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Suggested Citation:"FRONT MATTER." National Research Council. 1993. Social Dynamics of Adolescent Fertility in Sub-Saharan Africa. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/2220.
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SOCIAL DYNAMICS OF ADOLESCENT FERTILITY IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA

POPULATION DYNAMICS OF SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA

Caroline H. Bledsoe and Barney Cohen, Editors

Working Group on the Social Dynamics of Adolescent Fertility

Panel on the Population Dynamics of Sub-Saharan Africa

Committee on Population

Commission on Behavioral and Social Sciences and Education

National Research Council

NATIONAL ACADEMY PRESS
Washington, D.C.
1993

Suggested Citation:"FRONT MATTER." National Research Council. 1993. Social Dynamics of Adolescent Fertility in Sub-Saharan Africa. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/2220.
×

POPULATION DYNAMICS OF SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA

DEMOGRAPHIC CHANGE IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA

DEMOGRAPHIC EFFECT OF ECONOMIC REVERSALS IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA

EFFECTS OF HEALTH PROGRAMS IN CHILD MORTALITY IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA

FACTOR AFFECTING CONTRACEPTIVE USE IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA

POPULATION DYNAMICS OF KENYA

POPULATION DYNAMICS OF SENEGAL

SOCIAL DYNAMICS OF ADOLESCENT FERTILITY IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA

Suggested Citation:"FRONT MATTER." National Research Council. 1993. Social Dynamics of Adolescent Fertility in Sub-Saharan Africa. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/2220.
×

NOTE: This map, which has been prepared sorely for the convenience of readers, does not purport to express political boundaries or relationships. The scale is a composite of several forms of projection.

Suggested Citation:"FRONT MATTER." National Research Council. 1993. Social Dynamics of Adolescent Fertility in Sub-Saharan Africa. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/2220.
×

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Suggested Citation:"FRONT MATTER." National Research Council. 1993. Social Dynamics of Adolescent Fertility in Sub-Saharan Africa. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/2220.
×

WORKING GROUP ON THE SOCIAL DYNAMICS OF ADOLESCENT FERTILITY

CAROLINE H. BLEDSOE (Chair),

Department of Anthropology, Northwestern University

ANDREW J. CHERLIN,

Department of Sociology, Johns Hopkins University

ANASTASIA J. GAGE-BRANDON,

Demographic and Health Surveys, Institute for Resource Development/Macro International, Columbia, Maryland

JANE I. GUYER,

Department of Anthropology, Boston University

DANIEL M. SALA-DIAKANDA,

Institut de Formation et de Recherche Démographiques (IFORD), Yaoundé, Cameroon

BARNEY COHEN, Staff Officer

DOMINIQUE MEEKERS, Staff Officer*

JOAN M. MONTGOMERY HALFORD, Senior Project Assistant**

PAULA J. MELVILLE, Senior Project Assistant

*  

through December 1991

**  

through July 1992

Suggested Citation:"FRONT MATTER." National Research Council. 1993. Social Dynamics of Adolescent Fertility in Sub-Saharan Africa. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/2220.
×

PANEL ON THE POPULATION DYNAMICS OF SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA

KENNETH H. HILL (Chair),

Department of Population Dynamics, Johns Hopkins University

ADERANTI ADEPOJU,

Institut de Développement Economique et de la Planification (IDEP), Dakar, Senegal

JANE T. BERTRAND,

School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine, Tulane University

CAROLINE H. BLEDSOE,

Department of Anthropology, Northwestern University

WILLIAM BRASS,

Centre for Population Studies, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, England

DOUGLAS C. EWBANK,

Population Studies Center, University of Pennsylvania

PHILIPPE FARGUES,

Centre d'Etudes et de Documentation Economique, Sociale et Juridique (CEDEJ), Cairo, Egypt

RON J. LESTHAEGHE,

Faculteit van de Economische, Sociale en Politieke Wetenschappen, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Belgium

PATRICK O. OHADIKE,

Regional Institute for Population Studies (RIPS), Accra, Ghana

ANNE R. PEBLEY,

The RAND Corporation, Santa Monica, California

DANIEL M. SALA-DIAKANDA,

Institut de Formation et de Recherche Démographiques (IFORD), Yaoundé, Cameroon

Suggested Citation:"FRONT MATTER." National Research Council. 1993. Social Dynamics of Adolescent Fertility in Sub-Saharan Africa. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/2220.
×

COMMITTEE ON POPULATION

SAMUEL H. PRESTON (Chair),

Population Studies Center, University of Pennsylvania

JOSE-LUIS BOBADILLA,

World Bank, Washington, D.C.

