Chinese millennials aren't getting married, and the government is worried
China's marriage rate has been falling since 2013.
(CNN)Two years ago, Joanne Su was anxious about turning 30 years old.
She
worked for a foreign trade company in China's southern metropolis of
Guangzhou, earned a decent income and spent her weekends hanging out
with friends. But to Su and her parents, there was one problem -- she
was single.
"Back
then, I felt like 30 years old was such an important threshold. When it
loomed closer, I came under tremendous pressure to find the right
person to marry -- both from my parents and myself," she said.
Now
31, Su is still single, but says she is no longer worried. "What's the
point of making do with someone you don't like, and then divorcing in a
couple of years? It's only a waste of time," she said.
Su
is among a growing number of Chinese millennials who are postponing or
eschewing marriage entirely. In just six years, the number of Chinese
people getting married for the first time has fallen by a crushing 41%,
from 23.8 million in 2013 to 13.9 million in 2019, according to data
released by China's National Bureau of Statistics.
Newlywed couples from a Wuhan hospital attend a group wedding at the Yellow Crane Tower on October 20, 2020 in Wuhan, China.
The decline is partly due to decades of policies
designed to limit China's population growth, which mean there are fewer
young people in China available to be married, according to Chinese
officials and sociologists. But it's also a result of changing attitudes
to marriage, especially among young women, some of whom are growing
disillusioned with the institution for its role in entrenching gender
inequality, experts say.
In
extreme cases, some even took to social media to insult wives as being a
"married donkey," a derogatory term used to describe submissive women
who conform to patriarchal rules within marriage, said Xiao Meili, a
leading voice in China's feminist movement.
"This
kind of personal attack is wrong, but it shows the strong fear towards
marriage felt by many. They hope all women can realize that marriage is
an unfair institution to both the individual, and to female as a whole,
and thus turn away from it," said Xiao, who once walked 2,000
kilometers (1,200 miles) to call for reform of China's child sexual
abuse laws.
The declining marriage rate is a problem for Beijing.
Getting young people to have children is central to its efforts to avert a looming population crisis that could severely distress its economic and social stability -- and potentially pose a risk to Chinese Communist Party rule.
"Marriage
and reproduction are closely related. The decline in the marriage rate
will affect the birth rate, which in turn affects economic and social
developments," Yang Zongtao, an official with the Ministry of Civil
Affairs, said at a news conference last year.
"This
(issue) should be brought to the forefront," he said, adding that the
ministry will "improve relevant social policies and enhance propaganda
efforts to guide the public to establish positive values on love,
marriage and family."
Alarming statistics
In
2019, China's marriage rate plunged for the sixth year in a row to 6.6
per 1,000 people -- a 33% drop from 2013 and the lowest level in 14
years, according to data from the Ministry of Civil Affairs.
Chinese officials have attributed
the decline to a drop in the number of people of marriageable age, due
to the one-child policy, a deliberate strategy introduced in 1979 to
control China's population.
But
demographers have been warning for years of a looming population
crisis. In 2014, the country's working-age population started to shrink
for the first time in more than three decades, alarming Chinese leaders.
The next year, the Chinese government announced
an end to the one-child policy, allowing couples to have two children.
It went into force on January 1, 2016, but both marriage and birth rates
have dropped anyway. Between 2016 and 2019, birth declined from 13 per
1,000 people to 10 -- a trend not helped by the fact women are
emancipating and millennials have different values.
The decline of marriage is not unique to China. Across the globe,
marriage rates have fallen over the past few decades, especially in
richer Western countries. Compared with other East Asian societies like
Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong and Taiwan, China still has the highest
marriage rate, said Wei-Jun Jean Yeung, a sociologist at the National
University of Singapore who has studied marriage and family across Asian
societies.
But no other country has tried to social engineer its population in the way China did with its one-child policy.
That
policy has also affected marriages in other ways, Yeung said. Chinese
families' traditional preference for sons has led to a skewed sex ratio
at birth, especially in rural areas. Currently, China has a surplus of
more than 30 million men, who will face a hard time looking for brides.
A man looks at a painting named 'Better To Have Only One Child' at the China National Art Museum in Beijing in 2012.
Social economic changes
Demographic changes alone don't explain the drastic drop in China's marriage rate. Women are becoming more educated, and economically more independent.
In
the 1990s, the Chinese government accelerated the rollout of nine-year
compulsory education, bringing girls in poverty-stricken areas into the
classroom. In 1999, the government expanded higher education to boost university enrollments. By 2016, women started outnumbering men in higher education programs, accounting for 52.5% of college students and 50.6% of postgraduate students.
