The Future of Marriage (Hardcover)

~ (Author)
Key Phrases: surveyed countries, world values survey, two natural parents, United States, Trobriand Islands, Andrew Sullivan (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

In their current demands, Blankenhorn points out, gay and lesbian leaders are not asking for marriage with an adjective in front of it, but marriage itself. Therefore, what marriage is and why it matters is what this debate is all about. What exactly is this institution to which gay and lesbian activists are seeking access? Why do we have it in the first place? Where did it come from? What is it for? How is it changing? These are some of the hard questions The Future of Marriage confronts.

About the Author

David Blankenhorn is president of the Institute for American Values, a non-partisan organisation devoted to research and publication on family and civil society issues. He is the author of Fatherless America: Confronting Our Most Urgent Social Problem. He lives in New York City with his wife and their three children.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 260 pages
• Publisher: Encounter Books; annotated edition edition (March 14, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1594030812
• ISBN-13: 978-1594030819
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.3 x 1.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #680,879 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

47 of 53 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Same Sex Marriage is About Marriage, Not About Gay People, April 9, 2007

By	Jennifer Morse "jennyromo" (Vista, CA United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

David Blankenhorn's important new book, The Future of Marriage makes clear that the social issue of our time is not whether marriage will be "expanded" to include same sex couples. The real issue is whether marriage as an institution will be so emptied of meaning that it becomes a gender neutral institution, rather than the premier gender-based institution of society. This isn't fundamentally about gay people. The issue is marriage: what marriage is, and what it does for society. Blankenhorn argues convincingly that gender-neutral marriage, (which is what same sex marriage will create) can not perform the social functions that marriage universally performs: marriage attaches children with their fathers and mothers and fathers to each other.
Even in societies that tolerate pre-marital sex, permit polygamy, or take a relaxed approach to divorce, the basic idea of marriage across time and cultures does not change: for every child, a mother and a father. Human societies strive to have children affiliated with both their biological parents. The mother and child unit has universally been considered incomplete, and the sociological position of the father considered indispensable. Universally, that is, up until the last generation in modern western societies.

The public opinion-making elites of this country have pretty much decided that same sex marriage is a moral imperative.That is why you have heard so little about David Blankenhorn's new book, The Future of Marriage. Even the human interest story in USA Today was about David, and not his ideas. Blankenhorn makes a reasoned case, independent of any religious belief, for marriage as intrinsically a union between opposite sex couples. No one can read this book and believe that only the ignorant or spiteful oppose same sex marriage. An honest engagement with the arguments of this book reveals sophisticated and compelling arguments in favor of marriage.

Whether you are convinced by Blankenhorn's arguments or not, the arguments deserve to be considered. The elites hope to kill this book by ignoring it. Don't let them. Buy the book. Read it. Share it with others. We need to have an honest discussion about the meaning and The Future of Marriage.

15 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Why (heterosexual) marriage matters, July 29, 2007

By	William Muehlenberg (Melbourne Australia) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

Amazon Verified Purchase

David Blankenhorn is a world authority on the institution of marriage. One of the biggest debates concerning marriage today is whether we should expand the concept to include same-sex unions. Blankenhorn thinks not, and in these 300 pages he sets out to make the `no' case for homosexual marriage. But he does so, pre-eminently, by making the `yes' case for the institution of heterosexual marriage.

He first seeks to get a handle on what marriage is, and then show how it has been experienced over the centuries. The first half of the book is about what marriage is, and how it has developed. The second half deals with the challenge of same-sex marriage.

Blankenhorn recognises that a definition of marriage is a slippery affair, but after a close examination of the issue and how others have thought about it, he comes up with this helpful conceptualisation:

"In all or nearly all human societies, marriage is socially approved sexual intercourse between a woman and a man, conceived both as a personal relationship and as an institution, primarily such that any children resulting from the union are - and are understood by society to be - emotionally, morally, practically, and legally affiliated with both of the parents."

