FAMILY - Industrialisation and the Family (PARSONS)

Question 1

What sociologist’s theory of industrialisation is key in linking the development of the nuclear family (family) and industrialisation (the economy)?

Answer 1

Talcott Parsons = His theory says that industrialisation led to the development of the nuclear family.

Question 2

What other main issues regarding economic change is a more contemporary example compared to industrialisation?

Answer 2

Globalisation!

Question 3

What is Industrialisation?

Answer 3

Industrialisation is the process whereby the economy shifted from being based largely around agriculture to being based on industry and manufacturing!

Question 4

When did Industrialisation take place in the UK?

Answer 4

In the 18th and 19th centuries, during the Industrial Revolution!

Question 4

What other process took place during the same time as the Industrial Revolution in the UK?

Answer 4

Urbanisation!

Question 5

What is Urbanisation?

Answer 5

Urbanisation is the process where people move from rural communities to urban communities in towns and cities (rural-urban migration); this results in the rapid growth of those towns and cities.

Question 6

What does Parsons argue Industrialisation and Urbanisation did to the nuclear family?

Answer 6

Parsons argues that this massive change not only impacted the family, it actually was transformative; he argues that it created the nuclear family.

Question 7

What does Parsons believe in as a Functionalist?

Answer 7

He believes that the institutions in society work together like the organs in the human body (Organic Analogy) in order for society to work and function properly. Therefore, when there is social change, other institutions in society also have to change themselves to ensure that there is a functional fit!

Question 8

What is a ‘Functional Fit’?

Answer 8

This is the theory that suggests that institutions in society fit society as it is, not as it was; it changes to fit! (Kind of like the lock-and-key method in Biology, but the enzymes don’t denature and not fit; they change and adapt so they they can fit and mold together)!

Question 9

What family type did Parsons believe the pre-industrial, agrarian society was populated with?

Answer 9

Extended families - This was because there was a functional fit between the extended family and the rural economy!

Question 10

Explain the functional fit between the extended family type and the rural, pre-industrial economy in the UK!

Answer 10

Where people worked the land in rural communities, the more family members to lend a hand, the better: aunts, uncles, cousins and numerous children were economic assets. Everyone who was fit and able in the family had to be economically active, and so the presence of older relatives provided essential services in terms of childcare, education and healthcare. Families remained in the same communities and on same land for generations, and so there was no requirement to be geographically mobile to seek work, so a large family was not a burden. They also provided extra workers if someone fell ill = The family was still being provided for!

Question 11

What changed about the functional fit between the extended family and the rural economy after Industrialisation in the UK?

Answer 11

When people started moving from rural areas into towns and cities, in order to get jobs in factories and mills (industrial jobs), this all changed. Work and home were now separated - families needed to be geographically mobile, as they could not take large numbers of dependant family members and extended family with them into the city. There was paid work for men in the factories and mills, which led to a clear gender division of labour emerging, with women staying at home to look after the children and the house.

Question 12

As the state took over many of the family roles, what two irreducible functions where the family left with? HINT: Think about Parsons!

Answer 12

1. Primary socialisation
2. Stabilisation of adult personalities

Question 13

According to Parsons, what did Industrialisation create a clear change between?

Answer 13

This social change demonstrated a clear change in the family from extended families with many functions (in the pre-industrial society) to privatised nuclear families with fewer functions in the industrial society.

Question 14

What are the 3 factors that explain why nuclear families have a Functional Fit with the industrial society?

Answer 14

1. Geographical mobility
2. Social mobility or meritocracy
3. Specialised roles

Question 15

What does Geographical Mobility mean?

Answer 15

This means that families can move to where the work is - This is much easier for nuclear families, as there are not as many members of the family. This, clearly, suggests that geographical mobility is something that larger, extended families lack (especially during the Industrial Revolution).

Question 16

What is Social Mobility/Meritocracy and what does Parsons argue in relation to it?

Answer 16

Parsons argues that individual status in pre-industrial society was ascribed (you were born into a particular status) whereas in industrial society people could achieve a new status through hard work (achieved status). In extended families, social mobility can lead to inter-generational conflict, but this is less of a concern when families are “privatised” as small independent units. Both these forms of mobility are made a lot easier by the isolated and private nature of the nuclear family.

Question 17

What is an Ascribed Status?

Answer 17

A status/position in society that you were born into!

Question 18

What is an Achieved Status?

Answer 18

A status/position in society that you achieve through hard work and merit!

Question 19

What are Specialised Roles and what does Parsons argue in relation to them?

Answer 19

In nuclear families in industrial societies, men and women have separate specialised roles (according to Parsons). Parsons writes about men being ‘instrumental’ leaders and women being ‘expressive’ leaders and this being the most effective division of labour for industrial society. We will return to this in the section on gender roles.

Question 20

What type of role do men have in the Family in Industrial societies?

Answer 20

INSTRUMENTAL!

Question 21

What type of role do women have in the Family in Industrial societies?

Answer 21

EXPRESSIVE!

Question 22

What is one evaluation point regarding Parsons and his ideas surrounding Industrialisation and the Family? HINT: What is the truth?

Answer 22

One evaluation point of Parsons’ theory is that historians do not agree that the changes in the family described by Parsons actually match what really happened.

Question 23

What does Laslett say in opposition to Parsons’ ideas surrounding Industrialism and the Family? HINT: Nuclear family in pre-industrial communities!

Answer 23

Peter Laslett (1972) = He conducted research into pre-industrial families in his famous work of social history ‘The World We Have Lost’. He found that the most common family form in the pre-industrial communities he studied was not the extended family, but actually nuclear family. People may well have lived close to extended family and worked together, but in terms of their households, most were made up of parents and children.

Question 24

What does Anderson say in opposition to Parsons’ ideas surrounding Industrialism and the Family? HINT: Increase in the number of households made up of extended families; kinships were valuable!

Answer 24

Michael Anderson (1971) = He looked at households in Preston in the midst of rapid industrialisation and urbanisation (using the 1851 census) and found a significant increase in the number of households made up of extended families. A rational response to moving from rural areas into the city was to move in with family. This helped economically, but also socially as – unlike the rural communities they had moved from – these were neighbourhoods where people did not know each other and so kinship connections were very valuable.

Question 25

What are two evaluation points regarding Parsons and his ideas surrounding Industrialism and the Family? HINT: ‘Armchair theoriest’ and his outdated ideas regarding the ‘Warm Bath Theory’!

Answer 25

Parsons is criticised, then, for being an armchair theorist. His theory seems quite logical, but had he engaged in extensive empirical research into the question he may well have found evidence that undermined his theory. Indeed, if his data had replicated the findings of Laslett and Anderson, he might have had to turn his theory entirely on its head.

There are also strong criticisms of the way Parsons presents the nuclear family as ideal (and an ideal which society evolves towards) and also the of Parsons’ explanation of gender roles (which will be discussed in more detail in the appropriate section).

Question 26

Give two more evaluating points in regards to Parsons’ ideas surrounding Industrialism and the Family! HINT: More diversity than Parsons suggested!

Answer 26

Having said that, the common family form when Parsons was writing was certainly the privatised nuclear family and there certainly were more extended families in the past. So family structures and roles had changed and the major social change of the era was industrialisation, so it does not seem unreasonable to make a connection.

However, it would seem that Parsons had failed to detect the precise nature of the relationship.
In truth, what this array of research and evidence would appear to show is that there has always been rather more family and household diversity than Parsons’ theory would suggest.