Effects of Globalization on Parenting

Effects of Globalization on Parenting

There are as many cultures around the world as there are communities, races or tribes. Each group of population has its own set of written, or many a times unwritten, rules, which the majority of the group follows diligently. These rules are passed down from generation to generation, and in due course, become the 'culture' of that community. Culture, therefore, can be said to refer to a local, relatively coherent, self contained set of norms, presuppositions and practices that belongs to a localized group and is passed down to the next generation (Goodman via Ritzer, 2008). These norms and practices also include the day to day interactions between the members of the group, their communications with external elements, their transactions with a higher power (for want of a better word, God) and the way they nurture their future generations. Every culture develops its own methods and processes for bringing up their children, in accordance to their emotional intelligence, their cognitive intelligence and their social interactions. Thus the parenting styles differ from culture to culture. Some cultures are very lenient and generous with their children, while some believe in a very strict and disciplined upbringing. Some cultures abhor any form of punishment, while some support the use of corporal punishment to make their children toe the line.

Today one sees an interesting trend of globalization of parenting. All of a sudden, people around the world seem to be trying to evolve a unified set of methods for effectively raising kids. This is very evident in the way parenting books sell across the world. The authors of these books find an eager audience across all cultures. You find Indian mothers poring over American authors talking about how to rise a baby, notwithstanding the fact that the environment, climate and circumstances that a baby and its parent may encounter in the U.S might be quite different to what a baby and parent will find in India. The way a Chinese parent raises her baby may not be the way a French parent would want to raise her. However, despite these very obvious differences, the sale of global parenting books continue to soar, signifying how consumerism is driving homogenization (Goodman via Ritzer, 2008) of various cultures.

It is perhaps the proliferation of nuclear families, brought about by the onset of globalization, that has led to parents relying on bookish information on parenting from any source they can lay there hands on. With more parents moving away from their roots to live in a completely different culture, conflicts and confusion have become a part of a parent-child relationship. With an increase in distance from the wisdom of elders in the family, parents frantically search for solutions in the widely publicized parenting books. And many a times they readily consume the information fed by these books, not pausing to think whether it would really suit their family and their child, or not.

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The parenting books, for the most part, follow the culture their respective authors have grown up in. A couple of very popular titles on parenting styles are Amy Chua's Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother and Pamela Druckerman's "Bringing up Bebé". While Amy Chua extols the goodness and virtues of the Chinese style of upbringing, Druckerman swears by the French way of rising children. Both argue that their ways are the best. However, Amy Chua's book has been largely criticized for endorsing a highly authoritarian kind of parenting, something that 'shocks' the liberal Western world (Adams, 2013). So much so that Chua has to come out in defense of her parenting methods for those rising an uproar about it (Watch video – http://www.pbs.org/wnet/need-to-know/video/video-tiger-mom-amy-chua-responds-to-uproar/6395/). Neither are people sure they agree that American, or for that matter, any other country's parenting style is not as good as the French style (anon, 2012).

Just as buying lunch at McDonald's and clothes at Walmart no longer remain economic decisions, but have evolved into cultural decisions, driven more by status, trend and fashion than by the economics (Goodman via Ritzer, 2008), referring to parenting books and comparing one's own parenting style with the books and gloating over the milestones achieved (or fretting over those not achieved) have become more of an 'in-thing' today. If a child achieves the milestones before the time prescribed for it in the book, the child is brilliant. If it does on time, then it is a normal child. And, if, god forbid, the child arrives late at the milestone, the parent worries herself or himself thin and runs from frantically searches solutions to bring the child up to speed, probably in another parenting book.

This makes one wonder, do people give a thought to the impact this kind of consumerism of parenting can have on the upbringing of the child? By providing a child instructions contradicting to those of its natural tendency and the cultural setting around it, are the parents not stirring up an inherent conflict withing her? Everyone agrees that every child is unique, and if that is the case, the parenting techniques that will work for one child might not necessarily work for another. Hence trying to come up with a unified theory of parenting and trying to fit every parent and child across the world into that theory will be nothing but a facade for consumerism – for the authors and the publishers to gain from its ready consumption. For the global culture that is promoted in these parenting books, is nothing but a consumer culture (Goodman via Ritzer, 2008).

References

Douglas J. Goodman via Ritzer G, 2008. Globalization and Consumer Culture. The Blackwell Companion to Globalization. Published by - John Wiley & Sons

Susan Adams, 2013. Tiger Moms Don't Raise Superior Kids, Says New Study. Forbes. Online. Retrieved on: 08/06/2013. URL: http://www.forbes.com/sites/susanadams/2013/05/08/tiger-moms-dont-raise-superior-kids-says-new-study/

anon. 2012. The globalization of parenting. Online. Retrieved on: 08/06/2013. URL: http://fashion-for-the-rest-of-us.blogspot.in/2012/02/globalization-of-parenting.html