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Political responses to changing
definitions of families
Lennart Nygren
Department of Social Work, Umeå University
Overview of lecture
• What do we mean by “family”?
• Family diversification
• The family-state relationship
• Family policy
• How policy influences family changes
• How policy reacts to family changes
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Why the interest in ”family”
• Changes in family structures create
demands on policies
• Policies affect families
• Family is still (?) a fundamental
institution
• eg. the ”Think Family” approach in UK
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What do you mean by family?
?
4
Definitions of family
• Murdoch (1949): common residence, economic co-
operation, reproduction and ”a socially approved
sexual relationship”.
• Parsons (1956): a social subsystem that contributes to
the overall efficiency in society: co-residence,
marriage bond, raising of legitimate children, a single
(male) bread-winner role, and sharing of income.
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Changes of family definitions…
• The nuclear family as the norm vs. the postmodern
family and other constructions.
• Feminist critique: issues of power, patriarchy,
inequalities, intersectionality, inclusion of diverse
relationships, not always suggesting the use of
”family” as label.
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Family diversity – many possible
ways to categorise:
• Nuclear family
• Extended family/multigenerational
• Unmarried cohabitation
• Lone parenthood
• Reconstituted families
• LGBTQ-families
• One-person households
• Living Apart Together (LAT)
• Transnational and commuting families
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Changing family structures
Recommended reading:
Research on Families and Family
policies in Europe
State of the Art
Final Report
(16.07.2010, published 01.09.2010)
Edited by Marjo Kuronen
Family Research Centre, University of Jyväskylä
The following three charts are form the above publication
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Share of family-types in the EU27
countries (2007)
Figure 2: Average age of women at first
marriage, 1970-2004, by country
Divorce rates (2008), Eurostat
Share of re-marriages of divorcés as the percentage of all marriages
in European countries (1960 &2006)
What is ”family” for politicians?
• Fundamental definition: Should we talk about
families or households?
• Dilemmas in censuses:
- shift in use of terms such as ”married” vs.
”cohabiting” and ”head of household” vs.
”reference person”.
- family is not always related to housing unit
- how to deal with homeless?
- how to include children living under the
same roof as parent(s) and are >18 yrs?
13
A policy dilemma– how to
measure?
• Unmarried cohabitation
• Extramarital births
• Lone parenthood
• Reconstituted families
• One-person housheolds, students?
elderly?
• Multigenerational households/extended
families
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The family-state relationship
• What is your idea about the role of the
state in relation to families?
?
15
The role of the state vs. Family
(Kaufmann, 2000)
• Institutional (preserve the family institution,
control)
• Demographic (population, reduction of
abortions)
• Economic (human capital, work force through
child care etc.)
• Social political (compensate caring costs,
fighting poverty)
• Gender equality (reduction of disadvantages,
equality rights)
• Children’s welfare (support, protection,
socialisation) 16
Family policy cornerstones
A. Regulation
- family laws (adoption, divorces, child
support…)
- work related (rights to leaves)
- equality (equal opportunities)
17
Cornerstones, cont’d
B. Information
- family support
- performance indicators
- campaigns (health, socialisation)
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Cornerstones, cont’d
C. Financing, taxing for in kind and cash
benefits
- child care
- parental leave
- child and family allowances
- social insurances
- taxation schemes
- housing subsidies and allowances
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Family policies: de-familisation,
familisation or re-familisation
• De-familisation is “the degree to which
households’ welfare and caring
responsibilities are relaxed either via
welfare state provision or via market
provision”
Esping-Andersen (1999) with ref to Lister (1994)
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Four types of familialism
• Explicit familialism
• Optional familialism
• Implicit familialism
• De-familialism
• Care vs cost de-familisation
(Leitner, 2003, Michon 2008)
21
22
Source: Hantrais, L. (2004) Family policy matters, p. 200.
Attitudes to state intervention
in family life, examples
• France: strong support for state to deliver responsive
and proactive policies.
• Nordic countries: undisputed right to intervene into
private lives.
• UK: protection is ok, most other interventions are not.
• Germany: low support especially for intrusive and
interfering policies
• Italy, Greece: profound distrust
• Source: Hantrais, survey 2001-2.
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Fertility and female
employment rates
2000-2005 Total fertility rate Female
employment rate
Sweden 1.71 81.7
Nord. countr. mean 1.80 81.0
Belgium 1.61 67.7
Greece 1.27 56.6
Netherlands 1.75 73.9
Portugal 1.44 74.2
OECD, mean 1.55 65.9
From Gupta et al. 2007. Rev Econ Houshold 6:65-88
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But - attitudes also vary in
relation to different policies
• Avoiding population decline: often
controversial policies
• Support to parents; from medals to cash
benefits
• Regulations of contraceptives, abortion,
assisted reproduction, surrogate motherhood,
euthanasia
• Immigration
• Eligibility for all family types?
• Ageing and retirement
25
Welfare regimes based on degree of de-
familisation (rather than de-
commodofication), Kurhonen et al.
1. The Nordic model
- protestant/secular/left wing
- individuals rather than families
- gender equality
- no mention of ”family” in constitution
- equalisation of marriage and
cohabitation
- close relationship NGO’s -
government
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Welfare regimes based on de-familisation
(rather than de-commodofication), Kurhonen et
al.
2. Continental
- catholic, subsidiarity
- male breadwinner/female carer
- family policies explicit (F, B)
- constitution: protection of families
- protection in focus
- distance NGO’s - Government
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Welfare regimes based on de-familisation
(rather than de-commodofication), Kurhonen et
al.
3. Anglo-american (sic!)
- UK, IRL, Malta
- weak state, needs oriented, market
oriented
- familialistic
- constitution: protection of family;
specific ministry,
- relation NGO to government rel weak
28
Welfare regimes based on de-familisation
(rather than de-commodofication), Kurhonen et
al.
4. Mediterranean
- catholic
- male breadwinner/female carer
- mutual obligation for extended family
- constitution: protects families
- subsidiarity local variations
- low levels in allowances
29
Welfare regimes based on de-familisation
(rather than de-commodofication), Kurhonen et
al.
5. Post-socialist
- re-familisation
- some: family protection mentioned in
constitution
- extended family obligations
- no coherent family policy
- relation NGO-government weak due
to both catholic and communist values
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Table 1. Same-sex unions policy in Western Europe by policy type and
date of adoption.
Source: adapted from Wintemute (2005) and Kollman (2007).
Family policy family changes
• Increased (female) labour supply and
a mostly female labour market/care
market
• Fertility rates?
• Gender equality?
• Are the scandinavian welfare states
“women-friendly” and/or “family-
friendly”?
32
Family changes family policy
• De-institutionalisation of families provokes
religious/traditional values inherent in family
policy: more unmarried couples, more
divorces, stepparents, new family forms.
• Dealing with rights of alternative family
relationships: same-sex couples, LAT’s,
transnational families, reconstituted families
etc.
• Postponing childbirth and fewer children: a
serious demographic problem
33
To discuss
• In what ways are family policies in
your countries
a) obstacles to,
b) facilitators of
inclusion/integration of alternative
families?
• In what ways is family policy a hinder
or a facilitator in relation to gender
equality in your countries?
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