Family change in China

Family is a fundamental unit in a society. The change in structure will have a

great influence to the social development of the society. This essay aims to discuss the
issue of changing families in China. I will first briefly introduce the concepts of
family and the typical conditions of families in China. Secondly, I will explain the
changes of families through the cultural, political and economic aspects. Lastly I will
analyze the Chinese policies on families.

To begin with, what is the meaning of family in China? In ancient China, the
meaning of family is quite similar to clan. It involves a large group of people such as
the ancestors, relatives and the neighbors living in the same village. They may set
rules and force people to share their ethic values. Nowadays, residents in China would
have different opinions about what a family is. However, fewer people are involved in
the concept of family. All in all, the concept of family at present is a basic unit in a
society in which the people have biological, marital and adoptive relationships
(Chinese Encyclopedia: Sociology, 1991). The family as a unit is important in China
as family is the central and fundamental idea in the Confucianism values which is the
way of life followed by the Chinese since ancient China as a traditional culture and it
is now being challenged by the western values. Nuclear family and extended family
are the two types of family structure in the modern China that I am going to discuss.
Nuclear families involve a couple and their kids and extended families involve the
units in nuclear families along with the grandparents and relatives (Xu & Xia, 2014).

As for the condition of families in China, most of the family structure is either
nuclear or extended family. This is shown in the census conducted in 2006 which
found that the majority, nearly around 70%, of the families in China are nuclear
families (Li & Bian, 2006) Comparing with the census conducted in 1982, it is found
that the number of extended families has grown in the previous years from 26.6% to
34.3% of the families (Five Cities' Marriage and Family Study Project, 1985). Also, in
another census in 2007, it shows that there were fewer nuclear families and more
extended families in the rural area than in the urban area. This is due to the fact that
the rural area is underdeveloped so that people living in there stick to the traditional
family culture and they mostly run their agricultural businesses with their families
(Xu & Xia, 2014).

From the cultural aspect, how would it change the family structure in China? In
Chinese culture, we should take care of our parents when they are old and the parents
should take care of their grandchildren. In the past, the average income was much
lower compared to the present. The families before would not be able to own
apartments as it was restricted by the government. Chinese residents before would
prefer to live with their parents because of the traditional culture and the emphasis of
collective interests. Nowadays, young couples would usually separate with their
parents in terms of accommodation after marriage as they may buy apartments
themselves or may inherit one from their families as gift. The collective interests
becomes less influential because of modernization and globalization. However, even
though they do not live with their parents, they still maintain a good connection with
them. For instance, their parents may take care of their children when they are at work
and they will have dinner together. In this way, it works like a branch of extended
family (Xu & Xia, 2014).

In the political aspect, the Hukou system also influenced the family in China. In
the Hukou system, only the one with urban hukou can benefit from the welfare system
for welfare in housing, healthcare, education, etc. Residents in rural area are poorer
and they cannot enjoy the welfare as they possess no urban hukou. So, young couples
may move to the cities for jobs to improve the living standard. Then, their children
will be left in the villages and their grandparents will take care of them. As a result,
the extended family structure was broken up and the family size decreases.

For the economic perspective, the economic reform caused changes in the
structure of the family in China also. Before the reform, families in China lived in
flats assigned by their employers of their Danweis. The families were mainly
extended families and the family size was larger. After the reform, many families
became richer and they can afford multiple flats. Some families gave a flat to their
sons registered under his name as a gift after marriage and the young couple may live
in these flats so they become a nuclear family and the family size reduces (Xu & Xia,
2014).

This is shown in the data of the average size of family in 1982 and 2010, with
4.41 in 1982 and 3.1 in 2010 (China Census Data, 1982; NBSC, 2011). However,
some couples may still live with their parents and the data cannot reflect the real
living environment as the data only counted the registration record (Xu & Xia, 2014).
Therefore, the families may not reduce in size in such a significant value and there
should be fewer nuclear families.

Moreover, after the reform, industrialization took place and the market became
more competitive. In order to stay competitive, young couples need to be more
engaged in working and learn more new skills. So, they may live with their parents so
that it is more convenient for their parents to take care of their children when they are
at work. Also, for poorer couples, they can have a lower daily expense (Xu & Xia,
2014).

The policies would have a great influence on families as a basic unit in society.
I am going to focus mainly on the impacts of One Child policy. After the success of
the late, long, few slogan proposed in 1971 by the central government encouraging
the people to marry later and have fewer children (Feng, 2014), One Child policy
(OCP) was put forward in 1979 to restrict a family to have one child only and fines
will be charged if the residents have more than one child. Both of the policies aim to
relieve the problem of population explosion and prevent the over-consumption of
resources. There are some impacts by the OCP. Firstly, it is one of the factors that
leads to the shift of extended family to nuclear family as the family size decreased in
these years as i mentioned previously and the emerge of the 4-2-1 problem that a
couple, who are both the only-child in the family after the enforcement of OCP, need
to take care of their four grandparents and their only-child which is a heavy burden
for them (Feng, 2014). Secondly, the relationship in families has changed because of
the OCP. For instance, the Little emperor problem emerged that the only-child was
given all resource of a family and was spoiled (Feng, 2014). Another example is the
Empty nest problem that the aged parents were left behind and live alone after their
only child moved out as they got married (Feng, 2014). Recently, the two child policy
was proposed so that couples are allowed to have a second child hoping that the
population structure would back to normal as the OCP causes the decline of fertility
rate which leads to the problem of aging population. However, only less than 10% of
the couples applied for a second child as they have no extra time and not enough
money to take care of an extra child. Also, it is hard to get kindergarten admission. As
a result, they are not willing to have a second child (Feng, 2014). Some possible
improvement could be improving the social welfares to encourage having a second
child. Such as an extended maternity leave, reduce the tax for the two children family,
free kindergarten admission and more social service centers for child-caring.

To conclude, the extended family is still the major Chinese family structure
although it only composed of around 30% of the families in China owing to the fact
that the number of extended family did not decrease with modernization and the
nuclear families in china is special that they still have a close connection within the
network of extended family so that it acts like a branch of extended family. The One
Child policy influence Chinese family in a large extent. It relieves the problem of the
fast rising population but at the same time generated other social problems. Revision
and improvement still need to be made. (1454 words)

References:
China Census Data in 1982. Beijing: China Statistics Press.

Chinese encyclopedia: Sociology. (1991). Beijing: Chinese Encyclopedia Press.

Feng, W., Cai, Y., & Gu, B. (2013). Population, Policy, and Politics: How Will History
Judge China's One-Child Policy? Population and Development Review, 38, 115-129.

Feng, X.-T., Poston Jr, D. L., & Wang, X.-T. (2014). China's One-child Policy and the
Changing Family. Journal of Comparative Family Studies, 45(1), 17-29.

Five Cities Marriage and Family Study Project. (1985). Urban Chinese families.
Jinan: Peoples Press of Shandong.

Li, L. L. & Bian, Y J. (2006). Chinese General Social Survey (CGSS). Department of
Sociology, Chinese People's University, Beijing, China.

National Bureau of Statistics of People's Republic of China (NBSC) (2011). China

Statistical Yearbook. Beijing: China Statistics Press.

Poston, D. L., Conde, E., & Desalvo, B. (2011). China's unbalanced sex ratio at birth,
millions of excess bachelors and societal implications. Vulnerable Children and Youth
Studies, 6(4), 314-320.