Au carrefour des transitions : fécondité, niveau de vie et culture populaire

Abstract

Since the last decade several papers have tried to give a broad picture of the demographic transition process. All of them show a macro-demographic point of view which is very useful to establish the facts and to explore the basic mecanisms. Now micro-demographic analyses at a regional level have to relay them however, in order to pinpoint the deep motivations which brought the populations to modify their fertility pattern during the last 200 years. Among several factors associated with the demographic transition the cultural one (a very unprecise one) is more and more evoked by demographers. This paper deals with a micro-demographic analysis of the history of the population in the Eastern part of Belgium, called the Basse-Meuse. With the help of quantitative and qualitative data, it tries to give a better understanding of the cultural context in which the demographic changes have taken place. The new demographic pattern appears to be associated with the great economic depression of the years 1870-1890, which created a deep fear of falling back again into the traditional poverty. In other words, the demographic transition is part of a broader process of societal transition : a shift from a mass-poverty society to a relative mass-abundance society.