Of marriages and markets
7 May 2012 10:59 PM GMT
When Pan Feng, a 40-year-old wealthy businessman from Shanghai, decided to tie the knot the second time, he laid out a gala event. As the expensive wine flowed generously, Pan Feng and his pregnant partner, Tang Ming, strode down a catwalk to music more suited for Oscar nights. Guests were treated to a slickly-made film of the couple's courtship and as the rich-boy-meets-shy girl story blazed across more than 60 LED screens, a seven-tier faux cake took pride of place, and bridesmaids preened on this winter night - it was a side of China poised on a cusp. Comfortable spending its newly earned riches, the young and middle-aged are making up their own set of 'traditions' as they go along - some borrowed from Hollywood, some hangover from a pre-Communist era, but much of it dictated by the market.
If Pan Feng spent more than 100,000 US dollars on designing a wedding of his choice, 30-year-old Li Xuemei and her husband Jiang Shengtao spent an exhausting and expensive day posing for professional photographers in an elaborate mix of royal wedding dresses and Victorian ball gowns. The 'wedding album' - nipped, tucked and photoshopped - has come to take a central place in Chinese weddings - symbolising the bewildering change now cruising through hyper-consumerist China.
Back in 1967, when Pan Feng's parents Panyichen and Xujingcun signed the red marriage book, it was an austere China which had no concept of private property or tolerance for ostentation. But years of Communist rule did not completely wipe out traditions or class distinctions. The Marriage Law of 1950 guaranteed everyone the freedom to choose a partner, but alliances remained very much the preserve of parents and family elders - mostly arranged between families of equivalent status. Like elsewhere, it was desirable for the boy's family to be of a higher status, the most desirable husband material being administrative cadres, Communist Party members and employees of state-owned enterprises. Also, from the early 1950s to the late 1970s, when hereditary class labels were very significant, anyone with a 'counter-revolutionary' background, that is, anyone previously identified with landlords or the rich peasant class, was a bad prospect for marriage. Children of revolutionaries formed the top end of the pyramid, with unions limited within this 'elite circle'.
This aspect of marriage alliances continued well beyond the reforms of the 1980s - only the definitions of status changed radically. Because there is no inherited wealth in China, evaluation of a 'worthy boy' shifted to estimates of earning power and future prosperity in a country which began to see giddy levels of individual wealth.
The entire self and social worth of a boy now centers around his ownership of a home - so much so that the fortunes of China's sizzling housing market depends largely on the demand generated from marriage. Ever since China laid the foundations of a modern private housing market in 1998, the ownership of real estate became inextricably linked with 'status' in the marriage market. The taste of capitalism brought in its wake a revival of old feudal customs, fortified strongly by private property. Tying the knot with a man without a house is considered simply shameful - dismissed as a 'naked wedding'.
Innumerable surveys over the years have shown that majority of unmarried women and their mothers want 'home-owners' for grooms. Despite social progress and increasing calls for gender equality, the traditional mindset remains deeply entrenched. According to a survey conducted in 31 provinces throughout 2010, by All China Women's Federation, about 70 per cent of women interviewed said they would marry only if their partners possessed a home, solid savings and a steady income. Â
Sex ratio and housing market
A research paper, 'Status competition and housing prices: Some evidence from China' by professors of Columbia University and Tsinghua University draws a firm co-relation between how ownership of a house or property improves a young man’s chance on the marriage market and how average value of a real estate depends on the sex ratio of a region. The one-child policy, introduced more than 30 years ago, has skewed the country's sex ratio dangerously due to preference for sons. This disparity increased competition in the marriage market. The effect of this gender imbalance on urban housing prices in China was the topic of a recent paper published by the National Bureau of Economic Research, which noted that the cutthroat marriage market has boosted home ownership in China because men who own homes are perceived as being more attractive spouses than those who do not share this 'visible type of wealth.' Men must outshine their peers in order to find a wife. The report concludes that the skewed sex ratio 'accounted for between 30 to 48 per cent of the increase in housing prices in China between 2003 to 2009.' These figures vary region-wise according to the local gender imbalance: higher the imbalance, higher the housing prices.
The 'no house, no marriage' policy, so deeply entrenched in the mindset of people, saw a disturbing reflection, when an exceedingly pragmatic young woman by the name of Ma Nuo declared on a popular TV dating program, last year, 'I'd rather cry in a BMW sedan than smile on the backseat of a bicycle.'
Alarmed at the aggressive acquisitive mentality of the younger generation and soaring divorces, the Chinese State has decided to step in. Once a dirty word, divorce is now so commonplace that more than two million marriages ended in 2011, a jump of 17.2 per cent from the previous year.
Throughout the tumultuous political upheavals of the last century, families remained the basic stabilising unit within Chinese society and preserving this unit and shunning ‘disorderly sexuality’ are seen to be vital in maintaining social order. In a bid to protect traditional marriage values and restrain this rampant obsession with property, China’s Supreme Court gave a sensational interpretation of China's Marriage Law in 2011, that changes the way property disputes are handled after divorce.
Under the redefined law, which took effect in August last year, any property that was purchased before a marriage will no longer be up for negotiation after a divorce; it will belong solely to the person who bought it or whose name is on the deed. Also, if a house or apartment was purchased by the parents of either the bride or groom, it will revert to that person only, instead of being split between the couple. As a result of the new rule, divorced men get to keep houses - their ex-wives, meanwhile, won't be entitled to any compensation, despite their contributions — financial or otherwise — to the marriage.
