CHANGING FAMILY – CHANGING POLICIES?* Mária NEMÉNYI–Judit TAKÁCS Institute of Sociology, Hungarian Academy of Sciences H-1054 Budapest, Úri u. 49.; e-mail: H13249nem@ella.hu Institute of Sociology, Hungarian Academy of Sciences H-1014 Budapest, Úri u. 49.; e-mail: takacs@policy.hu Abstract: This article presents the findings of a qualitative research project which aimed to map out the political evaluations and the social effects of the changing concept of family and the changing forms of family life. By interviewing political and economic decision-makers we intended to highlight the goals and the motives of the differenct family policy approaches, the characteristic features of the family concepts reflected by the policy-makers’ decisions, as well as the relationship between state family policies and labor market policies on the one hand, and equal treatment expectations concerning both genders, on the other. On the basis of interviews conducted with ordinary people we examined how much people’s lives are practically infuenced by the family policy measures introduced by the political and the economic decision makers. According to our findings the two different categories of respondents saw specific family policy issues in different ways – however, their interpretations of family policy as a whole were rather convergent. The importance of providing equality of opportunity for men and women, increasing the female employment rate, acknowledging the plurality of family lifestyles, reconciling work and family life – being European expectations as well as conditions of a worthy life – seemed to be overshadowed by the demographic issues of fertility and procreation. Keywords: family, family life, family policies, labor market policies The functions of the institution of the family have transformed several times starting from the second half of the twentieth century. Along with the changes in its functions the concept of family has also broadened, that is to say, it is no longer so obvious what we call or can call a family. Many direct and indirect factors contributed to this. Among others, the loss of prestige of the institution of marriage, the growth of permissiveness towards diverging forms of sexual behavior, and the spread of divorce can be listed. Single parent families became more common as a consequence of divorce, remarriage, and cohabitation, and composite family forms are arising through 1417-8648/$ 20.00 © 2006 Akadémiai Kiadó, Budapest Review of Sociology Vol. 12 (2006) 2, 37–63 * This research was made possible by the OTKA grant No. 37380. In our research plan we referred to the IPROSEC international comparative research conducted within the terms of the fifth program of the European Commission, which we wished to extend with Hungarian results. This article can be read as the continuation of a paper Család és családpolitika, which appeared in Szociológiai Szemle 2003/1.