Alejandro Macarrón is an engineer, business consultant, and coordinator of the Demographic Observatory of CEU-CEFAS. He is the author of the books El suicidio demográfico de España (Spain’s Demographic Suicide) and Suicidio demográfico en Occidente y medio mundo (Demographic Suicide in the West and Half the World).
Climate change is the latest fad in anti-birth campaigns and possibly the most radical and absurd. How is it possible that this type of campaign is so popular in the mainstream media and political agendas?
There are several factors. First, the media are hungry for news, and any sensationalist headline is published without any verification. I am sick of seeing demographic data published that does not match reality. With the example of climate change, a wave of pessimism is generated in society, and the consequences are not taken into account. With this level of birth rate, it is certain that we are going to have a very bad time; on the other hand, climate change is hypothetical, and there is not that level of certainty because it is a very complex issue. Therefore, it is not rational to shoot oneself in the foot by not having children when we are not even at the population replacement level. The consequences will be disastrous on a social and collective level, and also on a human level, because anti-natalism leads both to an ageing society due to the lack of young people and to a very sad society due to affective poverty. There are political and economic interests in favour of propagating these ideas, and there is an obvious iron alliance between the Left and those who make money out of climate change.
The Malthusian theory has so far failed completely, because far more resources have been produced than the population has grown. It is true that there are physical limits to growth, but they are still far from being reached. What is certain is that the collapse of the birth rate is going to cause a real disaster. With a situation like the one we have in Spain, with 1.1 children per woman, each new generation is little more than half that of the previous one—a catastrophe.
This message is mainly addressed to the Western world.
Fifty years ago, there was an American project—the Kissinger report—which was initially secret but then declassified. It is very rational and shows concern about population growth in the Third World, mainly due to the reduction of the mortality rate of children and young people, which was also the cause of the great population growth in Europe and America in the 19th and 20th centuries. Pakistan, for example, has increased its population fivefold since independence. The United States was afraid that this might impede the development of Third World countries and give rise to revolutions and hostile governments contrary to its interests, and a plan was being drawn up to reduce the birth rate worldwide. Now I cannot say whether anti-birth campaigns are being carried out elsewhere, but in the West, they are, and it is horrendous when we are in the process of demographic suicide. There is an inertia in which, as fewer children were born thirty years ago, there are fewer women of childbearing age every year, and the number of births is mechanically decreasing.
The Kissinger report was very rational. I am not saying that it was moral, but it was prepared in the midst of the Cold War. The suicide of the West is incomprehensible. It is sad that it is happening, but it is despicable that it is being encouraged and nothing is being done to prevent it. One of the worst examples in Spain is Asturias, and its regional government does not seem to care. For example, in 2022, there were 2.9 deaths per birth—in fact, 3.6, if we don’t count the children of foreigners. These are terrifying proportions.
Ever more military commanders and politicians are announcing that the West has to prepare for war and enlist as many soldiers as possible. Who is going to fight in a childless society?
Yes, it all goes in the same direction. In addition to those who promote these anti-birth ideas, this has to do with the spectacular progress of humanity in the last two hundred years. We have gone from societies with a lot of faith and hardship, but with stable families and many children, to a society that is much more affluent and soft, and that is the fundamental cause of the problem. In Spain, when Franco died, the number of children per woman was half the historical figure, although it was not very noticeable because of the drop in infant and child mortality. But there was less willingness to have children, and this is what has happened throughout the West. To this is added the mentality that having a large family is an almost heroic act. It is a pessimistic mentality, promoted by many in the mainstream media, and one which, in the long run, is suicidal.
Perhaps people are not aware of what a childless society means for their own future.
Exactly. It is an individualistic mentality that separates the individual from the community and from the family, and that only lives in the present.
The solution they are proposing is that immigrants should come to cover the population deficit.
That mentality is absolutely pathetic, because it says that we, who think we are above the rest, are not going to tire ourselves out by having children, but that people from poorer countries are going to come and do it for us and solve the problems we have created by not having children ourselves. That’s what that mentality really means. It is a trap because, in practice, it is not going to avoid the emotional problems generated by the lack of children. Moreover, the immigration that comes generally only covers the least qualified jobs, to which we must add the cultural and integration problems. It is a reality, and it is not the fault of the people, that there are cultural clashes, such as between Christianity and Islam. And economically, the welfare state attracts and retains far more people than it needs. Many immigrants earn more money collecting a subsidy in Spain than working in their country. For example, as a result of the crisis in 2013, 60% of African immigrants were unemployed; the following year, only 1% had left because they are much better off here than in their countries. And that is not their responsibility; it is we who are allowing this situation. As a result, an influx of labour continues to arrive en masse—even though the country has a high rate of unemployment—which consumes resources that the state has to collect via taxes. In other words, it affects everything—wages, pensions, and so on.
Politicians do not talk about this issue because it is difficult for an increasingly infantilised society to admit.
It is an uncomfortable subject, especially for people who don’t have children or don’t want to have them. There have always been people who have not had children, but it used to be less common, and nearly everyone had a large family network. It is also uncomfortable for radical feminists. I declare myself a feminist 1.0 because I fully agree with the theoretical essence of feminism, of equality between men and women before the law. The latest generation of feminism is aggressively anti-male and anti-family. For this new feminism, having children is a woman’s remorse. This view is in the minority compared to the number of people who feel uncomfortable because they do not have children, a fact perceived by politicians, and for that reason they prefer not to talk about it. However, it must be explained to those who have not had children that it is still in their interest for others to have children.
Moreover, there are many childless people in politics. Of the last three German chancellors, none has had biological children. Macron is childless; the French prime minister is childless. In Spain, Ayuso, who is launching some pro-birth policies, has no children; Almeida has no children; Feijóo has only one child, and so on. When the Empty Spain movement was created, the presidents of Galicia, Asturias, Castile and León, and Aragon met. Between the four of them, they had had one child, and they talked about ageing as if it had fallen from the sky. They blamed emigration, but the determining factor is the lack of children. Asturias has lost far more population due to the fall in births than to emigration.
Hungary is a country that is committed to pro-natalist policies and has managed to halt the demographic decline by using economic incentives and promoting a pro-family mentality. Is it the example to follow? Is there still time to reverse this situation?
Hungary is taking some very interesting and positive steps, although the results are only partial because there has been some recovery, but not as much as desired. Of course, I would like Spain to do what is being done in Hungary. In any case, changing the mentality takes time and cannot be achieved in the short term. Poland, before Tusk, had also made a plan with economic incentives, but the question in the end is not merely economic. Before, there were no incentives; people had children because they wanted to have them. The fundamental thing is that people understand that having children is much better than not having them. The question is to change the mentality.
Can we avoid demographic suicide? Yes, it is possible to recover the birth rate. The good news is that two children per person is enough, and we are not so far away from that figure. One more child per woman would be enough.
