Overview Chapter 5: Determinants of family formation and childbearing during the societal transition in Central and Eastern Europe

Societal conditions for early and high rates of childbearing were replaced by conditions generating late and low levels of fertility common in Western countries. Central among factors shaping the latter behaviour (job insecurity, unstable partnership relationships, expensive housing, and profound changes in norms, values and attitudes) were the following: increasing proportions of young people were acquiring advanced education, a majority of women were gainfully employed, yet women were performing most household maintenance and childrearing duties. Two theories prevailed to explain what caused changes in family formation and fertility trends. One argues that the economic and social crises were the principal causes. The other considered the diffusion of western norms, values and attitudes as the prime factors of change. Neither reveals the root cause: the replacement of state socialist regimes with economic and political institutions of contemporary capitalism. The extraordinarily low period TFRs around 2000 were the result of low fertility of older women born around 1960 overlapping with low fertility of young women born during the 1970s.Central Europe, childbearing, Eastern Europe, family, fertility

Overview Chapter 3: Birth regulation in Europe

Early in the 21st century modern contraception -- primarily hormonal methods, advanced IUDs, sterilization and condoms -- has become the main instrument of birth regulation in Northern and Western Europe and gaining ground in Southern Europe and the formerly state socialist countries of Central and Eastern Europe. Legal induced abortion use, which was highly prevalent in Central and Eastern Europe, has been declining since the demise of authoritarian regimes around 1990. Nonetheless, abortions are still used in countries of the former Soviet Union and the Balkans, where the “abortion culture†had been deeply ingrained. Liberal abortion legislation, modern induced abortion technology, and modern contraceptives, have enhanced women’s health, been instrumental in childbearing postponement, have been a factor in changing partnership relations, and in the evolution of values regarding sexuality, reproduction, and childbearing, but they have not been a principal cause of contemporary low fertility. Assisted reproductive technology (ART) is emerging and having a slight positive impact on fertility in some countries.childbearing, contraception, Europe, fertility

Overview Chapter 1: Fertility in Europe

Early in the 21st century, three-quarters of Europe’s population lived in countries with fertility considerably below replacement. This general conclusion is arrived at irrespective of whether period or cohort fertility measures are used. In Western and Northern Europe, fertility quantum was slightly below replacement. In Southern, Central and Eastern Europe, fertility quantum as measured by the period total fertility rate (TFR) and its tempo-adjusted version was markedly below replacement; in many countries it was around 1.5, and in some populations it was as low as 1.3 to 1.4 births per woman. Throughout Europe, a historic transformation of childbearing patterns characterised by a pronounced delay of entry into parenthood has been taking place. This secular trend towards later childbearing has greatly contributed to the decline and fluctuations in period fertility rates. Delayed births were being recuperated, especially among childless women, but the extent of recuperation differs by country and region. All in all, despite a recent upward trend in the period TFR, European fertility early in the 21st century was at its lowest point since the Second World War.childbearing, Europe, fertility

Overview Chapter 2: Parity distribution and completed family size in Europe

By the end of the 20th century the two-child family became the norm throughout Europe. Between 40 and over 50 percent of women in the 1950s and 1960s cohorts had two children. There were some incipient signs that shares of two-child families were declining, especially in Central and Eastern and Southern Europe. An increase in childlessness among recent generations was an almost universal trend. The increase in proportions of one-child families was prominent in CEE and in SE. Wherever shares of childless women and of women with one child continue to grow, the obvious result will be entrenched below replacement fertility. Much depends on progression ratios to first and to second births. In CEE mainly the progression ratios to second births are declining. In the Nordic countries progression ratios to first and to second births were relatively stable and even more so in France. Altogether, most people opt for two children, very few for three or more, the frequency of the one-child family is increasing as are the proportions of people remaining childless. The latter trends were more pronounced in Southern, Central and Eastern Europe and not so much in Northern and Western countries.childbearing, Europe, family size, fertility, parity distribution

Cohort childbearing age patterns in low-fertility countries in the late 20th century: Is the postponement of births an inherent element?

