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In a time of unity and common purpose, why does it still feel as though we are a nation divided in half? On one side, are those with solid families, well-paying jobs, safe homes, and a sound education. On the other are those who were raised by one parent, live in poor neighborhoods, and lack the skills and support needed to hold down a steady job and steer clear of crime. How did this come to pass? In is penetrating new study, esteemed commentator James Q. Wilson argues that the answer lies in the state of modern marriage.Once a reliable thread in the social fabric, marriage is now a convenient promise easily made and just as easily broken. Long taken for granted, it is now under attack, and the result is devastating. The signs are everywhere, with the increase in cohabitation, the proliferation of single and teenage parents, and the high divorce rate, all of which are eroding family life and damaging children's futures. In fact, statistics have shown that children of divorce and single parenthood are the ones who continually have higher rates of school dropout and teenage pregnancy, as well as a greater propensity for emotional problems, drug use, and criminal activity. Drawing on meticulous research and an acute interpretation of American history, Wilson takes aim at the sweeping forces that have slowly but surely stripped away the value of one of our most important institutions.The Marriage Problem reveals that the seeds of today's crisis were planted over many years by unlikely sources -- from the glittering ideals of the Enlightenment to the shameful practice of American slavery. The exaltation of individual rights has made unmarried cohabitation -- with its lack of ultimate responsibility to another -- the lifestyle of choice among younger people. And in today's inner cities, families continue to feel the impact of slavery, which taught mothers and children not to rely on the presence of fathers, creating an environment prone to abandonment. With precision and persuasiveness, Wilson exposes the patterns that have allowed us to degrade marriage and shows us how we can reclaim it.Incisive, intelligent, and thought-provoking, The Marriage Problem is a clarion call to rebuild the family, and society, by returning a solid marital structure to its core.
- Sales Rank: #1523432 in Books
- Published on: 2002-03-01
- Released on: 2002-03-19
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 9.25" h x .97" w x 6.13" l,
- Binding: Hardcover
- 288 pages
From Publishers Weekly
In this study of the implications of broken marriages, conservative social scientist Wilson (The Moral Sense) posits that there is a direct connection between Americans' tolerance for no-fault divorce and unmarried cohabitation, and the country's rising rates of childhood delinquency, teenage births, abuse and single-parent families. As such, Wilson's work is poised to attract fans of Judith Wallerstein.'s important The Unexpected Legacy of Divorce: A 25 Year Landmark Study (2000), which suggests that divorce has a much harsher effect on children than previously believed. But many of Wilson's points assume that divorce is de facto a bad thing ("As one popular movie made clear, there is no such thing as a happy divorce"); he refuses to acknowledge that society's attitudes may have shifted precisely because many people now believe that divorce often represents a promising solution rather than a bitter failure. Many readers will take issue with Wilson's claim that the demographics of African-American families (high instances of single motherhood; absent fathers) can be traced to the cultural practices of people in Africa and the West Indies. And in fact, the teen birth rate has fallen significantly in the past 10 years. Wilson's polemic will likely be embraced by readers who already share his traditional views on public policy and shunned by those who don't.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
From Library Journal
While Maushart looks at what happens between husband and wife, Wilson (management, UCLA; government, Harvard) delves into the effect of "the marriage problem" on society. Wilson argues that the weakening of the family unit has been disastrous for our country and cites two reasons for this development: the individualism that arose following the Enlightenment and the consequences of slavery, which led to the emasculation of fathers and hence to single-parent households. Wilson makes his case with well-reasoned arguments and solid documentation, drawing on research that is both historical and international in scope to reinforce the important role family plays in child care. Wilson's cure: to restore the authority of marriage, for parents who are committed to each other and to their children can build a community and hence a nation that will flourish. Despite their contrasting themes, both books make a valuable contribution to the understanding of marriage in today's society and should find audience in public libraries. Deborah Bigelow, Leonia P.L., NJ
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
From Booklist
*Starred Review* Justly renowned for his gift for converting opaque sociology into lucid arguments, Wilson here ponders the cultural dynamics of America's remarkable retreat from wedlock. Though some have blamed the nation's epidemics of divorce and illegitimacy on the tumultuous1960s, Wilson probes much deeper. His careful scholarship uncovers the subtle ways in which ancient African kinship patterns still affect social life in the inner city and illuminates the legal traditions that turned eighteenth-century philosophizing into twentieth-century divorce statutes. But Wilson aims to explain not only how marriage has lost strength in modern America but also why that loss matters. With a raft of recent studies, he shows that once a society loses the anchorage of wedlock, riptides begin to pull entire communities into alienation and despair. Wilson particularly laments the suffering of children exposed to poverty and emotional confusion by the disintegration of their families. And it is precisely because the toll of family dissolution has run so high that Wilson challenges his readers to join in the search for ways to renew wedlock. That renewal, he makes clear, will require more than legislative finesse by shrewd lawmakers; it will require a profound shift in the entire culture. Wilson's sobering analysis will help spark the kind of public discussions that often presage such a shift. Bryce Christensen
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
Most helpful customer reviews
18 of 20 people found the following review helpful.
