Pronatalist Policies Research Articles

Social Construction of Population Policies and Problems in Iran Since 1963

: Population has been and continues to be a significant matter of concern and contention in Iran. A range of different claims-makers, with varying dramas, ideologies, resources, rhetorical strategies and schemas have made claims that name and frame the population problem in particular ways to influence policy processes, and the experiences, meanings, and practices of people in everyday life. As a result, since 1967, mainly in post-revolutionary Iran, there has been the rise and fall of contesting narratives of the population as a social problem. Drawing on theoretical insights from social constructionism, we track these debates. In particular, we are interested in how claims-makers use rhetorical strategies and mobilize resources to convince others and to influence policy processes through social problem games and works. In other words, we examine the claims-making activities around the population as a social problem over the last half-century in Iran, showing how an understanding of these activities can enrich our understanding of definitional processes. We also discuss how certain discourses, policies and social constructions of population and family planning have become dominant and have influenced cultural meanings, popular images and the daily life experiences of people, particularly women and their prospects of reproduction and motherhood, for the most part, in the shadow of interpretations of Islamic Sharia law enforced since the 1979 Revolution. Building on the constructionist analysis and interoperation of contesting anti-natalist and pronatalist claims and policies over the last half-century in Iran, this article highlights how images of population problems are constructed socio-culturally with actual impact on individuals’ everyday lives in society, and how people find ways to respond, resist and counter the dominant discourses and policies about family planning, population and reproduction and family. Hence, the contesting claims, definitions and discourses around population have not been merely abstract points of debate, but they have penetrated the emotions, memories, relationships, prospects and practices of people in Iran. The results reveal that there are several existing and emerging dialectics, paradoxes, and uncertainties on population policies and problems at multiple levels, with each of these definitions having key insights and implications for policy-related scientific research (science), the policy process and its outcomes, reproductive prospects and the practices of people (public).

Changes in reproductive policies in Hungary between 2010 and 2022

This paper examines Hungarian reproductive policies, their changes and their restrictions in relation to pronatalist objectives between 2010 and 2022. The aim of the study is to present and interpret legislative changes in reproductive policies in the context of the pronatalist policies in Hungary. Reproductive policies include the regulation of assisted reproductive technologies, adoption, abortion, contraception, and sex education. In the development of these policies, we assume that a fundamentally pronatalist approach prevails, but we also identify various specific related constraints: heteronormativity, marriage-centredness, and the maintenance and reinforcement of traditional gender roles. We assume that Hungary’s reproductive policies have become increasingly selective since 2010 after the second Orbán government. These policies can be considered selective because they do not encourage all social groups to have children. These result in the exclusion of for example socially disadvantaged groups, single people and same-sex couples from reproduction due to legal constraints, a lack of financial support, access, and transfer of information. In conclusion, selective, heteronormative and marriage-based pronatalism is most identifiable in the adoption context, but abortion regulation, the legal environment for assisted reproductive technologies and sex education, in general, may reinforce pronatalist objectives.

Perceptions towards pronatalist policies in Singapore

Fertility rates have been declining in most high-income countries. Singapore is at the forefront of developing pronatalist policies to increase birth rates. This study examines perceptions towards pronatalist policies among men and women in Singapore and compares which policies are perceived as the most important contributors to the conduciveness for childbearing. Using data from the Singapore Perceptions of the Marriage and Parenthood Package study (N = 2000), the results from dominance analysis highlight two important findings. First, paternity leave, shared parental leave, and the Baby Bonus are the top three contributors to the conduciveness to have children. Second, the combined positive effect of financial incentives and work–life policies is perceived to be favorable to fertility. The findings suggest that low-fertility countries may wish to consider adopting this basket of policies as they are like to be regarded as supportive of childbearing. Although previous research suggests that pronatalist policies may only have a modest effect on fertility, the findings raise further questions as to whether fertility may decline even further in the absence of these policies.

Mie Nakachi. Replacing the Dead: The Politics of Reproduction in the Postwar Soviet Union.

