Vladimir Putin

In his speech Putin explained the decline in population that has taken place each year in Russia and deemed it the Demographic problem. This problem revolves around three things: low birth rate, high death rate, and low immigration rates. Putin wants to implement government programs that will curb these problems. To increase the birth rate he explains a funding program instigated by the government to aid families who have more than one child. To decrease the death rate Putin discussed government programs improving the roads and decreasing the alcohol consumption. He has no definite plan to increase immigration, only that Russia needs to encourage educated people to come to its country. The rhetoric he uses makes it sound like the state cares about families, but Putin's words make it clear that the family thrives in order to provide the state. Putin said that a man's true love for his country begins with a love for his family.

Contemporary Families

Singly and Cichelli's artile on Contemporary Families argues that the new family order is characterized by the individual. Rather than the old family model in which family life was a collective concern, the family is now a place where the individual "searches for support from one's close relatives for the affirmation of one's identity."

Singly and Cichelli also argue that the European family has reconciled the individual with the "inegalitarian social order" perpetuated by the family in a general sense. The authors suggests that a study of social reproduction and personal fulfillment leads to an understanding of "the transformations that are under way in contemporary families.

The article divides the transformation of the family into different categories that shed light on the development of European families. One such category is that of education in contrast to social status as an asset in relationships. The contemporary family now allows the degree of the individual to determine their value in a relationship rather than the social rank of their parents. In a sense, the contemporary couple "trades" valuable degrees rather than social rank in the formation of a long term relationship. Interestingly enough a significant portion of the authors' evidence comes from novels and literature from the late nineteenth century to more contemporary literature.

The more compelling evidence however, comes from statistics gathered from surveys taken by different countries, especially France and Italy. With their evidence and arguments combined Singley and Cicchelli make the valid point that the European family of today is greatly based on the individual's development--including that of the child. While parents are responsible for creating opportunities for their child in competition with other families, the parent also assumes a more unattached role. Children are allowed to seek their personal identity, in fact, the parent is expected to help reach that latent personality.

An insightful conclusion is made by the authors. They recognized the great changes that have take place even in the last thirty to forty years and then pose the question of whether the current form of family life will actually last--what will be the next "contemporary family"?

Mary Abbott's "A Better World"

The post war era in Great Britain was a very tumultuous time. Not only did many families struggle with the reintegration of the father back into the home, but even uncontrollable factors like the weather caused problems for the British. Cold winters and low coal supplies hit families hard while floods ravaged the country once spring came. The societal trends in the post war years greatly shifted. For example, women went from wearing the boxy outfits of the interwar years, to wearing extremely feminine dresses emphasizing small waists. The television become a way to bring a family together. In essence, the British people wanted to forget the trends of the war, and revive the old world ideals. Abbott suggests a second wave of Elizabethianism occurred. However, women especially found it difficult to cope with the return to the old world. While the men were on the battle front, women had gained more power and influence on the home front. When the men returned, some wives complained that there husbands just expected things to go go to the way things used to be, which was a hard thing to cope with. The 1950's especially were a time of great change and uncertainty in Great Britain.

I would categorize this article in three categories: law, state, and church; family relationships and economics; and categories of difference. Abbott discusses the demands of families placed on the state, as well as the struggles felt by the state to provide for veteran families. She also discusses how this led to the creation of the welfare state. The article explains the strained family relationships between returning husbands and newly empowered wives in addition to children who view their father as an intruder/stranger in the home. Abbott also discusses the differences between the acceptance of change between classes. She talks about the integration of different races into British society and the issues created by homosexual couples which all represent categories of difference. Mary Abbott provides a very interesting and powerful overview of a transition period in British history.

Belgian War Refugees

The Reading was about the Belgian War Refugees and Irish Protestant Refugees. Flora Shaw and later known as Lady Lugard. Flora Shaw was awarded the Dame of the British Empire award in 1916 for her help with the war refugees . In the two documents that are placed side by side each reflect the work she has done. One was her giving a speech at 'The work of the War Refugees committee" and the other was a speech given in her honor. When World War I started she stated that it didn't matter the political or religious beliefs. Not only did she provide the refugees with housing and with a livelihood. The committee also helped after the war with finding homes and livelihoods.

'Lady Lugard's Hostels for Belgian Refugees"
Was given in her honor given by Stuart Hogg. There are 11 houses and 400 people are housed in them. Two were used as hospital like locations. Part of Lady Lugard's goal was to make each of the houses a little like the home county. All of the expenses to make the houses like homes come from the committees accounts. Also the public helped by donating food and clothing. They also have a factory for the newly arrived refugees to stay. These are just a few of of the things that Hogg stated.

'The Work of the War Refugees Committee'
It an address given by Lady Lugard to the committee. She discusses the stories that she has heard from the refugees, She mentions ones about a family who lost all their children who were killed by the German soldiers. She tells the committee how and what needs to be done to help those who arrive . She expresses thanks to those who have helped. She says that those who have helped and volunteer should be written in gold.

The website has first hand accounts of those that lived through the war.

The Family Versus the State Victoria de Grazia

Grazia’s chapter entitled gamily verses the states discusses the perplexing relationship that develops between the family and the state with the rise of fascism. She outlines that the new ideology of the fascist government is to incorporate the family into the government, but then shows how those socialist measures to accomplish this integration in actually undermines the family.

