Title: Marriage and Domestic Partnership (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
Headings: Marriage and Domestic Partnership
Marriage and Domestic Partnership
1. Defining Marriage
2. Understanding Marriage: Historical Orientation
3. Marriage and Morals
3.1 Contractual Views
3.2 Institutional Views
3.2.1 New Natural Law: Marriage as Procreative Union
3.2.2 Marriage as Protecting Love
4. The Politics of Marriage
4.1 Marriage and Legal Contract
4.2 The Rationale of Marriage Law
4.3 Same-Sex Marriage
4.4 Arguments for Marriage Reform
5. Marriage and Oppression
5.1 Feminist Approaches
5.2 The Queer Critique
Bibliography
Contemporary Works
Historical Works
Academic Tools
Other Internet Resources
Acknowledgments

Content: Their works reflect evolving, and overlapping, ideas of marriage as an economic or procreative unit, a religious sacrament, a contractual association, and a relationship of mutual support. In his depiction of the ideal state, Plato (427–347 BCE) described a form of marriage contrasting greatly with actual marriage practices of his time. He argued that, just as male and female watchdogs perform the same duties, men and women should work together, and, among Guardians, ‘wives and children [should be held] in common’ ( The Republic, ca. 375–370 BCE, 423e–424a). To orchestrate eugenic breeding, temporary marriages would be made at festivals, where matches, apparently chosen by lot, would be secretly arranged by the Rulers. Resulting offspring would be taken from biological parents and reared anonymously in nurseries. Plato's reason for this radical restructuring of marriage was to extend family sympathies from the nuclear family to the state itself: the abolition of the private family was intended to discourage private interests at odds with the common good and the strength of the state ( ibid ., 449a-466d; in Plato's Laws, ca.