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OCR for page 39
CHAPTER 3
MARRIAGE IN CHINA SINCE 1950
The 1/1,000-sample survey conducted in 1982 by the
Ministry of Family Planning collected retrospective data
on marriages as well as on births. The report of the
survey includes tables listing rates of first marriage by
single years of age (the number of first marriages in a
single-year age interval relative to the number of women
in the interval) for each calendar year from 1949 to
1981. It also provides the calculated mean age at first
marriage and the total first marriage rate for each year
from 1940 to 1982 (Zhao and Yu, 1983). The total
first-marriage rate for a given year is the sum of the
single-year age-specific rates of first marriage. It
equals the proportion that would ever marry in a
hypothetical cohort subject to the marriage rates of the
year in question.
PROPORTION EVER-MARRIED WOMEN AND THE FIRST-MARRIAGE RATE
Actual cohorts of women in China achieve very close to
100 percent entry into marriage, as is evident in the
proportion of women ever married by single years of age
in 1982--more than 98 percent at ages 29 and 30 and more
than 99 percent at every age over 30. The annual total
rate of first marriage has nevertheless differed from
unity in most years, often substantially. It reached a
low of .74 in 1959, during the Great Leap Forward, a high
of 1.19 in 1962, as the economy and society recovered from
the Great Leap Forward and the "bitter years" of 1960-61;
and fell again to .71 and .73 in 1965 and 1966, at the
beginning of the Cultural Revolution (see Figure 9). The
lowest point of .64 was reached in 1973, in the midst of
a rapid rise in the mean age at first marriage. From
39
OCR for page 40
40
l.5r
1.4
1.3
J 1.2
1.1
_, 1.0
6
0.9
A:
0.8 _
q6 0-7 -
o 0.6 _
0.5
1950
r
L A
~ , \
A 1
1955 1960 1965 1970 1975 1980 1985
YEAR
FIGURE 9 Total Female First-Marriage Rate (sum of first
marriage frequencies), 1950-82: China
1971 to 1979, while mean age at first marriage was
increasing from 20.29 to 23.05--an addition of almost
one-third of a year each year--the total first-marriage
rate was below 1.0 despite the ultimate achievement of
nearly 100 percent ever married within each cohort. In
1980 the total first-marriage rate reached 1.14, higher
than in any previous year except 1962; in 1981 and the
first 6 months of 1982 it rose to a new high above 1.30,
a boom in marriages that caused increased births in 1981
and 1982 and will have a continued upward effect on
births in 1983.
There are two reasons for differences from unity in
the annual total first-marriage rate even when every
cohort experiences a proportion ever married very close
to 100 percent.
One reason is a temporary deficit in the
number of marriages in years when social disruption
prevents marriages that otherwise would occur and an
excess in the number of marriages in the period of
recovery from such episodes (for example, the deficit in
1959 and the excess in 1962). The second reason for high
or low total rates of first marriage is a change in the
mean age at which cohorts marry. When the mean age at
marriage of a cohort falls, the total marriage rate rises
above 1.0 because the marriages of older and younger
OCR for page 41
41
women, which would have occurred sequentially with
constant mean age, overlap. The total rate continues
higher than 1.0 as long as mean age at marriage continues
to fall. A rising mean age at marriage has the opposite
effect, thinning out the occurrence of marriage until the
rise in mean age ceases. The average value of 0.885 of
the total marriage rate from 1950 to 1982 (despite the
continuation of virtually universal marriage) is the
result of the increase in mean age at marriage of about 4
years during this time. According to a formula of Norman
Ryder (1956), a period total first-marriage rate is
reduced in proportion to the average annual rate of
change of cohort age at marriage. An increase of 4 years
in 32 years should reduce the average period total
first-marriage rate by about 0.125, or to about 0.875--
very close to the actual average value of 0.885 for the
32 years in question.
MEAN AGE AT FIRST MARRIAGE
Figure 10 shows the annual value of the mean age at first
marriage from 1950 to the first half of 1982. The mean
age at first marriage calculated for the decade of the
1940s is little different from the mean for 1950 (18.46
compared with 18.68), but was a year higher than the
average (17.52) for the Chinese farm population in 1929-31
(Barclay et al., 1976). The increase in mean age was
relatively gradual in the 1950s and 1960s and relatively
rapid in the 1970s. The revolutionary government set a
legal minimum marriage age of 18 years and introduced
many changes in social organization that reduced the
incidence of very early marriage. In 1953 nearly 43
percent of women were married before reaching 18; by 1965
this fraction had fallen to about 21 percent; at the
beginning of 1982, only 4 percent had married before
reaching 18.
The mean age at marriage rose sharply after 1970: in
the 8 years from 1971 to 1979 the increase was twice what
the increase had been in the 21 years from 1950 to 1971.
The rise in age at marriage in the 1970s was certainly
enhanced, if not altogether produced, by government
pressure as part of the program to reduce the birth
rate. The official policy was later marriage, longer
birth intervals, and fewer children. Women were
encouraged to postpone marriage until age 23 in the rural
areas and until age 25 in the cities. From 1971 to 1979
OCR for page 42
25
24
7
42
23
22
UJ
a
UJ
21
on
18
17
-
1 1 1 1 1 1 1
1950 1955 1960 1965 1970 1975 1980 1985
YEAR
FIGURE 10 Mean Age at First Marriage of Females,
1950-82: China
the reduction in the proportion of women who had ever
married before reaching age 24 was large in the rural
areas and dramatic in the cities: from 89 to 76 percent
in the rural population and from 68 to 20 percent in the
urban population.
