Malta's fertility rate fell to a record 1.01 children per woman in 2024, remaining the lowest in the European Union for the eighth consecutive year, compared with an EU average of 1.34. Both these figures are much lower than the 2.1 replacement level (the average number of children needed for a generation to replace itself without migration).

Declining fertility has accompanied the demographic transition of industrialised societies. Increased education, particularly among women, urbanisation, changing cultural norms, changing employment patterns, improved contraception, and the declining economic role of large families have all contributed to falling birth rates. Indeed, there are several European countries which have now experienced fertility rates below replacement level. At the same time, life expectancy has increased considerably.

Yet demographic statistics describe what is happening without necessarily explaining how people experience it. Here, amongst other insights, we need evidence from various sources, both qualitative and quantitative, and the sociological imagination: connecting personal decisions with wider social circumstances.

Having a child is intensely personal. Decisions and lived experiences may involve relationships, values, aspirations, lifestyles, careers, income, housing, health and expectations about the future. In turn, these are made within particular economic, cultural and political circumstances.

Sociologist David Cheal makes a useful distinction between cultural and situational diversity in family life. People may organise their families differently because they hold different values and ideals. But people who share similar family values may also make different choices because they find themselves living under different circumstances.

This distinction is particularly relevant to fertility. Someone may strongly value family life and want several children but decide otherwise because of housing costs, employment insecurity, caring responsibilities or the difficulty of reconciling work and family life. Another person in similar economic circumstances may simply prefer a lifestyle without children. The outcome may appear identical in demographic statistics, but the social processes behind it are quite different.

Contemporary family life has also been associated with what sociologists such as Anthony Giddens, Ulrich Beck, and Elisabeth Beck-Gernsheim describe as individualisation. In various societies, traditional expectations about femininity, masculinity, motherhood and fatherhood have weakened, while individuals exercise greater agency in constructing their lifestyles, life courses and aspirations about family life.

This should caution us against moral panic. Low fertility should not simply be attributed to selfishness, materialism or the alleged decline of traditional values. Neither should we assume that financial incentives alone will persuade people to have children. We first need to understand what people actually want and the circumstances within which they make their decisions.

There is another Maltese paradox. While fertility is low, Malta's population has increased considerably through immigration of EU citizens and Third Country Nationals who, in turn, are essential for our economy. However, when it comes to the latter, there is a clear gap between their responsibilities and their social rights, as has been pointed out very clearly by David Spiteri Gingell in a series of articles in this newspaper, such as his most recent 'The Right to Stay, and Family' (The Malta Independent on Sunday, 30 August).

Questions about fertility intersect with migration, employment, and an ageing society, but also with belonging, citizenship, integration, community and what it means to be Maltese in a changing small-island society. Migration and mobility, after all, have long formed part of Malta's history as an island in the Mediterranean, though we seem to have difficulty coming to terms with it.

Government has an important role in ensuring that people who want children are not unnecessarily prevented from doing so by avoidable social and economic barriers. In this regard the Maltese government has introduced measures including tax incentives, increased children's allowances, and birth grants. But family policy should recognise the diversity of contemporary family life rather than assume that everyone shares the same aspirations.

Policies could therefore be universalistic in their social protection while being sufficiently flexible to respond to different circumstances and family forms. Affordable housing, childcare, decent employment, work-life balance and adequate social protection, including to third-country nationals, may be as important to family formation as direct financial incentives.

Social Impact Assessment could help policymakers understand how different measures affect different families and social groups. Quantitative demographic indicators should also be complemented by qualitative research into people's lived experiences, aspirations, fears and decisions.

Here Max Weber's concept of Verstehen remains remarkably relevant: before assuming why people behave as they do, we should attempt to understand the meanings they attach to their actions.

A fertility rate of 1.01 tells us something very important about Malta. But if we really want to understand why fewer children are being born, we need to listen to the people behind the number.

Michael Briguglio is Associate Professor at the Department of Sociology, Faculty of Arts, University of Malta 

www.michaelbriguglio.com