Theories of the family

Question 1

Functionalist view on the family

Answer 1

• Murdock and Parsons
• See the family as a particularly important institution; the basic building block of society
• Family performs crucial functions of socialising the young & meeting the emotional needs of its members
• Stable families underpin social order and economic stability

Question 2

Murdock - 4 Functions of the Family

Answer 2

Universal nuclear family consists of two generations - parents and children: Murdock believes that this family rules is the best family type and exists all over the world.

Functions of the family:
• Sexual - ensures that adult sexual relationships are controlled and socially acceptable (stable, monogamous, heterosexual) & prevents sexual jealousy
• Reproduction - biological reproduction of the next generation (so society can continue).
• Socialisation - teaching basic norms and values so that the next generation are fully integrated into society.
• Economic - meet its members economic needs eg producing food and shelter.

Question 3

Criticisms of Murdock

Answer 3

• Feminists : arguing that the family is essential is ideological because traditional family structures typically disadvantage women
• Other institutions could perform the functions above
• Anthropological research has shown that there are some cultures which don’t appear to have families eg The Nayar

Question 4

Parsons - Functional Fit Theory

Answer 4

• As society changes, the type of family that ‘fits’ society and the functions it performs change.
• Over the last 200 years, society has moved from pre-industrial to industrial and the main type of family has changed from the extended family to the nuclear family.

Extended Family

• Consists of parents, children, grandparents, and aunts and uncles all living under one roof or in a collection of houses very close to each other,
• Such a large family unit ‘fitted’ pre-industrial society as family was entirely responsible for the education of children, producing food and caring for the sick
• Family basically did everything for its members

Nuclear Family (industrial society - 1800s onwards)

• Consists of only parents and children
• ‘Fits industrial society’ because it required a mobile workforce & extended family was too difficult to move when needed to find work to meet requirements of a rapidly changing and growing economy
• Less need for the extended family as more and more functions (health/education) came to be carried out by the state

Question 5

Parsons - Functions of the Family

Answer 5

• Primary socialisation: teaching the norms and values of society — gender role socialisation: boys adapt the instrumental role (breadwinners) & girls adopt the expressive role (doing the caring work, housework and bringing up the children)
• Stabilisation of adult personalities: emotional security which is achieved within a martial relationship between two adults

Warm Bath Theory

• Working life in industrial society is stressful
• Family is a place where the working man can return and be ‘de-stressed’ by his wife; like sinking into a warm bath
• This reduces conflict in society

Question 6

Criticisms of Parsons

Answer 6

• Too neat: social change doesn’t happen in an orderly manner
• Laslett: Church records show only 10% of households contained extended kin before the industrial revolution, suggesting the family was already nuclear before industrialisation.
• Wilmott and Young: found that extended kin networks were still strong in East London as late as the 1970s

Question 7

Evaluations of Functionalism

Answer 7

• Downplays Conflict: family is not always the safe and warm place as suggested by Parsons eg ‘Darker Side’ of the family (violence against women & child abuse)
• Out of date: instrumental and expressive roles are very old-fashioned — may have held some truth in the 1950s but today with the majority of women in paid work and the blurring of gender roles, both partners are seemingly likely to take on both roles ms
• Ignores exploitation of women: ignored the way women suffer from the sexual division of labour as even today, women still end up being the primary caregivers in 90% of families and suffer the burden of extra works.
• Gender roles are socially constructed: there are no biological reasons for Functionalists view or gender roles and these roles lead to the disadvantages experienced by women.
• Deterministic: ignores the fact children create their own personalities and they aren’t predetermined at birth or something they have no control in — incorrectly assumed an almost robotic adoption of society’s values via parents (this isn’t true)
• Ignores family diversity: assumes all families are best when nuclear, however many family structures are apparent in today’s society and still fulfil the same functions.

