What was China's one-child policy?
Learn more about China's one-child policy.
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Did You Know?
China’s One-Child Policy
The one-child policy was a Chinese government program initiated in the late 1970s and early ’80s.
The policy was intended to limit China’s accelerating population growth by requiring most families to have no more than one child.
Efforts to curb the country’s population, which in the late 1970s was nearly one billion, were nothing new.
The government had been promoting birth control and family planning since 1949. By the end of 1978 it had begun encouraging families to limit themselves to one or two children, though the guideline was not yet enforced.
On September 25, 1980, a government notice called for official adherence to the one-child policy. The policy was sporadically enforced for more than three decades. To encourage cooperation, the government improved the accessibility of contraceptives, provided financial incentives, and even offered preferential employment opportunities.
To discourage opposition, it imposed sanctions against violators and sometimes—especially in the early 1980s—forced abortion or sterilization. In 2015 China announced that the program was ending: beginning in 2016, all Chinese families would be allowed to have two children...
a change that didn’t lead to a sustained increase in birth rates. In 2021 China increased the number again: all married couples were now allowed to welcome as many as three children into their families.
China’s One-Child Policy
The one-child policy was a Chinese government program initiated in the late 1970s and early ’80s.
The policy was intended to limit China’s accelerating population growth by requiring most families to have no more than one child.
Efforts to curb the country’s population, which in the late 1970s was nearly one billion, were nothing new.
The government had been promoting birth control and family planning since 1949. By the end of 1978 it had begun encouraging families to limit themselves to one or two children, though the guideline was not yet enforced.
On September 25, 1980, a government notice called for official adherence to the one-child policy. The policy was sporadically enforced for more than three decades. To encourage cooperation, the government improved the accessibility of contraceptives, provided financial incentives, and even offered preferential employment opportunities.
To discourage opposition, it imposed sanctions against violators and sometimes—especially in the early 1980s—forced abortion or sterilization. In 2015 China announced that the program was ending: beginning in 2016, all Chinese families would be allowed to have two children...
a change that didn’t lead to a sustained increase in birth rates. In 2021 China increased the number again: all married couples were now allowed to welcome as many as three children into their families.