Divided We Fall: Family Discord and the Fracturing of America

Divided We Fall explores the bewildering cross-cutting tensions surrounding the national turmoil in family life and new divides in political life (on the questions of abortion and gay marriage, for instance). The search for ways to bridge such splits takes on particular urgency because of the mounting costs of family disintegration – social and legal, cultural and psychological. Because they recognize the often-desperate plight of single mothers and their children, policymakers have often worked together in bipartisan fashion to intensify government efforts to collect child support from non-custodial fathers, to place abused children in foster care, and to provide shelter for the family fragments on the street. As the author probes a variety of issues, including the erosion of the home economy, of restraints on sexual conduct, and of the traditional family wage, he warns that continued reliance on government to compensate for family failure will make matters worse in the long run.