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1. Atomisation and Re-Bound of the Multi-Generational Family
Draft for discussion
Prepared and commented by George Perendia, PhD © Aug./Sep. 2020
Introduction
“ ….the intellectual historian Christopher Lasch noted in the late 1970s, the American
family didn’t start coming apart in the 1960s; it had been “coming apart for more than 100
years.”“ Brooks, D.1
This essay, a collage of different source materials with comments as an extension and as a reflection
on a discussions on social and family fragmentation in modern society at the Cafe Philo in London
and some of the counter remarks raised by others. In his email of 13th
Aug. 2020 to the members of
the Cafe Philo IF philosophy discussion group, Christian Michel, is re-opening this particular
discussion and bringing some interesting and valid points on causes of social and family
fragmentation in the society. However, despite agreeing on many points, some of the key ones I feel
I need to discuss and possibly complement with a more complex picture and possible explanations.
Namely, as I understand it, email declares start of a phenomena of the family atomisation in the
period when an awareness rose and social sciences started looking into it in more detail through
1960's (e.g. and most data start being collected ), and then, the text is drives to a, though, apparently
logically consistent, but, in my own opinion, a bit over-simplified conclusion, that the sole cause
behind this problem is the new, welfare state mechanism that, as there stated, started near the time.
Another aim seem to refute claim that the Capitalism is at fault for this atomisation.
Whilst I agree that the welfare system may have been a contributing factor, it seems to be just one
of such factors. I also do not want here, since I know better than, to blame capitalism. for that (or
for the other great problem, that of the climate change, as is often done) as I never did so. This is
not because I want to escape a politically over-loaded subject, but because I know empirically as
well as theoretically that the socialist state run economy was equally striving for economic growth
by all means with only exception that it was just not as economically successful in doing so as much
as those, more capitalist ones. Even China nowadays is not an exception.
However, whilst we agree on observation of atomisation, we, for start, do not agree on the timing of
its start. Despite the A. de Tocqueville's interesting and picturesque observations of the 1840's US
(that C. Michel refers to), having spent there a mere several months, he certainly could not then
perform either in depth nor an extensive study extending over a longer period so to gain both,
statistical and historical-trend observational certainties.
I then also do not see, why ...“It sound(s) a lot more logical and is historically verifiable that the
welfare state, and not the capitalist mode of production, mostly causes the atomisation of society. “
That is, a logically rational, axiomatic causality may have little with the historical one. Also, it may
be quite true that the atomisation has been observed and documented widely ever since 1960s, the
times of the rise of critical social thinking and social sciences, the start of documentation and
awareness may not be start of it existence or it's effect on our lives since phenomena may have
started well before we started observing it, i.e. at the assumed start of the welfare state.
Another thing we agree is that it is difficult if at all possible to drive causal conclusions on
empirical data. As we discussed in our recent session(s), different prejudices (often cultural, moral,
etc.) prime us in perceiving or driving conclusions on possible causal relations between or among
groups of phenomena, empirically observed and, when sample allows, statistically correlated. A
1 See: https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2020/03/the-nuclear-family-was-a-mistake/605536/

2. meaningful regression may appear spurious to another scientist coming from different scientific
prepositions and theory even though statistical coincidence may not give merit to any significant
conclusions on causality. This is specially the case in the social sciences. And it is particularly
difficult to determine which of the factors (and it is usually more than one) contributed more and
which less to a singleton event.
However, with longer term trends, it is usually easier to establish meaningful regression. Over a
prolonged period of time one can observe a phenomena of atomisation (a fragmentation) of an
average household and a reduction of its size.
Methodology
I here intend to take an empirical approach based on both quantitative and qualitative
analysis. However, to be able to even talk of any causes derived from empirical data and
observed phenomena, one first need to abandon and overcome the traditional Humean
scepticism of being able to induce any real causality when derived from observations, I.e.
other than a mere correlation. A handbook by Brady, H. E. (2011)2
on methodology of social
sciences recommends gives some some four criteria for a causality that can be accepted in
those sciences in a manner of the Neo-Humean approach.:
1. Neo-Humean regularity with constant conjunction, correlation and, when possible,
temporal precedence of the “cause” effecting the “effect” (Humean INUS criteria),
2. Counterfactual: can “effect” occur without the “cause” and vice-versa,
3. Manipulation: repeating in a controlled manner, e.g. in experimental conditions,
4. Mechanisms and capacities: identifying a scientifically plausible, likely
mechanism(s) allowing the “cause” effecting (i.e. leading to) the “effect”.
Some empirical, (i.e. experience derived) data are identified, presented and analysed in context of
the observed phenomena. However, instead of looking for a single cause, and possibly contributing
factors in terms of Humean INUS criteria for induction, where the main, the root, cause need to
show time-precedence, we are aware that the increasing complexity of socio-economic systems and
related phenomena are usually driven by a multitude of factors, each one that may be sufficient or
not, unnecessary or not on its own (in terms of Neo-Humean INUS criteria for induction) but
defining the start and the velocity (intensity) of a change mainly as a joint vector sufficient to
effectuate the phenomena even if only one or a subset of them and not all of them, had a time
precedence acting as, at least initial sufficient factor, whilst others, acting at a later time, the
augmenting and/or continuing effects on the phenomena when if the original initiator ceased to act.
This article , thus, identifies several such factors contributing to their combined, joint effect of
family and cultural fragmentation, where each may be sufficient but not creating such large,
significant historical changes acting only on their own. Another study may then be able to take
further steps to measure and quantify their individual, relative contributions (e.g. using principal
component and factor analysis).
2 See: Brady, H. E. (2011) Causation and Explanation in Social Science; in The Oxford Handbook of Political
Science, Edited by Robert E. Goodin, OUP, 2011
https://www.oxfordhandbooks.com/view/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199604456.001.0001/oxfordhb-9780199604456-e-
049