"With
increased education, women gained economic independence, so marriage is
no longer a necessity for women as it was in the past," Yeung said.
"Women now want to pursue self-development and a career for themselves
before they get married."
But
gender norms and patriarchal traditions have not caught up with these
changes. In China, many men and parents-in-law still expect women to
carry out most of the childcare and housework after marriage, even if
they have full-time jobs.
"The
whole package of marriage is too hard. It's not just marrying someone,
it's to marry the in-laws, take care of children -- there are a lot of
responsibilities that come with marriage," Yeung said.
Meanwhile, job discrimination against women is commonplace, making it difficult for women to have both a career and children.
"More
and more young women are thinking: Why am I doing this? What's in there
for me?" said Li Xuan, an assistant professor of psychology at New York
University Shanghai who researches families. "(The gender inequality)
is really making young Chinese female hesitate before getting into the
institution of marriage."
To
make matter worse, the grueling long hours and high pressure at work
have left young people little time and energy to build relationships and
maintain a family life, Li said.
A couple marks fingerprints on ceremonial calligraphy during a traditional group wedding in Changsha, China.
Statistics
show both genders are delaying marriage. From 1990 to 2016, the average
age for first marriages rose from 22 to 25 for Chinese women, and from
24 to 27 for Chinese men, according to the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.
The figures in big cities are even higher. For example, in Shanghai in 2015, the average age for first marriages was 30 for men and 28 for women.
Su, the 31-year-old from Guangzhou, has often heard from married friends about the burden that comes with married life.
"Nowadays,
women's economic capability has improved, so it's actually quite nice
to live alone. If you find a man to marry and form a family, there will
be much more stress and your life quality will decrease accordingly,"
she said.
The
increased social and economic status of women has also made it more
difficult to find a suitable partner for two groups at the opposite ends
of the marriage market: highly educated, high-earning women and
low-educated, low-income men.
"Traditionally,
Chinese women want to 'marry up' -- that means marrying someone with
higher education and income than themselves -- and men want to 'marry
down,'" Yeung said. That preference has largely remained in place,
despite the rising education and income levels status of women.
Shifting values
There
has also been a shift in values towards love and marriage -- changes
that have come a long way since the founding of modern China.
"During
Mao's era, marriage wasn't a personal choice," said Pan Wang, an expert
on marriage in China at the University of New South Wales. During the
Great Leap Forward, the ruling Communist Party encouraged people to have
as many children as possible, as the country needed labor to build a
socialist economy. Marriage, therefore, played a key role in socialism
and nation building, she said.
In
1950, China passed the New Marriage Law, which outlawed arranged
marriages and concubines, and enabled women to divorce their husbands.
But in practice, arranged marriages remained commonplace, and the
language of freedom of marriage and divorce was not translated into the
freedom of love, Pan said.
"During
the Cultural Revolution period, when you talked about love, that was
(seen as) something capitalist, something people needed to struggle
against," she said.
Students
waving copies of Chairman Mao Zedong's "Little Red Book" parade in the
streets of Beijing in June 1966 at the beginning of the Cultural
Revolution.
Much
has changed since then. Having grown up with more freedoms than their
parents and grandparents after China's reform and opening up, some
Chinese millennials no longer see the institution of marriage as an
obligation, but a personal choice.
Increasing
social acceptance of cohabitation and premarital sex, as well as the
wide availability of contraception and abortion, has enabled young
people to enjoy romantic relationships outside the legal institution of
marriage. They see marriage as an expression of their emotional connection, not just a means of reproduction.
Star
Tong, 32, used to believe that romance, marriage and childbirth are
things that should happen once a girl hits her mid-20s. Worried about
being single, she attended about 10 blind dates -- mostly set up by her
parents -- after she turned 25.
But
none of them worked out -- Tong insists on finding a partner who shares
her values and interests, and refuses to settle for someone just for
the sake of tying the knot.
"Now
I've realized getting married is not the only option," she said,"And
it's totally fine to just be by myself -- I'm perfectly happy, have
plenty of friends, and can focus my attention on advancing my career and
taking care of myself and my parents."
Tong said she felt encouraged by what she saw as a shift in society's attitudes towards single women.
In
2007, the state-backed All-China Women's Federation used "leftover
women" to describe unmarried women over 27 years old. Later in the year,
the Ministry of Education even added the term to the official lexicon,
further popularizing its use.
