The Anti-Social Family

by Michèle Barrett, Mary McIntosh

Although family values are frequently lamented for being in decline, our society continues to be structured around the nuclear family. The Anti-Social Family dissects the network of household, kinship and sexual relations that constitute the family form in advanced capitalist societies. This classic work explores the personal and social needs that the family promises to meet but more often denies, and proposes moral and political practices that go beyond the family to more egalitarian caring alternatives.

Genres: Nonfiction, Feminism, Politics, Philosophy, Sociology, Gender, History

176 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1982

Reviews

[Sammy · Rating 4 out of 5]

An unfortunately forgotten though only sometimes dated work of socialist feminist cultural criticism/sociology. I always appreciate Barrett's depth and range of theoretical insight and uncompromising radicalism. The polemic definitely centers around mid/late-20th century white anglo-american experiences of "the family" and the authors are often daft with regards to race, but Barrett and McIntosh are the first to recognize their own cultural and historical ideological embeddedness.

[Avery · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a fascinating historical document in that one can see the shifts in feminist thinking taking place in the 80s, and the postscript shows this dynamic unfolding even further. That being said, most of what the text argues is still quite relevant, striking analysis. The conception of familialism as an ideology and the critique of Christopher Lasch are especially insightful to me. For me the weakest point was the section on solutions to the problems of the family—most of it was good and fine, but some of it seemed dated, questionable, or a bit kooky. But I think it's often the case that leftists are better at critique than offering solutions.

[Veronika Valkovicova · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ľavicová feministická kritika konzervatívneho familializmu napísana v '81, aktuálna pre súčasné slovenské pomery. Dávam 12/10.

[Hestia Istiviani · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read in English but this review is in Bahasa Indonesia

Feminism, too, has seen some disturbing responses to the pro-family movement in the USA. One notable example is the latest reflections of Betty Friedan, much discussed in the light of the prominent role she played in the development of feminism in America.

Perlu diketahui, Verso adalah salah stau penerbit buku yang cukup radikal. Kalau bertandang ke situs dan akun media sosialnya, jangan kaget ya. Maka dari itu buku-buku yang diterbitkan pun sejalan dengan penyebarluasan pengetahuan mengenai salah satu ideologi atau paham tertentu.

Sekitar 2 tahun yang lalu, aku sempat membaca Communist Manifesto yang ditulis oleh Karl Marx dan Frederich Engels. Jujur saja, tulisan itu bukan bacaan yang mudah. Meski tipis, aku menghabiskan hampir seminggu untuk dapat menuntaskannya. Dalam manifesto itu, memang disebut bahwa organisasi terkecil yang bisa berpengaruh terhadap penyebarluasan paham itu adalah melalui keluarga. Tetapi keluarga yang bagaimana? Itulah yang diangkat oleh Michele Barrett dalam The Anti-Social Family.

Barrett menggambarkan bagaimana tipe keluarga yang ada di masyarakat adalah hasil konstruksi dari kapitalisme. Di mana laki-laki sebagai suami (dan ayah) adalah pekerja yang wajib mencari nafkah dan perempuan sebagai istri (dan ibu) bertanggung jawab untuk mengurus rumah. Pokoknya begitu suami pulang kerja, istri harus sudah siap sedia dengan kebutuhannya. Istri tidak perlu memikirkan mendapat uang dari mana karena itu adalah yang dipikirkan oleh suami.

Pemahaman semacam itu sebenarnya melemahkan perempuan. Sebagaimana yang pernah disuarakan oleh Betty Friedan dalam That Problem That Has No Name. Di samping itu, posisi perempuan hanya dilihat sebagai second class citizen. Kehadiran keluarga (yang dibentuk oleh kapitalisme itu) nyatanya memang menguntungkan laki-laki. Itu kalau keluarga tersebut adalah keluarga heteroseksual. Bagaimana jika keluarga itu terdiri dari pasangan homoseksual, hanya terdiri dari satu orangtua dengan anak? Tentu narasi "keluarga" tidak bisa diberikan kepada mereka.

Konstruksi sosial terhadap keluarga salah satunya menghasilkan kebijakan di masyarakat. Buku ini menyebutkan seperti kepemilikan aset, social security number, tunjangan, hingga gaji seorang istri atau wanita yang sudah menikah. Hal-hal yang sejatinya dari awal sudah menguntungkan pihak laki-laki yang heteroseksual. Namun menyusahkan pihak yang lain.

Many feminists identify, the family as a primary site, if not the primary site, of women's oppression and seek to abolish it (no doubt the 'world campaign' referred to earlier).

