Education, the Family and a Healthy Society, Part 2

 Eric Cochling, VP of Public Policy

This is the second in a two-part series lookingat the central role education plays in the formation of healthy families and, ultimately, the proper functioning of our society. The first installment may be found here.

Education, the Family, and a Healthy Society, Part 2: The Healthy Society

In the first part of this series, the connection was made between education, poverty, and family formation. The thrust of the argument there was that inadequate education leads to poverty which, in turn, makes it less likely that families will be formed or healthy enough to remain intact. This family breakdown leads to generational cycles of poverty and family breakdown that are extremely difficult to stop.

But in what ways does this affect the health of society?

Webster’s defines “society” as “an organized group of persons associated together for religious, benevolent, cultural, scientific, political, patriotic, or other purposes.”

The sociological evidence is clear that broken homes lead to myriad problems that undermine the health of society, including higher rates of mental illness, infant mortality, suicide, domestic violence, substance abuse, criminal and antisocial behavior. The cost to society of these outcomes, in terms of human suffering and financial loss, are tremendous.

But broken homes also lead to a much more systemic dysfunction that strikes at the very foundation of our form of government and our ability to remain a strong nation.

The Declaration of Independence says that our government is granted authority by the “consent of the governed,” meaning that citizens are “sovereign” (the ultimate source of authority for government). In order for “consent” to have real meaning, it must be both informed and sustained. An informed consent can only be granted by a person who understands the importance and implications of the thing consented to. A sustained consent can only be maintained by a person who is constantly engaged in monitoring the activities of government – and is prepared to withdraw his consent when government abuses its authority. This type of civic involvement requires a basic level of education and a considerable amount of time.

If the governed are uneducated, then they are severely handicapped in their role as citizen and sovereign authority. On the one hand, they will likely lack the knowledge to give an informed consent. On the other hand, they are more likely to be in poverty where they will spend most of their time trying to provide for their own basic needs (and those of their family – if it is still intact) and will have little time to monitor their government (sustained consent).

Taken together, the sociological and systemic problems created by family breakdown act as a kind of cancer on society – causing a generalized illness (crime, high infant mortality, etc.) while attacking the structural elements that make society possible in the first place. And, like cancer, these problems combined can turn malignant and spread – ultimately leading to the unraveling of society.

Nothing less than our future as a nation rests on our ability to promote and sustain healthy families. It is for this reason that education reformand education choice must be of the highest priority in our state (and nation). By receiving a quality education, individuals are most likely to stay out of poverty and form the healthy families that allow for the vigorous and ongoing civic involvement required to sustain a country.

As our state continues to struggle with what to do about the education “system,” it would be good to remember that education is not about a system. It is about educating people. And since our public system has consistently performed miserably in educating people, we must be willing to put all options on the table for doing the job.

For more information about the relationship between the health of the family and the health of society, see the following:

Institute for American Values, Why Marriage Matters, Second Edition, Twenty-Six Conclusions from the Social Sciences, 2005. Available at http://www.americanvalues.org.

Benjamin Scafidi, Taxpayer Costs of Divorce and Unwed Childbearing, First-Ever Estimates for the Nation and All Fifty States, 2008. Study published and commissioned by Georgia Family Council and Institute for American Values and available at http://www.georgiafamily.org/publication.aspx?a=476.

Eric Cochling is Vice President of Public Policy at the Center for an Educated Georgia. He can be contacted at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it