families and social policy

Question 1

What is a social policy? E.g?
What are policies based on? What does this result in?

Answer 1

Plans and actions of state agencies e.g. schools.
Laws introduced by gov that provide framework>agencies can operate.

Question 2

Give an example and explain a policy in which a government directly affected family life.

Answer 2

China’s one-child policy:
-policy control aimed to discourage couples from having more than one child
-couples who complied=extra benefits e.g. free childcare and higher tax allowances
-couples who didn’t comply=repay the allowances and pay a fine

Question 3

What does the New Right think about the traditional nuclear family? Why?

Answer 3

Strongly in favour, provides and cares for its members, especially socialisation of children.

Question 4

What does the New Right think about the changes that have led to family diversity?

Answer 4

Threatening to the conventional, nuclear family>social problems e.g. crime, welfare dependency.

Question 5

What does Murray argue about the New Right?

Answer 5

Critical of the welfare policy:
-providing welfare benefits, e.g. council housing for lone-parents or unmarried teenage mums, undermines the conventional nuclear family
-this encourages dysfunctional family types that harm society, aka ‘perverse incentives’

Question 6

What does Murray argue about ‘preserve incentives’?

Answer 6

Welfare benefits reward irresponsible, anti-social behavior, e.g:
-fathers are more likely to abandon their responsibilities for their children
-growth of lone-parents and young girls to becoming pregnant
-kids grow up without male figure and authority>rise in crime rates

Question 7

What are policies such as welfare benefits, according to the New Right, encouraging?
What 2 essential things does this threaten?

Answer 7

Dependency culture, relying on the state to provide.
-successful socialisation of the young
-maintenance of work ethic among young men

Question 8

What are the New Right’s solutions to the problems of welfare benefits?

Answer 8

-Cuts in welfare spending
-Tighter restrictions on who is eligable for benefits
-Denying council housing to unmarried teenage mothers
-Advocate policies that support traditional nuclear families, instead of cohabiting.

Question 9

4 criticisms of the New Right

Answer 9

-Functionalists: state welfare can benefit the family.
-Feminists: an attempt to justify the return of the patriarchal nuclear family, subordinated women to men (oppression).
-Wrongly assumes that the patriarchal nuclear family is ‘natural’, rather than socially constructed.
-Ignores policies that support and maintain the nuclear family

Question 10

What do feminists argue about social policies?

Answer 10

They help maintain women subordinate position and the unequal gender division of labour in the family.

Question 11

What policies do feminists identify that supports the patriarchal, nuclear family? (3)

Answer 11

-Tax and benefits policies
-Childcare
-Care for the sick and elderly

Question 12

What do tax and benefits policies assume?
What does this lead to?

Answer 12

That husbands are the main wage-earners and that wives are their financial dependents.
Makes it impossible for wives to claim social security benefits in their rights.

Question 13

What do policies governing school timetables and holidays make it hard for? Why?
What doe this lead to?

Answer 13

Parents, usually mothers, to work full-time unless they can afford extra childcare.
Women are restricted from working>economic dependence.

Question 14

What do policies assume about providing care?
What does this lead to?

Answer 14

The family, usually middle-aged women, will provide this care for the sick and elderly.
Women are restricted from working>economic dependence.

Question 15

Critisise the feminist view of social policies?

Answer 15

Not all policies are directed at maintaining patriarchy e.g. equal pay.
These policies improve the position of women in the family and wider society.

Question 16

What do marxists argue about gov policies?

Answer 16

They serve the capitalist class:
-e.g. holiday and sicky pay>increasing work productivity of working class>prevents revolution.
-Examples above appear to benefit workers, but it’s a form of IDEALOGICAL CONTROL

Question 17

How do functionalists view social policies?
Example of this?

Answer 17

Helping families perform their functions more effectively>better quality of life for its members.
E.g. NHS:
-with the help of doctors, hospitals, medicine>family is able to take care of it’s members.

Question 18

Critisise the functionalist view on social policies?

Answer 18

-Feminists: assumes that all members of the family benefit equally from policies, often benefit men
-Marxists: assumes that there is a MoP with social policies, policies can reverse progress e.g. cutting welfare benefits from poor families.

Question 19

How does Donzelot see social policies?
What does he argue about how professionals carry out surveillance of families?

Answer 19

A form of state power and control over families.
Social workers and doctors use their knowledge to control and change families, aka ‘the policing of families’.

Question 20

Where does Donzelot get his ‘policing of the families from’?
Explain

Answer 20

-Foucault’s concept of survaillance=sees power as something held by the gov, diffused throughout society and found within all relationships.
-Foucault sees professionals e.g. doctors and social workers as excising power over clients by using their knowledge to turn them into cases to be dealt with.

Question 21

How does Donzelot reject funtionalists MoP?

Answer 21

Social policy is a form of state control of the family, not policies and professionals creating a better, freer, more human society.

Question 22

2 critisisms of Donzelot

Answer 22

-Feminists: social policies operate in the interests of men
-Marxists: social policies operate in the interests of capital class
*both think that Donzelot fails to identify clearly who benefits from social policies of surveillance.

Question 23

What does Donzelot argue about survaillance on social classes?

Answer 23

Surveillance is not targeted equally on all social classes:
-poor families are more likely to be seen as ‘problem families’ and as the cause of crime and anti-social behavior
-professionals target them for improvement.

Question 24

Overall, how do policies impact the families?
Give some examples

Answer 24

Increased family diversity, e.g:
Marriage> ^ same sex
Divorce> ^ family diversity
Benefits> ^ women aren’t dependent
Contraception> less children or later in life