Widespread Interest in Divorce

Divorce research has occupied the energies of many social scientists during the past several decades. If one includes marital conflict, the number would be increased. Its fascination is just as great among the American population as among social scientists. Investigations into divorce have been carried out not only by social scientists, but by lawyers, judges, social workers, psychiatrists, physicians, and others. Divorce is one of the predominant themes of modern literature. 1 Specific divorces are considered newsworthy. There are many "how to do it" books whose aim is to show the popular reading public how to avoid this problem.

Most of these analyses focus on two main themes: (1) Divorce as an index of social disorganization or pathology; and (2) Paths to marital happiness. Let us look at each of these.

The Classical Family of Western Nostalgia, and Social Disorganization

Divorce has been viewed by many as an index of "social disorganization," or of the anomie of modern urban life. It has particularly been so viewed by those sociologists who are nostalgic for the rural "harmony" which they so eagerly left as youngsters. We are all guilty of loosely contrasting an undefined urban, supposedly pathological family life, with a rural, idyllic family pattern of some generations ago: the classical family of Western nostalgia is cited and praised in practically every public speech on the breakdown of the modern family and modern society. Idealizing the past and the distant, some have failed to do justice to the complexities of both rural and urban family patterns. Many analysts see in the "rising tide of divorce" abundant evidence that the country may be approaching moral disintegration. It is not alone the clergy and the professional moralists who have taken this position.

This view need not be criticized here. If divorce is seen as a mere index of social pathology, then as a consequence there is not much stimulus to analyze what happens to an individual after he has had this experience. The question that appears to loom as of far greater significance, is how to return to an older societal form, in which the "classical family" can flourish, rather than to chart what happens to those who become involved in a modern divorce.