Heterosexual monogamous marriage has been the state-enforced model of intimate union since the introduction of the country’s first marriage law in 1950. By 2013, the law had undergone a number of amendments and new official interpretations. In the first marriage law, marriage was
referred to as heterosexual and monogamous (yifuyiqi, one husband and one wife). Marriage was defined as voluntary and the wife and husband were granted equal rights. The law outlined the legal rights and responsibilities between spouses, and the relationship between parents and offspring. It also stated the equal rights of women and men to file for divorce, but the original version did not spell out the legal grounds that could justify divorce. It was not until 1980, with the issuing of the new marriage law, that more attention was given to the reasons that can justify divorce. The new 1980 marriage law stated that ‘broken affection’ (ganqing polie) could be a legal ground for divorce. Another important addition was to make the birth-control policy (started as a nationwide policy in 1979) part of the legal obligation that married couples should follow. In the decades that followed, a number of amendments were made based on the 1980 marriage law. Among them, property arrangements and rights between spouses have long been the most significant area. When the market economy was introduced in the 1980s, people’s economic life and private life underwent major changes. The accumulation of wealth by some people required more sophisticated legal guidance regarding property rights in marriage and after divorce. The increase in extramarital relationships in recent decades also called for a revision of the old marriage law. For example, the legal solutions for financial disputes between the ‘third party’ and the married couple were added in cases of extramarital relationships. After the new law was issued in 1980, new interpretations of the law have continued to be issued by the government at different times to address such emergent issues surrounding marriage.
The heteronormative conjugal family is also closely aligned with and supported by other state policies relating to resource allocation, social status, and communal control. For example, heteronormative marriage has long been upheld by the medical profession as the most biologically desirable and ‘normal’ form of sexual and psychological relationship. Legal and medical experts, and official women’s and youth groups have co-operated with each other for decades to promote heterosexual marital union as the only legitimate, healthy and morally correct form of adult intimate relationship. The preference of marriage and the association of marital life with maturity and adulthood are prevalent in state-run publications such as magazines for and about women and youth. The state-enforced naturalisation of monogamous heterosexual marriage has marginalised other intimate relationships. People who do not follow the dominant marriage model have long been marginalised, politically or socially, as sexual deviants, or as inferior citizens with a lesser share of resources and social respect (Evans 1997; Fang 2005b; Li 2002b; Li 2006).
For women, the dominant heterosexual marriage model prescribes the gender roles of wife and mother. Harriet Evans and others discuss the effect of this gender role expectation on Chinese women (Ding and Liu 2011; Evans 1997, 2008; Hershatter 2007; Li 2002c). First, it ‘leaves no discursive space for women — or men — to choose difference, whether this means simply not marrying, having a lover outside marriage, or rejecting heterosexuality’ (Evans 1997: 212). Women are pressured to perform the role of wife and mother. Second, the gender role expectation is further reinforced by the cultural belief that, as Evans also states, heterosexual monogamous marriage is naturalised as ‘the only legitimate form of adult existence’ (1997: 212).
It is important to underline the historical context that gives rise to the continuing valorisation of marriage in China today. Before the economic reform period, virtually everyone was working under the central job assignment system, or the so-called danwei system. Individuals were assigned a job by the state after they finished study. The danwei system provided not only a usually life-long job to individuals, but it was also the provider of nearly all daily necessities in a planned economy. From housing to everyday food supply, children’s education and even the approval of a divorce, the danwei played a significant role. In other words, it controlled the public as well as the private lives of every individual in the country during the time when employment was totally controlled by the state. Beginning in the economic reform period of the early 1980s, the country has seen significant changes concerning private life and sexual morality. Models of intimacy that deviated from heterosexual monogamous marriage began competing for legitimacy and acceptance when people’s economic life, as transformed by the introduction of a market economy, underwent significant change in the past two decades (Fang 2005a, 2005b; Farrer 2002; He 2010; Jacobs 2012; Kong 2010; McMillan 2006a, 2006b; Rofel
2007) . Alternative models such as singlehood, multiple partnerships, cohabitation, extramarital relationships and same-sex relationships have entered public discussion relatively free from the ideological and moralistic constraints that typified the pre-reform era. However, the dominance of heterosexual marriage as the only socially acceptable form of intimacy has not been significantly superseded. In contemporary China, marriage is still assumed to be a natural part of adult life despite the various challenges from other models of lifestyle.
