The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)

The Second Demographic Transition in Asia?
Comparative Analysis of the Low Fertility Situation in East and South-East
Asian Countries

Makoto AtohVasantha Kandiah
Serguey Ivanov

Introduction
In the latter half of the 20th century, the world
population increased unprecedentedly in large part by the
population explosion in the developing region. Such
population explosion was caused by widening gap between the rapid mortality decline and the persistence ofhigh fertility. When and how fast fertility in the developing region would decline and whether policy intervention is necessary and effective for fertility reduction in
the developing region have been one of the keenest andthe most urgent interests related to population-development-environment issues in postwar years in the world.
Fertility transition, that is, fertility decline from ahigh level to a low level, usually to the replacement level,
occurred first in the Western Europe between around the
middle of the 19th century and the middle of the 20th
century and spread to Southern and Eastern Europe. Japan became the first country which showed just afterWorld War‡U that fertility transition was possible in nonWestern societies. Fertility decline has spread, first, tocountries in Asia neighboring Japan and some countries
in Latin America, and fertility has started to decline subsequently in the whole developing region including already even a part of sub-Sahara Africa. Fertility decline
became “not an exception, but a norm” (Cleland, 1996)
in the world. Especially in East and South-East Asia
(ESEA), seven countries and areas, including Japan, havealready completed fertility transition, by which the pattern of fertility transition has been diversified from thesingle Western model.
In the 1970s when fertility decline toward the replacement level had started or continued in the developing regions, fertility in the Western societies started to
decline below the replacement level. Below-replacement
fertility has continued in this region up to now alreadyfor a quarter of a century, and it spread rapidly to Eastern
European countries and the former Soviet Union since
they began to change their economic system in around1990. Some demographers called such long-lasting andwidening fertility decline below the replacement level
which was accompanied by changes in reproductive values, norms and behavior in general as “the second demographic transition”(Van de Kaa, 1987 and 1999;
Lesthaeghe, 1999). It still remains to be seen whether theidea of the second demographic transition has such universal applicability outside the European region as thefirst demographic transition theory. But most of the countries and areas in ESEA that had already completed fertility transition also continued or resumed fertility decline
below replacement level.
In this article, seven countries and areas in ESEA,
that is Japan, Singapore, Hong Kong, (South) Korea,
Thailand, China and Taiwan, which have different cultural background from the Western societies, will be examined with respect to trends in fertility, their demographic determinants, their social and economic background and their relation to the traditional family system, focusing on their comparison between the period of
fertility transition and that of below-replacement fertility.

1. Fertility Transition and Below Replacement Fertility in ESEA
1-1.Change in the period total fertility rate (TFR)
It was Japan that had experienced the first fertility
transition in ESEA. The TFR in Japan declined from 5.1
to 4.1 between 1925 and 1940, resumed its decline again
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The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)
from 4.3 in 1949 and reached 2.0, around replacementlevel (RL), in 1957. The speed of her fertility transition
was -0.10 births per woman per year for the prewar period, but it was -0.29 per year for the postwar period.
Although the TFR in Japan was stable at around RL between 1957 and 1973, it began to decline again in 1974
below RL by the speed of -0.31 per year and reached1.34 in 1999 (Figure 1).
Six other countries or areas in ESEA, that havealready completed fertility transition, started to decrease
their fertility, sooner or later, since the end of the 1950s
just after Japan had completed its transition, from somewhat higher levels than Japanese pre-transitional levels.
The TFRs in Singapore and Taiwan were still 5.8 in 1960,
though it had already started to gradually decline from
more than 6.0 in the 1950s. The TFRs in Korea, China,
and Thailand were around 6.0 in 1960, when they had
not yet started their transition. The TFR in Hong Kong in
1960 was 5.2, close to the pre-transitional level of Japan.
It is in 1975 that the TFR in Singapore reached
RL(Saw, 1986). The speed of its decline between 1960
and 1975 was -0.25 births per woman per year, comparable to the speed of postwar transition in Japan. Although
Hong Kong started its fertility decline later than Taiwan,
her TFR reached RL in 1979 by the speed of -0.16 peryear between 1960 and 1979. The TFRs in Taiwan and
Korea reached RL in 1983 and 1984 (Gendell, 1989;
Freedman et al., 1994) with the speed of -0.16 per year
and -0.18 per year respectively. Thailand and China started
fertility transition during the 1970s and presumably completed it by the early 1990s (Yu,1999; Hischman, 1994;
Knodel et al.,1996). The speed of fertility decline was 0.23 per year between 1975 and 1990 and -0.20 per year
between 1970 and 1990 respectively.
The speed of fertility transition in these six countries or areas surpassed not only that in the Western societies, around -0.1 of TFR per year between 1880 and 1930,
but also that of the prewar transition in Japan. Specifically, fertility in Singapore, Thailand and China declined
at the speed comparable to the postwar rapid decline inJapan.
Unlike Japan, the TFRs in five countries and areas in ESEA uninterruptedly declined after they reached
RL. The TFR in Singapore decreased to 1.59 in 1983,
but it increased thereafter and reached 1.70 in 1996 (Yap,
2000). The TFR in Hong Kong continued to decline andreached all-time low, 0.9 in 1998 and the TFR in Taiwan
declined continuously up to 1.72 in 1992. Although the

TFR in Korea had been around 1.7 since the middle ofthe 1980s, it plunged into 1.48 in 1998(Cho, 2000). The
TFR in China is estimated to have kept about 1.8 in the
1990s. Only Thailand has supposedly maintained RL of
fertility in the 1990s (Ruffolo, 2000).
In sum, all the countries and areas that have completed their fertility transition in ESEA, except Thailand,
experienced below-replacement fertility for a period of
ten to twenty-six years and seemed to enter the second
demographic transition comparable to the Western societies.
1-2.Age patterns of childbearing
Fertility decline to the replacement level occurredat all ages of women of reproductive years (Table 1). As
for Japan, the forerunner of fertility transition in ESEA,
the age-specific fertility rates (ASFR) of women over 30(ASFR 30+) declined much more than that of women
under 30 during the whole period of transition. Divided
into prewar and postwar stages, while fertility declined
almost equally in all ages for the prewar years, ASFR30+
decline occupied much larger share during the postwar
years. Similar to the postwar Japan and the Western societies, the decline in ASFR 30+ contributed to fertility transition, much more considerably than the fertility decline
in younger age groups, in Taiwan, China, Korea, andThailand. But in the case of Singapore and Hong Kong,
ASFR declined equally at all ages, similar to the case of
the prewar Japan.
Fertility decline in young age groups happened
because the age at first birth rose and the second birthinterval widened. For instance, an outstanding postponement of the first and the second birth happened in Hong
Kong and Singapore where the mean age at first birthincreased from 24.4-25.1 years in the late 1960s to 28.128.3 years in 1998, and the second birth interval widened by 1.1-1.2 year (Figure 2). Notwithstanding, sincefertility decline at older ages outweighed the effect ofthat at younger ages, the age pattern of childbearing became younger at replacement level than it has been before the onset of fertility transition.
Further fertility decline below replacement level
shifted towards younger ages, and the decline of
ASFR30+ decelerated in China and Thailand, and reversed in Japan, Singapore and Korea (In this respect
Hong Kong was an exception as ASFR kept declining
steadily in all groups, resulting in a TFR of 0.9 children
per woman). This shift suggests an operational tempo

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The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)
transitional years for China.) The celibacy rate, measured
by the proportion never-married among 45-49 year olds,
before fertility transition was very low, between 0.1 percent (Korea) and 5.7 percent (Singapore), except in Hong
Kong where an exceptionally high percentage (7.4 percent of 45-49 year olds) remained celibate (Table 3).
Although the marriage pattern hardly changed in
the Western European countries when they experienced
fertility transition (Coale, 1969; Coale et al., 1986), itchanged considerably and contributed to the fertility transition in ESEA countries or areas. The SMAM for sevencountries or areas in ESEA increased by 1.5 years (Thailand) to 5.9 years (Singapore), except in China where thedata are limited. Such a large increase in SMAM wascaused mainly by the rise in the proportion never married for women in their 20s. Meanwhile, the celibacy ratein ESEA rather decreased somewhat, except in Thailand
and China.

