The Communist Chinese Attitude Towards Inter-Class Marriage

Abstract

Since the change of political régime on the Chinese mainland in 1949, new values and attitudes have been consciously introduced by the Communist Party. The family institution has undergone a rather drastic alteration not only in form but also in composition, structure, roles of its members and especially in values and patterns of mate selection and marital adjustment. According to traditional Chinese social values, one should marry a person of relatively similar social background consistent with the concept of homogamy discussed by Burgess and his associates. The traditional Chinese sentiment often referred to the marriage of two individuals whose family front doors faced each other as a good match, implying that they had matched family backgrounds in residence, social class, occupations, education, economic status and other values held important in pre-Communist China. The strong emphasis laid by the Communist Party on indoctrinating every citizen in the political ideology of socialism and communism in true totalitarian form covers every phase of his life, including that of marriage. In the course of Communist rule, slightly more than a decade, this political emphasis has often come in direct conflict with the traditional value of social homogamy in mate selection and marriage.