Marxist Perspective About the Family
Discuss the Marxist Perspective on the Family The Marxist feminists use Marxist concepts to explain their belief that the family is actually leading to the exploitation of women. Women have certain roles in the family which aren’t being paid by the government and the Marxist feminists see this as women are getting abused. Such roles are the caring of their children, attending needs of the husband and serve as an emotional safety-valve for the husband from the frustration of work. Friedrich Engels (1884) traces the origins of the family and the evolution of the family through time.
He argues that as the mode of production change, so does the family. The early stages of human evaluation states that the means of production where communally owned, such the family, did not exists. Individuals lived in groups which were characterized by promiscuity. There were no rules limiting sexual relationships and therefore the community was like a 1 big whole family. Another Marxist who argues that the family is instrumental to the capitalist economy is Eli Zaretsky (1976).
He believed that that the family was unable to provide physiological and personal needs which allow the proletariat (workers) to cope with the pressures of capitalism. The family aerates the illusion that private life of the family is separate from the economy but in actual fact, the family is supporting capitalism by producing future workers for the capitalists, consuming the products of the capitalists. Consequently this allows the capitalists to keep the profits up. For Zaretsky the family is a major problem to the capitalist economy.
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The socialization in the Marxist view is that the family socializes children into accepting values of capitalism, which to be clear with the status/level within hierarchy. The bourgeois nuclear family emerged with capitalism, this leads to the patriarchal power of male to be dominating the inheritance property. Women, on the opposite side, would be powerless for any decisions to be made within the family but only to obey. Females would have more domestic work at home whilst males are working, communicating and socializing more outside.
They rear children and look after their husbands due to the non-costly domestic works/choirs. Families also act as a safety valve toward those bourgeoisie men, which diverts their stress, anger and frustration. Meanwhile, Marxists also state their perspective of males would be less likely to go on strike throughout families play an important role to take responsibilities of them. As in unit of consumption, families consume goods and services that provided by the capitalism. The Marxist view doesn't take in part of the family diversity; they believe that the nuclear family is determined by our economy.
As a conclusion to this, we can say that the nuclear family didn’t actually coincide with the emergence of the capitalism. We can also say the Marxist view ignores family diversity and it sees the nuclear family as being simply determined by the economy. Marxist approaches often assume the existence of a traditional model of the nuclear family and may exaggerate the harm done to women by families. They tend to portray women as the passive victims of capitalist and patriarchal exploitation. Marxist disregards positive aspects in family life.
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