The Soviet Union lost some twenty-seven million citizens in World War II—so many that Joseph Stalin hid the full extent of losses, and leaders schemed to raise birth rates through unconventional programs and incentives. Yet a mere decade after the end of the war, in a move seemingly counterintuitive, abortion was relegalized after nearly two decades of restriction. In this deeply researched, strongly comparative, and utterly fascinating monograph, Mie Nakachi explores how the horrific toll of war and death on the Soviet Union served as a motivating force for domestic and foreign policy from the 1944 Family Law through the debates that resulted in the relegalization of abortion in 1955 and even on to the pronatalist policies currently pursued by Vladimir Putin. At the same time, in Replacing the Dead: The Politics of Reproduction in the Postwar Soviet Union, Nakachi balances the high world of policy with interviews and personal accounts she collected and dug out of the archives. The resulting work conveys the desperation of women and medical practitioners, makes data reporting and meeting minutes compelling, and reveals the full story of one of the most significant issues for not just women but all of society in the postwar Soviet Union.

The future of China's urban heat island effects: A machine learning based scenario analysis on climatic-socioeconomic policies

Risk assessment and adaptation have become key foci in the examination of urban heat island (UHI) effects. Land use change and population growth are known to impact UHI effects. Taking the Changsha-Zhuzhou-Xiangtan urban agglomeration in China as the study context, a rapid and simple method based on artificial neural networks was employed to spatially estimate UHI effects from 2040 to 2100. Considering carbon neutrality and pro-natalist policies, Representative Concentration Pathways (RCPs) and Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSPs) were integrated into combination scenarios: RCP2.6-SSP1, RCP4.5-SSP2, and RCP4.5-SSP3. The risk of UHI effects was assessed through UHI hazard and population exposure. Results showed that compared with 2020, heat islands would decrease by 30% - 34% in area but increase by 29% - 37% in mean intensity by 2100. The population impacted by UHIs would increase by >10 million under the third scenario. Areas at high risk of UHI effects are mainly located in the urban core, with the total value of risk across the study area by 2100 being about 2 - 4 times higher than that in 2020. Our findings provide a forward-looking perspective to identify overall risk and critical areas in relation to UHI effects in the future through which clearer climatic-socioeconomic targets can be empirically grounded to minimize damage to public health.

Is Japan Pronatalism Justified? Fear of Hinoeuma Women and Sex Selection

Japan, having had the longest isolationist policy in the world, is averse to options, such as migration to increase the population. What kinds of pronatalist policies to increase fertility and lower the population’s age are ethical? Two questions can be raised: is it ethical for the government to intercede, and is it ethical for individuals to exercise this choice? In addition to the gradually decreasing birth rate, Japan is faced with the challenge of a possible sharp decline in the birth rate in 5 years. Astrology and superstition have influenced the sex preference of a child in Japan, and in 1966, there was a 26% drop in the birth rate. It was the year of Hinoeuma, occurring at 60-year intervals, and women born that year are believed to have a potentially dangerous ‘headstrong temperament’ and murder their husbands. Abortion rates spiked that year, and many forged the birth date of their child. The next Hinoeuma is in 2026. Although the bioethical debate about pronatalism exists in the literature, there is no literature addressing the question of sex selection in the context of a decreasing population. This paper argues that even if the Japanese government’s current pronatalist approach is ethically warranted, it should not extend to sex selection since it would promote misogyny and stereotypical gender roles.

Mapping Shifts in Russian and European Welfare Polities: Explaining Policy Responses to Shared New Social Risks

Since 2000, literature on West (EU15) and East-Central European (EU8) welfare states has focused on a set of ‘new social risks’ including insecure employment and income, population ageing, unsustainable social security systems, and large-scale international immigration. Our State-of-the-Art (SOTA) article brings Russia into the dialogue on ‘new social risks’. We show that broadly similar structural changes in industrial economies, labour markets and demographic patterns ended the post-World-War-Two (WWII) ‘Golden Age’ of welfare expansion in both the EU15 and communist states. Shared new social risks rose to the top of policy agendas. Governments responded mainly, though not exclusively, with liberalising, privatising and exclusionary policies. The SOTA compares their policy responses, specifically pension system reforms, demographic (pro-natalist and family) policies, and integration of immigrants. We find both convergence and divergence based on states’ differing welfare legacies. The conclusion considers path-departing ‘emergency Keynesian’ responses to the COVID-19 crisis, and renewed attention to Beveridge welfare models.

