Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite: Exploring the role of governance in fertility decline

Monica Das Gupta ()

Journal of Development Studies, 1999, vol. 35, issue 5, 1-25

Abstract: A secular decline in fertility has taken place across the globe within a short span of human history. The timing and pace of this decline correspond broadly with changes in socio-political institutions in different regions of the world, of Asia, and of India. We hypothesise that this shift in child-bearing behaviour is related to cognitive changes wrought by the replacement of deeply hierarchical socio-political institutions by the more egalitarian institutions of modern governance. These changes have enabled socio-economic mobility and enhanced people's ability to shape their lives, internalising more of the positive and negative implications of their decisions, including childbearing decisions. Recent work in development economics argues that polities which foster local accountability are the most conducive to rapid development, and we argue that they also foster personal efficacy and rapid fertility decline. If true, our hypotheses indicate that development and fertility decline can be expected to be associated, though not necessarily sequential in nature. They also indicate that some policy settings are likely to effect a 'win-win' situation of rapid development and fertility decline, while others are likely to generate the converse 'lose-lose' outcomes.

Date: 1999
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00220389908422589 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:jdevst:v:35:y:1999:i:5:p:1-25

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/FJDS20

DOI: 10.1080/00220389908422589

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Development Studies is currently edited by Howard White, Oliver Morrissey and Ken Shadlen

More articles in Journal of Development Studies from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().