Is there a Chinese pattern of the second demographic transition?

The Second Demographic Transition(SDT)is a useful theoretical framework for explaining the recent trend in many countries of very low fertility combined with alternative union and family types.Although past studies have observed the SDT in many Western societies,whether it is applicable to East Asia remains unclear.Capitalizing on data from the Chinese Census and China Family Panel Studies,we provide estimates of key behavioral and ideational indicators of the SDT.We find that union formation in China has trended increasingly toward patterns commonly observed in the West,including delayed age of marriage and the common practice of premarital cohabitation.While having a lowest-low fertility rate,China has not experienced rising nonmarital childbirths,a key component of the SDT.However,we observe growing tolerance toward nonmarital childbearing and childlessness.Marriages remain relatively stable in China,especially among couples with children.Taken together,our analysis suggests that typically coincident changes in patterns of family behavior associated with the SDT are not occurring simultaneously in China.Moreover,ideational changes are preceding behavioral changes,particularly in attitudes toward nonmarital childbearing and childlessness.Our research suggests a different pattern of the SDT in China,which has been heavily influenced by Confucian culture.

A second demographic transition in Indonesia?

As a predominantly Muslim and ethnically diverse new democracy in Asia,Indo-nesia is a timely case to study how the contending forces of development and social change are reflected in changing norms and practices around family formation.This paper examines the extent to which the second demographic transition(SDT)theory can provide a primary framework to understand contemporary patterns of fertility,marriage and family change in Indonesia.Against the backdrop of socio-political change following Reformasi in 1998,we found emerging demographic fea-tures typically associated with societies in later stages of fertility transition.These include fertility below replacement in some regions;increasing age at first marriage,non-marriage,and divorce rates;and growing diversity in household/family forms.As the vast regions of Indonesia is economically,culturally,and demographically heterogeneous,these key features of SDT are not likely to emerge and unfold in a uniform manner.Further,these demographic shifts are taking place amidst multi-ple tensions and contradictions in the nature and direction of ideational change per-taining to marriage and the family.We argue that the prevailing ideational change driving the shifts in marriage,fertility,and the family within Indonesia is neither unilinear nor singular in nature.Emerging ideational change embodying individual-ism,secularism,and post-materialism-originally proposed in SDT theory to be the primary drivers of fertility decline in post-industrial Western Europe-can overlap with popular values promoting de-secularization and the strengthening of familial institutions.As a demographic framework,the SDT theory is an important and use-ful starting point.But it needs to be reevaluated by considering the complex socio-political and increasingly precarious economic terrains behind fertility transition,as well as marriage and family change in post-Reformasi Indonesia.

The second demographic transition:also a 21st century Asian challenge?

This introduction aims at placing the unfolding sub-patterns of the Asian“Second Demographic Transition”(SDT)in a global context by contrasting them with those of societies with other than patriarchal histories.Firstly,fertility transitions to below-replacement level can be achieved as part of the first“altruistic”transition without any SDT traits being present.Secondly,Asian societies are by no means immune to genuine SDT developments,as illustrated by the emergence and spread of pre-marital cohabitation.Thirdly,the SDT cohabitation pattern is still conservative:it is followed by marriage,pregnancies result in shotgun marriages or abortions,and parenthood within consensual unions remains rare.Also divorce rates are low.But it is also argued that all Asian cases are still at the beginning of the possible SDT evolution or have barely started it,and that old ways can die off rather quickly with the succession of generations.Finally,it is shown that the cultural component,i.e.the“Willingness”condition,can act as a bottleneck slowing down the transition to a new pattern of behaviour.We therefore illustrate on a global scale how the spread of cohabitation is part of a broader ethical revolution stressing individual rather than societal discretion in matters of life and death.On the basis of these profiles we expect stronger resistance to SDT patterns of partnerhip formation in Hindu and Muslim societies.

Demographic and social anxieties:the second demographic transition in Asia

Asia is now,predominantly,a continent of‘low’fertility-one of the features of the Second Demographic Transition.Across the continent,this feature of our population has sprouted concern and anxiety,primarily expressed in macroeconomic terms.Low fertility is directly linked to the twin challenges of population aging and stagnation/decline.We know,however,that maximizing human capital and institutional reform is a much more effective way of responding to these two‘grand challenges’in the short-and medium-term.Why,then,is there such a panic about the lack of babies?In this commentary,I argue that much of the concern is grounded in a‘fear’of some of the features of the Second Demographic Transition(SDT)-or,at least,a caricatured version of it-taking root in Asian societies.But how concerned should they be?The papers in this special issue clearly demonstrate that the pathway towards‘full SDT’has developed in a very uneven way,perhaps so much so that some may argue the SDT is not a viable tool for understanding family change in(much of)Asia.However,this caricature of what the SDT‘is’can be unhelpful.There is no doubt that ideals and attitudes are changing(even if many others are not).Therefore,if we rather consider the SDT as a“general narrative that leaves room for many sub-narratives”,the evidence from Asia clearly demonstrates that there are many sub-narratives operating within a general transition towards some of the key societal and familial features of the SDT.

