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i
The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia

ii
International Policy Exchange Series

Published in collaboration with the
Center for International Policy Exchanges
University of Maryland
Series Editors
Douglas J. Besharov
Neil Gilbert
Chinese Social Policy in a Time of Transition
Edited by Douglas J. Besharov and Karen Baehler
Reconciling Work and Poverty Reduction:
How Successful Are European Welfare States?
Edited by Bea Cantillon and Frank Vandenbroucke
University Adaptation in Difficult Economic Times
Edited by Paola Mattei
Activation or Workfare? Governance and the Neo-Liberal Convergence
Edited by Ivar Lødemel and Amílcar Moreira
Child Welfare Systems and Migrant Children:
A Cross Country Study of Policies and Practice
Edited by Marit Skivenes, Ravinder Barn, Katrin Kriz, and Tarja Pösö
Adjusting to a World in Motion:
Trends in Global Migration and Migration Policy
Edited by Douglas J. Besharov and Mark H. Lopez
Caring for a Living:
Migrant Women, Aging Citizens, and Italian Families
Francesca Degiuli
Child Welfare Removals by the State:
A Cross-Country Analysis of Decision-Making Systems
Edited by Kenneth Burns, Tarja Pösö, and Marit Skivenes
Improving Public Services:
International Experiences in Using Evaluation Tools to Measure Program Performance
Edited by Douglas J. Besharov, Karen J. Baehler, and Jacob Alex Klerman
Welfare, Work, and Poverty:
Social Assistance in China
Qin Gao
Youth Labor in Transition:
Inequalities, Mobility, and Policies in Europe
Edited by Jacqueline O’Reilly, Janine Leschke,
Renate Ortlieb, Martin Seeleib-Kaiser, and Paola Villa
Decent Incomes for All:
Improving Policies in Europe
Edited by Bea Cantillon, Tim Goedemé, and John Hills
Social Exclusion in Cross National Perspective:
Actors, Actions, and Impacts from Above and Below
Edited by Robert J. Chaskin, Bong Joo Lee, and Surinder Jaswal
The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia
Stuart Gietel-Basten
iii
THE “POPULATION PROBLEM”

IN PACIFIC ASIA
STUART GIETEL-B ASTEN
1
iv
1
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Gietel-Basten, Stuart, author.
Title: The “population problem” in Pacific Asia /Stuart Gietel-Basten.
Description: New York, NY : Oxford University Press, [2019] |
Series: International policy exchange series |
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2018054872 (print) | LCCN 2018057721 (ebook) |
ISBN 9780199361083 (updf) | ISBN 9780190051358 (epub) |
ISBN 9780199361076 (hbk : alk. paper)
Subjects: LCSH: Pacific Area—Population. | Pacific Area—Population policy. |
Population aging—Pacific Area. | Demographic transition—Pacific Area.
Classification: LCC HB3692.55.A3 (ebook) | LCC HB3692.55.A3 G54 2019 (print) |
DDC 363.9095—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018054872
9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Printed by Sheridan Books, Inc., United States of America
v
To Janet and Paul; Nerice and Celia; and Richard, David, and Wolfgang.
I could not have achieved any of this without you.
vi
vi
CON TEN TS
Foreword ix
Acknowledgments xiii
1
Economic Boom, Demographic Bomb? 1
2
Low Fertility, Population Decline, and Aging: Pacific Asia’s
“Population Problem” 16
3
Toward a Multidimensional Measurement of Fertility in Pacific Asia 36
4
Fertility Preferences in Low-Fertility Pacific Asia 58
5
Why Does the Two-Child Ideal Turn into a One-Child Intention? 77
6
Childlessness and the Retreat from Marriage 95
vii
vi
viii Contents
7
The Two-Child Policy: China’s “Silver Bullet”? 118
8
Toward a Holistic View of Childbearing in China 142
9
Conclusions 161
References 179
Index 215
ix
F OREWORD
T his is a book about the very low fertility rates we see in contemporary Pacific
Asia—about how they might have come about, what policies have been
implemented to try to increase them (and why those policies have largely had
little effect), and what the consequences of all of this might be.
The problem with writing a book about any contemporary issue is that “con-
temporary” at the time of writing, publishing, and reading can mean three dif-
ferent things. While I cannot predict the future, I can at least acknowledge what
has changed in the past year or so since the final draft went off to the publisher.
Fortunately, the new trends only make the central message of the book timelier.
In December 2018, it was announced that South Korea’s total fertility rate (TFR)
fell to 0.96, its lowest level ever and one of the very lowest national TFRs ever
recorded. China has ceased publishing the data required to adequately calculate
the TFR at the national level, perhaps reflecting a concern about extremely low
levels. However, we do know that in 2018 just 15 million children were born
in China. This figure—significantly lower than the 20 million forecasted by the
Chinese government—is further evidence that the two-child policy is not a
“silver bullet” to fix the population problem. The 2018 TFR in Singapore fell to
1.16, a 10-year low. In Japan, while the TFR appears to have stabilized at around
1.4, changes to the population structure mean that only around 925,000 births
were recorded in 2018, again the lowest number on record.
Taken together, the very latest data from Pacific Asia show us that fertility re-
mains stubbornly low, even at a time when the rhetoric surrounding both aging
and low fertility is increasing, and in the midst of ever more comprehensive
ix
x
x Foreword
policies designed to encourage (or at least support) childbearing. There is little

evidence across the region that any upswing in either period or cohort fertility
rates is in the cards in the near future (see Chapter 2 for definitions of these
measures). Indeed, the economic and demographic conditions in China—with
the likely significant increase in age at first birth—means that period TFR may
well decline before any rebound is seen.
Turning away from Pacific Asia, we see other developments in the immediate
past that have affected the message of this book. The rise of populism in Europe
and the link to conservative views of the family and to an antimigrant sentiment
have led some governments to develop pronatalist policies, often with very re-
strictive views of gender roles and resistance to newer forms of family forma-
tion (to put it politely). Hungary, for example, has allocated 0.3% of its GDP by
2020 to pay for new family policies. However, these policies are not grounded in
rights or fulfilling individual aspirations—nor are they even a holistic response
to greater challenges such as population aging. Rather, they are based on politics
and precisely the narrow unidimensional or two-dimensional thinking about
population policy that this book argues against.
Finally, we have seen changes in something that many demographers have
tended to take for granted, namely, the higher fertility rates seen in Northern
Europe. I, for one, will admit a kind of complacency when looking for policy
“formulas” for higher fertility. We have been able to consistently associate the
higher fertility rates in Scandinavia with a particular style of welfare state and ap-
proach to work, the family, and gender. Similarly, albeit for a different and rather
quixotic set of reasons, the fertility rates in the United Kingdom, North America,
and Australia were set out as an alternative framework of “higher” fertility. These
higher tracks were set apart from lower fertility rates in Southern, Eastern, and
Central Europe, with associated claims about the various contexts and regimes
in which we might see these different TFRs as an outcome.
In very recent history, this story has become far less clear-cut. In the Anglo-
Saxon world, period TFRs have consistently been declining from around the 2.0
mark down to around 1.8—still high, but not so far away from the historically
much lower TFRs in the German-speaking countries, which are now around
1.5. Perhaps more striking, though, is the collapse of period TFR in parts of
Scandinavia. In Finland, seven consecutive years of decline mean that, at 1.49 in
2018, the country reported its lowest TFR since the famine years of 1866 to 1868.
In Norway, the TFR fell to 1.62, another record low. All of this occurred despite
a suite of internationally recognized policies providing generous maternity and
paternity leave, subsidized daycare programs, financial support to all families
regardless of income level, and a range of other measures aimed promoting both
work-life balance and gender equity at home and the workplace.
Of course, we do not know whether these lower period TFRs will translate
into significant cohort declines (again see Chapter 2 for a discussion of what this
means). Similarly, because of the short-term nature of these changes, there is
xi
Foreword xi
little consensus around the key underlying drivers. But it does point us to two
things of relevance to this book. First, in terms of persistently higher fertility in
postindustrial and advanced economies, there is clearly no one magic formula
for countries to follow. This means we have to update our thinking. Even 10
years ago, for example, the idea that Germany would have the same period TFR
as Finland would have been risible.
The second major lesson is that low fertility has not “gone away” in Europe. As
I argue in this book, if we see low fertility—or at least the gap between aspirations
and outcomes—not as a problem in itself but rather as a symptom of other up-
stream institutional malfunctions, then we need to redouble our efforts to look
both at this new era of very low fertility in the European context and at linkages
and commonalities to the Asian context. In the post–Economic Crisis world,
what roles can be ascribed to dualization of the labor market? Or welfare state
retrenchment? Or the development of more conservative views linked to popu-
lism? Only through a holistic understanding of the nature and context of family
formation (and aging) in a comparative framework can we begin to develop
public policies to adequately engage with—and, arguably, properly specify—the
“population problem” in Pacific Asia, Europe, and beyond.
Finally, for the most up-to-date data, readers are directed to the following
Web resources:
World Population Prospects, United Nations: population.un.org/wpp/
World Development Indicators, World Bank: wdi.worldbank.org/
The Human Fertility Database, MPIDR & VID: humanfertility.org
xi
xi
ACKN OWLEDG MENTS
I have been extremely fortunate to have a strong network of scholars in Europe

and Asia whom I have been able to rely on to give me constructive feedback
and, in many cases, to correct me and help me rein in my ideas. Gu Baochang
has proved an indispensable guide to navigating both the politics and science
of Chinese demography. My collaboration with colleagues in Xi’an—especially
Jiang Quanbao, Li Shuzhuo, and Wei Yan—and in Taiwan—especially Yang
Wenshan, Peishan Yang, and Lillian Wang—has been immensely rewarding
both scientifically and socially. Ron Lesthaeghe, Jack Goldstone, Anna Rotkirch,
Wang Feng, Zheng Zhenzhen, Sergei Scherbov, Warren Sanderson, Gavin Jones,
Danny Dorling, Peter MacDonald, and Noriko Tsuya have been truly generous
with their time and support. Tomas Sobotka always brought me back down to
earth when I got carried away with my ideas.
The Hong Kong Census and Statistics Department and the Taiwan Ministry of
the Interior have been model agencies to work with. In particular, I am grateful
to Leslie Tang, Iris Law, and those working in the Social Statistics Division of
HKCSD in Hong Kong, and to Wanda Chang, Department of Household
Registration Affairs Director in the Taiwan Ministry of the Interior.
I have been truly blessed to have worked in a supporting environment in both
Oxford and Hong Kong. At the Department of Social Policy and Intervention
in Oxford, I owe much to my tremendous DPhil students—Yuxi Zhang, Xi
Liu, Rachel Woodlee, Timea Suli, Putu Natih, and Jenny Allsopp—as well as to
my great colleagues, many of whom have become friends for life. At Oxford, I
have been fortunate to experience college life in three different places and am
xiii
xvi
xiv Acknowledgments
grateful to Francesco Billari and Andrew Dilnot at Nuffield; Rosalind Harding

at St. John’s; and Denise Lievesley, Roland Rosner, Ingrid Lunt, the late Sir David
Watson, and other friends in the college staff at GTC.
Since 2017, I have been honored to call Hong Kong my home. At the Hong
Kong University of Science and Technology, I hope to be able to repay the con-
fidence placed in me by those who were instrumental in giving me this amazing
opportunity, namely Kellee Tsai, Cameron Campbell, Jack Goldstone, and Wei
Shyy. My faculty and administrative colleagues in the School of Humanities
and Social Science and in the Division of Public Policy have given me tremen-
dous support and have made my and my family’s transition to life and work here
much easier than I had feared. Also, my wonderful students in Social Science and
Public Policy have always kept me motivated and on my toes. I want to give spe-
cial mention to those in the offices on either side of mine who, through the pa-
per-thin walls, had to endure me either humming and whistling when the book
was going well or swearing and hitting the keyboard when it was not. Sorry.
Of course, the support of friends and family is always instrumental to
maintaining sanity, especially when writing a book. I can’t name everyone, but:
Jones, Rachael, Dominic, Lizzie, Jack, Mui, Ben, Anastasia, and Evelyn, we’ve
been through a lot over the past 20 years. And Jenny, Phil, Alice, Pete, Elaine,
Martin, Paul, Thees, and Fran: you really made our lives in Oxford a joy. Rhoda,
Patrick, Léandre, Iris, Rene, and the rest of my new, adopted family: thanks for
always being there. Huge thanks to Realyn for all of your hard work and support
since we arrived in Hong Kong. Also, of course, to Jelle. Despite the fact you have
made almost no measurable contribution to this volume, the fact that you named
me in your acknowledgment means I feel compelled to name you, too, or else
never hear the end of it.
Oxford University Press has been the model publisher in the opposite way to
how I have been the model author. I am amazed that Dana Bliss has not set up
a filter to my emails to send them directly to spam. (Perhaps he has now.) I re-
ally can’t believe how encouraging and supportive he has been throughout this
whole, somewhat tortuous process. I also have to send a huge amount of thanks
to the series editors and reviewers who were forced to endure the first draft of
this book, and then to come back for this version—their support and wisdom
have made this a publishable book. Finally, a huge thanks to the proofreaders,
copyeditors, designers, and other backroom staff at OUP USA and in India, who
have all worked quietly in the background to help produce this book.
1
1
ECONOMIC BOOM, DEMOGRAPHIC BOMB?
THE “POPULATION PROBLEM” IN PACIFIC ASIA
Anyone who studies the demography of Pacific Asia might be forgiven for
thinking that there is no good news at all. China, Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong,
Singapore, and South Korea,1 once the places of so much economic hope, are
now more often than not presented as demographically decrepit. Sometimes it is
hard to tell which is the most favored subject for writers in newspapers or busi-
ness magazines: the apocalyptic forecasts of aging and decline, or the ever more
imaginative, maybe desperate, ways in which governments are trying to tackle
it. Think switching the lights off in government offices on a Wednesday night to
encourage baby-making.
The way the “problem” is presented is very simple: Population aging and de-
cline are bad—bad for the economy, bad for the maintenance of health and wel-
fare systems, bad for the existential future of the country, even bad for the race or
the culture. Low fertility is the culprit. As such: fix low fertility, fix the problem.
These attempts at “fixing” low fertility have taken the form of a suite of
policies across the region focused both on incentivizing childbearing in a mon-
etary sense and on trying to ameliorate the perceived boundaries to either mar-
riage or having children. These fixes either address concerns that people give to
survey-takers about childbearing or otherwise try to cajole people into doing
something that, if you believe the prevailing narrative, they simply do not want
to do. Often wedded to nationalist discourses and a culture of blame, there is
generally a rather thin line between the “carrot and stick.” In China, meanwhile,
there is a simpler view: allowing people to have more children will make the pop-
ulation problem go away.
The only problem is that these policies don’t seem to be working especially
well. These territories still have some of the very lowest fertility rates in the world.
1
2
2 The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia
Just thinking in terms of a quasi-natural experiment, for example, Singapore

