Democracy and Social Ethics · Chapter
Household Adjustment explained
This chapter examines the ethical and social tensions inherent in domestic service, focusing on how the isolation of household employees from their families and communities reflects a narrow, undemocratic code of family ethics.
What happens
This chapter examines the ethical and social tensions inherent in domestic service, focusing on how the isolation of household employees from their families and communities reflects a narrow, undemocratic code of family ethics. It contrasts the devotion of young women to their families with the employer's insistence on preserving her own family life intact, which denies servants similar social ties. The chapter argues that this isolation leads to moral and psychological harm, as evidenced by statistics on illegitimate births among household workers and the loss of natural voice and demeanor. It critiques the belated economic and ethical conditions of domestic labor, advocating for a shift toward more democratic, associated efforts that align with modern industrial relations.
Themes in this chapter
Family Obligation vs. Social Claim
The chapter highlights the conflict between the household employee's devotion to her own family and the employer's demand for exclusive service, illustrating the ethical tension between private family duties and broader social responsibilities.
Democracy and Social Equality
The text critiques the undemocratic nature of domestic service, where the value of family life is unequally distributed, and calls for a more democratic adjustment that recognizes the dignity and social needs of all workers.
Gender Roles and Women's Work
Examines the specific challenges faced by women in domestic labor, including isolation, lack of social ties, and the moral double standards that arise from gendered expectations of family devotion.
Characters to notice
- King Lear
Referenced indirectly through the concept of 'unconscious slavery' and the revolt against it, drawing a parallel to Lear's tragic isolation and loss of dignity.
- Cordelia
Mentioned in the context of family devotion and the sacrifice of personal ties, echoing Cordelia's loyalty and the tension between individual morality and social claims.
- St. Francis
Invoked as a symbol of selfless service and the ideal of personal ministration to the needy, contrasting with the exploitative nature of household labor.
Key passages
“The employer of household labor, in her zeal to preserve her own family life intact and free from intrusion, acts inconsistently and grants to her cook, for instance, but once or twice a week, such opportunity for untrammelled association with her relatives as the employer’s family claims constantly.”
The housewife, eager to protect her own family's privacy, allows her cook only one or two evenings a week to freely visit her own relatives, even though the employer herself enjoys such family time every day.
Illustrates the unequal distribution of family life and the ethical inconsistency in domestic service.
“This in itself is undemocratic, in that it makes a distinction between the value of family life for one set of people as over against another; or, rather, claims that one set of people are of so much less importance than another, that a valuable side of life pertaining to them should be sacrificed for the other.”
This practice is fundamentally undemocratic because it values the family life of the employer above that of the employee, demanding that the servant sacrifice a crucial part of her own life for the sake of her mistress's convenience.
Highlights the core democratic critique of domestic labor's ethical framework.
“The writer has known the voice of a girl to change so much during three weeks of 'service' that she could not recognize it when the girl returned to her home. It alternated between the high falsetto in which a shy child 'speaks a piece' and the husky gulp with which the globus hystericus is swallowed.”
The author observed a young woman whose voice transformed dramatically after just three weeks of domestic work—shifting from a nervous, childlike pitch to a strained, choked sound—so much so that her own family could barely recognize her.
Demonstrates the psychological and physical toll of isolation and social maladjustment in household employment.
