Decline in the American Family

Popenoe believes that the declining American family is an alarming issue that deserves attention in the United States. He explains that some of the causes for family decline includes the number of children has been declining substantially over the last few decades; marital roles have changed due to increase women in the labor force; the change in family structure; and increasing acceptance of divorce. He describes the family to be a relatively small domestic group of kin or people in a kin-like relationship consisting of at least one adult and one dependent person. Popenoe states that for whatever reason, the institution of “family” has lost functions, social power and authority over its members and people are become less willing to invest time, money and energy in family life, turning instead to investments in themselves. Thus, he names this generation as the “me generation”. He also argues that the nuclear family, which consists of a man, woman, and child is breaking up and that the two principal functions of childrearing and the provisions to its members of affection and companionship are taken away from families.

Stacey agrees with Popenoe that there is a decline in the American family, but she believes that family is an ideological, symbolic construct that has a history and a politics. She believes that there are three major flaws to Popenoe’s argument. First, Popenoe states that the family was once the only social institution in existence, but Stacey argues that this is never the case and was never recorded in the history of any cultures. Second, she explains that Popenoe did not examine the postindustrial economic transformations of increase in salaries and wages as well as the increase of women in the workforce. Lastly, he failed to provide alternatives as to why the United States is experiencing a decline in the institution of family. Stacey suggests that in order to prevent the American families from declining further, there should be legal, economic, and social policy reforms to mitigate the unnecessarily injurious effects of divorce and single parenthood on children.

Cowan also agrees that there is a decline in the American family, but he believes that Popenoe’s definition of family is too narrow and that Popenoe neglected certain issues including violence, drug abuse, mental illness, general emotional dysregulation, and loneliness that constitute the daily lives of too many adults and children in contemporary American families. Additionally, Cowan argues that societal trends in the same time period should not be linked together and be established as proof of causation just because they happen to occur in the same period. Also, he points out that Popenoe failed to consider other causations for such decline in the American family. Furthermore, Cowan states that Popenoe continually blames the victim and ignore the synergy of social forces that place American families at risk. Cowan also argues against Popenoe’ notion of the negative impact on the quality of family and children’s development when mothers are in the labor force by stating that there is some evidence showing that working mothers of young children are less depressed than those who stay home. Finally, Cowan argues that future research on this subject should address the following: implicit values and prescriptions about the way families ought to be; the definitions of families and what they do; development of more sophisticated models to study the processes linking societal, familial, and individual functioning; new and more differentiated familial models requite more research; and the need to further investigate the change of role of gender in the nuclear family.

I personally believe that Popenoe neglected many different factors when he wrote his argument. I believe that he is not comparing the past decades with today’s society equally. First of all, many marriages were arranged marriages and divorces were viewed to be highly unethical and widely discouraged. Thus, when divorces are becoming increasingly acceptable, those who are unhappy in their marriages chose to end the relationship through a divorce, which causes an increase in divorces throughout the decade. Many couples have children before the divorces and there remains at least one independent and dependent, which still fits into Popenoe’s definition of marriage. Therefore, divorces should not be considered as causation in the decline in the American family, but instead on the effects of divorces and single parenthoods on the children’s future perspective of family. Also, the introduction of contraceptives and abortion give couples the option to have children when they believe they are ready to or to end a pregnancy, which I believe is a positive impact rather than a negative. Previously, individuals who may not be able to support more children financially or emotionally are forced to have them. I do know that many people are against abortion and contraceptives and these two topics alone are very controversial topics, but I also believe that if an individual or couple is unable to give them a decent living environment, then why would is it a bad thing to have these options available to them? Additionally, Popenoe neglects to take into account the life expectancy a couple decades ago versus the present. Couples can have babies, but how many of them survive in the old days versus those who survive now? So, if presently we don’t have as many births as before but still have the same amount of individuals who successfully become an adult, does that still mean a decline in the American family? I don’t have the statistics for this point but if I had to guess, I would think that more babies survive now, just because we are more medically advanced than before. Therefore, giving births to babies and being able to raise them should be something that Popenoe should have considered in his argument. Also, I agree with Cowan that Popenoe’s definition is too narrow. During class, my team defined a family to be a group of individuals connected by blood or connections, who affect each other personally. Nowadays, individuals can include anyone and everyone into their own family; they don’t have to have the blood relationships, but they just feel like they’re a family. There doesn’t have to be a dependent and an independent. Sure, most typical families fit into that definition but when the children grow up and are not dependent of their parents anymore, are they not a family anymore? Furthermore, Cowan mentions that Popenoe neglects certain issues such as child abuse. Due to such issues, the power is handed over the other authorities. So, if a child is abused by his or her parents, but is a dependent of theirs, is this group of people still the family that Popenoe is describing? I would have to argue no, this is not a family and that United States has a better system protecting the children than other countries, which is against Popenoe’s point of losing authority to other institutions. Lastly, I felt that Popenoe speaks very negatively about women in the work force. Women have been fighting for equal rights for a very long time and are still struggling to achieve this balance. Why does it have to be the women to be the housewives? Why can’t men take some responsibility too? Women have dreams, hopes, and goals just like men. Is it wrong for women to pursue these dreams, hopes and goals?

In conclusion, I just want to say people don’t have to be related to call each other family. As long as there’s the connection between the individuals, then it’s enough.