Since
then, the term has frequently made headlines and dominated online
discussions, often as a criticism of highly educated women deemed "too
picky" in the search of a partner. In recent years, the term has drawn
criticism from feminists and scholars, and in 2017, the flagship
newspaper of the Women's Federation said it would no longer use the discriminatory term in its coverage.
During
festive family gatherings, Tong was often lectured by relatives not to
be "too picky" when looking for a partner. "I used to think 'picky' is a
derogatory term," she said. "But now, I think it's about me choosing
what I want. And there's nothing wrong in that."
Rising costs
Then there is the problem of the cost.
For many Chinese families, buying a home is a prerequisite for marriage. But many young couples simply don't have the money to pay for an expensive property -- and not every parent has enough savings to help out.
Li
Xuan, the psychologist at NYU Shanghai, said even if buying an
apartment is not necessarily wanted by everyone, the social and welfare
system in China is built in such a way that home ownership has become
almost crucial for couples looking for a better future for their
children.
A couple poses during a wedding photo shoot next to Yangtze River in Wuhan, China.
For
example, owning a home near a good school grants access to high-quality
education for their children, and wealthy couples are often willing to
pay a high price for these coveted properties.
Joanna
Wang, a 24-year-old student from the southwestern city of Chengdu, has
been with her boyfriend for three years. The university sweethearts plan
to live together in Shanghai when she graduates from her Master's
program in Hong Kong, but have no immediate plans to marry.
"Everything about getting married costs money, but I can't make money faster than these expenses," she said.
And
the financial pressure is not only being felt in cities. In rural
areas, the families of grooms must pay a "bride price" to her family --
usually in the form of a large sum of cash, or a house. The practice has
existed in China for centuries, but the costs have soared in recent
decades due to the worsening gender imbalance -- namely a surplus of
rural bachelors, due to the one-child policy and rapid urbanization,
which has encouraged many women to move to cities for work.
The Chinese government is worried
With
a looming population crisis on the horizon, the Chinese government has
introduced a flurry of policies and propaganda campaigns exhorting
couples to have children. State media lectured couples that the birth of a child is "not only a family matter, but also a state affair." In cities and villages, propaganda slogans advocating for a second child went up, replacing old ones threatening strict punishment in violation of the one-child policy.
"The government wants to keep new kids coming," said Li, the psychologist from NYU Shanghai.
A
one-child policy billboard saying, "Have less children, have a better
life" greets residents on the main street of Shuangwang in southern
China in 2007.
Following the two-child policy, provincial governments extended
maternity leave beyond the 98 days mandated by national standards, with
the highest reaching 190 days. Some cities also started giving cash subsidies to couples with a second child.
In 2019, several delegates to the National People's Congress, China's rubber-stamp legislature, proposed
lowering the minimum marriage age to 18 for both sexes from 22 for men
and 20 for women, to encourage young couples to marry earlier and have
more babies. But the proposal drew criticism and ridicule online, with
many pointing out that it is the social and financial pressure, instead
of legal age limits, that has led young people to put off marriage.
Meanwhile, the Communist Youth League -- the CCP's youth branch -- has picked up the task of matchmaking, holding mass blind dating events to help singletons find life partners.
Authorities are not only encouraging young people to get married, they are also trying to keep married couples together.
Last
year, China's national legislature introduced a 30-day "cooling-off"
period for people filing for divorce, which went into force this year.
The new law provoked criticism online, especially from women, who fear
it will make it harder to leave a broken marriage -- especially for victims of domestic violence.
But so far, none of these policies appear to have reversed the fall in marriage rates.
A big part of the problem, according to experts, is none of the policies address the entrenched gender inequality
that has deterred young women from entering the institution of marriage
and family life -- such as traditional gender roles and job market
discrimination against women.
Li
said she has observed a revival of more traditional gender roles in
government propaganda in recent years. "It has a lot to do with
governmental plans, and how the government sees young men and women as
social resources," she said.
"Nowadays,
there's a very strong need for care work given the culture of intensive
parenting and the growing number of elderly. With the retreat of state
welfare, we need more and more people to shoulder childcare and elderly
care, and women are the 'default' pool of labor for such work. So I
think that is part of the reason for them to be pushing women back into
the family life."
Discrimination
against women at work has also worsened since the relaxation of the
one-child policy, as employers worry that women will now have a second
child and take more maternity leave, said Xiao, the activist.
With
these problems unresolved, the pressure from the state for young women
to get married, stay married and have children will only further
estrange them from it, she said.
"(The
government) needs to change its way of thinking and encourage women to
give birth from the aspects of protecting women's rights. They shouldn't
treat women's uterus as a water tap, one that they can turn off and on
as they wish," Xiao added.
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