The cement nude, the (h)ero(tic)ism of the working class – the artistic programme of outdoor sculptures on the Black Sea littoral and the pro-natal, pro-family policies under communism

Controlled eroticization of the proletariat through pro-natal policies was an almost unnoticed facet of the programme of iconographic public works displayed in exceptional locations throughout the newly-built resorts along Romania’s Black Sea shore. Never previously studied on its own merits, this artistic programme of open-air sculptures that begun in the Romanian Popular Republic and continued in the Romanian Socialist Republic needs to be understood and contextualized, by way of interdisciplinary instruments, against a broader post-Eastern approach that goes beyond the established methodologies of art history.

Demographic projections of depopulated zones in Serbia: The example of the municipality of Negotin

Demographic projections represent a multi-purpose instrument in predicting the population development for the purpose of spatial planning and organizing as well as local economic development. In Serbia, demographic projections are very rarely produced on territorial levels lower than regional, therefore, the projections that are depicted in this work will be focused on the municipality of Negotin with the goal of observing an exceptionally depopulated area located in Eastern Serbia. The projections have been created with a time horizon of the year 2040 by using the cohort-component method which is well-established in literature as a prevailing method of producing population projections. Population projections for the municipality of Negotin have been constructed in three variants all relying on the initial hypotheses of fertility, mortality, and migrations. This is also the first time that such projections have been made separately for a rural and urban area of the municipality of Negotin. Results have shown that by the year 2040, the population will range between 17 and 18 thousand citizens, with the depopulation rate in rural areas being twice as high as that of urban ones. With the current demographic state in mind, it is evident that only direct interventions in the domain of migrational policies could slow down the pace of depopulation. This is due to the fact that the current fertility potential is undoubtedly insufficient to slow down depopulation even in the occurrence of a complete response to pronatalist policies.

Regional Maternity Capital Programmes: Impact on Fertility in Russia

Despite an active demographic policy, the birth rate in Russia has been declining since 2015. Since 2007, federal maternity capital (FMC) programme has been implemented. In 2011, some Russian regions additionally introduced regional maternity capital (RMC). The paper aims to assess the impact of RMC on fertility in Russian regions. To this end, econometric models using panel data from the Federal State Statistics Service for 1996-2020 were utilised. A positive impact of regional maternity capital for a second child on fertility was revealed. The study demonstrated that this support measure is most effective in predominantly Orthodox regions, as well as in regions with a higher total fertility rate (more than 1.7). According to the analysis, it is necessary to raise RMC payments for a second child to the level of federal maternity capital, all other things being equal, in order to increase the average total fertility rate to 1.7. Fertility is negatively correlated with the average per capita income, housing costs, unemployment rate and preschool enrolment, as well as positively correlated with federal maternity capital and marriage rate. As a result, the state has to continue and improve maternity capital programmes for the purchase of housing for families with children, support them in the labour market, improve preschool infrastructure, and also to pursue a pro-natalist policy aimed at strengthening the family institution and preserving family values. Due to the specificity of data, an influence of regional maternity capital on changes in birth timing and purposes of the capital’s possible spending were not considered. Further research should focus on determining priority forms of providing regional maternity capital according to the intended use.

