Urban "good life" fuels rural disintegration

BEIJING, July 18 -- IF you think urbanites tend to divorce more than rural residents, you are wrong.

There are indications that rural residents are rapidly catching up in terms of divorce, if nowhere else.

The causes are many, but family disintegration is mainly a result of long-term separation between spouses as one or both of them seek their fortune in cities as migrant workers.

It is estimated that there are over 10 million rural migrant workers.

For decades governments at all levels have been encouraging rural residents to embrace the "good life'' in cities.

This liberal supply of cheap labor has been fueling China's economic expansion - at a cost.

Policy makers have been very interested in their cheap labor, but rather indifferent to these workers' obligations as husbands, wives, children and parents.

The rising divorce rate is just one result. As the children and elderly parents are left behind to fend for themselves, they suffer too.

Statistics from courts in Nanyang, Henan Province, suggest that the rate of rural divorce in the area has climbed from 29 percent in 2004 to 35 percent in 2006, representing an annual rise of 5.4 percent.

Statistics from Jintan in Jiangsu Province suggest that from 2001 to 2003 the number of rural divorce cases handled by the courts grew by 20 percent annually.

Such trends become more manifest in areas where there are more migrant workers - for instance Sichuan Province, Chongqing Municipality and Anhui Province.

Investigation shows that the majority of rural divorce cases involve spouses who work as migrant workers.

Rural China used to be the bastion of traditional values, where patriarchal authority and family loyalty were strong.

Young couples were under strong obligation to show gratitude to their parents, and respect for their family and village elders.

To be involved in lawsuits was considered ignominious, and it was trusted that family elders could settle most domestic disputes more effectively.

Thus family became the basis of village life, and it took on a religious sanctity by giving the wedded couple a sense of social recognition and continuity.

Marriage was a family affair, since the couple had more obligations towards their parents than each other.

Given these circumstances, unless they were prepared to ruin themselves, no couple in their right minds would ever consider divorce.

Of more than 100 rural relatives of mine, none has ever divorced.

Behind these family ethics are Confucian doctrines, among them the edict, "A man does not travel to distant places when his parents are living. If he does, he must have a definite destination.''

As these traditional values and functions of family life are being steadily eroded, marriage becomes more and more a union of convenience.

And such union can easily dissolve when threatened by a long separation - as in the case of families where spouses work long years in distant cities.

In the case of couples where one person chooses to work as a migrant worker, the urban exposure can be fatal for a marriage.

Though these migrants are often despised and lead only a marginal existence in cities, they seem to be economically superior to their spouses left behind.

Urban life corrupts their values as well as improves their manners.

The divergences lead to chasms and conflicts.

Long-term separation is also fatal.

The migrants, mostly in the prime of their lives, are usually overworked and sexually starved in an alien land.

As they are outside the supervision of their family and neighbors, they become particularly vulnerable to extramarital affairs.

There are families who move wholesale to the cities, but such cases are extremely rare.

No employer of migrants would consider it necessary to provide for their family, and the existence of hukou (residence registration) strictly rules out the possibility of rural residents settling down as naturalized urban residents.

From an economic point of view, unless urban slums are tolerated, there is no possibility of migrant workers settling down as a family unit.

They represent China's cutting edge, but only the thin edge is tolerated.

The steady rise in rural divorce rates has also taken its toll on the older and younger generations.

According to statistics, nationally there were about one million divorces involving rural couples in 2004, affecting about 2 million children.

This number far exceeded the about 1,091,000 children similarly affected in the United States in 1988.

(Source: Shanghai Daily)