On October 29th, 2015, Beijing announced the nullification of the nigh universally loathed “One Child Policy” as part of the regime’s new Five Year Plan. Effective immediately, each couple will be allowed two children, from a statement by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). The intended purpose of the policy course reversal is to counterbalance the strains of an aging population on Chinese society and the labor force. While China has loosened the policy several times already, the effective ending of the program demonstrates a marked shift in the vision of the Communist Party.
The controversial policy was first introduced in 1979 to promote balanced population growth. Under Mao Zedong’s leadership, the largely rural and impoverished population exploded, and life expectancy rates rose to their highest levels yet. When the population grew by 300 million persons in just thirty years, the central government deemed it appropriate to limit births per couple. Analysts estimate that the policy has prevented up to 400 million births. Population control, though, has created a burgeoning aging population relying on a comparatively low young population. As early as 1984, the number of young persons as a percentage of the workforce dipped below the world average. Beyond the obvious economic message of this statistic, that the Chinese economy was relying more heavily on the geriatric than the youthful, are the societal implications of a young workforce siphoning time and energy from work into caring for elders, or abandoning them altogether and thus increasing the need for public expenditures geared towards caring for destitute seniors. With the effects of an aging population threatening to harm economic growth by dwindling the labor force and its efficiency, it became time for the CCP to relinquish its grip on childbirth measures.
While still causing serious societal and economic changes, the decades-old policy has not been as resolute as its name might suggest. The initial policy applied differently to urban and rural couples. While urban residents were restricted to one child regardless of gender, rural couples were allowed to have two children if the first-born was female. This caveat in the original legislation demonstrates China’s commitment to furthering development of the agro-industry and related sectors. Additional loosening of policy application came in late 2013, when the Party announced that couples might attempt two pregnancies, assuming the mother or father to be an only child. Mei Fong, former reporter for the Wall Street Journal, describes the most recent relaxing of the policy: “The reason China is doing this right now is because they have too many men, too many old people, and too few young people. They have this huge crushing demographic crisis as a result of the one-child policy. And if people don’t start having more children, they’re going to have a vastly diminished workforce to support a huge aging population. Right now the ratio is about five working adults supporting one retiree. That’s why they have ended a policy that should actually never have been started in the first place.”
Global human rights activists still cry foul, as they believe the program will go down in history as one of the most glaring policy mistakes in Chinese history. While the controlling nature of the policy itself points to human rights violations, the bulk of the grievances come from how the government enforced the program. Couples found in violation of the former policy faced a variety of punishments including forced abortions and fines of $30,000 USD. Stories of forced sterilizations and infanticide have been reported as additional tools used by authorities. Beyond human rights violations and domestic effects, new difficulties sprang up globally after the policy was implemented. Birth tourism, a novelty in which Chinese women gave birth to their second and subsequent children overseas in order for the newborns to be granted birthright citizenship, became increasingly common in the United States, Hong Kong, and areas around Oceana.
An aging population and potentially a change in public image strategy led to the abandoning of the One-Child Policy. Currently, 30% of China’s population is over the age of 50. Officials worry that a country with so many seniors would likely affect the government’s ability to manage growth as well as social services. In addition to an aging population, gender norms are skewed as well. In 2011 China was comprised of 52% males, a number that has only since increased. Men outnumber women by 33 million persons, and 116 male babies are projected for every 100 female newborns. This phenomenon is driven by the antiquated, but still prevalent, worldwide notion that women hold less inherent value than men. This belief emerges in Chinese society as women move in with their husbands’ families after marriage, hoping to have a son rather than a daughter to care for the aging couple. Despite officials’ hopes that this relaxed population control policy will correct the labor deficit, many couples of childbearing age are shying away from their new opportunity to conceive. Chinese social media hosts commentators on both sides of the aisle, but the resounding consensus from the disenfranchised is that having a second child is too expensive in the current economic climate. Of the eleven million couples eligible to conceive a second child, less than one million have filed the paperwork to do so. This startling lack of motivated parents paints a grim picture of a middle age bolus that only continues to slide up the Chinese demographic tree.
Sources:
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-34665539
http://www.cnn.com/2015/10/29/asia/china-one-child-policy/
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2015-10/29/c_134763645.htm
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2015/11/151113-datapoints-china-one-child-policy/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2015/10/29/the-human-suffering-caused-by-chinas-one-child-policy/
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2015/10/151030-china-one-child-policy-mei-fong/
