Bogoslovska smotra, Vol. 69 No. 2-3, 1999.
Izvorni znanstveni članak
Marriage and Family in Demographic Context
Anđelko Akrap
orcid.org/0000-0002-5293-4775
; Ekonomski fakultet Sveučilišta u Zagrebu, Zagreb, Hrvatska
Sažetak
The paper consists of two parts. The first part presents general demographic changes generating from social and economic development, as well as Croatian features, which accelerated negative demographic processes. The second parts deals with the state of contracted and divorced marriages and tendencies to change their basic demographic features. The process of fast decline of birth rate in Croatia and demographic ageing connected therewith is accelerated through factors of instability which presented a disturbance to the normal population development trends - emigration to the overseas countries, wars, inadequate regional economic policy which caused concentration of the inhabitants in a small number of towns, leaving for »temporary work abroad« and demographic losses in the Homeland War. As opposed to most European countries facing natural extinction, Croatia is less developed and moreover, has a smaller population. The characteristic of Croatian population is that if has been divided in two constituent parts since the 1971 census - the inhabitants of the country itself and its citizens on »temporary work abroad«. There has been a decrease in population in nine counties (»županije«) in the last period between the censuses (1981-1991). As opposed to natural decrease of population in the country in 1991, the process has already been developing in a relatively large number of counties, starting from mid-sixties. The natural birth-rate in Croatia in 1996 and 1997 was negative, on monitoring the country itself, i.e. not counting children born abroad. The conclusion is that there has been an on-going process of natural depopulation in Croatia for 7 years (1991-1997). From demographic point of view, marriage and family are the basis of Croatian society, as over 90% of children are born to married parents. A long-term tendency of the declining birth-rate is directly co-related to a smaller number of contracted marriages, along with other factors of modern life-style. Nowadays, there is a significantly larger number of young people attending secondary schools and universities, therefore marrying in a later age. However, a more influencing cause of the decline of contracted marriages is the fad that young people have problems solving their housing problem. According to present data, most of women entering marriages are 20-24 years old, with a tendency towards an older age.
In comparison to economically developed countries, our citizens marry at an earlier age. Since 1996, there have been more families with 3 or 4 children. This was partly due to somewhat improved financial conditions through the so-called »National Programme of Demographic Development«. The number of divorced marriages in Croatia in the period 1968-1997 demonstrates expressive oscillations, which are due to the economic, political and social situation. There is an equal share of divorced marriages without children or with just one child; however, there is a smaller number of divorces in marriages with 3 or more children. The National Programme of Demographic Development, proclaimed at the Parliament of the Republic of Croatia on January 18th, 1996, provides a wide range of stimuli to bear more children, decrease depopulation, immigration, to encourage the return of the immigrants and stimulate settling of the whole territory. So far, Croatia has applied individual measures of population policy.
Ključne riječi
demographic processes; total number of inhabitants; natural tendencies; born abroad; contracted and divorced marriages; population policy
Hrčak ID:
31498
URI
Datum izdavanja:
22.12.1999.
Posjeta: 3.445 *