For example, the new ideology set forth was that men should be able to work and earn enough money to support his family so his wife could stay home (embracing this idea of separate spheres). So in an attempt embrace this family ideology the government established the family allowance system. However, to even get this set wage system you have to have the right connections with the proper private or governmental organizations. This new welfare state changes the role of women. Because men should be working to earn a wage for the family the women or the elitist class have to carry this idea out with the lower classes. Also, women of the lower classes are also forced to work as their husbands are unable to make enough money for their family. Thus, family size begins to shrink and with the realization that the state is not providing a support group. Families have to begin to rely on their kin for support. Grazia then exemplifies her point through the letter the wife of Milanese man to the government (103-104).

Grazia argues that two different family ideologies emerge. The first is then the fascist familism emphasizing family unity, paternity, and female devotion to the family. This ideology is then altered through its impracticable practice and gives way to oppositional familism. This placed more focus on the father and gave priority of jobs and wages to those fathers with larger families (in hopes of increasing the population). People during this time appeared to operate on the idea that you had to maximize your resources in the short run and not worry about future generations. Her discussion of oppositional familism is limited and somewhat confusing compared to her expansive explanation of fascist familism.

Grazia’s article could fall under three of the categories we have discussed. The most fitting category would be that of the Law, State, and Church. Her article focuses on how the state regulations affect the family. This leads to the next category of family relationships and family economics. Grazia takes great length to describe how the government imposes different ideas on the roles of men and women in the family. Men should be earning enough money for a large family while women stay at home and work. Furthermore, that state is suppose to step in and subsidize a husbands wage but jumping through the hoops to get this money is impossible. The last category this could fall under then is gender. In Grazia’s description of the family she does discuss the role of children briefly but she tends to focus on the different roles that husband and wives have (men and women).

Kristen Stromberg Childers, "Paternity and the Politics of Citizenship in Interwar France"

In Childers' paper she discusses the importance of men fulfilling their roles as strong paternal figures within their families in France. Her argument further discusses how the male head of the household, known as the pere de famille, became a subject in the way the French Third Republic viewed families in regards to suffrage and working condition reform.

She tells us that since 1913, paternity began to be connected to political discourse in order to construct a productive nation that pressured men to form families. Furthermore, political discourse during interwar France began to attack the rights that single men had. As examples of not fulfilling their paternal role, single men's voting rights were attacked. Reformers advocated for a change in how much a single man's vote was worth in comparison to that of a father's. Arguably a father needed more weight to his vote because he was representing not just himself, but a whole entire family. Historically single men had already dominated voting rights, and using previous political disasters as example, conservatives believed that a shift of rights to paternally experienced voters would produce effective and enlightened reform. This can easily be summarized by showing that there was pressure to give father's more representation because they were viewed as elite and the incompetence of single men throughout history was used as a way to push for this change (pg.94).

In order to reform working conditions, men used their status as fathers to advocate for change. If the state expected a father to support his family not only monetarily, but by educating his children, men would have to have time to be home and do that (pg.95). In addition to helping his wife with the children, a change towards a eight-hour work day would allow him time to educate himself. A father with the ability to read political literature weekly meant he would be a model citizen to the French government. This tactic for reform shows a example of modernity in the equalizing of parental roles. A man is now expected to help out and not just be the breadwinner for the home. However a father will still be expected to work, and to even teach his sons that this is important (pg.98). By asking father's to do more they were seen as valuable in reconstructing the state after the damage done during the Great War.

This article fits under several themes for this class, but primarily focuses on the state expectations for father's and also a father's relationship to his family. Although the Catholic church is mentioned a little bit throughout the work, the state's pressure on men to fulfill a paternal role dominates the paper. Family relationship is the other important theme because it mentions how important men were in their families and that the amount of experience men obtained from being a father could not be supplemented by any other activity.

"Women's War Work: Remunerative, Voluntary, and Familial", by Susan Grayzel

In Susan Grayzel’s article titled, “Women’s War Work: Remunerative, Voluntary and Familial” she focuses on working women in Europe during the period of World War I, specifically examining the affects of women’s wartime work on both waged labor and family maintenance. Grayzel first emphasizes that women before this time had already held both paid and unpaid working jobs. The war, however, enabled women to shift to jobs that had previously been filled by men. As women began to enter factory work, they played a vital role in sustaining the home front during the war for the government even though it sparked controversy.

Grayzel looks at a number of countries, comparing and contrasting what wartime work was like for women. She mentions that the highest active labor force was in Britain, and the lowest labor force was in Germany. With the welfare supervisors and factory inspectors that were employed during the war, they heavily pushed for the protection of women that were or potentially could be mothers. Grayzel argues that during the war “gender roles” were being challenged. Nurses, for example, “kept women subservient to male doctors….[and] did not offer a challenge to conventional gender roles” (Grayzel, p.37). The war was a time of strain and tension as men and women’s roles were being redefined in new ways.

Grayzel’s article also focuses on women as mothers and the double responsibility that they had for both work and home. Many women took on voluntary services, primarily though only the middle and upper classes, hoping to do their part for the war. Women also had a hard time managing their homes, as long work hours took them away from home and the increasing food shortages left them with little food to sustain their young ones. Laws were being passed during this time to protect the health of both mother and child. The welfare and factory inspectors helped with this as well as new laws supporting breast feeding in factories, etc, were being passed.

This article fits well under the categories of Family Economics because it focuses on the division and distribution of labor during World War I, Categories of Difference because Grayzel focuses on a number of countries comparing and contrasting woman’s experiences, and Law, State, and Church because the government had a large role in controlling women’s wartime work.