The dysfunctionalization of the Albanian family

2025-03-07 09:51:00, Opinione Besnik Bakiu

The dysfunctionalization of the Albanian family

Illustrative photo

A few days ago I read that cases of domestic violence have increased to worrying figures. 20,139 cases of this violence have been referred to the prosecutor's office.

The news has two sides to the coin, the first shows the awareness of society to denounce and the second, it is an alarm bell, where is the Albanian family going?

We still don't want to understand that the Albanian family is in depression, that the biggest social crisis our society is going through is the "defunctionalization of the family."

Official data shows that the family is shrinking and decreasing on the one hand and on the other hand it has shown a tendency to disintegrate. The number of people per family has dropped below 4 people, meaning couples are not even reproducing themselves.

Meanwhile, the dizzying increase in divorces with an annual double-digit growth rate often encourages conflicts and crimes in the family. These are not signs, they are evidence of the deep shake-up of social relations in Albanian society.

The family, which historically has constituted the basis of the unit in our country, often replacing society and the state itself, the family that should have been an example for society as a whole, has lost and is losing this role day by day, turning society into a conflict society. Today (unfortunately) we can say that the family was, but is no longer…

This depression has been knocking menacingly on the doors of Albanian society for some time, endangering its future, which found itself unprepared to face the consequences of the transition from a closed society to an open society, in this endless transition. It seems as if the shock therapy that the economy underwent was also suffered by the family.

Some social science researchers, psychologists and sociologists claim and try to justify this situation with the argument that these are not just Albanian phenomena, but worldwide, and are therefore issues of family modernization. Western society does indeed seem to have “killed the traditional family”, but it is organized in such a way that the individual is able to exist outside the family circle.

The progress made by Western society in terms of social security and social support for people aims to fill the void created by the family crisis: a person loses his family, but society finds it by creating certain conditions, not leaving him at the mercy of fate. Meanwhile, Albanian society is still far from creating such conditions, and this is the reason why the crisis of the Albanian family becomes even more acute.

The dysfunctionalization of the family has brought about the destruction of the most essential elements of human social life.

Today, the Albanian family suffers from: lack of education for freedom and responsibility (freedom without responsibility is anarchy), privatization of affective ties (work for me, don't interfere in my private life); distance from family (the vast majority of time is spent outside the family). Crime in the family has become a frightening phenomenon and this negatively affects not only the physical, psychological, economic and social integrity of the most vulnerable part of society (women, children and the elderly), but also the stability of the traditional family, since Albanian society does not yet have the right instruments to cope with the family crisis.

Official reports show that the phenomenon of domestic crime increases year after year. The man who kills his wife, the woman who kills her husband, the father who rapes his daughter, the brother who beats his sister, the child who kills his parents, the brother who kills his brother, parents who force their daughter into prostitution, the mother who abandons her baby, etc. If Thomas Hobbes were to examine our society, he would describe today's Albanian as an individual in a "state of nature", governed by instincts and not by the rules of living in society.

On the other hand, the indiscriminate and uncritical media coverage of such events further burdens our psyche and the atmosphere in the lives of ordinary citizens. Even without these events, they are traumatized and overwhelmed by the stresses of everyday life in order to cope with biological survival and are unable to cope with such an emotional burden.

Researchers list the causes of this phenomenon as the economic situation, jealousy, alcohol consumption, gambling, unemployment, low education, disputes over wealth and property, cohabitation after the dissolution of marriage, and inability to cope with living conditions. According to them, the state does not offer opportunities to prevent this crime, but on the contrary, has created excessive freedom even for “criminals”.

Some others abusively accuse the “Canon of the Mountains”. But if you read the Kanun of Lek Dukagjini carefully and positively, the opposite results. The Kanun (section 9: 19) sanctions that: “The family is a collection of members, who live under one roof, the purpose of which is to increase their number through marriage, to lead them to the development of their stature and to the development of their mind and intellect”;…. “The family is made up of the household; as these increase, they become brothers, brothers into clans, clans into tribes, tribes into flags and all together are summarized in a more open Family, which is called a Nation, and they have one homeland, one blood, one language, and one land”.

We can all list 1001 reasons, but the problem lies in answering the question: What should we do? Today, when we still have time to reflect on these problems and concerns, without letting them worsen and become incurable; we must urgently stop continuing like ostriches to hide from reality with pseudo-reasons, seeking the causes of evil far from us.

The first step must be to accept reality; that to date the Albanian state with all its political and social organizations have failed to curb the phenomenon of the "destruction" of the family. This would not only be the first step, but also a turning point, a movement that would ignite a glimmer of hope for curbing the destruction of the nucleus of Albanian society, the family.

The process of family recovery, and consequently that of Albanian society, is a process that runs parallel to other processes of economic, social and cultural development, legal and judicial development, and the fight against corruption, organized and ordinary crime.

The state and government have a duty to ensure the creation and implementation of concrete, long-term projects that include the most vulnerable segments of society, for employment, education, housing, and their integration into society.

Of course, the perfect family does not exist and should not be sought, but the real family, the functional family, does. To have this family, we must fight the causes that put it at risk: ignorance, poverty, injustice, insecurity, the loss of social morality and sensitivity and respect for family members. The best way to predict the future is to start creating it.

My friends, we must all work to raise awareness among the population. In conclusion, I would like to remind everyone of the words of Pope Francis (may God grant him long life): “Let us take care. Let us take care of many things… But especially, take care of the family! The family is a treasure, children are a treasure. Play with children: it is so beautiful.

This means planting the seeds of the future. This is so that the family, from a factor of despair, can be transformed into a factor of hope. This is so that we experience the value of having a family. May God help us!/ CNA