The Community of Care

An Ethico-Political Response to the Care Crisis

Abstract

This article proposes a theoretical reconceptualisation of care, shifting its understanding from an individualised, feminised, and depoliticised practice towards its recognition as the foundation for a transformative political community. In contrast to reductionist approaches, it is argued that care is a complex social praxis with intrinsically linked practical, ethical, and political dimensions. The analysis reveals how these dimensions, when articulated dialectically, allow for care to be understood as a communal act of sustaining life. The notion of a "community of care" is developed by conceptualising it not as a substantial identity, but as a shared duty or burden born from the recognition of common vulnerability. This community is thus erected as a form of political resistance to the neoliberal logic of individuation and commodification, prefiguring an alternative horizon where reciprocal care is instituted as the core of a new social bond based on mutuality, solidarity, and justice.