effect or “recuperation” (Lestheaghe et al., 2000) similar
to what is happening in most of the West and apparently
is being set in motion in Eastern Europe. Aging of fertility already occurred in Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore andsupposedly Taiwan and just started in Korea and Thailand. Aging of fertility is manifested in increasing average age at childbearing, age at first birth and share of
total fertility contributed by older women.
Trends in the difference between period total fertility rates and period average birth order (TFR-ABO)(Figure 3) reveal more about the changes in the age pattern of fertility. During the first stage of the fertility transition childbearing was first rejuvenating in all ESEA
countries (positive TFR-ABO values). Subsequently, therejuvenation subsided. Approximately when TFR reached
the replacement level, TFR-ABO became negative - similarly to what happened in most European countries. At
below replacement level, the negative values of TFRABO continued to increase (with transitory reversals inJapan and Singapore), suggesting aging and “compressing” of childbearing.
However, low-fertility countries currently still differ by age patterns of fertility (Figure 4). Western Europe, Japan, Hong Kong and Singapore have old fertility
schedules, where births to mothers older than 29 years
contribute 46-49 per cent of TFR, and the age groups 2529 and 30-34 have the highest ASFR. The United States,
Korea and Thailand are characterized by an intermediate
pattern with 31-32 per cent of TFR contributed by mothers in their 30s and 40s, and maximum ASFR in the agegroups 20-24 and 25-29. Fertility in China and Eastern
Europe is still young: women in their late teens and 20s
contribute 79-83 per cent of TFR.

In the Western societies, marriage changed toward
an earlier and more universal pattern after the completion of the fertility transition, which became the primecause of the postwar baby boom (Bongoarts et al., 1998).
Since the 1960s, however, marriage age rose considerably in the Western societies. The postponement of marriage characterizing the period of below replacement fertility there has been closely connected with the spread of
cohabitation among the young population (Council of Europe, 1999). Since extra-marital births increased in many
Western countries following the prevalence of cohabitation, marriage delay was not necessarily a direct cause of
the rise in childbearing ages. But in other Western countries, such as Southern European countries, where neither cohabitation nor extra-marital births increased much,the postponement of marriage directly caused the postponement of childbearing, leading to a considerable decline in TFR.
In the seven countries or areas in ESEA considered in this paper, marriage delay continued into the period of below replacement fertility. SMAM increased by
3.2 years between 1975 and 1995 for Japan, by 3.3 years
between 1981 and 1996 for Hong Kong, by 1.4 years
between 1980 and 1995 for Korea. SMAM increased also
for other countries in ESEA, save China where the data
are limited. The rise in SMAM in this period in Japan,
Hong Kong and Singapore, also in Taiwan though thedata are limited, was brought about mainly by the rise in
the proportion never married for women aged 25 to 34(Tsuya, 1991). In these three countries the celibacy rate

1-3.Change in nuptiality
Two demographic factors have been conducive tofertility decline at all ages in ESEA countries or areas:
One is changes in marriage behavior and the other ischanges in marital fertility.
Unlike the Western societies characterized by laterand fewer marriages before fertility transition (Hajnal,1965), the marriage pattern before fertility transition in
ESEA countries or areas was characterized by early anduniversal marriage. The singulate mean age at marriage(SMAM) before fertility transition was 21 years old forJapan (1920), 20-21 for Korea (1960), Singapore (1957)
and Taiwan (1960), 22 for Thailand (1960) and Hong
Kong (1961) (Table 2). (Data are not available for pre-44

The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)
ders (Figure 7) plummeted, closely reflecting trends of
TFR. For instance, in the 1960s period fertility rates forbirth orders 3 and higher were as high as 2.0 children per
woman in Hong Kong, 2.4 in Singapore and 3.1 in Thailand. Currently, period fertility rates for birth orders 3
and higher range from 0.1 children per woman in Hong
Kong (one of the lowest levels in the world) to 0.3 children per woman in Singapore and Thailand, which iswithin the range of most European countries and much
lower than in Iceland, Ireland and the United States (0.50.6 children per woman).
Childlessness is a rare phenomenon in China,
Korea, Singapore and Thailand; its incidence was somewhat higher (and similar to that in the European countries) among women born at the turn of the century inJapan and Hong Kong (Figure 8), but it decreased in thesubsequent cohorts up to those born in the 1930s. Since
then it is increasing in Hong Kong and Singapore. Anyway, the current incidence of childlessness in the regionis still low (and similar to that in the former Soviet Union)
and its role in the fertility decline was minor or nil.
Fertility transition resulted in dramatic changes inthe structure of female cohorts by the number of children
ever born (Table 4). In the last pre-transitional cohorts,from 5 to 9 per cent of ever-married women had one child,from 5 to 11 per cent had two children and from 74 percent (Japan and Hong Kong) to 81-88 per cent (China,
Thailand and Singapore) had three children or more.
Among ever-married women born from the early 1940s
to the early 1950s, from 5 per cent (Thailand) to 18 percent (China) had one child, from 26 per cent (Hong Kong)
to 50 per cent (Korea) had two children, and from 30 per
cent (Japan) to 80 per cent (Thailand) had three children
or more. Thus, there were striking decreases of the proportions of large families in all ESEA countries save Thailand where 80 per cent of women born in 1941-1945 the last cohort for which data are available — had morethan two children.
However, the cohorts that have completed childbearing most recently are characterized by substantial
structural differences across ESEA countries. These differences may result from three factors: (a) the compared
cohorts lived though different stages of fertility transition (e.g., in Thailand the cohort born in 1941-45 -thelast for which the data are available - experienced only
the beginning of the transition); (b) there were countryspecific features of the transition (such as one-child population policy in China); and (c) the reference periods ofhas been increasing somewhat in this period in contrast
to the transition period. Since marital fertility has hardly
changed and only a delay in marriage has happened inthis period in seven countries or areas in ESEA, the latteris estimated to be the prime cause of TFR decline below
replacement level.
1-4.Changes in marital fertility and its distribution
by birth order
The essence of change in marital fertility can be
captured by looking at the number of children ever bornfor completed families (CEB). In the Western Europe,
CEB decreased from about 5.0 children on average forthe cohort of ever-married women born in around the beginning of the 19th century to about 2.5 children on average for that born at the beginning of the 20th century,and it continued to decrease up to about 2.0 children (Figure 5).
In most ESEA countries, women born at the beginning of the 20th century had twice as many children as
Western Europeans of similar generations: in Japan, CEB
was 4.5-5.0, and in Korea, Thailand and Singapore 5.56.0. Hong Kong’s fertility was exceptionally low (for theregion) with CEB at the European level. Then, Japan became the forerunner of fertility transition in Asia and thedecline there was faster than in Europe: CEB was decreasing, on average, by 0.1 child for every successive
cohort born between 1905 and 1935. Following Japan,
CEB for completed families started to decline in other
ESEA countries from about 5 to 6 children for cohorts
born around 1925 to about 2.2 children (Singapore) - 2.5
children (China) for cohorts born around 1955.
After reaching 2.2 children on average for thecohorts born around 1935, CEB in Japan kept at almost
the same level for successive cohorts (NIPSSR,1998a).
In ESEA countries, including Japan, it is still guesswork
whether or not CEB for completed families would decline for those birth cohorts who reached the prime childbearing ages after the TFR sank below replacement level.
The essence of fertility transition consists of ashrinking number of large families and increasing shareof women with one to three children. In China, Japan,
Korea, Hong Kong and Singapore the share of womenwith four children or more in the cohorts with completedchildbearing collapsed from 60 per cent and more to just
8-17 per cent (Figure 6), perfectly mirroring the trends in
CEB of these cohorts (Figure 5).
Similarly, period fertility rates for high birth or-

