From ‘absent objects of blame’ to ‘fathers who want to take responsibility’: reforming birth registration law

Abstract

Unmarried fatherhood has long been seen as presenting a problem to be managed by government, with intervention necessary either to enforce men's (financial) responsibilities or, alternatively, to support and enable the relationships with children that men want, deserve and are unfairly denied. This most recent of a long chain of governmental initiatives in this regard is the reform of the Births and Deaths Registration Act (1953), proposed as part of the Welfare Reform Bill (2008–2009), which aims to increase the proportion of unmarried fathers who are named on birth certificates. Beyond a critical exploration of this specific reform proposal, this paper draws on the reform process to illustrate a number of dominant assumptions regarding fatherhood which resonate more generally across current family law and policy. Specifically, the paper identifies a ‘geneticisation’ of understandings of fatherhood; a commitment to equality between mothers and fathers and a particular vision of what this entails; an emphasis on independent, unmediated relationships between men and their children; a conflation of men's and children's interests, expressed in appeals to child welfare; an understanding of fatherhood as implying active engagement with children rather than a (merely) disciplinary or breadwinner role; and significant ‘policy optimism’ both about the desire of fathers to be more involved with their offspring and the likely success of initiatives in parenting as a means of addressing broader social problems.