Title:
Allegiance and Alliance: Low fertility in the long shadow of WWII
Authors:
Alexander Weinreb, Associate Professor of Sociology, UT Austin
Jennifer Johnson-Hanks, Associate Professor of Sociology and Demography, UC
Berkeley
Abstract:
Viewing comparative fertility trends through a prism of World War II (WWII) alliances, an odd pattern
emerges. The members of the Tripartite Pact—Italy, Germany, and Japan—have among the lowest
fertility rates in the world, while the countries that led the Allies at the end of World War II—Great
Britain, the USA, and France—are outliers for their high fertility. This paper first argues that the
association is not mere coincidence, but the product of specific cultural and institutional formations that
emerged after the war. How could wartime alliances half a century ago influence contemporary fertility?
What social, cultural, and institutional forces and processes account for these remarkable differences?
And what do those forces and processes imply for theories of fertility more generally? This paper uses
long-term national fertility trends to address these broader questions. We argue that many of the economic
and cultural factors most critical to fertility rates have deep political roots. A coherent model of low
fertility must be embedded in a comprehensive theory of social action. Social action, in turn, entails
allegiances and alliances, both individual and collective.
Allegiance and Alliance: Low fertility in the long shadow of WWII
Introduction
Viewing comparative fertility trends through a prism of World War II (WWII) alliances, an odd pattern
emerges. From the 1940s until 1965, Total Fertility Rates (TFRs) of the major Allied and Axis powers are
indistinguishable and the trajectories show no coherent pattern. Over the decade 1965-75, there is a
general synchronization—fertility falling in countries of the former Axis and Allies alike. And then, two
distinctive paths emerge: fertility in the former Axis powers falls almost monotonically from 1975
onward; in the former Allies, by contrast, fertility is largely flat, or even increasing. By the period 198590, there is no overlap between the two groups, and by the period 2005-10, the difference has become
dramatic: in all three members of the Tripartite Pact (Germany, Japan, Italy), TFRs are between 1.2 and
1.4; the former Western allies (France,
UK, USA), by contrast, have TFRs
between 1.8 and 2.1 (see figure 1).
How could wartime alliances half a
century ago influence contemporary
fertility to such a degree? What social,
cultural, and institutional forces and
processes account for these remarkable
differences? And what do those forces
and processes imply for theories of
fertility more generally?
This paper uses the long-term
national fertility trends of major Allied
and Axis powers as a springboard to
address these broader questions. We
argue that many of the economic and
cultural factors most critical to fertility
have deep political roots. Childbearing,
like all forms of social action, turns on
Figure 1: Total Fertility Rates 1930-­‐2010 (various sources) allegiances and alliances that both
reflect and reproduce older cultural patterns salient to family formation. To understand contemporary low
fertility, in other words, we need to attend to politics.
The association is not mere coincidence
We have three reasons to argue that the distinct pattern of Allied and Axis fertility that emerges in the
1970s is not mere coincidence. First, it extends outside our original sample. Very low fertility is also
found in Spain, Portugal, and throughout the former Soviet sphere of influence. That is, beyond the
central players in WWII, there appears to be a distinct post-totalitarian—Fascist and Socialist—fertility
regime. The result: although not all countries with a TFR of less than 1.6 have totalitarian histories,
among those with a totalitarian history, all have a TFR of 1.6 or less, with most in the 1.3 to 1.4 range.
This is substantially lower than the 1.9-2.0 range associated with the UK, France, Norway, Sweden and
the US (PRB 2011). Second, the historical moment at which the trajectories of the Allied and Axis powers
diverge is significant both in cohort perspective, and in terms of the macro associations between fertility
and work in rich countries. In cohort terms, the two paths begin to diverge as the first cohort born after the
war enters childbearing: potential mothers and fathers in 1975 were mostly born between 1945 and 1955.
That precisely in this cohort behavior between the victors and losers should diverge points to a WWIIrelated explanation. In addition, the divergence in trajectories begins in 1975, but the distinction between
the two groups is not visible until 1985. That is the same time that the association between women’s work
hours and fertility in rich countries switches from being negative to positive (Ahn and Mira 2002).
Indeed, these two patterns reflect the same underlying relations, seen through different lenses: the rich
countries in which women of childbearing age work outside the home the least are overwhelmingly
members of the former Axis. Third, our WWII-related explanation extends a model more typically used
to explain how reproductive decisions are framed during national political struggles, especially when that
struggle is intense. Examples include fertility of blacks in Zimbabwe (Kaler 1998) and of Palestinians and
Jews in Israel (Fargues 2000). We argue that mechanisms which underlie this “nationalization of
reproduction” (Kanaaneh 2002:65) extend into post-war periods, allowing the allegiances and alliances
forged during that struggle to caste a long shadow over post-war fertility.
