China must solve its population crisis, but not by government diktat

Simply raising the number of children a couple is allowed to have will not change the fact many young Chinese don’t want to have children, and policies that seek to encourage birth must rely on persuasion, not force

Lijia Zhang

Published: 3:30am, 27 Jan 2023

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Most likely, 2021 will go down in history as the year China last saw population growth. Only 9.56 million people were born on the mainland last year while 10.41 million people died, China’s National Bureau of Statistics recently announced. This demographic shift has happened much sooner than predicted.

To encourage more births, China first dropped its notorious one-child policy in 2016, but it didn’t work. In 2021, the authorities allowed couples to have up to three children, but I doubt this revision will reverse the fact that an increasing number of young Chinese simply don’t want to have children.

China’s fertility rate in 2021 stood at 1.15, well below the 2.1 replacement rate. First of all, let’s take a look at the reasons behind the trend. Many who reject parenthood cite financial reasons, with housing and child-rearing being forbiddingly expensive these days.

In fact, the cost is only part of the story. When a country becomes rich, the family size tends to shrink. In China’s case, it was further hit by the one-child policy, introduced in 1980, which led to profound changes in society. To start with, it has irreversibly changed the Chinese views of childbearing. Having one child or no children has become the social norm.

This radical social experiment has also generated some unintended consequences. Because of the policy, most families placed their resources on educating their single child, whether a girl or a boy. As a result, a large number of Chinese women started to attend university. Once they became well-educated with well-paying jobs, they were less keen to have children.

I know plenty of such women. Many of them belong to Generation Z, the product of the one-child policy. In China, they are often accused of being self-centred and unwilling to care for others as much as their mothers did.

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My niece Catherine Ji, 40, lives in Shanghai with her husband and their 13-year-old son. In 2016, her husband wanted to have a second child, but she firmly refused because, with another child, she wouldn’t be able to do things she enjoyed, such as reading and socialising. “I believe having a child or not is my right, not an obligation,” she said.

Others don’t even see marriage and motherhood as necessary for a happy life. In fact, the marriage rate has slumped in the past decade. According to an October 2021 survey of 2,905 urban singles aged 18 to 26 by the Communist Youth League, about 44 per cent of women said they either had no intention of getting married or were unsure of it, 19 per cent higher than men.

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The discrepancy can be easily explained. After all, it is women who shoulder more than their fair share of housework and child-raising responsibilities. Besides, China’s work culture is not kind to working mothers. Fearing that having children could push them out of the chance of advancement makes some career-minded women hesitate to become a mother.

In recent years, China has taken steps to address the fertility issue. Last October, it revised its Law on the Protection of Women’s Rights and Interests, aimed at strengthening the protection of working mothers and women in general.

That was the right move. The low fertility rate is China’s long-term time bomb. In the past, the Chinese economy benefited from an abundant and youthful labour force. Now the sharply declining fertility rate, compounded with a rapidly ageing population and longer lifespan, will inevitably cause labour shortages and an economic downturn.

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The authorities have to take the matter extremely seriously. A good starting point would be offering better legal protection to working mothers and introducing measures that help them balance work and life, such as longer maternity leave and good childcare facilities while severely punishing those who mistreat them. Pregnant workers are still frequently sacked by employers, and the perpetrators are rarely punished.

I also hope the Chinese government will deal with the matter humanely instead of using coercion or force, such as the forced sterilisation and abortion that supported the one-child policy. Back then, local officials competed with each other in coming up with excessive measures. As a factory worker in the 1980s, I had to visit the “period police” every month to show I was not pregnant.

“China’s current political and economic model is a typical legalist model of ‘powerful government and weak families’,” said Yi Fuxian, a professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and author of Big Country with an Empty Nest.

“The legalists can enable the country to rise rapidly. But this rise is unsustainable because it undermines family values and unduly restricts individual freedom, which can lead to a decline in population and socioeconomic vitality.”

Legalism, an ancient school of philosophy, emphasises strong state control and absolute obedience to authorities. I doubt the legalists’ heavy-handed way can work well in the long run given that today’s youth are more individualistic and aware of their rights.

The recent protests against excessive anti-pandemic measures are a case in point. It might be difficult for the authoritarian regime to give up the legalist model, but leaders will have to learn to treat citizens with respect.

Yi has this word of warning: “The Chinese authorities need to accept this difficult truth. China is not facing a rise but an existential crisis unseen for thousands of years.”

Lijia Zhang is a rocket-factory worker turned social commentator, and the author of a novel, Lotus