ABSTRACT
If we think of the family as the most basic social institution from which local communities, larger political units, and ultimately nation states are comprised then we should begin by examining how this basic social institution is evolving in a post-traditional environment. Changing sexual mores, extramarital fertility, divorce, cohabitation, single parenthood, and same-sex unions mean that as the extended family ceased to be the norm in the twentieth century, the nuclear family may cease to be the norm in the twenty-first. One of the most significant demographic and social trends in developed and even developing nations has been the rapid and extensive drop in fertility. Although part of the decline in fertility might be attributed to decreases in marriage, reproduction and childbearing do not of course require formal marriage. Tradition no longer dictates who one marries, whether one has children, the ways in which they are produced, or how they are raised.