3. Two Case Studies
The UK
As far as the UK is concerned, situation is a bit different: it seems that it traditionally lived in
smaller families and that the trends to further atomisation and living alone did start after WW1.
For example, according to a 2009 UK Family Parenting Institute report3
(from which most of the
below UK related data-diagrams have been reproduced ), a more detailed data shows atomisation
trends since 1960s, e.g.4
Fig.:1
3 Stephen A. Hunt, ed. Family Trends : British families since the 1950s, FPA 2009,
(See also: CPA 2014 : Changing family structures and their impact on the care of older people:
https://www.ageuk.org.uk/Documents/EN-GB/For-professionals/Research/CPA-Changing_family_structures.pdf?
dtrk=true)
4 but similar diagrams are available in the French, INSEE report : https://www.insee.fr/fr/statistiques/3047266

4. However, another data sets shows similar trends starting about 1920s, in the times after WW1 when
the UK experienced large surge of unemployment and, similarly to the US, slowing down in early
2000, the time of gradual transition towards both, post-industrial and internet economy, however,
also the times of economic turbulences of 2001 and 2007 midst the wage-share decrease in the
income portfolio together with wages increasing slower than the actual productivity and house and
other asset prices inflation booming. On the other hand, although trends started well before 1960s,
(and, thus, refuting that they started only in 1960s), they do not refute but almost support C.
Michel's thesis that they coincided (and possibly correlated) with the creation of the welfare state
since early UK welfare programs started just before, with the Liberal government 1906-1914, thus,
some fifty years earlier.
Fig.:2
, Fig.: 3: UK Unemployment5
5 House of Commons (199): A Century of Change: Trends in UK statistics since 1900,

5. Fig.:4a
Fig.:4b

6. Fig.: 5
Conclusions
While atomisation started well before 1960s, the factor of social security as a possible
mechanism and incentives for atomisation existed also well before 1960s and nearly
coincided if not even shortly preceded the rapid atomisation visible ever since WW1 and
1920s.
We then need to ask if we can satisfy more of the above causality criteria than just two and,
thus, ask if there may be, however, a counter-factual argument, a proof that atomisation
could occur without a social security in place and, thus, show that it is not only or main
factor contributing to it, or, confirming it in absence of any counterfactual argument.

7. The US
While some traces of social security for poor and pensions for soldiers, and after the Civil War, ,
for their widows too, existed through-out 18th
C. a wider applicable national system of social
security in the US started with the Roosevelt's August 1935 Social Security Act. However, as from a
2014 article covering period 1940-2014 6
and the below figure (Fig. 6) reproduced from there,
Fig. 6
we can see that the trend of the atomisation has been rapid at least since 1940s in the US similarly
to the UK, but slowly rebounded since financial liberalisation in 1980s when house-price rise boom
started overtaking the real wage growth. From the further below illustration (Fig. 7) from a more
recent article by Pew Research (2018) 7
we can also see that, nowadays it is the younger that stick
more with their parents than the baby-boom generation is sticking with their (adult) children.
6 Record Number of Multi-generational Families are Living Under One Roof, 2014
http://www.buzzcanadalive.com/2014/07/record-number-of-multigenerational.html?m=0
7 D’vera Cohn and Jeffrey S. Passel (2018): A record 64 million Americans live in multigenerational households,
FactTank, Pew Research 2018: https://pewrsr.ch/2JjKACu or https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/04/05/a-
record-64-million-americans-live-in-multigenerational-households/

8. Fig. 7
However, David Brooks in his article (ibid) states: “ As factories opened in the big U.S. cities, in
the late 19th and early 20th centuries, young men and women left their extended families to chase
the American dream.“
But, evidently, this is likely to have started earlier, as long back as mid 19th
C. According to their
even more recent (2019)8
study, (Fig. 8 below) we can see that the atomisation trend has been going
on since beginning of 19th
century but rapid since the start of the “Golden”new period of rapid
industrialisation in the US mid 19th
century, thus even before their Civil War in mid 1860s. Also, in
the below figure 9 from their earlier, 2010 article9
, we can see that single living (living alone)
started increasing from early 1930s, thus the time of the Great Depression and the New Deal driving
for the recovery from the effects of the 1929 Wall Street and financial crash and the ongoing
depression.
8 R. Fry (2019): The number of people in the average U.S. household is going up for the first time in over 160 years,
FactTank, Pew Research 2019: https://pewrsr.ch/2mEhnMa https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/10/01/the-
number-of-people-in-the-average-u-s-household-is-going-up-for-the-first-time-in-over-160-years/
9 The Return of the Multi-Generational Family Household, FactTank, Pew Research 2010:
https://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2010/03/18/the-return-of-the-multi-generational-family-household