and Hong Kong arguably have rather similar background causes of low fer-
tility. Singapore has probably the most comprehensive suite of family policies
to support marriage and childbearing in the world. Hong Kong, meanwhile, has
a modest tax break for parents of newborns. Indeed, the Hong Kong popula-
tion policy explicitly states that “we believe it is not appropriate for the [govern-
ment] to adopt policies to promote childbirth, a matter very much of individual
choices” (HKSAR Government 2003, 60). Yet, despite these major differences
in policies (which have been in place for many years now), Hong Kong and
Singapore have almost identical total fertility rates. In China, meanwhile, the
most recent set of relaxation of the family planning restrictions began in 2013,
when couples of whom at least one partner was an only child were allowed to
have two children, followed up in 2015 when the National Two-Child Policy was
instituted in China. However, the “baby tsunami” that was expected to occur in
China after these policy changes does not appear to have transpired (Wee 2016).
Furthermore, it is not just that the population problem hasn’t been fixed. The
discourse, rather, has turned toxic, almost as if exasperation has set in. Old people
blame young people for being individualistic, narcissistic, and causing a “social
recession” by eschewing their generational responsibilities. In this prevailing
narrative, which is employed by journalists, politicians, and even scholars, a gen-
eration has given up on marriage and childbearing, choosing instead to focus on
their own self-actualization. Young people, meanwhile, resent the older genera-
tion for making their lives intolerable through their management of politics and
the economy and for the irksome prospect of not having a pension or a lifetime
job security. Both generations seem to think that the other “never had it so good.”
Scholars in China are, supposedly with a straight face, genuinely advocating a
tax on the childless to transfer money into a fund designed to support couples
who want a second child (Gao 2018). Politicians in some territories, meanwhile,
appear to be genuinely worried about their citizens going the same way as the
Japanese sea lion and the Formosan clouded leopard—namely, becoming extinct.
Meanwhile, the blame game is not just intergenerational. The tension between
the sexes is palpable. The rejection of childbearing is, so it is argued, just as much
a rejection of the “marriage package.” For women, so the narrative goes, men ei-
ther are only interested in subjugation and imposing gendered domestic norms
or will only become a drain on the women through their inability to get a job.
Men tend to be referred to as the villains of the piece, imposing their hierarchical,
old-fashioned views on women, but also simultaneously are castigated for being
‘unmanly’ or, so the Japanese meme goes, soushoku danshi, or “grass-eating boys”
or “herbivores” because of a perceived lack of interest in dating, sex, and cer-
tainly commitment (Harney 2009).
Then you get the tragedies: In February 2017, an unnamed civil servant in
South Korea’s Ministry of Health and Welfare returned to work after giving birth
to her third child (Taipei Times 2017). You might think this is a success story
3
given the hard and soft policies outlined previously. Three children! Back to
work! And all in the Ministry responsible for encouraging childbearing! Only, in
this case, this 34-year-old mother of three had a heart attack and died just a week
later. She was working seven-day weeks to catch up on her workload and taking
primary responsibility for looking after her children (Straits Times 2016b).
Now, the world doesn’t need another book complaining about this state of
affairs; presenting miserable forecasts of a miserable future. We need to think
differently about this. Do it differently. Conceptually, even, some big questions
have not really been properly asked. Everyone says the fertility rate is too low, but
then that assumes that there is a “right” fertility rate. If that’s the case, what is it,
and why? A shrinking population is perceived as a mortal problem, as is aging.
But is this demographically deterministic view about the size of populations re-
ally so valid?
A DIFFERENT APPROACH TO THE PROBLEM
Thinking Multidimensionally
What I want to argue in this book, then, is that we need to change our thinking
of the population problem in two ways. The current way to think about it is in a
linear, two-dimensional direction. Aging and decline = bad; low fertility = cause;
therefore, fix low fertility. Rather, I think we need to think multidimensionally
about this. We need to be much clearer about what we mean by low fertility
and how this measure is composed. We then need to learn more about what
the preferences are for people and whether we are really in a no-hope era of
individualism in which children are an expensive consumer good whose di-
rect and indirect opportunity costs are just too high. We need to find out more
about the context of these clearly changing choices regarding how marriage and
childbearing fit into the life cycle of men and women in low-fertility Pacific Asia
(LFPA).2 In other words, if we can better identify the root of the issue, then we
can design better policies to support people.
So far, so normal: how to design more cunning ways to get people to have
more babies. But, my approach is different.
There is strong evidence that, despite what the narrative might suggest, people
do want to have children, and they do want to get married—or at least get into
long-term, stable unions. These low-marriage and low-fertility rates, I suggest,
are the outcome of a malfunction in society—a consequence of institutions that
are not working to allow people to actualize their own aspirations. Few people in
the region report at a young age an aspiration to be single and childless for their
whole lives, but high percentages of people are. Of course, many women and
men are unable to become parents for biological reasons, with extended post-
ponement of childbearing only serving to increase the chances of not being able
4
to conceive. But, this does not account for the very high proportions we see in
places such as Hong Kong. So, what is going on? Are respondents lying systemat-
ically in surveys? Or, more likely, is it the case that things happening in their lives
simply don’t allow that desired situation to come about? I am not the first person
to make this argument. Australian demographer Peter McDonald puts it very
succinctly: “ideals go unrealized because of countervailing forces ensuing from
the nature of modern societies” (McDonald 2006, 26). In other words, “Low fer-
tility is an unintended rather than a deliberate outcome of changing social and
economic institutions” (McDonald 2006, 26).
This gets us to think differently about low fertility. Rather than being the
problem, it is the symptom of various institutional malfunctions. There have
(rightly) been strong criticisms of prevailing fertility policies for using women’s
bodies to meet some kind of target of fertility. I would argue that policies that
put aspirations of individuals first and that explore (and ultimately remove) the
barriers to achieving these aspirations are likely to be the policies that succeed.
But, these policies should also be multidimensional in terms of looking at these
barriers to achieving aspirations and how they might be removed.
Indeed, there is arguably a precedent when we look at the “other side of
the coin” with regard to population policies, namely, policies to bring fertility
rates down. There is an argument that family planning policies over the past
half century were so effective because they were aligned with the aspirations of
women. Women wanted fewer children, more education, more rights, and more
opportunities for themselves and their offspring. Beneath these aspirations,
however, were multiple barriers relating to institutions, family, gender, and so
on. Fertility was decreased, then, not just by one policy of flooding the popu-
lation with contraceptives. Rather, it was a comprehensive suite of policies that
addressed the gamut of barriers to lowering fertility: from health to education;
from access to family planning to acceptance of family planning; and by talking
to women and men. It wasn’t easy, but it was successful. It was successful be-
cause it was built on the premise that high fertility might have been considered a
problem but was fundamentally an outcome of other problems.
Now, turning to low- fertility countries, there is an argument— set out
previously—that these policies to encourage childbearing are not working be-
cause they are not aligned with women’s aspirations. This is the narrative of
individualism, of egoism, of giving up. This view has been justified by a latent
intergenerational tension and, arguably, a misreading of demographic and social
theory. But, this idea that children have gone out of fashion doesn’t hold water.
Surveys say that there is still a relatively strong demand not only to have children
but also to have more than one (although there are some important regional
differences). Having said that, it is clear that there are a number of obstacles
to achieving this aspiration. At the time of writing, I am living in Hong Kong.
Housing is very expensive. The expectations for your children are sky-high, and
so are the costs of giving them what is felt to be the best education. Working
5
hours are incredibly long and not conducive to either dating or looking after
small families. Getting a stable, well-paid job is increasingly an aspiration in it-
self, rather than an expectation. We see the same issues across the region. In this
vein, giving someone a few thousand dollars might help a bit, but it is hardly
going to be transformative. But, then, policies that directly address some of these
features (e.g., accessing child care) don’t seem to have much success either.
Of course, if you actually talk to people, you will quickly find that the barriers
to marriage and childbearing are quite multidimensional in nature, drawing
on almost all aspects of life. While surveys might give the top three reasons for
staying single, these life choices are the result of myriad social processes oper-
ating at the family, community, local, regional, and global levels. Only by re-
ally understanding these processes and how they operate as barriers to meeting
aspirations do we have any chance of overcoming them. In other words, we have
to think multidimensionally about fertility. The point I want to make in this book
is that apparently problematic demographic measures, then, are an outcome
or a symptom of other problems rather than a ‘problem to be fixed’ in and of
themselves.
Toward a Rights-Based Approach

Although this might prove to be a more successful way of increasing fertility, we are
arguably still stuck in the same paradigm of a problem of low fertility that needs to
be fixed. Imagine for a moment that we don’t actually take the fertility rate as being
a problem at all. In fact, just completely take it out of the equation. Rather, focus
on the (stylized) fact that there is most often a gap between the number of children
that people say they want and the number of children they end up having. You
could consider this over space, or over time. Now, simply imagine that the ideal
family sizes were translated into the actual fertility rates. In many sub-Saharan
countries, fertility rates are high. However, if one turns to the fertility ideals of ad-
olescent girls—the next generation of mothers—these are frequently much lower
(Dorling and Gietel-Basten 2017). If these ideals were to be realized in sub-Saharan
Africa, for example, fertility rates would often be lower, in some cases much lower.
Also, we might imagine that if these girls in sub-Saharan Africa find themselves
able to meet these preferences, this may well be because they have better lives.
Better education, better health, better opportunities, better rights, better choices.
Absolutely rightly, these aspirations are the spur to improve the opportunities for
these women through a wide suite of policies, broadly considered as “develop-
ment.” In Figure 1.1, I show how the ideal family size and actual fertility rates have
altered over time. In the case of Taiwan, the lower ideal family size was an impor-
tant element in shaping the island’s highly successful family planning framework
(Freedman, Chang, and Sun 1994). I think you can argue, then, that in the same
way that the aspiration to have fewer children was a spur to action in the earlier
period, so, too, is the gap between ideals and reality today.
6
7.0
6.0
TFR/ideal family size
5.0
4.0
3.0
2.0
1.0
0
1960
1962
1964
1967
1969
1971
1973
1975
1977
1979
1981
1983
1985
1987
1989
1991
1993
1995
1997
1999
2001
2003
2005
2007
2009
2011
2013
2015
Mean ideal family size TFR
Figure 1.1. The gap between ideal and realized fertility, women aged 15 to 45 years, Taiwan.
TFR = total fertility rate.
Sources: Republic of China National Development Council 2016; various surveys.
In other words, we can change the narrative. Rather than talking about
“targets” set by the state, we can instead talk about “aspirations” set by people. In
doing this, we are much more aligned with the reproductive rights agenda that
was agreed on by (almost) all countries of the world back at the International
Conference on Population and Development in Cairo in 1994. In the dec-
laration that emanated from that conference, it was said that “Reproductive
health . . . implies that people are able to have a satisfying and safe sex life and
that they have the capability to reproduce and the freedom to decide if, when and
how often to do so” (UNFPA 2004). This statement was largely designed to be ap-
propriate for countries where women felt cajoled into limiting their childbearing
for the sake of a target; I would argue that the same principle holds for people in
low-fertility countries.
Objective 7.14 is, therefore, for signatories:
To help couples and individuals meet their reproductive goals in a frame-

work that promotes optimum health, responsibility and family well-being,
and respects the dignity of all persons and their right to choose the number,
spacing and timing of the birth of their children. (UNFPA 2004, 65)
By adopting this rights-based approach, with preferences at the center, we can

completely rethink our entire approach to fertility. We can move away from one
that blames and stigmatizes—that uses the female body as a vessel to achieve
national targets. In short, we can move toward a system that allows personal,
7
not national, reproductive goals to be met. Rather conveniently, the reproductive

goals of most people in LFPA actually align quite neatly with those of the state.
As such, it can be win-win outcome.
If we can combine this rights-based approach with a multidimensional view
of fertility, we can actually see the ways in which institutions—including, but
certainly not limited to, the state—can be reformed to enable people to achieve
their aspirations. I think that, if this were to be the case, the idea of low fertility
as a problem would pretty much go away. Furthermore, I think there is a good
chance that societies will be better.
Nico van Nimwegen, a Dutch demographer, once said, “States get the fertility
rates that they deserve.” I think there is certainly something in this. The evidence
seems to suggest that people know better than states about what’s best for them.
I don’t think that should come as a huge surprise. But, I think we need to be more
radical still.
Changing the Parameters

