China's one-child policy: Population control and long-term consequences

¶ … China's One-Child Policy

In 1981 the Chinese government implemented the reproductive health program, also known as the one-child policy. This policy was intended to limit the number of births per family in order to stem a growing concern about over-population. This paper takes the position that while the population in China has stabilized, the overall effect of the policy has been detrimental to the nation in the long-run.

Chinese officials insist the reproductive health program is fully voluntary. Women are free to voluntarily select the timing and spacing of their pregnancies. There are no targets and quotas for births and sterilizations, abortion is not promoted as a method of family planning, and coercion does not exist (Mosher).

However, according to Steven Mosher the Chinese government sets national targets for family size and total population. These numbers are achieved through bribes and punishments for the officials responsible for enforcing the one-child policy, bribes and punishments for families, group pressure tactics, mandatory contraception and sterilization, and the dissemination of propaganda supporting the one-child policy. Mosher claims the most important factor in all of this is the number of live births, as long as that figure is decreasing how it is accomplished is immaterial. Other research indicates there have been a number of other unforeseen consequences as a result of this policy including the loss of a demographic benefit (Liu), gender disparities, unregistered children, an aging population, and other social matters (Pascu).

Jiali Li notes the Chinese government has sought to establish controls over almost every aspect of its citizen's lives since its establishment in 1949 and sees the one-child per family policy is a further example of this quest. The government introduced a number of measures to secure compliance, for instance "one-child certificates were issued…to offer a variety of benefits to couples who had only one child and promised to have no more" (563). Furthermore a birth quota system was implemented to monitor reproductive behavior and penalties were imposed on couples who violated the policy.

Historical Background

In 1798 Robert Malthus argued that an unchecked increase in the world's population would outpace increases in food supply. Malthus asserted the only way to keep population in line with the available food supply were through a series of population 'checks' which included war, famine, and disease. Furthermore, Malthus asserted that modern civilizations also used preventative checks, such as delayed marriage and abstinence; however despite these checks humans still put a strain on available resources (Mayhew).

During the 1960s ideas about population growth and resource depletion began to garner more attention. In 1972 Limits to Growth, a study based on a computer model developed by three researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) to investigate five major trends of social concern: accelerated industrial development, rapid population growth, widespread malnutrition, depletion of nonrenewable resources, and a deteriorating environment. While the researchers acknowledged the model was imperfect, oversimplified and unfinished, they concluded that present growth trends in world population, industrialization, pollution, food production, and resource depletion continued unchanged the limits of growth on this planet will be reached sometime within the next one hundred years (Bailey).

In 1978 Song Jian a systems control specialist for China's state-owned defense industry visited Europe and learned about the application of systems-analysis theory to population problems. Applying this technique of analysis to China Jian determined the capacity of the land does not permit excessive increases in population. Jian calculated China's optimal population to be between 650 and 700 million, about two-thirds China's 1980 population. The study found that limiting woman to 1.5 births would produce the kind of population reduction they were seeking (Mosher).

The findings of this report became a Chinese political issue, population growth was said to be responsible for rising levels of unemployment, poverty, and falling levels of productivity and investment. In order to mitigate this problem a one-child policy was implemented in 1981. This policy requires IUDs for women of child bearing age with one child, sterilization for couples with two children, and abortions for women pregnant without authorization. In the mid-1980s the policy was modified to allow couples in rural areas a second child provided the first was a girl (Mosher).

Discussion

Recent Economic Gains

Prema Nakra notes that when the Chinese government initiated the one-child policy China was home to one fourth of the world's population and two-thirds of the Chinese people were under the age of 30. China's baby boomers of 1950s and 1960s were then beginning to enter their reproductive years. According to Nakra, China introduced the one-child policy to control what was perceived as the runaway birth rate. Deng Xiaoping, the Chinese leader at the time, believed that gaining control of the escalating population would be an essential part of transforming the country from an agrarian economy into an industrial economy.

Nakra contends Xiaoping's efforts to modernize China's economy have succeeded beyond all expectations. Between 1979 and 2010 China has experienced unprecedented economic growth in duration, pace and scale. In their efforts to modernize the Chinese have rebuilt their economy by opening their industrial sector to foreign investment, privatizing state-owned industries, and expanding higher education. China today is the world's second-largest economy, with a consistent growth rate of 10% per year. China has already claimed the number-two position in terms of GDP and at the current rate will assume the number-one position in the world by the year 2020.

