There are currently almost 7.4 billion people on this planet.1 Overpopulation contributes to the limited natural resources, rising global temperatures, and other environmental issues our world is currently facing. The term “population issues . These issues essentially boil down to debate over whether our planet can continue to support our growing population and what actions humans need to take right now to allow the population to continue to grow while maintaining environmental sustainability. China and its population policy is often discussed in this debate, as it currently has a population of over 1.4 billion 2 and employed a stringent child limitation of only allowing a couple to have one child, with extremely limited exceptions, for over 35 years.3 China has only very recently changed this limitation to 2 children per couple, and many other nations have been looking to China’s policy as something to consider in light of the impacts that massively growing populations bring to resource management and governance. Thus, should the ups and downs of China’s population dynamics, which were driven by its One-Child Policy, be used to illuminate countries’ future population policy decisions? Or should this type of arguably draconic policy be completely taken out of the conversation and removed from any kind of political consideration?
History of the One-Child Policy
When the People’s Republic of China was founded in 1949, Mao Zedong said, “Of all things in the world, people are the most precious.”4 However, as the population continued to boom, the country’s food supply began to be stretched thin. Despite this, in 1958, Mao’s Great Leap Forward discouraged birth control. Hu Yaobang, the secretary of the Community Youth League, said, “A larger population means greater manpower… The force of 600 million liberated people is tens of thousands of times stronger than a nuclear explosion.”5 Since the Great Leap Forward focused on modernizing China, the move from farming to steel production further put strain on the nation’s food supply. By 1962, the death of some 30 million people was attributed to a massive famine.6
After the famine, government officials began a “Late, Long, and Few” campaign to encourage families to have fewer children. From 1970 to 1976, the population growth was cut in half. Fearing this was not enough, in 1979, officials introduced the One-Child Policy, which stated that couples from the ethnic majority Han could only have one child; ethnic minorities were mostly exempt from this policy.7 The One-Child Policy had a combination of benefits and punishments to encourage families to only bear one child. Families could be fined thousands of dollars for having more than one child, and there have been numerous reports of forced abortions and sterilizations. On the other side of the coin, couples that wait longer to have a child are given longer maternity leave.8
Since boys are culturally preferred in China, a consequence of the One-Child Policy is that the country now has 32 million more boys than girls under the age of 20. Even though prenatal screenings were banned in 1994, ultrasounds and abortions have still allowed for the gender gap to widen. The country’s leaders are also now worried about the lack of youth in the workforce since factories have reported shortages in recent years. In 2008, China’s officials stated that the One-Child Policy wouldn’t be reversed for at least ten years in order to wait for a large wave of childbearing citizens to get older.9
Current Policy
Since 1979, the One-Child Policy has prevented an estimated 250 million births.10 This past October of 2015, the Communist Party released a statement allowing couples to now have two children instead of just one. This policy change is due to China’s unbalanced and aging population. Currently, about 30% of China’s population is over 50 years old.11
Interestingly, some believe that even though the One-Child Policy has been relaxed, couples may still choose to only have one child since that has become the cultural norm. On the other side of the coin, families who would like to have more than two children still won’t be allowed to. Maya Wang of Human Rights Watch says, “As long as the quotas and system of surveillance remains, women still do not enjoy reproductive rights.”12
Even with the reversal of the policy, China will have a surplus of 40-50 million bachelors by the mid- to late 21st century. This surplus brings interesting questions about the development of China. Research has shown that male criminal behavior drops once the male is married. Some are worried that a surplus of bachelors will lead to more crime against women and gang formation.13 China is also facing an aging population, which means the labor force is declining. An aging population will put strain on economic growth due to high pension and healthcare costs.14
There are mixed opinions on the One-Child Policy. Tang Kun, a global health expert at Peking University said, “It’s true, it was a big social experiment. But what else could we have done?” Yet, the Chinese media calls the young people who grew up as only children “the loneliest generation.” Interestingly, when the policy was relaxed for some couples in 2013, only 14% of those couples chose to have a second child. Liu Jia, a salon worker in Beijing, said, “I can’t give my son a sibling, it’s too expensive. But I can try to make up for it by giving him more love, spending more time with him and taking him out more often, to make him feel less lonely.”15