Low fertility is a problem because aging and population decline are a problem.
Yet, actually I don’t think this is true. Low fertility is just a “thing.” It is, in and
of itself, completely neutral. So is population aging, and so is population decline.
For that matter, so is population growth. It is only systems and institutions that
apply a value to these demographic measurements. Classical economic theory
tells us that growth is good (much as Gordon Gecko told us that “greed is good”).
But, increasingly, we are starting to question that paradigm, recognizing that the
population component of gross domestic product (GDP) growth can be driven by
changes in quality as well as by the quantity of the population. Similarly, in terms
of the environment, although some exceptions exist (e.g., Emmott 2013), there is
a general trend toward thinking that it is really about behavior, or the interaction
between humans and things (like driving cars, eating meat) and institutions (like
companies who pollute, or countries who refuse to sign up to climate change
targets), that causes the problem, not just the raw number of people. For a classic
example, Qatar and Nigeria produce roughly the same carbon dioxide emissions
(about 87 kilotons in 2015). The former has a population of 2.5 million; the latter
more than 188 million (World Bank 2016). Thinking about the future of popula-
tion growth in sub-Saharan Africa through this lens looks rather different.
In the same way that we have rethought the population paradigm in rela-
tion to growth and the environment, so, too, we must rethink the paradigm for
aging and decline. Population aging is only a problem because the institutions
in place cannot cope—or so we are told. This is surely the case for extant pen-
sion systems in both European and Pacific Asian territories. But aging is about
a lot more than pensions. Yet again, I think we are thinking in a unidirectional
way: ‘aging is bad, so let’s fix the causes’. I want to argue that we need to move
away from this two-dimensional, demographically deterministic paradigm and
8
toward one that considers populations holistically. In other words, if we rethink

and reconceptualize the problem itself, re-evaluate it in its own terms, we might
be able to become a little more relaxed about the so-called ‘root’ causes. This also
means we need to reconceptualize what aging and even being old actually is. By
doing so, I think we might be able to concentrate more on making society better
and rather less on chasing targets that may, ultimately, be rather meaningless.
We need to begin by stating categorically that increasing fertility is an ineffi-
cient way of addressing the economic, political, and cultural issues related to pop-
ulation aging. This needs to come out of a recognition that demographic change
alone didn’t lead to economic growth and everything else that has happened over
the past 50 years, and neither will demographic change alone lead to economic
collapse. There’s plenty of other “tools in the shed.” By only thinking of demo-
graphic solutions to demographic problems, we are, I would suggest, completely
setting ourselves up for a fall.
A THEORETICAL VACUUM
Demography is, as Dudley Kirk (1996, 361) once remarked, “a science short
on theory.” Perhaps many readers will be familiar with demographic transition
theory (see Coale 1984 for an explanation), which describes the relationship be-
tween declining mortality, fertility and population growth. Yet, the predictive
power of demographic transition theory has been questioned by many authors
for various reasons, especially in terms of having omitted an in-depth explora-
tion of causal roles played by institutions not adequately explored in the orig-
inal formulation (Teitelbaum 1975) (such as familial wealth flows; Barkow and
Burley 1980). This is especially the case in the fifth, or post-transitional, epoch of
very low fertility and mortality rates that we are generally concerned with in this
book. As Kirk (1996, 387) notes, “In Western areas of low fertility we are moving
into a post-transition era, where the old guidelines are no longer appropriate,
an era in which much more attention will have to be given to raising fertility,
rather than to lower it. . . . What happens after the transition is the most exciting
problem in modern demography, for which transition theory can provide some
guidance but few answers, as it is tied to a particular epoch of history.” This has
led Lutz (2007, 16) to suggest that “the Demographic Transition paradigm . . . es-
sentially has nothing to say about the future of fertility in Europe.” Clearly, the
same view can hold for Asia. In other words, as Lutz (2007, 16) continues, “the
social sciences as a whole have yet to come up with a useful theory to predict the
future fertility level of post-Demographic Transition societies.”
Later in the book, I will refer to a few theories that are applied within
demography—although whether a scientist in another field would call them
theories is open to question. These theories have each, in their own way, been ap-
plied to the LFPA context to try to understand current low fertility and, in some
9
cases, predict the future. Each will be referred to throughout the book. The in-
complete gender revolution theory, for example, posits that while women’s public
sphere roles have changed beyond all recognition, in many settings expectations
of them in the private sphere, or their domestic roles, have largely stayed the
same (Goldscheider, Bernhardt, and Lappegård 2015; Esping-Andersen 2009).
This mismatch is considered to be a key driver in shaping low fertility because
the tension between these two roles is acted out in terms of the postponement,
limiting, or eschewing of childbearing.
Two other theoretical threads within demography have been applied to the
kind of low fertility settings we are exploring in this book. Each describes a
set of societal circumstances that, in principle, not only characterize low fer-
tility societies but may also serve to sustain such low fertility. The second demo-
graphic transition theory (Lesthaeghe 2010, 2014) posits that through the process
of modernization, a former emphasis on basic material needs, such as income,
work conditions, housing, children and adult health, schooling, social security,
and an emphasis on solidarity, shifts toward a new emphasis on individual au-
tonomy, expressive work and socialization values, self-actualization, grass-roots
democracy, and recognition of the individual (Lesthaeghe 2014). This is linked,
through other related mechanisms, to structural sub-replacement fertility.
Another theory, meanwhile, goes further. The low-fertility trap hypothesis
posits that once a society has experienced a prolonged period of low fertility, a
series of self-reinforcing mechanisms act to make any increase in fertility ever
harder to achieve (Lutz, Skirbekk, and Testa 2006). These mechanisms come
about through the economic and political effects of population aging, the dem-
ographic effect of fewer and fewer women of childbearing age, and, crucially for
our understanding in this book, a normalization of smaller family sizes (and a
societal adjustment toward that), as reflected in fertility preferences.
Bearing all of this in mind, I want to say a little something about the approach
that I will be taking in the book. I am a demographer. But, I have come to the
conclusion that an understanding of demography and demography theory (such
as there is much theory) can only take us so far in trying to understand what is
going on. As such, I have sought to employ some insights from other approaches
and other disciplines. It is a little unusual, for example, for demographers to de-
ploy qualitative data, but I will. It is also quite unusual for demographers to de-
ploy late modern social theory. I have always thought this rather odd because
theorists such as Anthony Giddens, Ulrich Beck, and Elizabeth Beck-Gernsheim
have been quite preoccupied with the process of family formation and how this
fits into other aspects of modern life.
According to Beck and Beck-Gernsheim, through the process of moderniza-
tion, the function of the family has changed from a primarily economic orien-
tation geared toward production. Within these processes, men and women have
been active agents in shaping and reshaping their own identities within both
the home and the wider world. Rather than living out the lives or biographies
10
that past institutions had designed for them, men and women have set out to
organize their own biographies, with the goal of creating a life of one’s own.
Women, for example, are theoretically cut free from their status fate (Beck and
Beck-Gernsheim 2002, 202) as housewives. This new capacity to design one’s
own biography is termed individualization.
Beck and Beck-Gernsheim also describe another ongoing transition in so-
ciety contemporaneous to the move into—and out of—modernity as relating
to risk (Beck 1992). Though this concept has been expanded and applied in a
variety of contexts (e.g., the environment), at its heart is an understanding of
the manner by which risk is pooled. Traditionally, risk is pooled at the familial
level. Through the course of modernity (and the development, in some places,
of the welfare state), risk is then pooled with the state and employers. Finally, in
late-or post-modernity, when both the extended family and the big state take
on a less active role in people’s lives, risk is transferred onto the shoulders of the
individual. Of course, this transition is often closely aligned to shifts in individ-
ualization as described previously. Furthermore, the amount of time that this
transition takes is critical to understanding how it can affect people. In many of
the settings we explore, the concept of “compressed modernity” can be—and has
been—applied (e.g., Chang 2010).
These two concepts of risk and individualization have already been applied
to the Pacific Asian context in a number of important studies (e.g., Chan 2009),
although the explicit application to demography has been rather scarce (see Hall
2002 for a notable exception).
A ROADMAP OF THE BOOK
In the first section of this chapter, I tried to set out a statement of principles about
how I want to try to tackle the “problem part” of the population problem and to
introduce a new way of thinking about it. Before I set about showing how I am
going to achieve this, I want to justify a pretty major cleavage in the book. I have
decided to consider China and the other low-fertility settings separately because
the contexts of both fertility decline and possible responses now and in the future
are, at least at face value, somewhat different. This is not to say that Taiwan, Hong
Kong, Japan, Singapore, and South Korea are all the same. Absolutely far from it.
But, the shared characteristics are such that the orthodox view in the literature is
to consider these territories separately from China.
In this introductory chapter, I have only presented the population problem
and the ensuing distribution of blame in a very superficial, maybe even glib way.
It clearly requires a more in-depth exploration. In Chapter 2, therefore, I more
formally set out the parameters of the population problem by describing just
what it is that everyone is so worried about. I then describe the efforts that dif-
ferent governments have made to fix the supposed root of the problem, namely,
1
very low fertility. Given the arguably modest success of these policies, I then talk
about who gets the blame for this: what are the presented reasons for this pro-
longed period of low fertility?
Having identified that low fertility—very broadly defined—is considered in
most extant literature to be at the root of the population problem, in Chapter 3
I explore the recent changes in birth rates in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore,
South Korea, and Japan in more depth. The point of this chapter is to move be-
yond the traditional two-dimensional presentation of fertility through the total
fertility rate—which elicits a one-dimensional response, of simply trying to
increase it. Rather, by considering a multidimensional approach by exploring
how fertility transition actually occurred, through examining adjusted and co-
hort change as well as, critically, changes in the parity distribution of families,
we can have a much better idea of how family structures have changed. In
other words, to design a multidimensional population policy, we need to
have at least a multidimensional understanding of the “problem”. The chapter
concludes that the rise in zero/one-child families, coupled with the sharp de-
cline in families with three or more children, is at the heart of the low-fertility
paradigm. Finally, readers are reminded that fertility rates are little more than
averages. What this means is that in societies where large families are rare, a
policy that supports couples with one child to have another will only ever have
a relatively modest effect on fertility if there is no net change in the number
of people having no children at all. This chapter is demographic in nature, but
completely nontechnical.
After Chapter 3 identifies what people have done and what people do, Chapter 4
sets out to explore what people would like to do. Earlier in this introduction
and in Chapter 2, I set out how men and women of childbearing age are being
blamed for the population problem and how this blame is depicted as selfish-
ness, eschewing of a generational responsibly, and giving up on marriage and
childbearing. Chapter 4, then, sets out to explore the extent to which this is or
is not the case. Rather quickly, the evidence seems to point to the facts that not
only are respondents to surveys keen on getting married and having children but
also there is a strong two-child norm in the region. I argue that this gap has been
construed as a “space” in which pronatalist policies can operate. This has been
used as a justification for such policies that, arguably, are more geared toward
meeting reproductive targets than self-actualization. However, if we think in a
rights-based framework, it shows how people’s aspirations are being thwarted
by malfunctioning institutions. We can see this in the way that ideals turn into
intentions either because of prolonged periods of singledom or, in many cases,
after the birth of the first child. In this vein, people haven’t given up on the idea
of marriage and childbirth; it is just that circumstances got in the way. Rather
than the selfish eschewing of generational responsibilities, this is more a case of
thwarted dreams. Indeed, while the language of self-actualization is often used in
the sense of lower fertility as a consequence of seeking alternative pleasures, we
12
can see how self-actualization in the sense of a desirable marriage and children is
actually being desired and denied.
Chapter 5 focuses on marital fertility and explicitly asks why couples aren’t
meeting their ideals. After a brief exploration of demographic predictors of
moving to having a second child, I explore what surveys can tell us about these
reasons. These reasons are often presented in a very unidimensional way—
childbearing is too expensive; it interferes with careers; it is too much of a phys-
ical burden; parents think of themselves as being too old. This, therefore, elicits
a unidimensional policy response—of cash grants, investment in childcare, of-
fering in-vitro fertilization, and so on. But, it appears to me that these unidimen-
sional reasons for eschewing further childbearing can be deconstructed to show
other, underlying reasons. The cost of childbearing, for example, has to be linked
to the stability of household incomes in an ever more fragile labor market, and
the cost of education has to be linked to the quality of public schools and the need
to pay for private education. Issues relating to children hurting one’s career have
as much to do with work culture and gender roles as they do with the capacity
to find and pay for a few hours of child care. Indeed, we know of many cases in
which family policy provision is not taken up because of a fear of harm to one’s
career. These ideas, then, represent a multidimensional way of looking at policy
and low fertility. To develop this into a multidimensional view of the reasons
for low fertility, I will present the findings of a qualitative project performed
by myself and colleagues in Taiwan, which shows how all of these elements are
interlinked—along with intergenerational concerns regarding caring for parents.
Together, this provides a justification for starting to think about a multidimen-
sional view of population policy that will be returned to later. I end this chapter
with some further reflections on how all of this can fit into some of the core social
theory themes relating to risk and individualization.
As Chapter 3 showed the demographic importance of childlessness and
Chapter 4 showed that people do not seem to have fallen out of love with the
idea of getting married, in Chapter 6 I will use new surveys from across LFPA
to demonstrate the reasons that this is the case. I will show that, rather than a
unidimensional view of selfish millennials eschewing childbearing, for whom a
unidimensional policy response is to organize dating events and bribe with baby
bonuses, this retreat from marriage—because marriage is intrinsically linked
to childbearing—is actually being built on major structural issues within LFPA
societies. These issues relate to fragility in the labor market, inability to find
an adequate partner because of various mismatches in the marriage market—
including expectations regarding gender roles—and the impact that the mar-
riage package will have on the career aspirations of men and, especially, women.
I reflect on how these can be linked into the social theory issues I mention earlier,
namely risk and individualization. A multidimensional population policy, there-
fore, has to consider these underlying structural issues that are shaping decisions
toward childlessness and, ultimately, lower fertility.
13
As indicated previously, it is traditional to consider China separately from

its LFPA neighbors as a consequence of its size, different policy framework,
and history of family planning law. However, it would be a shame not to prop-
erly consider China in this book given its centrality in the region and its shared
concerns over low fertility, aging, and population decline. In Chapter 7, then,
I turn to explore the demographic context of China’s recent history, with the
aim of suggesting that the shift toward the two-child policy is the very defini-
tion of a unidimensional view of population policy: that the state controls eve-
rything. Rather, I will suggest that the role of the so-called one-child policy has
been exaggerated and that evidence from fertility preferences shows us that small
family sizes are now a voluntary choice in both urban and rural China. From a
unidimensional approach to fertility, China and its LFPA neighbors appear to
share the same population problem of low fertility. By examining measurements
in a two-dimensional manner, however, we can see that it is a different context.
While LFPA fertility is very much shaped by high levels of childlessness and
nonmarriage, in China we see nearly universal marriage but high levels of only-
child families being both aspired to and actualized.
In this vein, the reason for the high degree of one- child preference is
considered in Chapter 8. After presenting further evidence for this preference
from the limited impact of recent reforms, I will again explore the reasons for
preferring smaller families from various surveys. I will observe that, again, these
reasons are often represented in a somewhat unidimensional manner—too ex-
pensive, impact on career and life aspirations, and so on. Here, I will therefore
introduce the recent policies proposed by the Chinese government that, again,
attempt to tackle the problem of low fertility in a unidimensional manner in a
two-dimensional framework—tax breaks, mortgage relief, help with education
costs. In a similar vein to Chapter 6, I present findings from a qualitative study
in Beijing, which again shows an interconnected variety of reasons for limiting
family size, operating across generations. This demonstrates in a multidimen-
sional approach that changing just one dimension is, indeed, likely to have only
a relatively modest impact.
Chapter 9 starts tying together the strands relating to policy in both LFPA
and China. It leads with the statement given by one of my colleagues, Nico
van Nimwegen, at a recent United Nations Expert Group meeting on low fer-
tility: “States get the fertility rates that they deserve.” This represents how low
fertility is not a problem in itself but rather a symptom of a variety of issues in the
economy, society, and culture. What is it, then, that makes childbearing incom-
patible with much of contemporary Asian society? When we reframe the ques-
tion like this, we need to think about alternative policy responses. First, I think
about the industrialized countries where fertility is higher: these are northern
European countries that are characterized by a whole array of different systems
and institutions but, of course, no explicitly pronatalist policy. However, it is easy
to only look in recent history. Of course, the roots of the Swedish welfare state
14
were, in fact, largely grounded in building a society to support childbearing.

