The Family And Social Policy

Question 1

Social or state policy

Answer 1

An attempt to deal with social problems such as poverty, unemployment and homelessness. Also to make sure social needs such as jobs, benefits and a happy family are achieved. Social policy aimed at improving and regulating social conditions.

Question 2

Welfare state

Answer 2

A collection of social policies introduced between 1944 and 1948 which brought about the NHS, extension of schooling, increase of social housing etc. these policies were based of beliefs that citizens should be free.

Question 3

New right on the family

Answer 3

The New Right emphasise that the nuclear family plays a very important role in shaping the moral order of society. They believe the family makes sure the next generation is socialised into values such as discipline, respect and responsibility. Parenting based on those principles are seen as producing order and stability. New right influenced by the functionalist ideas of Murdock and Parsons.

Question 4

Threat to nuclear family - New Right

Answer 4

Claim feminism has turned women’s role within the family upside down. Also see social polices in the 1960’s and early 1970s as a beginning of the fall of traditional family values.

Question 5

1967 abortion act

Answer 5

Legalised abortion in the UK and made it available through the NHS.

Question 6

1967 sexual offences act

Answer 6

Allowed for same sex acts between two individuals in the UK. Age of consent was 21 in 1967, reduced to 18 in 1994 and 16 in 2000.

Question 7

Argue against gay couples

Answer 7

Patricia Morgan argue gay families are unnatural because children can only be the outcome of straight couples.

Question 8

1975 sex discrimination act

Answer 8

Made discrimination against women in the workplace by employers illegal.

Question 9

1970 equal pay act

Answer 9

Made it illegal for employers to pay women less than men employed in the same jobs.

Question 10

When was the contraceptive pill made legal

Answer 10

Made available through the NHS in the 1960’s and through family planning clinics in the 1970’s.

Question 11

1969 divorce reform act

Answer 11

Reduced the previously high cost of divorce and made the legal process of getting a divorce a lot simpler.

Question 12

Evaluating state policy

Answer 12

• new right have criticised both the Labour and Coalition government for undermining the traditional nuclear family and traditional sexual division of labour.
• feminists critique new right such as Leonard and argue that patriarchal ideologies still shape most state policies on the family.