Call for Papers: Infrastructure(s) and Care
Infrastructure(s) and Care, our second issue of our upcoming, open-access journal, Care in Common, is now open for submissions! We invite scholars, practitioners, activists, and artists to submit work and join us at Duke University, December 3-5, 2026. We welcome scholarly articles, practitioner and activist writing, and creative work in English, Spanish, and Portuguese.
Care is shaped by the worlds it sustains. It is always already embedded in material, social, institutional, and ecological structures: “built forms” (Larkin 2013) that order life as we know it, from allocating resources, assigning responsibilities, and making certain kinds of living possible or impossible. But care is a creative force too, giving rise to alternative structures and alternative worlds. The encounter between care and infrastructure(s)—spaces, systems, processes, networks—is the animating question of this workshop.
What does care look like when it inhabits certain infrastructures? Is it scaled up or down, formalized or informalized, regulated or left to the margins of policy attention? Is it bureaucratized, absorbed by market forces, woven into the fabric of cities, or folded into community networks that operate beneath institutional radar? Is it enabled or hindered, stretched or condensed, enriched or distorted? What, in turn, happens to these infrastructures as care moves through them? Are they sustained, repaired, challenged, transformed, dismantled? What does care help build, and what does it unsettle? What do we learn by observing these encounters: about care itself, about how it “travels” (Tronto 2020), about the worlds it interacts with and the ones it helps create?
These questions, which have long motivated care theorizing, are grounded with particular force in Latin America today, where an unprecedented array of encounters between care and infrastructure(s) has made the region one of the most generative sites for thinking through this phenomenon. Bogotá’s Manzanas del Cuidado, which bake care into the city’s urban landscape; Chile’s and Uruguay’s national care systems, which institutionalize it as a national public responsibility; commoning practices that weave care and ecological stewardship together; cooperativist and popular-economy approaches that insist on care’s place in economic life; ancestral traditions that understand human and planetary flourishing as one. These are all examples of a deliberate bringing together of care and infrastructure(s). Each, in its own way, pushing the boundaries of what care can look like and how it can be organized, what our built forms can or cannot hold, and what becomes possible when the two are made to meet.
This workshop invites scholars, practitioners, and advocates to bring different ‘encounters’ to the table: cases, methods, or frameworks that illustrate or introduce instances of when care and infrastructure(s) intersect, or help us make sense or better understand these encounters.We welcome contributions from across disciplines and methodological traditions, including but not limited to political theory, economics, sociology, anthropology, geography, law, urban studies, science and technology studies, design, feminist and decolonial thought, and community-based practice. Work that engages with Latin America is especially encouraged, though contributions from other regional contexts that speak to the workshop’s animating questions are warmly welcome.
About Care in Common
Care in Common is the upcoming, open-access journal of Revaluing Care in the Global Economy, an international, interdisciplinary research network launched in 2019 and based at Duke University. The journal starts from the premise that social, cultural, and ecological care are all imbricated and interdependent and that we need to look beyond this standard repertoire of solutions to what has been dubbed a crisis of care. To that end, we seek to foster a conversation among researchers, practitioners, activists, educators, and artists, and build a durable, freely accessible record of original thinking on care.
Formats and Submission Guidelines
Please note: only selected refereed articles will be presented and discussed during the workshop. Care in Practice and Creative Materials submissions will be considered for publication in the inaugural issue.
I. Refereed Articles
We welcome original scholarly research, theoretical contributions, comparative studies, and methodological interventions across disciplines. Articles typically run between 8,000 and 10,000 words, including notes and references. All refereed articles are subject to double-blind peer review. Submissions are welcome in English, Spanish, or Portuguese; the journal will provide AI-assisted translation in collaboration with authors. Six papers will be selected for the founding workshop, with participation open to all; additional submissions will be considered for publication in the issue.
Abstract submission deadline: October 16, 2026
Full papers submission deadline (after workshop): February 1, 2027
II. Care in Practice
A dedicated space for those whose primary engagement with care is practical and political: care workers and their organizations, community organizers, policy advocates, educators, disability activists, and others working at the frontlines of care. Scholarly conventions not required; we seek clarity of purpose, authenticity of experience, and a genuine contribution to collective understanding. Design proposals, policy reports, case studies of care programs or systems, accounts of building or organizing care infrastructures, toolkits, collective statements, or interviews, typically 1,500–3,000 words. Visual materials such as plans, maps, or diagrams are welcome. Collaborative submissions are encouraged.
Submission deadline: February 1, 2027
III. Creative Materials
Poetry, fiction, creative nonfiction, visual art, photography, graphic work, and experimental forms engaging care and, in this issue, the spaces, systems, and networks through which care moves. We seek work of genuine artistic merit and welcome both established and emerging voices. No strict length limits for written submissions. Visual work as high-resolution files; no reproduction fees.
Submission deadline: February 1, 2027
Key Dates
- October 16, 2026: Abstract submission deadline for refereed articles
- December 3–5, 2026: Infrastructure(s) and Care workshop | Duke University | Hybrid
- February 1, 2027: Full papers, Care in Practice, and Creative Materials submissions
All submissions must be original work not previously published and not under simultaneous consideration elsewhere.
Inquiries: revaluingcarelab@duke.edu
A journal of the Revaluing Care in the Global Economy network
All submissions here