End of century, end of family?: shifting discourses of family‘ crisis’

According to the voices that make up the chant of traditional ‘family values’, insistent in contemporary Britain as well as in the United States, the turn of our century is marked by a growing crisis in the family, a crisis that may prove terminal unless decisive action is taken. The tabloid press in Britain talk about ‘the collapse of marriage and family life’, discuss ‘the extent of the crisis’ and run a headline ‘End of Family Life in Britain’ (Daily Express cited in Selman 1996:2 and Walker 1996:49). Authors writing under the auspices of the Institute of Economic Affairs speak of the threat to freedom and stability posed by the unmistakable decline in traditional family life (Davies 1993: vi, 7), equating ‘fatherless families’ with rising crime and educational disadvantage (Dennis 1993).