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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.

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.

Over the past half century substantial changes in reproductive behavior have occurred throughout the developing world, with the total fertility rate declining by 56 percent—from 6.0 to 2.7 births per woman between 1960 and 2010 (United Nations 2015). Declines have been especially rapid in Asia and Latin America over this period, but in sub-Saharan Africa (“Africa”) the fertility transition occurred later and is proceeding at a slower pace. As a result of high African fertility and declining mortality, the population of this region is now growing at a faster rate (2.5 percent per year) than other regions of the developing world. The UN projects the sub-Saharan population to grow from 0.8 billion in 2010 to 3.9 billion in 2100 (ibid.) Such an unprecedented expansion of human numbers will create a range of social, economic, and environmental challenges and make it more difficult for the continent to raise living standards. Not surprisingly, interest in and concerns about the adverse consequences of demographic trends in Africa have reached high levels among policymakers and researchers.

The last four decades have witnessed large declines in fertility globally. This study uses data from 78 low- and middle-income countries to examine concurrent trends in unwanted fertility. Three measures of unwanted fertility are contrasted: the conventional unwanted total fertility rate, a proposed conditional unwanted fertility rate, and the percentage of births unwanted. Incidence of unwanted births and prevalence of exposure to unwanted births are both derived from answers to questions on prospective fertility preference, recognized as the most valid and reliable survey measure of preferences. Country-level trends are modeled both historically and with the decline in total fertility, with a focus on regional differentials. Results show that unwanted fertility rates—especially the conditional unwanted fertility rate—have declined substantially in recent decades. By contrast, the percentage of births unwanted has declined less, remaining stable or even increasing: from a birth cohort perspective, declines in unwanted fertility have been far more modest than the increased parental success in avoiding unwanted births. The regional patterns suggest that sub-Saharan Africa has several similarities with other major regions but also some peculiar features, including a recent stall in the decline of unwanted fertility that persists after controlling for the stage of fertility transition.

This study applies survival analysis to the birth histories from 317 national surveys to model pathways to low fertility in 83 less-developed countries between 1965 and 2014. It presents period measures of parity progression, the length of birth intervals and total fertility that have been standardized fully for age, parity, and interval duration. It also examines parity-specific trends in the proportion of women who want no more children. Outside sub-Saharan Africa, fertility transition was dominated by parityspecific family size limitation. As the transition progressed, women also began to postpone their next birth for lengthy periods in many countries. During the first half of the fertility transition in much of sub-Saharan Africa and in some other countries, however, women stopped childbearing without targeting particular family sizes. Moreover, birth intervals in sub-Saharan Africa have been lengthening since the onset of the transition. Birth control is not restricted to a dichotomy between limitation and spacing. Other reasons for curtailing childbearing and postponing having another birth also shape countries’ pathways through fertility transition.

Over the last 40 years, the question of the “African exception” has regularly come to the forefront in the discussion of fertility trends. In the 1980s, there was uncertainty about when fertility decline would commence throughout the region: while fertility was declining at a steady pace in Latin America and Asia, decline was evident in only a minority of sub-Saharan countries and, indeed, some countries showed fertility increase. As of the 1990s there was evidence of fertility decline in most countries of sub-Saharan Africa, and it appeared that sub-Saharan Africa was following the historical pattern of the other major regions. With a slow pace of fertility decline, or even stagnation at relatively high levels in various countries (Bongaarts 2008), the question of Africa’s exceptionality has resurfaced. The fertility level in sub-Saharan Africa is the world’s highest (5.1 children per woman versus 2.2 in Latin America and Asia in 2010–15; United Nations 2015a) (see Table 1). Compared with the experience of other world regions, sub-Saharan Africa stands apart not only in terms of fertility levels, but also with regard to a flatter age pattern due to longer birth intervals, the persistence of high ideal family size, and a low level of contraceptive use (Bongaarts and Casterline 2013). Sub-Saharan Africa also deviates from standard international patterns in terms of nuptiality. The traditional nuptiality regime has been defined by a particular combination of features, both for first marriage (early marriage for girls, a large age gap between spouses, almost universal marriage for both sexes) and for later conjugal life (polygamy, prompt and widespread remarriage for widowed and divorced women of childbearing age) (Lesthaeghe et al. 1989; United Nations 1988, 1990; van de Walle 1968).

