New Labour and the `problem of men'

Abstract

The New Labour government has arguably broken new ground by making "masculinity policy". Whereas the policy process is always inevitably gendered, with implications for men as well as women, it is only in the last few years that a government has made quite such explicit references to men in some areas of policy. The most high profile initiatives have been in relation to fathering and to the education of boys. In this paper we make out a case that New Labour proceeds with policy optimism about men in the home and pessimism about men outside the home. In contrast, there has been policy pessimism about women in the home and optimism about women outside the home. Where New Labour is optimistic, it tends to produce policies that are encouraging and facilitative, and where New Labour is pessimistic, it can produce policies that are authoritarian.

Išsiskyrę vyrai ir poskyrybinės tėvystės modeliai

“…Pirmuoju optimistiniu gero tėčio modeliu, paveiktu 7-ojo ir 8-ojo dešimtmečių Vakarų lyčių lygybės ir feministinio judėjimų, skatinamas vyrų įsitraukimas į šeiminį gyvenimą (Scourfield, Drakeford, 2002;O'Brien et al, 2007). ES nuosekliai remia lyčių lygybę, aktyvų moterų dalyvavimą darbo rinkoje (Hearn, Pringle, 2006) ir kartu aštrina priešpriešą tarp tėčio kaip šeimos maitintojo ir vaikų prižiūrėtojo vaidmenų.…”

Are Male Role Models Really the Solution?

“…According to Francis (2008) the desirability of male teachers rests on stereotypes of male teachers as disciplinarians, with little consideration of the reasons why boys might identify with this. Scourfield and Drakeford (2002) similarly argue that New Labour's policy approach had evident tensions in its conception of masculinity. They argue that, on the one hand, the attack on 'laddish' culture might be considered an attack on 'masculinity's privilege of irresponsibility' (Scourfield and Drakeford 2002: 628).…”

“…More broadly, there are moves to name men explicitly as men in social policy (Hearn 2010), but this is an unusual approach (for a relative exception see Ruxton 2009) Exploring policy discourses over the last decades, some writers have identified tensions in how men and masculinities have been constructed in relation to the victim/perpetrator axis (McDowell 2000;Scourfield and Drakeford 2002). On the one hand men have been seen as a source of danger, benefitting from the privileges of masculinity, through antisocial and destructive behaviour.…”

“…On the other, they have been considered to be more socially disadvantaged than women, victims of the costs of masculinity. According to Scourfield and Drakeford (2002) each discourse points to a 'crisis in masculinity' in which men and boys exhibit anti-social behaviour but do so because of increased role insecurity.…”

The social construction of young people within education policy: evidence from the UK's Coalition government

“…Fostering and adoption by gay and lesbian couples were promoted (Logan and Sellick, 2007) and greater support was provided for women who wanted to work outside the home (Daly, 2010;Scourfield and Drakeford, 2002). In contrast, while a clear family policy is not articulated in Positive for Youth, implicit in the many references to parents are assumptions of a two-parent, heterosexual model: 'Parents' influence…..remains key.…”