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Family & social policy, The new right, Donzelot: policing the fam,…
Family & social policy
Cross cultural eg:
- China's one child policy, which discourages couples to have more than 1 child. cpls who comply get xtra benefits such as free healthcare and higher tax allowances.
- Communist Romania, wanted to inc. birth rate so restricted contraception & abortion, made div. more diff & made unmarried cpls pay a 5% interest income tax.
- Nazi family policy, two fold policy. sought to keep women out of the workforce and confine them to 'kitchen, children & church.' They sterelised 375k disabled people that it deemed unfit to breed.
Cons govt 1979-97:
- Thatcher govt banned a promo of homo by authorities. This inclu a ban on teaching that homo was an acceptable family relationship.
- The cons defined divorce as a social prob. They set up the child support agency to enforce that absent fathers do not abandon resp to their fam.
- The con led coalition intro gay marriage.
New labour govt: The NLP favoured the dual-earner neo-conv family type.
- Longer maternity leave and the right 2 seek time off work for family reasons. Made it easier for both parents to work.
- Working families tax credit. Enabled parents 2 claim tax relief on childcare costs.
- The new deal, helping lone parents to return to work.
The new labour supp alternative families to the conventional type. Includ policies such as:
- Civil partnerships for same-sex couples.
- giving unmarried couples the same rights to adopt as married couples.
- Outlawing discrimination on grounds of sexuality. Equal pay act.
Cross cultural diff that enc/disc gender equality in the family:
- Familistic gender regimes: where policies r based on trad gender division. In Greece, there is lil state welfare or publicly funded childcare. Women have to rely heavily on their extended kin & there is a trad DOL
- Individualist gender regime: Policies that r based on the belief that husbands & wives r treated the same. In Sweden, policies treat husband and wives as equally responsible both for breadwinning & domestic tasks.
EOP, state provision of childcare, parental leave and good quality welfare services mean women r less economically dependent on their husbands & have more opportunities to work.
However, policies such as publicly funded childcare do not come cheap and create major conflict on who should pay for them and who it benefits. E.g fems argue that global recession in 2008 led to a cutback in govt spending which led to wom to taking more resp at home.
The new right
Are in favour of the nucleur fam based on a married het cpl w a DOL between a male provider & a female homemaker. In their view social policies have led to family divers that threaten the conventional fam & produce social problems such as crime & welf dependency.
Murray argues that welf. benefits offer 'perverse incentives' - that is they reward irresponsible/anti-social behav. E.g
- If fathers see that the state will maintain their children, some of them will abandon their responsibilities towards their fam.
- Providing council house for unmarried cpls encourages young girls 2 become pregnant.
- The growth of lone-parent fams, encouraged by generous benefits, means more boys grow up w/o a male role model. This lack of paternity figure is resp for a rising crime rate amongst young males.
They argue that social policy encourages a dependency culture where indiv come to depend on the state to support them & their children rather than being self reliant. This threatens the functions that family fulfil for society:
- Successful socialisation of the young
- The maintenance of the work ethic among men
Disagrees with functionalist bc the less the state 'interfere' in families, the better family life will be. Greater self reliance will enable the family to meets its members needs most effectively.
Evalu:
- Fem argue that it is an attempt to justify a return to the trad patriarchal NF that subordinated women to men & confined them to a domestic role.
- Abbott & Wallace argue that cutting benefits wuld drive poor fams into greater poverty & make them less self-reliant.
- Ignores policies that maintain the nucelur family rather than undermine it
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Feminism
Policies as self-fulfilling: Hilary Land argues that social policies assume that the ideal family is the patriarch. NF w a male provider & a female homemaker w their depend children. This norm of what the family should b affects the kind of policies governing family life. The effect of the policies is to reinforce that particular family type at the expense of other types, creating a self-fulfilling prophecy.
E.g if the state offers tax incentives to married couples only and exclude cohabiting couples, this policy may encourage marriage and discourage cohabitation.
They see society as patriarchal, benefitting men at the expense of women. They argue that all social institutions such as the state and its policies maintain the subordination position of women in society and its unequal division of labour in the fam.
Policies supporting the patriach fam:
- Tax & benefit policies. It assumes that husbands r the main wage-earners making it impossible for wives to claim benefits in their own rights since its expected that their husband will provide. Reinforces womens dependency on their husbands.
- Childcare. Govt does not pay enough for childcare which does not permit parents to work full-time. Policies governing school timetables makes it hard for mothers to work full time. women r restricted from working & r placed in a position of economic dependence.
Evalu:
- Not all policies r directed at maintaining patriarchy. E.g equal pay, sex discrim laws, right of lesbians to marry, rape being made a criminal offence in 1991 could b said to challenge the patriarchal fam & improve position of women in society.
Functionalist persp
See society as built on harmony & consensus from major conflict. See the state as acting in the interest of society as a whole & its social policies as being good 4 them. Policies help the family perform their functions more effectively & make life better 4 the members. E.g fletcher argues that intro of health, ed & housing has led to the develop of a welf state that supports fam perf functions effect. The NHS means that fam is better able to take care of its members when sick.
Criticism:
- Assumes that all members of the fam benefit equally from social policies, feminist argue that policies benefit men at the expense of women.
- Assumes there is a MOP view on social policies. Marxists argue that policies can also turn the clock back and reverse progress made e.g cutting welfare benefits to poor families.