This chapter then provocatively suggests that it is all well and good for states,
employers, and men (and their mothers) to choose a particular model for so-
ciety, but could it be that the cost of this will be low fertility? If this low fertility is
seen as the problem, then the underlying factors have to be tackled. This means
examining work culture, gender roles, intergenerational obligations, cultures of
education, the role of the state, and the state of the labor market. In other words,
thinking in a multidimensional manner about the root causes of low fertility and
seeing it as a symptom rather than as a problem mean that the policy responses
have to be much more holistic. This requires policymakers, business, and citizens
to stop thinking about low fertility as a problem and to start thinking about what
kind of society they want, working on the assumption, again, that you get the
fertility rates you deserve.
As Chapter 8 explores a more explicitly multidimensional policy response
to low fertility, Chapter 9 builds on threads already highlighted throughout the
book to consider how low fertility is defined as a problem. Low fertility is bad
because it leads to rapid population aging and population decline; as the labor
force shrinks both in total and relative to the older population, competitiveness
decreases while the burden of caring for an ever-growing dependent population
increases exponentially. This, then, is the classic population problem that I talk
about in the motivation for the book earlier in this chapter. Yet, this again is a very
two-dimensional way of looking at the world by problematizing low fertility. This
requires us to rethink the extent to which aging is a problem, about whether de-
cline is a problem, and more urgently about how all of these are linked. Consider
the intergenerational contract— if children were better supported through
improved public education, if the labor market were reformed and work culture
changed, and if older people were better supported through more efficient care
systems, could this not only improve labor force efficiency and ameliorate the
challenges of the aging society, but given what we know of the causes of lower
fertility, actually cause fertility to increase? The classic example of this is the so-
called sandwich generation, epitomized by the four–two–one families in China.
In other words, in the multidimensional population policy, population is every-
where and, simultaneously, nowhere. Substantively, then I present some of my
work on how aging can be reconceptualized and ideas for how, if we think about
population change in a multidimensional manner, some of the challenges of low
fertility might not be as great as they at first seem.
This book, basically, is not about policies to increase fertility or slow aging;
it is about policies which might make societies better for the people who live
in them.
15
NOTES
1 Throughout the text, the following expressions relate to the given United
Nations’ defined terms: China = People’s Republic of China (excluding the
Special Administrative Regions of Hong Kong and Macau unless otherwise
stated); Taiwan = China, Taiwan Province of China; Hong Kong = China,
Hong Kong SAR; South Korea/Korea = Republic of Korea. No political state-
ment is meant by the use of these commonly expressed names.
2 This rather clumsy abbreviation will be used throughout to indicate the fol-
lowing territories that form the main focus of this book: Japan, Taiwan, Hong
Kong SAR, the People’s Republic of China, Singapore, and South Korea.
The term Pacific Asia, rather than East Asia, is employed because, of course,
Singapore is in South-East Asia. Furthermore, the term has a pedigree in pre-
vious studies of low fertility (see, e.g., Jones, Straughan, and Chan, 2009).
16
2
LOW FERTILITY, POPULATION DECLINE,
AND AGING
PACIFIC ASIA’S “POPULATION PROBLEM”
THE AGED TIGER
The narrative of population aging and decline in low-fertility Pacific Asia is

widely known. Readers are likely to be familiar with the ever-growing academic
literature regarding these two perceived key features of demographic change
in the region. As may be expected, writing on “aging in Asia” abounds, vari-
ously produced by academics as well as by international organizations such as
the World Bank (2011), the International Monetary Fund (Heller 2006), and the
Asian Development Bank (Park, Lee, and Mason 2012). Indeed, the academic
literature exploring the causes and consequences of population aging in Pacific
Asia is almost impossible to quantify, covering as it does the entire breadth of
the social and biological sciences.1 To take a facile example, a Scopus search of
“Japan” AND “population aging” in title, keywords, and abstract confined just
to social science journals in 2014 alone yielded 31 articles covering aspects as
diverse as the voluntary sector in old-age care provision (Hayashi 2014), disaster
resilience after the 1995 Kobe and 2004 Chuetsu earthquakes (Chen, Maki, and
Hayashi 2014), and the effect of demographic change on Japanese interest rates
(Ikeda and Saito 2014).
Beyond the academy, population aging and decline are often found at the
very center of the international discourse surrounding the likely future eco-
nomic direction of countries generally perceived to be “powerhouses,” and,
as stated at the beginning of this book, aging is being presented as a threat to
the Asian Century. Two particularly popular books epitomize this gloomy
16
17
Low Fertility, Population Decline, and Aging 17
perspective—Agequake: Riding the Demographic Rollercoaster Shaking Business,

Finance and Our World by Paul Wallace (2001) and Fewer: How the New
Demography of Depopulation Will Shape Our World by Ben J. Wattenberg (2005).
The former book employs the earthquake metaphor throughout and uses East
Asia—and Japan in particular—as the general harbinger of a doomed future for
Europe and even the United States—see, especially, the chapter titled “Richter
Nine.” Fewer similarly takes South Korea and Japan as exemplars of the worst-
case scenario in terms of population decline. The underlying cause of this pro-
tracted malaise is explored in a third popular book, Phillip Longman’s The Empty
Cradle: How Falling Birthrates Threaten World Prosperity and What to Do About
It (2004)—again with Pacific Asian settings playing a prominent role in the
narrative.
Even the most cursory examination of the media shows just how dominant
this discourse of the joint threat of population aging and population decline is
held to be. Lexis searches of unique newspaper articles published between 2010
and 2015 containing the terms “population aging” and “Japan,” “South Korea,”
“Taiwan,” “Singapore,” or “China” yield 713, 340, 95, 344, and 911 respectively—
and if we included non-English language press and other sources such as online
news, the number of articles would be much higher. A systematic examination of
the presentation of population aging in the global media is a significant project
in its own right and as such can only be touched on in the most cursory way here.
Upon a reading of a sample of such reports, it is clear that the mood reflects the
impression given by the well-read books discussed previously. Readers of inter-
national business magazines such as The Economist will, no doubt, be familiar
with this particular thematic strand (see, e.g., Economist 2011b, which states that
“a large share of Japan’s [economic] woes can be blamed on its aging popula-
tion”). The language elsewhere is often apocalyptic. A 2010 article on population
aging in Japan in the Ottawa Citizen bears the headline “Economic Sunset in the
Land of the Rising Sun” (The Leader-Post 2010), while in the Edmonton Journal
(2010) in the same year the following headline appeared: “What Canada Can
Learn from Japan’s Stunning Economic Decline; Aging Demographic Turned
Potential Powerhouse into Financial Weakling.”
Population decline is also a growing feature of both academic research and
press reports of the demographic conditions of Pacific Asia. Florian Coulmas’s
(2007) Population Decline and Aging in Japan— The Social Consequences
represents one of the first full-length studies of this phenomenon, while impor-
tant articles by Reher (2007) and Coleman and Rowthorn (2011) provide critical
explorations of the concept of population decline. As well as national population
decline, it is important to note that decline (and, indeed, aging) is often especially
sharp in rural areas (Gluck 2003). In Japan, for example, it is estimated that about
half of all municipalities will see their female population aged 20 to 39 years de-
crease by more than half by 2040 (Nippon.com 2014). In this sense, it is little
surprise that population policy and regional development are usually dealt with
18
together. Again, in the press, population decline is either seen as the corollary
of population aging as the cause of future economic malaise in Pacific Asia or
is addressed in its own right. An article on Nippon.com leads with the assertion,
“Depopulation continues to be a dire problem facing Japan” (Nippon.com 2014).
In 2014, The Economist’s “Banyan” headline on Japanese demography referred to
“[t]‌he incredible shrinking country,” stating that “[a] quiet but constant ticking
can be heard from the demographic time bomb that sits beneath the world’s
third-largest economy. This week it made a louder tick than usual: official sta-
tistics show that the population declined last year by a record 244,000 people—
roughly the population of the London Borough of Hackney. . . . It is plausible to
think that the country could learn to live with its shrinking population. But that
might mean also embracing a much diminished economic and political role in
the world. Mr. Abe would seem to be the last leader to accept that” (Economist
2014). An edition of the Toronto Globe and Mail from October 2014 ran with the
headline, “A Bleak Future and Population Crisis for South Korea,” stating that
the forecasted changes in total population in the country were “not population
decline [but] population collapse” (Ibbitson 2014). Indeed, the logical extension
of this narrative regarding population decline is an emerging concern about pop-
ulation “extinction.”
Population stagnation and decline have been widely linked to possible stalling
economic growth in China. A special series of articles in the UK Financial Times
in 2015 explored the “End of the Migrant Miracle” (FT.com 2015) and China
crossing the “Lewis Turning Point.” This is a familiar concept in the academic
economics literature, which posits that the drying up of the surplus rural labor
that has driven China’s export growth through low-end manufacturing will lead
to wage inflation and a drag on exports (e.g., Zhang et al., 2011). China’s future
demographic travails are often compared to the “more favorable” circumstances
of India, again with insinuations made about the impact of the population de-
cline on future economic growth.
Concern regarding the “population problem” is expressed at the very highest
policy levels across Pacific Asia. In 2012, Masaaki Shirakawa, Governor of the
Bank of Japan, stated that “if you look back at 1992, with hindsight, Japan around
that time was painfully looking for ways to recover in the aftermath of the bubble
economy. At that stage, I recall that most Japanese people along with economists
did not grasp the gravity of population aging coupled with a low birth rate for
Japan’s economy as properly as we later came to realize” (Shirakawa 2012). Other
senior politicians have taken a more robust position. Perhaps the most notable is
Taiwan’s former President Ma Ying-jeou declaring in 2011 that “[t]‌he low birth
rate is a national security issue” which required, in the words of Minister of the
Interior Jiang Yi-huah, “national security-level measures” to be taken to combat
them (Kuo 2011). Elsewhere in Taiwan, Hau Lung-Bin, in his inaugural speech
as mayor of Taipei in 2010 stated that “[t]he falling birthrates have made a sig-
nificant impact on our already graying population over the recent years. This
19
phenomenon will indeed cripple our city’s development” (Hau 2009, emphasis
added).
Looking at the evidence, we can perhaps see why the issue of population
aging and decline is such an important part of the discourse regarding popula-
tion change in Pacific Asia.
In Figure 2.1, we can see that the future of population aging in Pacific Asia
is certainly a dramatic one. The measurement employed here is the old-age de-
pendency ratio (OADR). Along with the median age of the population, this is the
most widely employed measurement of population aging. The measure is derived
by simply taking the total population older than 65 years (called the “dependent”
population) and dividing this by the total population aged 15 to 64 years (the
“working-age” population)—and then multiplying by 100. To put this in a per-
haps more intuitive way, for every 100 people 15 to 64 years old in Hong Kong
in 2010 there would be about 20 older than 65 years. This measurement is the
default choice for national statistical offices, where a measurement of aging is
produced (see, e.g., Nishioka et al. 2011). It is also the default measurement in
academic, policy, and media analyses of population aging. Very recent studies
that uncritically apply the OADR include studies of the relationship of aging and
saving rates in China (Hu 2015) and pro-elderly social spending (Vanhuysse
2012), as well as extremely influential papers on demography published in
100.0
90.0
80.0
Old age dependency ratio
70.0
60.0
50.0
40.0
30.0
20.0
10.0
0
90
00
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
00
19
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
21
China Hong Kong Japan

Korea Taiwan Singapore
Figure 2.1. Old age dependency ratios for low-fertility Pacific Asia.
Source: UNPD 2015.
20
Science (Lee 2011) and in textbooks (e.g., Mujahid 2012). To take just a couple
of examples from the press: the Korea Times reported in 2012 that “the [Korean]
old age dependency ratio is predicted to steadily rise in the coming years until
people over 65, who are no longer economically active, will outnumber workers
in 2039. . . . It said in 2050, every worker in the country will have to support 1.65
people who no longer earn a living” (Yonhap 2012), while The Times of London
states that “[t]‌he ratio of dependent pensioners to workers, known as the old-age
dependency ratio, is 41% in Japan and is expected to rise to 72% by 2050. . . . The
equivalent figures for the UK are 27% and 42%, according to the World Bank and
UN. . . . This gives the UK more time to adjust as it shifts from an aging to an aged
society” (The Times 2014). The popular book referred to earlier, Agequake, uses
the dependency ratio in a more colorful metaphor, referring to the forthcoming
increase of the Japanese OADR as “almost one drone for every two worker bees”
(Wallace 2001, 174).
These figures as reported by The Times are indicative of the astonishing
increases shown in Figure 2.1. In Japan, the latest United Nations Population
Division (UNPD) forecasts (UNPD 2015) suggest that the OADR will rise
from 43.6 in 2010 to 57.7 in 2030 and to 71.8 by 2060. Long-range estimates di-
verge between the United Nations (UN) and the Japanese National Institute of
Population and Social Security, with the latter suggesting a further increase to
more than 80 by 2064, with a further modest rise to the end of the century (IPSS
2007)—in the language of Agequake, this equates to four drones for every five
worker bees—while the UN assumes a ceiling of about 73.0 being reached mid-
century and then stabilization to century’s end. In Taiwan, while the OADR is
currently much lower than Japan’s at just 17.9 (2010–15; UNPD 2015), it is set to
increase very dramatically to 44.7 by 2030, to 71.2 by 2050, and to 83.1 by 2060.
Indeed, by mid-century, Hong Kong and South Korea will be characterized by
OADRs of just under 70. Singapore’s OADR is forecast to increase to more than
double from 15.2 in 2010–15 to 36.5 by 2030–35 (UNPD figures), followed by a
further rise to 61.6 by mid-century and 82.3 by century’s end. Even Thailand and
China will see dramatic increases. The former is forecast to increase from just
14.5 in 2010 to 29.2 by 2030, with the UN forecasting a further increase to 52.5
by mid-century and 61.2 by 2065. Finally, the UN forecasts for China suggest
an increase in OADR from 20.5 in 2010 to 25.3 by 2030, to 46.7 by 2050, and to
59.9 by 2070. To take a global view, UN forecasts for 2050 suggest that four of
the eight “oldest” territories in the world will be in East Asia (Taiwan first, Japan
second, South Korea seventh, and Hong Kong eighth), with Spain being the third
oldest and Italy, Portugal, and Greece making up the rest. By 2070, Taiwan, South
Korea, Singapore, and Japan are forecasted to be the four oldest territories in
the world, while by century’s end, the mantle of “oldest country” in the world
is forecasted to be passed to Singapore. Here, then, is the grand narrative of a
rapidly aging Asia, which will see its supposed guaranteed economic prosperity
challenged over the coming century.
21
THE TIGER FACING EXTINCTION
Returning to the discussion earlier in this chapter regarding policymakers’

