New Demographic Three-Child Policy in China

Abstract

The article is devoted to the question of how ready the Chinese population is to accept the change in the goal of birth control and realize the pronatal possibilities of the new policy aimed at increasing the number of third children in the family. The relevance of a three-child family became apparent after the completion of several decades of mandatory one-child birth rate did not increase with the permission, and then with the encouragement of two-child. According to official statistics, information from publicly available sources in the media and the results of author surveys in 2018 and 2022 it is shown that the demographic reforms of 2016–2021 increased attention to the national specifics of the formation and implementation of reproductive intentions. Taking into account the experience of countries that have radically changed the vector of natal regulation, national socio-cultural and material factors contributing to the choice in favor of an increase in the number of children in the family, as well as the population groups most sensitive to pronatal measures are identified. In particular, the author’s survey of Chinese citizens who have been working abroad for several years revealed that with stable income in two-child families, the decision on a third child can be made if both children are of the same sex, and different-sex children are preferred. The prerequisites for positive prospects are the pronatal reorientation of financial, tax, insurance, labor, educational, and housing birth control measures that have proven effective during the mandatory one-child period. A new direction is the active and diverse promotion of large families, designed for categories of the population differentiated by the number of children, place of residence, income, etc. The Chinese feature is the explanatory work among the only children, many of whom do not want to share family property and parents’ attention with anyone. It is important to extend all measures to both urban and rural populations, which will allow considering the regional and demographic differentiation of the country.