Demographic Issues

Economists project that by 2032 a third of all Chinese will be over 60 years of age. This translates to approximately 438 million people outnumbering the entire population of the United States. The dominance of this population demographic means that fewer young people will be left to pay taxes and take care of the elderly (Nakra).

Lee Liu in his 2010 study, China's Population Trends and their Implications for Fertility Policy, also foresees a demographic problem on the horizon for China. Demographic dividend is the theory that age-structure affects economic growth. In the early stages of demographic transitions, high populations of young people result in a low working age ratio as compared to the general population. These circumstances suppress economic growth. As this population grows older and joins the workforce the economy benefits from their labor and grows as does the demographic dividend. However, as this population ages and the ratio of elderly to the general population increases, the demographic dividend dissipates and economic growth slows.

Economists assert a country needs to develop its human resources to obtain maximum economic growth. As pointed out earlier, when the Chinese implemented the one-child policy two thirds of their population was under 30. China's one-child policy has been compared to a "slow motion humanitarian tragedy" (Pascu, 108). The policy has been called a coercive population control program and a historic mistake. While the program has achieved its objective of lowering the number of births in the country, Pascu asserts it undermines the potential of future development. By 2015 China's working age population between 15 and 64 will be in a continuous decline and within a generation will be smaller than it is today.

Social Consequences

The disruption of the natural boy-girl balance has been an additional unintended consequence of the one-child policy. This disparity has been exacerbated by the rural mentality concerning the advantages of having a boy. Short et al. found there is "little doubt that China's one-child policy has had a profound impact on Chinese family life" (934). Research indicates that the ideal composition for many Chinese couples is one boy and one girl, but that having one son is most important. Pascu reports in Chinese rural culture the daughter leaves behind her parent's family after marriage to live with her husband's. This has a negative economic effect upon economy of the family. The girl's family loses manpower, as well as support, and a source of income when the parents grow old and can no longer secure income by their own physical work. Because of this rural couples historically preferred to have sons. After the one-child policy was implemented giving birth to a girl first placed a lot of families in an unfortunate position. The result of this was a high rate of baby girls being abandoned right after birth, a high rate of infanticide, and an even higher number of unregistered baby girls. The social consequences of being an unregistered child are particularly harsh. Children who have not been registered have no official identity, no rights, and no protection from the state. Legally they do not exist and the state is not responsible for them. Unregistered citizens "are not entitled to lawful employment, education, medical care, social protection, and remain permanently a social layer exploited by a society that institutionally refuses to formally acknowledge them" (Pascu, 107).

Today China there is 33.31 million more men than women in China. A survey of the Chinese Social Science Academy predicts that over 24 million Chinese at the age of marriage will be left without brides in 2020 as a consequence of this demographic imbalance. There is concern that this large population of bachelors may lead to an increase in sexual offences, such as forced marriages, female kidnappings for marriage, bigamy, prostitution, rape, and adultery (Pascu).

Another phenomenon that has arisen from the one-child policy is an increase in the crime rate. The crime rate has increased by 13% yearly since 1998 with 70% of the criminals between the ages of 16 and 25, 90% of which are males. Separate studies by American and Chinese scientists have attributed the link between the increased crime rate and single men to the higher level of testosterone among singles, hence an increased propensity for aggressiveness (Pascu).

Finally, the one-child policy also had psychological effects over China's population. The "Little Emperor" Syndrome refers to children who have grown up in families where they received exaggerated care from parents' and grandparents' due to their status as an only child. The pampering of these children has not only psychological and emotional effects, but also significant physiological and social consequences (Pascu).

Conclusion

Many feel the one-child policy has contributed to the great economic strides China has made over the past three decades. However, when one considers the demographics of the nation at the time the policy was implemented, with two thirds of the population under 30, one can also make the case this demographic dividend was inevitable.

By the end of 2005 the one-child policy had be credited with preventing over 400 million births and economists now believe that China's ageing population will cut multiple percentage points off its economic growth rate beginning around 2015. These demographic problems threaten to derail the nation's current economic momentum. Additionally, social problems brought about by the disparity in sex ratio continue to manifest themselves. While China has been able to stabilize population growth through the one-child policy, the overall effects of this stabilization will be harmful to the nation's future.