Belarusians choose traditional family

Happy together

Family, relations in it, people’s expectations of what it should be like — these are a social barometer of wellbeing. Especially under the circumstances when from abroad they try to convince us that having father and mother, marriage is optional too and every individual has a right to decide their gender on their own. However, as practice shows, Belarusians do not fall for provocations and show healthy conservatism. Alesya Solovey, a researcher at the National Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Sociology, spoke about traditional family values and explained their importance for society and state.

Life values

This year, NAS researchers conducted an annual republican social monitoring of public opinion on most relevant issues, including family values. The close attention to this subject is not random.

“Family is one of the most essential social institutions and has a number of vital functions for the full self-identification of the individual and the sustainable development of society: emotional, communicative, educational, regulatory, reproductive, economic, socialising, regenerative, social standing, spiritual and moral, relaxation and protective. The personality forms primarily through early socialisation: we learn the norms and rules of social behaviour, reinforce basic human values, assimilate the roles of men and women, build up the love for the Motherland and patriotism, inherit traditions and form professional preferences and life values. All things considered, I would generally say that this is a matter of national security, although that sounds a bit pompous,” Alesya Solovey emphasised.

According to the research data, Belarusians have more than healthy life values. The top three priorities are health, children and family.

Equal marriage

By definition, Belarusians are considered to be rather conservative and their centuries-old views on the roles of men and women are dominant. He is a provider, she takes care of children and runs the household. However, this stereotype does not reflect the reality in the long-changed society.

“The beliefs about gender roles common to the generation of our grandmothers and great-grandmothers, of course, have not vanished. As a matter of fact, they correctly reflect the needs that nature itself has instilled in us. However, as the living conditions change, people's needs also transform. In Belarus, a unique situation is observed, as the public consciousness of citizens retains both traditional views on women's and men's roles and egalitarian ones — implying equal participation of spouses in the family life,” the researcher explained.

According to the data of the republican social monitoring of 2024, 48.9 percent of the respondents (55.6 percent of men and 44.1 percent of women) indicated that the head of their family is mainly the husband. Moreover, 13.9 percent of the respondents identified the wife as the head of the family. Other respondents (37.2 percent) chose the option stating that both spouses equally head the family. When asked about material support, 48.3 percent of the respondents said that both husband and wife earn money. At the same time, 44.3 percent of the respondents indicated that the husband is mainly responsible for earning money. In fact, both husband and wife manage the family budget equally in 63.5 percent of the Belarusian families.

Household matters

As coined by Vladimir Mayakovsky [a prominent Russian poet] and later passed into popular wisdom — ‘love’s boats smash against the daily grind’. Considering this, the question of who will take the rubbish out becomes a serious one.

“Despite numerous jokes on this topic, it turned out that Belarusians deal with housework quite democratically. Almost half of the respondents (49.4 percent) indicated that both spouses do it,” Alesya Solovey stated.

At the same time, Belarus maintains the traditional gender role of woman, typically responsible for household — 73.8 percent of respondents indicated that the wife provides home cosiness and comfort in their family. The situation with parental leave is quite similar. Despite the fact that now a father can also sit with children, the overwhelming majority of the Belarusians (94 percent) indicated that in their family the wife takes or once has taken a maternity leave. However, more than half of the Belarusians (62.5 percent) indicated that both husband and wife are equally engaged in the upbringing of children, and 59.7 percent indicated that they equally organise family leisure time.

Women’s question

Today, women are full-fledged participants in the labour market, but the question of how to find a balance between professional and personal responsibilities remains relevant.

“I’m glad that men are increasingly helping women deal with the problem of ‘double burden’ [paid job and housework]. This contributes to equalising the social and economic opportunities of men and women, rationally combining parental and professional responsibilities and, most importantly, creating favourable conditions for new family addition,” Alesya Solovey said.

Besides, researching the actual distribution of roles in Belarusian families facilitates the implementation of Belarus’ 2021-2025 National Gender Equality Action Plan.

The young choose equal rights

The fact that the gender equality ideas are increasingly taking root in the public consciousness of Belarusians is confirmed by the data of the republican monitoring of 2024. In particular, 56.4 percent of young respondents under the age of 30 disagree with the statement that career and professional development is more important for men than for women.

“Modern youth have quite naturally accepted the idea of gender equality, and stereotypes hardly have any influence on them. Objective data also confirms the fact that career and professional development in Belarus does not depend on gender. For instance, the share of women in science in the whole country is 38.9 percent, while in NAS the share is even higher — 49.6 percent. As for other scientific fields: medicine has the greatest number of women scientists — 66.3 percent, followed by agricultural science — 61.8 percent, humanities — 59.9 percent, social and economic sciences — 59.7 percent, and the least number of women scientists (27.7 percent) is in technical sciences. However, it seems to me that this gap will be gradually bridged,” Alesya Solovey noted.

FYI

There are 4.93 million women in Belarus — 53.8 percent of the country's population. Every second of working females holds a managerial position, and 43.4 percent of female bosses have underage children. According to the data of the republican monitoring, 58.4 percent of young Belarusians disagree with the statement that women should always choose between career and family.