One-Child Policy From the Perspective of Social and Political Gains - Term Paper Example

ANALYZING THE UNFAMILIAR Introduction. The One-child Policy was introduced in China from 1979-1980, at a time when China’s population accounted for a quarter of the globe’s population. In coming up with the policy the government’s thinking was that the rising population would compromise development especially considering that majority of the population was young. Implementing the One-child Policy at the time therefore was a strategy by the government to improve quality of life by controlling further growth. This policy has remained even with the various political and social reforms that have taken place especially over the past two decades. Indeed the policy has helped ease the pressure of population growth to some large extent and seen to it that population reduces by at least two hundred and fifty million. In this paper, I will be analysing China’s One-Child Policy from the perspective of its social and political gains. China went through a myriad of reforms on the political and social fronts that reduced mortality with the resultant rise in population. Fertility rate went up to 6 children for every woman. There was wide belief in the general public that the policy was particularly extreme. For instance the policy is notably not applicable to the entire population i.e. officials in government and many persons residing in urban places are exempted. There is also permission for families to get a second child i.e. where the first child is female, is disabled or where the parents are born out of a one-child family. The policy is enforced at the provincial levels with fines being imposed for non-compliance and factors considered include but not limited to the family’s socio-economic status. To ensure success of the policy, the government established Population and Family Planning Commissions at all government levels with the objective of increasing awareness as well as carry out registration and inspection work. Population Growth Family planning services were introduced starting the year 1953 so as to improve maternal and child health services. There resultant decline in mortality rates saw the population of china rise by 2.8 percent hence by the year 1970 some additional two hundred fifty millions were added to the China’s population. It is remembered that the rise in population came at a time when the country had just come out century long rebellions, civil wars, epidemics and the imperial authority had just collapsed. The exponential growth in population was initially perceived as strength; Mao Zedong once said, “of all things in the world, people are the most precious” (Kane & Choi, 1999). However, it did not take long before the rising population began straining the efforts of government at meeting the needs of the population. The first time the five year plan of 1970 had provisions for population growth targets. The government extensively promoted contraceptives, abortion services late marriage, small families and taking spacing births. In the five years, the Chinese rate of population increase went down to an approximated 1.8% against a target of 1%. Every unit of administration was therefore required to come up with targets for population growth cuts, discuss strategies and where necessary attempt to change the population’s behaviour on fertility. At the level of local authorities, there were collective incomes, and funds were allocated for welfare, health services, programs in schools and many others with the aim of increasing awareness. A major goal was to have all persons understand the impact of their choices on family to the community and the entire society. The programs also empowered the communities to put pressure on those members wishing to get children outside the plans agreed upon (Jacobs, 208). Even after failing to attain the 19880 target China remained optimistic of achieving zero rate of population increase as at 2000 through its aggressive campaign for “later, longer, Fewer.” In line with China’s Marxist doctrines, studies on population were discontinued in the country during the late 1950s. it was until the year 1975 that Chinese Universities began establishing population research studies with statisticians. It was then realized that continued growth in population was almost inevitable even with small families since half of the country’s population was below the age of 21. By the time the 1982 census was conducted China was already having over a billion people. Many of the targets were given up the country’s objective as at 1985 was to maintain the country’s population at approximately 1.2 billion people by the year 2000 (Nancy, 2008). With the aim of the policy being to put an end to the rise in population, the hope was that at least third births and higher could be completely eliminated and approximately thirty percent of families convinced to forgo second births. In coming up with the One-Child Policy it was envisaged that ideally most families wouldn’t meet it. The argument was that sacrificing the second or third child was particularly considering the future of the country. Couples were therefore enticed to get just singe children through incentives such as financial reward and others like preferential treatment when accessing services such as schools, housing and healthcare. On other hand, to discourage large families, financial levies were imposed for any additional child. There were also sanctions such as social pressure and curtailment of career growth especially for those individual employed by the government. The various provinces employed different measures at achieving population growth targets and minority groups were exempted. Implementation. In the large cities such as Shaghai, majority of the families quickly saw the rationale behind the policy and chose to give birth to only one child. This was largely influenced by pressure of the continually tightening economic situations. The adults in the cities work for long hours and therefore as at 1977 housing allocation stood at just 3.6m2 for every person. With no conveniences like fridges and other appliances, daily tasks of shopping and preparing food consumed a lot of energy and time. In majority of the households at least one person was employed by the government and therefore susceptible to the directives of government. Because of this fact it did not take long for urban couples to attain 90% compliance with the One-Child-Policy. It was very easy to convince urban dwelling families to adopt the policy and get only one child. Convincing was difficult for those families residing in the rural areas. Majority of the peasant families with little or no savings at all and without any access to pension believe it is only through having more children that their social security in the old age would be guaranteed. As many girls got married and move in with their husbands, getting a son was considered very important and in many case getting more than one child was preferred. Whereas child mortality rates had fallen significantly, as at 1980 there were still some 53 deaths in every 1000 new births. The rates were even higher in rural areas. This further made it extremely difficult to convince rural families about the benefits of the One-Child-Policy. Another factor that made it particularly difficult to implement the policy was that many years of political unrest made the peasants to become more cynical about any policies by the government. Peasants became resistant to prescriptions perceived as unpopular to