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Same-Sex Marriage, Civil Partnerships and Stigma: Coming in from the Cold?

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Same-Sex Marriage, Civil Partnerships and Stigma: Coming in from the Cold? Same-Sex Marriage, Civil Partnerships and Stigma: Coming in from the Cold? Michael Thomas School of Social Sciences Cardiff University This thesis is submitted in fulfilment of the degree Doctor of Philosophy December, 2012. i ii Abstract Since the late 1980s, an increasing number of governments have extended varying forms of legal recognition to lesbian and gay couples. This thesis presents a cross-national, comparative study, focusing on civil partnerships in the UK and same-sex marriage in Canada and the US State of California. The study investigates the impact of these forms of recognition from the perspectives of lesbian and gay couples and, in particular, addresses the social implications of couples’ new legal status. Drawing on Erving Goffman’s Stigma as a theoretical basis for the research, the study considers the extent to which wider policy objectives for legal recognition in terms of reducing discrimination and raising the profile of lesbian and gay couples have been achieved. This analysis is based on a detailed investigation of couples’ assessments of the impact of marriage or civil partnership within their personal social networks and more widely. The study also explores the fallout from the 2008 Proposition 8 referendum in California, which repealed same- sex marriage there. Drawing on qualitative data, gathered from in-depth interviews with married or civil partner same-sex couples in the UK, Canada and California, the study analyses couples’ narratives around legal recognition to identify the meanings that they attach to their new legal status. The research concludes that couples broadly welcomed the legal rights and entitlements that flowed from marriage or civil partnership, and often saw marriage or civil partnership as providing opportunities to seek recognition from within their social networks. However, legal recognition did not in itself guarantee social recognition, indicating a significant gap between policy ambitions and effects. iii Acknowledgements A number of people have made an important contribution to this thesis. I am particularly grateful to my supervisors Amanda Coffey and Matt Williams for their unfailing insight, enthusiasm and good humour over the past four years. I will miss the challenging and stimulating conversations we have had throughout my time at Cardiff. I am also indebted to Ralph Fevre as my progress reviewer for his constructive comments on draft chapters of this thesis. My postgraduate colleagues within the School of Social Sciences and elsewhere also deserve thanks for their support and for making the process of getting from a research proposal to a completed thesis much more pleasurable than it might otherwise have been. I acknowledge the contribution of the Economic and Social Research Council in funding my doctoral research and the Masters in Social Science Research Methods. I should also thank Dr. Mary Pat Sullivan at the School of Health Sciences and Social Care at Brunel University, for encouraging me to pursue PhD study at the end of my social work training. Most of all, I owe a debt of gratitude to the couples in the UK, Canada and California who agreed to take part in this research study. Their inspiring and moving stories of their own experience of marriage or civil partnership provide the backbone of this thesis. On a personal level, I would like to thank my mum and Tina for putting up with me being around the house in Cardiff a lot more than usual. I’m also grateful to Naaz Rashid for her sense of proportion as we went through the PhD process together. And unending thanks to Hugh for putting up with hearing more about this thesis than he ever imagined possible and for his unstinting support throughout the highs and lows of the last four years. And for feeding the cats when I was away, or too preoccupied to notice they were hungry. iv CONTENTS Prologue: Cardiff, 1980 vi Introduction: research questions and structure of the thesis 1 1. Building a context for legal recognition for same-sex couples the UK, 6 Canada and California 2. Reading marriage, homosexuality and same-sex couple relationships 33 3. Erving Goffman’s Stigma as an evaluative framework for marriage 53 and civil partnership 4. Methodological considerations: theory and practice 73 5. For the first thirty-two years of my life I was a criminal: 100 The impact of recognition on same-sex couple relationships 6. You get two hundred people to come out, just for two queers : 126 The impact of recognition within couples’ social networks 7. We’re treated that way now: 158 The impact of recognition beyond couples’ social networks 8. I don’t think I’m being paranoid, but they ARE out to get me : 181 The Proposition 8 referendum in California as an exercise in re-stigmatising lesbian and gay couples 9. Conclusion: evaluating civil partnerships in the UK and same-sex 