A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE ONE-CHILD POLICY

In order to discuss the cultural contexts surrounding international adoption in China, it is necessary to take a closer look at the country’s One-Child Policy (OCP). Though not fully responsible for the increasingly skewed age and gender demographic, the OCP, officially established in 1980 and only recently amended on a nationwide scale, has played a major role in shaping China’s current demography and will continue to have ramifications far into the future. Though lacking conclusive evidence, there is likely a strong correlation between the OCP and the abandonment and adoption of Chinese girls during the past several decades. By exploring the political, cultural, and social atmosphere present in China around the time of my birth, with specific focus on the OCP and China’s other family planning measures, I hope to shed a more objective light on the pressures Chinese families would have faced when it came to making decisions about their children—and in doing so allow for a greater understanding of the decisions any mothers or families I may meet would have had to make.

The One-Child Policy was implemented in September of 1980. As the most publicized part of a broader Family Planning Policy—though the two terms are often conflated—the OCP sought to limit most couples to one child in an attempt to prevent overpopulation, decrease resource demand, and increase the country’s GDP per capita. Exemptions for ethnic minorities and rural citizens were made in the months following the policy’s initial implementation, but in more urban areas the policy was strictly enforced. Urban couples who adhered to the policy were often given government-mandated benefits as incentives. The OCP itself was heavily influenced by attempts to control population size during the 1970s, in particular a mandatory birth planning strategy called “晚，稀, 少 (wan, xi, shao)” or “later, longer, fewer.” The idea behind wan, xi, shao was to promote marrying later in life, have longer intervals between births, and overall have fewer children per family (Feng et al 2014). This initial policy has been linked to a decrease in birthrate and an increase in sterilizations, infanticide, abortions, and accessible birth control, all of which are often mistakenly attributed as being results specific to the OCP. It is far more accurate to say that the OCP contributed to and exacerbated pre-existing population trends.

The OCP was conceived by a former missile scientist and top Chinese official Song Jian, along with a group of mathematicians, and approved by new Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping. Influenced by Western reports (e.g. from the Club of Rome and the Sierra Club) of the potentially disastrous effects of overpopulation on the earth, Song determined an ideal, sustainable population size for the country and used that to inform the specifics of a strategy that would theoretically prevent any such problem. The OCP was enforced throughout the country at the provincial level, and echoed Mao Zedong’s post-Great Leap Forward sentiment that “(Re)production needs to be planned… [Humankind] has plans for production in factories, for producing cloth, tables and chairs, and steel, but there is no plan for producing humans” (translation by Whyte et al 2015 from Excerpts from Works of Mao Zedong by Topic, 2003). Punishments for those who broke the law or actively disagreed with the OCP were severe, ranging from expensive fines to forced abortions. Economic and social benefits for those who followed the OCP encouraged policy conformation. Contraceptives, which had been a major focus of wan, xi, shao, remained a focus of the OCP, but problems with meeting demand, affordability, and general availability made them a less realistic options for many families.

Besides coinciding with and helping to define the political shift from Mao Zedong to Deng Xiaoping, the OCP complicated long-established social and cultural traditions. Before the OCP it was common for Chinese women to have around three children or more, particularly in the country where having a large household contributed to farming efficiency and prosperity. Boys were preferred as a symbol of good luck and health, but there was no need to abort or avoid girls; families could always try again. With the implementation of the OCP, however, sex-selection for boys became far more frequent. It is estimated that the effect of “the one-child policy on the probability of [a child] being a boy was as large as 1.01” percent (Li et. al 2011). The disparity was driven by traditional gender conventions: a son would take care of his parents when they grew old while a daughter would assist her husband. This, combined with the other social benefits of having a son (status, potential for wealth, etc.), made a compelling argument for families who were only allowed one child.

