Social policy

Question 1

What is social policy?

Answer 1

Social policy refers to the plans and actions of government agencies, such as the health and social service, the welfare benefits system, schools and other public bodies.

Question 2

What is the welfare state and what consequence does it have on the family?

Answer 2

• provides benefits and NHS
• supports the family financially
• but makes them more reliant on benefits and makes people lazy creating an underclass (New right)
• Functionalists believe it performs positive functions

Question 3

Marital rape act 1991

Answer 3

• it was a made a criminal offence for a husband to rape his wife
• holds men accountable for the actions
• women becomes less oppressed by men and have more power against their husbands

Question 4

Children’s act 1989

Answer 4

• requires the sharing of information between services
• caused a decrease in child abuse
• better protection of children

Question 5

The sex discrimination act 1975

Answer 5

• prohibits sex discrimination in the workplace
• gives more rights women, causing them to feel less oppressed
• allows for a dual earner family

Question 6

Bedroom tax (2013)

Answer 6

• charges people for unused bedrooms in council houses
• an attempt to tackle housing shortages as it encourages people to downsize

Question 7

Divorce reform act 1969

Answer 7

• easier for divorces to happen
• divorce doubled as a result
• caused an increase in family diversity (single parent and reconstituted)
• gives women more freedom to change the family to suit their needs

Question 8

Same sex couples can marry (2013)

Answer 8

• legally recognising homosexuality
• more equal than civil partnership act
• increase in same sex marriage
• decrease in stigma
• more freedom

Question 9

Free childcare for 15 hours (2015)

Answer 9

• All 3 - 4 year olds get 15 hours of free childcare a week
• available only during term time and for 38 weeks
• allows women to work and don’t have to cover childcare costs
• family can be a dual earner and neo-conventional family

Question 10

Do radical and liberal feminists have a positive or negative view on social policy?

Answer 10

• Radical feminists have a negative view on social policy
• liberal feminists have a positive view on social policy

Question 11

What solutions do the New right put forward to reinforce the traditional nuclear family?

Answer 11

• child support act -> make absent fathers pay, a way to prevent them from leaving the family
• denying council housing to unmarried teenage mother -> ensures young girls wouldn’t get pregnant.

Question 12

Why is the nuclear family the best type of family? and what must social policy do?

Answer 12

because they are self-reliant and capable of caring for its members.
therefore, the new right believe social policy should avoid doing anything that might undermine the natural and self-reliant family.

Question 13

Why do the new right disapprove of social policy?

Answer 13

• Social policy promotes diversity and the new right are against this. It also helps the low income families through benefits, which the new right disapprove of because they cause lazinesses.
• they believe the less the family interferes, the better family life will be.

Question 14

Almond agrees with the new right view, what do they agree have undermined the nuclear family?

Answer 14

• laws making divorces easier have undermined the idea of marriage being a lifelong commitment.
• introduction of civil partnerships sends out the message that the state no longer see heterosexual marriage as the superior domestic set up.
• tax laws discriminate against the conventional families with a sole breadwinner.

Question 15

What do the new right believe about more cohabitating rights?
eg adoption rights and council housing tenancies

Answer 15

• being to make cohabitation and marriage more similar.
• sends out the message that the state does not see marriage as special.

Question 16

What does Murray (new right) argue about the welfare state?

Answer 16

• provides ‘generous’ welfare benefits eg council housing for unmarried teenage mothers. Causes more teenage mother to have a baby just to get a house.
• cash payments to support lone-parent families encourages deviant and dysfunctional family types.
• fathers will abandon their responsibility if they see the state will maintain their children.
• Murray argues they offer a ‘perverse incentive’.

Question 17

How can marxist views on social policy be criticised?

Answer 17

• Functionalists would argue policies benefit everyone, not just capitalism
• Feminists would argue policies serve to reinforce patriarchy, not capitalism
• The new right believe the government support the poor too much and reward them for their bad behaviour
• Donzelot believes professionals target the poor families for improvement as the government see them as the problem

Question 18

What are marxist views on social policy?

Answer 18

• Marxists do not see social policy as benefitting everyone equally
• social policies benefit the rich by policing the poor and help maintain capitalism.
• Eg they see the low level of state pension as evidence that workers are too old to produce profits and are maintained at the lowest possible cost.

Question 19

What does Donzelot believe about social policy?

Answer 19

• state policy is a form of power and control over families.
• professionals like doctors and social services exercise their power and turn them in to cases to be dealt with.
• ‘policing of the family’ -> parenting orders
• social services make judgements based on backgrounds.
• poor families are more likely to be seen as the cause of crime and anti-social behaviour, which benefits the rich as they get away with it.

Question 20

What is a example of a policy that fits into the Donzelot view of the government policing the family?

Answer 20

• parents being given Parenting Orders where parents of young offenders or badly behaved children may be forced to attend parenting classes to learn the correct way of brining up children.

Question 21

How can Donzelot’s view on social policy be criticised?

Answer 21

• Marxists and feminists criticise Donzelot for failing to identify who benefits from these policies. For example, for marxists only the rich benefit. For feminists, only men benefit.

Question 22

How was social policy improved the position of those who choose to cohabit?

Answer 22

there’s been a decline in stigma attached to sex outside of marriage
young people are more accepting to change as they are more likely to accept cohabitation and a change in social standards
you can now adopt as a cohabitating couple
there’s more legal recognition

Question 23

What do feminists believe about social policy?

Answer 23

• helps to maintain women’s subordinate position and the unequal gender divine in the family.
• the state assumes that ‘normal families’ are based on marriage and offer tax incentives to married couples and not cohabitating couples.
• policies encourage marriage and discourage cohabitation - makes it difficult to live in any other family type

Question 24

What does Hilary Land (Feminist) argue about social policy?

Answer 24

• she argues that social policies assume that the ideal family is the patriarchal nuclear family. The is the family type that Edmund Leach calls the ‘cereal packet norm’.

Question 25

Why does Edmund Leach call the nuclear family the ‘cereal packet norm’?

Answer 25

because it is the kind of family that often appear in advertisements for breakfast cereals.

Question 26

What policies do the feminists identify help maintains the nuclear family and reinforce women’s economic dependence?

Answer 26

• tax and benefits -> assume husbands are the main wage earners and wives are their financial dependents. This can make it impossible for wives to claim social security in their own right.
• Childcare -> government pay childcare but it’s not enough so it’s difficult for women to go back to work unless they meet the additional cost needs. Women have to be financially dependent on their partner’s.
• care the for the sick and elderly -> policies assume the family provide this meaning women are expected to care for them meaning they cannot work