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Panama SOCIAL ORGANIZATION
Family and Kin
In the late 1980s, family and kin continued to play a central
role in the social lives of most Panamanians. An individual without
kin to turn to for protection and aid was in a precarious position.
Loyalty to one's kin was an ingrained value, and family ties were
considered one's surest defense against a hostile and uncertain
world. This loyalty often outweighed that given to a spouse;
indeed, a man frequently gave priority to his responsibility to his
parents or siblings over that extended to his wife.
Co-resident parents, children, and others living with them
constituted the basic unit of kinship. Family members relied upon
each other for assistance in major undertakings throughout life.
Extended kin were important as well. Grandparents, uncles, aunts,
and cousins faithfully gathered to mark birthdays and holidays
together. Married children visited their parents frequently--even
daily. In some small remote villages and in some classes (such as
the elite), generations of intermarriage created a high measure of
interrelatedness, and almost everyone could trace a kinship link
with everyone else. Co-residence, nonetheless, remained the basis
for the most enduring ties an individual formed.
A significant portion of all marriage unions were consensual
rather than contractual. A formal marriage ceremony often
represented the culmination of a life together for many mestizo and
Antillean couples. It served as a mark of economic success. Grown
children sometimes promoted their parents' formal marriage.
Alternatively, a priest might encourage it for an elderly sick
person, as a prerequisite for receiving the rite of the anointing
of the sick.
The stability of consensual marriages varied considerably. In
rural areas where campesinos' livelihood was reasonably secure and
population relatively stable, social controls bolstered informal
unions. Mestizos themselves made no distinction between the
obligations and duties of couples in a consensual or a legal
marriage. Children suffered little social stigma if their parents
were not legally married. If the union was unstable and there were
children, the paternal grandparents sometimes took in both mother
and children. Or, a woman might return to her mother's or her
parents' household, leaving behind her children so that she could
work. Nevertheless, there were a significant number of femaleheaded families, particularly in cities and among the poorest
segment of the population.
Formally constituted legal marriage was the rule among the more
prosperous campesinos, cattle ranchers, the urban middle class, and
the elite. Marriage played a significant role for the elite in
defining and maintaining the family's status. A concern for
genealogy, imputed racial purity, and wealth were major
considerations. Repeated intermarriage made the older elite
families into a broadly interrelated web of kin. As one upper-class
wife noted, ". . . no member of my family marries anyone
whose greatgrandparents were unknown to us."
Men were expected to be sexually active outside of marriage.
Keeping a mistress was acceptable in virtually every class. Among
the wealthier classes, a man's relationship with his mistress could
take on a quasi-formal, permanent quality. An elite male could
entertain his mistress on all but the most formal social occasions,
and he could expect to receive friends at the apartment he had
provided for her. Furthermore, he would recognize and support the
children she bore him.
The ideal focus for a woman, by contrast, was home, family, and
children. Children were a woman's main goal and consolation in
life. The tie between mother and child was virtually sacrosanct,
and filial love and respect deeply held duties. Whatever her
husband's extramarital activities, a woman's fidelity had to be
above reproach. An elite or middle-class woman derived considerable
solace from her status as a man's legal wife. Nevertheless, middleclass and more educated women often found their traditional role
and the division of labor irksome, and were particularly offended
by the diversion of family funds into their husbands' pursuit of
pleasure.
Campesinos, too, divided social life into its properly male and
female spheres: "The man is in the fields, the woman is in the
home." As a corollary, men were "of the street" and able to visit
at will. Women who circulated too freely were likened to
prostitutes; men who performed female tasks were thought to be
dominated by their wives.
Childrearing practices reinforced the traditional male and
female roles and values to a greater or lesser degree among all
classes. Boys were permitted considerably more latitude and freedom
than girls. Girls were typically tightly supervised, their
companions screened, and their activities monitored.
Because children were deeply desired, their birth was
celebrated, and a baptism was a major family event. The selection
of godparents (padrinos) was an important step that could
have a pronounced influence on the child's welfare and future. It
resulted in a quasi-kinship relationship that carried with it
moral, ceremonial, and religious significance, and broadened family
ties of trust, loyalty, and support.
Parents tried to choose for their children godparents whom they
respected, and trusted, and who were as high on the social scale as
possible. A certain degree of formality and ceremony was expected
of godparents in social interaction, but the bonds primarily
involved protective responsibility and a willingness to render
assistance in adversity.
Campesinos followed two distinct patterns in choosing
godparents. The parents might choose a person of wealth, power, or
prestige, thereby gaining an influential protector. Such a contact
could give a parent the confidence to launch a child into an alien
outside world, in which he or she might have little personal status
or experience. By contrast, among some campesinos there was strong
informal pressure in the opposite direction. They believed it was
inappropriate to ask someone of higher economic status to act as a
godparent, so they sought out instead a relative or friend,
especially one who lived in the same area. The choice here tended
to reinforce existing social ties and loyalties.
Data as of December 1987
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