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The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)
accompanying economic growth, the so-called effect ofmodernization(Notestein, 1945; Leibenstein, 1957;
Bulatao et al., 1983). Economic and social development,
it was hypothesized had to reach a certain threshold(United Nations, 1965) before fertility would start to decline. On the other hand, most governments of developing countries have, more or less, intervened to influence
fertility trends in the postwar years by family planning
programs, through which the conditions of the “supply”
of children have been changed so as to reduce unwanted
births (Easterlin, 1985).
At the onset of the fertility transition in the six
ESEA countries, indicators of socio-economic development were similar for some but quite diverse for others.
In the six countries, fertility started to decline at 1000 to1500 US dollars of GDP per capita (1985 basis) except
China (at 700 US dollars) (Figure 9) and at almost 100
percent level of primary school enrollment ratios and,though the data are limited, at similar levels of secondary
school enrollment ratios. However, the degree of urbanization ranged from 15 percent (Thailand) to 100 percent(Singapore), and infant mortality and life expectancy
ranged from 32 per thousand births (Singapore) to 166(Japan) and 42 years (Japan) to 66 years (Hong Kong)
respectively. The data on industrialization are limited,
but the proportion of workers engaged in primary industry presumably varied considerably at the onset of transition among these countries from less than 10 percent in
the two city-nations of Singapore and Hong Kong toaround 80 percent in China. Judging from those data,
while we could say that fertility transition started at certain levels of living and with the universality of the primary education, we do not find any such thresholds forother indicators of development in ESEA.
Although the timing of fertility transition and thelevel of development at which transition occurred differed among six countries in ESEA, economic growthand its accompanying social changes continued in the
period of fertility transition. GDP per capita increased
between the year of the onset and the end of fertility transition by 2.7 times for Japan, by 4.3 times for Korea, by
3.3 times for Hong Kong, by 3.2 times for Singapore (Figure 9). It increased also for China and Thailand by 1.9
times and 1.6 times respectively. The level of industrialization and urbanization became higher in those countries in ESEA except the two city-nations where urbanization had reached the maximum, IMR declined and life
expectancy lengthened and enrollment ratios for second-

the most recent estimates are 10 years apart (1980 and1981 censuses in Thailand and Hong Kong as opposed
to 1990 censuses in China, Korea and Singapore).
1-5.Decomposition analysis of fertility decline
It has been already mentioned that in ESEA countries or areas fertility transition was brought about by the
decline in marital fertility as well as by the postponement of marriage and that fertility decline below replacement level seemed to be caused mainly by the postponement of marriage. But can we measure to what extent
these two demographic factors are related to TFR decline
in both the period of fertility transition and the period of
below replacement fertility? For clarifying the relative
effect of the change in proportion currently married andthe change in marital fertility, decomposition method by
Cho and Retherford has been applied to the TFR decline
in both periods for seven countries and areas (Cho et al.,1973). Unlike the European countries where cohabitation and extra-marital births have increased considerably
since the 1960s, decomposition analysis is still very effective for analyzing TFR changes in ESEA countries
where cohabitation is rare and extra-marital births are
exceptional. The results are shown in Table 5.
According to Table 5, for the period of fertility
transition, the decline of marital fertility was the major
factor for the TFR decline, but the decline of the proportion married (or the postponement of marriage) contributed to it to a certain extent in ESEA countries or areas,
except Thailand and China where the effect of marriagechange was negligible or rather fertility-raising. In contrast, for the period of below replacement fertility, thechange of marital fertility was rather positive (in Japan,
Singapore and Korea) or negligible (in Taiwan) and thedecline of the proportion married (or the postponementof marriage) was the sole determinant of the TFR decline, except Hong Kong where the two factors wereequally responsible for the TFR decline.

2. Social and Economic Background of
Fertility Decline
2-1.Modernization and family planning programs
According to demographic transition theories andthe more recent economic theories of fertility, fertility
transition is brought about by the decline of the “demand”
for children due to economic and social development

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The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)
ary school rose in all of them.
By the end of transition, GDP per capita had increased by over 2500 US dollars save China (1300 US
dollars), IMR decreased to below 50, between 48 (China)
and 12 (Singapore), and life expectancy reached around70 years, between 68 (Japan) and 75 (Hong Kong). From
this we could say that the conspicuous rise in survival
rates of children was a necessary condition for fertility
transition in ESEA. The proportion of non-agrarian workers and city-dwellers increased in four countries in ESEA.
Whereas Japan and Korea was transformed into an urban, industrial society (two thirds became non-agrarian
workers and urban dwellers), China and Thailand still
remained a rural agrarian society when they completed
their transitions (two third remained agrarian workers andrural dwellers) (Table 6).
Did the social and economic developments described above change the demand for children in ESEA?
As for Japan, there had been scarce data on family size
preference in the prewar and in the postwar transition
periods. According to a series of surveys on family planning which were undertaken between 1950 and 1967
covering postwar transition period, the proportion of
married women aged less than 50 responding negatively
to the question “ Do you rely your sons or daughters foryour living for your old ages?” increased from 18 percent to 48 percent, which might imply the decline in demand for children (PPRC, 2000). In Japan, there has
been little change in the mean ideal number of children
at around 2.6, with three children as the majority, nor in
the total intended number of children at around 2.2,with
two children as the majority, since 1977 when the data
were available for the first time (NIPSSR, 1998a).
In some other countries or areas in ESEA, there
were series of surveys on family size preference during
the period of their fertility transition. Those surveys
showed that the total desired number of children declined
from 4.0 (in 1965) to 2.6 (in 1985) in Taiwan (Freedman
et al., 1994), from 3.9 (in 1967) to 2.0 (in 1985) in Korea(Gendell, 1989) and from 2.8 (in 1975) to 2.0 (in 1987)
in Thailand (Knodel et al., 1989). The mean ideal number of children also decreased from 3.9 (1967) to 2.0(1985) in Korea and from 3.8 (in 1972/73) to 2.7 (in 1987)
in Thailand. These data suggest that the demand for children clearly declined in ESEA in the period of transition
because of economic growth accompanied, especially, by
the expansion of educational opportunities and the improvement of children’s health.

The Japanese government only indirectly contributed to the prevalence of family planning during the transition period. In the prewar period the pro-natalist government banned induced abortion very strictly and intervened sometimes against the birth control movement by
non-governmental organizations and activists (Kubo,
1997). The postwar rapid transition was brought about
directly by the increase of induced abortion that became
easier to have by its legalization in 1948 and the successive revisions of its law which were proposed by someparliamentarians. The government started to support family planning initiatives by NGOs in the late 1950s partly
for the purpose of reducing induced abortion.
As for Hong Kong, although the government had
not been directly involved in family planning programs,
the activities of such NGOs as the Family Planning Association had continued since the 1950s. Its activities
have contributed much to the prevalence of modern contraceptives (Chan, 1976; Wat et al., 1972).
In the other five countries or areas in ESEA, contraceptive practice prevailed through strong family planning programs under anti-natalist policies of their governments. The years when the governments of Singapore,
Taiwan and Korea began family planning programs werein 1966, 1964 and 1962 (Palen, 1986; Freedman. et al.,
1994; Cho, 2000) but fertility had already started to decline before those years. Because of this fact we might
say that fertility transition occurred in these three countries or areas without their governments’ intervention, if
only very gradually, but their strong family planning programs, together with some incentive-disincentive programs, were conducive to accelerating fertility decline
through directly affecting marital fertility.
It was in 1973 and 1970 that the governments ofChina and Thailand began their family planning programs
respectively (Jiang et al., 2000; Guest et al., 1996). Although their policy stances are evaluated to be in contrast, a directive one in China and a voluntary one in Thailand, they have in common the fact that fertility would
not have declined as fast given their levels of development, unless their governments had undertaken suchstrong family planning programs.
Contraceptive prevalence were at very high levels, from 68 percent in Thailand to 83 percent in China(among the highest in the world), by the completion offertility transition, in all the countries or areas in ESEA,
except Japan, where prevalence was a little more than 40
percent in 1959 (PPRC, 2000). The effectiveness of con-47

