“the family” from the Great Society to Neoliberalism

“The family” holds a central position in American political discourse. Historian Robert O. Self (2012) argues that debates over the second half of the 20^th century were primarily over the proper use of government to support the family. Liberals in Lyndon Johnson’s administration promoted the breadwinner ideal and the male wage to formulate anti-poverty jobs programs. Over time, these social programs drew the ire of conservatives. It has become a truism in political studies that Republicans politicized a particularly narrow vision of the “traditional” family 1980s and 1990s under the banner of “family values.” President Reagan led a coalition of religious and social conservatives who argued that government programs harm the family more than help it. Since Reagan, Republicans have used a discourse of family values and personal responsibility to articulate an anti-welfare, anti-government platform. Rather than counteract the narrowness of the Republican definition of family, Clinton-era Democrats adopted conservative discourse by embracing the language of “personal responsibility” and “welfare to workfare.” By accepting the Republican’s rhetorical framework, the Democrats effectively narrowed the possibilities for a politics focused on economic redistribution and welfare speaks in the name of families. The redistributive potential of the Great Society has been replaced by a neoliberal insistence on efficiency in federal programs, an insistence that usually justifies cuts to services rather than improvements.