China's leaders have announced the first significant easing of the country's one-child policy in nearly 30 years and moved to abolish an often-abused labour camp system, while vowing some of the most ambitious economic reforms in recent Chinese history.
The long-debated changes to the family planning rules and labour camp system address deeply unpopular programs at a time when the Communist Party feels increasingly alienated from the public.
The extent of the changes surprised some analysts. They were contained in a policy document issued after a four-day meeting of party leaders in Beijing one year after Xi Jinping took the country's helm.
The leaders pledged to open state-owned industries to more competition, improve anti-corruption efforts and make the legal system more fair, while signalling their firm intention to keep the country's one-party system intact.
"It shows the extent to which Xi is leading the agenda, it shows this generation of leaders is able to make decisions," said University of Chicago China expert Dali Yang. "This is someone who's much more decisive, who has the power, and who has been able to manoeuvre to make the decisions."
Far from sweeping away all family planning rules, the party is now providing a new, limited exemption: It said families in which at least one parent was an only child would be allowed to have a second child. Previously, both parents had to be an only child to qualify for this exemption. Rural couples also are allowed two children if their first-born child is a girl, an exemption allowed in 1984 as part of the last substantive changes to the policy.
Demographers have argued that the population policy has created a looming aging crisis for China by limiting the size of the young labour pool that must support the large baby boom generation as it retires.
"It's great, finally the Chinese government is officially acknowledging the demographic challenges it is facing," said Cai Yong, an assistant professor of sociology at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.
"Although this is, relatively speaking, a small step, I think it's a positive step in the right direction and hope that this will be a transition to a more relaxed policy and eventual return of reproductive freedom to the Chinese people," Cai said.
The Chinese government credits the one-child policy introduced in 1980 with preventing hundreds of millions of births and helping lift countless families out of poverty. But the strict limits have led to forced abortions and sterilisations by local officials, even though such measures are illegal. Couples who flout the rules face hefty fines, seizure of their property and loss of their jobs.
The update on birth limits was one sentence long, with details on implementation left to the country's family planning commission. It was unclear what might happen to children born in violation of rules, whose existence have been concealed and thus lack access to services.
Cai said some experts estimate that the policy change might result in 1 million to 2 million extra births in the first few years. But he said the figure might be significantly lower because of growing acceptance of small families.
The China Development Research Foundation said the policy had resulted in social conflict and high administrative costs, and led indirectly to a long-term gender imbalance because of illegal abortions of female foetuses and the infanticide of baby girls by parents who cling to a traditional preference for a son.
The party also announced it would abolish a labour camp system that allowed police to lock up government critics and other defendants for up to four years without trial. It confirmed a development that had been reportedly announced by the country's top law enforcement official earlier this year but was later retracted.
Also known as "re-education through labour," the system was established to punish early critics of the Communist Party but has been used by local officials to deal with people challenging their authority on issues including land rights and corruption.
Pu Zhiqiang, a prominent Beijing lawyer who has represented several former labour camp detainees in seeking compensation, welcomed the abolition of the extra-legal system.
"There have been many methods used recently by this government that are against the rule of law, and do not respect human rights, or freedom of speech," Pu said. "But by abolishing the labour camps ... it makes it much harder for the police to put these people they clamp down on into labour camps."
"This is progress," Pu said.
Earlier this year, state broadcaster CCTV said China has 310 labour camps holding about 310,000 prisoners and employing 100,000 staff, although some estimates range higher.
The party report also promised to improve the judicial system and help farmers become city residents. It also elaborated on the party's previous announcement that it would set up a national security commission.
China's Communist Party said the country's one-child policy would be eased in the first significant adjustment in nearly three decades. Key events in the history of China's family planning policy:
1953: Chinese leaders suggest that the population should be controlled and approve a law on contraception and abortion, but the plan is stranded by political upheaval and the 1959-1961 famine.
1970: Chinese population exceeds 800 million.
1975: China adopts the slogan "Late, Long and Few" and encourages couples to have one child and urges them to have no more than two.
1980: The Communist Party says every couple should have only one child. A new marriage law says couples are obligated to practice family planning, placing a de facto limit of one child for each family.
1984: China adjusts the policy, allowing a second child for some families in rural areas and for couples who both are an only child, and in some other specified circumstances.
2001: China decrees new laws to better manage the administration of the policy, including penalties for unapproved births. The laws allow local government to impose fines for additional children.
2013: China adds an exemption allowing two children for families in which one parent, rather than both, is an only child.
Sources: China's National Population and Family Planning Commission and Xinhua News Agency
- AP
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