Faith in the flag, and fertility
Across the six Axis and Allied powers on which we focus in this paper—Germany, Japan, Italy, the UK,
US and France—WWII and its aftermath was experienced in three discrete ways. For Germany and
Japan, whose militarism, unequivocal racial ideologies, and strict hierarchies made them the core Axis
powers, the end of WWII represented both absolute military loss and a comprehensive discrediting of
their totalitarian forms of government and underlying creeds. By losing the war after so great an
investment, German and Japanese societies suffered from a crisis of legitimacy that undermined their
nomos—the meaningfulness of the social order in the eyes of their citizens (Berger). On one hand, this
crisis of legitimacy reoriented people away from national projects associated with the fascist era—in
Germany’s case, to revitalize the Volksgemeinschaft—toward more familial and local concerns. On the
other hand, it sapped an important source of the national, emotional energy that drives many costly
personal investments, fertility decisions and childrearing among them.
Young Germans and Japanese born after the war therefore grew up in states that were profoundly
different from their pre- or early-WWII counterparts: occupied by foreign forces, physically divided
(Germany), coerced into multi-party democracies with entrenched checks on sovereignty (e.g., foreign
deployments for West Germany and Japan) or into joining the Soviet bloc (East Germany), forced to pay
reparations, and whose major cities were either destroyed by allied air power (Dresden, Berlin) or
obliterated entirely (Hiroshima, Nagasaki). Young post-WWII Germans and Japanese were also educated
with completely different curricula. Instead of a highly gendered and race-obsessed curriculum
(Germany), or autocratic imperial one (Japan), they were exposed to more liberal democratic models
focused, in part, on the sins of their forefathers. This continues to this day. In Germany, in particular,
WWII appears centrally in the history curriculum in 10th, 11th, and 12th grades, inculcating young people
with the view that their nation had acted in ways that were profoundly, deeply wrong.
Contrast this with post-war childhood and adolescence in the UK and US. Foreign forces never
controlled domestic UK or US territory during the war. Even with the looming Cold War and, in the UK’s
case, post-WWII rationing and the loss of empire, the postwar experience in general was one of
ideological continuity. The effort to win the war may have been painful and costly, but it ended in
success, validating national political ideals and the sacrifices invested in them.
Experiences in Italy and France stand somewhere between these two extremes, pointing to neither an
absolute win nor loss. Although a founding Fascist state, Italy’s fascism was softer, with little of the racial
underpinning and more modest imperial ambitions than the German or Japanese variants, and with
continued opposition to Nazi policies. Likewise, France: some French may have stood shoulder-toshoulder with the Allies, and were certainly portrayed as such in the forging of post-WWII alliances and
historiography. But France’s actual struggle with Fascism and its underlying racial creeds includes
extensive Vichy collaboration and, in the preceding two centuries, its history as one of the intellectual
hubs for modern racial ideology and activism (e.g., Leclerc, Gobineau, Drumont).
We suggest that these distinct post-WWII experiences, and the alliances and allegiances from which
they arose, profoundly influence fertility decisions. Men and women buy into national ideologies. To the
extent that a child can be seen as part of a reciprocal relationship between a couple and the state that has
educated them, provided them with an identity, and a physical and cultural home, then loss in war and the
subsequent perception that the state’s unique character is being lost—or is not worth preserving—may be
another factor that depresses fertility. Why invest finite personal and family energies in “gifting” a child
to a nation after that nation has been discredited?
In contrast, winning strengthens identity and encourages the gift of a child. In this sense it is no
coincidence that the “greatest generation” gave birth to the baby boomers. The demobilized troops who
made up this generation may have been no less traumatized by their combat experiences than their
German and Japanese counterparts. But they returned victorious to a victorious society, not to a losing
one (Germany, Japan) or to an ideologically divided one (Italy, France). And that same pride in
nationhood, and faith in the credibility of the armed forces and other coercive institutions, was transmitted
to their children more effectively than in Axis powers. Hence the diverging Allied and Axis fertility
patterns from the late 1970s.
Hunkering down and opening up
In addition to influencing the perceived legitimacy of the state, winning or losing an ideologically
significant war can influence the kinds of social policy that the post-war state implements, and the kinds
of social institutions that those policies foster. Of course, these policies and institutions also have sources
other than the military win or loss, centrally including the relative popularity of given political and
economic ideas prior to the war.
