"One family - one child" policy in China

2024 Author: Priscilla Miln | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 00:21

China is one of the most numerous countries in the world. This has happened historically. Many families in this country have many children. Although the territory of China is large, it has an abundance of population. Because of this, the country's authorities decided to influence the demographic situation by issuing a decree "One family - one child".

Features of this decree

This policy was introduced in the country in the 70s of the last century. It is connected with the fact that at that time there were many large families in China. Because of this, the country's economy and the standard of living of the population decreased. There was no place to settle families with many children - they simply did not have enough square meters for life. As a result, such families demanded state care for them, benefits, and so on. Therefore, for families where only one child was born, all the best that the state could give at that time was provided. And for those who, for any reason, had more children, the fine was from 4 to 8 average annual incomes of the region where the family lived. Parents literally ransomed their children.

"One family - one child" policy in China - pursued the goalreduction of the population by the year 2000 to 1.2 billion people. Administrative measures were introduced, contraceptives were actively promoted, and abortions became popular. But why is China so populated?

Historical background to large families in China

China has been famous for its large population since the time of the samurai. They were actively engaged in land development, while their wives followed the family life and gave birth to children. This tradition began to actively continue after the Second World War. At that time, the authorities of the country saw that many people died in the world, in their state it was necessary to raise the economic level of development, and the installation was given to having many children. The birth of 3-4 children in the family was actively encouraged.

When the population began to grow at a rapid pace, attempts were made to reduce these rates, various restrictions were introduced for families. But the most extreme measure of influence on the demographic situation in the country was the policy of "One family - one child" in China. It was officially adopted in 1979.

Peculiarities of population registration in China

This policy already at that time had its pitfalls and shortcomings. Everything is connected with the peculiarities of accounting for the number of population and the attitude towards the female sex. In China, there is no registration of births, and records are kept only by the number of deaths in the family of people in 1 year. This approach does not satisfy the request for the exact number of the population in the country, so it is more than the statistics.

The "One family - one child" policy immediately ran into problems ongender level. In this country, the attitude towards the female sex is not the same as in Europe. Women there are an order of magnitude lower than men in terms of status and rights. Therefore, when a girl was the first to appear in the family, the parents clandestinely sought to obtain permission for the birth of a second child. It turned out that the authorities decided who should give birth a second time, and who should not.

How are children connected to the country's economy?

As a result of the "One family - one child" policy, the authorities did achieve some positive things. The age composition of the Chinese has changed, and the approach to financing families has also changed somewhat. The state spends much less on one child than on three or five. As a result, the question of raising wages is not urgent, thereby preserving cheap labor with increased working capacity of the population. In addition, women, freed from the obligation to look after small children, could go to work earlier, which also had a positive effect on the economic growth of the state. In addition, the authorities did not have to think about how to feed and teach the second and subsequent children.

All this is good, and there was even an ideal period for the country, when there are already few children, and there are still few old people. But the policy of "One family - one child" (China) has already shown its downsides over time. Problems began that were not immediately calculated.

Surplus of elderly Chinese

When there was a period of a small number of elderly Chinese, no one thought about what would happen next,and the authorities were happy with the "one family, one child" policy. Problems began already closer to the 2010s: the population was redistributed, there were an order of magnitude more aged people. They now needed to be looked after, but there was no one to do it. The working-age population is actively working, but there are few young people.

The country also turned out to be unprepared for a pension policy in which the state assumes responsibility for the maintenance of the elderly. Therefore, even at the age of 70, many Chinese were forced to work to earn a living.

There was a problem of lonely old people. There was an additional burden on social services to inspect these people. It turned out that in one household sometimes there was one person who could no longer cope with physical activity.

The problem of children's selfishness in connection with such a policy of the authorities

The second pitfall of the "One family - one child" policy was the problem of raising children. On the one hand, the opportunity to properly raise one child, to give him everything he needs, is much greater than to provide all this for seven. But many have noticed that children have become too selfish. There was even such an example when a mother became pregnant with her second child, and the first teenage girl set her a condition: either her mother had an abortion, or the girl committed suicide. This was due to a selfish desire to get all the attention from parents and not share it with anyone else.

