Fractured Generations: Crafting a Family Policy for Twenty-first Century America

Until the 1960s, the nuclear family was an institution that was part of the natural life-course expected of most adults. Family meant marriage, children, the establishment of a home, care of the elderly, but perhaps most of all, bonding of the generations.. As early as the 1840s, certain elements of states’ policies hinted at a weakening family structure, but not until the 1960s was the family openly attacked. Contemporary family policy represents an attempt to counter the negative forces of the last four decades so as to restore the natural family to its necessary place in American life. Fractured Generations’ chapters follow the life-course of the human family - marriage; the birth of children; infant and toddler care; schooling; building a home; crafting a durable family economy; and elder care.

Allan Carlson is president of the Howard Center for Family, Religion and Society in Rockford, Illinois, and distinguished fellow in family policy studies at the Family Research Council in Washington, DC.