Using Material from Item 2b and Elsewhere, Assess Sociological Views of the Impact of Government Policies and Laws on Family Life (24 Marks)

of health care. Also, this public policy protects the interest of individuals who are unable to protect themselves such as children. Finally, Other social objectives can be defined as government aims that are not related to the other three categories. For example governments may try to promote national unity or culture as a goal and promotion of certain community values by putting limitations on alcohol and gambling. Normative rationale for policy must be based on at least one of these four categories.

Social policies often are based on the government’s philosophies and ideologies. In 19th century, Britain had the Laissez-faire approach which led the economic life. This meant that there was not government’s interference.

The new labour has introduced laws which benefit the family, one of the laws being allowing adoption amongst cohabiting couples and gay couples. In effect this will mean other family types will be able to have children this will lead to a decline in nuclear families because couples will not have to marry to have to adopt children. For example a cohabiting couple are unable to pay the expenses of a wedding and they cannot have babies due to fertility issues therefore the new law will help them adopt a child without marriage. In addition to laws introduced by the new labour, they have also increased welfare by re-distributing income to increase welfare to help lower income families afford food and clothing. For example a mother with three children cannot finically support herself with one job and benefits, but due to the increase in welfare benefits, she is now able to support herself. Although other sociologist would disagree with these introductions of social policies,

Social policies have impacted my life before I was even aware of the term social policy. Today, social policy impacts my personal life and my professional life daily. I am impacted personally by many social policies that pertain particularly to higher education and women’s rights. Social policies that increase assess for adult learners and reduce financial barriers for higher education has allowed me to return to higher education. I am an adult student who has children and works full time so attending classes in a traditional setting is not an option for me. With higher education being more accessible and offered on-line I am able to attend higher education working towards a degree. Financial policies regarding higher education have provided

Social policies often are based on the government’s philosophies and ideologies. In 19th century, Britain had the Laissez-faire approach which led the economic life. This meant that there was not government’s interference.

A social policy refers to the plans and actions of government agencies, such as health, welfare benefits, schools etc. These can often be used by politicians to promote certain family structures, which they believe to be ‘ideal’. There are many examples of policies which the government use to try and promote the traditional nuclear family which is commonly seen as the family ideology. One example is the 1930’s Nazi government who wanted to create an Aryan race and put policies in place to sterilize certain groups to prevent them from having children. Another more recent example is China’s two child policy which was out in place to

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the poverty rate for single parents in 2009 was 37.1%, while the rate for married couples with children was 6.8%. This means that being raised in a married family reduces a child’s probability of living in poverty by 82%. Policies that can be implemented to strengthen marriage would be ones that educate the public on the benefits of marriage to financial stability and child development. Returning to economic policies, the welfare system has penalties against marriage within it that create incentives to not get married. Since benefits are reduced as a family’s income rises, a single mother will receive more benefits than if she had an employed husband in the home. For low-income couples, this means that marriage would cause a decline in welfare benefits and an overall decline in the couple’s joint income. In order to remove these disincentives, the welfare system could be changed to increase the value of earned income tax credit for married couples with children. Work requirements can again be of assistance by making it so able-bodied parents are required to or look for work in order to receive aid. This will prevent the appeal of using welfare as an alternative to work or marriage. By implementing these ideas, marriage will increase and poverty and welfare dependence will

To gain a better understanding of Social Policy we need to look at its definition:

Social policies the fundamental principles in which a society is based. Created to tackle poverty, protect society addressing issues such as social welfare, justice and individual wellbeing. By 1834 the government were under fierce criticism due to rising and mounting costs of looking after the poor, it became clear a change was needed to fix problems in society. The government brought in an amendment act titled the Poor Law (1834) which was designed to reduce the cost of looking after the poor, passed by parliament this new law meant anyone seeking relief from poverty had to now enter a workhouse (BBC-Bitesize, 2017). In the early 1800's the population was rapidly rising, an industrial revolution, the development of towns and the first experience of modern unemployment caused problems within British society (Spicker, 2017). There was suspicion from middle and upper-class taxpayers that their money encouraged the poor to be lazy and avoid work, Squandering money on alcohol and tobacco. In addition, this encouraged the poor to have more children in which they could not afford to support causing resentment and dividing society (Murray, 2013).

In this essay is about the relationship between the social policy and social problem, but before going into a deep understanding of the two related parts that involve in a society, let is defined each one of them and know what they are and how they connect. When it comes defining the social policy or social problem; there is no one solid definition for them as it has many definitions because of their widely involvement in the society. In Bessant Theories, Mark Considine (1994;2) , fairly recommended that policy is cleverly easy caption that is able to cover parts of actual complicated actions.

Since the early nineteenth century the reformist of social democracy has hugely affected the development of social policy. Basing its principles on the two theories, socialism and liberalism it has influenced social democracy. The state is a key instrument that constructs social change, social democracy protects individual liberty and believes in state intervention to better the welfare and equality among the public. Altogether social democracy is a theory used by social democrats to transform from capitalism to a welfare state, extending the rights and freedom for citizens. Social democrats accept the confined role of markets, and the economic system. Social democracy is achieved through parliament distributing goods and implementing policies that support the welfare promoting egalitarianism, such as taxing the wealthy to redistribute wealth.

Through this paper you will learn about the family preservation policy which was a movement that was used to keep children at their homes with their families rather than in foster homes or institutions. We will learn more details of how this movement came to be it turned out to be a reaction to the earlier policy of family breakup, which pulled children out of unfit homes. poverty alone was seen as a justified reason to remove children. This paper will also focus on the policy’s values, ethics, and political ideology that affect the policy’s implementation. It will also focus on the rules that need to be followed while this policy is being conducted. This paper will also explore the strengths and weakness of this policy as well as how young

Where functionalism believes the nuclear family is positive, marxism argues from a negative viewpoint seeing an extended and reproduced conflict between classes. Marxist dispute the belief of family having equal benefit for all and argue the capitalist economy depends on the family to buy and work, to produce goods which benefits the capitalist. Although the nuclear family is responsible for socialisation, it must be considered that not all norms and values are positive. They oppose the functionalists who paint a rosy view, who forget to account for issues that arise possibly leading to divorce or separation, as not all families are the same (Taylor and Richardson et al,. 2002). The increase of economic pressure from unemployment and people living longer seen to impose pressure on relationships leading to breakdown. The socialisation process seen to result in the spreading of the ruling class philosophy, individuals being deceived into accepting a capitalist system of leadership and dominance. Those Bourgeois benefitting from  a created labour force with the proletariat exploited. Engels (1972) saw the bourgeois form of nuclear family as oppressing women, who were dependent financially on their spouse and expected child bearers. Family being designed to control women, protect property and for men to know their

While not all family restorationists go along with such drastic legislation, they generally use a language of moral failure and cultural decline to account for family change. They all seek to revive the stigma that used to surround divorce and single motherhood. To change the

Family is one of the hardest words to define. There are many definitions and thoughts of what a family consists of. When one accepts the definition of the census family given by Statistics Canada then a family becomes “a married couple and the children, if any… a couple living common law and the children, if any… a lone parent with at least one child living in the same dwelling… grandchild living with grandparents but no parents present… Census families can be opposite or same sex and children may be adopted, by birth, or marriage and all members must be living in the same dwelling” (Baker 2014). With family being such a difficult term to agree on, the creation of a complex study of family life emerges. The factors that influence family life are put into three theory categories; Social Structure, Interpersonal Factors, as well as Ideas, Global Culture, and Public Discourse.