The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)(3) Decreasing children’s utility and increasing
childcare cost in a highly industrialized and urbanizedsociety.
(4) The increasing difficulties of combining work andchildcare or increasing in opportunity cost of childcare
due to increased women’s labor force participation.
How are these viewpoints applicable to the caseof below replacements fertility in ESEA? First, unlike
the Western societies, changes in fertility control behavior were conspicuous in the first fertility transition in
ESEA. The use of effective modern contraceptives
reached almost saturation levels during that period in
ESEA save Japan, so that further changes in contraceptive prevalence have been limited as is seen Table 7. Thus,
the level of unwanted births became so low that changes
in the timing of marriage and childbearing have come tobe the most important factor affecting the trend in the
period TFR. It is often said that “the pill liberated women”

traception is estimated to be very high in these six countries or areas because the share of modern contraceptive
methods such as sterilization, the pill and injection, and
IUD made up 59 percent of total use in Singapore to 97
percent in China (United Nations, 1999). Japan was again
the exception in her disproportionately greater use of thecondom and the rhythm method (Table 7).
In addition to the use of the modern contraceptive
methods, there has been high possibility that induced
abortion contributed to fertility reduction in these countries or areas, let alone Japan, since its use as a fertility
regulation method was accepted tolerantly there even if
it was not legalized for the birth control purposes(Muramatsu, 1971; Gendell, 1989).
In sum, in the countries or areas in ESEA, almost
all married couples could achieve the number of children
they wanted to have or, in other words, they could avoid
any unwanted births by the end of transition because of
the universal prevalence of effective means of contraception and the easy availability of abortion. Its important implication for the subsequent period is that the main
determinant of fertility became the timing and frequency
of marriage and family size preference among married
couples.

in the Western societies or, in other words, the easy availability of the modern female-oriented contraceptives
helped to promote changes in women’s social and economic role and status (Ermish, 1991). It remains to be
seen whether this hypothesis is applicable to situations
in ESEA.
Second, cohabitation and extra-marital fertility
have hardly increased in ESEA: For example, in Japan
only 1.7 % of unmarried women aged 18 to 34 reported
to be currently cohabiting in the 1997 survey (NIPSSR,
1998b) and the share of extra-marital births has increased
by only a fraction, from 0.8 percent of all births in 1975
to 1.6 percent in 1999. The latter figures are 2.7 percent
in Korea in 1983 and 5.9 percent in Hong Kong in 1998,
which are somewhat higher than those in Japan but much
lower than those in the Western societies. These facts
imply that marriage institution is still robust in ESEA.
But the divorce rate has been increasing continuously inall these countries during this period, like in the West.
Between 1985 and 1998 the divorce rate increased from1.39 to 1.94 in Japan, from 0.79 to 1.96 in Hong Kong,from 0.91 to 2.12 in Korea and from 0.82 to 1.39 in
Singapore.
Some have asserted that in the Western countries
there was ideational changes, such as from materialism
to post-materialism or secularization and individualism(Lesthaeghe et al., 1988; Van de Kaa, 1987), whichbrought about changes in reproductive norms and values
and in a revolution in marriage, but there has been only
scant evidence showing such ideational changes in ESEA,

2-2.Women’s emancipation and below replacement
fertility
As was seen before, the mean number of children
ever born for completed families has changed little since
it had decreased to just more than two children and family size preference has held at just more than two children on average in these countries in ESEA. The reason
TFR declined and remained below replacement level inat least five countries or areas in spite of this fact was theconspicuous rise in the proportion single in the prime reproductive ages, accompanied by the postponement ofmarriage and childbearing. What has brought about sucha large change in marriage behavior in ESEA?
As for social and economic background of fertility decline below replacement level since the 1970s in
the Western societies, there have been several viewpoints(Westoff, 1977 and 1983; Davis et al., 1987):(1) The decrease in un-timed or unwanted births dueto the prevalence of modern contraceptive methods
and the legalization of induced abortion.
(2) A dramatic change in marital behavior such as theincrease in cohabitation, extra-marital births and divorce, together with ideational changes.

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so far. For example, a series of opinion surveys in Japan
showed that there had been only slightly weakening of
religious mind and only a slight shift of value systemfrom collectivism to individualism in this post-transitional
period (Atoh, 1997b).
Third, all the ESEA countries have, indeed, experienced rising levels of living, industrialization (e.g. anincreasing share of work force in the secondary and tertiary industry) and an increasing proportion of employees in this period, but we cannot say that these changes
have entirely reduced children’s utility for their parents.
In all these countries or areas in ESEA except Japan, economic necessities of having children seem to be still strong
because their social security system has not been fully
developed and levels of personal assets are not enoughfor the general public. The robustness of two-children
family norm and the strength of son preference in someof these countries (Park et al., 1995) seem to support thisargument. In Japan, indeed, “investment values” of children for parents, e. g. “economically depending upon children in old ages”, have been depreciated continuously inthe postwar years and the central value of children forparents became their “consumption value, e.g. “having acheerful home with children” (Atoh, 1996). But children’svalue as providers of physical care in parents’ old ages isstill regarded as important.
On the other hand, it cannot be denied that thecost of childcare has increased in ESEA like in the Western societies. The rise in college enrollment ratios in allthese countries in ESEA reflect not only the societal needfor expanding a highly qualified labor force of these countries but also the rising aspiration of parents for their children to climb the social ladder, and it has clearly raised
education cost of children, including economic and psychological costs, for their parents. In Japan, the overwhelming majority of married women in the prime reproductive ages said that the main burden of bringing up
children was the economic cost of children and psychological stress caused by socialization and education ofchildren (Atoh, 1996).
The above three factors may have been, at leastindirectly, related to fertility decline below replacementlevel in ESEA, but the most direct and important factor
is the fourth one, that is women’s emancipation.
It goes without saying that in the period of fertility transition, girls as well as boys came to receive more
years of education and were more likely to be engaged in
employed work during the period of fertility transition in

all the ESEA countries, which was conducive to rising
proportion single and marriage delay. Also in this period, more and more women have entered into the secondary or higher education and taken jobs in the secondary and tertiary industries, in at least four countries in
ESEA.
First of all, the secondary school enrollment ratios increased, for both boys and girls. Ratios have reachedalmost 100 in Japan and Korea in 1996, about 70 in Hong
Kong and Singapore since 1990. The tertiary school enrollment ratios also increased both for men and women(Table 8). Although this ratio for women was below 20
in Japan and below 10 in three other countries in 1980 or
before, it increased to over 40 in Japan and over 30 inthree other countries in 1996. Furthermore, the relative
gender gap in enrollment ratios shrank for all four countries (It even reversed in Japan if two-year colleges were
included).
In Japan, the share of females among four-yearcollege graduates increased, with more women choosing
fields of study such as social sciences, natural sciences,or engineering rather than literature, education, arts andhome economics. The latter implies that a college diploma for women became an instrument for furthering
their occupational career in raising their wage potential
rather than as a good passport for a happy mate selection(Atoh, 1992).
Higher education for women is clearly connectedwith the postponement of marriage and in some caseswith higher celibacy rates. In Japan, data for 1980 and1990 show that more female college graduates tend to be
single at all ages compared with females with less education, in contrast with the fact that fewer male college
graduates are single at all ages compared with their lesseducated counterparts (Table 9). Similar patterns areobserved for Singapore (Table 10) and Taiwan (Freedman et al., 1994) in data for 1990. Celibacy rates werealso high for female college graduates. The proportionof female college graduates who were single at age 4044 in 1990 was 10 percent in Japan, 24 percent in
Singapore and about 18 percent in Taiwan.
Secondly, more women came to be engaged in
employed work in countries in ESEA. In the period of
below-replacement fertility, women’s labor force participation (WLFPR) increased for almost all age groups in
the four countries in ESEA (Figure 10~14). The exception is 15-24 age categories: WLFPR decreased considerably for these ages, because the prolonged education

