Mao Zedong's One Child Policy

Over population is an extremely serious problem facing the world today. According to an article from Newsweek in Oct. 2009 called “Where do babies come from?”, today’s world population has reached over 6.6 billion people. Also the article mentioned that in 2009 57.4% of all new born babies who were born this year came from Asia alone. This is an issue because over population can lead to hasty consumption of resources. China who has one of the largest population in the world with over 1.3 billion people, has taken a stance against over population.

The freedom that Americans have to raise their children according to their beliefs starkly contradicts the one-child policy implemented in China. The one-child policy was a program designed to restrict Chinese families to only one child, with severe consequences lined up for those who disobeyed. It was met with harsh opposition, from Chinese citizens as well as from other countries. The policy succeeded in creating smaller families, but it unleashed a slew of unintended consequences, including a higher crime rate and an increase in the elderly population, who only have one child to support them. Most significantly, the policy caused a national “gendercide” and an influx of Chinese bachelors, indirectly causing an increase in sex trafficking in and around the country. Did the one-child policy achieve its intended effect, or did it cause many more inadvertent effects that it could not control?

The one child policy was adopted to help improve economic, environment, and population problems in China. The policy was used to limits the number of children that couples can have. When , the law was introduced it was only supposed to help with the overpopulation but , it has caused many children to be left and abandoned. Although China has a population problem, the one child policy was not the right way to handle the situation.

Would it be fair for the Government to control how many children you have? Is it fair for them to kill your unborn children? Since 1949 under the rule of Mao Zedong, the communist Chinese government had enforced policies that control families and couples in China. The Government has forced the people to have more children at one point and less at another. The One-Child policy in China limits Chinese couples to one child each. The three exceptions to the policy are: Minority ethnic groups, urban single-child residents, and the policy only enforced on the Han Chinese. The one-child policy was a bad idea for China for three reasons: punishments (inequality), unfair treatment of women, and china’s fertility rate was already decreasing

China’s One Child Policy was founded in 1949, this policy was founded upon the idea that China’s population was growing at an exponential rate (Doc B). China had one of the largest growing populations at over 150 million every year and with a population density of over 104 people/sq. km in rural areas and in cities up to 22,350/sq. km (Pop. Den.). China’s One Child Policy focuses on lowering the fertility rate of women and in turn lowers the population and population density, this is done by limiting most of the Chinese society to only having one child. China’s One Child Policy was a good idea because it focused on academic achievement, lessened the load on the environment and lowers fertility rates in women which then in turn lowers the already crowded Chinese population.

With more than 1.3 billion people, China has to think about a solution and find ways to deal with its population explosion. In order to have control over population, in 1970, a policy named China’s One Child Policy was introduced. Mingliang argues that, “China, through the one-child policy, has instituted the most aggressive, comprehensive population policy in the world” (1). This policy limits all families in the Republic of China to have only one child, regardless of the sex: however, within this policy there are some exceptions. It is possible to have two children only if the first child is born with a disability, if parents work in a high risk job, if the couple lives in villages, or if the family is a non- Han, otherwise you are

China’s one-child policy has interesting origins. Although,” China’s fertility rate began to fall in the 1960’s, there was no national policy aiming for a population of smaller families until 1971. In 1979, “Wan Xi Shao”, a program that encouraged later marriage, longer birth intervals between births and fewer children is what evolved to the well-known “one-child policy”.”(Gilbert, 24) Under the one-child policy, couples are given incentives to have a single child. Couples who pledge to have a single child receive monthly allowances for child support until the child reaches the age of fourteen. “Along with the money received monthly, they are promised more spacious housing and higher pensions for retirement”(Gilbert, 24). However, for

In conclusion, the standard of living and the economy of China before the one-child policy was not better off after the policy was enforced and to some extent, it can be said that the policy helped steer the economy of China in the desired direction, considering how far she has come within the world today. The disadvantages of overpopulation are numerous and some of it’s compound problems immeasurable. China before the one-child policy had just cause to view overpopulation as a serious threat. The one-child policy provided China with a way to prevent the impending population explosion. At the time, it was the only solution that had concrete evidence it would actually work at controlling the rate of population growth based on the limitations

Since 1980, China has made its people the subject of an intrusive and unfair, One Child Policy. This policy was the result of Chinese officials becoming worried of the countries jump in population from 1960 to 1980 causing a widespread lack of resources, so they decided to induct a law that would make force Chinese citizens to be limited to one child. Because of this controversial policy the question has been raised, did the one child policy positively or negatively effect China? The one child policy did negatively effect China and its people, because it resulted in gender discrimination, unjust punishments and was unnecessary due to the already declining fertility rate.

In 1980 the Chinese government became intently terrified of the current population of their country. China housed over 950 million citizens and growing. To stop the increasing rates of fertility the government created a proposal to keep citizenry rates down. The one-child policy stated that every household of china could only give birth to one child. The conspiracy of the policy has said to have had positive and negative out views of the only child. In final analysis the making of the one-child policy left China prosperous in educational value, conserving land as well as pollution and limiting the overdevelopment of citizenry.

The world’s most populated country, occupying a population approaching one and a half billion and contributing to approximately twenty percent of the worldwide population. A country named the People's Republic of China. During the late 1970’s, the overgrowing population of China was reaching one billion, causing problems for the society and government. Chinese citizens were living in extreme poverty and starvation. As a means to rectify these issues, the Chinese government introduced the One Child Policy. This regulation permits couples to have one, and only one child in order to diminish the extremely populated country. The One Child Policy is incredibly controversial, in comparison to many government law and regulation affecting moral and

China’s one-child policy made it illegal for most Chinese couples to have more than one child. It was the culmination of the government’s long struggle to control population growth. The policy was enforced mainly through financial incentives and punishments, but in rural areas brutal enforcement techniques like non-consensual sterilization and abortion were sometimes used. While the policy did reduce the population, it also caused problems such as an unbalanced male-female sex ratio and “4:2:1 families.” The one-child policy shows that women in Communist China remained in a position of social and political inferiority.

China is the world's most populous nation and its population has, on average, increased by over 25 people every minute, every day for the past 40 years. (Richards 5) For a developing country such as China, with 22 percent of the world's population and only 7 percent of the world's arable land, rapid and persistent population growth can contribute significantly to the nation's poverty levels and restrain its potential for economic growth. (Gu 42) China's one-child family policy was first announced in 1979. In a 1979 speech, Deng Xiaoping drew the first outlines of a policy to limit population growth, "Use whatever means you must to control China's population. Just do it." (Mosher 50)

In 1979, Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping introduced the one child policy. This was part of the family planning policy to help control China’s growing population. This policy limited a couple, of a man and a woman, to only one child. Fines, pressures to abort a pregnancy, forced sterilization accompanied second or unwanted pregnancies. Although many think the one child policy was a law, it surprisingly was not. It was a policy enforced by the system of punishments. The punishments of disregarding the policy included being fined a great deal of money, demotion, and discharge from work. China’s government was inhumane in enforcing the policy.