Question 8

Marxist View of the Family

Answer 8

• Believe that the family is a tool of capitalism
• Main function is to maintain capitalism and reinforce social inequalities
• Families perform the function of ideological control: convince the masses that the present unequal system is inevitable, natural and good
• Family type generally changes with society: nuclear family emerges not because of the needs of industrialisation but because of the needs of capitalism

Question 9

Fredrick Engels

Answer 9

• Monogamous nuclear family only emerged with capitalism: before capitalism, traditional tribal societies were classless and had primitive communism (no private property). Property was collectively owned and the family structured reflected this; there were no families as such but tribal groups existed in a kind of promiscuous heat (no restrictions on sexual relationships)
• With capitalism, the bourgeoisie started to look for ways to pass on their wealth to the next generation rather than having it shared amongst the masses
  ↳ this is where the monogamous nuclear family comes from as it is the best way of guaranteeing you’re passing on property to your son
  ↳ reproduces inequality: children of the rich grew up into wealth while the children of the poor remain poor
  ↳ nuclear family benefits the bourgeoisie more than the proletariat

Question 10

Criticisms of Engels

Answer 10

• Gender inequality clearly proceeded capitalism: vast majority of tribes in Africa and Asia are patriarchal, with women being barred from owning property, having no political power, having to do most of the childcare & hard physical labour
  ↳ Capitalism, increasing wealth and gender equality within a nation seem to be correlated as seen within wealthy capitalist economies such as the UK and the USA who have seen the fastest improvements in gender equality in the last 100 years

Question 11

Zaretsky

Answer 11

Cushioning Effect

• Similar to the Warm Bath Theory
• Family acts as a comfort from the stresses and strains of society
• Believes that the family allows a man to feel in control and powerful which they don’t feel in the workplace due to bourgeoisie oppression
  ↳ maintains capitalism as it prevents the proletariat from recognising their oppression and starting a revolution

Unit of Consumption

• Plays a vital role in the generation of profit for the bourgeoisie
• Workers are paid less than the amount charged for the products they create
• Family is targeted by advertisers to buy the producer they have created by urging families to Keep Up With the Jones and targeting children to use Pester Power to ensure they have the latest things to prevent bullying.
  ↳ particularly bad in the UK where there are few legal restrictions on adverts aimed at children, in Sweden advertising aimed at children under 12 is illegal

Question 12

Althusser

Answer 12

• Family socialises the next generation into the ruling class ideology & unequal social hierarchy
  ↳ maintains capitalism by ensuring the next generation accepts the ruling ideology as normal
• Family is an ideological apparatus: it serves to transmit values of the state
• Hierarchy in most families teaches children to accept there will always be someone in ‘authority’ who they must obey
  ↳ mirrors the hierarchy of boss-worker relationships in paid employment in later life

Question 13

Evaluations of Marxism

Answer 13

+ Discusses the idea that the nuclear family is a social construct and not necessarily good for society
+ Explains the existence of the dark side of the family
- Ignores family diversity: only discusses the role of the nuclear family, ignoring all other family types
- Deterministic: overemphasises the role of the family in maintaining capitalism and ignores other inequalities such as the role of the family in maintaining patriarchy & assumes people passively accept socialisation
- Negative view: ignores positive effects family can have for its members eg both parents supporting the children (New Right points out this is the most functional environment to raise children)
- Feminists: Marxist focus on social class inequalities downplays the role of patriarchy which is the real cause of female oppression. Sex inequalities exist within all families, irrespective of social class background

Question 14

Feminist View On The Family

Answer 14

• Critical of the family as social institutions
• Family is a tool of female oppression
• The nuclear family serves the needs of men rather than women through DV and unequal division of labour
• Believe gender inequality is a social construct, not a natural phenomena

Question 15

Liberal Feminist Views Of The Family

Answer 15

• Families are slowly becoming more equal through law changes and social attitudes
• Do not believe full equality has been achieved but the process is well underway
  ↳ eg socialisation of children in more gender neutral ways - with similar aspirations for both sons and daughters + chores not being determined by gender

SOMMERVILLE

• Many feminists have failed to acknowledge progress for women
  ↳ eg greater freedom to go into work, greater degree of choice over whether they marry/cohabit, when/whether they have children, same sex/heterosexual relationships or whether to live alone
• Greater equality in relationships through dual-earner households & increased choice for women
• Argues that in order to achieve true equality within relationships we need increased flexibility in paid employment

Question 16

Evaluations of Liberal Feminism

Answer 16

+ Sommerville recognises significant progress has been made in both public and private life for women
+ More appealing than radical idea
* More practical: system is more likely to accept small policy changes
- Remains that the inability of men to ‘pull their weight’ in relationships meaning high rates of relationship breakdowns will continue to be the norm = more serial monogamy
- Difference Feminists: this is an ethnocentric view as it really only reflects the experiences of mainly white middle class women
- Marxist/Radical Feminists: failed to challenge the underlying causes of female oppression
- Changing the law is not enough to bring about equality, there needs to be a fundamental change in social structures
- Black Feminists: traditional feminists fail to identify the diverse experiences of women in the family in relation to ethnicity
↳ many argue that intersectionality must be considered: the disadvantage caused by the factors of class and ethnicity as well as purely gender.

