Cross-National Variations in Abortion Patterns of Europeans: Divergence or Convergence?

Jirina Kocourkova, Charles University In Prague
Bara Idlbekova, Charles University

In the late 1980s, the East-West divide by birth control was identified in Europe as both parts differed by contraceptive practices and abortion rates. The aim is to address changes in the birth control patterns that have occurred till 2019 in EU countries and to find out whether the large variation in terms of abortion rates and contraceptive patterns can be still identified in Europe. Cluster analysis of birth control indicators based on data from Eurostat and UN World Contraceptive Use 2022 was used to give more detailed insight into current typology of abortion behaviour in the EU and attitudes towards abortion were analysed using data from European Value Survey in 2017 and applying binary logistic regression. The main results could be summed up as follows: (1) The East-West divide in abortion behaviour was distorted, but not fully eliminated. Besides the former Eastern and Western abortion patterns the new “low abortion” pattern has emerged. (2) Within the EU countries convergent trends towards lower abortion level was identified since 1990. (3) Liberal attitudes towards homosexuality and no religion are connected with abortion justification in all selected countries.

Keywords: Family Planning and Contraception

See extended abstract.