49

The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)
needed for employment in the modern sector necessitatedthe postponement of entry into the labor market.
Despite increases in labor force participation inchildbearing ages, all these countries in ESEA save Thailand show a dip in WLFPR just after the peak childbearing age group, a pattern evident in many of the more developed countries. In these countries many women tend
to quit their jobs at the time they are needed for childcare.
When the children get older, women may or may not reenter the labor force. In the four countries in ESEA, maleand female participation rates are about equal until theage 25, after which the rates for females drop off whereas
those of males continue to increase. Among these four,
the levels of WLFPR at the age 30-34 in Japan, Korea
and Hong Kong in the 1990s are lower, about 50 percent,than those in Singapore, about 70 percent, which are close
to their male participation rates.
Thirdly, the proportion of working women in professional and technical occupations is increasing, reflecting rising college enrollment ratios. For example, in Japan it increased from 6.7 percent in 1975 to 14.3 percent
in 1995. Related to this, the wage differentials between
men and women shrank. Wage ratio of female to 100
male workers aged 25 to 29 in Japan increased from 67.7
in 1975 to 84.9 in 2000 (Atoh, 1999). The similar changes
were observed for Singapore and Taiwan (Cheung, 1990;
Chi, 1992)
Fourthly, women’s emancipation was encouraged
by various UN international conferences or conventions
on women’s issues, such as the Convention for Abolishing all Forms of Discrimination against Women. For example, in Japan this convention was ratified in1985, after when Equal Employment Opportunity Law took effect in 1986. The law prohibited employees to discriminate against women in terms of employment, promotion
and wages, which were potentially conducive to women’s
employment, especially the employment of four- year
college graduates.
Increasing female college graduates (and theshrinking gender gap among graduates), more and longer
female participation in labor market, increasing female
workers in professional or technical jobs with higher income and prestige, shrinking wage differentials by gender and the legal protection of gender equality in employment field, all led to changes in women’s social andeconomic achievements and status and thereby contributed to the decreasing merit of married life for womenand the postponement of marriage and childbearing in

ESEA. These developments also increased the difficulties combining work and childcare, which may have also
led to the lowering of the attraction of married life.
2-3.Family, Gender Equality and Fertility
Modernization has continued after fertility transition in ESEA: GDP per capita reached over 10,000 US
dollars in Japan, Hong Kong and Singapore (and probably in Taiwan) in the 1980s and in Korea in the 1990s.
These five countries and areas have become affluent, fully
industrialized and urbanized societies. The other two
countries, Thailand and China remain, by and large, agrarian and rural societies, though they are modernizing very
rapidly. In addition, women’s emancipation progressed
during and after the transition. More and more womenare college graduates, more work outside their home andwage differentials by gender have decreased.
These changes are wholly similar to those that
happened in the Western societies since the 1960s. The
issue then, is why do more educated and working womenin ESEA stay single longer and why do young people in
ESEA scarcely dare to cohabit and have extra-maritalbirths like their counterparts in the West? In order toanswer those questions we examine the traditional family system and women’s role and status in it.
All the countries and areas in ESEA studied in thispaper had, traditionally, a patrilineal and patrilocal family system, except Thailand that was characterized bymore flexibility in lineage and residence. Among the six
countries or areas only Japan and Korea had the stem
family system and the other four, the joint family system.
Under this system, either the stem or the joint, the malehead of the patrilineal family controlled all the family
properties and was generally the sole provider of economic support. An important concern of the traditionalfamily group was the begetting of a male heir to maintainthe continuation of the family lineage, to inherit the family property, and to perform ancestral rituals in the household and at the family grave. A woman, up on marriage,
had to leave her parental home and move to her husband’shouse (Pak, 1998). Under this system sons tended to beobedient to their fathers and wives were expected to beobedient to their husbands as well as their father ormother- in- law. Such patriarchal system was legitimatized by Confucianism that was cultural heritage of thesesocieties.
The family system is not invariable. As these countries or areas have modernized with continuous, rapid eco-50

The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)
nomic growth, the family system has but changed gradually. However, in the period when fertility transition occurred, the traditional family system was still dominant.
For example, in 1960 just after the end of fertility transition in Japan, the rate of newly-wed couples living with
their parents (mostly the husband’s) was about 60 percent and the percentage of elderly aged 65 or over coresident with the sons or daughters was 87 percent (Atoh,
1997a). Similarly the percentage co-resident of newlyweds with their parents in Taiwan was still 67 percent in1985 just after the transition, though it had declined from
92 percent in 1958 (Chi, 1992). The proportion co-resident must have been similarly high in Singapore and Hong
Kong at the end of the 1970s when they completed theirfertility transition, though the data are limited.
The assertion that the extended family is connectedwith high fertility (Davis et al., 1956) does not hold forthe cases of the countries in ESEA where there is evidence that the extended family type could coexist withthe small family accompanied by fertility transition(Freedman et al., 1994;).
Can the traditional, extended family coexist withthe replacement fertility in a modernized society where
women are more emancipated? In all the countries orareas in ESEA except the two city-nations, more and moreyoung people have left their parental home and migrated
from rural areas to urban centers where job opportunities
are abundant. They established nuclear-family households when they got married in cities. Parents’ households were nucleated after all their sons and daughtersleft. For example, in Japan the co-residence rate of newlyweds with their parents decreased by up to about 30 percent in the 1970s and then stabilized and the co-residence
rate of the elderly with their children continued to decrease by one percent per year to 56 percent in 1995 (Atoh,
1997a). The proportion of the sum of nuclear family
households and single households among the total number of households increased from 65 percent in 1960 to
84 percent in 1995 (Atoh, 2000a). Similar increases occurred in Korea; from 72 percent in 1970 to 80 percent in1995 (Pak, 1998) and probably in Taiwan and Hong Kong.
In the latter cases decreasing proportion of joint family
types was accompanied first by increasing stem family
types but eventually led to increasing nuclear family types(Chi, 1992; Wong, 1975).
Thus, indeed, families were nucleated in terms of
the household type. But does this mean “the emotional
nucleation of families” (Caldwell, 1982), too? For in-

stance, in Japan, it is true that the feeling of filial obligation has weakened, but still about half of married women
aged 50 responded positively the general idea that sonsor daughters should take care of their parents (PPRC,
2000). The weakness of emotional nucleation in Korea,
China and Taiwan is reflected in the persistence of son
preference in these countries (Park et al., 1995; Zeng,
1997). The sex ratio at birth, normally about 105, started
to rise in these three countries or areas around 1985, reaching 117 in Korea, 114 in China and 112 in Taiwan around1990. The ratios were even higher for births of higher
parity. Such a recent rise in the sex ratio at birth may beinterpreted as a reflection of desperate efforts by those
who want to secure boys for maintaining their family lineage with a newly available technique under conditionsof the national demand for limiting family size. It is alsoa reflection of the persistence of the traditional family
there.
Secondly, industrialization and urbanization promoted the separation of home and work place, but only
as long as such sex role division of husband as breadwinner and wife as homemaker continued was the traditionalfamily system compatible with replacement fertility (twochildren family) and parental care. As women have become more educated and more engaged in jobs out of
home, however, ideational changes related to women’ssocial and familial roles have occurred.
For example, in Japan, attitudes toward women’sroles changed dramatically. A series of opinion surveys
showed that the proportion of respondents, for twenty
years between the middle of the 1970s and the middle ofthe 1990s, agreeing with the opinion that women should
get married decreased from around 80 percent to about
40 percent both for men and women and that those supporting the opinion “Men work outside, and women keephome” decreased also from more than 80 percent for both
men and women to 66 percent for men and to 56 percent
for women. On the other hand, those agreeing that womenshould continue their job after their marriage and childbearing increased from 12 percent to 26 percent (Atoh,1997b). Those women who are more educated, who areliving in urban areas and who have jobs of higher prestige are more likely to support women’s emancipation(Kaneko, 1993).
A survey conducted in Korea revealed that thoseagreeing with the opinion “women should be involved inhousekeeping only” decreased from 25.7 percent for men
and 17.0 percent for women to 19.6 for men and 12.1 for