Tidak itu saja, narasi "keluarga" yang mengglorifikasi "blood is thicker than water" juga dianggap merugikan. Seorang anak menjadi seakan-akan bertanggung jawab terhadap orangtua atau saudara/i-nya. Dikatakan bahwa keluarga sebenarnya hanya berdasarkan relasi genetis tetapi seharusnya tidak meletakkan beban terhadap anggotanya.

Ada banyak hal yang cukup membuat kaget ketika membaca The Anti-Social Family (yang sebenarnya juga tidak terlalu membuat terkejut jika terbiasa membaca buku-buku aliran ini). Bagaimana Barrett menantang ide soal pernikahan, berkeluarga, dan memiliki anak. Sebab bagi Barrett itu semua hanya taktik kapitalisme untuk menciptakan kelas pekerja baru dengan harapan mereka bisa lebih produktif namun dengan bayaran yang murah. Ini mengingatkanku soal kemiskinan dan diskrimansi sistemik dan struktural.

Membaca The Anti-Social Family bagiku agak sulit di bagian awal untuk menangkap ide besar dari gagasannya. Namun sekalinya paham, sisanya bisa diikuti dengan cukup mudah.

Education has become seen as the main road to success in life. It is what you do rather than where you are that counts.

[Quin Rich · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very dated, but still contains many interesting insights.

What I find particularly valuable is the emphasis on how “the family” meets real needs for which there remain few to no viable alternatives and how the emphasis should be on collective, communal, and democratic solutions and not just “diverse households.” This strand of socialist feminist critique, that focuses on the collective meeting of human needs, seems to have gotten almost completely lost in contemporary queer critiques of marriage. These latter are typically more concerned with “domesticity” and “heteronormativity,” where these are primarily critiqued for their implied sexual conservatism and on aesthetic grounds rather than for the material race, class, and gender inequalities they entrenched and the distorted forms of social life they undergird.

[Sally · Rating 4 out of 5]

1980s feminism has long been left behind, and in many ways this has been for the better due to the growing interest and research into intersectional feminism, taking on perspectives from different groups that were previously ignored. I would argue that Barrett's theory is limited in its focus on solely women living in the UK, however a range of different family structures are also considered. I would also like to see more of Barrett's thoughts brought back into mainstream feminism, as critiques of the liberal family structure seem to be running a bit thin at the moment, and this book does a fabulous job of stating the case for reconsidering the way we think about the family.

[Ren Morton · Rating 4 out of 5]

Barrett and McIntosh provide a very succinct theoretical explanation of the family as ideology as opposed to the family as institution. Taking on the conservative and socialist arguments of the time (1981) to show how the ideology of familialism supports oppression, they nevertheless note that the concept of “patriarchy” doesn’t fully capture the social processes at play. Nevertheless, by critically engaging with leading psychoanalysts and socialist pundits, they demonstrate that the family defined as bourgeois nuclear Christian form is anti-social. By this, they mean this it is anti-socialist in the sense that it is a barrier to collectivism and shared responsibility by emphasizing the privatization of care, which is really a collective responsibility. At the end they offer some clear strategies to fight towards collectivism and ways to support social experiments constructively.

There are some portions of the text that date itself. Though the postscript, written in 1991, offers a great example of reflexivity and academic humility by noting the limitations and their growth since the original publication. Interestingly enough, certain arguments are now being asserted on tiktok- nearly 45 years later. I wish this material was more widely disseminated and critically engaged with so it doesn’t feel like we have to constantly start over.

[Salo Birra · Rating 3 out of 5]

Clear summary on the various problematics regarding the definition of family (historically and sociologically); interesting critique of different perspectives that both 'attack' and mourn the seemingly rapid decline of the nuclear family; poignant critique of the family (at the time of first publication date, 1982) as being anti-social and acting as a structure that perpetuates gender hierarchies and inequalities, whilst enshrining a cemented ideal for socialising.
Despite briefly touching on it, this book lacks depth in understanding queer perspectives in the critique of the nuclear family.

[Claudia · Rating 2 out of 5]

I got this book as a present and was told it'd just been released so I thought that was the case and had to stop reading and do some research on it. Just found out it's from 1982 (everything makes sense now). The book's analysis is based on binarism and cisheteronormativity and is therefore transphobic and excludes from the narrative all bodies that don't stick to the status quo. There are some interesting points the authors talk about but the book's clearly outdated and so it just doesn't work if our aim is to analyse the role of the family in society

[Crystal · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked this? The Anti-Social Family was interesting, thorough critique on the nuclear family structure but, I don't know, it was sort of weight downed by the authors' whiteness. It could've been more intersectional which, yes, the authors' examined themselves in an afterword. That doesn't quite push my rating higher.

