Non-Sectarian Resources
The mission of the National Marriage project, a nonpartisan, nonsectarian and interdisciplinary initiative located at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey, is to provide research and analysis on the state of marriage in America and to educate the public on the social, economic and cultural conditions affecting marital success and child well being.
The State of Our Unions 2009:Marriage in America - Money & Marriage
Edited by W. Bradford Wilcox, Ph.D., associate professor of sociology at the University of Virginia and Director of the National Marriage Project and Elizabeth Marquardt, Director of the Center for Marriage & Families at the Institute for American Values
”Inspired by the financial crisis our nation felt in the last year—what some are now calling the ‘Great Recession’—and its effects on the financial and emotional lives of millions of couples, the 2009 State of Our Unions focuses on the theme of ‘Marriage and Money’...As scholars who care deeply about marital and child well-being, we are convinced that our nation needs excellent arguments and accurate data to help us confront the challenges and opportunities that face marriage, and to identify strategies to strengthen the quality and stability of married life in America.”
Life Without Children: The Social Retreat from Children and How It Is Changing America
By David Popenoe, Ph.D. and Barbara Dafoe Whitehead, Ph.D., author and social critic who writes extensively on issues of marriage, family and child wellbeing
“The retreat from child-centeredness within marriage is part of a larger transformation in the meaning and purpose of marriage. In recent decades, marriage has been deinstitutionalized—that is, it has lost much of its influence as a social institution governing sex, procreation and parenthood. Legally, socially, and culturally, marriage is now defined primarily as a couple relationship dedicated to the fulfillment of each individuals’ innermost needs and desires.”
The Institute for American Values, founded in 1987, is a private, nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that contributes intellectually to strengthening families and civil society by bringing fresh knowledge to bear on the challenges facing them. The website is a consolidator of articles on American Values.
The American Family, 1988-2028: Looking Back and Looking Forward
By David Popenoe, Ph.D., Professor of Sociology emeritus and Co-Director of the National Marriage Project at Rutgers University
“Strong families remain essential for a strong and healthy society and irreplaceable for successful child rearing and for satisfying the deeper social-emotional needs of both adults and children.”
By W. Bradford Wilcox, Director of the National Marriage Project at the University of Virginia and a Senior Fellow at the Institute for American Values
“… [B]y the time the 1970s came to a close, many Americans—rich and poor alike—had jettisoned the institutional model of married life that prioritized the welfare of children, and which sought to discourage divorces in all but the most dire of circumstances. Instead, they embraced the “soul-mate” model of married life, which prioritized the emotional welfare of adults and gave moral permission to divorces for virtually any reason.”
What Marriage Is - And What It Isn't
By Robert P. George, McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence at Princeton University
“The law is a teacher. It will teach either that marriage is a reality in which people can choose to participate, but whose contours people cannot make and remake at will, or it will teach that marriage is a mere convention, which is malleable in such a way that individuals, couples, or indeed, groups can choose to make of it whatever suits their desires, goals, and so on.”