Why is Son Preference Declining in South Korea?
Author: Woojin Chung
Publisher: World Bank Publications
Published:
Total Pages: 33
ISBN-13:
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Why is Son Preference Declining in South Korea?
Author: Woojin Chung
Publisher: World Bank Publications
Published: 2007
Total Pages: 33
ISBN-13:
DOWNLOAD EBOOKAbstract: For years, South Korea presented the puzzling phenomenon of steeply rising sex ratios at birth despite rapid development, including in women's education and formal employment. This paper shows that son preference decreased in response to development, but its manifestation continued until the mid-1990s due to improved sex-selection technology. The paper analyzes unusually rich survey data, and finds that the impact of development worked largely through triggering normative changes across the whole society - rather than just through changes in individuals as their socio-economic circumstances changed. The findings show that nearly three-quarters of the decline in son preference between 1991 and 2003 is attributable to normative change, and the rest to increases in the proportions of urban and educated people. South Korea is now the first Asian country to reverse the trend in rising sex ratios at birth. The paper discusses the cultural underpinnings of son preference in pre-industrial Korea, and how these were unraveled by industrialization and urbanization, while being buttressed by public policies upholding the patriarchal family system. Finally, the authors hypothesize that child sex ratios in China and India will decline well before they reach South Korean levels of development, since they have vigorous programs to accelerate normative change to reduce son preference.
Watering the Neighbour's Garden
Author: Christophe Guilmoto
Publisher:
Published: 2007
Total Pages: 425
ISBN-13: 9782910053291
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThe Demographic Masculinization of China
Author: Isabelle Attané
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Published: 2013-06-26
Total Pages: 236
ISBN-13: 3319002368
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThis book describes the shortage of girls and women in present day China and focuses on two important features: the sex imbalance in childhood and youth, and the excess mortality of women at various stages of their life. The author analyzes the causes and the processes of a strong preference for sons, which generates discrimination toward females and results in a shortage of girls and women. China’s higher proportion of men than women is a population characteristic that is shared by very few countries in the world. This demographic masculinity is unprecedented in the documented history of human populations, both in scale and its lasting impact on the numbers and the structure of the population. Despite the economic boom of recent years, many families in China still consider girls to be less important than boys. Although Chinese women have become largely emancipated since the 1950s, they still do not have the same opportunities for social achievement as men, and Chinese society remains fundamentally rooted in highly gendered social and family roles. As a consequence, Chinese girl babies who have the misfortune to be born instead of a long-awaited son go by various names, such as Pandi (literally "awaiting a son"), Laidi ("a son will follow"), or Yehao ("she'll do too"). The book provides a comprehensive review of the situation of women in China’s society and shows that discrimination against girls and women is part of a system of norms and values that traditionally favours males.
Low and Lower Fertility
Author: Ronald R. Rindfuss
Publisher: Springer
Published: 2015-10-12
Total Pages: 190
ISBN-13: 3319214829
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThis volume examines two distinct low fertility scenarios that have emerged in economically advanced countries since the turn of the 20th century: one in which fertility is at or near replacement-level and the other where fertility is well below replacement. It explores the way various institutions, histories and cultures influence fertility in a diverse range of countries in Asia, Europe, North America and Australia. The book features invited papers from the Conference on Low Fertility, Population Aging and Population Policy, held December 2013 and co-sponsored by the East-West Center and the Korea Institute for Health and Social Affairs (KIHASA). It first presents an overview of the demographic and policy implications of the two low fertility scenarios. Next, the book explores five countries currently experiencing low fertility rates: China, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore and South Korea. It then examines three countries that have close to replacement-level fertility: Australia, the Netherlands and the United States. Each country is featured in a separate chapter written by a demographer with expert knowledge in the area. Very low fertility is linked to a number of conditions countries face, including a declining population size. At the same time, low fertility and its effect on the age structure, threatens social welfare policies. This book goes beyond the technical to examine the core institutional, policy and cultural factors behind this increasingly important issue. It helps readers to make cross-country comparisons and gain insight into how diverse institutions, policies and culture shape fertility levels and patterns.