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The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)
women between 1991 and 1995, and instead those who
believed that women should work before marriage andafter maturity of children increased from 20-25 percent
to about one third (Pak, 1998).
Despite Japanese women’s greater involvement inwork out of the home and their attitudinal change towardegalitarianism by gender, men’s family role has notchanged significantly in those twenty years. According
to a series of time-use surveys, the average time husbands
spent for family matters increased only modestly from 6
minutes to 13 minutes on weekdays and from 34 minutes
to 56 minutes on Sundays between 1981 and 1996. They
also showed that working wives were always involved inboth work and family matters for longer hours than working husbands on weekdays as well as on Sundays (Atoh,2000a).
In this situation, more educated and more professional women would feel frustrated with such wife’s roles
as submission to husbands and taking care of husband’sparents as well as household chores and childcare thatare expected in the traditional family system. At the sametime, in an employee-centered society with the tendencyof the nucleation of households, working wives find it
more difficult to combine their work and family duties
they are assigned.
To cope with such issues related to working wives
or working mothers, several measures or strategies havebeen taken, explicitly or implicitly in ESEA countries.
The first strategy is the Japanese type reflected in
the M-shaped age profile of women’s labor force participation rates: that wives quit their jobs after marriage or
the first birth and resume them usually after children
reached school age. The biggest problem with this strategy from women’s point of view is that longer interruption of occupational career means less accumulation ofhuman capital. Furthermore, new jobs are often limited
to part-time jobs with low wage levels in such a society
as in Japan where lifetime employment is prevalent. In
this situation the opportunity cost of childbearing becomesvery high (EPA, 1998). From the macro point of view,
under this Japanese type strategy women’s labor supply,
especially in the prime childbearing age, tends to be limited.
The Korean type strategy is different from theJapanese one in that Korean women after quitting theirjobs at the time of marriage or the first birth are less likely
to return to the labor market. As part-time jobs are strictly
limited in Korean labor market, wives wanting to takejobs face a dilemma, taking either no work or a full-time
job with long working hours (Tsuya, 2000). This strategy seems to have the same but larger problems than theJapanese one.
The second strategy is the Taiwanese one in which,while young working couples fulfill their traditional filial duty by co-living with husband’s parents during theearly stage of married life, they can have help for childcare
and household chores from non-working mother-in-laws
and save money for acquiring their own house in the future (Chi et al., 1996). The problem with this strategy isthat they cannot necessarily find jobs in their parents’location and this strategy for childcare is impossible if
mother-in laws work out of home themselves (Freedman
et al., 1994).
The third strategy is one which is popular in
Singapore (and probably in Hong Kong) that co-working young couples, either living with their parents or not,hire maids for household chores and childcare (Cheung,1990). In order for this strategy to have general applicability, the labor cost of maids should be relatively cheap.
But in highly developed countries that have completed
their fertility transition, the supply of domestic labor becomes severely limited and expensive without cheap foreign labor. The employment of foreign maids may not be
an easy option for every country because of language
and cultural barriers.
The fourth strategy is the utilization of maternity
and parental leave and public or private childcare facilities. The availability, of course, depends upon the efforts
taken by governments and private companies. In mostof the countries or areas in ESEA, and especially in the
1990s in Japan, governments have made efforts tostrengthen family policies for coordinating the work-family dilemma, but those efforts are not sufficient yet (Atoh,2000a; Atoh, 2000b; Cheung, 1990).
The above strategies may have contributed to solve
the work-family dilemma to a certain extent. But the factthat the proportion single has been increasing in the prime
childbearing ages, especially among more educatedwomen, in at least five countries or areas in ESEA, showsthat those strategies have not fully met the needs of these
women. There seems to be another factor which has madewomen hesitant to get married and, as a result, hindered
compatibility of work and family, which is the patriarchal nature of gender relationships originating from thetraditional family system and Confucianism.
This factor, the persistence of the patriarchal gen-52

The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)
der relationship, may also explain partly why there has
been a very low incidence of cohabitation and extra-marital births in ESEA. Cohabitation is, on principle, based
upon free decisions by equal partners, therefore it cannot
be prevalent in a society with a patriarchal gender relationship because women may suffer from the limitationof their free decisions, e.g. having a baby or not, morethan men even in a cohabiting union. Another reason why
very few women choose to cohabit is also related to the
traditional family norm. For instance, about 85 percent
of working, single women aged 20-34 in Japan live attheir parent’s home (Atoh, 1998). Some Japanese sociologists call these young people “parasite singles” in asense that they enjoy higher levels of living with theirparents’ support (Yamada, 1999). But their behavior may
seem to be derived from the advantages of the parentschild relationship over the conjugal relationship in the
traditional extended family system or, in other words, theweakness of individualism derived from the emotional
nucleation of the family. The similar phenomenon is observed in Singapore, but is interpreted in a different way.
There, the unmarried daughters have displaced the married sons in the right to share the parental home, waiving
married son’s obligation to live with the parents. As aresult, the unmarried daughters came to have to bear agrater burden in the care of the parents, substituting therole traditionally performed by daughters-in-law (Cheung,1990).

First, fertility decline below replacement level has
occurred in ESEA almost entirely due to the rise in the
proportion single, implying the postponement of marriage.
Since cohabitation and extra-marital births has hardly
increased in ESEA, the postponement of marriage has
led directly to the delaying of childbearing. Based on
this observation, some have argued that the period TFR
underestimates the potential of the cohort completed fertility because at least some portion of delayed births will
be recuperated at the later stage of women’s life course,
usually at age 30s. The idea of “catching-up” has been
supported by the experiences in the 1980’s in some of
the Western countries. It has also been strengthened by
the application of new measures of TFR, such as TFR
based on parity progression ratios or TFR adjusted by
the tempo effect, to some of ESEA countries or areas(Feeney, 1986, 1987 and 1981: Sweet, 1996).
Indeed, the catching up of fertility at the later stage
due to “the aging of fertility” is occurring in Japan, Korea, and Singapore, but it was so limited and so modest
that it could not compensate for fertility decline at theearlier stage of reproductive life, usually at age 20s, inthese countries. Also, the decline in fertility at earlier
stage has went on steadily in ESEA because of the everrising proportion single at the age 20s and even at age
30s at least in Japan and Singapore. Nobody can predict
to what level the increase of the proportion single willreach. But we may have to envisage the coming of thesame society in the future of these countries and areas in
ESEA as the pre-transitional Western European societies
with the late and non-universal marriage system, though
its causes may be totally different between them.
Secondly, the governments of the five countries
or areas in ESEA have changed their policies on population since their fertility plunged into below replacementlevel. Singapore changed the position by 180 degrees,from anti-natalist to pro-natalist, in 1984 (Palen, 1986;
Yap, 2000), Taiwan aimed at the resumption of replacement level fertility in 1992 (Freedman et al., 1994). Although the government of Japan never stated any pronatalst position, it started to strengthen family policies in1990 (Atoh, 2000a). Korea and Thailand stopped fertility policy in 1996 and 1997 respectively. Only the government of China is keeping the strongest anti-natalist
position (Jiang et al., 2000). As was well documented,
the strong programs based on the pro-natalist policy in
Singapore had some positive effect on fertility: After TFR
hit the record-low 1.45 in 1985, it recovered somewhat

Concluding Remarks
Below replacement fertility is not limited to theWestern societies. In East and South-east Asia there areseven countries and areas that had already completed fertility transition to the replacement level. They are Japan,
Singapore, Hong Kong, Korea, Taiwan, Thailand andChina. More countries in ESEA are sure to follow themin the near future. Among the seven, fertility of the first
five continued to decline or stayed much below the replacement level already for 10 to 25 years. In this paper
the demographic, social and economic determinants offertility trends in these countries and areas have been
examined. We would like to conclude our paper by briefly
discussing the future of fertility in ESEA. In order todiscuss about the prospects of fertility, we need to take
into consideration at least three factors: The relationshipbetween the period and cohort fertility, the effect of policy
intervention and cultural background.

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The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)
and stayed at the around levels of 1.70 since then (Yap,
2000). Thus from the case of Singapore we could saythat fertility policies have some effect on actual fertility
trends but that even with such strong programs as thegovernment of Singapore took fertility would stay much
below replacement level. With softer policies, fertility
in Japan and Taiwan seems to resist the resumption.
Thirdly, the traditional family system was, unexpectedly, able to coexist with fertility transition to thereplacement level in ESEA. The system has been changing gradually, especially in the household type, but thechange in mentality of the patrilineal extended familysystem, strengthened by Confucianism, has been more
gradual than the speed of changes in the household type.
Can the system coexist with replacement level fertility inthe age of women’s emancipation? Some strategies havebeen taken to coordinate family roles in the traditional
system to women’s rising aspirations in social and economic life, but the trends of the postponement of marriage and childbearing seem to have not changed. Someargue that the traditional family system is a component
that is rather favorable to fertility. The persistence of thetwo-child family norm and the strength of son preference in some countries or areas is regarded as the evidence for it (Freedman et al., 1994; Park et al., 1995).
But this factor seems to work only among married
couples, so that its effect on TFR is limited. The decisive
factor for fertility in the future in ESEA is not marital
fertility but marriage or partnership formation. The traditional family system seems to be a component that israther unfavorable to partnership formation in the age ofwomen’s emancipation, since it has such emotional connotation as women’s obedience to men and the predominance of parent-child relationship over conjugal relationship. The trend that more and more women stay longer
at their parent’s home at least in Japan and Singapore,
either as “parasite singles” or as “surrogates of the maleheir”, may reflect the difficulties of changing the natureof gender relationship derived from the traditional family system.

