Abstract

We are enthusiastic about Miller's project. She supplies interesting and comprehensive analyses of six central social welfare programs (Aid to Families with Dependent Children, work training incentives, child custody and support, social welfare services for children, Social Security, and pensions). We are also sympathetic to Miller's method. She deploys feminist theory to investigate gender and the social welfare system. Moreover, Miller's attempt to highlight the gender, race, and class dynamics of the policies she examines is commendable. Readers interested in feminism and social policy will certainly want Miller's book on their library shelves. American Journal of Sociology An invaluable summary of recent developments in what Miller calls the major elements of 'the vast network of public policies and programs designed to provide goods and services' to women. Choice This volume applies a feminist theoretical perspective to an analysis of the treatment of women in the U.S. social welfare system. Using a theoretical framework that postulates a masculine world view of patriarchal necessity, Miller attempts to clarify the current status of women in welfare, work experience and training programs; the custody and care of children; and Social Security and pension programs. She identifies gender as a key variable in current debates about the future of social welfare and sheds new light on the ways in which social policies themselves often function to perpetuate women's subordination and economic insecurity. Students and scholars in the fields of social work, social policy, and women's studies will find Miller's work both enlightening and provocative. Following her introduction, Miller briefly reviews feminist theories that seek to explain the differential treatment of gender in Western society. Major government programs for poor women and children, such as Aid to Families with Dependent Children, are then described and analyzed with respect to gender and the concept of patriarchal necessity. Subsequent chapters examine such issues as the Family Support Act, daycare, and the plight of older women in a patriarchal society in light of feminist theory. Miller demonstrates that even programs ostensibly created to help women or make them more independent usually have the opposite effect because they are developed and managed within a masculine-dominant culture. In her concluding chapter, Miller makes some suggestions for reform and discusses how the concept of patriarchal necessity could be used to both analyze other programs and predict the acceptability of reform legislation affecting women.