DV and decision-making in the household

Pahl and Vogler (1993) identify two main types of control over family income:

• The allowance system, where men give their wives an allowance out of which they have to budget to meet the family’s needs, with the man retaining any surplus income for himself.

• Pooling, where both partners have access to income and joint responsibility for expenditure; for example, a joint bank account.

Pahl and Vogler (2007) found that even where there was pooling, the men usually made the major financial decisions.

What did Gershuny argue about financial decision making?

found that by 1995, 70% of couples said

they had an equal say in decisions. Significantly, though, they

found that women who were high earning, well qualified

professionals were more likely to have an equal say.

Identify two types of explanation of domestic violence:

• The radical feminist explanation. This emphasises the role of patriarchal ideas, cultural values and institutions.

• The materialist explanation. This emphasises economic factors such as lack of resources.

Radical feminists explanations of the family

• Millet and Firestone argue that all societies have been found by men and ruled by men. Men are the oppressors women are being exploited.

• Radical feminists see the family and marriage as the key institutions in patriarchal society and the main source of women’s oppression. Within the family, men dominate women through domestic violence or the threat of it.

• For radical feminists, widespread domestic violence is an inevitable feature of patriarchal society and serves to preserve the power that all men have over all women. In their view, this helps to explain why most domestic violence is committed by men. Radical feminists give a sociological, rather than a psychological, explanation by linking patterns of domestic violence to dominant social norms about marriage.

Evaluate radical feminist claim of patriarchy within the family

• Elliot (1996) rejects the radical feminist claim that all men benefit from violence against women. Not all men are aggressive and most are opposed to domestic violence. Radical feminists ignore this.

• Radical feminists also fail to explain female violence, including child abuse by women and violence against male partners and within lesbian relationships. For example, the Crime Survey for England and Wales (2013) found that 18% of men (2.9 million) have experienced domestic violence since the age of 16.