Lawrence Stone, in The Family, Sex, and Marriage in England, 1500-1800, argues that the causes of radical changes in the home and in relations between men and women in England during those three centuries were manifold. Stone also argues that while some of the transformations were negative, most were positive and were precursors of elements which exist in free societies today. These conclusions on the part of Stone stand in stark contrast to the ideas of Friedrich Engels. In The Condition of the Working Class in England, Engels argues that the changes were almost wholly negative, and that the cause was singular---the dehumanizing, exploitive and alienating impact of capitalism in its early stages.
In terms of accuracy, Stone's thesis is more convincing than Engels', for the wide variety and dramatic nature of the changes in the family and marriage in the three centuries simply cannot be attributed to one cause, no matter how powerful that cause. Engels simply has adopted, for ideological purposes, far too narrow a perspective to explain these radical social transformations.
On the other hand, Engels shows a humane concern for the lower classes, the workers and the women who even Stone would allow were those least likely to benefit from the liberalization of social standards.
Stone compares his effort to those of Max Weber and Jacob Burckhardt, who he says, like himself, "were obsessed with the complex interrelationships thanks to which changes in culture emerged from changes in religion, social structure, political organization, economics, literacy and so on" (Stone, 199, p. 22). Stone establishes the modern relevance of his study when he argues effectively that
The four key features of the modern family---intensified affective bonding of the nuclear core at the expense of neighbors and kin; a strong sense of individual autonomy and the right to personal freedom in the pursuit of happiness; a weakening of the asso...