Features of the institutional approach to analysis of the pronatalist policy

The paper considers the possibility of applying institutional approach to analysis of the pronatalist policy. The pronatalist policy creates space for institutions that should contribute to achievement of its goals, namely, raising the birth rate. However, the consistent application of the institutional approach has shown the absence of institutions with necessary for these goal parameters such as addressee, regulation, object, conditions and sanctions. Institutional impact should be focused on a target group of people and its characteristics. Depending on the groups' age, it should ensure a new parental status for young people aged 20 to 35 or birth of children in a certain order. Given this evidence for focusing on specific recipients and digitizing this process, an examination of their impact upon the effectiveness of pronatalist policy measures seems warranted. Considering the real, rather than conditional generation, we analyses the dynamics of the number of women and the age-specific fertility rates among women aged 20 to 34. It allows assessing the potential for growth in the birth rate in this real generation and predicting the required level of age-specific fertility rates in the next time period. The paper proposes a model for analysis of statistical data, which requires further verification on a larger array. The author also makes an attempt to model a new institution within the pronatalist policy — the institution of potential parents. As possible sanctions for violation of institutional norms by potential parents, it is proposed to use the mechanism of lost profits, that is, a reduction in additional payments and privileges from the state with an increase in the protogenetic interval.

Компенсаційний приріст народжуваності в Україні: очікування, чинники, перепони.

The purpose of this study was to find out whether post-war rebound in fertility will be able to achieve at least the pre-war level in Ukraine and whether the “baby boom” phenomenon will be possible in our country. For the first time, the factors that will contribute to fertility growth or slow down this process were considered in the context of the Russia’s full-scale military invasion of Ukraine. The research was carried out using such methods as analysis and synthesis, comparison, generalization, analogy, graphic method. Fertility accumulates the effect of a huge number of various factors that ultimately manifests itself in certain trend in the development of this process. It is relevant to analyse the factors that will change the birth rate during the war and post-war periods. The long period of military conflict in the east of our country, political tension, decrease in the welfare level of the population, and the protracted nature of the pandemic led to the accumulation of significant number of postponed births. The cohorts born in the 1990s are in active childbearing age now, but they are not large in number. This can reduce rebound in fertility after the end of the war. At the same time, certain expectations of increase in fertility are associated with women aged 30–34, who are more numerous than the younger cohorts, have accumulated significant number of postponed births and further postponement will increase the risk of impossibility to implement childbearing plans due to biological factor. Large number of dead, destroyed housing and infrastructure, social and economic problems, uncertainty about the future, significant share of refugees who decide not to return to Ukraine can significantly restrict rebound in fertility. Responsibility towards the unborn child forms the intention to further postpone their birth, but raising the responsibility of parenthood to the level of family or society will not allow the rejection of plans to give birth to a child. Under the condition of comprehensive family policy, in particular a pronatalist policy, one can hope for increase in the birth rate in the post-war period. However, it is unlikely that the number of births will exceed the number hit during the wave of increased fertility (that is, the possibility of a baby boom).

Trying to Reverse Demographic Decline: Pro-Natalist and Family Policies in Russia, Poland and Hungary

During the early 2000s governments in Russia, Poland and Hungary declared demographic crises and adopted pro-natalist programmes to increase fertility, as well as policies to support families with children. Our article compares their ‘flagship’ pro-natalist programmes: Russia’s Maternity Capital, Poland’s Family 500+, and Hungary’s enhanced earned income tax credit, all framed by governments’ neo-familialist discourses. We confirm these policies had limited impacts on fertility, finding that their most significant and disparate effects were instead on childhood poverty. Provision of preschool public childcare and parental leaves with levels of mothers’ employment across the cases were compared. We find no relationship between coverage of childcare institutions and employment rates of mothers with young children. Data show a weak relationship between length and compensation for parental leaves and maternal employment. We conclude that post-communist governments’ flagship pro-natalist incentives, family policies and traditionalist rhetoric have had limited effects in reversing demographic decline or in re-traditionalising contemporary women’s lives.

