Revisiting individualization: The transitions to marriage and motherhood in Chile

Abstract

The life course of Chilean women has experienced profound transformations in the past decades. It has been argued that transitions to marriage and motherhood are being postponed as they are experienced by women at an older age and are becoming events that characterize an increasingly smaller part of the female population. These changes have been often interpreted as part of a process of individualization that would have had reconfigured the cultural norms and social practices regarding gender roles and family formation in Chilean society. Nevertheless, the prevalence and diversification of the practices and norms that shape the transitions to marriage and motherhood at an empirical level remain unexplored. This paper aims to assess the individualization of the life course of women in Chile by empirically analyzing the destandardization of the practices and norms that shape the transitions to marriage and motherhood. By analyzing data from Encuesta Nacional Bicentenario Universidad Católica-Adimark (2009), it demonstrates that changes in the prevalence of the transitions to marriage and motherhood and the diversification of the practices and norms that shape their timing are ambivalent regarding destandardization. These results suggest that the life course of women in Chile is becoming individualized to some extent, but that this trend of cultural and social change is not consistent and uniform, but rather partial and fragmented, nonlinear, and significantly conditioned by the social structure.

The Gender Role Attitude Scale (GRAS) as an alternative for the crisis in measurement of attitudes towards gender roles in Latin America: A study in Chilean university students

“…Likewise, marriage is becoming less frequent. The life course of Chilean women is increasingly individualized, although this process is conditioned to the social structure (educational level and the profession) (Gómez-Urrutia & Royo, 2016;Yopo, 2017). Besides, Chilean women have less control capacity in the material and political area, lower wages, and fewer labor opportunities (Franceschet et al, 2015;Guzmán et al, 2012;Hermans et al, 2016;Mora & Blanco 2017;Ugarte et al, 2015).…”

“…The literature describes an exponential increase in egalitarian attitudes starting in the 1970s (Blofield & Martínez, 2015;Cotter et al, 2011;Pedulla & Thebaud, 2015;Pepin & Cotter, 2018;Scarborough et al, 2018;Walter, 2018;Yopo, 2017). Unfortunately, we are experiencing a slow-down in change, and the revolution in gender roles is incomplete.…”

“…Other authors argue that this situation results from a complex process: gender equality has become a new social norm, but this norm has not been accompanied by social structure and regularisation based on equity. This incongruence limits individuals' capacity to create equality relations (Blázquez-Alonso et al, 2019;Franceschet et al, 2015;Halimi et al, 2017;Pedulla & Thebaud, 2015;Yopo, 2017). The Triangle Theory of Violence (Galtung, 2016) indicates that offering different life opportunities according to sex facilitates discriminatory attitudes.…”

Globalization, place and the life course: Local economies and middle-class transition to adulthood in two Israeli cities

“…Beck (2007) criticized sociology for its ‘methodological nationalism’, which conflates social structure and the nation-state – a view which, he argued, could not be supported in the age of globalization. The main response of sociologists was to reinstitute the significance of the nation-state by demonstrating local variations of social patterns between countries (Brückner and Mayer, 2005; Buchmann and Kriesi, 2011; Mayer, 2009; Mills and Blossfeld, 2006; Shanahan, 2000; Yopo Díaz, 2018). Our findings suggest that global forces are expressed differently not only between countries, but also within them.…”

“…More recently, scholarly attention has shifted from universal explanations to more nuanced accounts of various patterns of entering adulthood in different countries (Brückner and Mayer, 2005; Buchmann and Kriesi, 2011; Mayer, 2009; Shanahan, 2000; Yopo Díaz, 2018). Mills and Blossfeld (2006), for example, suggested that the uncertainties created by globalization are filtered through national welfare regimes and specific employment, educational and family systems.…”