This section of the paper reviews the institutional divergence between former Axis and Allies powers
on matters of social policy, focusing on two aspects of post-WWII policy in particular: the centrality of
the family and migration. We argue that the “traditional” structure of the family was supported and
retained as a central social institution in the Axis countries after the war—in certain ways, it was the only
thing left standing and credible. In the shorter run, this policy decision was neutral or even positive for
fertility. But in the longer run, it meant ossified institutions that could not handle new forms of
childrearing for working women. When public schools have short days with long lunch breaks and there
is limited preschool care, many families will need to have one parent out of the labor force in order to
manage house, children, and home. The former Allied countries saw a wider range institutions and
subsequent gender and work policies, starting soon after the war. For the first decades, innovative policy
was not terribly important: at the cross-national level fertility remained negatively associated with
women’s work; however, starting in the mid-1980s, this relationship reverses. In the former Axis
countries, where family-supporting policies remained relatively fixed, fertility continues to fall. In the
former Allies, by contrast, fertility remains flat, or even rises, as alternative policies and institutions
emerge that make work “family friendly” in a new way.
There was similar divergence in immigration policy: the Allies had relatively open borders to older
colonies (UK and France) and poor neighbors (US) in particular. After all, why not be open and flexible
about immigration after such a huge success? In contrast, immigration to Germany was limited much
more to guest-workers and in Japan it was limited, period.
Each of these differences in social policy affected, and continues to affect, fertility differences in
Europe (Sobotka 2008), but they do account for the differences between these two sets of countries. To do
that, we need to consider the legitimacy mechanism in more detail.
Empirical sections
We evaluate the legitimacy mechanism in two ways, focusing on Germany, Japan, Italy, France, the UK
and the US. First, we build an inferential case by linking fluctuations in period TFR (pTFR) to events that
impact nationalism and pride. One illustrative example: pTFR in the US increases from 2.013 in 2002 to
2.10 in 2006, the highest value in four decades (NVSR 2009). This occurred alongside significant
reductions in teen-pregnancy and while household income in working age households remained flat. We
will expand on this post 9/11 trend and compare patterns across US states and the six target countries.
Second, using World Values Survey (WVS) data, we look at the micro-relationship between ideal family
size, reported fertility, nationalism, and faith in credibility of the armed forces. In addition to standard
sociodemographic controls for age, education, religion, and religiosity, our main explanatory variables in
these analyses are: 1) pride in nationality; 2) primary orientation for identity (local, national or
international); and 3) confidence in the state’s coercive institutions (armed forces, police and judiciary).
Predicted effects of confidence in the state’s coercive institutions on number of children, net of
sociodemographic controls (both lines) and all
other explanatory variables (blue line), are
presented in Figure 2. These are preliminary
models which do not parse out effects by age or
period. But they clearly demonstrate the quite
different relationship between family size and
levels of confidence in the state’s coercive
institutions between the core Axis powers
(Germany, Japan) and the core Allies (US, UK):
negative in one group, positive in the other.
Implications for fertility theory
There is some irony that it is the older fascist
regimes with all their homilies to the virtue of
fertility that are now caught most profoundly in
low fertility traps. In this paper, we attempt to
demonstrate that this outcome and its inverse,
higher fertility in the United States, France, and
the U.K., are predictable products of losing or
winning ideologically laden and costly wars.
The struggles which go into wins and losses
cast a long shadow over the credibility of
national institutions—always contested, but
more so when loss is in the air—and
subsequently, over people’s interpretive
schema, senses of self, the effectiveness of
Figure 2: Fertility differentials by faith in coercive cultural transmission of each of these, and
institutions of the state
finally, fertility. In addition, the experience of
loss or win influences the environment in which
social policy is made. Policies of course matter for institutions and practices, producing another pathway
through which war can cast a long shadow on fertility.
Although we limit our empirical arguments in this paper to major Western players in WWII, we think
that the underlying mechanism is generalizable to all other contexts in which significant military or
ideological loss invites institutional discontinuity. In particular, we think that barring extensive popular
skepticism, the more ambitious the claims of the older institutions, the greater the undermining of
institutional credibility upon loss. We can make at least a prima facie case for this in Eastern Europe in
the post-socialist period, contemporary Iran, or any country where the shine associated with once popular
revolutionary movements has dimmed (e.g., Cuba, South Africa, Zimbabwe).
The bigger lesson for fertility theory is this. It is not only culture and economics that matter. It is also
political history. To claim otherwise is to assume that people do not construe themselves as links in a
chain of reproduction rooted in a meaningful national heritage. This strikes us as a peculiarly western
(liberal) conceit. Those links are rooted in struggle, credibility, and the perception of institutional
continuity. This is the primary source, we argue, of the remarkable differences in fertility which emerge
30 years after WWII. Those old alliances and allegiances insidiously affected—and continue to affect—
contemporary fertility.