page_title: Women in Albania
section_title: Marriage, fertility and family life
hierarchical_section_title: Women in Albania / Marriage, fertility and family life
caption_attribution_description: Photos by Adam Jones
context_page_description: Women in Albania are women who live in or are from Albania. The first women's association in Albania was founded in 1909. Albanian women from the northern Gheg region reside within a conservative and patriarchal society. In such a traditional society, the women have subordinate roles in Gheg communities that believe in "male predominance". This is despite the arrival of democracy and the adoption of a free market economy in Albania, after the period under the communist Party of Labour. Gheg Albanian culture is based on the 500-year-old Kanun of Lekë Dukagjini, a traditional Gheg code of conduct, where the main role of women is to take care of the children and to take care of the home.
context_section_description: The total fertility rate is 1.5 children born per woman (2015 est.), which is below the replacement rate of 2.1. The contraceptive prevalence rate is quite high: 69.3% (2008/09). Most Albanian women start their families in the early and mid-twenties: as of 2011, the average age at first marriage was 23.6 for women and 29.3 for men.
  In some rural area of Albania, marriages are still arranged, and society is strongly patriarchal and traditional, influenced by the traditional set of values of the kanun. The urbanization of Albania is low compared to other European countries: 57.4% of the total population (2015). Although forced marriage is generally disapproved by society, it is a "well known phenomenon in the country, especially in rural and remote areas" and girls and women in these areas are "very often forced into marriages because of [a] patriarchal mentality and poverty".
  Abortion in Albania was fully legalized on December 7, 1995. Abortion can be performed on demand until the twelfth week of pregnancy. Women must undergo counseling for a week prior to the procedure, and hospitals which perform abortions are not allowed to release information to the public regarding which women they have treated.
  During the government of Enver Hoxha, communist Albania had a natalist policy, leading women to have illegal abortions  or to induce them on their own. Eventually the country had the second-highest maternal mortality rate in all of Europe, and it was estimated that 50% of all pregnancies ended in an abortion.
caption: Albanian women and their children in Berat, Albania
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