Question 17

Radical Feminist Views of the Family

Answer 17

• Men are the enemy
• Marriage and family are the key institutions which allow patriarchy to exist
• Overturning patriarchy = equality achieved
  ↳ advocate for the abolition of traditional patriarchal nuclear family and the establishment of alternative family structures and sexual relations.
• Family needs to be abolished: a system of separation is needed
  ↳ Political Lesbianism: heterosexual relationships are oppressive & so lesbianism is a good alternative
• ‘Dual burden’ of paid work and unpaid housework which men benefit from
• ‘Triple Shift’: emotional support, paid work & domestic labour
• Dark side of family life: nearly 1 in 4 women will experience DV

Question 18

GREER (Radical Feminist): Role of women as wives, mothers and daughters

Answer 18

• There is a strong ideology suggesting that being a wife is the most important female role
• Marriage reinforces patriarchal relationships
• Motherhood can be intrinsically satisfying but it is not valued by society
  ↳ ‘Mothers bear children in pain, feed them from their bodies, cherish and nourish and prepare to lose them
• Men expect to exercise control over women and expect them to service their needs
  ↳ daughters are quite likely to experience sexual abuse from their fathers
• Women are better in matrifocal households

Criticisms

• Makes generalisations which aren’t backed up by evidence
• Does not take into account the process women have made in family life in recent years

Question 19

Evaluations of Radical Feminism

Answer 19

• Less relevant today than the 1950s: women are less likely to suffer from the dual burden and triple shift
• Could still be relevant: Me Too Movement and Harvey Weinstein both show that harassment and sexual abuse of women remains common
• SOMMERVILLE: fails to see improvements that have been made to women’s experiences of the family; they are no longer trapped
  ↳ separatism is unobtainable due to heterosexual attraction
• Ignores domestic/emotional abuse suffered by men who often don’t report: resulting in a huge dark figure of DV against men
• Too radical: often detracts from the more moderate concerns of other strands of feminism

Question 20

Marxist Feminist View on the Family

Answer 20

• Women’s oppression comes from capitalism not men
• Women reproduce the labour force: through unpaid domestic labour, socialisation of the next generation of workers & servicing the current workers (their husbands)
• Women absorb anger from men who are frustrated by their alienation and exploitation
• Women are a ’reserve army of cheap labour’: women’s domestic role means they are restricted from working & are “in reserve”, making production more flexible

Question 21

Margaret Benston (Marxist Feminist) - Reproduction of labour power

Answer 21

• All chores associated with traditional, expressive role (domestic labour, childcare & emotion work) are necessary to ‘keep the family going’ & so benefits the capitalist class because they only have to pay one person in the family (the male breadwinners wages)
• The women attends to the husbands needs and ‘keeps him going’ as a worker for free & does childcare for free thus reproducing the next generation of workers for free
• Women are a “reserve army of cheap labour”: they are brought in and out of the labour market when the economy needed them
  ↳ makes production more flexible
  ↳ benefits the economy as women are kept in low paid and unstable jobs & supports their dominant role in the family
• Because the husband has to pay for his wife and children he cannot easily withdraw his labour power even if he is exploited: reduces his bargaining power & makes it more likely that he will put up with a low wage rather than risk being sacked striking for a higher wage

Question 22

Fran Ansley (Marxist Feminist) - Women as the ‘takers of shit

Answer 22

• Unequal division of labour in the family benefits the ruling class & capitalism
• Emotional support provided by women for the men in the home is a safety valve for the frustrations men experience as a result of working in a capitalist system
• “When wives play their traditional role as ‘takers of shit’, they often absorb their husbands legitimate anger and frustration at their own powerlessness and oppression”
• Critical of Parsons Warm Bath Theory: these roles are different and unequal and this benefits capitalism

