30th anniversary of Estonian Demographic Association
by Luule Sakkeus
June 1, 2016
My today’s speech is a hommage to the persons, events and bodies who have paved the way towards having population studies in Estonia as it is recognised internationally today.
Although our invitation makes it appear as if demography in Estonia is only 30 years old, there are several beginnings and collaborations that have shaped our current way of being.
Looking at how demographic thought has influenced us, we can’t get past Lexis who formulated one of the most used demographical instruments – the expression of three-dimensionality of time while he stayed in Tartu University. Although his authorship as the first researcher to propose such an instrument has been challenged, everybody who deals with longevity, life course and event history analysis is well familiar with the Lexis diagram nowadays. Therefore, our deep interest in such surveys like the FFS, GGS and SHARE might not be just a coincidence.
Another philosopher and Latvian-Russian demographer who, aside being known as Carl Ballod alias Karlis Balodis might be even more known as Carl Atlanticus, got his first round of higher education also in Tartu University. The collaboration with Baltic, in particular Latvian demographers, has been one of the main cornerstones of our evolvement.
Maybe more interesting in our current search for interdisciplinarity in science is the fact that exploring population in Estonia got its start from professionals of medical sciences. In the end of the 19th century more than 20 medical doctors pursuing their degree wrote their theses on population issues in Tartu University. Among them one of the most known is Bernhard Körber who was also helping to conduct the 1881 census in Tartu, and later was the first to analyse the 1897 census data before its official publication. Maybe from there we take stock in our collaborations in the health and mortality field.
Perhaps one of the cornerstones of today’s situation in Estonian demography was laid out already by Swedish king Carl XI whose church law made us systematically gather population events. The law was reinforced in the 19th century, ahead of the Russian Empire’s first census in 1897, and thus ahead in terms of conducting several regional censuses already from mid-century. This certainly is one of the cornerstones of our interest in historical demography (Heldur Palli), now pursued by younger generation (M. Klesment, H. Jaadla, M. Maiste).
In the 20th century the scope of fields which dealt with population issues widened- remained the medical sciences, but additionally geographers and historians added their input, including two Tartu University rectors, not to mention population statisticians who aside of conducting three censuses (1922, 1934, 1941) also added analytical overviews.
The darkened era of Soviet occupation first banned data and any reference to population issues. In the 1960s with the relative thaw came the first census in 1959 (now also digitalised by EIPS), the start of first overviews in different fields such as economists whose representative from that time is also present in our audience today (Kaljo Laas), followed by already known human geographers, historians and epidemiologists. A special place in the development of nowadays Estonian demography still belongs to statisticians, and among them, on the one side, Lembit Tepp, who managed to ignore Soviet rulings and did not throw away census lists from 1959, 1970 and 1989. Thanks to him we can today analyse the Soviet legacy on the individual level. Another person was Uno Mereste, a well known professor of statistics at Tallinn Technical University, however, his contribution is much wider than teaching population statistics among many other statistical disciplines to me and many others in this room. His article at the conference of historical demography for Soviet researchers in Tallinn in 1977 was dedicated to applying system theory framework to population studies. As A. Vishnevski, currently the leading demographer of Russia has cited – that opened up a new avenue which enabled to defend dissertations using internationally recognised theoretical framework of the demographic transition also in the Soviet Union from that time onwards. All well-known Baltic demographers as well as Vishnevski’s doctor habilitatus in 1983 followed this wave.
What we are celebrating today is what followed thereafter. And this you can study further from our roll-ups (and a historical overview in the blog) during the dinner. Hereby I want to pay attention to some of the organisations which have contributed to the new start 30 years ago, and with whom the collaboration has been essential for our development.
In Estonia:
Internationally:
June 1, 2016
My today’s speech is a hommage to the persons, events and bodies who have paved the way towards having population studies in Estonia as it is recognised internationally today.
Although our invitation makes it appear as if demography in Estonia is only 30 years old, there are several beginnings and collaborations that have shaped our current way of being.
Looking at how demographic thought has influenced us, we can’t get past Lexis who formulated one of the most used demographical instruments – the expression of three-dimensionality of time while he stayed in Tartu University. Although his authorship as the first researcher to propose such an instrument has been challenged, everybody who deals with longevity, life course and event history analysis is well familiar with the Lexis diagram nowadays. Therefore, our deep interest in such surveys like the FFS, GGS and SHARE might not be just a coincidence.
Another philosopher and Latvian-Russian demographer who, aside being known as Carl Ballod alias Karlis Balodis might be even more known as Carl Atlanticus, got his first round of higher education also in Tartu University. The collaboration with Baltic, in particular Latvian demographers, has been one of the main cornerstones of our evolvement.
Maybe more interesting in our current search for interdisciplinarity in science is the fact that exploring population in Estonia got its start from professionals of medical sciences. In the end of the 19th century more than 20 medical doctors pursuing their degree wrote their theses on population issues in Tartu University. Among them one of the most known is Bernhard Körber who was also helping to conduct the 1881 census in Tartu, and later was the first to analyse the 1897 census data before its official publication. Maybe from there we take stock in our collaborations in the health and mortality field.
