The Two Demographic Transitions of Finland

Lutz, W. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7975-8145 (1986). The Two Demographic Transitions of Finland. IIASA Working Paper. IIASA, Laxenburg, Austria: WP-86-009

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Abstract

"It might be said that western Europe has experienced two demographic transitions. The first-t'ne extent, date, duration, and some might say even the existence of which are conjectural-was a transition from early and universal marriage to the west European form of nuptiality."

Ansley Coale, who made this point in 1973 (Coale 1973), calls this first transition the Malthusian transition since Malthus - at a time of already late marriage - advocated a still higher age at marriage as the solution to the problem of unfavourable high fertility. The second transition then refers to the decline in marital fertility and the introduction of conscious family limitation; hence it might be called the Neomalthusian transition.

The second demographic transition is obvious in all European countries. It began in France around 1800; for the bulk of the countries marital fertility started to decline on a significant scale between 1890 and 1910. These marital fertility transitions occurred at a time when national population statistics had already started to register the structure of the population and the incidence of marriages, births and deaths. For most countries, at least crude fertility indicators can be calculated to show the extent and timing of this secuiar fertility decline....

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