The issue of selective abortion

Given the attitude of the Chinese towards women, as well as the imposed limit on the number of children in the family, it is not surprising that parents wanted to have a boy. But you can't predict gender, so many began to look for an opportunity to determine who they would have as early as possible in order to get rid of an unwanted girl.

Illegal ultrasound services to determine the sex of the fetus have appeared, although this is prohibited by law. "One family - one child" - a policy in China - has led to selective abortion, which has become commonplace among Chinese women.

The problem of finding a spouse for young Chinese

As a result, after the wholesale birth of boys, the number of girls in the country has greatly decreased. At first they didn't see any problem with it either. It is much better to have a boy in the family, who will later become the breadwinner. The policy has even changed its name in some circles: "One family - one child with a higher education." Parents were proud of the opportunity to give their son a quality education, as they had the opportunity to teach him.

But the years go by, there are fewer girls in the country, a lot of guys, and another problem has appeared - finding a wife or just a couple. In China, homosexuality began to flourish on this basis. The reasons for this, for the most part, lay precisely in the excess of the male population. Some statistics show that same-sex youth are willing to enter into traditional marriage if given the opportunity. On theat the moment, the number of male population prevails over the female population by as much as 20 million people.

Birth in Hong Kong. Surplus of women in labor

The policy of having no more than one child in the family determines the quotas for the birth of a baby. Therefore, most Chinese women who decided to have a second child were forced to go to give birth in another territory - in Hong Kong. There the laws are less strict, and no one has introduced any quotas. But the problem arose in the smallest state. After all, the number of Chinese women is large, and the capacity of maternity hospitals is designed for the officially registered population of Hong Kong. As a result, not all local residents had the opportunity to give birth to children in comfortable conditions - there were always not enough places in hospitals. The authorities of both states began to fight "mother tourism".

The future of the country with this policy

The policy of bringing up only one child in China has led to the emergence of a new unspoken holiday for the population - the day of twins. For the family, the birth of twins was considered a big event, as this gave them the right to raise their two children. No matter how hard the authorities try to prevent this, you cannot go against nature. When future parents found out that they would have twins, their happiness knew no bounds - this freed them from a fine for a second child and increased the family by as many as two small miracles. The country began to organize festivals of twins on this occasion.

But this law does not apply to small national minorities who do notexceed 100,000 people for the entire population of China. These people are also lucky - they have the right to give birth to as many children as they want.

Analyzing all the problems and pitfalls of the law on one child per family adopted in the late 70s of the twentieth century, the Chinese authorities came to the conclusion that it is necessary to somehow soften its wording and enable the population to give birth to more than one child. As a result, the "One family, one child" policy in China has been abolished. It happened in October 2015.

The country's leadership approved a new law allowing families to have two children. According to their forecasts, this will solve the problem with selective abortions, there will be no such pursuit of boys in families, and many will allow themselves to raise girls as well. In addition, there will not be such a sharp decline in the young population, and two young children will come to replace two old parents. In addition, not all Chinese women can have children, and some will remain with one child. Therefore, the demographic situation will not change significantly with the adoption of the new law.

"One family - one child" policy cancellation

Of course, there are rumors about the cruelty of the Chinese authorities towards childbearing. The population of this country breathed a little easier when, on January 1, 2016, the policy of having one child per family was finally abolished. But what is the reason for this? Increased concern for the moral component of the population. The thing is that this law, which has been in force for about 35 years, has become stronglycontrary to the economic interests of the country. That is why the "One family - one child" policy has been abolished. What does this give the country and young parents?

Some are wary of this cancellation, as they allow the idea of a baby boom. But you should not be afraid of a sharp change in the demographic situation. The fact is that in recent years (since 2013) the policy has already been relaxed - it was allowed to have two children in those families where at least one of the spouses grew up alone in the family. Thus, the Chinese have gradually been prepared for the abolition of the policy.

For young families, the cancellation is a breath of fresh air. Indeed, at the legislative level, they were allowed to raise not "little emperors" - selfish children, but two full-fledged members of society who know how to be in a team.