The Low Countries, 1750–2000

The complex life course of mobility: Quantitative description of 300,000 residential moves in 1850–1950 Netherlands

“…The cohort result is striking given the scope of change occurring in the Netherlands at this time, with industrialization, changing agricultural lifeways, as well as population growth (Karel et al, 2011). The cohort analysis, as visualized in figure 5 suggest a significant drop in all age classes around the advent of World War II (the Netherlands were invaded in 1940).…”

“…With industrialisation, the Dutch economy picked up again by 1850, and 1850-1920 represented a period of both economic and population growth (Steckel & Floud, 1997). In fact, between 1800 and 2000, the population of the Netherlands multiplied 8 fold, thus establishing the highest population growth rate in Europe (Karel et al, 2011). This population growth was the result of falling death rates, rising life expectancy, and high birth rates (Karel et al, 2011).…”

“…In fact, between 1800 and 2000, the population of the Netherlands multiplied 8 fold, thus establishing the highest population growth rate in Europe (Karel et al, 2011). This population growth was the result of falling death rates, rising life expectancy, and high birth rates (Karel et al, 2011).…”

“…Until the end of the 19th century, a system of live-in house help was the norm, particularly for agricultural households (Karel et al, 2011). For small-hold farmers, children would stay home until the age of about 12-14, and then begin work on someone else's farm or enter into domestic service, until marriage.…”

“…High population growth and increasing wealth replaced the dip experienced at the end of the Dutch Golden Age (seventeenth and eighteenth centuries). Karel et al (2011) describe the transition in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries as that of the emergence of a 'modernised', family-based agriculture and transitional lifestyles whereby more engagement occurred between those in the rural and urban landscapes. The authors label the transition as a process of 'deruralisation' to reflect not the total urbanisation of the population, but rather a restructuring of what it meant to be rural, as agricultural lifeways became integrated with the market and finally homogenised into a form of twenty-first-century agriculture (Karel et al, 2011).…”