remarks on population aging and decline, we actually saw a number of different
emphases. The mayor of Taipei explicitly referred to the “aging population” as a
threat to the city’s growth, while the former Governor of the Bank of Japan re-
ferred to the diminishing size of the labor market—both orthodox and perhaps
justifiable concerns when looking at future demographic trends. Yet, the remarks
by Taiwan’s President Ma concerning low birth rates being a “national security
concern,” coupled with the (offhand) remark of the Economist writer who re-
ferred to Japan’s President Abe as being unwilling to accept a diminished role in
the world for Japan as a result of population decline, raise somewhat bigger issues
relating to geopolitics and, potentially, nationalism. There is no doubt that, in
some settings, population decline is a very real phenomenon. Given the nature of
demographic change, this will be especially pronounced at younger age groups.
Figure 2.2, for example, shows both overall population stagnation and decline for
the age group of 20 to 24 year olds. Clearly, changes in the latter group will have a
profound impact on the education sector and the graduate job market.
A number of academic papers in recent years have sought to explore the
consequences of population decline and attitudes toward the phenomenon.
Seminal papers by Reher (2007) and Coleman and Rowthorn (2011) have sought
to systematically consider the pros and cons of such projected changes. First, both
papers observe that this is likely to be a universal phenomenon: “the reality of
population decline is the likely course of events for many world regions and could
possibly affect the entire world within a few decades” (Reher 2007, 200). In other
words, while forecasts of population decline are rather steep in much of Pacific
Asia, this is by no means a unique phenomenon. Second, both papers recognize
that there are likely to be some positive outcomes as a result of population decline.
As Reher (2007, 200) (perhaps rather optimistically) observes, “from the stand-
point of natural resources and the environment, over the long run [population
decline] will be good news indeed. . . . Eventually the twenty-first century will be
seen as the one in which the excesses of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries
were corrected.” Coleman and Rowthorn address in greater depth some of the key
economic, social, and political problematics that are often cited. In each case, they
appear to find as many positive outcomes as negative ones (2011).
Yet, in parts of Pacific Asia, the narrative regarding population decline is ex-
tremely strong. In Japan, for example, a cursory examination of the major news
agencies (Mainichi, Asahi, Nikkei, Yomiuri) reveals a number of articles that ex-
plicitly link the prospect of population decline with a sense of crisis at the national
level (Asahi.com 2014; Nikkei.com 2014). Similarly, many newspaper reports dis-
cuss population decline in alarmist terms in South Korea (Lee 2010) and Taiwan
(Taipei Times 2014). Many of these articles are then coupled with two implications
(to a more or less explicit extent). The first concerns immigration and is often set
2
(a) 130
120
Relative total pop, size (2015 = 100)

110
100
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
15
25
35
45
55
65
75
85
95
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
China Hong Kong
Japan Korea
Taiwan Singapore
(b) 130
Relative 20–24 pop, size (2015–20 = 100)
120
110
100
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
5
5
5
55
65
75
85
95
1
2
4
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
China Hong Kong

Japan Korea
Taiwan Singapore
Figure 2.2. Forecasts of population stagnation and decline: (a) total population; (b) population
aged 20–25 years. Indexed to 2015.
Source: UNPD 2015.
23
up as economists arguing for the need to supplement the working-age population

versus remarks concerning the effect that such mass immigration might have (e.g.,
Jun 2014; Irish Times 2015; and see the latter for an especially egregious example of
a Japanese educational adviser appearing to advocate “apartheid-style” education
systems). It is important to note that other studies have explicitly linked concerns
about population decline to immigration, with a study in The Netherlands
concluding that “immigrants seem to inspire greater fear than the prospect of pop-
ulation decline” (van Dalen and Henkens 2011, 437). The second implicit assump-
tion relates back to President Ma’s fears of a national security crisis. The logical
extension of this is the remarkable long-range extinction scenario, which can be
identified in the Japanese and Korean popular and official discourse.
Although it is easily conceivable that countries would like to use projections
to identify themselves as continuing/ developing key players in the global
economy, Japan and South Korea appear to have taken rather a polar opposite
approach. In recent years, both have sought the expertise of demographers to
perform extremely long-run forecasts to predict when their country will become
extinct. The first such exercise was performed in Japan by the National Institute
for Population and Social Security Research (2006). Their widely reported results
are represented in Figure 2.3. By the end of this century, the population of Japan
is projected to have fallen to just 50 million, with further declines to just 10 mil-
lion by the end of the following century. By 2350, the total population will be
just one million, while in the year 3000, just 62 people will be rattling around the
Land of the Rising Sun. These forecasts were supplemented by further studies by
Tohoku University researches, who have since designed a “reverse population
clock,” which counts down to when the last child will be born in Japan (Yoshida
2015). At the time of writing this book, this so-called doomsday clock suggests
that by about 8 pm GMT, on August 13 in the year 3776, there will only be one
child left in Japan. Set your alarms.
Not to be outdone, South Korean opposition lawmaker—Yang Seung-jo of the
New Politics Alliance for Democracy—commissioned the National Assembly
Research Service to perform similar calculations for the country. The results,
widely reported in 2014, are reproduced in Figure 2.3 (Ysj.or.kr 2014a). In just
over a century, the South Korean population is projected to decline to about
10 million, while by the middle of the 23rd century, the population will be just
100,000. By the start of the 25th century, only 10,000 people will occupy the
area currently known as South Korea. Extinction is projected to occur in 2750.
Curiously, subnational extinction dates were also provided, with Busan be-
coming completely empty by 2413.
As implied in the work of Coleman and Rowthorn (2011), vitality in popula-
tion size is often seen as a reflection of a country’s strength, and, by implication,
population decline could be seen as a sign of weakness. Their study, for example,
opens with the following quote from Proverbs 14:28: “In the multitude of people is
the king’s honor; but in the want of people is the destruction of the prince.” (Other
24
(a) 140
120 m
50
=
90
Total population (millions)
100 20
80
60
40 m
10
= 5m 1m 5m
9 5 = = 0. 62
20 21 40 50
= =
22 50 00
23 24 30
0
2006
2030
2060
2090
2120
2150
2180
2210
2240
2270
2300
2330
2360
2390
2420
2450
2480
2600
2900
(b) 60
m
50 40
=
Total population (millions)
56 m
20 30
40 =
74 m
20 20
30 =
97
20 m
20 10
= 5m m
6 0. 1m
3
0. 01
21 =
= 0.
10 98 =
21 56 03
22 ..2
5
.
0
2010
2020
2030
2040
2050
2060
2070
2080
2090
2100
2110
2120
2130
2140
2150
2160
2170
2180
2190
2200
2210
2220
2230
2240
2250
2260
Figure 2.3. Very-long-range population projections for (a) Japan and (b) South Korea.
Sources: National Institute of Population and Social Security Research 2006; Ysj.or.kr 2014.
studies, such as that by Stephen [2011], consider more explicit implications such
as the capacity to recruit military forces.) This is especially important in the con-
text of the delicate state of international relations in the region and tense historical
associations (see Part III of Pekkanen, Ravenhill, and Foot 2014).
THE ROLE OF LOW FERTILITY
Low Fertility as Cause of Population Aging and Decline

Population aging and population decline have their roots in decreasing fer-
tility and decreasing mortality. Now, of course, the apocalyptic view of popu-
lation aging and decline presented previously has actually come about because
25
of revolutions in health and well-being; because of tremendous changes in

women’s rights and education and their role in the labor market; and because
of access to highly effective contraception, which has allowed parents to make
their own reproductive choices with ever more confidence. This is actually a
good news story.
But, if you read the newspapers, you would see it as something that has gone
seriously wrong. In short, lowering fertility is a good thing. But, so the story goes,
it has just gone a bit too low, for a bit too long. Indeed, it is a demographic quirk
that fertility is a much more significant factor in shaping both total population
size and dependency ratios than shifts in (older age) mortality (Basten, Lutz, and
Scherbov 2013).
In Figure 2.1, I presented the predicted future OADRs for the territories
under analysis in this book. These are based on the projections made by the UN,
which generally assume that fertility will take an upturn in the near future. But,
if we look at the assumptions of various local statistical offices and other pop-
ulation experts, this projection is far from taken as a given. However, evidence
from local statistical offices suggests that rather than a general increase, there is
an assumption of stagnation in fertility rates (Basten 2013). This view represents
the rather more cautious approach of local statistical offices, which might tend
toward forecasting a business-as-usual scenario in order to show the impact of a
continuation of recent trends. The point of the comparison, however, is simply to
show that the UN view of an uptick in fertility in the near future is by no means
a universally accepted model and that, consequently, the rates of aging presented
previously may, in fact, be viewed as being optimistic.
“Fixing” Low Fertility

It is no surprise, then, that governments have been proactive in trying to craft
an alternative future. Most recently, we have seen China abandon its family pla-
nning restrictions and implement a national two-child policy. The view, then, is
that by lifting the restrictions on childbearing in China, the population problem
of aging and decline can be fixed by “turning on the tap” to allow more children
to be born. As Xinhua reported at the time, “The change of policy is intended to
balance population development and address the challenge of an ageing popula-
tion” (Gietel-Basten 2015). Indeed, we have seen in early 2017 evidence that the
country may be moving toward providing cash incentives for parents to bear a
second child (Gietel-Basten 2016). As Premier Li Keqiang said in a 2016 speech,
“We will improve the supporting policies to complement the decision to allow all
couples to have two kids. . . . We will encourage the development of kindergartens
open to all children” (Gietel-Basten 2016).
Elsewhere in low-fertility Pacific Asia (LFPA), countries have a longer his-
tory of proactive policies to encourage childbearing and support families. First,
in terms of direct policies that support childbearing, many Asian countries
have developed wide-ranging policy responses to ultra-low fertility. These have
26
been reviewed extensively elsewhere both in regional accounts (Frejka, Jones,

and Sardon 2010; Jones, Chan, and Straughan 2009) and for individual settings
(e.g., Chen 2012 for Taiwan; Sun 2012 and Jones and Hamid 2015 for Singapore;
Basten 2015 for Hong Kong; Boling 2008 for Japan; Chin et al. 2012 for South
Korea; and so on).
In brief, though, in South Korea, the Budget for Stimulating the Birthrate rose
from ₩2.14tn in 2006 to ₩14.89tn ($13.85 billion US) in 2014, with some 70% of
that devoted to providing child-care subsidies (but there are regular complaints
of poor-quality, overpriced facilities; see Chin et al. 2012 and Choe and Park
2006 for further discussion). In Taiwan, recent family policy dynamics have built
on the 2006 Mega Warmth Program and are based around seven key themes: de-
veloping child-care facilities; financial assistance for families; creation of family-
friendly workplaces; revision of maternity protection; improvement of the
reproductive care system; creating child-safe environments, and expanding the
opportunities to meet prospective partners (see Chen 2012). The Singaporean
family policy system is perhaps the most financially generous, primarily being
based on the “baby bonus,” although with other elements, such as child-care
reforms, Work-Life Works schemes, Medisave programs, and maternity leave
(Yap 2003, 2013). The Singaporean government estimated that a middle-income
family with two children would receive some $166,000 US in benefits until both
turned 13 years old (Baby Bonus 2015). Family policy systems in Hong Kong
are generally more residual, with some tax relief and a greater emphasis placed
on migration from Mainland China (Basten 2015). Finally, Japan’s family policy
systems are generally rather more holistic, based on improving work-life balance
(building on the Angel Plan). These policies are encouraging take-up of annual
leave, discouraging long working hours, and increasing male child-care time
(Suzuki 2009; Boling 2008).
The policies set out previously generally fall into the category of “family
policies”—designed to support parents in their childbearing. Elsewhere, more
eye-catching policies have caught the media’s attention. In Singapore, for ex-
ample, the government has played an active role in encouraging couples
to get together by “playing matchmaker” through its Social Development
Network program (SDN 2017). Similarly, in Japan, the government is devel-
oping increasing efforts to encourage matchmaking through konkatsu events
(Ghosh 2014), while in Taiwan the government is also ordaining singles events
and holding special ceremonies for couples who get married (Ketels 2015). (I
explore these in more depth in Chapter 5.) In South Korea, meanwhile, the re-
cent policy of the Ministry of Health, Welfare, and Family Affairs to switch off
the lights at 7 pm so that they can have a “date night” (and thence reproduce)
was widely reported (Straits Times 2016a). Indeed, these policies have entered
the national psyche so much that even advertisers are getting in on the act.
Consider these lines from a viral rap video for the mints Mentos released in time
for National Night in 2012:
27
Singapore’s population, it needs some increasing/So forget waving flags,

August 9th we be freaking. . . . I'm a patriotic husband, you're my patriotic
wife, let's do our civic duty and manufacture life. (McRobbie 2013)
According to the director of the relevant advertising company:
It is the biggest issue in this country. We are the worst in the world at
reproducing ourselves, so we felt like this was an issue we had to tackle. We
knew that the government had tried many things, whether it be launching
perfumes with pheromones in them or trying speed-dating nights, and
many of these things may have been creative but didn't necessarily work.
So we thought, why don't we do the most creative thing we can to fix this
problem, which is come up with a rap song? (Leyl 2012)
Taken at face value, these policies (or shall we say “interventions”) seem helpful
and harmless. The news reports consistently say that childbearing is too expen-
sive, so policies to support parents in their efforts make sense. Similarly, although
one might question whether the government belongs in the bedroom, switching
the lights off at work is a gimmick that at least gets people talking about fertility
and the population problem.
But, while we might chuckle at the efforts of besuited Pacific Asian politicians
trying to encourage Millennials to “get it on,” we mustn’t lose sight of the political
reality. As stated previously, low fertility rates are talked about as an existential
crisis, even a national security issue. And one should not be confused: it is the
fault of the citizen. While the word “pronatalism” is only infrequently used in po-
litical discourse, sometime the mask slips.
Taiwan’s population policy is simply to “promote marriage and childbirth
at suitable ages” (Executive Yuan of the Republic of China 2013). Elsewhere,
Jeon Soo-ho, team leader of the Seoul government’s Women and Family Policy
Department, stated in 2014 that “Seoul city is trying its best to encourage
people to have more children, but we still need serious help from the govern-
ment” (Kung 2014). Earlier, I referred to the concern expressed by the mayor
of Taipei about low fertility rates crippling the city’s development. In response
to this, he announced in his inaugural speech that the city’s government would
“unveil a series of generous incentive programs to encourage marriages, stimu-
late childbirths and provide more job opportunities for our young people” (Hau
2009). He continued to say, “This is one of the most important policies I will
execute in the next four years” (Hau 2009). In 2013, Singapore Prime Minister
Lee Hsien Loong’s New Year Message said, “We have to find effective ways to en-
courage Singaporeans to have more babies” (Adam 2013). No doubt, he had the
words of his father Lee Kuan Yew, written just the year before, in the forefront of
his mind: “If we go on like that, this place would fold up because there will be no
original citizens left to form the majority” (Adam 2013).
28
Plus, some of the interventions can be quite, shall we say, sinister—or at least
pretty insensitive. In South Korea, the Korea Productivity Center, a government
agency, held a competition in 2015 to find a poster to “boost the birthrate.” The
winning poster showed two little saplings growing from the soil. The sapling
on the right was bright and green under a blue sky, while the sapling on the
left was weak, dying, and under a gray sky. The sapling on the right had two
leaves; the sapling on the right just one. The caption? “One is not enough.” As if
that wasn’t clear enough, the subtitle read: “Because an only child does not have
siblings, he or she can be slow in social and human development. . . . Because
he or she had control at home, an only child can easily become selfish” (Korea
JoongAng Daily 2015). Indeed, these posters are reminiscent of the old family
planning posters from Korea and elsewhere that showed a miserable-looking big
family compared with a happy-looking family with fewer children (Koreabridge
2011). Also, in South Korea, the government recently published a map of all re-
gions colored by various shades of pink denoting the number of women of child-
bearing age, denoting “fertility potential.” Such was the outcry that the website
was quickly taken down. As one blogger noted, “They counted fertile women like
they counted the number of livestock” (quoted in Choe 2016).
Indeed, this commodification of childbearing is a common theme in critiques
of these policies. Referring to policies in Taiwan, for example, demographer Lee
Meilin wrote in 2009 that the policies there were an “instrumentalization of
women’s bodies . . . taking women’s bodies as an instrument to fulfil [a]‌nation’s
target goal” (Lee 2009). This kind of target goal is typified in the following, taken
from a news report describing the objectives of the South Korean government:
In announcing its third framework plan in Dec. 2015, Seoul set a total fer-
tility rate target of 1.5 by 2020. Initially, it had pledged measures to increase
the number of newborns this year to 445,000. The plan was to increase
births by around 8,000 per year to reach the target of a birth rate of 1.5. But
experts warn that with little impact perceived from the current measures,
the number of births could drop below what has been called the “Maginot
line” of 400,000. (Hankyoreh 2016).
Abe’s patronizingly labeled program of Womenomics—the plan to boost female

