FAMILIES OF A DIFFERENT KIND: PATTERNS OF KINSHIP, SUPPORT AND OBLIGATION IN REMARRIAGE FAMILIES AND THEIR IMPLICATIONS FOR PUBLIC POLICY.

• Author: Fleming, Robin

INTRODUCTION

"Family" is such a familiar concept it is usual for people to assume a common understanding of what it means without exploring the possibility of difference. Ideas about family membership and family obligations are so much a part of the fabric of thinking that we tend to take them as part of the natural order of things, yet these meanings do vary not only between cultural groups but even between individuals who share the same cultural background.

In the area of public policy, the family group consisting of a man, a woman and their children is frequently the unit of focus, and policies tend to be based on a cluster of assumptions about behaviour and obligation within this family group. The problem for social policy is that, where family groups do not conform to these expectations, their members may not respond to policy initiatives in the manner anticipated or may be disadvantaged by policies intended to benefit them. The situation is further confused by the fact that untested assumptions about family behaviour that underpin policies in different areas are sometimes contradictory, resulting in a confusing and at times blatantly unfair impact at the family level.

One type of family that fails to conform in many ways is the family created by the remarriage or new partnership of a parent with children from a previous relationship. This paper examines the ways remarriage families differ from first marriage families and the implications of these differences for social policy.

My discussion is based on a recently completed study of families of remarriage.(1) The project, "Kinship, Support and Obligation in Reconstituted Families", was funded by the Foundation for Research, Science and Technology in 1996/97 and 1997/98. The objective of the study was "to identify patterns of economic support, living arrangements and kinship-based obligations in families of couples who have children from a previous marriage or marriage-like relationship". A case study method was used, and the units for the study were family households that had been created by a remarried or re-partnered couple, one or both of whom had dependent children living with them some or all the time.

The research has confirmed that remarriage families are structurally different from first marriage families. The difference makes it difficult and at times impossible for remarriage families to operate in the way that many people, including those involved in policy development, expect families to operate. This paper highlights several policy-related issues associated with remarriage families. These include:

* the impact on remarriage families of policies developed for the care of children of separated parents,

* the high fixed costs involved in running a remarriage family and the implication of these costs for policies involving targeted social assistance where household or couple income is the basis for assessment of eligibility, and

* the adverse impacts on remarriage families of inconsistencies between policies developed in different policy areas.

Overall, the research brings into question taken-for-granted notions about the way a family is constituted and how a family operates. It highlights the need for a better understanding of remarriage families in the current social policy environment where particular emphasis is placed on the family as an agent for social provision.

The high levels of divorce and remarriage in New Zealand suggest that a significant and growing proportion of all families will be families of remarriage. Approximately one marriage in three will end in divorce, and in one in three of all marriages, one or both partners have been previously married (Statistics New Zealand 1998:61, 63). Failure to identify these family types in census or household survey data means that they remain invisible and easily ignored.

DIFFERENCES BETWEEN FIRST-MARRIAGE AND REMARRIAGE FAMILY HOUSEHOLDS

Several basic beliefs about what families are and how they operate come into question when applied to second-marriage families. These beliefs are that, 1) the family is a unit; 2) all family members are related; and 3) both parents are involved in parenting the children. Families of remarriage are not the only kind of family that deviates from these expectations. The priorities and obligations which apply in many Maori and Pacific Islands families, for example, means that they too will operate differently (Fleming 1997:7-20). The following analysis outlines the differences specific to remarriage families.

The Family is a Unit

A family household is assumed to be an identifiable group, a unit to which its members belong. Family members are all part of the same broader network of kin and relations in-law. They may do things "as a family".(2)

As a unit, the family earns and spends on its own behalf, and the money earned by family members is available first and foremost for the support of the family (Fleming 1997).

The family unit lives in one house. Even when family members go away for some time, for such things as study or work, the family house is thought of as their "home".

In many remarriage families, this feeling of family unity is fractured. In the majority of the families in the study, children lived in the family homes of both their natural parents, either spending half their time in each in shared parenting situations, or making regular access visits to their non-custodial parent. Their non-custodial parents made it clear that visiting children were considered to be "part of the family", and children who moved between houses said they were members of two families and had two homes.

In addition, payments of child support into and out of many of the remarriage family households meant that the sum of the income earned by the couple was not the sum of the income that was available for the support of their household.

The boundaries of many second-marriage households are therefore permeable to a greater degree than the boundaries of first-marriage households, in that both family members and family resources move across them as of right, and family membership of children overlaps.

All Family Members are Related

First-marriage family members are all related either by marriage (either legal or de facto), or by birth ("blood") or by adoption. These relationships define membership of the family unit and the nature of the relationships within it. Parents share a joint commitment to all their children, and the children have expectations of parenting and support from both their parents.

Typically, children will address the parents by the appropriate kin terms, such as "Mum" and "Dad" and family members will refer to one another by terms such as "son", "father", "mother", "daughter" and so on. Associated with these terms are cultural blueprints for appropriate behaviour and obligation.

In a remarriage family, not everyone will be related. The new marriage or marriage-like partnership links the adult couple, but there is no legal or biological relationship between a parent's children and his or her new partner or spouse. The "blood" relationship between natural parents and their children, and between natural siblings, is a powerful symbol which evokes a sense of common family membership, and without this symbol, the relationship between step-kin lacks a conceptual blueprint.

Use of the "step" kin terms might be expected to transfer the cultural blueprint for a parent-child or sibling relationship through a social fiction of relatedness, but in the majority of the families this did not occur. Almost all the children in the study called their parents' new partners by their first names, not "Mum and Dad". They reserved "Mum" and "Dad" for their biological parents whether or not they saw much of them, and whether or not they were still alive. Most of the new partners said they resisted being called "Mum" or "Dad" by their partner's children.

Many new partners used terms such as "his (or her) kids" or "my partner's children" or "my wife's (or husband's) children", to refer to their new partner's children, emphasising their lack of parental relationship to them. Describing his relationship with his...