[GwenViolet · Rating 5 out of 5]

Responsive and deeply humane work of feminist theory that understands the genuine moral weight of these philosophical/sociological/etc. debates about "family"

Earth shatteringly good

[KT · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting and thought-provoking critique of the normative family under capitalism and its supposed universal experience, which the author argues in reality, is far from being a social leveller, forging bonds that cut across the barriers of class and sex, the family instead create and recreates the very divisions it is often thought to ameliorate
In addition the author criticises marriage for rendering relationships outside the marriage thinner and less meaningful, and discusses the struggle between state and church for control over marriage, which reveals marriage as a contract controlled not by the partners themselves, but by the state. The author concludes that marriage is an oppressive institution for both married and unmarried, and provides the major legal support for the current family form. Instead the author recommends socialists and feminists should not get married themselves and should not attend or support the marriages of any who can be convinced of their critique of the family. "Paper" marriages designed to get round immigration restrictions are the sole exception they consider, but savings to be made on income tax or death duties are considered a form of collusion, not of subversion

A large portion of the book focusses on the family present certain advantages within the context of a particular society, such as neoliberal capitalism in the West. The benefits of family life depend upon the suffering of those who are excluded. The ideal of the family life brings in its train many a bitter marriage and disappointed parents. If the family were not the only source of a range of satisfactions, were it not so massively privileged and thus attractive.

Finally the abolishing the family would result in nothing in the place of the family given that anything in place of the family with the world around it unchanged, in the author's view, would likely be little different from the household patterns and ideology that is known as "the family" at present

Other highlights include:
Discussion of domestic labour and that "labour-saving" equipment and ready-prepared food and clothing are not bringing about a reduction in these hours; instead the author proposes that they raise standards of what must be done - with a freezer and a microwave oven, there is no excuse for a well prepared dinner when the wage earning husband returns home from work, and references Ann Oakley's study of housewives.
Calling for the abolition of housewife, the author considers why many socialists have unclear qualms about paid domestic work. The author offers that what is wrong with it is not that someone else is doing someone else's dirty work, given the belief that it should be socialised, but of the belief that it is not eternally one's private responsibility. What is wrong the author proposes is that someone, usually a woman, is being paid an abysmally low wage and that the relation is one of mistress-and-servant.

Reviewing orthodox Marxist thought on the rejection of family life that according to the author, more or less imply that when women are engaged in wage labour on equal terms with men, and when housework has been socialised, we shall have arrived at the nirvana of proletarian heterosexual serial monogamy - an immature and underdeveloped view in the author's opinion

[Durakov · Rating 4 out of 5]

For how slim this is, the authors pack in a lot of great material.

I disagree with the reviewers who argued that their critique is limited by their lack of analysis of race or cisnormativity. It's true that those aren't really present here, but 1) the authors are clear about their own limitations and the gaps in their analysis in the text, footnotes, and the postscript; 2) are clear about their aims, which is not to analyze The Family in its historical formations, but to critique the very notion of The Family and critique its primary function as an ideological apparatus at least as much as an always-changing and mutating economic unit and structure of kinship.

In line with that, their intention was to scrutinize this ideological object and reveal that it a) is a quantitatively minority experience (especially if we go back before the 19th century), b) insofar as it has material reality, it reinforces gendered violence and mystifies the wage by naturalizing domestic labor. They do this through surveying the myths and rhetoric of The Family (which, again, is not a real material unity, but a projected unity that has material effects); reviewing sociological and empirical data about both the advantages offered by and the ugly realities of domestic life; critiquing the common critiques of the family and their hidden romanticisms; and then acknowledging the real needs fulfilled by the family and speculating about institutional and social forms that could provide for those needs more effectively.

That they do all that in a 170 page book with very small pages is pretty admirable. It could have been better, sure, but probably not much better at this length. It's easy to read and a great way to introduce the scary idea of family abolition in the context of the broader historiography of the family in the 20th century.