Families who illegally had two children found themselves in a difficult situation, in that they would break the law no matter what they did. Infanticide, abortion, and abandonment of children are all illegal in China. Though children could be given up to (or requisitioned by) the authorities legally, a family typically had to pay fines for breaking the law, meaning this was an option only the wealthier classes could afford. Instead, many parents would leave children near orphanages, police stations, or churches. More recently, it has been revealed that a vast number of children—reportedly 13 million—were simply hidden and unregistered. These children are known as “heihaizi” (黑孩子), and present a growing problem for the Chinese government as they reach working age, particularly as many are forced to go into illegal jobs due to having no documentation. Sex-selective abortion of infants was also common, though it is difficult to say to what extent it, and infanticide, were practiced. When it came to abandonment and adoption, giving a child to the social welfare system was a way of trying to ensure the child would have a prosperous life (particularly as international adoption grew more popular). Still, it is not difficult to imagine the stress a birth family, particularly in the poor or working class, was under when it came to the OCP—especially considering China’s traditionally family- and community-oriented values.

Driven by the sudden surplus of orphaned babies and relatively cheap adoption costs, international adoption from China to the West skyrocketed in the 1990s. The OCP was a powerful humanitarian argument for adoption, and the overwhelming number of adopted girls seems to be a clear cut example of China’s traditional, sex-selective values. The OCP also meant that domestic adoption rates were reduced, leaving international adoption as an attractive solution for orphaned infants. From 2000 to 2010, however, adoption from China has significantly reduced (from around 11,000 children to 5,000 children) and continues to decline, and the number of healthy babies available for adoption is very low. Today, current cultural stigmatism against babies with physical deformities or illnesses, such as a missing limb or Down’s Syndrome, means special needs children make up the majority of infants available for adoption. Domestic backlash against international adoption—similar to trends seen in Russia and South Korea—has also made the process more difficult for adopting families. Like these other countries phasing out international adoption, however, China runs the risk of not having a social welfare system supportive enough to adequately compensate for the gap left by international adoption practices. This is particularly true as population policy in China continues to change, even though the full impacts of the OCP remain only partially analyzed.

There has already been a great deal written about the consequences and ramifications of the OCP on China. The policy has had a long-lasting impact on the demographic structure of China, particularly as the number of elderly dependent on a single child increases, while the “missing girls”—girls who were adopted, aborted, or never registered—have resulted in the infamous skewed sex ratio. An article about “Little Emperors,” children born under the OCP, explores the psychological and behavioral effects that the OCP has had on a generation. The OCP has also been linked to an increase in quality of life for women and improvements in healthcare, but little to no research has been done on the cultural impacts and psychological effects of the OCP on families who gave up their children for adoption. The effects of the OCP on special needs children (even after the two-child policy was enacted), and on heihaizi, are similarly unstudied. While a comprehensive analysis of the consequences of the OCP remains currently impossible, given how recent the policy was, I have provided links to publications discussing known and predicted consequences of the OCP below.

Recent policy changes, however, seem to be heralding another shift when it comes to population management. In 2015, the Communist Party of China amended the OCP to a “two-child policy,” likely in response to growing domestic concerns about the aging population. Under this amendment, which went into effect on Jan. 1st, 2016, couples nationwide will be allowed to have two children. It is still too early to tell the exact impact that this will have on the country, but initial reports indicate a slow rise in fertility rate. China will also need to implement changes in key infrastructures—education, healthcare, employment, and the like—to encourage families to have children, and to subsequently support the increased birth rate. It remains to be seen how this new policy will effect domestic and international adoptions in China, but the presence of a functional and efficient social welfare system remains as important today as it was when the OCP was first implemented.

The OCP is a great deal more complicated than the simplified perspective I’ve offered here. Thankfully, a great deal of research and excellent writing has been done on the topic, and if you are interested in learning more, here is a list for further reading.