JOHN B. CASTERLINE,

Department of Sociology, Brown University

KENNETH H. HILL,

Department of Population Dynamics, Johns Hopkins University

DEAN T. JAMISON,

School of Public Health, University of California, Los Angeles

ANNE R. PEBLEY,

The RAND Corporation, Santa Monica, California

RONALD R. RINDFUSS,

Department of Sociology, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

T. PAUL SCHULTZ,

Department of Economics, Yale University

SUSAN C.M. SCRIMSHAW,

School of Public Health, University of California, Los Angeles

BETH J. SOLDO,

Department of Demography, Georgetown University

MARTA TIENDA,

Population Research Center, University of Chicago

BARBARA BOYLE TORREY,

Population Reference Bureau, Washington, D.C.

JAMES TRUSSELL,

Office of Population Research, Princeton University

AMY O. TSUI,

Carolina Population Center, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

LINDA G. MARTIN, Director

BARNEY COHEN, Research Associate

SUSAN M. COKE, Senior Project Assistant

KAREN A. FOOTE, Research Associate

DIANE L. GOLDMAN, Administrative Assistant*

JAMES N. GRIBBLE, Program Officer

JOAN M. MONTGOMERY HALFORD, Senior Project Assistant**

CAROLE L. JOLLY, Program Officer

DOMINIQUE MEEKERS, Research Associate*

PAULA J. MELVILLE, Senior Project Assistant

*  

through December 1991

**  

through July 1992

Page viii Cite
Suggested Citation:"FRONT MATTER." National Research Council. 1993. Social Dynamics of Adolescent Fertility in Sub-Saharan Africa. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/2220.
×
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Suggested Citation:"FRONT MATTER." National Research Council. 1993. Social Dynamics of Adolescent Fertility in Sub-Saharan Africa. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/2220.
×

Preface

This report is one in a series of studies that have been carried out under the auspices of the Panel on the Population Dynamics of Sub-Saharan Africa of the National Research Council's Committee on Population. The Research Council has a long history of examining population issues in developing countries. In 1971 it issued the report Rapid Population Growth: Consequences and Policy Implications . In 1977, the predecessor Committee on Population and Demography began a major study of levels and trends of fertility and mortality in the developing world that resulted in 13 country reports and 6 reports on demographic methods. Then, in the early 1980s, it undertook a study of the determinants of fertility in the developing world, which resulted in 10 reports. In the mid-and late-1980s, the Committee on Population assessed the economic consequences of population growth and the health consequences of contraceptive use and controlled fertility, among many other activities.

No publication on the demography of sub-Saharan Africa emerged from the early work of the committee, largely because of the paucity of data and the poor quality of what was available. However, censuses, ethnographic studies, and surveys of recent years, such as those under the auspices of the World Fertility Survey and the Demographic and Health Survey programs, have made available data on the demography of sub-Saharan Africa. The data collection has no doubt been stimulated by the increasing interest of both scholars and policymakers in the demographic development of Africa and the relations between demographic change and socioeconomic develop-

Suggested Citation:"FRONT MATTER." National Research Council. 1993. Social Dynamics of Adolescent Fertility in Sub-Saharan Africa. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/2220.
×

ments. In response to this interest, the Committee on Population held a meeting in 1989 to ascertain the feasibility and desirability of a major study of the demography of Africa, and decided to set up a Panel on the Population Dynamics of Sub-Saharan Africa.

The panel, which is chaired by Kenneth Hill and includes members from Africa, Europe, and the United States, met for the first time in February 1990 in Washington, D.C. At that meeting the panel decided to set up six working groups, composed of its own members and other experts on the demography of Africa, to carry out specific studies. Four working groups focused on cross-national studies of substantive issues: the social dynamics of adolescent fertility, factors affecting contraceptive use, the effects on mortality of child survival and general health programs, and the demographic effects of economic reversals. The two other working groups were charged with in-depth studies of Kenya and Senegal, with the objective of studying linkages between demographic variables and between those variables and socioeconomic changes. The panel also decided to commission papers reviewing levels and trends of fertility, the proximate determinants of fertility, nuptiality, child mortality, adult mortality, internal migration, and international migration, as well as the demographic consequences of the AIDS epidemic.

