Population masculinization in Asia' Causes and policy implications

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Population masculinization in Asia.Causes and
policy implications

• CZ Guilmoto, IRD, Paris
• Hanoi,
• 20 December 2007

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• Why avoid girls ?
• A tragedy of the commons

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Why avoid girls ? The preconditions of
discrimination

• 1 People need to be able to do it
• Feasibility and supply factors
• 2 People should be willing and ready to do it
• Social acceptance and demand factors

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To be able

• To be feasible, prenatal discrimination requires
  the increased accessibility of new technologies
  at reduced costs, a responsive private health
  sector
• It also means the absence of legislation against
  illegal abortions or incomplete implementation of
  existing laws.

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To be willing

• 1 Sex selection methods need to be acceptable
• 2 Boys need to be more advantageous
• higher costs of girls (protection and care,
  marriage expenses, dowry, etc.)
• boys also more profitable as a source of
  economic support to parents throughout life
• 3 Boys also traditionally required
• for rituals, perpetuation of the family line,
  inheritance

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Synthesis
Old methods
New technology, abortion
Infrastructures
Able
Law enforcement
Sex selection
Economics of son preference
Ethics
Socioeconomic rationale
Willing
Rituals
Prestige
Fertility decline
Social change and gender equity
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• Why avoid girls ?
• A tragedy of the commons

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• Tragedy of the commons a situation in which
  individual interest gradually destroys a public
  good enjoyed by everyone (such as for
  environmental degradation).
• Is the current sex ratio crisis an emerging
  tragedy of the commons in which families by
  artificially rising the probability to bear boys
  will cause collective disaster ?

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• The scenario
• Avoiding female births carries social or economic
  advantages for many households
• Given the availability of appropriate methods,
  many parents will therefore manipulate SRB
• Governments do not know, do not want to
  interfere, or do not fear consequences
• Negative consequences (externalities) affecting
  every one, but only after a 25-year lag and
  self-regulation may come to late

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Fighting against sex selection
Protecting the girl child
Monitoring new technology and their use
Supply-sideTechnology is not for sex selection
Enforcing the law to curb illegal use of prenatal
diagnostic
Sensitization on future gender imbalances
Balanced sex ratio
Positive discrimination and pro-girl policies
Demand-side Girls are beautiful
Giving women a larger role in traditions
Showcasing women's success
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Government interventions

• Supplycurbing the supply of sex selection
  methods customers, providers, facilitators
• Demand factorsCounterbalancing the disadvantage
  of daughters over sons transfers and benefits
  towards girls, changing gender unfair laws,
  creating quotas, etc.
• Attitudes and mindsetChanging the gender bias
  through advocacy, sensitization, etc.

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Social change and mobilization

• 1 Media coverage of imbalances and their
  consequences
• 2 Local civil society initiatives
• 3 Exogenous social transformations womens
  employment and education, urbanization and
  economic change, etc.
• 4. Endogenous change self-corrective behaviour

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Future options (1)

• Spontaneous social change and laissez-faire
• Risky and lengthy
• Diffusion to new segments of society
• Impact of increasing prosperity, education,
  urbanization, improved private health care
• New technology

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Future options (2)

• Ensuring proper monitoring of sex ratio trends
  using reliable local statistics
• Regulating sex determination and curbing illegal
  sex selection
• Tackling the demand side to address gender
  inequity in society through targeted campaigning,
  legislation, subsidies, etc.

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SRB in South Korea, 1970-2005
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A summary

• Sex selection is only a part of a wider
  environment of gender violence and discrimination
• It is a new trend closely related to the
  diffusion of sex selection technology
• Its full impact will be only felt by society in
  the coming decades when it is too late to correct
  it
• Possible policy interventions are numerous,
  diverse and often effective.

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Thank you