Home

Login

Contact us

Cette page existe uniquement en anglais

Home > Activities > Committees >Low Fertility (1999-2001) > Programme Outline

Proposed Activities of the Exploratory Mission on Low Fertility

Suitability and feasibility

Low fertility has emerged as a vital area of demographic concern. The topic is already on the programmes of most general conferences and papers on low fertility are appearing in all demographic journals. The topic has gained the attention of many governments around the world seeking policy approaches to low fertility. There seems little point in wasting too much time on debating whether or not this is an issue in which IUSSP should have an interest. It is clearly a topic which will be in the forefront of IUSSP interests for some time to come. International agencies, governments, the scientific community in general and the general PUBLIC will be expecting that IUSSP will have scientifically-based views about this issue.

Feasibility of a research programme on low fertility is ensured by several factors. First, it is an issue highly appropriate to be studied by population scientists so that a new research programme should receive enthusiastic support from the profession. Second, population scientists are well skilled to undertake this research. At the narrowest end, the technical demography of low fertility is one of the most important features of the issue. The issue cannot be addressed without an understanding of cross-sections and cohorts, of timing issues, of parity distributions, etc. Beyond this narrow understanding, however, population scientists have been researching behavioural changes in relation to fertility for a very long period of time. Third, this is becoming an issue with great PUBLIC interest and concern. Governments in some countries are looking for solutions and international agencies are also beginning to run conferences based around this issue. Thus, there is likely to be financial support, both national and international, for work in this field.

This will obviously be a research area which will extend beyond a 2 to 4 year period of study, but IUSSP needs to be leading the field.

The state of current knowledge

This is obviously a topic upon which opinions will vary, hence the need for better research. Demographers have been slow in taking up this area of research because there was an initial sense that the phenomenon was temporary, related to changes in the timing of births. That is, cross-sectional fertility was temporarily below the levels which would apply for any birth cohort of women. Rises in some countries in the late 1980s (Sweden, USA) fuelled this belief, although little good demographic research was carried out to prove this case one way or the other. Recent projections of cohort fertility have shown now that age cohorts will have fertility below replacement level, and often substantially below replacement level. Thus, the argument that low fertility is merely a matter of shifts in the timing of births no longer seems viable.

There was perhaps also a lack of a sense of urgency because current age structures in many countries are favourable to population growth for many years to come, even with low fertility. In already-crowded countries, low fertility can be seen as a good thing, at least for a time. In this regard, however, there has been a greater realisation of the force of low fertility. If fertility is around 1.2-1.5 children per woman, then populations begin to fall very rapidly, age structures become much older and a substantial momentum for population decline is set in place through the new age structure.

It is also evident that different countries have their own ways at arriving at low fertility. In Japan, for example, low fertility seems to be heavily related to a retreat from marriage and low rates of ex-nuptial fertility. Nearby, in Korea, low fertility is related to low fertility among married couples, again with little fertility outside marriage. In Southern Europe, low fertility seems to stem from extremely late marriage with little fertility outside marriage. In northern Europe, there is substantial fertility outside of marriage, but still there is low fertility. There are variations between countries in the parity distributions which are associated with low fertility – although common to most is an historically very low frequency of women having more than two children. It is clear that low fertility is not simply about some women having no children, but about many women having one or more less than they might otherwise have had.

There are strong indications that fertility preferences are below achieved fertility in most low fertility countries, that is, that large numbers of women are having fewer children than they would like to have, or than they would have liked to have had if asked when they were younger. Young women (under 25 years) still express fertility preferences which average above replacement level. Women in their early 30s, however, generally express much lower preferences than those aged 20-24 years and the projected completed fertility of women in their thirties tends to be lower than their fertility preferences.

We have only a poor understanding of the ‘causes’ of low fertility. At a session at the Population Association of America meeting in Chicago this year, low fertility was attributed to late marriage stemming from insecure economic conditions in Italy, to the costs of children’s high school education in Japan, and to rises in levels of women’s education in Canada. These are very different propositions. Low fertility has been associated with aspects of gender equity, and there are very broad indications that fertility tends to be higher where the transfer system is more favourable to having children (with notable exceptions).

