Families – Beyond the Nuclear Ideal

Daniela Cutas is Research Fellow in Practical Philosophy at the Department of Health, Ethics and Society, Maastricht University, the Netherlands, as well as at the Department of Philosophy, Linguistics and Theory of Science, Gothenburg University, Sweden.Sarah Chan Research Fellow in Bioethics and Law, and Deputy Director of the Institute for Science, Ethics and Innovation, University of Manchester, UK.

• Chapter 1: Daniela Cutas and Sarah Chan, Introduction: Perspectives on Private and Family LifeChapter 2: Julie McCandless, The Role of Sexual Partnership in UK Family Law: the Case of Legal ParenthoodChapter 3: Mianna Lotz, The Two-Parent Limitation in ART Parentage Law: Old Fashioned Law for New-Fashioned FamiliesChapter 4: Christian Munthe and Thomas Hartvigsson, The Best Interest of Children and the Basis of Family Policy: The Issue of Reproductive Caring UnitsChapter 5: Joanna Scheib and Paul Hastings, Donor-conceived Children Raised by Lesbian Couples: Socialization and Development in a New Form of Planned FamilyChapter 6: David Gurnham, Donor-conception as a 'Dangerous Supplement' to the Nuclear Family: What can we learn from parents' stories?Chapter 7: Susanna Graham, Choosing Single Motherhood? Single Women Negotiating the Nuclear Family IdealChapter 8: Mary Shanley and Sujatha Jesudason, Surrogacy:Reinscribing or Pluralizing Understandings of Family?Chapter 9: Adrienne Asch, Licensing Parents: Regulating Assisted ReproductionChapter 10: Simon Cabulea May, Liberal Feminism and the Ethics of PolygamyChapter 11: Maura Irene Strassberg, Distinguishing Polygamy and Polyamory Under the Criminal LawChapter 12: Dossie Easton, Sex and Relationships: reflections on living outside the boxChapter 13: Kerry Lynn Macintosh, Human Cloning and the Family in the New MilleniumChapter 14: Melinda Roberts, Moral and Legal Constraints on Human Reproductive Cloning

Families: Beyond the nuclear ideal discusses various 'alternative' family forms in Western societies...the coverage of the book is impressive – it encompasses families with more than two parents, families with children conceived through donor insemination and surrogacy, families with lesbian and single heterosexual mothers, polygamous and polyamorous families, and families that may emerge in the future as a result of human cloning...the publication will certainly be useful to those readers who would like to expand their 'everyday' understanding of 'non-traditional families by looking at what ethics, philosophy and law have to say about them.