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Adverse Child Sex Ratios Challenges for Development

Adverse Child Sex Ratios Challenges for Development. International Workshop on Feminist Economics in China and India Mary E John. The Adverse Child Sex Ratio. Does the story begin with Amartya Sen? Colonial north west India and female infanticide

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Adverse Child Sex Ratios Challenges for Development

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  1. Adverse Child Sex RatiosChallenges for Development International Workshop on Feminist Economics in China and India Mary E John

  2. The Adverse Child Sex Ratio • Does the story begin with Amartya Sen? • Colonial north west India and female infanticide • 1970s: Demographers discover long term declines in overall sex ratios; correlated with poverty, low health and work patterns • Women’s organisations and health activists discover abuse of amniocentesis testing for foetal abnormalities in 1982

  3. The 1990s • Joint activism by women and health groups results in first legislation against sex determination testing in Maharashtra in 1986 • 1991 Census data show a decline in both overall sex ratio to 927 and CSR (0-6) 945 • But north-western states CSR around 900 • National law to regulate pre-natal diagnostic techniques (PNDT Act) 1994

  4. A new moment: 2001 Census • For the first time national CSR drops to 927, below overall sex ratio (indeed overall sex ratio registers a small improvement to 933) • Huge drops in states in north west India and especially in urban areas • Wide scale adoption of sex selective abortion especially through ultrasound • Also high rates of female child mortality in selective areas

  5. Problems • Uneven regional patterns • “Prosperity Effect” • Correlations of high education, lower fertility with skewed child sex ratios • Two child norm • Impunity of Medical Establishment

  6. Responses • State: PCPNDT Act (revised) in 2004 • Various states launch Schemes for the “girl child” • Religious and caste organisations now join the fray, given very low CSRs among Sikhs and Hindus • New researches both macro and micro • NGO campaigns • International focus

  7. Planning Families, Planning Gender • Study conducted by a team of researchers in low CSR districts in PU, HA, HP, RA, MP • In depth analyses of contextual factors at work in these diverse contexts • Ranging from poverty to affluence • Low CSRs especially among some groups and sites • But not specific to particular castes and classes

  8. Patterns of low CSR • Diverse patterns • Sex selection most prevalent and growing • High female child mortality in pockets • Cases of infanticide

  9. Social Indicators • Widespread schooling for girls • Higher education in Pu, Hp, Ha, where girls even outnumber boys • Low work participation rates overall • Invisibility of women’s work • Rising ages at marriage – 16 in MP and 21 in HP

  10. Fertility Patterns • Stated preferences “one boy, one girl”, weak in MP strong in HP • Fertility declines everywhere to different degrees • Revealed preferences: growing proportion of families with one boy, one girl; but also two boys, two boys, one girl…

  11. Fertility (contd.) • Tiny proportion of families willing to have only girls • One son norm among families in Punjab • “At least one son, at most one daughter” • Not just son preference • Daughter aversion

  12. Why? • Intergenerational transfer of resources • New ‘costs’ of having a daughter with economic growth • Education, health, care till adulthood • Anxieties over daughter’s sexuality • Marriage remains the compulsory institution

  13. Problems and differences • Aggressive use of technology by medical establishment locally and globally, ever newer technologies • Shortage of “women” and “bare branches” • Traditional and/or new forms of gender discrimination • Ethics and language of choice • Sex selection and the right to abortion

  14. 2011 • Predictions and speculations about Census 2011 • A turnaround or peaking of the practice? • Or even more rampant effects of son preference and daughter aversion?

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