PATTERNS OF MARRIAGE
By cumulation of age-specific first-marriage rates, the
proportion of women ever married at each age can be
calculated for each cohort: that proportion is shown for
selected female cohorts in Figure 11 (see Table A-4 for
data for all years). From the cohort reaching age 15 in
l9SO to the cohort reaching 15 in 1965, the curves
showing age of attaining successively greater proportions
of ever-married women moves to the right--to higher
ages--with each cohort, ultimately reaching nearly 100
percent. The cohort reaching age 15 in 1970 has a
relatively slow start in entering marriage, reaching 50
percent ever married at an age 2 1/2 years later than the
attainment of 50 percent by the cohort only 5 years older
(age 15 in 1965). However, the younger cohort made up
for its slow early entry into marriage and by age 26 had
OCR for page 43
43
1.00
C) 0.90
UJ
CC
a:
LL
>
By
o
-
G
o
o
0.80
0.70
0.60
0.50
0.40
0.30
0.20
0.10
~9~.-~- ·. ,<0
I:---- ..
/ .- ;~ -~.e
O
10 15
1 1 1
20 25 30 35
AGE
FIGURE 11 Proportion of Ever-Married Women, by Single
Years of Age, Cohorts Aged 15 in 1950, 1960, 1965, 1970,
and 1973: China
surpassed the proportion married that had been achieved
at the same age by the older cohort. Those reaching 15
in 1973 were even slower than the 1970 cohort in entering
marriage at early ages and then quickened the pace so as
to surpass older cohorts--by about age 24 for the cohort
15 in 1965 and by age 23 for the cohort 15 in 1970.
In Figure 12 the curves showing cumulative entry into
marriage for selected female cohorts are compared with a
standard curve of cumulative first marriage. The
standard curve is a mathematical function of age that
with suitable choice of constants fits the marriage
experience of many quite different populations. The
standard distribution--an asymmetrical curve skewed to
the right--fits different experiences, ranging from
early-marrying to late-marrying cohorts, if the appro-
priate starting age (or, alternatively, the proper mean
age) and the proper pace of marriage (or the proper
standard deviation) is chosen. (The proportion
ultimately marrying must also be specified, but in China
this proportion can be estimated to a good approximation
as 100 percent [Coale, 1971; Coale and McNeil, 1972]).
In Figure 12, the standard curve of the proportion of
ever-married women is fitted to the experience of each
OCR for page 44
44
LL
-
cr
LL
111
a
o
-
o
o
/~/
.
.
Get 1 1 1 1
10 15 20 25
.
.
.
30 35
AGE
FIGURE 12 Proportion of Ever-Married Women, Cohorts Aged
15 in 1950, 1960, 1965, 1970, and 1973 (solid lines), and
Standard Curves Fitted to Ages 16.5 and 20.5 (dotted
lines): China
cohort by choosing two parameters (of location and
spread) that forces the standard curve to pass through
the cohort's recorded proportion ever married at ages
16.5 and 20.5. For cohorts reaching age 15 in 195D,
1960, and 1965, the nuptiality experience past age 20 is
fitted very well indeed by the standard curves forced to
pass through these early points in the cohort's entry
into marriage. Those reaching 15 in 1970 also follow a
standard curve fitted to the proportion ever married at
16.5 and 20.5, but only up to age 22; at higher ages the
standard curve fitted to these early points rises too
slowly--or, more realistically, above age 22 the cohort
accelerates its entry into marriage above the slow pace
it had followed up to age 22. The cohort of women aged
IS in 1973 departs still earlier and more steeply from
the very slow pace of marriage it followed up to age 20.
The existence of a standard frequency distribution of
first marriages has a behavioral explanation: it is
generated by a normal (Gaussian) distribution of attaining
an age considered as marriageable, followed by exponential
distributions of the duration of three intermediate
stages--the search for the ultimate spouse, the interval
OCR for page 45
45
between finding the spouse and engagement, and between
engagement and marriage (Coale and McNeil, 1972). When
age at marriage is governed by accepted social norms and
gradually evolving conditions, the standard distribution
seems to fit very well.
In the 1970s the intensified program to reduce the
birth rate included later marriage as an important
component. The legal minimum of age at marriage was not
increased (from the 18 years for women set in the
marriage law of 1950); however, permission to marry had
to be obtained from the administrative head of the work
units of bride and groom, and a late marriage rate (the
proportion of marriages of women older than 23 in rural
areas and older than 25 in cities) was one of the aims
imposed by the new population policies (Tien, 1983).
Restrictions that slowed down entry into marriage for
women under age 23 led to more rapid entry into marriage
for women after that age: for example, see the
comparison of the 15-in-1970 cohort with the fitted
standard in Figure 12.
In 1980 a new marriage law was passed that increased
the legal minimum marriage age for women from 18 to 20.
The passage of the new law was reportedly accompanied by
a relaxation of the measures that enforced later marriage
because of the social problems created by postponing
marriage past age 23 in a society in which women are
traditionally married soon after menarche and in which
sexual relations among unmarried people are not socially
acceptable. The new law was accompanied by a marriage
boom: the total first-marriage rate for women rose from
.922 in 1979 to 1.137 in 1980, 1.303 in 1981, and 1.314
in the first half of 1982; mean age at first marriage
fell from 23.1 in 1979 to 22.7 in the first half of 1982.
The departure of recent cohorts from standard curves of
age at marriage may be the result, then, of government
action that artificially reduced rates of first marriage
at early ages and led to artificially high rates at later
ages, when the pressure was off. The relaxation of
pressure against marriages at ages under 23 led to a
marriage boom. The effects of these marriage patterns on
fertility are explored in the next chapter.
Representative terms from entire chapter:
standard curve
