The State and the Family

In a number of industrialized countries, governments are alarmed by the combined prospects of population decline in the near to medium future and a further ageing of the population. This book argues that demographic changes have been a major force in bringing population and family issues on to the political agenda. The decline in fertility, the increase in divorce rates and lone-parenthood, and the entry of women into the labour force have all reduced the relevance of systems of state support aimed at traditional families. From this perspective, the author examines the changes that have affected families over the past 100 years, and the various policies that have been adopted by the governments of twenty-two industrialized countries in response to these changes. The book assembles arguments from demography, sociology, and economics to explain population policies, their origins and aims. It shows that despite major similarities across countries in the ways family policy has evolved, and in the ways governments have viewed and supported families, there are major dissimilarities shaped by country-specific events, ideologies and circumstances.