The global abortion bind

Figure 1. Population Sex Ratios for China, India and Selected Countries.

China and India both have significantly more males than females among their populations, a sharp contrast to demographics in most developed countries and many developing countries where females outnumber men (Figure 1). By 2020, it’s estimated that the number of young “surplus males” unable to find brides could be more than 35 million in China and 25 million in India.

As in all societies, raising a family is a fundamental tradition in Chinese and Indian cultures. Given such strong familial emphasis, the acute gender imbalances are unlikely to lead bachelors to celibate lives as priests, monks or sadhus.

More likely, sex imbalances will push many men to look for brides in younger age groups, allowing the re-emergence of customs like child brides or marriage promises. Men unable to marry locally may need to import brides from distant regions. Also, some suggest that large numbers of surplus bachelors are likely to generate crime and civil disorder, such as the growth of urban gangs, increased trafficking of women, prostitution and bride kidnapping. The trends could even lead to the build-up of large militias to provide a safety valve for the frustrations of numerous bachelors.

Increasing evidence suggests that the practice of sex-selective abortions is occurring among Chinese and Indian immigrant communities living abroad. In the US, for example, figures from the 2000 census indicate US-born children of Chinese, Indian and Korean parents tended to be male. Countries that permit induced abortion, such as Canada, Germany and the UK, have outlawed sex selection for social reasons, and member states of the United Nations have collectively adopted recommendations urging governments to take the measures to prevent prenatal sex selection.

Medical technology has added a new dimension to the induced abortion debate: gender bias.

Allowing parental choice on the sex of their offspring represents the first major step toward exercising control not over whether, when and how many children to have, but over what kind of children are acceptable. Permitting couples to choose the sex of their children is viewed as a slippery slope by some ethicists, leading to “designer babies” selected on the basis of characteristics such as appearance, height or intelligence.

Others, however, while acknowledging that sex-selective abortion is a morally reprehensible practice, stress a woman’s right to choose her reproductive outcomes as paramount.

Many pro-choice and feminist groups are convinced that outlawing sex- selective abortion will undermine the reproductive rights of women. When they choose to address this highly sensitive issue, they advocate changing the son-preference mindset of the public through education campaigns that stress the value of daughters. Such an approach alone may prove to be a Herculean task in countries such as China and India. Economic development that provides equal education and employment opportunities for men and women is far more likely to be effective in eliminating son-preference in these societies.

These weighty matters no doubt will become more complicated with medical advances, such as the widespread use of home gender and DNA kits, raising further difficult issues surrounding induced abortion and putting more people in the abortion bind.