Marxist view of the Family (Week 16) Flashcards
Early Marxist view
- Earliest view of the family was developed by Fredrich Engels. His book > **‘The origin of the Family’. **
- He argued that family changed/adapted to the way proucts were made.
- He believed in the early stages of human evolution the ‘means of production’ were communally owned and the family didn’t exist.
- During this time there were no rules limiting sexual relationships, the society was the family.
- Argued we began as a ‘promiscuous horde’ having relationships with who we liked, when we liked.
- Children were the responsibility of everyone.
- Monogamous nuclear family developed with the emergence of private property, particularly the private ownership of the means of production.
Protection of private property
- The state introduced laws to protect the private property.
- Also to enforce the rules of **monogamous marriage. **
- This form of marriage and the family developed to solve the problems of the inheritance of private property.
Primogeniture
Primogeniture: Property was owned by males and in order to pass it on to their heirs, they needed to be certain of their legitimacy.
* So they needed greater control over women so there wasn’t doubt about the paternity of the offspring.
Zaretsky
- His writings are on the theory that modern capitalist society and the factory system destroyed the family as a unit of production, thus separating work and family life.
- Family became necessary to provide a cushion to absorb the stresses and frustrations of the working environment.
- Zarketsky doesn’t believe that the family can fulfil this role - “It simply cannot meet the pressures of being the only refuge in a brutal society.”
Zarketsky
Production of Labour
Also sees the family as holding up the capitalist system in a variety of ways;
1. Providing a unit of consumption > perpetuating the system
2. Exploiting woman as unpaid domestic servants and childrearers
3. The production of labour > capitalism requires a continuous supply of labour in order to make it’s profits. The nuclear family is suited to providing this in the cheapest way. (especially through women)
Roles of the family
Socialisation: child learns to be obedient. They are successfully reared into a false consciousness.
Psychological outlet: family is a comforting device for worker against the oppressive system and dampens any anger.
Sexual: marriage often referred to as ‘legalised prostitution’. Women ‘gives’ sex in return for economic security.
Economic: family is encouraged to be consumers.
Love: the word becomes distorted > if a women loves her husband she should labour in the home and if a husband loves his wife he should go to work to support them.
Geographically mobility: weakening of the extended family ties provide capitalism with a more mobile workforce.
How families support the capitalist economic system?
- Ideological control
- Economically
- Politically
- Families spread ideas favourable to both capitalism and the ruling class.
- Althusser(1970) says the family is an ideological state apparatus where children learn the norms and values of society.
- Zaretsky(1976) argues that socialisation is about passing on ruling class ideology and accepting that the system is about the importance of work ethic and to obey authority.
How families economically support the capitalist system
- Families produce future workers
- Take on the cost of looking after the old/sick
- Althusser > the family is a unit of consumption instead of a unit of production (like in the past).
- Zaretsky > families are important targets for advertisers ecouraging consumption
How families politcally support the capitalist system
- Family acts as a stabilising force that helps maintain political order needed for companies to function profitably.
- Zaretsky argues that the growth of the privatised nuclear family encourages people to focus on private problems rather than wider social concerns.
- The family becomes a release for adult frustrations. eg. If men are powerless in the workplace they are able to exert power over their family.
Marxism Analysis
- Provides an important corrective to the functionalist view.
- Sees the family in the context of capitalism and how the family helps to legitimise class inequalities.
- Recognise the way the family are a target fo rconsumers by companies seeking to maximise profits.
- Marxists may be exagerating its negative aspects - ignore the emotional and social fulfillment people get from family life.
- It’s possible for parents to socialise their children into recognising the oppressive nature of capitalism and prepare them to resist it.
Neo-Marxism
Bourdieu
- This perspective adds a cultural dimension to the relationship between the family and the economic system.
- Highlights how different types of family capital give advantages and disadvantages to children of different classes.
Types are; cultural, social and symbolic capital.
Cultural capital
- Bourdieu argues that some parents are better positioned to invest in their children. (have more cultural capital than others)
- Silva & Edwards (2005) argue that middle and upper class parents are better able to equip their children with the knowledge/skills necessary for an easy transition to the workplace.
- Bourdieu argues that cultural capital operates through the family to give some children a head start in education.
- Parents can motivate their children by passing on the knowledge/attitudes to needed to succeed educationally.
Social capital
- Refers to people’s connections within a social network and the values that these connections have.
- Putnam calls ‘norms of reciprocity’ - what people do for each other.
- Cohen & Prusak argue high levels of social capital involves trust, mutal understanding, shared values that tie wealthy families into networks.
- These networks are strengthend by mutal advantage and self-interest.
- Middle & upper class families have greater access to significant social networks in schools and the workplace, that give their children economic advantages.
Symbolic capitalism
Relates to the characteristics that upper class children develop.
* Authority - directing the efforts of others in the expectation of being obeyed.
* **Personal charm **(charisma) - used to manipulate others behaviour.
