senheiser
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Eastern Europe Is Facing A Rapidly Worsening Demographic Crisis - Forbes
To the extent that people ever write anything about demography in Eastern Europe, they tend to write things like the following:
I really don’t understand why, but there’s an overwhelming assumption among most people that if a country (like Russia) is suffering a demographic crisis then it must be some kind of divine punishment for the sins of its government. The solution, in this understanding, must always and everywhere be liberal political and economic reform: only by giving people the freedom to decide for themselves will they believe in the future, take care of themselves, and raise children.
If this were true, if there was any kind of causal relationship between political and economic liberalism and demographic stability, then you would expect to see improved performance among those post-communist countries that have already joined the EU. Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Croatia, Latvia, Lithuania, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and Slovakia: all of these countries have made far more progress than Russia in building democratic and accountable governments and flexible and open economies. Are these other governments perfect? No, of course not. But on purely objective terms they are much more responsive than Russia’s, and all of the comparative “democracy rankings” reflect as much.
The problem is that the real-world demographic performance of these countries has been far worse than Russia’s over the past several decades. Since 1994 the new members of the EU, the ten countries listed in the above paragraph, have collectively lost about 5.5% of their populations. Russia, in contrast, has lost about 3.2%. What is particularly relevant for this discussion is that the most dramatic change in performance between the two groups has happened since 2008. That is to say precisely as Russia’s government has become more repressive it started to perform better than the other post-communist countries in Europe.
And this isn’t some strange one-off occurrence or a meaningless bit of statistical noise. When you look at the total fertility rate, which is the single most important predictor of future population movement, you can see that Russia is likely to outperform the new EU members long into the future:
As serious as Russia’s demographic challenges are (and they are very, very serious!) they are far less serious than those facing all of the other post-communist countries in Eastern Europe. Russia’s population is currently growing, not shrinking, and its total fertility rate has been on a more than decade long upswing. It is possible, if a bit unlikely, that it could experience immigration-driven population growth for the next 15 to 20 years. The new EU members, in contrast, have been on a downward path since 1994, a trajectory that has deteriorated sharply since the onset of the global financial crisis. Given the headlines out of the region, this downward slump seems likely to continue for quite awhile.
Looking at the numbers, it’s really hard to see any relationship whatsoever between countries that have “reclaimed some of their ability to hope” and actual improvements in population trends. Indeed several of the countries that were most aggressive in confronting the crimes of communism, particularly the Baltics, are today the very worst demographic performers.
None of this means that autocracy is good or that countries that want to improve their demographic outlook should become more like Putin’s Russia. What it does suggest is that the struggle to make Russia a more open, democratic, and accountable place, a struggle which I support, will have no influence whatsoever on its population dynamics: other countries that have made vastly more progress in political reform are much worse off demographically. Demography isn’t some kind of “reward” that a country gets for good behavior, it’s a very complicated process that has little to do with high politics and a lot to do with unexciting things like unemployment, wage growth, and housing policy.
I hope that Russia becomes more democratic, but if it does there’s no reason to expect that this will have any impact on its long-term population trends.
To the extent that people ever write anything about demography in Eastern Europe, they tend to write things like the following:
I really don’t understand why, but there’s an overwhelming assumption among most people that if a country (like Russia) is suffering a demographic crisis then it must be some kind of divine punishment for the sins of its government. The solution, in this understanding, must always and everywhere be liberal political and economic reform: only by giving people the freedom to decide for themselves will they believe in the future, take care of themselves, and raise children.
If this were true, if there was any kind of causal relationship between political and economic liberalism and demographic stability, then you would expect to see improved performance among those post-communist countries that have already joined the EU. Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Croatia, Latvia, Lithuania, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and Slovakia: all of these countries have made far more progress than Russia in building democratic and accountable governments and flexible and open economies. Are these other governments perfect? No, of course not. But on purely objective terms they are much more responsive than Russia’s, and all of the comparative “democracy rankings” reflect as much.
The problem is that the real-world demographic performance of these countries has been far worse than Russia’s over the past several decades. Since 1994 the new members of the EU, the ten countries listed in the above paragraph, have collectively lost about 5.5% of their populations. Russia, in contrast, has lost about 3.2%. What is particularly relevant for this discussion is that the most dramatic change in performance between the two groups has happened since 2008. That is to say precisely as Russia’s government has become more repressive it started to perform better than the other post-communist countries in Europe.
And this isn’t some strange one-off occurrence or a meaningless bit of statistical noise. When you look at the total fertility rate, which is the single most important predictor of future population movement, you can see that Russia is likely to outperform the new EU members long into the future:
As serious as Russia’s demographic challenges are (and they are very, very serious!) they are far less serious than those facing all of the other post-communist countries in Eastern Europe. Russia’s population is currently growing, not shrinking, and its total fertility rate has been on a more than decade long upswing. It is possible, if a bit unlikely, that it could experience immigration-driven population growth for the next 15 to 20 years. The new EU members, in contrast, have been on a downward path since 1994, a trajectory that has deteriorated sharply since the onset of the global financial crisis. Given the headlines out of the region, this downward slump seems likely to continue for quite awhile.
Looking at the numbers, it’s really hard to see any relationship whatsoever between countries that have “reclaimed some of their ability to hope” and actual improvements in population trends. Indeed several of the countries that were most aggressive in confronting the crimes of communism, particularly the Baltics, are today the very worst demographic performers.
None of this means that autocracy is good or that countries that want to improve their demographic outlook should become more like Putin’s Russia. What it does suggest is that the struggle to make Russia a more open, democratic, and accountable place, a struggle which I support, will have no influence whatsoever on its population dynamics: other countries that have made vastly more progress in political reform are much worse off demographically. Demography isn’t some kind of “reward” that a country gets for good behavior, it’s a very complicated process that has little to do with high politics and a lot to do with unexciting things like unemployment, wage growth, and housing policy.
I hope that Russia becomes more democratic, but if it does there’s no reason to expect that this will have any impact on its long-term population trends.