رانه سیاست جوان‌سازی جمعیت ایران چیست؟

In spring/summer of 2022, amid backbreaking crises and sanctions, the Islamic Republic pushed a ‘population rejuvenation policy’ with a ‘double-urgent’ legislative priority through Parliament, the Guardian Council, and readied it for quick implementation, despite extensive public opposition to its debatable mechanisms. This article argues that the Islamic Republic is less concerned with the future graying of Iran’s population, and more worried about rebuilding its eroding political base. It has realized that its supporters have become outnumbered by secular-minded Iranians. Under the bland term of “population rejuvenation”, the regime is putting in place incentives that are more acceptable to its conservative and compliant followers and rejected by more progressive citizens. The mechanisms include inter alia such disputed institutions as child marriage, temporary unions, or legal polygamy, and are promoted through generous financial incentives. By contrast, family planning services are considerably reduced and are at high cost to poorer women. In this manner, the regime hopes to bring about a differential fertility rate between its dependents and its detractors, which will over time increase the share of the former over the latter group, and keep political representation in its favor. This ideological approach is not new. In fact, the methods of the Islamic Republic are akin to the “great replacement theory”– a term used by white supremacists, Christian nationalists, and rightwing Western groups to represent the view that their demographic share is dwindling relative to their more secular opponents. In the West, too, under euphemistic slogans such as “family values “or “saving the unborn,” these groups have pushed for decades pro-natalist policies that target women’s reproductive rights and limit access to contraception and abortion – essentially limiting women’s choices to plan their lives. Behind the crowning moment of the Dobbs case – the overturning of the right to abortion in Roe v Wade by the U.S. Supreme Court – lies the belief that reproductive rights have facilitated “white replacement”. And, by taking away these rights, white women will have more children and thus increase the white population’s share vis-à-vis non-whites, particularly since the latter has gained consistently more political power and representation.

'DO I HAVE TO CHOOSE?' TWO CHILDREN VS FOUR CHILDREN IN BALI’S FAMILY PLANNING PROGRAM

The Indonesian family planning program has been running for over five decades. Until the present, the implementation of this program still generates debate over important policy issues. On June 14th, 2019, the Balinese provincial government released a new pro-natalist family planning policy No.1545 (Keluarga Berencana Krama Bali) to respond to the concerns from the national family planning program two-child policy success. What are the implications for Balinese women's position in response to the political and cultural policies that impact their reproductive rights? This study analyzes the tensions between the national family planning program's two-child policy and the recent local Balinese Keluarga Berencana Krama model by focusing on Balinese women's perspectives. Ethnographic research was conducted from January to February 2020 in Bali. This study indicates that the women's fertility decisions were constrained by patrilineal structures, economic stresses, and government population policies. Krama Bali, which encourages a four children model according to the Balinese naming system, complicates the triple burden impacts on Balinese women's agency. The new pro-natalist provincial policy explicitly prioritizes cultural values and indirectly exacerbates the pressure to produce inheriting sons. Balinese women had to choose between cultural preservation and economic considerations, which intensified the tensions between their productive, reproductive, and customary (adat) obligations. Internal and external pressures imposed upon the Balinese women participants have forced them to navigate conflicting economic, political, and cultural demands with varying degrees of agency.

The Representation of the Socialist Abortion Ban as Women’s Reproductive Burden in Postsocialist Romanian Cinema

This paper examines the representation of back-alley abortions in postsocialist Romanian cinema as reproductive burden and the abortion ban during the socialist period 1966–1989, when Decree 770 was in effect. 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days (Cristian Mungiu, 2007), tells the story of a university student, who resorts to an illegal abortion. The female characters in Mungiu’s art film show reproductive agency. Back-alley abortions became a way of reclaiming women’s bodies. In the documentary Children of the Decree, director Florin Iepan explores Ceaușescu’s pronatalist policies by subversively juxtaposing official propaganda images with a series of interviews with medical professionals, abortionists, and women. Iepan’s contribution is to show the eugenic dimensions of Ceaușescu’s population policy that preferred healthy children to the detriment of disabled children. In another serialized documentary Truths about the Past female director Raluca Rogojină explores the impact of communist patriotic pronatalist policies on women and children.

