An NBC poll found this week that male Donald Trump voters under the age of 30 rank “having children” first among 13 options when asked what is most important to their “personal definition of success”. Female Kamala Harris voters, by contrast, put “having children” in 12th place. Zoomer women were less likely than their male counterparts to rank children as important, but the bigger difference was between Trump and Harris voters.

These results echo findings reported last month by John Burn-Murdoch of the Financial Times, showing a rising fertility gap between young progressives and conservatives in rich countries. The difference was modest before 1990, but has widened to 0.6 of a child in America and 0.4 of a child across these advanced societies. In a similar vein, since 2010 the fertility gap between religious and non-religious women under 45 has increased considerably. American women who attend church regularly now have almost one more child, on average, than those with no religious affiliation.

Might we go further and identify the rise of “woke” politics — equal outcomes and emotional harm protection for women and minorities — as a factor in the post-2010 decline in fertility in the Anglosphere and Scandinavia? Second-wave feminism argued that the institution of the family oppressed women and reproduced the patriarchy. Some called for sisterhood and political lesbianism. Social media allowed these radical ideas to flow off campus into mainstream media and youth culture. Radical feminism was a key component of the “Great Awokening” alongside critical race and gender ideology, and reached fever pitch in the aftermath of the #MeToo movement.

The share of women under 30 identifying as bisexual soared in this period: in the American General Social Survey (GSS), it leapt from under 5% in 2010 to over 25% in 2022. According to Gallup, 31% of Generation Z women now identify as LGBT. In the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) student surveys, non-heterosexual identification is strongly linked to identifying as very liberal. Even controlling for ideology, non-heterosexuality is connected to progressive views such as endorsing the shouting down of offensive speakers on campus.

This progressive ideology has been particularly dominant in the Anglosphere and Northern Europe. Now consider fertility trends in the global Northwest. As the chart below shows, across the Anglosphere (US, UK, Canada, Australia, Ireland, New Zealand) and Scandinavia (Sweden, Norway, Finland, Denmark), total fertility rates have fallen faster since 2010 than anywhere else in the developed world. The chart demonstrates that these societies had close to replacement fertility until around 2010, but have since undergone a birth dearth.

Birth rates are plummeting in the developed world

Regional average of births per woman 1990-2023

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Academic demographers have long argued that feminist policies such as subsidized daycare and easy entry and exit from the workforce, alongside greater acceptance of children outside marriage, helped to boost fertility in Scandinavia and the Anglosphere. This contrasted with Southern Europe and East Asia, where women were expected to prioritize their husbands and having children outside of marriage was frowned upon. Many women rejected this deal, opting to avoid marriage or limit family size.

Though there is good evidence for the feminism-as-pronatalism argument — fertility remains lower in Southern Europe and East Asia — it appears that Northern Europe and North America’s embrace of feminism is a double-edged sword. As gender equality moved from moderate egalitarianism to feminist radicalism, it ushered in an anti-family ethos which has arguably depressed fertility among members of Gen Z and younger Millennials. No wonder female Harris voters put having children second to last on their priority list while male Trump voters placed it first.

While it is difficult to neatly distinguish the effects of the Great Awokening from the LGBT surge and youth mental health crisis which accompanied it, those seeking to explain the Anglosphere and Scandinavia’s post-2010 fertility plunge must reckon with the seismic cultural changes which gripped youth culture during this period.

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Eric Kaufmann is Professor of Politics at the University of Buckingham and author of Taboo: How Making Race Sacred Led to a Cultural Revolution (Forum Press, 4 July).

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