This book makes several contributions to the study of fatherhood at the level of the individual and the family and to current debates about policies and social services in the UK. Firstly, Featherstone includes fathering trends and evidence among minority groups such as different groups of non-resident fathers, families where domestic violence is an issue and gay and lesbian parents. Fathers in intact-couple families are covered in less detail. Secondly, she connects large range of theoretical and empirical research on fathers from different strands of sociology and psychology, which do not usually speak to each other. By doing so, she provides an excellent reflection of the evidence on questions such as the importance of father presence for children's emotional wellbeing and gender role development. Thirdly, the author covers research on fathers from an individual- or family-level perspective as well as debates in the area of social policy and social work. She illustrates how policy makers’ priorities often seem to cherry-pick from the research on fathers and what problems arise when policy design and implementation by social services do not take into account the complexity of contemporary family relationships. By giving voice to fathers as well as considering issues of mothers’ and children's welfare, an important message of this book is that we need to question the currently existing hierarchies of policy goals which target children, mothers, and fathers separately. Featherstone argues for a more holistic policy approach to families and also provides some advice for its implementation.
Chapters 2 and 3 review the contemporary and historical context of fatherhood, respectively. In contrast to most other literature, Featherstone combines a discussion of general demographic trends and work–family balance issues with a description of less well-known figures about domestic violence, homosexual parenting and legal changes of biological versus social fatherhood in the context of IVF treatments and adoption. Her review of the historical developments around fatherhood are particularly interesting, since she shows that quite contradictory reports exist as to how much fathers were also responsible for children's care (at least for organising it) among some groups of British society before the industrial revolution. She suggests that the dominant role for fathers to be the provider and breadwinner and not to be involved in family life has been more prevalent in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries than at some previous times.
The following three chapters review psychological and sociological theories on masculinities, fatherhood and gender. One central issue in many theories concerns the importance of children's relationships with mothers and fathers for their development. Since non-resident fathers have been a topic of heated debates among policy makers and the media over the past decades, Featherstone devotes some space to them. She suggests that there is not much scientific support for father absence hindering boys in developing healthy masculine identities. Instead, research gives more credit to the loss of fathers’ economic support and emotional contribution to the family and the relationship with the mother negatively affecting children's development. In evaluating the effects of fathers’ contact with children post-separation, she argues not enough attention has been paid to issues of power imbalances – in particular, in families with a history of domestic violence towards women – and to resolving the ongoing parental conflict which often arises with contact arrangements.
These issues re-emerge in her insightful chapters on different father organisations and recent policy developments regarding rights and responsibilities of British fathers post-separation. She convincingly makes the point that the current legal framework for fathers emphasises fathers’ responsibilities in terms of providing financial support for their children and their contact rights rather than day-to-day involvement in childcare. Existing work–life balance policies, even after the extensions under New Labour, still include more generous parental leave entitlements for mothers, no particular incentives to facilitate take-up by men and do not give consideration to the generally long working hours of fathers. These policies do not encourage fathers’ day-to-day involvement as caregivers for their children on an equal basis with mothers. Some readers might have liked to see this point extended to include considerations of how preventative support for fathers and relationships between men and women could be provided even before relationships break down. Featherstone briefly mentions how pregnancy and maternity services could be targeted at couples or directly at fathers, but does not elaborate on possibilities for support at subsequent contact points between state institutions and parents, such as childcare and education institutions or children's centres.
The final two chapters discuss among others Featherstone's own fascinating work on the relationship between fathers and social services and practical suggestions for improving the latter. Fathers perceive social services as unpredictable and biased towards women. The author's research reveals that social workers do not seem to be adequately trained to deal with the complexities of relationships in the families they are dealing with. In particular, they often seem unable to support families with tensions around biological and stepfathers and with ongoing parental conflict as a result of power imbalances, including issues of domestic violence. Featherstone derives some recommendations to improve social work practices. She discusses the importance of attracting more men to social service jobs and stresses that support services should include therapeutic efforts that try to understand the diverse needs many men who are non-resident fathers have. Finally, she reminds the reader of a key argument throughout the book that policies and services to support children cannot be easily disentangled from those for mothers and fathers. For the most part, cooperation is needed from all members of the family to promote children's wellbeing. The current hierarchy of policy goals prioritising children's welfare over gender equality policies and over support for fathers is therefore in many cases misplaced. This interconnectedness is crucial at the policy design as well as the implementation stage.