Perceptions of Barriers to Motherhood: Female STEM PhD Students’ Changing Family Plans

Despite recent pronatalist policies in Hungary, the country has not boosted birth rates at the expected rate. Higher educated women still delay the transition to first birth, a smaller proportion of planned children are born than in Western European countries, and the level of childlessness has also been increasing. As a post‐socialist legacy, prevailing traditional family and gender norms strongly constrain the reconciliation of work and family roles, which can prevent women from realizing their childbearing intentions or drive them to live a childfree life. Qualitative studies about how the fertility decisions of women are formed are scarce, particularly in relation to male‐dominated high‐skilled professions, where the realization of family plans can be especially challenging. The present article explores the barriers to motherhood among female engineers. Results of 27 semi‐structured interviews with mainly childless female PhD students in 2014–2015 show that the women were subject to strong social expectations that negatively influenced their fertility plans. On the family side, these involve becoming a mother and being responsible for child care and household chores; on the work side, challenges include the knowledge‐intensiveness of jobs and a male career model that hardly tolerates the role of motherhood. As a result, the respondents had further delayed childbearing, forecast reconsidering family plans after first childbirth, and in one case, opted for voluntary childlessness. Women also reflected on how their fertility is at stake due to their postponed motherhood and the cumulative effects of hazardous laboratory work. Several intervention points are suggested to stakeholders.

Hitler’s Northern Utopia: Building the New Order in Occupied Norway

Hitler’s Northern Utopia: Building the New Order in Occupied Norway

Factors associated with fertility rebound in the former soviet union: case study of Armenia and Tajikistan

While countries around the world have experienced a continuous decrease in fertility, in the early part of the new millennium (2005-15), almost all countries of the former Soviet Union recorded a fertility increase. Those countries had experienced a decrease in fertility after the dissolution of the Soviet Union in the 1990s, and the assumption was that economic recovery after the transition period led to a fertility rebound. In particular, a higher socio-economic condition of the household and women’s status were possible contributing factors. The investigation of factors behind the fertility rebound in this region will help policymakers in the countries with similar contexts to address demographic dynamics. Armenia recorded an increase of its total fertility rate (TFR) from 1.65 to 1.76, while Tajikistan recorded a stable TFR at 3.61 during 2000-15. Data from the 2015-16 Armenia Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) and the 2017 Tajikistan DHS were used to examine factors associated with fertility in these two countries. Contrary to the hypothesis of this study, we found that age, marriage, and the desire for more children were positively related to Children Ever Born (CEB), while being employed, having higher education, and living in a household with a better-off wealth index were negatively related to CEB in both countries. Moreover, we found that the desired number of children among women was higher than the actual fertility in both countries, implying that unmet fertility goals may be considered as a potential driver for pro-natalist policies in the low-fertility countries.

Корпоративная политика, ориентированная на семьи работников: потенциал внедрения в российских регионах

Various social institutions may be involved in the implementation of the state’s pro-natalist policy. Family-friendly corporate policies, common in many countries, are still quite rare in Russia. At the same time, many socio-economic indicators significantly differ across Russian regions. The study aims to identify regional development models of the Russian corporate sector and determine those models that have the highest potential for dissemination of family-friendly corporate policies aimed at increasing the birth rate of the population in these regions. It is hypothesised that such Russian regions can be identified based on a multidimensional classification of socio-economic indicators. The hierarchical cluster analysis was used to model the Russian economic space. Then, the clusters were further grouped according to additional variables. The article analysed official regional statistics characterising the development of the corporate sector. Five clusters of Russian regions were identified. It is proved that corporate family-friendly policies can be disseminated in two regions in particular. Specific demographic (in particular, low birth rate and growth potential) and economic (high innovative activity, small number of loss-making enterprises, the highest demographic indicators among organisations and the average level of priveate consumption) conditions are observed in these clusters. It is concluded that in the corporate sector of these Russian regions, family-friendly policy may gain popularity among staff. This approach, accessible to enterprises, can act as an effective tool of demographic policy. Further research should focus on the analysis of cases of Russian enterprises implementing family-friendly policies, identification of benchmarks, assessment of the possibilities of scaling such experience and forecasting its demographic results.