The Social and Sociological Consequences of China's One-Child Policy

2021 ◽  
Vol 47 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Yong Cai ◽  
Wang Feng
Keyword(s):  
Population Aging ◽  
Social Engineering ◽  
Social Consequences ◽  
Annual Review ◽  
Publication Date ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
Social Fabric ◽  
One Child Policy ◽  
Child Policy ◽  
Present Generation

China's one-child policy is one of the largest and most controversial social engineering projects in human history. With the extreme restrictions it imposed on reproduction, the policy has altered China's demographic and social fabric in numerous fundamental ways in its nearly four decades (1979–2015) of existence. Its ramifications reach far beyond China's national borders and the present generation. This review examines the policy's social consequences through its two most commonly invoked demographic concerns: elevated sex ratio and rapid population aging. We place these demographic concerns within three broad social and political contexts of the policy—gender, family, and the state—to examine its social consequences. We also discuss the sociological consequences of the policy, by reflecting on the roles of science and social scientists in public policy making. Expected final online publication date for the Annual Review of Sociology, Volume 47 is July 2021. Please see http://www.annualreviews.org/page/journal/pubdates for revised estimates.

Psychology Within and Without the State

2021 ◽  
Vol 73 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
H. Clark Barrett
Keyword(s):  
Indigenous Communities ◽  
Psychological Research ◽  
Social Processes ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
Annual Review ◽  
Publication Date ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
The World ◽  
Psychological Similarity

Psychological research in small-scale societies is crucial for what it stands to tell us about human psychological diversity. However, people in these communities, typically Indigenous communities in the global South, have been underrepresented and sometimes misrepresented in psychological research. Here I discuss the promises and pitfalls of psychological research in these communities, reviewing why they have been of interest to social scientists and how cross-cultural comparisons have been used to test psychological hypotheses. I consider factors that may be undertheorized in our research, such as political and economic marginalization, and how these might influence our data and conclusions. I argue that more just and accurate representation of people from small-scale communities around the world will provide us with a fuller picture of human psychological similarity and diversity, and it will help us to better understand how this diversity is shaped by historical and social processes. Expected final online publication date for the Annual Review of Psychology, Volume 73 is January 2022. Please see http://www.annualreviews.org/page/journal/pubdates for revised estimates.

Testing Causal Theories with Learned Proxies

2022 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Dean Knox ◽  
Christopher Lucas ◽  
Wendy K. Tam Cho
Keyword(s):  
Political Science ◽  
Best Practice ◽  
Computational Models ◽  
Annual Review ◽  
Publication Date ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
Theoretical Concepts ◽  
Point Estimates ◽  
Causal Diagrams ◽  
Causal Theories

Social scientists commonly use computational models to estimate proxies of unobserved concepts, then incorporate these proxies into subsequent tests of their theories. The consequences of this practice, which occurs in over two-thirds of recent computational work in political science, are underappreciated. Imperfect proxies can reflect noise and contamination from other concepts, producing biased point estimates and standard errors. We demonstrate how analysts can use causal diagrams to articulate theoretical concepts and their relationships to estimated proxies, then apply straightforward rules to assess which conclusions are rigorously supportable. We formalize and extend common heuristics for “signing the bias”—a technique for reasoning about unobserved confounding—to scenarios with imperfect proxies. Using these tools, we demonstrate how, in often-encountered research settings, proxy-based analyses allow for valid tests for the existence and direction of theorized effects. We conclude with best-practice recommendations for the rapidly growing literature using learned proxies to test causal theories. Expected final online publication date for the Annual Review of Political Science, Volume 25 is May 2022. Please see http://www.annualreviews.org/page/journal/pubdates for revised estimates.

The Justice Department's Pattern-or-Practice Police Reform Program, 1994–2017: Goals, Achievements, and Issues

2021 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Samuel Walker
Keyword(s):  
Academic Research ◽  
Annual Review ◽  
Publication Date ◽  
Law Enforcement Agencies ◽  
Police Reform ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
Reform Program ◽  
Or Practice ◽  
Consent Decrees ◽  
The Impact

The Department of Justice's pattern-or-practice police reform program has been an unprecedented event in American policing, intervening in local and state law enforcement agencies as never before and requiring a sweeping package of reforms. The program has reached reform settlements with forty agencies, including twenty with judicially enforced consent decrees. Academic research on the program, however, has been fairly modest. Social scientists have largely focused on a few selected issues. There is no study of the full impact of the program on one agency, and there is no comprehensive study of the impact of the program as a whole. Evaluations of individual agencies have been generally favorable, although with backsliding in some agencies. This review argues that the combination of several major goals and the various elements of specific consent decree reforms have created a web of accountability that is unmatched by any previous police reform effort. Expected final online publication date for the Annual Review of Criminology, Volume 5 is January 2022. Please see http://www.annualreviews.org/page/journal/pubdates for revised estimates.

