Abstract
Jennifer Utrata, in Women Without Men, sets out to document rising divorce rates and births outside of marriage in today’s Russia, a consequence of declining social stigma associated with single motherhood and women seeking freedom from undependable men that began after World War II. This book is an outcome of 12 months of fieldwork between 2003 and 2004 in Kaluga, a city in North West Russia. Using a nonprobability sampling strategy, she located and conducted 151 interviews: 90 single mothers, 20 married mothers, 20 grandmothers who were single mothers during the Soviet era, and 21 divorced and nonresident fathers. While most in the sample were divorced, a quarter had never been married. Like most single-mother families in the United States, these Russian parents had one (63%) or two (24%) children. Unlike in the United States, Utrata’s research shows that single-mother families are socially accepted in today’s Russia and do not face stigma.
This book provides a window into Russian women’s lives as single mothers and primary breadwinners during the Soviet era and after its transition to market economy. Utrata argues that state policies and interventions to promote births within and outside of marriage after the World War II to replenish millions of men lost during the war set the stage for social acceptance of single mothers in Russia. During the Soviet era, state support to single mothers was strong. All able-bodied working-age men and women worked for the state, the jobs were guaranteed, and the state guaranteed child support as it was easy for the state to deduct child support from working fathers’ paycheck. The state also guaranteed other forms of support: childcare, housing, health care, education, and free afterschool activities for all children. Additionally, single mothers could count on their own mothers, who had access to state social protection and were glad to step in to provide additional help to their daughters and grandchildren.
As the economy transitioned from the communist Soviet Union to market-driven capitalism of new Russia, more men drifted away from family responsibilities due to low wage, unemployment, increased stress, or alcoholism. The author vividly describes the experiences of women who saw divorce as a way to gain “freedom” from unfaithful, abusive, and financially undependable men who often left all household responsibilities to their wives. Even when the state cut back previously guaranteed support, the number of single mothers increased throughout Russia due to a rise in divorce rate. Here the book challenges the notion that material challenges will reduce single motherhood; rather, Utrata reminds the readers that states with meager support for single motherhood, where the cost of raising children is high, are also the states experiencing a rise in single motherhood. Increased social acceptance of single motherhood in Russia has also made it easier for single mothers to turn to their own mothers, their children’s babushki for help. In a way, these single mothers are simply fulfilling their expected role of “strong women”: “Single mothers are expected to step up, without complaint, to compensate for systemic weaknesses. In doing so, they draw on the broader cultural discourse of strong women and weak men to make sense of their feelings and actions” (p. 93). Similarly, grandmothers bound by tradition “are expected to derive their own sense of value primarily from conforming to ideal babushka expectations” (p. 138). Even with reduced state support, they are invariably available to fulfill their babushka role, a role that involves full responsibility for her daughter’s home—from babysitting and to housework—so that the daughter may focus on her employment. In this study, 40% of children were living with grandmothers. Russian society has responded positively to these women’s efforts toward self-reliance and has accepted these mothers’ struggles as a normal response to “shrinking state and unreliable men” (p. 95). Very likely, because single motherhood is widespread throughout the Russian society, they are perceived as empowered women trying to survive without men or help from the state, “willing to accept some hardship in pursuit of increased personal independence and a sense of control over their own lives and those of their children” (p. 5). They felt free to focus on their and their children’s lives as their married lives ended. This book encourages scholars to “see single motherhood with fresh eyes” (p. 4).
This book makes an excellent case for developing social institutions aimed at supporting growing single-mother families. Contrast this with Isabel V. Sawhill’s arguments in Generation Unbound: Drifting into Sex and Parenthood without Marriage that the rise in births to women outside of marriage has adverse social outcomes increasing the risk for intergenerational poverty. Sawhill advocates for traditional marriage and planned births within marriage. Whereas, Utrata, in her engaging book shows how and why single motherhood is rising in new Russia in spite of weak state support to single mothers. The book is timely and valuable, given the upward trend in single motherhood across the world. The book offers new insights into social arrangements that address single motherhood. It challenges the notion that single mothers are helpless women with children relying on state support for survival. Rather, Russian mothers are seen as empowered women who can survive without men or state support. The author calls for more attention to social institutions aimed at supporting families, including single-mother families rather than stigmatizing them and questioning their moral behavior as is often done in the United States. This is a valuable source for social work students, researchers, and policy makers interested in reducing vulnerabilities among single-mother families.