Sociology Essay

[Last Child of Ungoliant]

I am here posting an essay i wrote for my A-Level Sociology,
when i have had a few replies, I will post the marks and grade i was awarded
(see if you can guess first )

Assess the view that the family is a dying institution.

A popular debate in sociology concerns the idea that the family is a dying institution. To demonstrate this viewpoint, it is useful to refer to the ideology of the New Right sociologists, who claim that a decline in morals, including a rise in young, single mothers and a rise in divorce and juvenile delinquency has in turn led to the decline in the family. David Marsland claims that this is the result of the Welfare State being too generous, and that it has created a “Culture of Dependency”, which in turn takes money away from where it is more needed, for instance the Education system and the Health System. He claims it has created an incentive to stay unemployed, and has such weakened the family that the family is now in crisis, and under threat. His solution would be to cut welfare benefits to all but the neediest, the sick, the elderly and the disabled; a solution which Charles Murray would no doubt agree with. He claims that single mothers, his “New Rabble” of society, should have all their benefits cut completely, which would “starve them into marriage”, as he claims.

Further support for this argument can be taken from the work of John Redwood, who also cites single mothers as the reason for the decline of the family as a social body. He suggests four solutions to this problem; first, he would advocate seeking out the father, to get him to support the mother and child, secondly, he suggests that if the father can, or will, not help, then the grandparents should assist. Next would be to place the child up for adoption, if the grandparents can not help, and finally, if all the prior options have been thoroughly explored, and found to be unviable, then the state would intervene, by placing the child, and mother, in a hostel, where the mother would be able to finish her education, and enable her to go on to become a productive member of society, and not become a burden to the Welfare State.

A contrasting view is that of the Functionalists, who would argue that the family is far from dying; in fact it is the cornerstone of society. Murdock would argue that the family is not in any decline, but still performs four basic functions; Sexual, Reproductive, Economic & Educational, however, he ignores the fact that other institutions can perform these functions: Sexual function can be performed by prostitution, Reproductive by IVF treatment and sperm donorship, Economic by the Welfare State, and Educational functions by schools and colleges. He also ignores the phenomena known as the “Dark Side” of the family, or dysfunctions, for instance domestic violence, and divorce.

Support for the Functionalist argument can be drawn from the studies conducted by Talcott Parsons. He claimed that the family provides two basic functions. Up to the age of about five years, the family conducts the primary socialisation process, which entails teaching Norms and Values to the child. The other function performed by the family is the Stabilisation of Adult Personalities, also coined his “Warm Bath” Theory. The result of this function is that the family is there to relax the adults, and prevent them from going insane. A criticism of Parsons is that he also ignored the “Dark Side” of the family, and also that he only viewed white, middle classed families in the United States of America.