Question 23

Diane Feeley (Marxist Feminist) - Family and Ideological Conditioning

Answer 23

• Traditional nuclear family not only physical reproduces cheap labour for the ruling class, it also teaches ideas that the capitalist class require for their future workers to be passive
• The family is an authoritarian unit dominated by the husband in particular and adults in general
  ↳ the family had an ’authoritarian ideology’ which teaches passivity, not rebellion and children learn to submit to parental authority thereby learning to accept their place in the hierarchy of power and control in capitalist society

Question 24

Evaluations of Marxist Feminism

Answer 24

• Very Dated: women today are just as likely to be in paid work as men so they no longer act as a “reserve army of labour”
• POSTMODERNISTS: the traditional nuclear family is becoming less common and so this theory is less applicable today
• Women’s oppression was evident before capitalism; if anything women are probably more oppressed in pre-capitalist, tribal societies
• Appears to be a correlation between capitalist development and women’s liberation: suggesting capitalism has the opposite effect
• Liberal/Difference Feminists: ignores progress women have made in family life
• Functionalists: see this division of labour as natural and desirable for the individual and society

Question 25

Intersectional Feminist Views on the Family

Answer 25

• Other feminist beliefs focus on the experience of women in a nuclear family but not all families are nuclear
  ↳ just as not all women will have the same experience of family life
  ↳ a Black woman may find her family provides a refuge from societal racism rather than it being a place of oppression or negativity

Evaluations

• Neglects the fact that many women do share the same experiences of family regardless of ethnicity or social class
  ↳ eg they all face a risk of DV and low pay

Question 26

New Right View on the Family

Answer 26

• Traditional nuclear family is the ideal type of family
• Argued that government policy was undermining the family so policy changes were needed
  ↳ support social policies which encourage nuclear families eg pro-marriage and against benefits for single mothers
• Nuclear family is ’natural’ and based on fundamental biological differences between men and women
• Decline of traditional family/growth of family diversity = more social problems eg higher crime rates & declining moral standards generally
  ↳ rate of family breakdown is much lower amongst married couples (6% to 20%)
  ↳ children from broken homes are almost 5x more likely to develop emotional problems, 3x more likely to become aggressive/badly behaved & 9x more likely to become young offenders
  ↳ lone parent families are more than twice as likely to live in poverty as two parent families
• Important for children to have stable homes with a married mother and father
  ↳ ideally the wife should be able to stay at home to look after the children
• Introduction of welfare state = people are dependent on handouts from the state
  ↳ encourages single parenting

CHARLES MURRAY

• nuclear families are the best
• pointed to single parent families for causing many social problems, feckless, lazy and work shy families who inadequately socialised their children

Question 27

Evaluations of the New Right View on the Family

Answer 27

• Exaggerate the decline of the nuclear family: most adults still marry and have children, most marriages continue till death, most children are reared by two natural parents, divorce has increased however most divorces remarry
• FEMINISM: gender roles are socially determined rather than being fixed by biology & traditional gender roles are oppressive to women
  ↳ divorce being easier is good because without it many women end up trapped in unhappy or abusive relationships
• Most single parents are not welfare scroungers: most want to work but find it difficult to find jobs that are flexible enough so they can balance work and child care
• CHESTER: the New Right exaggerate the extent of cohabiting and single parent families
  ↳ most children still spent most of their lives in a nuclear family arrangement (Neo-Conventional family)

Question 28

Postmodernist View on the Family

Answer 28

• Recent social changes such as increasing social fragmentation and diversity has made family a matter of personal choice
  ↳ families have become more unstable and diverse
• Family structures are increasingly varied
  ↳ individuals have much more freedom in choice in aspects of their lives which would have been relatively constrained eg lifestyles, personal relationships, family arrangements
• No longer one dominant family type
  ↳ no longer possible to make generalisations about society

Question 29

Judith Stacey (Postmodernist)

Answer 29

• Women have more freedom than ever to shape their families to meet their needs and free themselves from patriarchal oppression
• SILICON VALLEY, CALIFORNIA Case Study: women have led the change in family structures, roles and responsibilities rather than men
• Many women have rejected the traditional housewife role
• ”Divorce-Extended Family”: members are connected by divorce rather than marriage eg ex in laws/formers husbands new partners
  ↳ members are not connected by blood/marriage will still help each other financially and domestically