Civilization-Saving Science for the Twenty-First Century

2021 ◽  
Vol 50 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Marcia K. McNutt
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Environmental Health ◽  
Climate Change Mitigation ◽  
Earth Science ◽  
Leading Edge ◽  
Annual Review ◽  
Publication Date ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
Mitigation And Adaptation ◽  
Change Mitigation

Geoscientists have generally been at the leading edge of predicting the challenges society faces from hazards both natural and anthropomorphic. As geoscientists, we have been less successful in devising the solutions to those problems to ensure a habitable planet for ourselves and future generations because often the solutions lie in creating novel partnerships with other researchers, including engineers, biologists, and social scientists. These sorts of transdisciplinary partnerships have been leading to radical advances in human health, under the banner of convergence science. Application of these principles of convergence science offers significant promise for addressing challenges such as climate change mitigation and adaptation, environmental health, protecting ecosystem services, and advancing sustainability science. To apply this approach rigorously, however, will involve a culture change in the geosciences in terms of how students are educated, how researchers are rewarded, and how projects are funded. ▪ Geoscientists need to work collaboratively with life, physical, and social scientists, as well as engineers, to solve the problems of our time. ▪ Universities need to address financial, procedural, educational, and cultural impediments to the conduct of convergence research. ▪ Adopting a solutions orientation to major environmental issues could help attract a more diverse geoscience workforce. ▪ Climate change mitigation would benefit from partnerships between geoscientists and social scientists to make the right behavior easy. ▪ The current course of Earth science education, research, and partnerships is inadequate to address sustainability. ▪ Ensuring environmental health requires collaboration between experts in health, environment, infrastructure, and economics. Expected final online publication date for the Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Volume 50 is May 2022. Please see http://www.annualreviews.org/page/journal/pubdates for revised estimates.

Future People

2020 ◽  
pp. 307-324
Author(s):  
Nancy S. Jecker
Keyword(s):  
Old Age ◽  
Population Aging ◽  
Age Groups ◽  
Intergenerational Justice ◽  
Fertility Rates ◽  
Bodily Integrity ◽  
One Child Policy ◽  
Child Policy ◽  
The Future

Chapter 11 explores the future of population aging, asking if aged societies will become a permanent fixture or are fleeting and unique to our time. It approaches this question by looking at the effects of controlling fertility rates by means of reproductive policies designed to balance ratios between young and old age groups. Using historical examples of China’s one-child policy and Romania’s Decree 770, the chapter argues that both pro- and antinatalist policies produce population aging and can exact a heavy toll on individuals’ capabilities to be healthy, have bodily integrity, and determine a plan of life. The chapter examines future societies with aged, super-aged, and extremely aged populations and gives guidance for intergenerational justice that is dignity-based. It considers the objection that reproductive choices do not make future persons worse off because they change the identities of future persons (the nonidentity problem). We counter this objection by drawing on the dignity framework developed throughout the book. After examining evidence of the effects of pro- and antinatalist reproductive policies, the chapters conclude that the longer-term effects on population aging must temper any assessment of the putative shorter-term good of raising or lowering fertility rates.

One-Child Policy and Population Aging in China

2021 ◽  
pp. 3657-3662
Author(s):  
Quanbao Jiang ◽  
Xiujun Tai ◽  
Lina Wang
Keyword(s):  
Population Aging ◽  
One Child Policy ◽  
Child Policy

scholarly journals Food Systems for Human and Planetary Health: Economic Perspectives and Challenges

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Shenggen Fan ◽  
Derek Headey ◽  
Christopher Rue ◽  
Timothy Thomas
Keyword(s):  
Food Systems ◽  
New Technologies ◽  
Food System ◽  
Annual Review ◽  
Publication Date ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
Planetary Health ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Economic Perspectives ◽  
And Behavior

Food systems are currently facing unprecedented challenges. More than 690 million people still suffer hunger while climate change, rapid depletion of natural resources, and loss of biodiversity further threaten future food systems. Influential global reports emphasize the need for fundamental transformations of food systems for human and planetary health, but few incorporate economic considerations. This review adopts an economic lens to assessing potential transitions to ideal food systems that are productive, sustainable, nutritious, resilient, and inclusive. Our findings show that new technologies, policies, institutions, and behavior changes can leverage synergies for achieving multiple food system targets, but rigorous economic analysis is needed to further analyze trade-offs and to overcome complex behavioral, institutional, and political barriers. This review also points to important knowledge gaps that economists and other social scientists must address to contribute to the radical transformation of food systems. Expected final online publication date for the Annual Review of Resource Economics, Volume 13 is October 2021. Please see http://www.annualreviews.org/page/journal/pubdates for revised estimates.

China's infamous one-child policy

The Lancet ◽  
2005 ◽  
Vol 365 (9455) ◽  
pp. 215-216 ◽  
Author(s):  
M KING
Keyword(s):  
One Child Policy ◽  
Child Policy
Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document