IF YOU HAVE a young population, the future is yours," Turkey's current President (and former Prime Minister) Recep Erdogan said about the challenge of population aging in Turkey. "At the moment, thank God, 60 per cent of our population is under 30. But when we look at the increase, if we continue like this, alarm bells are ringing for 2037-40." 1 Erdogan's fear of an increase in the proportion of elderly people in Turkey is mainly driven by fertility rates that have been rapidly decreasing over the last several decades. Turkish women still have more than two children on average, but trends suggest an eventual decline below replacement level. At the same time, female education and employment have been increasing over the past 15 years. Even though female employment rates are still relatively low in Turkey in comparison to other European countries, they are rising especially for young cohorts of better-educated women, who also tend to have lower fertility.This article examines the determinants of Turkey's fertility decline using census and survey data. We show that the transition from a second to a third child is crucial for the future of fertility levels in Turkey. In a context of increasing education and employment opportunities for women, our results suggest that the decline in fertility reflects an important conflict between work-life balance in Turkey, which affects in particular mothers in formal employment. When women who have two children are employed, their contribution to household income is crucial. In the absence of possibilities to combine employment and family life, mothers who are active in formal jobs are thus most likely to decide against having a third child.Enabling women to work while raising children would allow families to generate the financial means that are needed for larger family size. However, the current policy setting in Turkey is conducive to impeding P O P U L AT I O N A N D D E

International audienceBACKGROUNDThe European Union Statistics on Income and Living Conditions (EU-SILC) are increasingly used in demographic analysis, due to their large country coverage, the availability of harmonized socioeconomic measures, and the possibility to merge partners. However, so far there exists no comprehensive analysis of the representativeness of the fertility behavior reported by EU-SILC.OBJECTIVEThis paper quantifies the quality of periodic fertility measures in EU-SILC.METHODSWe compare periodic fertility measures obtained with EU-SILC to unbiased measures from the Human Fertility Database (HFD) for several European countries, by applying a cross-sectional perspective.RESULTSWe show that EU-SILC measures of periodic fertility are biased downward, mainly due to attrition, while births of order one for ages 20‒29 are particularly underreported. However, we find no evidence of socioeconomic differentials in attrition.CONCLUSIONSOur results suggest that for the majority of European countries, EU-SILC can be used for the analysis of childbearing behavior when respecting the measures of precaution mentioned in this article

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BACKGROUND Complex extended families are common in rural sub-Saharan Africa. Relationships between family members take on a wide range of forms (polygamy, classificatory kinship system). However, the complexity of children's family unit and changes in it are not well taken into account by quantitative surveys. OBJECTIVE Our paper brings together traditional demographic perspectives, anthropological and genealogical approaches, to analyze children's kinship networks and how they change over time. By documenting who is present in a child's network and who remains there over time, our approach aims to generate new insights into the context of child socialisation. METHODS Using genealogical data, coupled with results from a follow-up survey conducted in rural Mali, we define the set of kinship ties that connect each child to other members of his domestic group and measure the turnover in children's family environment. RESULTS Children grow up surrounded by complex families whose boundaries extend well beyond parents, siblings, and close relatives. Moreover, this environment constantly changes. In the space of five years, 50% of the people in a child's relational network are replaced.

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