[Tom · Rating 4 out of 5]

Although dated in places (and the authors' summary, written 10 years after original publication, goes some way to redress this), this is a really good, clear introductory critique of the family. Written at the height of Thatcherism there is obviously some focus on blatantly anti-feminist, family-centred social policy - there's a broad focus on the ideology of familialism, where the family arrangement is prioritised as the primary source of childrearing, care and domestic labour, which is very enlightening.
I really liked the chapter that looked at Donzelot's book - a Foucauldian deconstruction of the family, looking at a shift from government of the family to government through the family. The authors are methodologically sympathetic, but the political motivations of this work are masked behind a false universalism and are ultimately anti-feminist. I'd still like to read it, or a more updated version of a Foucauldian family analysis. It feels like such a natural fit for Foucauldians that I'm surprised it's not more prevalent!
The summary of psychoanalytical thinking on the family is great - it's not an area I'm familiar with and this was really well done.
The authors themselves acknowledge the ethnocentrism of their analyses - their experience of white families in Britain is not made explicit, and so they run the risk of centring this. And this is despite being keen to indicate the historical specificity of their work in other sections - it's surprising that they didn't also bracket their experience and examples in other ways (i.e. with regards to ethnicity or cultural experience). But I think this book would be a really good starting point for more specific analyses. I'd like to read more!

[Karima Yulia · Rating 3 out of 5]

Akhir-akhir ini aku lagi mikir—
Mungkin nggak sih, kita bisa membangun bentuk kekerabatan yang berbeda?
Yang nggak melulu harus berdasarkan darah atau pernikahan?

Gimana rasanya hidup buat kita yang “format” keluarganya nggak sesuai standar kebanyakan orang—
Ada suami sebagai pencari nafkah, perempuan jadi ibu rumah tangga, anak-anak dan tinggal rumah milik sendiri (yang bahkan makin sulit dimiliki di ekonomi sekarang)?
Gimana kalau ada yang memutuskan hidup single, childfree, atau terpaksa menjadi single parent.

Aku baca The Antisocial Family, ditulis oleh feminis sosialis kulit putih di Inggris tahun 1980-an. Jadi, konteksnya memang nggak semua relevan buat Indonesia.

Buku ini nggak serta-merta menolak nuclear family, tapi mempertanyakan:
kenapa format itu dijadikan standar?
Siapa saja yang tersingkir ketika kebijakan publik, norma sosial, bahkan desain rumah dibangun berdasarkan model tunggal itu?

Buku ini juga membahas bagaimana struktur keluarga tradisional memberi beban besar ke perempuan:
pekerjaan rumah tak dibayar, beban emosional, tanggung jawab yang sering tak terlihat.
Tapi kalau soal pajak, KPR, asuransi, hukum dan norma sosial secara umum—perempuan seringkali nggak diuntungkan.

Buku ini mengajak kita membayangkan bentuk hidup bersama yang lebih inklusif dan fleksibel.
Tapi itu sulit, selama sistem sosial dan ekonomi hanya mendukung satu bentuk keluarga.

Ini bukan sesuatu yang bisa diubah dalam semalam.
Tapi mungkin, dengan mulai memikirkan, menyebutkan, dan membayangkan alternatif…
itu sudah langkah pertama.

[Elizabeth D · Rating 4 out of 5]

really quite brilliant and incisive (and, contra some of the reviews here, not at all 'dated'). argues against what we might call 'reformism' wrt family and for the necessity of family abolition to socialist politics.

fascinating discussion of Foucault and Foucauldian critiques, which I wish they had expanded and developed more, because it parallels a lot of the misgivings I've had about left-Foucauldians.

was planning to give it five stars but it stumbles in the last chapter in its solutions, which fail to live up to the revolutionary boldness of the book's premise.

the neglect of racism, migration, incarceration, etc. is a major flaw, less so b/c of the epistemological problems the authors refer to in their afterword, but because it means they end up neglecting how 'the family' operates in all its forms, ignore major examples of how the family hurts those it excludes as well as those it includes, and how, as Barrett and McIntosh argue over and over, there is no one 'family' or 'bourgeois family' that exists under capitalism.

[Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

I got this book during a Verso sale and never thought I’d pick it up. Luckily, its freshness and iconoclastic outlook made it hard to put down. Mixing good ole fashioned class analysis, old school feminism (the not so problematic kind), and fresh (for its time) Foucauldian analysis, the book delivered on several fronts. It changed the way I think about the family. Highly recommend.

[Nihar Mukund · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.75
Despite a few dated notions and strategies of change that still feel wrapped up with a particular type of family, the postscript clarifies that ideas are bound to change and progress, and the authors are open to it. Overall, the book is well-written and does not pretend to be the end-all but successfully presents itself as a conversation-opener.

[Turlough · Rating 4 out of 5]

A little bit dated now as feminist theory has obviously progressed drastically since 1982. The authors themselves recognise that if it were to be written today it would necessarily be more intersectional. Having said that, the extent to which it holds up is remarkable and a little depressing.

