Analysis of the parliamentary debate on low birth rates in Spain: the 14th Legislature between demographic crisis and reproductive revolution
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.22325/fes/res.2025.272Keywords:
birthrate, fertility, gender, political discourse, reproductive revolutionAbstract
This article analyzes how Spain’s main political parties addressed the issue of low birth rates in parliamentary debates during the 14th Legislature (2019-2023). Drawing on agenda-setting and framing theories and employing a mixed-methods approach that combines lexicometric and content analysis of speeches by the five principal parties (PSOE, PP, Ciudadanos, UP, and VOX), the study identifies two predominant discursive frames: the demographic crisis and the reproductive revolution. The findings reveal how each party constructs narratives around birth rates, family, and gender. VOX and PP frame the issue primarily through cultural and economic lenses, emphasizing the demographic crisis, while PSOE and UP advocate for a perspective centered on gender equality and the redistribution of caregiving responsibilities. The study also uncovers hybrid discursive frames that blend elements from both approaches, illustrating the nuanced nature of the debate on birth rates in a context of growing ideological polarization. This analysis underscores the political and gendered dimensions of these discourses, highlighting the importance of addressing structural inequalities in the development of public policies concerning birth rates and reproduction in Spain.
References
Abacus.AI. (2025). ChatLLM Teams platform [Large Language Model]. https://abacus.ai/
Aragón, A. M., y Ruiz, A. M. (2023). La extinción de la nación española y cómo evitarla: Una aproximación al discurso parlamentario post-VOX y sus consecuencias de género. En A. Domingo (Ed.), La coartada demográfica y el discurso de la involución en España (pp. 95-130). Icaria.
Ayuso, L.,y Bascón, M. (2021). El descubrimiento de las políticas familiares en España: Entre la ideología y el pragmatismo. Revista Española de Investigaciones Sociológicas, (174), 3-22. https://doi.org/10.5477/cis/reis.174.3
Bakker, I., y Gill, S. (2019). Rethinking power, production, and social reproduction: Toward variegated social reproduction. Capital & Class, 43(4), 503-523. https://doi.org/10.1177/0309816819880783
Balbo, N., Billari, F. C., y Mills, M. (2013). Fertility in advanced societies: A review of research. European Journal of Population, 34(1), 1-29. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10680-012-9277-y
Beaujouan, É., y Sobotka, T. (2017). Late motherhood in low-fertility countries: Reproductive intentions, trends and consequences (Vienna Institute of Demography Working Papers No. 02/2027). Vienna Institute of Demography. https://doi.org/10.1553/0x003cd014
Borriello, A., y Crespy, A. (2015). How to not speak the ‘F-word’: Federalism between mirage and imperative in the euro crisis. European Journal of Political Research, 54(3), 411-621. https://doi.org/10.1111/1475-6765.12093
Castro, T., Martín, T., Seiz, M., y Cordero, J. (2022). El desafío de la muy baja fecundidad en España: ¿Qué políticas sociales serían deseables? En A. Penadés, y A. Garmendia (Coords.), Informe sobre la democracia en España 2021 (pp. 119-131). Fundación Alternativas.
Chazel, L., y Dain, V. (2023). Left-wing populism and environmental issues: An analysis of La France Insoumise’s ‘popular environmentalism’. Political Studies, 72(3), 1223-1249. https://doi.org/10.1177/00323217231178631
Coole, D. (2012). Reconstructing the elderly: A critical analysis of pensions and population policies in an era of demographic ageing. Contemporary Political Theory, 11(1), 41-67. https://doi.org/10.1057/cpt.2011.12
Cuenca, C., Rebollo, S., y García, J. M. (2023). Los discursos demográficos como herramienta político-mediática: El caso de la prensa española. Teknokultura, 20(1), 37-47. https://doi.org/10.5209/tekn.81161
Dearing, J. W., y Rogers, E. M. (1992). Agenda-setting. Sage.
Domingo, A. (2018). Posverdad, gobierno y población: Relatos demográficos para no dormir. Tiempo de Paz, (130), 81-88.
Entman, R. (1993). Framing: Toward clarification of a fractured paradigm. Journal of Communication, 43(4), 51-58. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1460-2466.1993.tb01304.x
Feola, D. (2022). Metapolitics and demographic anxiety on the new right: Using and abusing the language of equality. Perspectives on Politics, 20(3), 1012-1023. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1537592721004072
Ferreira, C. (2019). Vox como representante de la derecha radical en España: Un estudio sobre su ideología. Revista Española de Ciencia Política, (51), 73-98. https://doi.org/10.21308/recp.51.03
Fraser, N. (2016). Contradictions of capital and care. New Left Review, (100), 99-117.
Gietel-Basten, S., Rotkirch, A., y Sobotka, T. (2022). Changing the perspective on low birth rates: Why simplistic solutions won’t work. BMJ, 379, e072670. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj-2022-072670
Goetz, J., Höft, S., Oláh, L., y Petö, A. (2022). Discourses on demography in the EU institutions. Gunda Werner Institut. https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:0168-ssoar-78637-5
Goldscheider, F., Bernhardt, E., y Lappegard, T. (2015). The gender revolution: A framework for understanding changing family and demographic behavior. Population and Development Review, 41(2), 207-239. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1728-4457.2015.00045.x
González, A. y Jaraíz, G. (2020). Las políticas de inclusión social en Andalucía desde la perspectiva discursiva y lexicométrica. Un análisis comparativo del discurso técnico-político. Empiria, (45), 75-111. https://doi.org/10.5944/empiria.45.2020.26305
Hernández-Santaolalla, V. (2018). Los efectos de los medios de comunicación de masas. Ediciones UOC.