Perhaps one of the cornerstones of today’s situation in Estonian demography was laid out already by Swedish king Carl XI whose church law made us systematically gather population events. The law was reinforced in the 19th century, ahead of the Russian Empire’s first census in 1897, and thus ahead in terms of conducting several regional censuses already from mid-century. This certainly is one of the cornerstones of our interest in historical demography (Heldur Palli), now pursued by younger generation (M. Klesment, H. Jaadla, M. Maiste).
In the 20th century the scope of fields which dealt with population issues widened- remained the medical sciences, but additionally geographers and historians added their input, including two Tartu University rectors, not to mention population statisticians who aside of conducting three censuses (1922, 1934, 1941) also added analytical overviews.
The darkened era of Soviet occupation first banned data and any reference to population issues. In the 1960s with the relative thaw came the first census in 1959 (now also digitalised by EIPS), the start of first overviews in different fields such as economists whose representative from that time is also present in our audience today (Kaljo Laas), followed by already known human geographers, historians and epidemiologists. A special place in the development of nowadays Estonian demography still belongs to statisticians, and among them, on the one side, Lembit Tepp, who managed to ignore Soviet rulings and did not throw away census lists from 1959, 1970 and 1989. Thanks to him we can today analyse the Soviet legacy on the individual level. Another person was Uno Mereste, a well known professor of statistics at Tallinn Technical University, however, his contribution is much wider than teaching population statistics among many other statistical disciplines to me and many others in this room. His article at the conference of historical demography for Soviet researchers in Tallinn in 1977 was dedicated to applying system theory framework to population studies. As A. Vishnevski, currently the leading demographer of Russia has cited – that opened up a new avenue which enabled to defend dissertations using internationally recognised theoretical framework of the demographic transition also in the Soviet Union from that time onwards. All well-known Baltic demographers as well as Vishnevski’s doctor habilitatus in 1983 followed this wave.
What we are celebrating today is what followed thereafter. And this you can study further from our roll-ups (and a historical overview in the blog) during the dinner. Hereby I want to pay attention to some of the organisations which have contributed to the new start 30 years ago, and with whom the collaboration has been essential for our development.
In Estonia:
- In the beginning it was all hosted by the urban sociological research laboratory of Tallinn Technical University (M. Pavelson), where K. Katus, myself, A. Vikat and A. Puur started to issue the first series of research papers in population studies (1983);
- The Estonian Academy of Arts and Unemployment Bureau lended their rooms free of charge to us;
- Collaboration with Statistics Estonia in census data processing and reorganisation of population statistics in 1991-1992, followed by collaborations in the organisation of nation-wide surveys (FFS; EHIS, ELFS, SILC; SHARE) throughout the decades;
- Under the aegis of the Estonian Science Foundation (H. Martinson) the committee of social sciences headed by Jüri Allik first recognised our research with grants in 1995;
- Since 1994 Tallinn University until its not so well conducted reform in 2015, and coincidence of it with the national reform in research funding which threatens today to wipe out the long-paved route of Estonian demography;
Internationally:
- Väestoliitto – we recognise with deep gratitude the many scholarships which enabled access to contemporary literature and many collaborations, among others first Estonian doctors in demography A. Vikat and H. Kulu in Helsinki University. First Finnish- Estonian seminars enabled to introduce our research, the second one in 1991 just several days after the Soviet coup and restoration of Estonian independence;
- Barbara Anderson and Brian Silver from Michigan universities with whom first high level articles emerged in Demography and Population Index, but also with whom Estonian population data was transformed in 1991 in a PC format;
- The descent on Estonia of Statistics Sweden in 1990 laid grounds for decades-long collaborations, and introduced Jan Hoem and his team from Stockholm University to Estonia during the Estonian-Swedish demographic seminar in 1991. This collaboration has been extended to many avenues – under Livia Olah’s guidance collaboration in the FamiliesandSocieties project, on one hand, but also leading to Jim Vaupel, our today’s main presenter, to visit Tallinn, having been the co-founding director of Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research with Jan Hoem;
- Baltic collaboration – with whom the ups and downs, especially in the institutionalisation of demography in our countries, have been shared, and in particular the establishment of Baltic demographic section which was the first framework for Estonian Demographic Association to operate. The most distinguished collaboration is the Baltic mortality project which has led to long-lasting collaboration with J. Vallin, F. Meslé from INED, and V. Shkolnikov’s group from MPDIR. In 2015 we organised together the Population Europe event in Riga.
- Invaluable has been the recognition of our potential by the UN ECE PAU even before the Soviet Union collapsed, and engaging us in the FFS (1990s) project, which has led to participation in GGS (2000s), as well as development of the life course approach in Estonia, but also engaging us in an internationl migration project (1996) and an ageing project(1990s-2000s). The latter has been followed by SHARE project in 2010s - of which continuation we are today still waiting for (Max Planck Institute for Social Policy and Law, MEA);
- Population Committee of the Council of Europe extended our international collaborations in the field of internal migration (1999), national minorities (2000), foreign origin population (2003) and other areas, among which also the European population yearbook in 1996 was edited;
- And last but not least, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research – whose founding director James Vaupel is our main speaker today and will be holding a two-day seminar on longevity the next few days in Tallinn. MPDIR has been one of the main collaborating partners during the last decade, in particular having contributed through EDSD and Population Europe. The co-director of MPIDR is now Mikko Myrskylä, the Baltoscandinavian – hence, to allow for Edgar Kant’s definiton - direction of collaboration is hoped to be enlargened in the near future.