The court ruling no doubt left women enraged. Legal experts argued that the new interpretation will put women at a clear disadvantage in a culture in which marital homes are traditionally provided by men. Chinese papers reported how women threatened their fiancés, refusing to have children, or care for in-laws, unless they are registered as the co-owner of the property before they marry.
And so values collide as modern China struggles to cope with remnants of its ancient feudal past, Mao Zedong's feminism and the glitter and greed of market economy. As always, the family is the first to be swept up in this great churning.
If Pan Feng spent more than 100,000 US dollars on designing a wedding of his choice, 30-year-old Li Xuemei and her husband Jiang Shengtao spent an exhausting and expensive day posing for professional photographers in an elaborate mix of royal wedding dresses and Victorian ball gowns. The 'wedding album' - nipped, tucked and photoshopped - has come to take a central place in Chinese weddings - symbolising the bewildering change now cruising through hyper-consumerist China.
Back in 1967, when Pan Feng's parents Panyichen and Xujingcun signed the red marriage book, it was an austere China which had no concept of private property or tolerance for ostentation. But years of Communist rule did not completely wipe out traditions or class distinctions. The Marriage Law of 1950 guaranteed everyone the freedom to choose a partner, but alliances remained very much the preserve of parents and family elders - mostly arranged between families of equivalent status. Like elsewhere, it was desirable for the boy's family to be of a higher status, the most desirable husband material being administrative cadres, Communist Party members and employees of state-owned enterprises. Also, from the early 1950s to the late 1970s, when hereditary class labels were very significant, anyone with a 'counter-revolutionary' background, that is, anyone previously identified with landlords or the rich peasant class, was a bad prospect for marriage. Children of revolutionaries formed the top end of the pyramid, with unions limited within this 'elite circle'.
This aspect of marriage alliances continued well beyond the reforms of the 1980s - only the definitions of status changed radically. Because there is no inherited wealth in China, evaluation of a 'worthy boy' shifted to estimates of earning power and future prosperity in a country which began to see giddy levels of individual wealth.
The entire self and social worth of a boy now centers around his ownership of a home - so much so that the fortunes of China's sizzling housing market depends largely on the demand generated from marriage. Ever since China laid the foundations of a modern private housing market in 1998, the ownership of real estate became inextricably linked with 'status' in the marriage market. The taste of capitalism brought in its wake a revival of old feudal customs, fortified strongly by private property. Tying the knot with a man without a house is considered simply shameful - dismissed as a 'naked wedding'.
Innumerable surveys over the years have shown that majority of unmarried women and their mothers want 'home-owners' for grooms. Despite social progress and increasing calls for gender equality, the traditional mindset remains deeply entrenched. According to a survey conducted in 31 provinces throughout 2010, by All China Women's Federation, about 70 per cent of women interviewed said they would marry only if their partners possessed a home, solid savings and a steady income. Â
Sex ratio and housing market
A research paper, 'Status competition and housing prices: Some evidence from China' by professors of Columbia University and Tsinghua University draws a firm co-relation between how ownership of a house or property improves a young man’s chance on the marriage market and how average value of a real estate depends on the sex ratio of a region. The one-child policy, introduced more than 30 years ago, has skewed the country's sex ratio dangerously due to preference for sons. This disparity increased competition in the marriage market. The effect of this gender imbalance on urban housing prices in China was the topic of a recent paper published by the National Bureau of Economic Research, which noted that the cutthroat marriage market has boosted home ownership in China because men who own homes are perceived as being more attractive spouses than those who do not share this 'visible type of wealth.' Men must outshine their peers in order to find a wife. The report concludes that the skewed sex ratio 'accounted for between 30 to 48 per cent of the increase in housing prices in China between 2003 to 2009.' These figures vary region-wise according to the local gender imbalance: higher the imbalance, higher the housing prices.
The 'no house, no marriage' policy, so deeply entrenched in the mindset of people, saw a disturbing reflection, when an exceedingly pragmatic young woman by the name of Ma Nuo declared on a popular TV dating program, last year, 'I'd rather cry in a BMW sedan than smile on the backseat of a bicycle.'
Alarmed at the aggressive acquisitive mentality of the younger generation and soaring divorces, the Chinese State has decided to step in. Once a dirty word, divorce is now so commonplace that more than two million marriages ended in 2011, a jump of 17.2 per cent from the previous year.
Throughout the tumultuous political upheavals of the last century, families remained the basic stabilising unit within Chinese society and preserving this unit and shunning ‘disorderly sexuality’ are seen to be vital in maintaining social order. In a bid to protect traditional marriage values and restrain this rampant obsession with property, China’s Supreme Court gave a sensational interpretation of China's Marriage Law in 2011, that changes the way property disputes are handled after divorce.
Under the redefined law, which took effect in August last year, any property that was purchased before a marriage will no longer be up for negotiation after a divorce; it will belong solely to the person who bought it or whose name is on the deed. Also, if a house or apartment was purchased by the parents of either the bride or groom, it will revert to that person only, instead of being split between the couple. As a result of the new rule, divorced men get to keep houses - their ex-wives, meanwhile, won't be entitled to any compensation, despite their contributions — financial or otherwise — to the marriage.
The court ruling no doubt left women enraged. Legal experts argued that the new interpretation will put women at a clear disadvantage in a culture in which marital homes are traditionally provided by men. Chinese papers reported how women threatened their fiancés, refusing to have children, or care for in-laws, unless they are registered as the co-owner of the property before they marry.
And so values collide as modern China struggles to cope with remnants of its ancient feudal past, Mao Zedong's feminism and the glitter and greed of market economy. As always, the family is the first to be swept up in this great churning.
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