Education is an important determinant of reproductive preferences. However, few studies have explored the evolution of its role in countries with different levels of fertility transition, due to the lack of adequate data. In this paper, we analyze the role of education as a determinant of fertility preferences in Mexico, a country which is rapidly approaching the end of fertility transition, albeit with substantial differences between different areas of the country. Using survey data, we contrast the results with evidence from a very low fertility country, Italy. The results indicate a persistent negative correlation between fertility preferences and educational levels in Mexico. However, a more detailed analysis at the territorial level reveals that in the most developed regions—such as Mexico City—the relationship is going into reverse, with more educated women showing a greater willingness to having another child, similarly to Italy, where higher levels of education have a positive effect on fertility intentions. La educación es un determinante importante de las preferencias reproductivas, pero la evolución de su papel en los países con diferentes niveles de transición de la fecundidad ha sido poco investigada, en gran medida debido a la falta de datos adecuados. Este documento analiza el papel de la educación como determinante de las preferencias de fecundidad en México, un país que se acerca rápidamente al final de la transición de la fecundidad, aunque con diferencias territoriales sustanciales. Esta información se contrasta con la evidencia de una nación con muy baja fecundidad, Italia, utilizando en ambos casos datos de encuestas. Los resultados indican que existe una relación negativa persistente en México entre las preferencias de fecundidad y el nivel educativo. Sin embargo, un análisis más refinado por áreas territoriales revela que, en las regiones más desarrolladas –como la Ciudad de México–, la relación se está revirtiendo, mostrando que, entre las mujeres con mayor nivel educativo, hay una actitud favorable a tener un hijo más, similar a la observada en Italia, donde el efecto de una mayor educación en las intenciones de fecundidad es positivo.

Can the names parents gave their children give us insights into how parents in historical times planned their families? In this study, we explore whether the names given to the firstborn child can be used as indicators of family-size preferences and, if so, what this reveals about the emergence of intentional family planning over the course of the demographic transition. We analyze historical populations from 1850 to 1940 in the United States, where early fertility control and large sample sizes allow separate analyses of the White and Black populations. We also analyze Norway from 1800 to 1910, where there was a much later fertility transition. A split-sample method allows automated scoring of each name in terms of predicted family size. We find a strong relationship between naming and family size in the U.S. White population as early as 1850, for the Black population beginning in 1940, and for the Norwegian population in 1910. These results provide new evidence of the emergence of “conscious calculation” during the fertility transition. Our methods may also be applicable to modern high-fertility populations in the midst of fertility decline.

This research examines the demand for children in sub-Saharan Africa and how this demand bears on prospects for fertility decline. Fertility levels on average are high in the region. At issue is whether, and how, fertility decline will occur in the near or medium term. In sub-Saharan Africa fertility desires too are generally high, as we have documented elsewhere (Bongaarts and Casterline 2013; Casterline and Agyei-Mensah 2014). The backdrop for this research, then, is high fertility evidently sustained by high demand for children. We confine our analysis to the quantity of children, setting aside desires to space births. Caldwell et al. (Caldwell, Orubuloye, and Caldwell 1992; Caldwell and Caldwell 2002) stress the prominence of birth spacing in sub-Saharan African reproductive regimes, inferring from this that increased birth spacing will play a larger role in African fertility declines than has been the case in other regions. More recently, on the basis of analysis of Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) data Moultrie, Sayi, and Timæus (2012) conclude that “birth postponement” has made a large contribution to African fertility declines to date. Consistent with this argument, Casterline and Odden (2016) document that inter-birth intervals have lengthened during the early stages of fertility decline in Africa. By no means do we seek to dismiss the importance of birth spacing in African reproductive regimes. Rather, to set some reasonable bounds on the present research, our attention is limited to the desired quantity of children, as revealed by survey data on the ideal number of children and the parity-specific preference to have no more children. While it may be the case that intentional birth spacing reduces fertility to a greater extent in Africa societies than in other regions, it is highly unlikely that fertility in African societies will fall below four births per woman, not to mention falling to replacement level, unless most women have just a few children. And this in turn seems very unlikely in the absence of widespread deliberate effort to limit the number of children.

A growing body of research has argued that the traditional categories of stopping and spacing are insufficient to understand why individuals want to control fertility. In a series of articles, Timæus, Moultrie, and colleagues defined a third type of fertility motivation—postponement—that reflects a desire to avoid childbearing in the short term without clear goals for long-term fertility. Although postponement is fundamentally a description of fertility desires, existing quantitative research has primarily studied fertility behavior in an effort to find evidence for the model. In this study, we use longitudinal survey data to consider whether postponement can be identified in standard measures of fertility desires among reproductive-age women in rural Mozambique. Findings show strong evidence for a postponement mindset in this population, but postponement coexists with stopping and spacing goals. We reflect on the difference between birth spacing and postponement and consider whether and how postponement is a distinctive sub-Saharan phenomenon.