Martha Fineman's Response to Rob Vischer

I shared with Martha Fineman--who is my colleague here at Emory--Rob's post on "family diversity".  Here is Martha's responsse:

A good place to start for my work is with my newest book – The Autonomy Myth: A Theory of Dependency (New Press 2004).  Judith Stacy and others have written extensively on the lack of social science information supporting the superiority of the nuclear family when it comes to raising children (having adequate money seems to be a big part of the equation for success, as distinct from having formally married or being heterosexual parents).  Our Emory colleague, Anita Bernstein, has edited a collection (NYU Press) that takes on the marriage issue from diverse perspectives – Marriage Proposals: Questioning a Legal Status.  There is also have a collection I edited, published by Cornell University Press, titled Feminism Confronts Homo Economicus, which has a section on family and welfare policies and generally takes on the kind of “rational” economic approach implicit in Professor Vischer's comments.
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mp