Ireland

The social and economic change that has occurred in Ireland over the past four decades has fundamentally altered the context in which women mother. Traditional structures of gender inequality have been challenged and women have acquired a range of rights in relation to fertility control, divorce, labor market access, and welfare provision. However, women receive limited support in their mothering roles, and choice around mothering remains unequally distributed between women.

The average age at which women give birth to their first child has risen steadily over the past 25 years, increasing from 24.9 years in 1980 to 28.8 years in 2007. Fertility rates, which were in decline since 1960, began to increase again in 2002. The total fertility rate, which reflects the projected number of children a woman would have if she experienced current age specific fertility rates while progressing from age 15–49, increased from 1.98 in 2002 to 2.03 in 2007. The percentage of births to mothers who are not married continues to grow, accounting for 32.8 percent of all registered births in 2007 as compared to 28.3 percent of births in 1998. In 2006, 18 percent of all family units were headed by a lone parent and in 2007, women represented 92.7 percent of lone parents with children under 20 with the number of women living as lone parents almost doubling between 1997 and 2007. The numbers of women mothering in cohabiting as distinct from marital relationships is also increasing, and cohabiting family units increased from 8.4 percent of all family units in 2002 to 11.6 percent in 2006. The introduction of divorce in 1995 has also contributed to the increase in the number of women parenting alone, and while divorce rates are relatively low, they are increasing; 3,684 divorces were granted in 2007.

The significant shift in social mores around family life and sexual morality since the early 1970s has rendered extramarital motherhood more acceptable. Ireland gained independence from English governance in 1921, and the early decades of self-governance were characterized by a close adherence between Catholic social teaching and state policy on issues of family life and sexual morality. Legislation passed in 1935 banned the importation and sale of contraceptives in Ireland, and was not rescinded until constitutionally challenged by a married mother in 1973. Contraception was only made legally available to unmarried people through a series of legislative measures in the 1980s. Abortion is not legal in Ireland.