Question 30

Ulrich Beck (Postmodernist) - ‘Risk Society’ and The Negotiated Family

Answer 30

• Traditional, patriarchal nuclear family has been undermined by mainly two trends
  ↳ Greater Gender Equality - has challenged male domination in all spheres of life; women now expect equality both at work and in marriage
  ↳ Greater Individualism - people’s actions are influenced more by calculations of their own self-interest than by a sense of obligation to others
• This has led to a rise of the negotiated family: does not conform to the traditional family norm, but vary according to the wishes expectations of their members, who decide what is best for them by discussion
  ↳ partners enter relationships on an equal basis
• Rise of negotiate family is part of the move to a postmodern risk society
  ↳ more individual freedom = postmodern society which is more chaotic and uncertain than ever
• People have developed a risk consciousness: they have to constantly make choices
  ↳ for people in a relationship this means more time has to be spent discussing and making decisions eg whether to move in together/have kids etc
• Although the negotiated family may be more equal, it is less stable because there is far more scope for disagreement and conflict (which could lead to divorce) compared to the previous, traditional nuclear family
• Although the traditional, patriarchal family was unequal and oppressive, it did provide a stable and predictable basis for the family by defining each members role and responsibility

Question 31

Anthony Giddens (Postmodernist) - Individualisation & Pure Relationships

Answer 31

• Relationships in postmodern society have become ‘individualised’ (individuals put themselves first & their partners second)
• In a postmodern society, we are somewhat obsessed with ourselves and our own identities
• Relationships today have become part of each individuals process of self-discovery: trying different relationships has become part of establishing who we are, rather than about the relationship itself
• ’Pure Relationships’: exists solely to meet the partners needs and is likely to continue only so long as it succeeds.
  ↳ Couples stay together because of love, happiness, and/or sexual attraction rather than tradition, a sense of duty or for the sake of children.
• Downside of pure relationships: we now have a historically high rate of relationship breakdowns and divorce
  ↳ increasing trend towards serial monogamy - where people go from one committed relationship to the next, rather than sticking with one relationship for life
• Positives of pure relationships: basis of marriage and family has now changed into one in which couples are free to define the relationship themselves rather then simply acting out roles that have been defined in advance by law or tradition

Question 32

Evaluations of Postmodernism View on the Family

Answer 32

• Late Modernists (Anthony Giddens): even though people have more freedom, there is still a structure which shapes peoples decisions
• Contemporary Feminists: in most cases, traditional gender roles which disadvantage women remain the norm
• Personal Life Perspective: exaggerates how much choice people have about family.
  ↳ people are not completely disembodied as social structures will still influence peoples choices, as well as social context and the media
• Vanessa May: Beck and Giddens view of the individual is simply an idealised version of the white middle class man
• Carol Smart Connectedness Thesis: people are social beings who live in a web of connectedness, networks of relationships and personal histories which strongly influence and shape our range of options and choices

Question 33

Personal Life Perspective on the Family

Answer 33

• Developed alongside an Interactionist approach
• Other approaches ignore the increased diversity of families today compared with 50 years ago eg lone-parent families
• Structural theories assume that families and their members are simply passive puppets manipulated by the structure of society to perform certain functions
  ↳ eg to provide the economy with a mobile labour force or serve the needs of capitalism/men
• Personal life perspective believe that in order to understand families we must start from the point of view of the individuals concerned and the meanings they give to their relationships.
• Family is not in decline, it is just very different and much more diverse and complex than ever before

Carol Smart

• Rejects many of the assumptions about the decline of family life found in theories of individualisation (Beck/Giddens)
• Her approach prioritises the bonds between people and the importance of memory and cultural heritage etc
• Draws attention to a range of other personal or intimate relationships that are important to people, even though they may not be conventionally defined as family
  ↳ all kinds of relationships individuals see as significant and give them a sense of identity, relatedness and belonging
  ↳ chosen families, close friends and even pets

Question 34

Evaluation of the Personal Life Perspective on the Family

Answer 34

• Helps us understand how people themselves construct and define their relationships as ‘family’ rather than imposing traditional sociological definitions of the family from outside
• Can be accused of taking too broad a view
• By including a wide range of personal relationships, we ignore what is special about relationships that are based on blood or marriage
• Rejects the top down view taken by other perspectives but does see intimate relationships as performing the important function of providing us with a sense of belonging and relatedness