Major changes in the age patterns of fertility were characteristic of fertility trends following the Second World War. The paper provides an overview and analysis of changes in age patterns of cohort childbearing in low-fertility countries during the second half of the 20 th century. In Western countries cohorts born around 1940 had earlier childbearing than those of 1930. Early childbearing persisted among cohorts born during the 1940s, although generally at a lower level. Major shifts occurred among the cohorts born during the 1950s. These women incurred considerable fertility deficits when young and compensated, at least in part if not totally, with surpluses when they reached their upper twenties and thirties. Many of the postponed births were made up. The decline in fertility among young women continues in the cohorts born during the 1960s and 1970s. In the formerly socialist countries the fertility decline among young women commenced with those born in the late 1950s and is continuing among those born in the 1960s and 1970s. In almost all low-fertility countries each cohort of young women born in the 1960s and 1970s is having fewer children than preceding ones. It appears unrealistic to expect that these cohorts will eventually attain replacement levels because of the considerable deficits incurred when young. Their fertility when older would have to be extraordinarily high even to realize completed fertility of the cohorts born around 1960, which on average was below replacement. A postponement of births regarded as temporary by the couples involved with many of the postponed births never being born, as well as conscious decisions to have fewer births than previous cohorts, appear to be continuing processes in most countries. (AUTHORS)

The Fertility Transition Revisited: A Cohort Perspective

This paper deals with the fertility transition, one of the two essential components of the demographic transition. The analysis demonstrates that by applying the cohort perspective new insights are obtained about how the fertility transition unfolded. Within the overall framework of the fertility transition there were four distinct pathways of fertility trends. Combining these findings with those of other scholars shows that the demographic transition has not yet led to an equilibrium of relatively stable low mortality and stable low fertility.The four fertility transition pathways are the following: (1) The Western fertility transition pathway characterized by major cohort total fertility rate (CTFR) fluctuations; (2) the South European fertility transition pathway characterized by an almost uninterrupted CTFR decline; (3) the Central and East European fertility transition pathway characterized by stable CTFRs in the 1920s to 1950s cohorts and a decline in the 1960s and 1970s cohorts; (4) the East and South-East Asia fertility transition pathway characterized by a late start in the mid-20th century with rapidly declining CTFRs.The exploration of societal conditions shaping fertility trends in the 19th and 20th centuries confirms Notestein’s conclusions that the causes are a complex combination of “technological, social, economic, and political developments” as well as cultural and ideational effects, and that it is “impossible to be precise about the various causal factors”. At times the primary factors were economic, as in the Great Depression of the 1930s and the 1960s post-war prosperity in Western countries. However, these economic factors also had many political, cultural, social, policy and other important facets. In Central and Eastern Europe the primary factors during the era of state socialism were the political system and social policies. The patriarchal nature of societies was the prime factor shaping fertility trends in Southern Europe and in East and South-East Asia

Cohort Reproductive Patterns in the Nordic Countries

Total fertility rates were declining from peaks experienced by early 1930s cohorts for 20 successive cohorts. The decline ceased among the 1950s and 1960s cohorts, because fertility deficits of young women were compensated with increased fertility when women reached their late twenties and thirties. The relative stability of completed fertility of these cohorts is attributed to Nordic social policies. Fertility deficits of young women in 1970s cohorts are comparatively large. For their completed fertility to be similar to that of earlier ones, there is considerably more catching up to do. What remains an open issue is whether social policies will be sufficiently effective for couples born in the late 1960s and the 1970s to have births not born earlier in their lives.age patterns of fertility, cohort, cohort fertility, low fertility of 1970s cohorts, Nordic countries, prospects for below-replacement fertility, Scandinavia

Online Appendix: Cohort total fertility rates, by populations and by regions

This online appendix contains data files for the article: Frejka, Tomas: The fertility transition revisited - a cohort perspective. in: CPoS, 42, 2017, pp. 89-116. http://dx.doi.org/10.12765/CPoS-2017-09e

First birth trends in developed countries

Levels and trends of various facets concerning first births are continuously changing. The evidence confirms that the postponement of first births is an ongoing and persisting process which started in western countries among cohorts of the 1940s, but only in the 1960s cohorts in Central and Eastern Europe. The mean age of women having first births is universally rising. Fertility of older women was increasing. The decline in childbearing of young women is robust among the cohorts of the late 1960s and the 1970s; in Southern Europe as well as in central and Eastern Europe the rates of decline have accelerated. Childbearing behavior in the formerly socialist countries is in transition to a different regime.changing age patterns, childlessness, cohort analysis, developed countries, first birth, postponement, transition to different age patterns in Central and Eastern Europe

First birth trends in developed countries: a cohort analysis

-cohort analysis, first birth