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IPSS
Vasantha Kandiah
United Nations Population Division
Serguey Ivanov
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56

The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)

Table 1. Age-specific and Total Fertility Rates before and after TransitionAge-specific Fertility Rates
25-29
30-34
35-39

Country

Year

15-19

20-24

Japan

1925
1940
1950
1960
1975
1998

43
13
13
4
4
5

228
146
162
107
107
39

259
239
238
182
190
103

228
208
177
80
70
93

Singapore

1967
1975
1998

37
17
8

198
104
41

251
157
110

Hong Kong

1969
1980
1998

19
12
5

141
86
27

Korea

1960
1983
1995

35
12
3

Thailand

1975
1986
1996

China

TaiwanShare of
PASFR30+
in TFR

TFR
40-44

45-49

174
146
105
24
15
29

75
62
36
5
2
3

12
9
2
0
0
0

5.11
4.12
3.65
2.02
1.91
1.36

48
52
43
27
32
46

170
96
105

98
36
44

43
10
7

8
1
0

4.02
2.11
1.57

40
34
49

231
159
57

165
106
56

89
40
25

35
8
4

5
1
0

3.43
2.06
0.87

43
38
49

249
139
63

323
183
186

273
53
70

204
13
14

96
3
2

16
1
0

5.98
2.02
1.69

49
17
26

81
68
54

239
166
126

247
142
107

182
86
68

143
56
36

70
22
11

18
6
3

4.90
2.73
2.02

42
31
29

1970
1990
1994

39
22
5

278
199
161

308
156
144

252
56
47

179
20
10

83
6
4

10
2
1

5.75
2.29
1.86

46
18
17

1961
1983
1991

45
26
17

249
154
92

342
174
149

245
62
68

156
13
16

71
2
2

10
0
0

5.59
2.16
1.72

43
18
25

Thailand

China

TaiwanSource: United Nations Population Division (2000), Database on Fertility Patterns.

Table 2. Singulate Mean Age at Marrriage
Period of census
Japan
Singapore Hong Kong
1920
1940
1958-1962
1963-1967
1968-1972
1973-1977
1978-1982
1983-1987
1988-1992
1993-1997

21.2
23.3
25.0
24.8
24.7
24.5
25.1
25.8
26.9
27.7

Korea

21.1
20.3
24.2
26.2
27.0

21.9
22.5
23.8
24.5
25.3
26.6
27.7
28.6

21.3
22.8
23.3
23.7
24.1
24.7
25.4
26.1

22.1
22.0
22.8
23.5
24.0

Source: United Nations Population Division (2000), Database on Marriage Patterns.
(Tsuya, 1991) for Taiwan.

57

22.4
22.0
22.1

23.3
23.8
24.7

The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)

Table 3. Celibacy Rate (Percent of Women Never Married at Age 45-49)
Period of Census
Japan
Singapore Hong Kong
Korea
Thailand
1920
1940
1958-1962
1963-1967
1968-1972
1973-1977
1978-1982
1983-1987
1988-1992
1993-1997

1.9
1.6
1.5
2.1
4.0
4.9
4.4
4.3
4.6
5.6

5.7

7.4
5.9
3.8
2.7
2.3
2.4
3.7
5.9

3.1
4.2
7.3

0.1
0.1
0.1
0.2
0.3
0.4
0.6
1.0

China

2.6

Taiwan

1.0

3.0
4.1

0.2
0.1
0.2

5.2
7.0

0.8
1.0
2.6

Source: United Nations Population Division (2000), Database on Marriage Patterns.
(Tsuya, 1991) for Taiwan.

Table 4. Distribution of Female Cohorts by the Number of Children
Number of Children
Country
CohortNone
12

3

4 or more

CEB

Japan

1905-09
1935-39
1948-52

8.4
6.2
3.2

8.7
14.5
12.1

9.0
47.8
55.5

10.8
22.6
24.0

62.3
7.4
3.5

4.5
2.1
2.1

Singapore

1921-30
1950-54

3.2
6.4

6.5
15.4

8.8
43.5

11.0
26.2

70.0
8.4

5.5
2.2

Hong Kong

1926-30
1941-45

6.6
9.2

8.4
10.1

10.6
25.8

12.8
24.8

61.7
30.0

4.3
2.8

Korea

1916-201950-54

2.2
2.1

4.3
9.3

6.5
50.3

8.7
26.8

78.2
9.0

5.7
2.3

Thailand

1920-24
1940-44

1.8
2.8

5.9
4.9

6.6
8.5

7.3
12.1

74.4
68.2

6.3
4.1

China

1925-29
1950-54

3.1
1.2

3.8
18.4

5.1
37.5

7.8
26.2

80.2
16.7

5.5
2.5

Source: United Nations Population Division (2000), Demographic Yearbook Database.

58

The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)

Table 5. Decomposition of TFR Change into Change in Marital Fertility and Change in Proportion Currently Married
Transition period
Below Replacement Period
(a)
(b)
(a)
(b)
absolute effectabsolute effect
Country
BeginningEnd(％ effect)
BeginningEnd(％ effect)Japan

1925 (5.10)

1940 (4.17)

0.60
(65)
0.25
(16)
1.02
(33)

0.33
(35)
1.36
(84)
2.09
(67)

1950 (3.60)

1960 (1.99)

1925 (5.10)

1960 (1.99)

Singapore

1957 (6.56)

1975 (2.11)

1.40
(31)

Hong Kong

1966 (4.46)

1981 (1.96)

Korea

1960 (5.98)

Thailand1975 (1.93)

1995 (1.42)

0.69
(135)

-0.18
(-35)

3.05
(69)

1975 (2.11)

1990 (1.87)

0.41
(171)

-0.17
(-71)

0.59
(24)

1.91
(76)

1981 (1.96)

1996 (1.06)

0.54
(59)

0.37
(41)

1983 (2.02)

1.04
(26)

2.92
(74)

1983 (2.02)

1995 (1.69)

0.48
(145)

-0.15
(-45)

1960 (5.91)

1996 (2.02)

0.01
(0)

3.87
(100)

China

1981/82 (2.65)

1990 (2.29)

-0.10
(29)

0.45
(129)

Taiwan1956 (6.51)

1983 (2.16)－－
1983 (2.16)
1991 (1.72)
－
－
(36)
(64)
(100)
(0)
Note: (a) effect of change in proportion married and (b) effect of change in marital fertility
Source: United Nations Population Division (2000), Demographic Yearbook Database and Database on Fertility Patterns.
(Freedman et al., 1994) for Taiwan.