This report, one of the four cross-national studies, is concerned with the social dynamics of adolescent fertility in sub-Saharan Africa. It uses data from recent national surveys, conducted under the auspices of the Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS), to examine, among other things, contemporary trends in marriage, sexuality, contraceptive use, and fertility. It describes in some depth the changing social context within which adolescents are having children in sub-Saharan Africa, and the effects of these changing circumstances on the benefits and risks of early childbearing. The report draws extensively on ethnographic and historical literature to demonstrate the enormous heterogeneity in economic and social regimes within sub-Saharan Africa. This heterogeneity is used to explain why adolescent fertility has very different meanings and outcomes for different groups.

This report results from the joint efforts of the working group members and staff and represents a consensus of the members' views on the issues addressed. The Committee on Population and the Panel on the Population Dynamics of Sub-Saharan Africa appreciate the time and energy that all the working group members devoted to the study. Caroline H. Bledsoe wrote the first drafts of Chapters 1 and 8, and she and Barney Cohen served as the principal editors and coordinators for the manuscript. Andrew J. Cherlin and Dominique Meekers collaborated on the first draft of Chapter 2, and Anastasia Gage-Brandon wrote the first draft of Chapter 3. Jane I. Guyer wrote the first draft of Chapters 4 and 6. Dominique Meekers wrote, and Daniel M. Sala-Diakanda contributed to, the first draft of Chapter 5. Barney

Suggested Citation:"FRONT MATTER." National Research Council. 1993. Social Dynamics of Adolescent Fertility in Sub-Saharan Africa. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/2220.
×

Cohen wrote the first draft of Chapter 7, relying heavily on a commissioned paper by Laurie Zabin and Karungari Kiragu. As noted above, however, this report represents the views of the group as a whole, and considerable effort by all the members and staff went into the refinement of the early drafts.

The working group would like to acknowledge the help of Katherine Abu, A.A. Adejo, Aderanti Adepoju, Odette Ba, Gary Barker, Ann Blanc, Reed Boland, Judith Bruce, Kabir Cham, Gracia Clark, Francine Coeytaux, Sidiki Coulibaly, Allan Ferguson, Karen Foote, Christina Fowler, Samantha Garbers, Adrienne Germaine, Muhiuddin Haider, Karen Tranberg Hansen, Sarah Harbison, Kenneth Hill, Nikki Jones, Karungari Kiragu, Anke Kleiner-Bossaller, Mary Kay Larson, V.K. Lema, Thérèse Locoh, Carolyn Makinson, Linda G. Martin, Dominique Meekers, Asha Mohamud, Leo Morris, Pierre Ngom, Wangui Njau, Mojisola Olaneyan, John Paxman, Sam Preston, Paul Richards, K.O. Rogo, Harshadkumar C. Sanghvi, Krista Stewart, John M. Whiting, Nancy Williamson, and Laurie Zabin.

As is the case for all of the panel's work, this report would not have been possible without the cooperation and assistance of the Demographic and Health Surveys Program of the Institute for Resource Development/Macro Systems. We are grateful to the DHS staff for responding to our inquiries and facilitating our early access to the survey data.

We are also most grateful to the organizations that provided financial support for the work of the Africa panel: the Office of Population and the Africa Bureau of the Agency for International Development, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, and the Rockefeller Foundation. Besides providing funding, the representatives of these organizations were a source of information and advice in the development of the panel's overall work plan.

Special thanks are also due to Joan Montgomery Halford and Paula J. Melville for providing superb administrative and logistical support to the working group, to Mendelle T. Berenson and Florence Poillon for skillful editing of the report, to Elaine McGarraugh for meticulous production assistance, and to Eugenia Grohman for valuable guidance and extraordinary patience through the review and production processes.

SAMUEL H. PRESTON, Chair

Committee on Population

Suggested Citation:"FRONT MATTER." National Research Council. 1993. Social Dynamics of Adolescent Fertility in Sub-Saharan Africa. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/2220.
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This examination of changes in adolescent fertility emphasizes the changing social context within which adolescent childbearing takes place.

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