CHANGING OF FAMILY PATTERNS

Question 1

Charles Murray (New Right, lone parent families, changes in law)

Answer 1

• Sees the growth of lone-parent families as resulting from an overgenerous welfare state providing benefits for unmarried mothers and their children.
• This has created a ‘perverse’ incentive, rewarding irresponsible behaviour, such as having children without being able to provide for the.
• The welfare state creates a ‘dependency culture’ in which people assume that the state will support them and their children.
• He criticises specifically changes in law, both of those being the Divorce Reform Act (1969), and The Welfare Reform Act (2012), as not only does one of these equalise, widen
• make the grounds for divorce cheaper (which saw a sharp rise in divorce and led to an increased number of lone-parent families)
• but it also meant gaining benefits was easier
• encouraging lone-parent families and alongside it creating this ‘nanny state’ and ‘dependency culture’.

Question 2

Eval (Jessie Bernard, Radical Feminist)

Answer 2

• Argues that the reason for these divorces is because marriage is patriarchal and that many woman feel a growing dissatisfaction with patriarchal marriage, seeing the rising divorce rate, and the fact most petitions come from woman, as evidence of the growing acceptance of feminist ideas; woman are becoming conscious of patriarchal oppression and more confident about rejecting it.

Question 3

Anthony Giddens & Ulrich Beck (Postmodern, divorce and separation, individualisation)-

Answer 3

• In modern society, traditional norms, such as the duty to remain with the same partner for life, loses hold over individuals.
• each individual becomes free to pursue their own self-interest, society has become individualised.
• Relationships have thus become more fragile, as individuals become unwilling to remain with a partner if their relationship fails to deliver personal fulfilment.
• Instead they seek the ‘pure relationship’, one which exists solely to satisfy each partner’s needs and no tout of a sense of duty, tradition or sake of children, resulting in higher divorce rates.
• Furthermore, divorce ‘normalises’ divorce, further strengthening the belief it exists solely for personal fulfilment.

Question 4

Eval (Carol Smart, PLP)

Answer 4

• Traditional hasn’t lost its hold over individuals, families and individuals roles are shaped by one’s personal experience (connectedness thesis), and so preferences are still limited by norms.

Question 5

Hochschild (Feminist, single person households, changes in woman’s roles)

Answer 5

• Argues that for many woman, the home compares unfavourably with work.
• At work, woman feel valued, whereas at home, men’s continuing resistance to doing housework is a source of frustration and makes marriages less stable.
• In addition, the fact that both partners now go out to work leaves less time and energy for the emotion work needed to address the problem that arises, which has led to woman becoming increasingly unhappy and wanting a divorce.
• Woman no longer want to take on this ‘dual burden’ and ‘triple shift’, it’s patriarchal, and since woman now have the opportunity to divorce, divorce rates have increased alongside woman’s employment rates.

Question 6

Eval (Lynn Prince Cooke and Vanessa Gash)

Answer 6

• Found no evidence that working woman are more likely to divorce, arguing that this is because working has now become the accepted norm for married woman.

Question 7

Ronald Fletcher (Functionalist, divorce and separation, rising expectations of marriage)

Answer 7

• Argued that the higher expectations people place on marriage today are a major cause of rising divorce rates.
• Higher expectations make couples less willing to tolerate an unhappy marriage.
• This is also linked to the ideology of romantic love, and idea that marriage should be based solely on love, and that for each individual there’s a Mr/Miss Right out there.
• If love dies, there’s no longer any justification for remaining married and every reason to divorce as to be able to renew and search for ones ‘true soulmate’.
• By contrast, in the past, individuals often had little choice in who they married, and most marriages were born out of economic and political contracts, and so divorce was less likely as individuals had less expectations.
• In modern society, marriage is viewed less as a contract, and more as a relationship in which individuals seek personal fulfilment, and so encouraging divorce if this isn’t fulfilled.

Question 8

Eval (Feminist)

Answer 8

• Functionalists take a too optimistic view, arguing that the oppression of woman within the family is the main cause of marital conflict and divorce, proven by how divorce rates have risen alongside the increase in feminist ideas.