Template-type: ReDIF-Paper 1.0

Author-Name: Sandra Gonzalez-Bailon
Author-Workplace-Name: Nuffield College and Department of Sociology, University of Oxford
Author-Name: Tommy Murphy
Author-Workplace-Name: IGIER and Centro Dondena, Universita Bocconi
Title: When Smaller Families Look Contagious: A Spatial Look At The French Fertility Decline Using An Agent-Based Simulation Model 
Abstract: Despite  some  disagreements  about  specific  timing,  it  is  now  widely  accepted  that France was the first 
European country to experience a systematic decline in fertility, a decline that took place in a very distinctive geographical
pattern. Whereas two areas of low birth rates (the Seine valley and the Aquitaine region) kept spreading, two ‘islands’
of  high  fertility  (Bretagne  and  the  Massif  Central)  shrank  until  they  more  or less disappeared in the early 1900s. 
In an attempt to provide a sensible explanation of this pattern, we build an  agent-based  simulation model which 
incorporates both historical data on population characteristics and spatial information on the geography of France,  
and  allows  us  to  study  the  role  of  social  influence  in  fertility  decisions. We assess how different behavioural 
assumptions and network topologies cause variations in  diffusion  patterns,  using  quantitative  data  on  the  Ecclesiastical 
Oath  of  1791  to proxy  for  the  impact  the  Revolution.  Analysis  of  several  simulations  shows  that  a combination 
of  both  endogenous  and  exogenous  factors  help  to  explain  the  way  in which the diffusion took place and suggests some 
of the mechanisms through which this was materialised.
Classification-JEL: N33, J13, C15.
Keywords: Economic history, demographic history (Europe pre-1913), France, demographic economics, fertility, 
simulation models (agent-based), diffusion.
Length: 30 pages
Creation-Date: 2008-09-02
Number: _071
File-URL: http://www.economics.ox.ac.uk/materials/papers/3457/71murphy.pdf
File-Format: application/pdf
Handle: RePEc:nuf:esohwp:_071