labor force participation by 2020—is part of this paradigm. According to Noriko
Hama of Doshisha University in Kyoto, this is about “mobilizing women for Abe’s
own purposes of building what he envisions as a ‘richer and stronger’ nation. . . .
He simply sees women as an under-utilized resource and this has nothing to do
with giving us more chances of promotion or fairer working conditions” (quoted
in Ryall 2014).
For Wang Lih-Roh, professor of gender studies at the National Taiwan
University, “Encouraging sounds like a positive word, but when it is transformed
into pronatalist policy instruments, in reality the government uses its political
29
power to require citizens to do something” (personal communication 2013, em-

phasis added). In Taiwan, for example, the sense of national security is leveraged
as a means of holding people responsible for their actions. In 2015, the mayor of
Taipei Ko Wen-je said, “Single women over thirty are a threat to national secu-
rity.” After something of a backlash for this sexist remark, he recanted and later
said, ‘I didn’t mean single women over 30 are threats to national security. . . .
I meant that all unmarried individuals over 30 are threats to national security!”
(Onely.org 2015, emphasis added).
Perhaps the most sustained critique of these policies can be seen in Sun’s
(2012) study of Singapore and Hiroko’s (2005) study of Japan, which are both
reviewed in Song, Chang, and Sylvian’s (2013) piece provocatively entitled, “Why
Are Developmental Citizens Reluctant to Procreate?”
The reality, however, is that these policies do not seem to be working tremen-
dously well. In Chapter 3, I explore the measurement of fertility—if, indeed, we
see this as an outcome of these policies—in more depth, but for the time being
it seems relatively safe to say that the net outcome is somewhat underwhelming.
In Singapore in 2016, the total fertility rate dipped back to 1.2 from 1.24 (Yong
2017). In a wonderfully optimistic vein, sociologist Pauline May Straughan of
the National University of Singapore stated, “As long as it’s above 1, I think we’re
always grateful” (Yong 2017). Flatlining fertility rates can also be seen elsewhere
across the region (e.g., see Hankyoreh 2016 for Korea).
Even in China, the move to the national two-child policy does not appear
to have seen the baby-boom response that was widely predicted (see later and
Chapters 7 and 8).
Who Is to Blame for Low Fertility?

As intimated in the last section, a large array of activities to promote marriage
and childbearing arranged through carrots and sticks has been implemented to
try to “fix” low fertility and, hence, solve the “population problem.” The policies
seem to address some of the key concerns of both parents and prospective
parents alike: cost of childbearing, chances to meet the right partner, and so on.
But the results appear to be somewhat limited. Under these circumstances, it is
only natural to look for reasons that this is the case.
In 2006, Pope Benedict XVI said that “the problem of Europe” was that it
“seems no longer to [want to] have children” (Pope Benedict XVI 2006). Pope
Francis continued the pontifical theme of pronouncing on low fertility by telling
an audience in St Paul’s Square that this is “a society with a greedy generation,
that doesn’t want to surround itself with children” and that “the choice not to
have children is selfish” (Kirchgaessner 2015). The online magazine Flare put
the question in a rather more down-to-earth manner: “Are Childless Millennials
Selfish A-Holes?” (Heinrichs 2015). An article in the Canadian National Post led
with the headline, “Trend of Couples Not Having Children Just Plain Selfish”
30
(O’Connor 2012). A recent anthology of personal essays on childlessness is

