Massimo Anelli, Paolo Pinotti and Zachary Porreca documented the transplantation of the Sicilian Mafia to the United States in the 1920s, when a large-scale repression campaign in Italy targeted Mafia strongholds and forced many Mafiosi to migrate, and study the resulting short- and long-term effects across neighborhoods in U.S. cities. Using newly linked administrative and historical data from the U.S.
Health and Socio-Demographic Surveillance (HDSS) systems are a response to low levels of vital event registration in areas where data for health planning is critically scarce. HDSS aim to provide high quality longitudinal data on population dynamics of health and social transitions to inform policy and practice.
Rapid urbanisation in many developing countries is a profound demographic change, which has fundamentally reshaped the spatial distribution of poverty and health inequalities. Although many scholars have examined the impact of poverty on child health outcomes, their measures of poverty are commonly limited to the asset-based approach that may not fully capture the multidimensional nature of deprivation, potentially biasing estimates of its effects.
This 2-day course introduces the foundation for understanding how and why certain events do or do not occur, such as when young people leave home, length of employment, or time to first home ownership.
In this 2-day course, we'll learn skills that help demographers, policymakers, and health and social researchers measure differences between populations, and techniques that allow valid comparisons to be made across populations with differing compositions.
Latin America and the Caribbean have experienced rapid demographic change over the past century, marked by sustained fertility decline, improvements in life expectancy, and shifting migration patterns. Although these processes are often described as part of a compressed demographic transition, they have not unfolded uniformly across countries. Differences in the timing, pace, and configuration of demographic change reflect persistent structural inequalities and the region’s diverse social and institutional contexts.
In many low-fertility societies, fertility debates increasingly centre on gender equality, yet research has produced inconsistent findings on how gender relates to fertility ideals and intentions. Mental health has also become a growing concern and is itself shaped by gender, but it has rarely been integrated into fertility research. This thesis proposes that fertility ideals are shaped not only by gender beliefs, but also by the psychological resources available to act on them.
In common with other high-income countries, a key feature of Australia’s population trends since Federation has been a shift towards smaller families. The fertility rate has fallen from over 3.5 children per woman in 1901 to just under 1.5 in 2024, although this decline has not been linear. Periods of falling fertility have frequently prompted political concern, parliamentary inquiries, and debate about potential policy responses. Understanding how politicians interpret fertility decline is central to interpreting how fertility has been debated.
This talk presents a taster of some findings that Marion Burkimsher has presented at conferences but not taken further. Topics include:
In this talk, Michelle will present research looking at three common missteps that are made when designing and implementing gender equality initiatives: (1) when we don’t go beyond describing the numbers; (2) when we try to ‘fix’ women rather than fix systems; and (3) when we are overly optimistic about the progress we have made. She will consider each of these missteps in term, referencing a programme of research that suggests alternative ways of approaching gender equality initiatives.