A specific demography of the South. Does it exist?
Historical studies have always underlined deep differences in the demography
of southern Italy respect to that of the northern and central part of the country.
This paper is particularly interested in discovering if nowadays the Southern
demographic dynamics are finally comparable with the recent evolution of the
North and the Centre of the Peninsula. We examine specifically the different
evolutions of mortality, fertility and family formation. The hypothesis is that
beneath the similarities shown by the data there are economic and anthropological
differences.