The Culture That Influences Demography
We think about globalization as a process of convergence. We see the spread of global change and we tend to think that we are becoming similar to each other. It may be the opposite: behaviors are influenced also by peculiar institutional quality and social traits. In his ERC-awarded project Institutional Family Demography, hosted by Dondena Centre for Research on Social Dynamics and Public Policy, Arnstein Aassve (Department of Policy Analysis and Public Management) uses this perspective to explain demographic trends as the result of the interaction between global change and local cultural and institutional features, whilst the existing literature stresses the importance of the policies observed across countries.
"Let's consider for instance the differences in fertility levels between Northern and Southern Europe. These countries are subjected to the same changes occurring at a global level, but the Anglo-Saxon and Nordic countries have been quicker to adapt their policies to the shift in the preferences of higher-educated women who want to have both children and a successful career. My hypothesis is that they were able to do it because of their long-standing cultural features and the impact of these traits on institutions".
Aassve, who was already awarded with an ERC grant in 2007 for Consequences of Demographic Change, will measure the historically persistent cultural traits by using existing data and by performing text analysis of digitalized newspapers, books, and historical records. "The most challenging activity will be the creation of a dataset to quantify cultural attitudes in historical perspective".
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