Adam Smith Blog - China's me generation
By Dr Madsen Pirie Society
For some years observers have commented on the results of China's 'One Child' policy. ABC's Jane Hutcheon called them "the over pampered and over-fed offspring of China's elite." Jesse Zink, writing on the Acadia University page says that
the one-child policy has led to the rise of the so-called "little emperors" - only children who are spoiled, since their parents and grandparents have fewer people on whom to spread their largesse. Studies have shown that these children are less interested in tradition than their elders and feel compelled to quickly carve out a niche for themselves in society.
China's leaders introduced the 'One Child' policy for population control, never imagining children who would grow up as the sole centre of attention of doting parents and granparents, and accustomed to instant gratification.
These solitary children carry the family's hopes and ambitions, too. Clay Chandler, in Fortune and The Business, reports that they are put through a daunting schedule of study, and are pressured to succeed.
Nanjing University's Professor Feng Xiaotian is quoted in the Straits Times questioning how different these children are from those of multi-child families. But most observers think they are already beginning to have an impact on the Chinese Society and economy.
The first wave of them are now in their 20s, and have decidedly uncommunist characteristics. They are very concerned about personal appearance, and spend freely on grooming products and designer wear. They assert individualism rather than collective values, and present themselves to the world through brand and lifestyle choices. They eagerly embrace new gadgetry, and seek to do things which mark them out as modern, and different from their predecessors. They might be the ultimate me-generation.
In many ways their values and attitudes correspond with the high growth consumer society which China is fast becoming. They may lack the stoicism, restraint, and self-effacement which enabled their predecessors to survive the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution, but they are a generation more likely to make a success of China’s embrace of capitalism.
It is one of history's unintended consequences that Communist China's 'One Child' policy, designed to produce a more easily managed society, is fast producing a generation more suited to spontaneous dynamism of a free-wheeling capitalist culture.
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