entitled, Selfish, Shallow, and Self-Absorbed: Sixteen Writers on the Decision Not
to Have Kids (Daum 2016). Jonathan Last (2013), meanwhile, in his bestselling
apocalyptic view of the future of demography entitled, What to Expect When No
One’s Expecting: America’s Coming Demographic Disaster, stated, “Having chil-
dren is difficult but important work and . . . the main threat to fertility comes
from a worldview that places the self at the center.”
It is easy to see this kind of narrative regarding a “selfish turn away from
childbearing and marriage” in the LFPA narrative too. Clearly, a social
stigma is constructed around low fertility; especially imposed on the child-
less, who are considered as “individualistic and avoiding adulthood and its
responsibilities,” or “self-centered and narcissistic” (Li, Pluess, and Kwok-Bun
2013). (Of course, this is rather ironic because previously there was a nar-
rative of selfishness for having too many children, known in Chinese as chi
chang xi de (“eating the factory”), or taking advantage of the collective entity)
(Danning 2013).
Indeed, if you believe the headlines, you would think that marriage as an
institution in LFPA has fallen completely out of favor. The topic is a recur-
rent favorite of The Economist, with recent headlines on the topic of marriage
in Asia including, “I Don’t,” “The Decline of Asian Marriage: Asia’s Lonely
Hearts,” “The Flight from Marriage,” and the 2011 cover story, “Asia’s Lonely
Hearts: Why Asian Women are Rejecting Marriage and What that Means”
(Economist 2011c). This is the Sampo generation who have “given up on dating,
marriage and childbirth” (Joy 2015a). This is also casually linked into the no-
tion of the feckless, selfish youth responsible for what has been referred to as a
“social recession” (Wiseman 2004). In Japan, so the tiring narrative goes, young
men are more preoccupied with cybersex, secluding themselves from the out-
side world (hikikomori), and “seem intimidated and bewildered by assertive
young women who are nothing like their moms” (Wiseman 2004). According
to Kunio Kitamura, president of the Japan Family Planning Association’s
Family Planning Clinic, “[men] seem to find relationship[s]‌cumbersome. . . .
You have to be attentive to your partner” (quoted in Wiseman 2004). In the
words of a recent newspaper report, this means “to an astonishing degree, men
and women go their separate ways—the women to designer boutiques and chic
restaurants with their girlfriends or moms, the men to karaoke clubs with their
colleagues from work or the solitude of their computer screens to romance
hassle-free virtual women” (quoted in Wiseman 2004). This is a “problem”
generation.
It only requires a short narrative leap from this characterization of young
people as being unwilling to commit to being stigmatized as a social problem.
These have been attached to all sorts of cultural stereotypes associating
hyperconsumption, self-centeredness, indolence, and greed, from the Kong
Girl—a derogatory term for young Hong Kong women seemingly obsess with
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Miss Parrett herself appeared in the doorway—an accusing and
alarming figure.
“This is a nice way you waste my time!” she exclaimed, with an
angry glance at both. “You and cook gossiping together and idling.
Where are the cloths and the hot water, young man?”
The cook, grumbling audibly and insolently, went back to the dresser,
and Miss Parrett, with folded arms, waited dramatically in the kitchen
till Wynyard was provided for. He then walked off with a brief “Thank
you” to his fellow-culprit. As he passed along the flagged passage he
caught Miss Parrett’s shrill voice saying—
“Now, I’ll not have you flirting with that young man, so I warn you! I’ll
have no carryings-on in my house.”
Then a door was slammed with thunderous violence, and there was
silence.
No, by Jove, he could not stand it, he said to himself as he set down
his bucket, and wrung out a cloth; like the cook, he, too, would
depart, and in his next situation stipulate for no women. Of course
Leila would be disappointed, and he was sorry; but Leila would never
ask him to put up with this! He would give a week’s notice and
advertise; he had enough money to keep him going for a while, and
his certificate.
Presently he set to work on the dining-room, where there were three
old casemented, mullioned windows; to clean these he stood on the
lawn, and had begun his job when Miss Susan entered, smiling and
radiating good humour.
“I dare say you don’t know much about this sort of work,” she began
apologetically, “and I’ll just show you! You have to use lots of clean
water, and stand outside on the lawn—no fear of breaking your
neck.” Then in another tone she added, “I’ll see you are not asked to
do this again; at present we are rather short-handed, but by and by
everything will go smoothly.” She was about to add something more,
when her sister put her head in at the door, and called out—
“Now, do come away, Susan, and don’t stand gossiping with the
young man, and idling him at his work. He has wasted half an hour
with the cook already!”
Wynyard, as he rubbed away at the panes, whistled gaily whilst his
mind dwelt on many matters, amongst others of how strange that he
should be down in this queer, God-forsaken village, living in a
labourer’s cottage, and employed in cleaning windows! Well, he had
Miss Susan’s word for it that he would not be asked to do it again;
she was a good sort, with a nice, cheery face, and such a pair of
twinkling blue eyes. Then he thought of the tragic cook, also sent by
Leila, and he laughed aloud. The house wanted a lot of servants,
and as far as he could gather the staff was short-handed; probably
Miss Aurea would see to all this, since she managed every one in
Ottinge, did as she liked, and was the prettiest girl within ten
parishes!
Wynyard was a handy man, and got through his work rapidly and
well. He fetched many cans of water, and presently moved on to the
drawing-room—another low room with heavily beamed ceiling and a
polished oak floor. The apartment was without carpet or curtains,
and scantily furnished with various old chairs, settees and cabinets,
ranged against the wall. He was sitting outside on the sill, whistling
under his breath, polishing his last casement, when he heard,
through the half-open door, a clear young voice talking with
animation, and a girl came into the room laughing—followed by an
Aberdeen terrier on a leash. As she advanced, he noticed that she
had wild rose colouring, wavy dark hair, merry dark eyes, and an
expression of radiant vitality. Tom was right! Here, no doubt, was
Miss Aurea, the prettiest girl in ten parishes!
As Wynyard looked again at this arresting vision something strange
seemed to stir in his heart and come to life. First impressions have a
value distinct from the settled judgment of long experience.
“What a floor, Susie!” exclaimed the young lady. “Really, we must get
Aunt Bella to give a dance;” and as she spoke she began to hum the
“Merry Widow Waltz,” and to execute some remarkably neat steps,
accompanied by the terrier, who struggled round in her wake,
barking indignantly.
“Mackenzie, you are an odious partner!” addressing the animal; then
to her aunt, “I’ve brought him on the chain, and he has me on the
chain; he is so strong! We have accosted and insulted every single
village dog, and frightened Mrs. Watkins’ cats into hysterics!
However, he can’t get loose and murder poor gentlemanly Joss! Oh,
we little knew what we were doing when we accepted Mac as a
darling puppy!”
“I must confess that I never care for these aggressive, stiff-necked
Aberdeens, and I don’t pretend to like Mac. To tell you the honest
truth, I’m mortally afraid of him!”
“But he must be exercised, Susan. And now we must exercise
ourselves, and begin on this room. I’ve sent over the curtains, and
they are ready to go up.”
Suddenly she noticed the stranger, who was polishing a distant
window. “Why, I thought it was Hogben!” she muttered. “Who is it,
Susie?” and she looked over at Wynyard with an air of puzzled
interest.
“The new chauffeur, my dear,” was the triumphant response. “He
only came yesterday; his name is Owen.”
“Oh!” exclaimed the girl, turning her back to the window and
speaking in a low voice. “And didn’t he object?”
“No; but I fancy he doesn’t like it. He seems a nice civil young fellow.
Lady Kesters found him for us.”
“Did she? I sincerely hope he is a better find than the cook. What a
fury! Even Aunt Bella is afraid of her!”
“She has a splendid character from her late mistress.”
“I dare say, in order to pass her on at any price. She’s a first-rate
cook, but a regular demon.”
“My dear, they all have tempers—it’s the fire, poor things. Now,
about the chauffeur——”
At this moment the object of her conversation threw up the sash and
stepped into the room—a fine figure in his clean blue shirt, turned up
to the elbows, well-cut breeches, and neat leather leggings.
“I’ve finished this room, miss,” he said, addressing himself to Miss
Susan. “What am I to do next?” and his eyes rested upon her with
respectful inquiry.
“No more windows to-day, thank you, Owen. I expect it is nearly your
dinner-hour.”
“Shall you require the car this afternoon, miss?”
“No; but it will certainly be wanted to-morrow,—eh, Aurea?”
“Then I’d better take her out and give her a turn;” and with this
remark he picked up his bucket and rags, and walked out of the
room.
During this brief conversation, Aurea stood by listening with all her
ears, and making mental notes. Her aunt’s new chauffeur, with his
clean, tanned, high-bred face, spoke like an educated man.
“My dear Susie,” she inquired, “where did Lady Kesters get hold of
such a superior person?”
“I’m sure I can’t tell you. She said she had known his family all her
life, and that they were most respectable people. Chauffeurs are
supposed to be smart, and well-groomed, eh?”
Yes, but there was more than this about the late window-cleaner—
something in his gait, carriage, and voice, and, unless she was
greatly mistaken, the new employé was a gentleman; but with
unusual prudence Aurea contrived to keep her suspicion to herself.
Aloud she said—
“Well, now, let us see about the carpet! This room ought to be settled
at once—pictures up, and curtains; there’s no place to ask visitors
into, and you’ve been here six months. You are lazy, Miss Susan
Parrett—this is sleepy hollow.”
“Oh, my dear child, you know perfectly well it’s your Aunt Bella; and
she won’t make up her mind. What’s done one day is taken down
another. What is that awful row?”
“It’s Mackenzie and Joss,” cried Aurea, dashing towards the door.
Mackenzie, at large and unnoticed, had stealthily followed the
chauffeur out of the room, and stolen a march upon his deadly
enemy—Miss Parrett’s impudent and interloping mongrel. The result
of this dramatic meeting was a scene in the hall, where Miss Parrett,
mounted on a chair, looked on, uttering breathless shrieks of “Aurea!
Aurea! it’s all your fault!” whilst round and round, and to and fro,
raged the infuriated animals, snarling and growling ferociously, their
teeth viciously fastened in each other’s flesh.
Mackenzie, the more experienced, able-bodied, and malevolent of
the two, had Joss by the throat—Joss, for his part, was steadily
chewing through Mackenzie’s fore-leg.
Here Wynyard came to the rescue, and, though severely bitten,
succeeded after some difficulty in separating the combatants; he and
Miss Aurea somehow managed it between them, but he had borne
the brunt of the fray, the forefront of the battle.
A good deal of personal intimacy is involved in such encounters, and
by the time the panting Mackenzie was hauled away by the collar,
and the furious Joss had been incarcerated in the dining-room, the
new chauffeur and Miss Morven were no longer strangers.
CHAPTER X
AS HANDY MAN
The chauffeur was informed that there were no orders for the car the
following morning, as “Miss Parrett was suffering from neuralgia in
her face,” and also—though this was not mentioned in the bulletin—
a sharp pain in her temper.
Aurea, an early visitor, radiating gaiety, was on this occasion
unaccompanied by Mackenzie. Mackenzie, aged six years, was the
village tyrant and dictator. He also had been accustomed to consider
himself a dog of two houses—the Rectory and the Red Cottage; and
when the Red Cottage had moved to the Manor, and installed an
animal of low degree as its pet, he was naturally filled with wrath and
resentment, and on two opportunities the intruder had narrowly
escaped with many deep bites, and his life!
Aurea found her Aunt Bella trotting about the premises and
passages, with the knitted hood over her head, and key-basket in
hand.
“Not going out to-day!” she exclaimed; “but it’s lovely, Aunt Bella. The
air is so deliciously soft—it would do you no end of good.”
“My dear Aurea,” she piped, “I know you don’t allow any one in
Ottinge to call their soul their own, and I must ask you to leave me
my body, and to be the best judge of my ailments—and state of
health.”
“Oh, I beg your pardon, Aunt Bella; I meant no harm. Well, then, if
you are not going to use the car yourself, perhaps Susan and I could
take it over to Westmere? The Woolcocks have a large house-party,
and Joey and her husband are there.”
Miss Parrett closed her eyes tightly—a sure hoisting of the storm
cone—and screwed up her little old face till it resembled an over-ripe
cream cheese.
“Really, Aurea! I don’t know what the world is coming to! How dare
you propose such a thing! Take out my car for the first time without
me! But, of course, I know I’m only a cipher in my own house!”—an
almost hourly complaint.
“But do think of the chauffeur, Aunt Bella; is he to have nothing to
do?” Here this crafty girl touched a sensitive nerve—a responsive
key.
“Plenty for him to do; there’s enough work in the house for twenty
chauffeurs: unpacking the book boxes and china—never opened
since your grandfather’s death—staining the floors, and putting up
the curtains, and laying carpets. If you and Susan are going to settle
the drawing-room at last, he may help you. I can’t spare Jones or
Hogben from the garden.”
“Very well, we must have some one to lift the heavy things, and
stand on ladders. Where is he?”
“Outside in the hall, awaiting my orders,” replied Miss Parrett, with
magnificent dignity, folding her hands over what had once been a
neat waist, but now measured thirty inches.
Yes, the chauffeur was in the hall, cap in hand, attended by the
grateful Joss, and had overheard the foregoing conversation.
Miss Parrett came forth as she concluded her speech, and issued
her commands.
“Owen, you are to help my sister and Miss Morven in settling the
drawing-room. Be careful how you handle things, and don’t break
anything; and you may have your dinner here for to-day, with the
other servants.”
“Very good, ma’am,” he assented.
But with respect to dinner with the servants, it was really very bad.
He would be compelled to fence with the London cook, and keep her
and her civil proposals at arm’s length—no easy job!
From ten o’clock till half-past one, Wynyard spent an agreeable and
busy time in the service of Miss Susan and her niece. His boast to
his sister that he was “clever with his hands” was fully justified. He
hung the chintz and white curtains with the skill of an upholsterer, he
laid the dark blue felt on the floor, stretched it and nailed it neatly in
its place, whilst Aurea stood by, and gave directions, and sometimes
—such was her zeal—went down on her knees beside him, and
pulled and dragged too, exertions which enabled her associate to
realise the perfect curve of cheek and neck, and the faint perfume of
her glorious hair!
And all this time industrious Miss Susan sewed on rings, fitted loose
chintz covers, and talked incessantly. She did not appear to find the
presence of the chauffeur the slightest restraint—indeed, he was so
quiet and kept his personality so steadily in the background, that as
aunt and niece chatted and conferred, measured and altered, they
seemed to have entirely forgotten his existence, and as the old
drawing-room was full of nooks, angles, and deep windows, he was
not only out of mind, but also out of sight. Meanwhile, he enjoyed the
rôle of audience, especially in listening to Miss Aurea! What a gay,
light-hearted girl! And in her playful arguments with her aunt, he
realised the delightful camaraderie that existed between them. Her
chaff was so amusing that, although he was not included in the
conversation, he often felt inclined to echo Miss Susan’s appreciative
laugh. Never had he come across any one who had attracted him so
much; the more he saw of Miss Morven the more he admired her!
Possibly this was because for the last twelve months he had not
been brought in contact with a happy, high-spirited English girl—or
was it because in this out-of-the-world village he had met his fate?
As Wynyard hung curtains, and put in screws, he stole swift glances
at Miss Susan’s busy helper, noticed her slim elegance, her
infectious smile, and lovely face. It was a ridiculous, but absolutely
true fact, that to see a really beautiful, charming, and unaffected girl,
one must come to Ottinge-in-the-Marsh!
Meanwhile, as he worked in the background, he gathered up many
crumbs of conversation, and scraps of family and local news. He
learned that Mr. Morven’s great work on The Mithraic Heresy and Its
Oriental Origin was nearly complete, that the Manor cook had given
notice, and that no one had rented the fishing.
“The Woolcocks have a houseful at Westmere,” so said Miss Susan,
“and their staff of servants had recently enjoyed a sensational
turning out. Joey Waring and her husband are there, just back from
their winter trip.”
“And how is Joe?” inquired Aurea.
“Her hair is twice as fluffy, and she is louder, noisier, and talks ten
times more than ever!”
“Now, Susan, you know that is impossible!”
“Yes; Kathleen declares that you can hear her laugh as you pass the
park gates.”
“What! a whole mile away! She must have mistaken one of the
peacocks for Joey, and however loud she laughs and talks, she
never says an unkind word of any one.”
“No, a good, kind little soul! but I wonder Captain Waring can stand
her, and her chatter does not drive him crazy.”
“On the contrary, he adores her, and is enormously proud of her flow
of animation and conversation. You see, he is so silent himself, Joey
is his antithesis; and Joey is worshipped at home, for in a family of
large, heavy, silent people, a little gabbling creature is appreciated.
Tell me about Kathleen.”
“Oh, Kathleen is, as usual, very busy and cheery; she has three new
boarders—hungry and quarrelsome.”
“And he?”
“Just as usual too, dear. You know he never can be better.”
“But he may grow worse!”
“Oh, don’t speak of such a thing! Think of Kathleen.”
“Yes; and I think Kathleen is a saint—so brave and unselfish. Now,
where shall we put the old Palairet mirrors?”
“You had better consult your Aunt Bella.”
“My dear, good Susan!” (This was the style in which she addressed
her relative.) “Don’t you know your own sister by this time? She has
been here nearly seven months, and you are not half settled yet—
only bedrooms and dining-room—and I have undertaken to help you
finish off in three days.”
“Yes, but that’s nonsense, though I must say you’ve worked miracles
this morning—curtains, covers, carpet; but there was no question of
where they had to go. As to pictures, mirrors, and cabinets, it will
take your aunt a twelvemonth to decide how to place them.”
“I shall decide, and place them to-day,” rejoined the girl, with calm
decision; “if I ask Aunt Bella, they will be tried on every wall, till our
backs are broken, and then taken down after all. The round glass
between the windows,”—looking about and speaking with authority
—“the other over the mantelpiece, the Chinese cabinet in that niche
—they are just made for one another—the Charles the First black
bureau from the schoolroom just here, and the screen from her
bedroom by the door.”
“My dear child, you”—and she broke into a laugh—“you wouldn’t
dare!”
“Would I not? Just wait and see. The room is charming, and when it’s
finished Auntie B. will be enchanted! You may leave her to me. Oh,”
in another tone to Wynyard, who had come forward in search of
some wire, “you have worked well. It must be your dinner-hour. We
shall be ready to start again at half-past two o’clock, and then the
parlour-maid will help you with the furniture.”
“Very well, miss,” he answered.
As Aurea walked off, followed by Miss Susan, Wynyard the imposter
assured himself that Miss Morven was quicker witted than her aunts.
He had noticed her expression of keen attention as he discussed a
matter of a curtain pole with her relative, and it was quite possible
that she already had an inkling of the truth! He must be careful and
wary not to give himself away or utter a word beyond “Yes, miss,”
and “No, miss.” He was already attending closely to the speech of
Tom Hogben, and had marked the scantiness and laziness of his
vocabulary; how he never said more than he could help, and used
the words, “Sure-ly,” and “I dunno,” and “ye see,” and “’ee” for “he,”
and “I be” for “I am,” and resolved to imitate him.
The meal in the servants’ hall proved an even more trying ordeal
than he anticipated, and was altogether so disagreeable to the new
chauffeur that, sooner than face it again, he determined to fast.
The London cook (Miss Hicks) and four maids were present, also the
boot-boy—a clumsy yokel, who was in terrified attendance. Owen
sat on Miss Hicks’ right hand, and received all her attention, the best
helpings, and daintiest morsels of a solid and satisfying meal.
She would scarcely suffer the other servants to address him, though
the rosy-cheeked parlour-maid made bold and even desperate
attempts. She plied him with questions, compliments, and
information. For his part, he proved a disappointing guest, and did
not afford Miss Hicks much satisfaction; she came to the conclusion
that in spite of his fine figure and good looks the chauffeur was a dull
sort of chap, and terribly backward at taking a hint. When she
nudged him with her elbow, and pressed his foot under the table,
there was no response—in fact, he moved a bit away! However, she
laid the flattering unction to her soul that the poor fellow was shy. He
was duly favoured with the cook’s candid opinion of the place and
their employers, namely, that Miss P. was an old terror, was a
shocking one for running after lords and ladies, and talking grand,
yet that mean and sneaking she would frighten you! She and Miss
Norris, housekeeper at the Rectory, were cuts, only for the Rector;
anyway, Norris never came to the Manor. Miss Susan was a lady, but
a giddy old thing, so fond of gadding and amusement, and laws!
what a one to talk! As for Miss Aurea——
No, he could not sit by and hear Miss Aurea dissected, and with an
excuse that he wanted to have a pipe before he went back to his job,
the chauffeur pushed away his unfinished cheese, and with a civil
farewell took his departure.
The afternoon was a busy one: the mirrors were put up, pictures
were hung, but with many incursions and interruptions from Miss
Parrett. Joss, the dog, was also in and out, and seemed inclined to
attach himself to Wynyard.
Miss Parrett, still hooded, sat upright in an arm-chair, offering
irritating criticisms, and quarrelling vigorously as to the position of
pictures and articles of furniture; the old lady was altogether
extremely troublesome and argumentative, and gave double work.
Thoroughly alive to the fact that her niece had good taste, she was
jealous of her activities, and yet wished to see the old rooms
arranged to the best advantage—as the result would redound to her
personal credit.
It was an immense relief to the three harassed workers when the
parlour-maid entered and announced—
“If you please, Miss Parrett, Lady Mary Cooper has called, and I’ve
shown her into the study.”
“You mean the library,” corrected her mistress. “Say I’m coming;” and
she trotted over to a glass, removed her hood, and called upon
Aurea to arrange her cap.
“Time Lady Mary did call!” she grumbled. “We are here seven
months.”
“She has been abroad,” said Susan; “and, anyway, she’s not much
of a visitor.”
“Well, she is our own cousin, at any rate.”
“Our cousin—Lady Mary!” repeated Miss Susan. “I do declare, Bella,
you have a craze for cousins. Why, we scarcely know the woman!”
“Now, Susan, don’t argue! She is our relative; her great-great-aunt
married a Davenant, and I suppose you will allow that they are our
kin? I have no time to explain now;” and she pattered off,
abandoning the workers to their own devices.
“Your Aunt Bella is so funny about relations! People I’ve never heard
of she will say are our own cousins.”
“Yes, to the tenth generation,” agreed Aurea, “if they are well born.
Aunt Bella has pedigree on the brain—for myself, I think it a bore.”
It was strange that Miss Parrett, who, on her mother’s side, was the
granddaughter of a rough Hoogly pilot, should be as haughty and
exclusive as if she were an Austrian princess. In the neighbourhood
it had become a well-established joke that, if any one of importance
and old family was mentioned before Miss Parrett, she was almost
sure to announce—
“Oh, I don’t know much about them personally, but they are our
cousins!”
By six o’clock the task of arranging the drawing-room was
completed. Wynyard had been assisted by the rosy-cheeked maid in
bringing tables, cabinets, and china from other rooms, and they
really had, as Miss Susan declared, “worked like blacks.”
“It is a dear old room!” said Aurea, surveying the apartment with
unconcealed complacency. “When the bowls are filled with flowers,
and we have a bridge table, and a jigsaw puzzle, we shall be perfect
—old-fashioned, and in the fashion.”
“Glad you think so!” said a little bleating voice in the doorway. “Lady
Mary asked for you, Susan, and I told her you were out, or she’d
have wanted to come poking in here. So”—looking about—“you’ve
brought the black cabinet out of the schoolroom! Who gave you
leave to do that? And”—she threw out a quivering forefinger—“the
blue china bowls from the spare room, and my screen! You take too
much upon yourself, Aurea Morven! You should have consulted me.
I am tired of telling you that I will not be a cipher in my own house!”
Aurea coloured vividly. Did her aunt forget that the chauffeur was
present? Really, Aunt Bella was too bad. She glanced at the young
man, who was standing on the steps straightening a picture;
apparently he was absorbed in his task, and to all appearances had
not heard the recent conversation.
“Oh, I’m so sorry you don’t like the room, Aunt Bella!” said Aurea,
seating herself in a high old chair, crossing her neat feet, and folding
her hands.
“Sorry!”—and Miss Parrett sniffed—“that’s what you always say!”
“Now, my dear, please don’t be so cross,” she replied, unabashed;
“you know, in your heart, you are delighted, and as proud of this
drawing-room as a peacock with two tails.”
“Aurea!” shrieked her aunt.
“You have been here seven months, and you’ve not a single place in
which to receive visitors. Look, now, at Lady Mary—you had her in
the musty old study—and why?”—waving an interrogative hand
—“simply because for months you could not make up your mind
about the arrangement of this room. All the county have called—the
first calls—and carried off the first impressions. None of your lovely
old things were to be seen, but waiting to be settled.”
“Aurea, I will not suffer——”
“Please do let me finish, dear. Before I left, you may remember how
you and I talked it all over—cabinets, china, sofas—and settled
exactly where everything was to fit. I come back at the end of a
month and I find nothing done; so I’ve made up my mind to work
here for several days. I’ve asked the padré to spare me. This room is
finished, and looks extremely nice; the next I take in hand will be the
den! Now, as it’s after six o’clock, I’m afraid I must be off;” and she
arose, stooped down, and kissed her aunt on the forehead, adding—
“Of course I know, dear, that you are immensely obliged to me, and
so you need not say anything. Good-bye—good-bye, Susie,” waving
her hand, and she was gone, leaving Miss Parrett in the middle of
the room temporarily speechless.
“Well—up—on my word!” and she took a long breath.
“After all, Bella, Aurea has made the room perfectly charming,” said
Miss Susan, with unusual courage. “It’s the prettiest in the whole
neighbourhood; the old things never were half seen before. She
sewed the curtains herself, and, until to-day, we’ve never had any
decent place to ask visitors to sit down in.”
“Oh yes, it’s all very well, but if she hadn’t my nice old things to work
with, she couldn’t have made up such a room. Yes, I’m always just—
every one says my sense of justice is my strong point—and I admit
that she helped; what I object to is Aurea’s way—her way,” she
repeated, “of just doing exactly whatever she chooses, and smiling in
your face. She leads the whole of Ottinge by the nose, from the
parson, her father, down to Crazy Billy.” And Wynyard, who was
listening to this declaration, told himself that he was not surprised.
Miss Parrett was not particularly attached to her niece, although she
was by no means indifferent to her fascinating personality, and a
sunny face that brought light and gaiety into the house; but this
wizened old woman of seventy-four grudged the girl her youth, and
was animated by the natural antagonism of one who has lived,
towards one who has life before her!
CHAPTER XI
THE TRIAL TRIP
At last, with considerable pomp and circumstance, after a whole

