ABSTRACT
The post-war period has been popularly characterized by its recourse to ‘traditional’ family values. While the numbers of women in paid employment steadily increased, they were still a minority. For married women, especially middle-class women, it was still seen as more respectable to remain at home. 1 Following the war, families increasingly aspired to the ‘male breadwinner’ model. The idea that man and wife would undertake complementary roles within marriage formed the basis of William Beveridge’s report Social Insurance and Allied Services (1942). Beveridge proposed that a man would make insurance contributions on behalf of his wife, ‘as for a team, each of whose partners is equally essential,’ and thus it was proposed that ‘during marriage, most women will not be gainfully occupied.’ 2 However, contemporary writers were drawing attention to growing discontent among educated housewives. In 1963, attempting to highlight the so-called ‘problem with no name’ among American housewives, Betty Friedan wrote the much-publicized text The Feminine Mystique. In Britain, Viola Klein, Judith Hubback, and Hannah Gavron all identified a level of confusion surrounding acceptable roles for married women. 3 Since the 1970s, feminist historians have suggested that the lack of opportunities afforded to women and the banality inherent in the domestic role caused symptoms of anxiety and depression in post-war housewives. Correspondingly, they have argued that the primary motive for prescribing psychotropic drugs was to ensure that women ‘adapted’ to their domestic role. 4
