Revolutionary Transition: Inheritance Change and Fertility Decline

Résumé

France’s demographic transition occurred a century ahead of any other country. We test Le Play’s (1884) hypothesis that this early demographic transition was triggered by the French Revolution and its harmonization of inheritance across France. After a series of laws implemented in 1793, the Loi de Nivôse, year II abolished impartible inheritance practices that excluded non-heirs and women. We develop a theoretical framework predicting a decline in fertility because of indivisibility constraints in parents’ assets and a delay in marriage ages of women included in inheritance. We test these hypotheses with a newly compiled map of pre-Revolution inheritance practices and demographic data from the Henry survey. Our difference-in-differences estimates are based on comparing cohorts of fertile age and cohorts too old to be fertile in 1793 between municipalities where the reform altered and did not alter the existing inheritance practices. We find that the reform reduced completed fertility by half a child, increased childlessness and women’s age at marriage. These changes triggered France’s early demographic transition.