Same-sex marriage in the Netherlands: parsing the stats

On Friday, Andrew Sullivan posted this brief item on his blog:

There's a big jump in the number of same-sex married couples in Holland, as the reform begins to change gay culture and social expectations.

Here's what the linked article, at the Dutch English-language website Expatica, actually says:

The number of gay couples in the Netherlands has risen sharply in recent years.

There were 53,000 gay and lesbian couples living together in the Netherlands at the beginning of 2005, according to Statistics Netherlands (CBS). Ten years ago there were less than 39,000 gay or lesbian cohabiting couples.

Almost a quarter of the gay or lesbian couples are married or in a registered partnership. Of these, 12 percent are married and 10 percent are in a registered partnership.

The CBS said there are 29,000 all-male couples and 24,000 lesbian couples. Despite the significant increase in the number of gay and lesbian couples, the group is equal to just over 1 percent of the total number of cohabiting couples in the Netherlands.

Clearly the article talks about all same-sex couples living toether, not just married ones.

It's hard to tell what the rise in same-sex couples in the Dutch census really represents. It could be, in part, due to the fact that more same-sex couples are identifying themselves as such to the census-takers. A change in gay culture -- a shift toward "settling down" -- has undoubtedly taken place as well, just as it has in the United States. But it's hard to make the case that legalized same-sex marriage has a lot to do with this, considering that only 12% of same-sex couples living together in the Netherlands are married.

As this CBS statistical table shows, same-sex marriages peaked in 2001 when they were first legalized; that year, there were 1,339 male-male marriage and 1,035 female-female ones. (Male-female marriages that year numbered 79,677.) The figures have dropped in every subsequent year, to 579 male-male marriages and 631 female-female marriages in 2004. In the same year, there were 261 civil partnerships registered between two men, and 322 between two women; these figures have held relatively steady over the past four years. (Registered partnerhips first became available in 1998.)

In 1996, Jonathan Rauch wrote that if same-sex marriage is to succeed, it must become the general norm in the gay community, not just another lifestyle option. At least so far, that does not seem to be happening in Holland.

Also in the past 10 years, the overall marriage rate has dropped, from 5.4 per 1,000 inhabitants in 1994 to 4.5 per 1,000 in 2004. More heterosexual men and women are entering into civil partnerships -- which are much more easily dissolved -- instead of marriage; in 2004, about 7% of new male-female legal unions were civil partnerships. This does not prove, as Stanley Kurtz has argued, that same-sex marriage undermines heterosexual marriage; the drop in marriage rates is undoubtedly due to many complex factors. However, one can plausibly argue that the changing attitudes toward marriage that make same-sex marriage possible may also be related to overall lower marriage rates. (Whether that's a bad thing is another matter.) And the Dutch experience does seem to refute Rauch's argument that legalizing same-sex marriage will improve the status of marriage in the larger society.

Why am I pointing this out? Because, while I fully support legal rights for same-sex partners, I think both sides in the marriage debate have been prone to unwarranted and exaggerated claims about the social impact of same-sex marriage. The legalization of same-sex marriage has not, as some have claimed, led to polygamy in the Netherlands. But at least so far, it has not created a "marriage culture" among gays and has not boosted marriage among heterosexuals. As we continue our own discussion of same-sex marriage, we need to have all the facts on the table.

(By the way, my best wishes to Andrew in his recovery from the flu.)