Families and households - Changing Family Patterns Flashcards
Between 1961-69-72, by what factor did divorce increase
2x
What was the peak of divorces?
1993: 165,000
How has number of yearly divorces changed over time?
1961: 25,000
2023: 80,000
55,000 more
How has % of divorces petitions were from women changed over time
1946: 37%
2021: 63%
What couples are most likely to get divorced?
- Those who marry young
- Those with a bastard
- Those who cohabit before marriage
- Those containing one who has already been married
What were the historical flashpoints for divorce and why?
1949: Legal aid makes divorce cheaper
1972: Divorce Reform Act comes into effect and establishes principle of ‘irretrievable differences’
1993: Previous reasons + changing attitudes
What are the 7 explanations for the increase in divorce?
- Law
- Attitudes
- Secularisation
- Rising expectations of marriage
- Women’s increased financial independence
- Feminist explanations
- Individualism
What are the three main changes in law that have increased divorce?
- Equalising the grounds between sexes (1923)
- Making divorce cheaper (1949)
- Widening the grounds (1969)
What were the alternatives to legal divorce when it was more difficult?
Desertion, legal seperation, ‘empty shell’ marriages
Those these were possible alternatives to marriage, they became less common as divorce became easier.
What is the issue with the law explanation for the increase in divorce?
Although it is easier get divorced, it doesn’t explain why people are choosing to take it up.
What were the perspectives on divorce in the 1950’s?
Divorce was a desertion of traditional gender roles and ideas: a husband who wanted a divorce was abandoning his post as ‘man of the house’ and a woman was deserting the ‘loving wife’ and ‘caring mother’ post. It was also believed more heavily that children require two parents to properly develop and be socialised.
Mitchell and Goody (1997) and divorce stigma:
Declining stigam towards divorce is a significant factor behind its increase
How does declining stigma increase divorce?
As it becomes less stigmatised, the social cost of divorce declines and people’s social lives and support networks are less negatively affected by divorce, giving them a safety net to fall back on and feel like they won’t lose everything.
How has society become secularised?
- Fewer people hold strong, traditional religious values (less than 50% Christian in 2023)
- Religious institutions hold less control in public sectors (Parsons (1951) and structural differentiation)
- Diversity of religion (immigration)
How does secularisation cause an increase in divorce?
Religions which have traditionally opposed divorce as breaking a vow to God have lost power, meaning their condemnation is largely weightless as its lost its sacred canopy and has less official power to enforce or socialise it.
Fletcher (1966) and rising expectations:
Rising expectations of marriage make couples more willing to divorce if unhappy in their relationship.
Traditionally, what were the expectations of marriage?
People had very little choice over who they married and it was often on an economic and biological basis rather than based on love; as such, as long as the economics or biology were stil there, there was little reason to leave.
Crow (2001) and the ‘cornerstones of marriage’:
‘Love, personal commitment and intrinsic satisfaction’, the absence of which is justification for divorce.
What is the functionalist perspective on the rising expectations of marriage?
Positive, they point to the high remarriage rate, arguing that this is not a rejection of marriage, rather of non-suitable individuals.
What is the feminist perspective on the rising expectations of marriage?
Although functionalists can explain why there are increasing divorces, its view is too rosy to explain why its mostly women asking for divorces - a symptom of heterosexual marriage being a patriarchal and oppressive institution that women seek to escape.
How does women’s increased economic independence increase divorce?
Women now have the resources to leave their husbands and fesibly survive with their own wage - this also socialises girls into the idea that they should be on an equal footing with their partner.
Give an example of women being more financially independent.
Women are paid the most from the ages of 40-49 (£36,000 in 2024), the average age of divorce in 2019 was 45-49 (11%)
Allan and Crow and marriage and economics:
“Marriage is less embedded within the economic system,” and families are no longer units of production so couples are less reliant on staying together for their wage.
Single-Rushton (ESRC, 2007) and working and non-working morthers and divorce:
Working mothers divorce more than non-working mothers who have a traditional division of labour, but where the husband of the working wife is actively involved in the housework, the divorce rate is the same, essentially finding its more about domestic labour than economic.
What is the effect of triple shift on divorce?
The increasing number of burdens on wives (fiscal, emotional, domestic) create a new source of conflict between partners that make women more likely to leave.
Hochschild (1997) and the comparison of work and home:
For many women, work provides a source of positive, independent identity, as well as self esteem, that the home does not, making women feel less need to stay in unhappy marriages. Work also gives women less time to do emotional labour and address problems before they build up and become ‘irretrievable differences’.
Giddens (1992) and the pure relationship:
Traditional norms like obligation and duty are losing hold, giving way to a society based on selfish individualism. Relationships, therefore, become based only on the fulfillment of each partner’s needs
Give a criticism of relationships as becoming more individualistic.
Whether or not this is a bad thing is debatable: it makes relationships more unstable but the relationships that do form are based on the fulfillment of all partners.
What does the New Right see the high divorce rate as?
It undesirable as it undermines the traditional nuclear family and creates an underclass of welfare-dependant matrifocal families that drain government resources and improperly socialise boys.
What do feminists see a high divorce rate as?
More women are free from the oppressive chains of marriage; though this can also be seen as a smoke screen for the continuing oppression of women in the forms of shoving parenthood on them.
What do postmodernists see a high divorce rate as?
A symptom of the growing individualism and freedom of the postmodern age, and a significant factor in the growing family diversity.
What do interactionists see a high divorce rate as?
Morgan (1996) argues we cannot generalise what it is, what divorce means varies wildly based on the individual; Mitchell and Goody found for some it is the best day of their life and some don’t recover.
What do personal life perspective theorists see a high divorce rate as?
Divorce can cause issues but, as Smart (2011) states, family life can adapt without disintergrating, it is ‘just another transition among others in the life course’.
Give evidence of marriages decreasing.
The proportion of adults who have never married or been in a civil partnership has increased every decade from 26% in 1991 to 38% in 2021 (2021 census).