Hwang, K. (2024). The complex interplay of causal narratives in public policy and political discourse. Journal of Infrastructure, Policy and Development, 8(2), 3079. https://doi.org/10.24294/jipd.v8i2.3079
Ilie, C. (2018). Parliamentary discourse and deliberative rhetoric. En P. Ihalainen, C. Ilie, y K. Palonen (Eds.), Parliament and parliamentarism: A comparative history of a European concept (pp. 133-145). Berghahn Books. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctvgs0b7n
Instituto Nacional de Estadística [INE]. (2023). Estadística continua de población. Instituto Nacional de Estadística. Recuperado el 3 de noviembre de 2024, de https://www.ine.es/dyngs/INEbase/es/operacion.htm?c=Estadistica_C&cid=1254736177095&menu=ultiDatos&idp=1254735572981
Kessler-Harris, A. (2021). Engendering democracy in an age of anxiety. En F. McCall, y M. Weir (Eds.), Who gets what? The new politics of insecurity (pp. 103-126). Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108879170.005
Krippendorff, K. (2004). Content analysis: An introduction to its methodology. Sage.
Lakoff, G. (2007). No pienses en un elefante. Lenguaje y debate político. Editorial Complutense.
McCombs, M., y Shaw, D. L. (1972). The agenda-setting function of mass media. Public Opinion Quarterly, 36(2), 176-187. https://doi.org/10.1086/267990
Neubert, C., Gökariksel, B., y Smith, S. (2019). Demographic fever dreams: Fragile masculinity and population politics in the rise of the global right. Signs, 44(3), 561-587. https://doi.org/10.1086/701154
Organización para la Cooperación y el Desarrollo Económico [OCDE]. (2024). Demography data: Population indicators. Organización para la Cooperación y el Desarrollo Económico. Recuperado el 23 de noviembre de 2024, de https://www.oecd.org/en/data/indicators/population.html
Pérez, J., y Abellán, A. (2018). Envejecimiento demográfico y vejez en España. Panorama Social, (28), 11-47. http://hdl.handle.net/10261/241140
Pérez, J. (2018). Duración de la vida, fecundidad y migraciones en España. Ekonomiaz, 96(2), 52-79. http://hdl.handle.net/10261/309772
Pérez, J. (2020). Cambio demográfico y natalismo. En J. A. Fernández (Coord.), Demografía: Cambios en el modelo reproductivo (pp. 45-51). Economistas Sin Fronteras. http://hdl.handle.net/10261/309764
Pérez, J. (2023). El natalismo en la España del siglo XXI. En A. Domingo (Ed.), La coartada demográfica y el discurso de la involución en España (pp. 19-58). Icaria.
Pirro, A. (2023). Far right: The significance of an umbrella concept. Nations and Nationalism, 29(1), 101-112. https://doi.org/10.1111/nana.12860
Saldaña, J. (2013). The coding manual for qualitative researchers. Sage.
Slapin, J. B., y Proksch, S. O. (2014). Words as data: Content analysis in legislative studies. En S. Martin, T. Saalfeld, y K. Strom (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of legislative studies (pp. 126-144). Oxford University Press.
Snow, D. A., y Benford, R. D. (1992). Master frames and cycles of protest. En A. D. Morris, y C. McClurg-Mueller (Eds.), Frontiers in social movement theory (pp. 133-155). Yale University Press.
Takas, E., Prodromitis, G., y Papastamou, S. (2020). Representing Europe in times of crisis: Rhetorical construction on “Europe” in the parliamentary discussions regarding the voting of the three Memoranda in Greece. Journal of Education, Innovation, and Communication, 2(1), 26-44. https://doi.org/10.34097/jeicom_2_1_june2020_2.
Timm, A. F. (2015). Biopolitics, demographobia, and individual freedom: Lessons from Germany’s century of extremes. En R. Solinger y M. Nakachi (Eds.), Reproductive states: Global perspectives on the invention and implementation of population policy (pp. 33-62). Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199311071.003.0002
Valkenburg, P. M., Semetko, H. A., y De Vreese, C. H. (1999). The effects of news frames on readers’ thoughts and recall. Communication Research, 26(5), 550-569. https://doi.org/10.1177/009365099026005002
Van Atteveldt, W. (2008). Semantic network analysis: Techniques for extracting, representing, and querying media content [Tesis doctoral]. Repositorio de la Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam. https://hdl.handle.net/1871/15964
Wesolowski, K. (2020). It’s all about the money? Family policies, individual gender-role attitudes, and childbearing intentions in an international perspective. Journal of Family Issues, 41(11), 2065-2089. https://doi.org/10.1177/0192513X19896047
Zacharenko, E. (2024). European Union gender equality and work–life balance policies: Managing tensions between the demands of production and reproduction. European Journal of Politics and Gender (advance online publication). https://doi.org/10.1332/25151088Y2024D000000050
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2025 Alba María Aragón Morales, Antonia María Ruiz Jiménez
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
• The transfer of the copyright of the article to Revista Española de Sociología.
• The assignment to the Revista Española de Sociología of the rights of commercial exploitation of the article to third parties both in the offset and digital formats, as well as to the search engines and platforms that may serve as intermediaries for the sale or knowledge of the article.