Gendering the second demographic transition:gender asymmetry,gendered tension,and cohabitation in contemporary urban China

The Second Demographic Transition(SDT)framework highlights individuals'ideational shift toward greater individualism in explaining the rise of non-marriage unions.Contemporary China has seen a substantial increase in premarital cohabitation.Drawing on 65 in-depth interviews with highly educated young urban Chinese women and men,this article examines the gendered ways in which young Chinese adults perceive and make decisions about premarital cohabitation,as they envision their ideal lives and what autonomy and self-realization mean to them.I demonstrate that while male respondents predominantly view cohabitation positively as a risk-reduction strategy for avoiding incompatible marriages,female respondents still consider cohabitation to be a risk-amplification arrangement in practice that increases the possibility of uncertain marriage prospect,unsafe sex,and reputational damages.Young women,but not men,often have to strategizethrough carefully managing information disclosureabout persistent parental expectations that discourage women's premarital cohabitation.As a result,while male respondents regard marriage to be neither the necessary precondition nor the end goal of cohabitation,female respondents,who otherwise emphasize autonomy and individualistic fulfllment,continue to desire a close linkage between cohabitation and marriage.Leveraging the unique strength of qualitative data in demographic research,this article articulates the gender asymmetry in how women and men perceive cohabitation's risks,benefits,and link to marriage.I elucidate the gendered tension between privately-held ideals of individualism vis-a-vis enduring social norms of female marriageability,as women and men differentially navigate parental expectations surrounding cohabitation.In so doing,this article makes a theoretical contribution by bringing a careful treatment of gender into the SDT framework.

The second demographic transition in Japan:a review of the evidence

Despite a half century of below-replacement fertility,Japan is typically not in­cluded in discussions and evaluations of the second demographic transition(SDT),a widely referenced framework for understanding family changes and attitudinal shifts associated with very low fertility.I address this limitation by drawing upon a range of published research and data sources to provide an empirical basis for thinking about how the Japanese experience does or does not conform to the gen­eral patterns of behavioral and attitudinal change associated with the SDT in the West.From this evidence,it seems clear that the prototypical pattern of family change in Northern and Western Europe has only partially emerged in Japan.The same is true of attitudes,particularly those related to gender.Consistent with de­pictions of the SDT in Europe,Japan has experienced substantial delays in mar­riage and childbearing along with notable increases in non-marital cohabitation and divorce.However,non-marital childbearing has remained at negligibly low levels and cohabiting unions have not emerged as an alternative to marriage.Attitudinal data show that endorsement of conventional family patterns and gender roles has declined,but remains at higher levels than in most SDT countries.Taken as a whole,these data describe a distinctive path to very low fertility in which universal forces of social and family change interact with strong normative expectations of two-parent families characterized by a clear gender division of labor.

Different pathways of the second demographic transition in four East Asian societies:evidence from the 2006 and 2016 East Asian Social Surveys

This study uses the 2006 and 2016 East Asian Social Surveys to map value changes related to the second demographic transition in China's Mainland,Japan,South Korea,and Taiwan.The study examines trends in attitudes towards cohabitation,childrearing,and divorce over a 10-year period in the four East Asian societies.The findings suggest that the second demographic transition,if any in East Asia,is an uneven process between societies,and China's Mainland stands out as the only society in which attitudes had become more conservative,even after controlling for compositional differences in population.In the other three societies,attitudes had shifted to be more liberal.Moreover,the study finds little evidence on the diffusion within societies,given their similar trends across different sociodemographic groups.From an ideational perspective,China's Mainland and the other three East Asian societies illustrated different patterns of attitude changes regarding marriage and family.From a behavioral perspective,trends in attitudes do not always align with demographic patterns at the macro level,especially in China's Mainland.More studies are needed to understand the nuanced differences in ideational shifts between societies and the relationship between ideational and behavioral changes in East Asia.

Trends in premarital pregnancy among Chinese women

Consequent to the spread of liberalism,individualism and sexual liberation,premarital pregnancy is gradually becoming more common in China.Data from a national reproductive history review reveal that more than 20%of Chinese women born since 1957 have experienced a premarital pregnancy,and that such pregnancies occur more frequently in younger cohorts.Although data from the second demographic transition in the West would lead us to conclude otherwise,an overwhelming majority of premarital pregnancies in China have translated into marriages.Compared with the OECD countries,China is one of several countries with a very low outof-wedlock birth rate.Premarital pregnancy points to a separation between sex and marriage,whilst the high rate of births within marriage is reflective of a strong bond between marriage and childbearing.The partial loosening of the"sex-marriagechildbearing"linkage not only lays bare the strong influence of values such as individualism,but also illustrates the exceptional resilience of China's"family"culture that continues to compel people to maintain the inherent link between childbearing and marriage.Pregnancy may occur before marriage,but childbearing is only allowed within marriage.Premarital cohabitation and premarital pregnancy mark a preparatory or transitional stage rather than alternatives to marriage and childbearing.When considering how to deal with marriage,pregnancy,and childbearing,the choices Chinese women make are informed by both the second demographic transition and China's traditional family values.