender and social policy for many decades to come." Governance July 2001