them. This left local authorities with just the option of imposing heavy fines to discourage higher order births. They also resorted to very stringent campaigns for population control and as a resultant in the initial years significant proportion women were bullied into taking abortions and getting sterilized. Family planning workers at the village levels on the other hand found themselves in between implementing government demands and the resistance from neighbours and friends. Slowly by slowly the villagers devised a process for negotiation and compromise in which some degree of flexibility was allowed in implementing the One-Child-Policy. The result was that regardless of the specific directives that were given, the number of women who eventually proceeded to having second births only dropped to 90% in the year 1990 (Ebenstein, 2008). How Reforms have Affected the Policy. The ongoing economic reforms in China have impacted on the One-Child-Policy in a number of ways. With the growing requirement for labor in cities, restrictions on rural-urban migration were lifted and this encouraged internal migration significantly. The efforts by government to control migrants or at least determine their numbers have since been largely unsuccessful. Research now shows that approximately one hundred fifty Chinese most of whom are in the ages of 20 and 30 years have left the villages. Majority of them are now living in makeshift structures, with meagre wages changing jobs often. Since they do not qualify for social services offered by the stated, they see not a reason for seeking official attention even through temporary registrations. This makes population statistics increasing unreliable and the situation is compounded further by admission by family planning workers that they are unable to meet the demands of government in taming population growth. Additionally, whereas lack of or underreporting affects births for both males and females, the likelihood of ignoring the birth of a girl child is twice. The problem of birth under-reporting accounts for approximately over 50% of the sex ratio differences which stood at 114 girls for 100 girls. The daughters who are not reported could be left in the care of relatives, given out for adoption or dumped in orphanages. As a result therefore orphanages in China are experiencing an influx of children being abandoned and will soon not be able to cope. The skewed sex ratios could further be accounted for by the increased rates of abortion that follow the lucrative but illegitimate identification o foetal sex through the use of ultrasound. Since the girl child is less valued, a foetus determined a female is more likely to be aborted as compared to where a male is determined. The ultimate is the sex ration being increasingly skewed in favour of males. With increasing incomes many couples especially in rural areas see it feasible to incur the fines and get additional children as a strategy for investment. The culture of saving especially for old age is also on the rise among the peasants who are now part of various schemes provided mostly by NGOs and family planning associations. The schemes not only promote the One-Child Policy objectives of family planning but also provide social welfare services such as training, loans and screening for maternal the child health among rural women. One perennial hindrance to effective family planning services surrounded the poor quality and limited access to contraceptives in rural areas where sterilisation and intrauterine devices were the only options. Efforts by international organisations like the Un Population Fund, have led to an improvement in quality, availability of choices and ultimately popularity. Effects of the One-Child Policy. The policy has definitely placed significant costs on many individuals. It should be considered that traditionally, the Chinese never make demographic decisions as individuals. They will mostly make such demanding sacrifices when the pain is considerably shared across the community. Complaints from the population regarding the implementation policy have largely centred on favouritism. However, the policy has been criticised to large extent for stimulating sexual discrimination. With individuals having to make extremely hard choices about the overall population in terms of numbers, the girl child in China once again has increasingly become expendable. Very many girls who escape being aborted are often subjected to life in orphanages or some second class lives in which they are concealed from the general world and given limited chances to access healthcare and schooling. China is also known for high rates of women in the reproductive ages committing suicide. More pressure to give birth to children of desired sex and a reduction in value for the females can only serve to escalate the problem encountered by women especially in rural areas (Shuzhuo, 2007). The policy’s success can also not been ignored. considering the rising cost of life and growth in aspirations among the Chinese, the larger proportion of the population which resides in rural areas is increasingly recognising the burden that comes with giving birth to a third child and in fact many are now willing to forgo the second child. Furthermore the policy has seen the population growth of China and ultimately that of the entire world reduce by approximately two hundred fifty million persons. The decline in fertility has at leases eased the pressure placed by population on the stated, communities and more importantly the environment considering that China’s population represents 1/5 of entire world population. Conclusion. The One Child Policy was introduced by China in an effort to address the problems surrounding the rising population. The large population came with social, economic and environmental issues and therefore there was a need to address the same. It is approximated that the policy averted at least 200 million between the years 1979 and 2009 and is currently receiving widespread support across the country. The topic is important to China considering it has impacts socio-economic status and the environment in both positive and negative ways. It also attracts a lot of interest and controversy outside China for many reasons; there concerns of human rights violation and the policy are also associated with negative social consequences. It stimulates skewing of sex ratios and contributes to the undervaluing of the girl child. References. 1. Avraham Ebenstein. (2008). The “Missing Girls” of China and the Unintended Consequences of the One Child Polity. The Journal of Human Resources. 2. Greenhalgh, S. (2008). Just one child: Science and policy in Dengs China. Berkeley: University of California Press 3. Jacobs, Andrew Jacobs (2008). One-Child Policy Lifted for Quake Victims Parents". The New York Times. 4. Li, Shuzhuo. (2007). Imbalanced Sex Ratio at Birth and Comprehensive Intervention in China. Prepared for 4th Asia Pacific Conference on Reproductive and Sexual Health and Rights. 5. Penny Kane and Ching Y Choi. (1999). China’s One-Child Family Policy. BMJ. 319(7215): 992–994. 6. Poston, Dudley, and Karen Glover. (2005). Too Many Males: Marriage Market Implications of Gender Imbalances in China. Paper presented at the 25th IUSSP World Population Conference. Tours, France. July 18–23. 7. Qian, Nancy. (2008). Quantity and Quality and the One Child Policy: The Only-Child Disadvantage on School Enrollment in Rural China. 8. Scharping, Thomas. (2003). Birth Control in China 1949–2000. New York, NY: Routledge Curzon. Read More