THE POPULATION PROBLEM

DOES IT NEED TO BE SOLVED? WHAT MEASURES SHOULD BE TAKEN TO CONTROL POPULATION? WHAT IS TOO MUCH?

TWO PERSPECTIVES

Pessimists •  Population will

overtake food supplies, leading to famine, disease and social disorder

•  There aren’t enough resources to support our population now, let alone if the population grows even more

Optimists •  Known as cornucopians. •  They have faith in

mankind’s ability to find innovations that will increase Earth’s carrying capacity.

•  Technological developments and increased trade will ease the problems of developing nations.

•  Educational programs will increase knowledge of population control.

CHINA’S ONE CHILD POLICY: HOW DID IT BEGIN?

China – Mao Zedong formed Communist government in 1949.

• Encouraged the increase of a population already at 540 million.

• He saw this as a way to make China into a great power.

China – Great Leap Forward / Cultural Revolution (1958-60)

• An economic and social campaign intended to use the vast population to radically increase China’s agricultural production while maintaining high industrial growth.

• More people had children to fuel the increase in

agricultural and industrial production.

CHINA’S ONE CHILD POLICY: HOW DID IT BEGIN?

By 1974 China’s population swelled to 853 million. Mao died in 1976. The One Child Policy came into existence in 1979.

CHINA’S ONE CHILD POLICY: HOW DID IT BEGIN?

WHAT IS THE ONE CHILD POLICY?

China’s One Child Policy was created by the Communist Chinese government, under Deng Xiaoping, introduced in 1979. The Big Picture Goal: Solve the problem of overpopulation/ population growth caused by Mao’s policies. Purpose: make sure that China could support its large population (healthcare, education, housing, good jobs and most importantly, food) The more specific Goals: reduce poverty and to improve overall quality of life for the people while curbing population growth.

ENFORCEMENT OF THE POLICY • The policy was not formally written into Chinese law but it was strictly enforced with three main goals:

• 1) Favouring delayed marriage and delayed child birth

• 2) Favouring fewer and healthier births, rather than more unsuccessful ones

• 3) Laying down the rule of one child per couple

The One Child Policy was very hard to enforce.

CHINA’S ONE CHILD POLICY: ENFORCEMENT

•  Incentives: cash, medical, and housing to encourage one child per family

•  Those who didn’t listen? •  fined for having more than

one child •  lost medical and educational

privileges. •  So… how did it work?

•  Halved the birth rate •  Population of 400 million less

people. •  The population was still

growing by 800,000 every 5 weeks

CHINA’S ONE CHILD POLICY ABOLISHED •  China decided to abolish their

One Child Policy on October 29, 2015.

•  This decision was due to the fact that there were unforeseen (or ignored) problems with controlling the population to this degree.

Legacy of China's One Child Policy

THE EFFECTS: “BACHELOR BOOM”

Cultural preferences for boys – as they could carry on the family name. Now China has a problem of men looking to settle down but there are not enough women for all the men Bachelor Boom – too many males, not enough females

THE OTHER EFFECTS: AGING POPULATION

People born after the 1949 Cultural Revolution in China are aging

Increased life expectancy means that the 400 million Chinese born before the introduction of the one-child policy will have fewer people working to support them

EFFECTS OF THE POLICY: TO BE CONTINUED

The end of the policy is expected to diversify the country’s aging, increasingly male population But the degree to which the policy has affected the country of more than 1.3 billion people is immense It will take decades to rectify - if they can as cultural norms take years to change

EVALUATION:

•  Overall, China’s One Child policy has ultimately done what it set out to do.

•  Yet, was it a success, or did it create more issues for the country?

•  China was getting to a point where it was going to

become drastically overpopulated and the government was right to try and implement a system which would reduce numbers. But, did it go on for too long?

EVALUATION:

•  Many people (researchers) think that the whole system has been a fiasco and that the government went too far in trying to implement this rule.

•  There is a vast shortage in females compared to males and this has made China an even more male dominated country than it already was.

•  China may have started to control it’s population, but has it really solved the problem of bringing the country up to date and creating a better standard of living for its people?

YOUR TASK Three news articles will be passed out; a third of the class will read #1, another third #2 and the remainder #3 1.  Move to a central location for your article (all ‘1.1s’ together, all

‘1.2s’ together, all ’2.1s’ together, all ‘2.2’s together, all ‘3.1’s together, all ‘3.2’s together).

2.  Read the article as a group or independently. 3.  Be sure to take notes as your read ! think about main ideas,

and interesting or surprising facts. 4.  Discuss the article and summarize the main points together.

Your summaries should all be similar. 5.  Form groups with a number 1, 2 and 3 and discuss the main

ideas of each article. 6.  When you are done sharing your summaries, develop a pro/

con chart of the policy based on the research that your trio has conducted.