9. Fig. 8
Fig. 9

10. Some of the strains were economic. Starting in the mid-’70s, young men’s wages declined, putting
pressure on working-class families in particular. The major strains were cultural. Society became
more individualistic and more self-oriented. People put greater value on privacy and autonomy. A
rising feminist movement helped endow women with greater freedom to live and work as they
chose.” D. Brooks (ibid)
Conclusion
While it may be possible that a welfare state and pension systems (be it state be it private ones)
from mid 20th
C. could have lead to reduced number of children and growing independence of adult
from either support of their children, or their partners, once at old age, the trend throughout 2nd
half
of the 19th
and the first half of the 20th
C is not coincidental with welfare state or pensions.
Other Factors
Media and Culture
“By the 1920s, the nuclear family with a male breadwinner had replaced the corporate family as the
dominant family form. By 1960, 77.5 percent of all children were living with their two parents, who
were married, and apart from their extended family. ...” …..
“ ...A study of women’s magazines by the sociologists Francesca Cancian and Steven L. Gordon
found that from 1900 to 1979, themes of putting family before self dominated in the 1950s: “Love
means self-sacrifice and compromise.” In the 1960s and ’70s, putting self before family was
prominent: “Love means self-expression and individuality.” Men absorbed these cultural themes,
too. The master trend in Baby Boomer culture generally was liberation—“Free Bird,” “Born to
Run,” “Ramblin’Man.” “ Brooks, D (ibid)
In a series of studies (e.g. McBride (1998)10
, ) it has been shown that individualism has been
increasingly prevalent in the US society starting from early 1970s and that the predominantly
advertising financed commercial TV in the US was likely to have had a dual, mutually accelerating
and re-enforcing effects: first, by the simple presence of the technology that allowed people to stay
at home and entertain by watching TV, leading thus, to reducing their social interactive time with
others, and second, by means of the emitted programmes that presented individualist (raw) models
of behaviours (those particularly influencing the younger generations) and, so, encouraging
development individualist mind-set culture (again, mainly among the younger) too.
Both aspects had effect on further increased of audience and, thus, revenues from advertising based
on the share of popularity, so the TV stations had their own incentives in pursuing such policies.
However, whilst the first effect may not have directly influenced degradation of the nuclear family
sizes, the second, the rise in the individualist culture, could provide a mechanism and most likely
has contributed to it accelerating (mainly through young leaving parental homes) considering the
time coincidence visible on the above graphs 7 and 8. Encouragement of such culture, however,
could have been coming even all the way from the marketing departments of the advertising clients,
the commercial industry, that could then, sell more of home facilities (kitchen, bathroom and TV
equipment) or even cars and housing itself, that would be otherwise shared within larger families.
10 Allan McBride ( 1998) Television, Individualism, and Social Capital; in Political Science and Politics
Vol. 31, No. 3 (Sep., 1998), pp. 542-552

11. Conclusion
Although an increasing number of single (e.g. single mother) families has been observed (in the
UK) since liberalising 1960s., coinciding with assumed welfare state care for such families, an
overall trend in family size reduction and atomisation has started long before, in the US coincided
with the start of industrialisation in 1850s and finished in early 1980s with the end of intensive
industrialisation and move to post-industrial economies. However, it is unlikely to be the
industrialisation per-se the only direct reason for this fragmentation. More likely it is technological
progress, Increased complexity of work tasks, and increased productivity based on increased
specialisation that made people move with their atom families away from their parents, or splitting
atom families,forcing couples to be working in distant places of work that have need for their
specific combination of skills. Again, this is economic system agnostic as either/both capitalism or
socialism would have driven families to fragment for the same above goals and motivation if not
even an imperative.
On the other hand, with longer term trends and covariations, it is usually easier to establish
meaningful causal regression. And, as it can be seen from the data diagrams in the above article, ,
one can see that the atomisation trend precedes 20th
C. and, in the US, even their Civil War, And,
though, the start of longest, steeper trend, around 1850s, post-cede A. de Tocqueville's 1840's visit,
(and thus, he would not have been in position to observe it there and then.), it coincides closely with
the start of the intensive industrialisation in the US. It's end, around 1980s, also coincides with the
end of the intensive form and start of the trend of subsided industrial growth and of the so called
post-industrialisation and globalisation driven economics which started being dependent more
heavily on investment and higher returns from abroad. This change in the trend, however, also
coincided with start of diminishing wage ratio in the western aggregate income and rise of housing
prices too.
Whilst we agree on many points, the aim of this essay was to bring awareness of an inherent
complexity behind social phenomena which can not but rarely explained by single reasons.