Table 6. The Proportion of Labor Force in the Primary Industry
Year
Japan
Singapore
Hong Kong
Korea
1920
53.8
1940
44.3
1950
48.5
1960
32.7
1970
19.3
3.8
51.6
1975
13.8
2.5
46.4
1980
10.9
1.5
1.5
34.9
1985
9.3
0.9
1.7
26
1990
7.1
*0.3
0.9
18.3
1995
6
0.3
0.6
12.5
1998
5.4
0.4
0.3
12.5
Source: United Nations Population Divisin (2000), Demographic Yearbook
Database

59

Thailand

China

*77
55.8
70.9
68.6
64.1
52.2
51.4

*61.5
54.9
50
48.5

The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)

Table 7. Contraceptive Prevalance Rate (CPR) and Percentage Distribution of Contraceptors by Contraceptive Methods
Contraceptive Methods (%)
Country
Survey Year
CPR
Sterilization
Pill
Injection
IUD
CondomOthers
Japan

1959
2000

42.5
55.9

2.8
6.4

1.5

-

2.7

25.9
75.3

28.7
43.8

Singapore

1977
1982

71.3
74.2

21.9
22.9

17
11.6

-

3.1
-

20.8
24.3

8.5
15.4

Hong Kong

1982
1992

72.3
86.2

21.1
19.8

19.4
17.1

2.7
1.7

3.5
5.1

14.6
34.5

11.1
8.1

Korea

1985
1991

70.4
79.4

40.5
47.3

4.3
3

-

7.4
9

7.2
10.2

11
9.9

Thailand

1987
1993

67.5
73.9

27.9
22.6

20
27.2

9.2
14.8

7.2
5.7

1.2
1.9

2
1.9

China

1992

83.4

44.6

3.2

0

33.4

1.8

0.4

Taiwan

1985

78

26

5

-

20

14

14

Source: (United Nations, 1999)

Table 8: Gross Enrollment Ratios at the Tertiary Level of Education
Teritiary Gross Enrollment Ratios
Country
1970
1980
1985
1990
China
Male
…
2.5
3.9
3.9
Female
…
0.8
1.7
2.0
China, Hong Kong SAR Male
…
13.8
16.9
22.5
Female
…
6.6
9.4
16.2
Japan
Male
29.3
41.3
40.6
35.1
Female
17.7
33.3
34.5
37.4
Republic of Korea
Male
…
21.3
45.8
51.3
Female
…
7.5
21.2
25.1
Singapore
Male
…
9.1
16.6
22.1
Female
…
6.3
10.4
15.2
Source: UNESCO Yearbook 1999

60

1996
7.3
3.9
…
…
44.2
47.5
65.5
37.6
36.7
30.7

The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)

Table 9. Proportion of Women Who are Single by Age and Education : Japan in 1980 and 1990
Age Group
Level of
25-29
30-34
35-39
40-44
Educational
Attainment
1980
1990
1980
1990
1980
1990
1980
1990
Total
23.9
40.2
9.1
13.9
5.5
7.5
4.5
5.8
Compulsory
17.0
30.6
7.7
15.0
4.5
7.9
3.8
5.5
High School
20.5
33.2
8.2
11.4
5.2
6.1
4.3
4.9
Junior College
32.5
46.0
12.6
15.2
8.3
8.6
7.1
7.3
University
40.5
56.2
15.2
18.7
10.6
11.2
10.0
9.7
Source: Bureau of Statistics, MCA, Population Census of Japan for 1980 and 1990.

Table 10. Proportion Single among Male and Female Citizens by Age Group and Highest Qualification
Attained: Singapore in 1990 and 2000
Highest Qualification Attained
30-34
35-39
40-44
1990
2000
1990
2000
1990
2000
Ma l es
Below Secondary
37.2
41
21
29.2
12.3
21.1
Secondary
31.4
30.4
15.2
18.3
7.9
13.8
Post Secondary
29.2
29.5
13.2
16
7.9
9.8
University
31.2
33.1
12.4
17.4
6.1
8.6
F ema l es
Below Secondary
14.9
15.6
10.4
11.1
8
9.1
Secondary
23.6
18.4
19
14.5
17.6
14.8
Post Secondary
30.6
24.4
24.7
21.4
20.9
20.4
University
33.3
32.8
27.3
29.1
24
26.7
Source: SINGAPORE CENSUS OF POPULATION, 2000 ADVANCE DATA RELEASE NO. 8, Table 3, p.3

61

The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)

Figure 1. Total Fertility Rate, 1960-1998

7.0
6.5
6.0
5.5
5.0
4.5
4.0
3.5
3.0
2.5
2.0
1.5
1.0

19
60
19
62
19
64
19
66
19
68
19
70
19
72
19
74
19
76
19
78
19
80
19
82
19
84
19
86
19
88
19
90
19
92
19
94
19
96
19
98
20
00

0.5

China
Western Europe

Singapore
Eastern Europe

62

Hong Kong
Korea

Japan
ThailandThe Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)

Figure 2. Age at First Birth, 1955-1999(Years)
29

28

27

26

25

24

23

22

21

20
1955

1960
Korea

1965
Thailand

1970

1975

1980

Singapore

1985

Hong Kong

63

1990
USA

1995
Japan

2000

The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)

Figure 3. Difference between Total Fertility Rate and Average Birth Order, 1955-1998(Moving Average)
1.0

0.8

0.6

0.4

0.2

0.0
1960

1965

1970

1975

1980

1985

1990

-0.2

-0.4

-0.6

-0.8

-1.0
Japan

Singapore

Hong Kong

64

Korea

Thailand

1995

2000

The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)

Figure 4. Sum of ASFR of Women Older than 29 as Per Cent of TFR, 1994-1999

Singapore

Hong KongJapan

European Union

Thailand

United States ofAmerica

Republic of Korea

Russian Federation

China

0

10

20

30

65

40

50

60

(％)

The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)

Figure 5. Average Number of Children Ever Born. Cohorts 1897-1952
7.0
6.5
6.0
5.5
5.0
4.5
4.0
3.5
3.0
2.5
2.0
1895

1905

China
Republic of Korea
USA

1915

1925

China, Hong Kong SAR
Singapore
Thailand

66

1935

1945

Japan
Spain

1955

The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)

Figure 6. Percentage of Women with 4 or More Children. Cohorts Born in 1897-1952
(％)
90

80

70

60

50

40

30

20

10

0
1895

1905
China
Republic of Korea
USA

1915

1925
China, Hong Kong SAR
Singapore
Thailand

67

1935

1945
Japan
Spain

1955

The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)

Figure 7. Period Fertility Rates for Birth Orders 4 and Higher, 1960-1998

2.5

2.0

1.5

1.0

0.5

0.0
1960

1965
Japan

1970
Korea

1975
Thailand1980
Singapore

68

1985

1990
Hong Kong

1995
United States

2000

The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)

Figure 8. Percentage of Childless Women. Cohorts Born in 1900-1955

30

25

20

15

10

5

0
1895

1905

1915

GermanyJapan
Thailand

1925

1935

United States
Korea
Hong Kong

69

1945

RussiaSingapore
China

1955

The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)

Figure 9. Real GDP per Capita(US100000

10000

1000

100

China
China, Hong Kong SAR
Japan
Republic of Korea

10

Singapore
Thailand

1
1960

1965

1970

1975

1980

Source: United Nations Statistics

70

1985

1990

1995

The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)

Figure 10. Trends in Labor Force Participation Rates by Age and Sex for Japan:
1975-1995
120

100

80

60

40

20

0
15-19

20-24
1975m

25-29

30-34
1985m

35-39

40-44

1995m

71

45-49

50-54

1975f

55-59
1985f

60-64

65 or
over
1995f

The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)

Figure11. Labor Force ParticipationRates by sex, Singapore

120

100

80

60

40

20

0
15-19

20-24

25-29

30-34

1970m

35-39

1980m

1990m

40-44

1999m

45-49

1970f

Source: United Nations Population Division (2000), Demographic Yearbook Database.

72

1980f

50-54

1990f

55-59

1999f

60-64

65-69

The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)

Figure12. Labor Force Participation Rates by Sex, Hong Kong
120

100

80

60

40

20

0
15-19

20-24
1975m
1985f

25-29

30-34

1980m
1990f

35-39

40-44

1985m
1998f

45-49

1990m

50-54
1998m

55-59

60-64

1975f

Source: United Nations Population Division (2000), Demographic Yearbook Database.

73

65-69
1980f

The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)

Figure13. Labor Force Participation Rates by Sex, Rep. of Korea

120

100

80

60

40

20

0
15-19

20-24

25-29

30-34

1975m

35-39

1985m

40-44

1990m

1999m

Source: United Nations Population Division (2000), Demographic Yearbook Database.

74

45-49

1975f

50-54

1985f

1990f

55-59

1999f

60-64

65-69

The Japanese Journal of Population, Vol.2, No.1 (March 2004)

Figure14. Labor Force Participation Rates by Sex - Thailand

120

100

80

60

40

20

0
15-19

20-24

25-29

30-34

1970m

1990m

35-39

1995m

2000m

Source: United Nations Population Division (2000), Demographic Yearbook Database.

75

40-44

1970f

1990f

45-49

1995f

2000f

50-54

55-59