In the 1950s, as medical care and sanitation improved in China, coupled with the country's transformation from an agricultural country to an industrial nation, the population began to outpace the food supply. In 1958, a famine claimed the lives of tens of millions of Chinese. As a result, the government began promoting family planning and the usage of birth control, and slogans that read “Long, Late, and Few” began popping up everywhere. A resolution was needed since China’s …show more content…
For example, when introduced, the policy mandated that Han Chinese, the ethnic majority, could only have one child. However, this law did not apply towards China’s ethnic minority or rural populations, such as the Tibetans. In the early 1980s China relaxed the policy to allow couples to have a second child if each parent are both only children. Incentives or rewards for families who adhere to the one-child policy include better employment opportunities, higher wages and government assistance. Those who don’t are subject to fines, and access to government assistance and employment opportunities can become …show more content…
Without it, the population of China would have continued to skyrocket until carrying capacity. Most of the issues brought up by opponents of the one-child policy directly refer to the fact that Chinese culture values men more than women, resulting in the mass adoption, infanticide, and illegal abortion of females. However, there is much evidence to show the decline of that cultural bias.
With more women attending higher education, building careers, and fostering personal success due to their increased value resulting directly from their rarity (and that they are also the only children in their families) caused by the one-child policy. If China had continued the one-child policy and instead focused on reforming other policies that restricted inheritances to males, it would have eventually decreased the notion of male dominance enough to drastically change China for the better in regards to women’s rights while also allowing the replenishment of China’s female population over