Women in Comparative Societies
Bare Branches
China's Missing Females

Scope of the problem today:
Estimates that there are between 80 and 111 mln Chinese men without marriageable partners in China today, i.e., 80-111 mln missing females in the 15-34 age group China today

Sex ration for population given in 2000 census:  106.74 males to females
yet sex ration for chilren under 5 is:  118.38


Why?  What caused China's high sex ratio?
   1.  China, esp. in certain regions, has a history of son preference
         
    2.  Female infanticide, as well as male infanticide in some cases, as the traditional means     of accomplishing desired number, spacing of children
  
    3.  the country's "one-child policy" launched in the late 1970s exaccerbated
    son preference and
    led to increasing practice of female infanticide
    (including death from abandonment and neglect)
   
    4.  new technology (ultrasounds) and its increasing availablity in China has
    increased the incidence of sex selective abortion (despite its illegality)
   
Questions growing out of a close reading of the text:
How have women fared in Chinese society historically?  Name some examples of women's empowerment and oppression.

During what time periods was women's status highest?  Lowest?


How did Confucianism affect women's status in China?

What are some of the reasons given for son preference?


How did the Chinese Revolution and introduction of communism affect women's status in China?

How has China's recent attempts to restructure its economy and become integrated into the world economy affected women's status in China?


Why has son preference persisted in modern China?

What kinds of political, social and economic problems are likely to result from China's gender imbalance?





Answers:
How have women fared in Chinese society historically?  Name some examples of women's empowerment and oppression.
There are examples of women leaders in Chinese history

Empress Dowager Cixi rule Manchu China from 1861-1908



During what time periods was women's status highest?  Lowest?
Matriarchal times:
Shang Dynasty (1766-1122 B.C.E.)
    matrilineal society; heroes identified by mother's name;
    mother's honored in special ceremony, buried in mother's family's graveyard;
    inheritance through mother's line.

Zhou Dynasty (1122-221 B.C.E.)
    traces of matriarchy
    women's surnames still family name  
    only women nobility segregated from men
    women could choose husbands, divorce, remarry
 Yet:
    women's status shifts during this time; marriage by capture, purchase, arrangement; the     higher the status woman, the more restrictions placed on her

Changes after the Warring States period (475-221 B.C.E.)
    i.e., a period of instability, political change/turmoil
    after  Confucius (551-479) codifies and disseminates moral system of thought

Tang Dynasty (618-907)
cosmopolitan time; lessened influence of Confucians
more freedom for women
Woman ruler Wu Zetian (655-705) kept a harem of men

Late-19th C-early 20th Century
    missionaries, western-educated Chinese question women's roles, status
    women participate in rebellions, movements
    Qiu Jin, woman political activist, agitates against female infanticide, wife beating,
    widow chastity, polygamy, concubinage
    seclusion and veiling decline
    new laws on right to choose husband, inheritance

Chinese Revolution

Low points for Women's Status in China:
Qin Dynasty (221-206 BCE) and Han Dynasty( 202 BCE-22 CE)
    'feminine virtues" stressed:  obedience and loyalty (to father, husband, son)
    cult of chastity
    arranged marriages
    dowries, betrothal gifts
    book of women's duties Records of Virtuous Women and Admonitions to Women

Three Kindoms, Jin and Southern and Northern dynasties (220-588 CE)
    social caste, marriage restrictions, no remarriage, retreats for widows
  increased costs of marriage, increased female infanticide, increased number of bachelors

Song Dynasty (960-1279 C.E.)
    dowries expected size grew
    tried to legislate against using dowry to acquire wealth
    foot binding, female infanticide, widow suicide become prominent
    regional differences with these, e.g., footbinding virtually unknown in SE

14th-19th Centuries
    middle and upper class women increasingly secluded
    dowry competition, female infanticide, polygyny


How did Confucianism affect women's status in China?
It lowered it;
Confucius (551-479)

source of moral guidance

stresses fundemental difference betweent male and female which must be maintained in order to preserve the cosmic order (like Taoism)

argues that women have a "tempermental nature" and limited intellectual abilities

therefore, are subordinate to men

natural order of things:  man under heaven, woman under man

What are some of the reasons given for son preference?


How did the Chinese Revolution and introduction of communism affect women's status in China?
enhanced women's status;

"The People's Republic of China shall abolish the feudal system that fetered women.  Women shall enjoy equal rights with men in all spheres of life, political, economic, cultural and social, including family life.  Men and women shall enjoy the freedom to choose their own spouse" (148).

Yet, work for less money, fewer points in agriculture, work for smaller industries, worse pay (150)

Constitute 46.5% of the workforce yet earn 80.4% of men (150)

Didn't really gain control over land (150)

Yet, consider the impact of the one-child policy on women.  The degree of state control over their reproductive capacity this policy has entailed.

e.g. need permission from workplace to have child; in practice, have to regularly submit to family planning sessions, use birth control, submit to sterilization, abandon children. (See 154)



How has China's recent attempts to restructure its economy and become integrated into the world economy affected women's status in China?
Women important in EPZs
women entrepreneurs
men as migrant laborers, problems

Why has son preference persisted in modern China?
failed modernization of agricultural sector (155)

What kinds of political, social and economic problems are likely to result from China's gender imbalance?
Chapters 5 and 6

Behavior of unattached, esp. younger males
lawlessness, vice, organized crime

Political effect:
    need for greater authoritarianism

Effects on women
    sex trafficking, kidnapping/abduction,
    import of women from other societies
    lower age of "consent" and marriage for girls
    increases female infanticide (!)
    increases preference for sons