Is there such a thing as small island demography? Within the modern Third World context, it has sometimes been suggested that small islands have relatively low fertility, low mortality and high rates of migration to developed countries.
This does seem to accord with recent demographic experience (HDI Rank: 32 BACK 1), and in the case of fertility, at least, this has been empirically confirmed. This work discusses demographic characteristics of small islands states and comments on demographic trends in Malta.The case of Malta is particularly instructive in this respect. There are two likely causes of such demographic distinctiveness: first, the circumscribed space of small islands provides logistical advantages both for the eradication of disease and the provision of health care and family planning facilities. Moreover, a combination of high population density and restricted space encourages the population to consider not only emigration but also voluntary constraints on family size.
Tikopia in the Solomon Islands provided a classic illustration of cultural mechanisms adopted by a traditional society to curb population growth by combinations of withdrawal, abortion, delayed marriage, celibacy and infanticide. In such circumstances there is a recognizably collective interest in fertility restraint, and modern governments can harness this in the implementation of family planning programmes. The second cause relates to the fact that mortality and fertility reduction are promoted by the relatively high development levels that characterize most small island states.Such development levels are, in part, caused by island status, stemming from the period during which many small islands were part of the European maritime system when the West did not have the capability to penetrate and transform continental areas. Another contributory factor must be the higher levels of development aid enjoyed by microstates (the great majority of which are islands) for whatever reason (historic links with the west, ‘purchase’ of UN votes, and so on). Even after standardizing for development level, a clear relationship between small island status and demographic modernization persists within the Third World.
Many islands, however, have suffered massive population decline as a result of emigration. Thus, within half a century, a wave of heavy emigration reduced the population of Ithaca, an island off the west coast of Greece, from 11,409 (1891) to 5,877 (1951). Of course, there are differences in the rate and timing of the outflow. Some islands like Corsica and Salina have been steadily losing people for a century or more. In others the decline is more recent and perhaps more sudden. The population of Kastellorizo, off the coast of Turkey, fell from 9,000 in 1910 to 2,750 in 1922.
The main exception to the general trend of net emigration is to be found in the Balearics, where economic growth following the model of tourism has led to positive migratory balances over all recent periods. The Republic of Malta is a small Mediterranean island nation with a limited land area (<316 km2) and very high population density (at 1,095 per km2, the highest in Europe) (The World Factbook - Malta). Persons sixty and over today make up about 13 percent of Malta's total population of 358,000 and may reach 23 percent by the first half of the next century.This increase has given rise to greater demand for state provisions, which is reinforced by the spread of modernization, migration, and changing family and kinship support systems. Between 1881 and 1937 Malta's civil population had nearly doubled from 149 782 to 264 663 (a rate of increase of more than 2000 per annum); but between 1931 (when the population was 241 621) and 1937, the rate of population growth was, approximately, 4000 per annum (Economic Commission for Europe).
The main reason for the increased rate was that Malta was experiencing relative prosperity as a result of its increasing strategic importance to Great Britain. By 1938, the figures had increased to: 9458 (dockyard), 1257 (army), and 1245 (other). Population growth remained a major problem confronting Malta. During the peak war years for Malta (1941-43), the birth-rate declined and nearly 1500 civilians had been killed.
The marriage rate declined, in large part because of the housing shortage.After the war, as houses were rebuilt and built, the marriage rate, and the birth-rate, increased rapidly. In 1939 Malta's population had been 269 999. In 1945 it was 286 000 and, three years later, stood at nearly 306 000.
By the early 1950s, Malta's rate of population growth was actually being reduced - for the first time in Malta's history - as a result of emigration. Overall, in the decade 1946-55, Malta's population increase was 60 583. The population has continued increasing steadily since.Demographic review 2000 presents the main demographic trends registered in the Maltese Islands during the year, 2000 (Table 1, 2). Population change is the net result of two demographic aspects: the difference between births and deaths and the migration balance (Official Statistics of Malta).
One of the most significant global developments of this century is the dramatic increase in the number and proportion of aging persons. Demographic trends indicate that in the next few decades the number of the elderly will reach over one billion, with big percent living in small islands states.The work discussed demographic trends experienced by small islands in general before commenting on demographic change in Malta, an island which thirty years ago suffered from grave problems of population pressure on limited resources. An increasing birth-rate precipitated a population explosion in the 1950s and 1960s with an annual growth rate in population of over 3 per cent. Twenty years later the population growth rate had been cut to almost 1 per cent.
The work examines the factors which account for this spectacular fertility decline and the role of family planning policy.