Recommended: Susan Greenhalgh’s series, “Writing a Chronicle History of China’s One-Child Policy,” is a carefully researched and highly detailed account of the OCP, from its inception to its current role in a more ‘modern’ China. The series consists of three books, “Governing China’s Population: From Leninist to Neoliberal Biopolitics” (2005), “Just One Child: Science and Policy in Deng’s China” (2008), and “Cultivating Global Citizens: Population in the Rise of China” (2010). Each book is fascinating and informative, and though the series can be a difficult read at times, the insights it offers into the OCP and the Chinese government is comprehensive and eye-opening.

OCP/Two-child policy:

1. “Challenging Myths about China’s One-Child Policy.” Whyte, M.K., Feng, W. & Cai, Y. (2015). The China Journal, 74, 144-59.
2. “China’s Hidden Children” (Article). Gordon, S. (2015). The Diplomat.
3. “China’s One-Child Policy.” Fitzpatrick, L. (2009). Time.
4. “China Population and Labor Report No. 17.” 2016. Social Sciences Academic Press.
5. “China’s two-child policy one year on.” Lili, L. (2017).
   East Asia Forum.
6. “History of the Chinese Family Planning program: 1970-2010.” Wang, C. (2012). Contraception, 85(6), 563-9.
7. “Household registration type and compliance with the ‘one child’ policy in China, 1979-1988.” Cooney, R.S. & Li, J. (1994). Demography, 31, 21-32.
8. “Modifying China’s One-Child Policy.” Whyte, M.K. (2014). Harvard E-International Relations Publishing.
9. “The one child family policy: the good, the bad, and the ugly.” Hesketh, T. & Zhu, W.X. (1997). The BMJ, 314, 1685-87.
10. “Two-child policy calls for better public services.” 2015. Xinhuanet.

Adoption:

1. “Adoption Nation.” Adam Pertman. 2000. Basic Books.
2. “A Unique Diaspora? The Case of Adopted Girls from the People’s Republic of China.” Miller-Loessi, K. & Kilic, Z. (2001). Diaspora: A Journal of Transnational Studies, 10(2), 243-60.
3. “China’s Hidden Children.” Kay Ann Johnson. 2016. University of Chicago Press.
4. “How China’s One-Child Policy Transformed U.S. Attitudes on Adoption.” October 2015, NPR: All Things Considered.
5. “International adoptions in decline as number of orphans grows.” Voigt, K. & Brown, S. (2013). CNN.

Consequences of the OCP:

1. “China’s excess males, sex selective abortion, and one child policy: analysis of data from 2005 national intercensus survey.” Zhu W.X., Lu, L., & Hesketh, T. (2009). The BMJ, 338, 920-23.
2. “China’s Skewed Sex Ratio and the One-Child Policy.” Loh, C. & Remick, E.J. (2015). The China Quarterly, 222, 295-319.
3. “Estimating the effect of the one-child policy on the sex ratio imbalance in China: Identification based on the difference-in-differences.” Li, H., Yi., & Zhang, J. (2011). Demography, 48, 1535-1557.
4. “Little Emperors: Behavioral Impacts of China’s One-Child Policy.” L. Cameron, N. Erkal, L. Gangadharan, & X. Meng. (2013). Science, 339, 953-57.
5. “The Effect of China’s One-Child Family Policy after 25 Years.” Hesketh T., Lu L., & Zhu W.X. (2005). The New England Journal of Medicine, 353, 1171-76.
6. “The Impacts of Ending China’s One-Child Policy.” Jia, Y. (2016). Cornell Policy Review.
7. “Unnatural Selection: Choosing Boys Over Girls, and the Consequences of a World Full of Men.” Mara Hvistendahl. (2011). PublicAffairs. (Focuses more on the sex-ratio imbalance across Asia, but discusses China repeatedly.)
8. “Who will care for the elderly in China?: A review of the problems caused by China’s one-child policy and their potential solutions.” Zhang, Y. & Goza, F.W. (2006). Journal of Aging Studies, 20(2), 151-64.