Some People Are Choosing Not to Have Any Children at All

Mammoni

Some people are choosing not to have any children at all:

The headline reads "Blissful Bachelorhood and the Shrinking Village." That's

how the current situation in Italy is portrayed in newspapers in the United States.

With a total fertility rate of 1.2, Italy has one of the lowest TFRs in Western Europe.

In much of Italy, rural villages have decreased in size as villagers migrated to cities

and many of the young adults that remained chose not to marry, or if they did marry,

had fewer children. The lack of interest in marriage and raising families has

confounded government officials, parents, and even some children. While fertility

rates are low throughout Western Europe, Italy and Spain, predominantly Roman

Catholic countries, have the lowest TFRs. Within Italian society, there is even a term

for Italian men who continue to live at home, don’t marry and are cared for by their

parents when they are adults: mammoni. Sociologists find this phenomenon puzzling:

the younger generation has a desire for financial independence and sexual freedom,

yet relies on their parents for housing, food, and high levels of parental care. "Maybe

it's my fault" said 70 year-old Ada Marracino as she prepared lunch for her husband

and her son and daughter, who are both in their mid-40's, unmarried and living at

home. Her husband smiled sadly as he said, "It used to be the kids who would look

after the old people. Around here, it is the reverse." Their daughter, Vincenza, used

to live in Rome but moved back to her family village to live with her parents. She

told a reporter that she felt no social or family pressure to get married. "I don't feel I

have to get married, just to be married. Though lately, I have been thinking more about having children someday." Vincenza was 43 years old when she made this

statement.

Aside from personal choice, there are governmental programs, such as China’s

policy of limiting children to one per family, that can have drastic and significant

effects on population. From the Communist revolution in 1949 to the present, the

population in China has more than doubled and today is approximately 1.3 billion. In

1979, China articulated a goal to achieve zero population growth by the year 2000. A

government program of social pressure and increased supply of contraceptives was

initiated. In addition, the government implemented a system of economic incentives

for one-child families and disincentives for larger families. The policy met with a

great deal of success, although at a TFR of 1.8, China is not even close to the TFR of

Italy. The CBR dropped from 40 to 20 between 1960 and 2000, although most of

those gains occurred before the much publicized "one child" campaign. Some critics

have suggested that economic development was more a factor than government

policy in reducing China's fertility rate . In many countries, over the past hundred

years or so, decreases in fertility have occurred shortly after economic development.

Sources: A. Stanley. Blissful Bachelorhood and the Shrinking Village. NY Times November 16, 1999

Weeks, J.R. Population. 1999. Wadsworth.

Author: A.J. Friedland