Abstract
This chapter focuses on the evolution of demographic variables in France over the past 200 years. Particular attention is paid to the evolution of the marriage pattern. The investigation of regional specificities shows the coexistence of two types of fertility regulation during the mid-nineteenth century: control via marriage versus control within marriage. Long-run trends indicate that the fertility transition occurred at the same time as the decline in the traditional marriage pattern in favor of birth control within marriage.
Il n’y a ni richesse ni force que d’hommes [There is neither wealth nor strength than men] Jean Bodin (1576)
Le contrôle de la procréation entre les mains des femmes elles-mêmes est la première marche vers l’égalité [The control of reproduction in the hands of women themselves is the first step towards equality] Françoise Héritier
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Notes
- 1.
France is the first country to experience the demographic transition in Europe but at the worldwide level, Binion (2000) shows the correspondence with the American demographic transition that also started a long time before other Western countries.
- 2.
Couples with birth-to-pregancy interval higher than 49Â months are considered either infertile or controlling births.
- 3.
Number of living children at the last pregnancy for a 100 households during the last five years of conjugal life (women married before age 30).
- 4.
Appendix A provides the map of France with the names of the counties (Fig. 1.22).
- 5.
Darker red corresponds to higher fertility rates; clearer red corresponds to lower fertility rates.
- 6.
The definitive celibacy is the share of women aged 50 and more who are single per 100 women.
- 7.
Hutterites are Christians of the Radical Reformation of the sixteenth century in Europe—Anabaptists. Hutterites are male-managed. Women take care of traditional rules. Hutterites families are characterized by very high fertility rates, around 10 children per family.
- 8.
Haut-Rhin is the district with the highest I g : 0.747; Lot-et-Garonne is the district with the lowest I g : 0.298.
- 9.
The degree of industrialization and urbanization differ across counties in France. The North of France is characterized by industrialization with human concentration; elsewhere industrialization made on a rural basis, closer to proto-industrialization with no wild urbanization. Appendix A provides additional maps of the geographical distribution of density, share of urban residents and horse power in the middle of the nineteenth century (Fig. 1.25).
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Appendix A
Appendix A
Map of the metropolitan French Départements, 2014. Source: http://www.webvilles.fr
Geographical dynamics of marital fertility index between 1851 and 1901. Sources: Data from Coale and Watkins (1986)
Geographical distribution of variations in fertility between 1821 and 1851. Sources: Own calculations—Using data from Statistique Générale de la France. (a) Recensement 1821, 1851, and (b) Recensement 1881, 1911
Geographical distribution of density, urban residents, and horse power. Sources: Using data from Statistique Générale de la France. (a, b) Recensement 1851, and (c) Statistique industrielle 1861–1865
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Diebolt, C., Perrin, F. (2017). Evolutions of Demographic Behavior. In: Understanding Demographic Transitions. Population Economics. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-44651-6_1
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