In his overview of the history of marriage, he demonstrates what has been the universal belief about marriage: It reflects the fundamental belief that "for every child, a mother and a father". Thus marriage is primarily about two things: the socially approved sexual intercourse between a woman and a man, and the protection and nurturing of the fruit of that relationship. Both are vital components of marriage, and must not be separated from it or from each other.

He argues that marriage is based on two universal and timeless basic rules: the rule of opposites (marriage is man-woman) and the rule of sex (marriage involves sexual intercourse). And even though it is difficult for moderns to get their head around this fact, sexual intercourse has always been about procreation, or at least its possibility.

Put at its simplest, "marriage is fundamentally about sex and reproduction". And children born into married households are greatly advantaged. As such, "Marriage is society's most pro-child institution." The research on how child fare in a two-parent household cemented by marriage is now voluminous. No other type of relationship is as good for children as heterosexual marriage. Family structure, in other words, matters overwhelmingly for children.

And marriage is not just a private relationship; it is a public institution. Social institutions exist to meet fundamental human needs. The need for the institution of marriage arises because human beings are "sexually embodied creatures who everywhere reproduce sexually and give birth to helpless, socially needy offspring who remain immature for long periods of time and who therefore depend on the love and support of both of the parents who brought them into existence."

So how does same-sex marriage fit into all this? First, it must be said that Blankenhorn is not unsympathetic to the arguments of homosexuals wanting marriage rights. He believes that basic human rights are important, and that all people must be treated with dignity. But he still believes that marriage is not something that can be redefined to include same-sex relationships.

He argues that homosexual marriage fundamentally means transforming the institution of marriage. Even the various international human rights documents of today speak of the right to participate in the institution of marriage, but they do not "recognise the right to turn marriage into another word for any private adult relationship of choice".

And given the intimate link between marriage and parenting, to change the institution of marriage is to change parenthood itself. Changing marriage changes marriage for everyone, and it will change parenthood for everyone. But as the research keeps telling us, that will be bad news for children. Says Blankenhorn, every child in the world has a right to a name, a nationality, and a mother and father.

In addition to the deinstitutionalisation of marriage, same-sex marriage would "require us in both law and culture to deny the double origin of the child." Says Blankenhorn, "I can hardly imagine or more serious violation".

Blankenhorn then goes on to list some 23 possible positive consequences of legalising same-sex unions, then lists 24 possible negative outcomes. He also offers 12 possible neutral outcomes. A major reason for all this is to demonstrate that this idea being proposed is a very big one indeed, with profound consequences.

As but one example, if we accept the logic of same-sex marriage, how can we possibly oppose the logic of, say, bisexual, polyamorous marriage? If we can redefine marriage in terms of sexual orientation, "why not permit a bisexual woman to marry one man and one woman?"

The consequences of such a revolutionary change will be far-reaching, and at this point, perhaps unmeasurable. But the changes will be monumental. Thus we need to be very careful about how we proceed here.

Blankenhorn concludes by offering some recommendations as to how we might strengthen the institution of marriage. He acknowledges that the future of marriage is shaky at best. But it has never been equalled. The message of this important book is that we dare not play fast and loose with the world's first, and most important, social institution.

11 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Table of Contents Below, April 11, 2007

By	Deborah Strubel "former editor and agent" (Lancaster, PA United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Some in the blogosphere have wanted to see the table of contents for The Future of Marriage. Since the publisher hasn't yet supplied the images for Amazon's preview pages, here is the table of contents:
1. What Is Marriage? 1
2. Prehistory 11
3. The River Valley 23
4. The Trobriand Islands 41
5. What Marriage Is 69
6. Deinstitutionalize Marriage? 127
7. Goods in Conflict 171
8. Determining Marriage's fate 213
Appendix: Topics in the Anthropology of Kinship 247
Acknowledgements 263
Notes 265
Index 317

(Full disclosure, I helped the author with some edits, and I am employed by his organization.)