Marriage, Divorce and Cohabitation Flashcards
Overall trends in marriage and cohabitation
- Long term decline in marriage rates: people are less likely to marry
- People are marrying later: age 32 (men) & 30 (women)
- People are more likely to cohabit: cohabiting same sex families made up 29.4% of all same sex couples
- Very recent increase in the marriage rate
Anthony Giddens (Postmodernist): changing nature of love and relationships
- Our ideas and expectations surrounding love and marriage are shaped by society
↳ today, the norm is to see marriage as primarily about love and passion rather than fury - In the past, in Britain and France marriage was much more of a practical arrangement: it wasn’t based on choice but instead on financial necessity and carrying on the family name
- Today, most of us expect to have a choice over who we get married to, and the norm is that marriage is about an emotional-connection at least as much as duty
↳ we expect more than ever from our partner - they are expected to meet their partners emotional needs and the passion to be kept alive
↳ these expectations do not live up to the mundane-reality of married life which may explain the high divorce rate - Giddens Pure Relationships are a part of late-modern society characterised by reflexivity and greater gender equality
- Confluent love: individuals are now looking to create meaningful relationships based on love and respect
- Seems as if most people going into a marriage for the long-term are kidding themselves and the correct attitude towards marriage should be ‘until one of us simply decides that we should part’
- Simply describing the most appropriate type of relationship/marriage which fits in with a late-modern society characterised by dual-careerism, near gender equality and the eroding of traditional norms of masculinity and femininity
- Evaluations: people don’t talk about their relationships in these terms, this type of serially monogamous relationship-lifestyle seems great for kid-free people but not when kids are involved
Long term decrease in marriage
1) Economic Factors - increasing cost of living, weddings & property prices
↳ average cost of a wedding around £30,000 & average cost of a first time home is over £34,000
↳ periods of recession may account for trends in marriage
2) Changing Gender Roles (Liberal Feminism) - more than half the workforce is now female which means most women don’t have to get married in order to be financially secure
↳ Wilkinson (Genderquake) - economic power is shifting to women meaning marriage seems like a poor option
3) The New Right - blame the decline of marriage on moral decline: part of the broader breakdown of social institutions and due to too much acceptance of diversity
↳ results in the inability of people to commit to each other which is bad for society and the socialisation of the next generation
↳ Morgan: blames social policies, particularly over generous welfare as damaging marriage because it encourages single parents.
↳ Secularisation has made the institution of marriage less sacred and people are less likely to engage in a life long commitment to each other sanctioned by marriage
4) Postmodernists - decline in marriage due to the move to postmodern consumer society characterised by greater individual choice and freedom
↳ marriage is now a matter of individual choice, like how we are used to being consumers
↳ secularisation = less social stigma attached to cohabiting or remarrying after a divorce
↳ Giddens Pure Relationships: even though people may still value marriage, changes to social structure make it harder to start and maintain stable relationships
Evaluation
- Most households are still headed by a married couple
- Couples may cohabit, but this is normally before getting married (they just get married later)
- Surveys show most people still think marriage is the ideal type of relationship
- The fact that remarriages have increased show that people still value the institution of marriage
- General social changes lie behind its decline
- Very recent increase in the marriage rate
Changing patterns of Divorce and Marital Breakdown
- Long term increase in overall divorce rate
- Increase was especially rapid following the 1969 Divorce Act
- 42% of marriages end in divorce
- 10.6% decrease in divorce in 2018 compared to 2017: the lowest number since 1971
Reasons for the Long-Term Increase in the Divorce Rate
1) Social Policy - 1969 Divorce Reform Act replaced blame with ‘irretrievable breakdown’ which meant much loose criteria and made divorce easier
2) Economic Factors - increasing equality in the UK means lower social classes now get paid less compared to rising living costs
↳ both partners in a marriage need to work to get by which puts a strain on marriage and leads to higher numbers getting divorced
↳ Positive evaluation: divorce rates are higher amongst poorer families
3) Functionalism - Goode: conflict has increased because the family has become more isolated from other kin, placing an increased burden on husbands and wives who have little support from other relatives
↳ Dennis: because the family performs fewer functions, the bonds between husband and wife are weaker
↳ Allan and Crowe: because the family is no longer an economic unit, this makes it easier for families to break up
4) The New Right - increasingly generous welfare benefits for single mothers allows women to divorce if they deem it necessary: if divorce occurs, in 9/10 cases the child will go to the mother making if difficult to find full time work (thus making benefits necessary)
↳ a sign of wider moral decline
5) Feminism/Changing gender roles - women today are much more likely to be in employment today meaning they are less financially dependent on their husbands & freer to end unsatisfactory marriages
↳ advances in contraception: allows woman to avoid unwanted pregnancies and leave marriages without children
↳ Evaluation: advances of women can be exaggerated as women still earn less than men and traditional gender norms remain in many families
6) Postmodernism - religion and traditional values have declined in Britain meaning there is no longer a set of social values which force people into staying married & there is less social stigma attached to getting a divorce (reflects the declining importance of social structure and the rise of consumer culture)
↳ Giddens: nature of marriage has changed because the nature of intimate relationships have changed - development of plastic sexuality where sex is for pleasure rather than conceiving children. Relationships and marriage are no longer seen as permanent and is based on confluent love (dependent on partners benefitting from the relationship)
↳ Beck: divorce has increased due to individualisation - more opportunities for individuals (especially women) and increasing choice leads to increased conflict and chaotic relationships
7) Secularisation - changing attitudes towards the legal entity of marriage have also had an effect on people’s perception of marriage and divorce
↳ New Right: this illustrates a decline in morality as people no longer take the sanctity of marriage seriously whereas Postmodernists may argue it is just a consequence of society
Perspectives applied to declining marriage and increasing divorce
Feminism
- Decline of marriage as a tradition is a good thing because traditional marriage is a patriarchal institution
- Most divorce proceedings are initiated by women which suggests marriage works less well for women than men
- Radical Feminists: increase in divorce has not necessarily benefitted women - children go to live with the mother in 90% of cases following a divorce and single parent families suffer higher levels of poverty and stigma
The New Right
- These trends are negative as they indicate a decline in morality and a breakdown of social structure and order
↳ the family is supposed to be the fundamental building block of society and it is difficult to see what will replace it
↳ without the family we risk less effective primary socialisation and more problem children and anomie for adults
Postmodernism
- Decline in marriage and increase in divorce reflect the fact we are part of a consumer society where individual choice is central to life
- End of the ideology of the nuclear family is seen as good as Postmodernists reject the idea that traditional married nuclear family is seen as better than other families forms
- People still value marriage but changed in the social structure make it harder to start and maintain stable relationships: greater gender equality means it’s harder to please both partners & both partners working doesn’t help with communication needed to start/maintain a relationship
- People now delay getting married to establish a career
- People delay getting married due to increased cost of mortgages and weddings and because of increased fear of getting divorced
↳ cohabiting is the new norm before marriage
