Families topic 7

• A comparative view of social policy

  Cross cultural examples of family policy

  • China’s one child policy- aimed to discourage couples having more than one child, supervised by workplace, family, planning committees, women must seek permission to become pregnant, there was benefits to complying, e.g. child, healthcare for free and priority in education
  • Communist Romania- in 1980s, there was policies to increase birth rate, such as restricted contraception and abortion, lowered legal age of marriage to 15 ect
• A comparative view of social policy

  Natzi family policy- 1930s state introduced a twofold policy encouraged the healthy and racially, pure to breed a master race. It sought to keep women out of work and can find them to kids, kitchen, church. they sterilised 375,000, disabled people that were deemed unfit to breed due to mental retardation, physical malfunction etc
• Perspectives on family and social policy- functionalism

  See society as based on consensus and see the state as acting in the interest of society, it’s policies being good for all, they see policies as helping the family to perform their functions better, which makes life better

  • fletcher argues, introduction of health, ed , and housing policy since industrial revolution, has led to developments of welfare state that supports families to perform their functions
  • However, it’s criticised cus it assumes all members of the fam benefit equally from social policy. Fems argue, they only benefit men.
• Perspectives on family and social policy- denzelot: policing the family

  Has a conflict view, sees social policy as a form of state power to control families,

  • He uses foulcarts theory of surveillance, foulcart sees power, not just as something held by the government, but diffused through society and found in all relationships,
  • Denzelot applies this to families, he is interested in how professionals carry out surveillance on families he argues social workers, doctors ect use their knowledge to control and change families. He caused this policing of families
• Perspectives on family and social policy- Denzelot: policing the family p2


  Surveillance isn’t targeted equally, poor families seen as the cause of crime that professionals target for improvements

  • eg Condry state control families by issuing compulsory parent orders through court
  • Criticisms- smart and feminists criticise this as he doesn’t say who this surveillance benefits Marxist would argue with benefits capitalism. feminists would argue it benefits men
• Perspectives on family and social policy- New Right

  Strongly in favour of conventional nuclear family, men work, women stay at home

  • argue changes that have led to greater family diversity e.g. divorce, cohabitation, same sex partnerships are threatening to self reliant, nuclear family and producing social problems. E.g. crime
  • argue state policies encourage these changes and helped undermine nuclear family
  • eg Almond Laws making divorce easier undermine idea that marriage is a lifelong commitment
  • into of homo marriage sends out message that state doesn’t view hetro marriage as superior
• lone parent, welfare, policy, and dependency culture- NR, Murray 


  Argues providing welfare benefits, e.g. council housing for unmarried, teenage mothers and cash payments to lone parents undermines the conventional nuclear family and encourages dysfunctional family types as there is a perverse incentive

  • If fathers, see the state will maintain their kids, some of them will abandon their responsibilities, providing council, houses for pregnant teens, encourages young people to get pregnant
• Lone parent, welfare policy,

  and dependency culture- NR, Murray p2


  Therefore, they believe policies are encouraging a dependency culture where people depend on state to care for them and their kids which threatens to essential functions

  1. Successful socialisation of the young
  2. Maintaining work ethic of men
• New right solution

  Argue policy should be changed with cuts in welfare spending and tighter restrictions on who’s eligible for benefits

  • This would have advantages such as, taxes could be reduced, it would give fathers incentive to work, denying council housing for teenagers would remove incentive to be pregnant at a young age
  • They also advocate policies, favouring, married, couples/traditional nuclear families
• Evaluation of new right

  New right view has been criticised

  • Feminist argue it attempts to justify a return to a traditional patriarchal nuclear family that oppresses women
  • Abbott argues, cutting benefits, would make poor families, even less self-reliant, and more dependent
• New right influence on policies

  Conservative view developed in 1970s, therefore we might expect it had a strong influence on the conservative family policies. However, we can see similarities between the new right and labour
• Conservative government, 1979-1997

  reflecting NR Margaret Thatchers government band, promotion of homosexuality by local authority, including a ban on teaching that homosexuality was an unacceptable family relationship

