Het luide roepen om een harde hand. Notities bij Hoge eisen, ware liefde van Gabriël van den Brink

Samenvatting

Loud Calls for Tough Love. Notes concerning Gabriel van den Brink's High Demands, True Love. A review essay on a book by Gabriel van den Brink, Hoge eisen, ware liefde. De opkomst van een nieuw gezinsideaal in Nederland ([High Demands, True Love. The Rise of a New Family Ideal in the Netherlands] publication date not provided), in which developments in Dutch family life in the last 30 years are examined from a formal evolutionist perspective and placed within a broader social context. Van den Brink uses a typology of childrearing methods based on low vs high discipline on the one hand and low vs high parental involvement on the other; subsequently, he argues that the egalitarian (high involvement, low discipline) family type of the 1960s must be replaced by the communitarian (high involvement, high discipline) type. Although van den Brink's historical insights are considered interesting, it is argued that his descriptions of authoritarian vs egalitarian childrearing practices lack definition and are more moralistic than sociological. The book is deemed full of self-serving rhetoric, with van den Brink's clamoring for a return to less-permissive childrearing values; this "fin de siecle" sentiment is placed within the context of (national) identity loss due to increasing globalization and the end of the Cold War. Adapted from the source document.