Does Experiencing Irregularity Affect Migrants Fertility? Evidence from Italy

Livia Elisa Ortensi , Alma Mater Studiorum University of Bologna
Roberto Impicciatore , University of Bologna
Rocco Molinari, University of Bologna

It is broadly recognised that international migration is a life course event with a potentially significant impact on both timings of birth and completed fertility. Scholars analysing the nexus between migration and fertility have developed theories to understand fertility patterns among migrant groups and in different countries of settlement to the present day. So far, the extensive effort to understand migrants’ fertility has been carried out on the subgroup of migrants who have the legal right to stay in the destination country, holding a long-term or temporary residence permit. The reason for this selection is due to the fact that large surveys targeting migrants and providing information on past birth, fertility intentions, or the ideal number of children are usually carried out on samples drawn from the resident population, leaving therefore outside irregular migrants or regular non-resident migrants. The impossibility to reach irregular migrants and the lack of information on their current or previous legal status left, therefore the reflection on the impact of irregularity on migrant fertility in the background. However, irregularity involves a large number of migrants in Europe, and many are women of reproductive age. This study aims at filling this knowledge gap by investigating, through retrospective survey data, the linkage between undocumented experience and fertility patterns in Italy, a country that in the past hosted a large number of undocumented migrants and repeatedly recurred to regularisation programmes. Preliminary findings suggest the existence of a disruptive effect of irregular status on the fertility behaviour of international immigrants.

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 Presented in Session 23. Legal status and life course of immigrants