  • They also defined divorce as a social problem
  • But they did also adopt policies that went against the new right such as making divorce easier
• New labour government, 1997-2010

  There’s some new ideas in new labour government, as they also saw family as bedrock for society, and saw marriage and heterosexual couples as best for raising kids

  • They also connect a new right with emphasising need for parents to take responsibility for their kids by introducing parenting orders for parents of young offenders
  • However, smart notes, new labour, rejects the new right view that family should have one male, breadwinner, they advocated, dual, earner, neo conventional families, as described by Chester
• New labour government, 1997-2010 p2

  These policies included longer maternity leave, Three months unpaid leave for both parents, the new deal helping lone parents return to work

  • New labour argue, some state intervention can improve life for family, e.g. their welfare, taxation, and minimum wage policies were partly aimed at lifting kids out of poverty by redistributing the wealth
  • New labour also differs from new right because of new alternatives they made two nuclear family, such as civil partnerships for same-sex couples, giving unmarried couples the same right to adopt
• Conservative lead government from 2010

  There’s been a long divide on what Richard Hayton calls modernisers who recognise that families are now more diverse, and are willing to reflect this in their policies and traditionalists, who favour, new right View and reject diversity as morally wrong

  • This division means that the Conservative party has found it difficult to maintain a consistent policy on the family
  • E.g. Conservative lead coalition. Government introduced gay marriage a policy opposing new right traditionalists
• Feminism

  Takes a conflict view, they see patriarchy is being reflected in society, arguing all institutions, including state policy, help maintain women’s coordination and unequal division of labour in families
• Feminism- policy as self fulfilling prophecy

  Land argues social policies. Assume the ideal family is patriarchal nuclear family with a male provider and female homemaker.

  • This of the family should be like affects the kind of policies, governing family life
  • The effect of the policies is often to reinforce that particular type of family at the expense of others
  • E.g. if state assumes normal families are married and offers tax incentives to married couples. This policy may encourage marriage and discourage cohabitation Which in affect, makes it more difficult for people to live in other fams
• Feminism- policies supporting the patriarchal family


  tax benefit policies, assume husbands main wage earner, + the wife is financially dependent, making it impossible for women to claim Social Security benefits in their own right because it is expected that their husband will provide

  • Childcare, as government only pays for some childcare, most parents can’t work full-time as they have to look after kids, so women are restricted from working
  • women left to care for sick+ elderly women + working, so often must give up job to care for people in the fam making them financially dependent on men
• Evaluation of feminism

  Not all policies are directed at maintaining patriarchy, e.g:

  • equal pay
  • sex discrimination laws
  • equal rights to divorce
  • gay marriage
  • benefits for lone parents
  • Rape within marriage made illegal

  Are all policies which have improved the position of women
• Gender regimes- Drew

  Drew uses the concept of generation genes to describe how policies in different countries can either allow or discourage gender equality in the family and at work •. •She identifies two types of gender regime following different types of family policy 1) familistic gender, where policies are based on a traditional welfare of publicly funded childcare, women must heavily rely on support from their extended kin
• Gender regimes- drew p2

  . 2) individualistic gender, where policies are based on the belief that husband/wives should be treated the same, wives aren’t assumed to be financially dependent on their husband, so each partner has separate entitlement to state benefits

  • E.g. in Sweden, men and women treated equally as breadwinners and doing domestic housework
• State V Market- Drew

  argues most European countries are now moving towards more individualistic generations, however, policies such as publicly, funded childcare aren’t cheap and involve conflicts on who should benefit from them, and who should pay for them, so it would be naive to assume there’s an inevitable ‘ march of progress’ towards gender, equality

  • Feminists argue since global recession in 2008, cutbacks in government spending throughout Europe have led to pressure on women to take more responsibility for caring for family members because state retreats from providing welfare