[Nate C-K · Rating 2 out of 5]

For a book that says homosexual relationships are too complex to consider, it sure manages to be homophobic a lot.

Awful. Offensive. Can't imagine why this was brought back into print. Stop it.

[Rufus Johnson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Although a bit repetitive and couched in academicese, this is an excellent critique of the family institution and what else we need to consider in our communities.

[Smiltė · Rating 2 out of 5]

so so outdated. some points are good, but the majority of the content is painfully binary and lacks depth. opt for something else.

[Richard · Rating 4 out of 5]

Michèle Barrett and Mary McIntosh argue in The Anti-Social Family that while everyone deserves "love, kinship, and nice things to eat," the (mid-20th Century Western [British] concept of the) family is not necessarily the ideal way to obtain them. In four parts, they argue that the more a society depends on the family to provide these things, the weaker the society becomes at providing these things for all in an equitable way.

First published in 1982, the argument -- at times -- feels as modern and controversial as any contemporary leftist writing: "Marx and Engels may have called . . . for the abolition of the family, but socialists have long regarded this as a flight of utopian fancy." They acknowledge from the start that the book concentrates on a white, hetero-normative understanding of family and that this decision is both purposeful and yet lacking.

The next two parts are about defining this concept of family. They describe both how it only exists as a construct (i.e. the idea of the family as a natural phenomenon) and how that construct fails many -- especially those oppressed by it through unequal cultural and political means by the ideology of famialism -- namely women and children.

The third section is devoted to analysis of then-contemporary philosophy on family. This is in reference to Jacques Donzelot's "The Policing of Families" and Christopher Lasch's critique of it, but also references Freud and Focault. Having never read any of the texts I found this section difficult, but I appreciated the authors' style of critique -- naming both what they saw as flawed and what they felt should be praised despite those flaws.

The final section on strategies for change might be what most readers are eager to get to. In summation, they are that we should work toward any change that gives people choice in their living arrangements but that we should also be striving toward collectivism and away from individualism.

With that in mind, the personal politics they prescribe are thus:

1. Encourage variety. The authors take care here to list some alternative family structures that will likely not end familialism outright (like open marriages and women's separatism) but remind the reader that while it may be easy to dream up alternatives to the family, "it is even easier to ridicule other people's dreams."

2. Avoid oppressive relationships. Here they name what it seemed to me they were orbiting the whole book. "We believe socialists and feminists should not get married themselves and should not attend or support the marriages of any who can be convinced of our critique of family," (They make an exception for paper marriages as immigration loopholes.) Married myself, I still appreciated the point that "nobody, man, child, invalid, or woman needs a long-term 'house-wife' or has a right to one." After all, exploitative unpaid labor by any other name is still just that.

3. Beware of domesticity. They argue against making the home and the child-rearing life the sources of your deepest satisfaction. Homes should have private spaces for all occupants (including children who might be considered occupants with "full-membership rights.") If dad has an office, mom deserves one too (before devoting an empty room to the idea of future guests). Fight the idea that public spaces are simply places you shop for commodities to bring back to your private space. And what would a leftist book be without a hint to attend public meetings?

They list some things they think you should fight for, e.g. good wages for women and young people, much more robust social security, better housing for all, and parents' rights -- by which they mean not simply the limited choice to raise your child in a way that benefits the state (by producing a mild-mannered worker) but more that all parents should have the same choices for raising their child that the wealthy do.

There are as many great points in this book as there are less strong, outdated arguments by the nature of this book being 40 years old. The post-script, written in 1991, can be perhaps be summarized as "oops, we forgot about racism." But if we critique this book in the way they show how to critique interesting yet problematic texts, I think we will find much to appreciate even as we acknowledge what is missing or no longer relevant.

[Alexii · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fine. good resource in connecting familial arrangements to structural inequality and patriarchal norms. very dry writing and sometimes needlessly verbose, hard to get through. spends a lot of pages just quoting large chunks of other books. Outdated and very white in some places in terms of how common certain family arrangements are. The post script does a lot of heavy lifting to cover its shortcomings

[Nathan Fisher · Rating 5 out of 5]

Limited both by an emphasis on concision and its particular scope, but for the force and liveliness of its radical arguments, this is very well-done and worth repeated consultation.

[Eurethius Péllitièr · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is a Masterpiece. It is unfortunate that its politics is not more prevalent despite it being decades since it was published

[Peter Harrison · Rating 4 out of 5]

A little dated, which is acknowledged by the authors in a subsequent post-face, but a still very useful examination of the family in its social setting from a feminist standpoint.