@article{9b019fe3441c4fdba8292c8333534e43,
title = "Recent government reforms related to marital formation, maintenance, and dissolution in the united states: A primer and critical review",
abstract = "In this manuscript, we provide a sampling of law and policy reforms over the past decade intended to help couples form and sustain healthy marriages and set out the rationale employed to justify these initiatives. Then we turn to the challenging task of evaluating whether these initiatives are likely to bear fruit, acknowledging three primary critiques. In the end, we see governmental efforts to strengthen the institution of marriage as legitimate, although we raise several nontrivial concerns with implications for future directions. To predict that these initiatives will have a significant impact on the institution of marriage requires a strong belief in the power of educational intervention and a substantial expansion of public support that spurs efforts in the private sector.",
keywords = "Couple education, Divorce, Family policy, Marriage",
author = "Hawkins, {Alan J.} and Wilson, {Robin Fretwell} and Theodora Ooms and Nock, {Steven L.} and Linda Malone-Colon and Lloyd Cohen",
note = "Funding Information: Work for this article was supported by the Camilla E. Kimball Chair, School of Family Life, Brigham Young University. †Dr. Nock passed away tragically during the revision of this article. We express our deepest appreciation for his help with this article and for his tremendous contributions to the field. Address correspondence to Alan J. Hawkins, School of Family Life, 2050 JFSB, Brigham Young University, Provo, UT 84602, USA. E-mail: hawkinsa@byu.edu Funding Information: In February 2006, Congress passed the Deficit Reduction Act of 2005 (DRA), which reauthorized the TANF program. In addition, it established a new program of competitive grants for the support of healthy marriage initiatives ($100 million a year for 5 years) and responsible fatherhood programs ($50 million a year for 5 years). The HMI funds were allocated for eight defined general activities. Seven of these fell into the category of marriage and relationship education, especially for disadvantaged couples. In 2006, the Office of Family Assistance (OFA) in ACF announced the award of 124 healthy marriage grants and 100 responsible fatherhood grants funded under the DRA for five years. There are now more than 250 HMI programs funded by OFA and other ACF offices. (The most current list of programs is posted at www.acf.hhs.gov/healthymarriage.) This major infusion of federal funding has brought MRE into the national spotlight. It also created enormous challenges to provide services to large numbers of people across the United States from diverse economic, racial, and ethnic backgrounds. To meet the capacity-building challenge, ACF has funded several information and technical assistance activities, and paid for grantee program staff to become trained in various marriage and relationship education curricula. The National Healthy Marriage Resource Center (www.healthymarriageinfo.org) was funded in 2004 and now serves as a “first-stop shop” for information about research and programs, and provides technical assistance to grantees. In addition to rapid expansion, MRE is undergoing a major transformation. Despite the fact that programs were not required to target only low-income couples, most funded programs do so. Offering MRE to low-income couples has been a challenge because MRE has served primarily middle-class couples (Ooms & Wilson, 2004). ACF funding has supported the modification of existing MRE programs to better serve the needs of lower-income couples. MRE also is being offered in many different types of settings from schools to prisons, welfare agencies, hospitals, and military bases, as well as in the traditional community and religious settings (Ooms, 2007). Significant ACF funds have supported much of this transformation work. Copyright: Copyright 2009 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved.",
year = "2009",
month = jul,
doi = "10.1080/15332690903049265",
language = "English (US)",
volume = "8",
pages = "264--281",
journal = "Journal of Couple and Relationship Therapy",
issn = "1533-2691",
publisher = "Routledge",
number = "3",
}