Péter Somlai
Children of the Changeover
[..]
Pluralism in family patterns
The usual family model people have in mind is that of two young children living with their biological parents. However, the number of children living in families of a different composition or character is continuously growing. The most frequent types are the following (Mikrocenzus 1996):
- parents have one child only (roughly a third of all families fall into this category). The "only child" has long been a problem for Hungarian demography. Quite apart from the ambiguous ideological context, development and education problems arising from the loneliness of the child are very real;
- single parent households, some 15 per cent of all families, called by many an "incomplete" family;
- common-law marriage and a "new family": one of the child's or children's
parents, together with a new partner or spouse lives with the child, perhaps with more, "new" children. The exact number of households of this kind is not known but one revealing figure of the Microcensus of 1996 shows that, while the number of married couples has been steadily declining since 1990, the number of unmarried couples (de facto marriages), both with children and without, shows a marked growth. (It must be noted that this structure is actually not excluded by the above mentioned "incomplete" family form. It is quite common that, following a divorce, the child lives in the same household with the mother, but also has a place in another, new family established by the father and a new companion or wife, and in which another child or children may also live.)
- mixed, combined or the extended household and the extended family: one of the parents and one or more relatives live in a household with the child, or several families live in the same household. (The ratio of families and households of this type is low, around 3 per cent, though the ratio of people involved is of course higher than that.)
- the child (alone or together with a sibling) is being brought up by adoptive parents; numbers here are rapidly growing, too;
- orphans in state/official care live with foster parents.
These family types, and sub-types, have come into being in the wake of demographic processes which, besides a diminishing birthrate, are primarily responsible for the plurality of family structures and life styles in modern society. In the mid-1990s, every fourth child was born out of wedlock. But among the processes in question, it is the separations and recouplings, divorces, early widowhood and remarriages or new cohabitation of parents that have the greatest impact on the development of children.
In Hungary the divorce rate has been high for some time. If the current rate persists, nearly a third of the marriages concluded in the mid-90s can be expected to end in a divorce. In divorces, the proportion of cases involving one or more children is also increasing. In the 1950s, cases of this kind made up about 50 per cent of all divorces, versus 75 per cent in the 90s.
Some 10 to 15 per cent of today's fathers and mothers themselves grew up without one or the other parent, mainly because of divorce (Kamarás, 1995) and, according to some estimates, 16 to 18 per cent of children currently live in such households (Hoóz, 1995). In the majority of single-parent families, it is the mother who lives with a child or several children. In all social classes the living standards of such families are lower than those of complete families. Children living in single parent families are more likely to fall ill, are more at risk, are more prone to turn to crime or end up in state/official care than others.
However, it is not the actual fact of divorce that has a shattering impact on the state of mind of the child, or leads to irresolvable tensions, but the deterioration of the parents' relationship. That may start quite often even before the birth of the child, or during pregnancy.
[..]
Children at risk
In the last decade there has been a steep rise in the number of children at risk. In 1973, the number registered was still only 75,000, and it was 330,000 in 1966. Since 1988, however, there has been a 250 per cent rise. Here again, the decline in material living conditions is mostly responsible. An investigation of the development of infant hazards over time (Horvát, 1995) found that the rate of premature births and degeneration stagnated in the past decade, but the frequency of what are called "other causes" in infant and child-care statistics—and which usually concern the diet, health and environment of the mother—has increased. Two thirds of the cases were due to parental alcoholism.
Parental neglect or violence means lasting lack of care, insufficient food and clothing for children, no protection against illness, no education and no emotional bonds. An investigation conducted in County Borsod found that 5.7 per cent of the children suffered serious violence at the hands of their parents or were otherwise neglected. The researchers listed the following forms of behaviour (Velkey, 1994): children are taken to a doctor's surgery in a state of hypothermia, starvation or general deterioration, at an advanced stage of illness; disregarding the advice of the family doctor, the child is taken to hospital too late, no interest is shown in him/her during treatment, the child is taken home well after discharge is possible; when the child is treated at home, he is not given medication in time, if at all. Beside neglect, emotional and physical abuse (heavy torture, truncation) also occurs, and so does sexual harassment, abuse and incest.
Unemployment, poverty, an unhealthy life and institutional segregation and rejection are frequently found where children are in jeopardy. In such environments various deviations are repeated and are also learnt by the children. In some cases it is precisely the parents who force their children to drink, steal or to prostitute themselves. In Hungary, just as in every developed country, new deviations (e.g., drug abuse) are on the rise, with criminals hungry for profit preying mainly on children and the young. According to an investigation covering secondary school pupils in Budapest (Elekes–Paksi, 1994), more than 20 per cent of 17 year olds were regular smokers, 30 per cent drank, and the ratio of those using illegal drugs could be put at some 25 per cent.
One of the most negative consequences of the socio-economic and political changes in Hungary has been the spread of crime and, within that, the growth in children (below 14) and juvenile (14–18) delinquency. Since 1989, the proportion of perpetrators younger than 18 has doubled against the total number of criminals. Delinquents are growing younger and younger, the average age is about 13. The most common crime in that age group is larceny. The majority of children involved, however, are not recruited from those in jeopardy (fewer than 15 per cent), and it is also remarkable that the majority do not come from broken homes either. Those in state care, on the other hand, are conspicuously over-represented, with their ratio being around 10 per cent (Németh, 1995: pp. 2–3.).
The complex causal chain made up by macro- and micro-sociological factors contributing to juvenile delinquency cannot be accurately established. Here I would like to call attention to a single link in that chain, namely domestic violence against children. Some 15,000 cases of dangerous neglect or abuse come to the knowledge of the health services every year. Some of these imply physical violence, a fifth is of an emotional character, and a fifth involves sexual abuse (Barkó, 1995). There is, however, a consensus among all concerned that these figures are only the tip of the iceberg, that the number of children abused is far higher, and many more adults are at fault. Still, in the 1990s, a growing acceptance of the fact of children being at risk and of the "decriminalization" of neglect and violence are clearly observable (Kerezsi, 1995: p. 89). Criminal proceedings are ever more rarely initiated by child welfare authorities. In 1987, the number of people convicted of child abuse was 468; in the 1990s that number was below 200 annually (Gulyás, 1995).
Yet the spiral of violence and its inhuman mechanism are clearly shown by the cases of self-induced abortion or infanticide by teenage girls. Many of them are in state care themselves, others are on the run from their parental homes or their boyfriends or spouses, becoming pregnant because of ignorance or indifference towards pregnancy. Infanticide is strongly condemned by public opinion in Hungary, but the same public is indifferent to the problems of pregnant underage girls or the fate of their babies.
[..]
Péter Somlai,
is Head of the Department of History and Theory of Sociology of the Institute of Sociology at the Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest.