205 marriage in Canada and California Epilogue: Toronto, 2010 224 Annexes v Annex A: Topic guide for research interviews 225 Annex B: Information sheet for research participants 226 Annex C: Consent form 228 Annex D: Pen pictures of research participants 229 Annex E: Excerpt of transcribed data 234 References 235 vi Prologue It is 1980. I am sitting in a crowded bus, on my way to secondary school in Cardiff. I am eleven or twelve years old. I already know that I am gay. I have known this for a while, but as the bus approaches the school gates I experience a sudden realisation that I will never have a girlfriend, get married, settle down with a wife, or have children. I look around me, at my brother, sister, friends, the other children on the bus, and I understand that I am different from them. That I will have a different life to theirs, that I will have other goals. That I must find a way in life. And that I must keep this to myself. vii Introduction: research questions and structure of the thesis This doctoral thesis presents a cross-national comparative study of alternative forms of legal recognition for lesbian and gay couples, focusing on civil partnership in the UK and marriage in Canada and the US State of California. Legal recognition for same-sex couples has spread across the Western world and beyond since the late 1980s, and the thesis seeks to contribute to the growing body of sociological literature documenting the complexities and uncertainties that these reforms have set in train. Paradoxically, the spread of legal recognition for same-sex couples has revealed deep-seated opposition to LGBT rights claims. The dramatic reversal of marriage rights for lesbian and gay couples in California as a result of the Proposition 8 referendum in 2008 offers a particularly interesting case study, marking California out as the only jurisdiction in which existing marriage rights for same-sex couples have been withdrawn as the result of a popular vote. The political struggle around legal recognition for same-sex couples is perhaps most visible in the US, where the campaign for marriage equality continues to be fought state by state. There are, however, echoes of moralistic opposition to same-sex marriage in the UK, as revealed by recent government consultations on extending full marriage rights to lesbian and gay couples. Deep-seated opposition to same-sex marriage points to an intriguing gap between legal and social equality for lesbian and gay couples. A key objective of this thesis is to explore the gaps between high level policy objectives and what happens at the micro-social level when same-sex couples seek legal and social recognition. The thesis problematises policy discourses that claim legal recognition as the last word in LGB equality, and seeks to highlight the messiness and the complexity of couples’ lived experience of their new legal and social status. The thesis maintains a deliberate focus on the perspectives of gay and lesbian couples as a basis for understanding the impact of civil partnerships and same-sex marriage. 1 Marriage and civil partnership offer access to legal and social privileges, in clear contrast to the historical invisibility of same-sex couple relationships. This thesis acknowledges the potential for legal recognition to assert the value of lesbian and gay couple relationships and overcome the social stigma that has been attached to homosexuality and to these couple relationships. In this context, the work that couples perform in understanding, negotiating and asserting their new status is explored as a micro-social battleground between historical stigma and newfound recognition. The focus on the meanings that couples make around legal and social recognition means that the study is grounded within an interpretivist framework, and draws on qualitative research methods of data collection and analysis. In terms of evaluating same-sex marriage and civil partnership, this thesis considers the extent to which these policy innovations can be relied upon to eradicate or ameliorate as powerful and enduring a concept as stigma. Same-sex marriage and civil partnership provide opportunities for a focused and original interpretation of Erving Goffman’s Stigma (1963), not simply as a classic sociological text but also as providing a robust theoretical framework for a close evaluation of policy. Goffman’s compelling analysis of stigma as the denial of full social acceptance allows for a critical assessment of legal recognition, whether in terms of policy discourses framed around social justice, or as providing insights into the ways in which marriage and civil partnership are constantly negotiated, contested or accepted within lesbian and gay couples’ social networks. Marriage and civil partnership require lesbian and gay couples to claim legal and social privilege, not simply as a one-off process at the culmination of the wedding or civil partnership ceremony, but time and again in routine social interaction within their close personal networks and beyond.
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