The Privatized American Family

Maxine Eichner*

“The central dilemma of public policy today is how to reconcile the imperatives of deregulated markets with enduring human needs.”¹

“The philosophy of the traditional, minimalist welfare state was to establish a safety net, a haven of last resort, for those demonstrably unfit or unable to work. . . . [T]he modern, advanced welfare state has deliberately abandoned the minimalist philosophy . . . . The goal is to allow individuals to harmonize working life with familyhood, to square the dilemmas of having children and working, and to combine productive activity with meaningful and rewarding leisure.”²

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© 2017 Maxine Eichner. Individuals and nonprofit institutions may reproduce and distribute copies of this Article in any format at or below cost, for educational purposes, so long as each copy identifies the author, provides a citation to the Notre Dame Law Review, and includes this provision in the copyright notice.

*Graham Kenan Distinguished Professor of Law, UNC School of Law. A number of scholars have given me helpful comments in the course of the long genesis of this project. My thanks to Al Brophy, Neil Buchanan, Naomi Cahn, June Carbone, Meredith Harbach, Jill Hasday, Carissa Hessick, Clare Huntington, Alice Kessler-Harris, Tamara Metz, Rachel Rebouche, Michele Rivkin-Fish, Ziggy Rivkin-Fish, Naomi Schoenbaum, Elizabeth Scott, Jeff Spinner-Halev, Noah Zatz, and Adam Zimmerman.

1 John Gray, False Dawn: The Delusions of Global Capitalism 132 (1998).

2 Gøsta Esping-Andersen, The Three Worlds of Welfare Capitalism 141 (1990).