week of procrastination, Miss Parrett ventured to inaugurate her
motor.
She appeared in a long fur cloak and gigantic sable stole—a
shapeless bundle, resembling a well-to-do bear, with a cross human
face. Susan, who, after all, was but fifty, looked unusually trim and
young in a neat tailor-made, and becoming toque, whilst Aurea—
who had been permitted to share in the triumph—was so pretty
herself, that one scarcely noticed what she wore, merely that she
exercised marvellous dexterity in the matter of introducing a large
black hat into the interior of the car.
The household were collected for this supreme event: the cook,
scowling and scornful, three maids, Hogben, Jones the head
gardener, and the boot-boy, all assembled to witness the start—even
Joss was in attendance. The motor (in truth a whited sepulchre) had
been recently done up, and with its good-looking driver in smart
leather coat and cap, presented an imposing appearance as it sped
down the drive.
Miss Parrett closed her eyes, and when it swung out of the gate with
a slight lurch, she gave a loud scream, but as it glided up the street,
and she noticed that all eyes were on her car (there was Mrs.
Ramsay at her door, and the doctor’s wife too), she became
comparatively composed. At the gate of the Rectory the Rector
awaited the great sight, and waved a valedictory stick; then they
sped along easily, and, being now out of the village, Wynyard put on
the second speed, but was instantly arrested by Miss Parrett’s
protesting cries.
“Tell him to stop!” she called to her sister. “Supposing we met
something. There!” as they passed the local carrier’s cart within
three yards.
“Owen, you are not to go so fast!” commanded Susan. “Miss Parrett
is nervous.”
He obediently slowed down to eight miles an hour, and as the old
machine joggled along, bumping and shaking, the window-glasses
rattling, the chauffeur was conscious of a feeling of angry contempt,
instead of the usual partiality which a driver reserves for his own car.
He had heard that a driver should be in tune with his machine, but
how could any sane man be in sympathy with this bone-shaker? He
was confident that after a long journey, or any extra strain, the old
thing would collapse and fall to pieces.
After many directions, and not one poor little adventure, they entered
a long avenue leading to an imposing Tudor house with picturesque
chimney-stacks, situated in a great park. This was once the family
seat of the Davenants—cousins of the Wynyards; and as she saw
the end of her journey, Miss Parrett’s courage mounted. When the
car was crawling, or, better still, at a full stop, she was extremely
fond of motoring and not the least nervous.
As the visitors approached the hall door, they overtook a large and
lively house-party, who were returning from the golf links to tea. They
included Mr. Woolcock—a burly figure in knickerbockers, and brilliant
stockings,—his vivacious married daughter, Mrs. Wade Waring,
commonly known as “Joey,” her husband, and half a dozen guests—
altogether a smart and cheerful crowd.
After the first noisy greetings had subsided, Mrs. Waring seized upon
Aurea; she, to use her own expression, “adored the girl.” Aurea
Morven was so pretty to look at, so gay, and so natural, it was a sin
to have her buried in Ottinge; and she secretly designed her for her
future sister-in-law. Aurea was just the wife for Bertie. He was heavy,
dull, and stodgy—a complete contrast to herself, with her animated
face, lively gestures, wiry figure, and ceaseless flow of chatter.
As, arm in arm, she was conducting her friend indoors, she halted for
a moment to look back.
“So that’s the wonderful new motor!” she exclaimed dramatically. “I
say, where did you find such a tophole chauffeur? Why,” she
screamed, “I know him! It’s Owen; he was a saloon steward on the
Anaconda!” and Wynyard, seeing that he was recognised, made a
virtue of necessity, and touched his cap.
“Why, Owen,” hastily descending the steps as she spoke, “fancy you
on dry land! So you’ve given up the sea, and taken to a new trade.
How do you like it?”
“It’s all right, thank you, ma’am,” he answered, with an impassive
face.
“I hope you got the beautiful white-covered umbrella I left for you?”
“Yes, thank you, ma’am.”
“I was afraid the stewardess might bag it! I thought it would be useful
to you in Buenos Ayres, when you were walking in the Calle Florida
with your best girl!” and she surveyed him with twinkling eyes.
“Come, come, Joey!” expostulated her father; “you are blocking up
the gangway, and we all want our tea. Let the man take his car
round.”
“But only think, dad, he was my pet steward coming home,” declared
his lively daughter; “on rough days he brought me chicken broth on
deck, and was so sympathetic—just a ministering angel! Toby will tell
you what a treasure he was, too. He always had a match on him,
always knew the time, and the run, and was the best hand to tuck a
rug round me I ever knew!”
Long before the conclusion of this superb eulogy, (delivered in a
high-pitched voice from the steps), its subject had found a refuge in
the yard.
“Isn’t it extraordinary how one comes across people?” continued
Joey, as she led Aurea indoors. “Fancy your chauffeur being one of
the stewards on the Anaconda!”
“What’s that you say about my chauffeur?” demanded Miss Parrett,
with arrogant solemnity, who had been a disapproving witness of the
recent scene. (She considered Joey Waring a shockingly fast, vulgar
little person, who absorbed far too much of the general conversation
and attention; but as she was the wife of a wealthy man, and the
sister of a notable parti, she dissembled her dislike, or believed she
did. But Joey was aware that the eldest “Polly” considered her a
terribly inferior, frivolous sort of person.)
“I’m only saying how odd it is to find a steward turned into a
chauffeur! I do hope he is experienced, dear Miss Parrett, and that
he won’t bring you or the car to grief. I call him quite dangerously
good-looking, don’t you?”
To this preposterous question Miss Parrett made no reply, merely
squeezed up her eyes, tossed her head, and as she followed Mrs.
Woolcock into the drawing-room her feathers were still quivering.
After tea Mrs. Waring carried Aurea off to her room to enjoy a good
gossip, and to exhibit some of the treasures she had collected during
her recent trip. Joey and her husband were enterprising travellers;
he, a big, silent man—the opposite of his lively little wife—was also a
mighty sportsman.
“Now, let me hear what you have been doing with yourself, Aurea,”
said the lady, after a long and animated description of her own
experiences in the West Indies and Buenos Ayres. “You have been
up in town, I know. Do tell me all about your love-affairs—I know they
are legion. Do confide in little Joey!”
“My love-affairs!” and the girl laughed. “I have none; and if I had,
Joey, you are about the worst confidante I could find. All particulars
would be given out no later than at dinner to-night, and you’d put my
most heart-breaking experience in such a light, that every one would
be shrieking with laughter.”
“Well, anyway, you are heart-whole so far, eh?”
“Yes; I think I may admit that.”
“And so your Aunt Bella has set up a motor; what possessed her?”
And she stared into the girl’s face, with a pair of knowing, light grey
eyes. “She’s as nervous as a cat!”
“Aunt Bella was possessed by the spirit of contradiction. And, talking
of the car, do tell me some more about the chauffeur.”
“Or the waiter that was,” lighting another cigarette. “He was awfully
quick and civil; every one liked Owen.”
“Did it strike you, Joey, that he was something above his class—er—
in fact, a gentleman?” And as Aurea asked the question she
coloured faintly.
“No, my dear,” rejoined her friend, with decision. “I have not a scrap
of imagination, or an ounce of romance in my composition. Such an
idea never dawned on me. You see, Toby and I go about the world
so much; although we have two big houses, we almost live in hotels,
and I am accustomed to being served by men with nice voices and
agreeable manners, who speak several foreign languages. So sorry
to dispel your illusions, but Owen waited to the manner born. He may
have been trained in some big house, and been a gentleman’s
gentleman. I fancy he is a roving character. I think some one said he
had been on a ranch up-country.”
Aurea looked out of the window, and was silent. Joey knew the
world, and Joey, for all her free-and-easy ways and her noisy
manners, was au fond a sensible, practical, little person.
“I dare say you are right, Joey,” she remarked at last.
“Why, of course I am! I grant you that the man is rather an unusual
type of chauffeur, to come down to a dull situation in a dull little
village; but, for goodness’ sake, don’t run away with the idea that he
is some swell in disguise, for he is not; he is just ‘off the cab rank’—
no more and no less. I admit his good looks, but that’s nothing. One
of the handsomest young men I ever saw was a London carriage
groom. I give you my word, his eyelashes were half an inch long! In
these days, too, there are such hideous scandals about women and
their smart chauffeurs, that one cannot be too reserved or too
careful.”
“Joey!” cried Aurea, turning on her with a crimson face.

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The "Population Problem" in Pacific

Asia (International Policy Exchange) 1st

The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia

International Policy Exchange Series

THE “POPULATION PROBLEM”

Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press

© Oxford University Press 2019

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in

You must not circulate this work in any other form

Library of Congress Cataloging-​in-​Publication Data

policies designed to encourage (or at least support) childbearing. There is little

ACKN OWLEDG MENTS

I have been extremely fortunate to have a strong network of scholars in Europe

grateful to Francesco Billari and Andrew Dilnot at Nuffield; Rosalind Harding

THE “POPULATION PROBLEM” IN PACIFIC ASIA

2 The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia

Just thinking in terms of a quasi-​natural experiment, for example, Singapore

Economic Boom, Demographic Bomb? 3

A DIFFERENT APPROACH TO THE PROBLEM

4 The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia

Economic Boom, Demographic Bomb? 5

Toward a Rights-​Based Approach

6 The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia

To help couples and individuals meet their reproductive goals in a frame-

By adopting this rights-​based approach, with preferences at the center, we can

Economic Boom, Demographic Bomb? 7

not national, reproductive goals to be met. Rather conveniently, the reproductive

Changing the Parameters

8 The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia

toward one that considers populations holistically. In other words, if we rethink

Economic Boom, Demographic Bomb? 9

10 The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia

A ROADMAP OF THE BOOK

Economic Boom, Demographic Bomb? 11

12 The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia

Economic Boom, Demographic Bomb? 13

As indicated previously, it is traditional to consider China separately from

14 The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia

were, in fact, largely grounded in building a society to support childbearing.

Economic Boom, Demographic Bomb? 15

THE AGED TIGER

The narrative of population aging and decline in low-​fertility Pacific Asia is

Low Fertility, Population Decline, and Aging 17

perspective—​Agequake: Riding the Demographic Rollercoaster Shaking Business,

18 The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia

Low Fertility, Population Decline, and Aging 19

China Hong Kong Japan

20 The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia

Low Fertility, Population Decline, and Aging 21

THE TIGER FACING EXTINCTION

Returning to the discussion earlier in this chapter regarding policymakers’

Relative total pop, size (2015 = 100)

China Hong Kong

Low Fertility, Population Decline, and Aging 23

up as economists arguing for the need to supplement the working-​age population

24 The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia

THE ROLE OF LOW FERTILITY

Low Fertility as Cause of Population Aging and Decline

Low Fertility, Population Decline, and Aging 25

of revolutions in health and well-​being; because of tremendous changes in

“Fixing” Low Fertility

26 The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia

been reviewed extensively elsewhere both in regional accounts (Frejka, Jones,

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

2 The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia

Just thinking in terms of a quasi-natural experiment, for example, Singapore

4 The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia

Toward a Rights-Based Approach

6 The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia

By adopting this rights-based approach, with preferences at the center, we can

8 The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia

10 The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia

12 The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia

14 The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia

The narrative of population aging and decline in low-fertility Pacific Asia is

perspective—Agequake: Riding the Demographic Rollercoaster Shaking Business,

18 The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia

20 The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia

up as economists arguing for the need to supplement the working-age population

24 The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia

of revolutions in health and well-being; because of tremendous changes in

26 The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia

Singapore’s population, it needs some increasing/So forget waving flags,

28 The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia

Abe’s patronizingly labeled program of Womenomics—the plan to boost female

30 The “Population Problem” in Pacific Asia