Women's equality, demography, and public policies

Rather than assuming (as so many demographers and feminists have done) that promoting women's equality and elevating birth-rates is incompatible, Alena Heitlinger argues that there is no inherently antagonistic relationship of this sort, and that there may be mutually compatible pronatal and gender-equality policies. Based on comparative data from Canada, Australia, Britain and, to a more limited extent, the USA, her study examines the impact of major international instruments promoting women's equality, and national similarities and differences in women's policy machinery, provision for maternity and childcare, fiscal assistance for families with children, and the costs and benefits of fertility-related measures vis-a-vis immigration-related measures. The author concludes that broadly conceived measures to achieve equal opportunity can provide a new, quite powerful justification for policies which in other contexts may be called pronatalist. For the most part, pronatalist intent has been non-existent, but the potential for higher fertility is significant.