Filial Piety
Author: Charlotte Ikels
Publisher: Stanford University Press
Published: 2004
Total Pages: 318
ISBN-13: 0804747911
DOWNLOAD EBOOKHow have rapid industrial development and the aging of the population affected the expression of filial piety in East Asia? Eleven experienced fieldworkers take a fresh look at an old idea, analyzing contemporary behavior, not norms, among both rural and urban families in China, Japan, Korea, and Taiwan. Each chapter presents rich ethnographic data on how filial piety shapes the decisions and daily lives of adult children and their elderly parents. The authors ability to speak the local languages and their long-term, direct contact with the villagers and city dwellers they studied lend an immediacy and authenticity lacking in more abstract treatments of the topic. This book is an ideal text for social science and humanities courses on East Asia because it focuses on shared cultural practices while analyzing the ways these practices vary with local circumstances of history, economics, social organization, and demography and with personal circumstances of income, gender, and family configuration.
Family Demography in Asia
Author: Stuart Gietel-Basten
Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing
Published: 2018-11-30
Total Pages: 412
ISBN-13: 1785363557
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThe demographic future of Asia is a global issue. As the biggest driver of population growth, an understanding of patterns and trends in fertility throughout Asia is critical to understand our shared demographic future. This is the first book to comprehensively and systematically analyse fertility across the continent through the perspective of individuals themselves rather than as a consequence of top-down government policies.
Women's Human Rights
Author: Anne Hellum
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Published: 2013-07-11
Total Pages: 699
ISBN-13: 110727673X
DOWNLOAD EBOOKAs an instrument which addresses the circumstances which affect women's lives and enjoyment of rights in a diverse world, the CEDAW is slowly but surely making its mark on the development of international and national law. Using national case studies from South Asia, Southern Africa, Australia, Canada and Northern Europe, Women's Human Rights examines the potential and actual added value of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women in comparison and interaction with other equality and anti-discrimination mechanisms. The studies demonstrate how state and non-state actors have invoked, adopted or resisted the CEDAW and related instruments in different legal, political, economic and socio-cultural contexts, and how the various international, regional and national regimes have drawn inspiration and learned from each other.
Gender-Biased Sex Selection in South Korea, India and Vietnam
Author: Laura Rahm
Publisher: Springer
Published: 2019-07-18
Total Pages: 360
ISBN-13: 3030202348
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThis book provides an in-depth analysis of the influence of public policy on sex selection. Three Asian countries were chosen for the comparative policy analysis, namely South Korea, India and Vietnam that share in common a historical legacy of son preference, high levels of sex imbalances and active policy response to curbing the growing demographic masculinization of their nations. The research based on the data collected from field work in the three countries shows that despite the adoption of very similar anti-sex selection policies the outcomes have been markedly different for each of the three countries. These unexpected diverse outcomes are explained partly by their different historical and cultural contexts, and partly to the different social, political and economic institutions and dynamics. This monograph offers careful and detailed explanations of both within and across country diversities in policy outcomes, pointing to the importance and the limits of cross-national policy learning and adoption, and raising questions about the efficacy of international organizations’ current approaches to global policy and knowledge transfer.
South Korea under Compressed Modernity
Author: Kyung-Sup Chang
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2010-04-12
Total Pages: 270
ISBN-13: 1136990259
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThe condensed social change and complex social order governing South Koreans’ life cannot be satisfactorily delineated by relying on West-derived social theories or culturalist arguments. Nor can various globally eye-catching traits of this society in industrial work, education, popular culture, and a host of other areas be analyzed without developing innovative conceptual tools and theoretical frameworks designed to tackle the South Korean uniqueness directly. This book provides a fascinating account of South Korean society and its contemporary transformation. Focusing on the family as the most crucial micro foundation of South Korea’s economic, social, and political life, Chang demonstrates a shrewd insight into the ways in which family relations and family based interests shape the structural and institutional changes ongoing in South Korea today. While the excessive educational pursuit, family-exploitative welfare, gender-biased industrialization, virtual demise of peasantry, and familial industrial governance in this society have been frequently discussed by local and international scholarship, the author innovatively explicates these remarkable trends from an integrative theoretical perspective of compressed modernity. The family-centered social order and everyday life in South Korea are analyzed as components and consequences of compressed modernity. South Korea under Compressed Modernity is an essential read for anyone studying Contemporary Korea or the development of East Asian societies more generally.
