It is within the family that socialization takes place. This is a process whereby the values of the wider community and society are transmitted to the individual. It is not only the family that can perform this function of socialization, of course.

Education conveys knowledge, skills and sometimes values to individuals other than those found at home.

Another important source of socialization is peer groups which may require conformity to sub-cultural values not found in the family, generally. For example, gangs may have codes and rituals and even an alternative slant on values to those parents might wish to convey.

Yet another is religion, although this is something often promoted along family lines. The extent to which religion is important and a regular part of an individual’s life may be directly linked to how strongly the family promotes it.

The mass media will also exert a considerable influence. It holds up a multiplicity of role models and fashions and it may be hard for a traditional family, rooted in more mundane conservative values, perhaps, to compete with the glamor of the pop-star or film actor.

There are two main views on how a family exerts pressure on the individual to conform. One is Marxist in origin and comes under the heading of ‘conflict theory’. In this view, the family seeks to repress social growth and a willingness to seek change. Inter-racial marriage, homosexual relationships, rich associating with poor, inter-religious liaisons - all these things, in this view, will be prevented by families. Homogeneous family units will become willing workers in a corrupt and unfair Capitalist economy.

Alternatively, the family may be seen as a good thing, and the socialization and control of individuals by it helpful in making a stable society. This is a view championed by Emile Durkheim who long ago suggested that the family was a source of equilibrium that provided the best context in which to bring up children. This view is known as ‘Functionalism’ - or, more fully, ‘The Functionalist Theory of Social Stratification.’

Just as Marxist-based thought concerns itself with the distribution of wealth within society, Durkheim also considered what happened to it. Families pass on wealth to their own members through inheritance which encourages stability and the strength of them as meaningful social units.

It is in the family that the individual may benefit from the wisdom and experience of elders, financial support, and it is also there that integration with the wider society is controlled and moderated.

Feminists will see the promotion of stability within the family as undesirable and possibly tending to restrict relationships that do not fall into traditional lines. Traditional notions of the husband as the bread-winner and the mother staying at home looking after the children will not be considered fair.

The Marxist and Feminist viewpoints are a source for much doubt about the Functionalist view expounded by Durkheim and may, for example, point to domestic violence and news reports showing statistical evidence of child abuse within some families.

Families, in this view, are a means by which society is held back from developing more liberal ideas, and a source of overall social stagnation.

It is the Functionalists who will see the family as a unit that promotes stability. It is within the family that children are raised and influenced, supported and directed, and grow to become useful members of society.

Whether one accepts the Marxist and/or Feminist view of the family as a negative influence, holding back both the individual and society, or Durkheim’s proposition that it is the family that best promotes socialization is really a matter that will be decided by one’s personal political stance.

The fact is that even though Sociology was initially called scientific and would like to be objective, many questions will not respond easily to surveys and empirical measurement. The family may be different things to different people and the adversarial process of arguing that it promotes stability or repression must remain a matter of subjective interpretation.