Introduction - Filiation and Identity: Towards a Sociology of Intergenerational Relations

Abstract

While American sociology, in the wake of Talcott Parsons's work, foregrounds the nuclear family, European sociology focuses on solidarity. In fact, the concept of family solidarity is essential to the French sociological tradition. The French-speaking world has become one of the most dynamic grounds for this kind of sociology, with the development of longitudinal methods and biographical methods, which have progressively brought along a new approach to the notion of family and prompted the use of another methodology.

Cultures of Intergenerational Transmission in Four-Generation Families

“…Changes in fertility and rising female employment are creating ‘an enormous intergenerational funnel’ for the intergenerational transmission of wealth which is creating both winners and losers (Myles, 2002: 172) and about which we know relatively little in the UK. A growing body of evidence from other European countries testifies to the considerable volume of inter vivos transfers across family generations of money and material goods even where public support in the form of cash and services is provided by welfare states (see Attias-Donfut and Arber, 2000; Bawin-Legros, 2002; Kohli, 1999; Gulbrandsen and Langsether, 1997, 2001). In respect of care, national and cross-national studies have emphasised the major role that continues to be played in many affluent countries by informal carers, in particular by relatives, both in the care of children and elderly people (EC Childcare Network, 1996a; OECD, 2001), with up to 80 per cent of care for elderly people provided informally (Jacobzone, Cambois, Chaplain and Robine, 1998; Attias-Donfut and Segalen, 2002).…”

Understanding generations: political economy and culture in an ageing society

“…This aspect of generation is connected to the problem of social and cultural reproduction, that is, the succession of people into social roles and cultural reproduction of norms and values over time (cf. Bawin‐Legros 2002). The second of Corsten's categories is that of a set of groups with relationships to each other – inter‐generational contracts, generational gaps and conflicts.…”