Marriage in a sociological and historical context
By Hagios
"Two nations, between whom there is no intercourse and no sympathy." Benjamin Disraeli was speaking of the nations of the rich and the poor, but Wilson sees underlying causes. One nation is married, reasonably affluent, educated, and invests heavily in their children. The other nation is fatherless, poor, and does not invest in their children. On page 11 he quotes a study by William Galston, a former advisor to President Clinton. Galston shows that you only have to do three simple things to avoid being poor: finish high school, marry before having a child, and wait until age 20 to have a child. Only 8% of people who do these three things are poor, compared to 79% for those who do not.
The problems in the fatherless nation go beyond poverty. Children of single mothers are more likely to be delinquent; they are more likely drop out of school, become suspended and suffer from emotional problems. This is not from the lack of financial resources; the researchers Sara McLanahan and Gary Sandefur were able to show that the poverty that resulted from being a single mother only explained about half the difference in outcomes between children with single mothers and children with married parents. The results for cohabitation are not much better, particularly since cohabitating relationships typically end in less than two years, sometimes in marriage, but about as often in separation. Furthermore, the marriages that result from cohabitation are more likely to end in divorce.
Wilson develops the theory of sex ratios. When the ratio between men and women is high, men have to compete with each other for women, and women that bargaining power to secure monogamous relationships. But when the ratio is low, women have to compete for the limited supply. This results in women having to accept sex outside of marriage, polygamy (depending on the culture), and a general loosening of morals as women use their sexuality to increasingly "outbid" each other for the limited supply of men.
This explains a great deal of why single motherhood has devastated the black community in America; with many black men in jail the sex ratios are extremely low. But the research shows that sex ratios do not explain the full story. A whole host of research, from that of Guttantag and Secord, to Mark Fossett and Jill Keicolt, to James Wilson himself, show that the correlation between sex ratio and illegitimacy is stronger for blacks than it is for whites or Latinos. Wilson partly attributes this to slavery, and partly to the lingering effect of various African cultures, and makes a convincing case.
Wilson also takes on the "disappearing jobs" theory of the increase in black out of wedlock childbirths. It suffers from numerous flaws. Christopher Jencks looked at black men with steady jobs. 80% of them were married in 1960, but only 66% were in 1980. The difference is that men with jobs were less inclined to marry. Furthermore, Robert Lerman and others have shown that immigrants in the same urban neighborhoods have lower rates of illegitimacy despite living in the same neighborhoods. In some cases when there isn't work, they will take long bus rides to available work.
The conclusion is that the increase in out of wedlock childbirths is driven by two factors: welfare benefits and the loss of the social stigma for unwed mothers. Wilson defeats two main objections to the welfare theory. The first objection is that welfare benefits have been declining relative to inflation, but Robert Moffitt has shown that when you also account for other benefits besides welfare, such as Medicaid, food stamps and public housing, welfare benefits did keep up with inflation. Another objection to the welfare theory is that some states offer much higher welfare benefits despite having lower rates of out of wedlock childbirths. This objection fails because different states have different cultures. When you compare how people make decisions you find that welfare benefits do have an influence. On page 147 he cites many researchers making that point, ranging from Mark Rosenzweig, the economists Jeff Grogger and Stephen Bronars, and by the 1998 research of Robert Moffitt (not to be confused with his earlier 1992 research on the subject).
Finally, Wilson spends much of the book putting marriage in both a sociological and historical context. This review is already long so I'll just touch on it briefly. Wilson notes that critics of monogamous marriage are correct when they point out that our current "white dress, vows, big ceremony" notion of marriage is a fairly recent invention. But they miss the larger point; marriage is generally most strongly formalized in societies in which the ties between parents and their children are fragile. In more robust societies with strong senses of social obligation, cohabitation and common law marriage produce the same results as our formalized marriages: a tangible claim on the father for help with both raising the children and supporting the mother.
