DEPOP members

Yuliya Hilevych

I am leading the DEPOP project team and the archival and oral histories research with partners in Ukraine. Trained in sociology and history, I position myself as both historical sociologists and social historian of Europe, developing comparative approaches to the study of population, healthcare, and welfare provision during the long 20th century. I am interested in questions such as: how population trends, including low fertility, outmigration and staying, and high mortality vs ageing, have changed at subnational levels? What have been the links between population trends and health, care, and welfare provision? And how have these changes been experienced and perceived by the communities? Here, gender dynamics, family relations, and social institutions are the key lenses. 

My ambition for the DEPOP project is that we lay out the foundation connecting population decline and welfare decline, which can be replicated beyond the three countries. 

Gijs Hoekstra

I am a PhD Candidate in the DEPOP project, where I analyse depopulation and community welfare in the Groningen province. More specifically, my work examines the lived experiences of ‘decline’ - both in terms of population loss and disappearing facilities - as well as the provision and reception of health care, and collective action in health care. Additionally, part of my research analyses the development of health care in the province through the lens of health care associations. I use a wide variety of data (oral history, archival, and quantitative), which makes my work challenging, but most of all interesting and varied. 

My background in contemporary social history was what first drew me to the project. I completed my Bachelor’s in History at the University of Groningen and a Master’s in Applied History at the Erasmus University in Rotterdam. During and after my studies, I worked as a research assistant first in medical history at the Erasmus Medical Centre, and later, at the NIOD Institute for War, Genocide and Holocaust Studies. 

In the DEPOP project, I am able to combine my previous research interests and experiences in medical history, social history, grassroots organising, and the impact of migration on everyday life. Working on this project has been especially great thanks to the collaboration with project members who do similar research, in very different contexts. 

Ilmari Railo

I am a PhD candidate working on the DEPOP project, where I research depopulation and its relationship with welfare provision with a local community perspective. I graduated from the University of Helsinki in 2024 with a MA degree in Economic and Social History. In my PhD, I analyse the connection between regional depopulation and welfare provision in the Finnish province of North Karelia from the 1950s until the 2020s. What drew me to the DEPOP project was its oral history focus, which to me, felt like a natural progression from my previous projects where I have worked with oral history collections and interviews.

In my research, I seek to understand how individuals and communities have historically responded to changes brought about by population decline and welfare state developments. By investigating the lived experiences of people living regions with population decline, I can view the impacts of depopulation and changes in welfare provision through their consequences for the affected communities. I am particularly interested in how individuals and communities have found ways to maintain their welfare in the rapidly evolving demographic and institutional conditions that have prevailed throughout the research period.

Mustafa Firat

I am a postdoctoral researcher in the DEPOP project, where I conduct quantitative and comparative analyses to study demographic patterns across regions and over time. My work focuses on understanding how regional trajectories develop and how they come about in broader historical, social, and institutional contexts.

What draws me to this project is its historical approach and integration of multiple levels of analysis. By combining regional, national, and temporal perspectives in a comparative framework, DEPOP provides a unique opportunity to link demographic patterns to broader societal changes. Beyond this research fit, I was also motivated to join the project because of its collaborative and interdisciplinary environment, bringing together diverse perspectives and expertise in a way that I find both stimulating and enriching.

With my work in the project, I aim to contribute to a better understanding of how regional differences in demographic trends emerge and persist, shaped by the interplay between institutional structures, social relations, and historical developments. I am excited to discover these patterns and help uncover the stories that regional demographics can tell about our past, present, and future.

Research Assistants

• Ksenia Zhuzha-Palamarchuk (Ukraine)
• Orest Kostiv (Ukraine)