Generation Maybe: Why We’re Having Fewer Children

The populations of countries including China, Poland, Japan, Russia, South Korea and Italy are shrinking rapidly. In Britain, one in five couples have no children, and almost half of all families have one.

Conflicting explanations are emerging: pronatalists wail that feminism has killed the family, governments throw money at childcare subsidies, and would-be grandparents wring their hands at the apparent selfishness of the young. For Camilla Cavendish, the baby gap conversation is in entirely the wrong place.

Bringing her humane and incisive research to The Conduit, Cavendish will reveal a complex tapestry of motivations across a diverse range of societies and cultures. From a dating recession to a loss of faith in the future, the pressures of modern parenting to infertility struggles, we will grapple with the profound implications of a world in which fewer babies are born.

Speakers

Camilla Cavendish is a leading journalist, broadcaster and commentator. She is a weekly columnist for the Financial Times and author of Extra Time: 10 Lessons for an Ageing World, which charted the global challenges of longevity. She is a research fellow at Harvard University’s Kennedy School, a visiting faculty member at King’s College London, a crossbench peer in the House of Lords and former head of the 10 Downing Street Policy Unit – the second woman ever to lead it. Her awards include the Paul Foot Award for investigative and campaigning journalism, and Wincott Senior Financial Journalist of the Year. Cavendish is a mother of three.