I would also recommend Civil Rights: Rhetoric or Reality by Thomas Sowell, who shows the importance of culture, for example, African Americans of West Indian descent made 94% as much as whites back in 1984, compared to 62% for African American's as a whole.
10 of 12 people found the following review helpful.
Why marriage matters
By Bill Muehlenberg
Marriage is a problem, argues Wilson. That is, it is in a problematic state. Marriage is good for societies, for individuals, and especially for children. But the Western world is quickly moving away from marriage. As a result a host of problems are arising.
Wilson begins with what are now well-known and depressing figures. Any other type of relationship but marriage is bad for the adults and especially bad for the kids. Take cohabitation, for example. People who cohabit before marriage short-change themselves and their children in numerous ways. First, the average duration of a cohabiting couple is 1.3 years. Cohabiting couples are far more likely to divorce when they do marry than couples who did not cohabit before marriage.
Moreover, children of cohabiting couples are likely to be as poor as children in single-parent families. And in England, children of cohabiting couples are twenty times more likely to suffer child abuse than kids from married couples.
Or consider step-families. The homicide rate for children in such families is seventy times higher than for those living with both biological parents. Child abuse is also much higher in these families. The evidence merely confirms what common sense has always told us: "people care for their own children more than for those of others".
Wilson then examines the social, cultural and biological/evolutionary evidence for why marriage and families exist. In addition, the historical development, and recent decline, of marriage and family are discussed. While a combination of nature and nurture, biology and culture, made marriage a civil necessity, the doctrines of the Enlightenment sowed the seeds of its demise.
Beginning with the Enlightenment, marriage began to be seen less as a sacrament and more as a contract. Today it is seen less as a contract and more as an arrangement. Individual rights and freedoms, the product of modernism, have undermined the rationale for and the basis of marriage. Thus it is surprising that people bother to get married at all in the modern, secular, individualistic West.
Wilson also examines how government policies, especially economic policies, impact on the family. He acknowledges that many policies have a negative impact on families, but questions to what extent government policies can in fact help families. While marriage is in the best interests of children, there are limits as to how much a government can do to encourage marriage. After examining a number of federal programs aimed at doing just that, Wilson concludes: "getting single mums to marry is harder than keeping married couples together".
Thus while financial incentives from the government can help to an extent, they are no panacea. Indeed, the cultural incentives, or disincentives, to marriage, may be more crucial. And these cultural trends may be harder to overcome. A concern for relationships has replaced a concern for marriage. This is the result of larger cultural shifts such as the Enlightenment, with its attendant rugged individualism, rampant secularism and often amoral utilitarianism. How these forces can be offset is no easy matter. Interestingly, Wilson sees a revival of religion as a major factor if we are to see cultural trends reversed.
While Wilson himself displays no deep religious convictions, he does acknowledge the role religion has played in the past both to curtail some of these forces, and to under-gird and affirm marriage and family. One way religion does this is by acknowledging the value of stigma and shame. Our society, says Wilson, "has managed to stigmatize stigma so much so that we are reluctant to blame people for any act". Thus our no-fault divorce laws, for example. No one wants to take responsibility for their actions anymore, and our laws are beginning to reflect that.
Wilson argues that we somehow need to recover the positive nature of stigma and shame. We need to recognize that not all behaviors are in society's best interests. Illegitimacy, for example, is one of them. Forty years ago a mother who brought a child into wedlock had a clear understanding that this was not something to boast about. Today no such moral compunction exists. But it should.
Perhaps part of the way to make for a better future is to recapture an accurate sense of the past. Marriage and family are not dead yet, but have taken a severe hammering. We need to redouble our efforts to affirm and protect these most vital of institutions. This book is an important component in such a defense.
13 of 21 people found the following review helpful.
An Excellent Book!
By A Customer
Wilson's excellent book sumarizes the findings of virtually all of the factual studies of the consequences of divorce and illigitmacy for children and for American society done over the past decade and more.
Those reviewers who have traduced the author are precisely the kind of ultra feminist ideologues who for over a decade have been denying the facts, ignoring the consequences, touting the tired old 60's rhetoric of rights without responsibilities, continuing to insist against all the empirical evidence that divorce is good for the children, and, all in all, burying their heads in rhetorical sand because the reality of the world they have made doesn't square with the prognostications of their ideology.
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