Marriage has remained a very secure and powerful institution since 1940 and even after the economic reform period (Xu and Ye 2002). According to the official population data of 2009 (China Statistical Yearbooks Database 2010), 81.24 per cent of the entire population aged 15 or above was married and only 1.23 per cent was divorced (but divorce rates have been rising annually). The population of never married (aged 50 or above) and divorced women was lower than that of men. Nationwide, there was 0.18 per cent and 2.45 percent of women and men who had never married. The population of unmarried women in every age group was lower than that of men. For example, among the total population of unmarried people aged 20—39, 60.76 per cent were men. More women in cities were unmarried than those in rural areas. For men, the opposite was recorded between 1990 and 2009. Far more men in rural areas remained unmarried than men in the cities. Women with more education tended to delay marriage whereas less-educated men tended to marry later. Women would expect to find a husband with a higher educational level. This explains why there are a lot more bachelor men in rural areas than in cities since the general education level of rural residents is lower.
There have been a lot of discussions of unmarried women in China both in academia and popular media. Academics and media commentators show great interest in finding the reasons why women tend to delay or reject marriage. Studies show that unmarried women are predominantly urban dwellers with relatively high educational qualifications or a professional background (Ni 2008). The findings from 2009 indicated that the norms surrounding suitable marriage age still had a tight grip on most people in China, especially on women. For example, 2009 showed the biggest difference in number between the unmarried population of men and women at the age of 23. Unmarried men constituted 70.48 per cent and women 49.28 per cent of the total population of their gender group. This is due to the fact that women are expected to marry at a younger age, starting from their early twenties. In urban China, the period between early to late twenties is considered to be the most suitable age for marriage for women and men. By that age, many will have finished their education, and probably will have a stable job. Most people will experience the strongest and also the most organised pressure to get married during these few years before they turn 30. During these years, parents, relatives, or employers, married colleagues and friends will start to introduce prospective mates to them and arrange matchmaking meetings.
The punitive effects are obvious for people in China who choose not to marry. Even though direct state control over private lives has weakened, people in state-run or affiliated enterprises are still subject to various degrees of control over their private lives. Married people in those enterprises receive more economic and other forms of material rewards than unmarried people. For example, married people are assigned bigger apartments while unmarried people may have to wait for years before they can get an independent housing unit. Fang Gang (2005a: 45), in his qualitative study of women and men with multiple sex partners in China, found that people who work in state-owned enterprises tend to worry more about the exposure of their sexual behaviour at work than people with jobs in the private sector. According to the official statistics of 2009 (released in 2010), less than 25 per cent of the urban working population (age 16 or above) were working in the state-owned enterprises (danwei), which includes government departments, schools, state-owned businesses and social welfare organisations. As the study cited above indicates, people working in state-owned enterprises are still subject to tighter control of their private lives. Individual conduct, as judged by moralistic standards, will be taken into consideration in their job promotion and assessment. Although the economic grip of the danwei on people’s daily lives has lessened since the reform period, its political and moral surveillance still constitutes a source of stress for people with socially disapproved sexual behaviour.
Apart from economic benefits, married people enjoy a much higher social status. Marriage in China is understood as a rite of passage to adulthood. Young people will be socially recognised as independent beings only when they are married and have their own conjugal family. This cultural belief is expressed through the association of marriage with social responsibility. To be an adult means taking up more social responsibilities and being a (re)productive citizen for the country. Whether or not one leads a ‘normal’ life is not merely a personal choice. Rather, it affects one’s social status and reputation, and sometimes the reputation of one’s family as well.
In urban China, it is generally believed that parents should assist their offspring to find a marital partner and to start a new family. According to my ethnographic research in Shanghai during 2005—11 (Kam 2013), it is common for parents to arrange matchmaking meetings for their adult daughters and sons and to commit both emotional and economic investments to the marriage of their children. Parents take part in young people’s decisions regarding marriage, their wedding plans and the establishment of their marital home. Although arranged marriages are very rare in urban areas, semi-arranged marriages are not uncommon. Meetings with potential partners introduced by relatives or friends of parents are usually arranged for younger members in a family who have reached the marriageable age. After the initial meeting, the young people can decide whether or not they want to develop the relationship.