Abstract
China has witnessed rapid economic growth in the past three decades but affluence has not resulted in an equitable society. Today, China is marked by income, regional, ethnic and gender inequalities. This book focuses on the aspect of gender inequality in urban China in connection with women who have remained unmarried or ‘leftover’ and their compromised rights to property. It argues that women are being discriminated against and left out of the ‘biggest accumulation of residential real estate wealth in history’ (p. 44) despite being economically independent. The author Leta Hong Fincher was a journalist before she went to pursue doctoral studies in sociology at Tsinghua University. This book is an outcome of her doctoral thesis and reveals the deep schisms in Chinese society today due to discrimination faced by women. It is a detailed account that has been long overdue. Fincher weaves the narrative through case studies and anecdotes from personal accounts, using in-depth interviews as a method (36 women and 24 men interviewed in Beijing, Shanghai, Xian), besides a Weibo survey of 283 men and women conducted across 19 cities.
There is a whole new category of women labelled by the state in China today as shengnü (literally ‘leftover women’). The author defines this category as urban, professional women who are 27 years or older, and unmarried; the term was coined by the Chinese Women’s Federation in 2007, in a state-media driven campaign to persuade women to marry early. Fincher puts this into perspective by explaining that this calculated pressure on women has to be seen in the context of a transforming society that is witnessing the implications of the one-child norm. China has eased out its one-child population policy over the past two years, but it has a skewed sex ratio resulting from a traditional preference for males, compounded by sex-selective abortions. The sex ratio of 117 boys for 100 girls (p. 21) is worse than India’s (around 110 boys to 100 girls). In China, where there are more men than women, with educated and economically independent women choosing to delay marriage or not marry at all, the state puts pressure on women to not just marry but to do so early. The aim is to creating a ‘harmonious’, ‘stable society’ in order to rectify the skewed population ratio and also improve ‘population quality’ (p. 20). Fincher sums up this campaign saying: ‘The very people the Chinese government would like to see having babies are highly educated urban women, who would be able to produce children with “superior” genetic make-up, and provide these children with the most nurturing environment possible’ (p. 30). So the ‘leftover’ category is a myth created by the state to manage outcomes that have arisen from its own actions. The Women’s Federation directs women in urban China to stop being ambitious and choosy and to get married. Fincher gives details of extremely derogatory illustrations by the state-media, portrayed in the form of cartoons that depict urban Chinese women as an ‘object of mockery’ (p. 25).
The book covers in two chapters the gender dynamics in home ownership, the way the real estate sector functions, and how preference towards the male heir makes women vulnerable and keeps them out of ownership. Real estate prices are steep in first- and second-tier cities, and a major reservoir of wealth. Most real estate wealth is in the hands of men. For a man, having an asset in the form of a house in his name is a primary condition when it comes to getting married. Real estate developers work with the matchmaking industry in line with the government’s goals of promoting marriage and demand for property. Fincher illustrates this through several cases. In some instances, it is seen that both the man and the woman put in their savings to buy a house, but it is the man whose name appears in the deed. So in case of a separation or a divorce the loss is the woman’s. Fincher suggests that the fear of being categorised as ‘leftover’ is driving women to marry early, and to make serious compromises due to societal pressures. The Marriage Law of 1950 was one of the first laws under the communist government that gave women many rights including the right to property. The interpretation of the Marriage Law by the Supreme People’s Court in 2011 stated that each side is entitled to keep whatever property is registered in his or her own name upon divorce. This gender-neutral law glosses over the fact that most houses have the man’s name in the deed. In a few cases where there is a joint registration and the woman too has contributed, she is unable to claim her part of the share in case of a separation for fear of violence that could be perpetrated by the husband and his family. The link between women’s weak property rights and the rampant problem of domestic violence in China is a major issue and there are no laws protecting women in these instances. The legal and social systems have, in a sense, failed to protect women’s rights in general. In rural China too, most land contracts feature a man’s name and rural women routinely lose land to the male relatives in the family. Fincher emphasises that any benefit that brides receive as betrothal gifts is negligible compared with the absence of women’s property rights and their low awareness of their rights as individuals within the marriage.
An interesting section in the book looks at women’s property rights historically. Fincher sketches this through the Song, Ming and Qing dynasties, the post-revolution period under Mao Zedong and the period under Deng Xiaoping. There have been periods in history like the Song dynasty in the 11th century where daughters had rights to property and hence, had more protection than women today. But later Confucian philosophers from the 10th to 13th centuries challenged women’s rights to property and the Ming dynasty adopted the law of ‘mandatory nephew succession’ (p. 115) in case there were no sons. In present-day China, there is also pressure on the parents to contribute to the purchase of a house for the son or any male heir of the family in case they do not have a son, thus discriminating against their daughters. So in a sense, the current state of affairs goes ‘back to the Ming dynasty’ as Fincher suggests (p. 109). The Qing dynasty seemed to have relaxed the situation somewhat and widows could have property rights. Two famous feminists in the late Qing, He-Yin Zhen and Qiu Jin, advocated the need for women’s emancipation and critiqued Confucian thought that was the basis of patriarchal power and hierarchy among men and women. The author goes on to give an account of how women paradoxically enjoyed more freedom in Mao’s China due to changes in marriage laws, with divorce allowed, and due to rural collectivisation when women enjoyed equal rights alongside male counterparts. Deng’s period again saw the erosion of property rights for women since rights to land were tied to their household association again.
In the last chapter, titled ‘Fighting Back’, Fincher expresses some optimism and gives experiences of resistance from women in an authoritarian state from different parts of China. She also talks of groups of LGBTQs (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer) who are fighting to claim their rights as they face intense pressure from the state and society to enter into heterosexual marriage.
While unmarried women in many parts of the world face discrimination and women lack property rights in general, especially in South Asia, what makes China unique is the state-driven attempt to label women; this happens in spite of women being economically empowered. The use of the word ‘resurgence’ in the title, however, may not be apt; China never had anything like complete gender equality, despite attempts by early communists. The transitions in Chinese society have to be seen in a continuum where changing political contexts may have mitigated gender inequalities at some points in time but never eliminated them. Mao tried to do away with patriarchal norms deeply ingrained in society by improving marriage laws and rights to property, but women were seen merely as instruments to achieve the economic goals set by the state, as were men. Women even then had the ‘double burden’ of looking after households as well as working in fields or factories. While deep-seated patriarchy was prevalent, the state at least attempted to mitigate the inequalities by introducing progressive laws as against the situation today where it is directly perpetrating gender inequalities. One issue the book could have dealt with is the works of Chinese feminists, including, scholars and activists. Though an entire chapter is dedicated to resistance in today’s China, the reader does not get a sense of where this is headed, whether an organised feminist movement addresses these issues or whether the struggles remain fragmented and localised.
Gender inequality in China has not received much scholarly attention in the past and has been limited to journalistic discussions. This is ground-breaking work, with an interesting narrative style, recommended to anyone seeking to understand Chinese society in transition. While to the outside world the successful Chinese urban woman is empowered, this book goes beyond that superficial image. That said, more research and scholarship is required on the issue of gender in China—this book derives its analysis from a limited number of interviews and feedback, and is restricted to urban China and property rights. Future research could perhaps be more ethnographic with a more detailed historical analysis of struggles and movements of the past and today to allow for a more complete analysis of China’s gender issue.