Summary of major research gaps and issues

Below I have listed a number of research dimensions related to low fertility. They are by no means mutually exclusive, with obvious overlaps between different dimensions. The overall framework in relation to explanation of low fertility is one of the costs and benefits of children. Decisions about the marginal (or extra) child are made by individual women or couples in negotiation in an environment in which deliberate choice is paramount. These decisions are made in the light of perceived (rather than actual) costs and benefits to the individual or couple, but within a social and economic institutional context. The institutional context may add to or reduce the costs of children to the individual or can also be conceived as adding to or reducing the benefits of children, that is, if societal institutions ‘value’ children, their value to individuals will be greater.

The topics outlined below are not prioritised. All, in my view are important, although more work has been done on some than upon others. Any might be addressed by a scientific committee. In all instances, the cultural context needs to be kept in mind. These are not research topics which exist independently of particular social or cultural contexts.

Research topics

A review of theories of fertility transition and applicability of those theories to the contemporary low fertility situation.

Demographic implications of low fertility. Migration as a demographic alternative. The mathematics of stationary populations with below replacement fertility and positive migration. Simulations.

The demography of low fertility. Trends in different countries. Parity distribution changes. Timing changes (cohort v cross-section). Effects of marital status/relationship status. Similarities and differences across countries in the demography of low fertility.

Socio-economic differences in fertility within countries and the contributions of different socio-economic groups to changes in fertility over time. To what extent is low fertility due to shifts in the compositional characteristics of the population?

The private and PUBLIC costs and benefits of children. Is the couple (or household) an adequate unit to measure private costs and benefits or must we also measure separately the values and costs to the mother and the values and costs to the father? Negotiation about costs and benefits at the level of the couple. How can the value of children to parents be measured?

Measurement of the more subtle PUBLIC costs and benefits of children, that is, the implicit values or costs of children inherent in the structures of social institutions. Private versus PUBLIC responsibility for the costs of children. The children as social goods argument.

Fertility preferences of women and men and their meaning. Changes in preferences with age (panel studies). unfulfilled desires for children. Intensive studies of individual women and men and their preferences and histories (the emic perspective).

Timing of births. Does delay itself lead to lower numbers? Lower fecundity with increasing age. Lifestyle unsupportive of additional children with increasing age. Breakdown of relationship before child is born. Experience of economic insecurity before child is born. Experience of benefits of childfree lifestyle or child-few lifestyle.

Fertility control issues. We can stop them when we do not want them but cannot necessarily have them when we want them. Relations of low fertility to sexual behaviour.

Fertility and employment of women, or, looking to the future, parents. Gender roles. Supportive workplaces. Other social supports for working parents, PUBLIC or private. Forgone earnings revisited.

Changing nature of relationships. Difficulties in forming relationships. Incongruities in the seasons of commitment. Perceived and actual security of relationships. Decision making within the couple. Men’s attitudes to relationships and to family, including male commitment. Gender equity within relationships. Attitudes and values related to having children outside of an on-going relationship. Which types of relationship have higher levels of fertility?

Effects of community and family support networks upon fertility choices.

The economy and individuals. The impacts of economic insecurity and unemployment. Economic inequality and changing economic aspirations/materialism, that is, does increased inequality alter the aspirations of the lower end of the distribution to the extent that they reduce their fertility? Post-materialist motivations.

The size of the generation. Will future small generations be better off in economic terms and consequently have more children (the Easterlin hypothesis).

Financial markets distorting social/economic goals to those which are short-term only. Profit in the short term as a motivating principle. Impact of the tax-transfer system. Low tax - low redistribution regimes imply low support for families with children. Demise of horizontal equity in redistribution policy. You have them, you pay for them!

Effective policy approaches to promote fertility.

Peter McDonald