Gendercide Crisis CAN the LETHAL PREJUDICE AGAINST GIRLS BE CHANGED?

OCT. 4, 2011 VOLUME 5, NUMBER 19 PAGES 473-498 WWW.GLOBALRESEARCHER.COM Gendercide Crisis CAN THE LETHAL PREJUDICE AGAINST GIRLS BE CHANGED?

n estimated 160 million babies in China, India and other Asian countries have been aborted or killed

over the last 30 years — just because they were girls — in a phenomenon some are calling

“gendercide.” A strong cultural preference for sons has existed for centuries in Asia. But in recent A decades anti- female bias has combined with falling fertility rates, China’s coercive one-child policy, new, high-tech prenatal gender-detection tools and widespread access to abortion to produce unprecedented gender

imbalances in the region. An alarming shortage of females is changing the fabric of societies, with many villages so

devoid of women the men cannot find wives. Governments are struggling to reverse societal attitudes toward daugh -

ters, but the changes will be too late for the 30-50 million Chinese men who over the next 20 years won’t be able

to marry. The gender imbalance already has led to increased kidnapping and trafficking in women and higher

prostitution rates in the area. And ex -

perts worry that having so many un -

married men could threaten stability and

security, because studies show that having

large numbers of unattached young males

leads to “the criminalization of society.”

A New Delhi billboard encourages parents to save their baby girls. Some 600,000 female fetuses are aborted in India each year. Governments in India and other Asian countries have launched mass publicity campaigns to promote the value of daughters and reverse an alarming gender imbalance across the region.

PUBLISHED BY CQ PRESS, A DIVISION OF SAGE WWW.CQPRESS.COM GENDERCIDE CRISIS

THE ISSUES The Scope of Asia’s 477 ‘Missing’ Females • Should China rescind its The number surpasses the U.S. Oct. 4, 2011 475 one-child policy? female population. Volume 5, Number 19 • Should abortions be Banned Dowry System more restricted, in order 478 MANAGING EDITOR: Kathy Koch to prevent sex-selective Perpetuates Infanticide [email protected] Families kill or abort girls to abortions? avoid paying dowries. CONTRIBUTING EDITORS: Thomas J. Billitteri • Did the West cause [email protected]; Thomas J. Colin [email protected] Asia’s epidemic of sex- Asian Countries Have selective abortions? 480 Most Males CONTRIBUTING WRITERS: Brian Beary, Seven out of the top 10 Roland Flamini, Sarah Glazer, Reed Karaim, BACKGROUND male-to-female birth ratios Rob ert Kiener, Jina Moore, Jennifer Weeks are in Asia. DESIGN /P RODUCTION EDITOR: Olu B. Davis An Ancient Practice 484 Killing offspring helped 483 India’s Gender Gap Is ASSISTANT EDITOR: Darrell Dela Rosa prevent starvation. Growing FACT CHECKER: Michelle Harris The population in low girl-to- 487 Population Worries boy ratio states has doubled. Governments worried about Chronology a population explosion. 485 Key events since 1953. \ ‘Momentous Problem’ How South Korea Reversed 488 The gender imbalance 486 Anti-Female Bias emerged in the 1980s. Women’s roles have changed dramatically. A Division of SAGE VICE PRESIDENT AND EDITORIAL DIRECTOR: CURRENT SITUATION East Asia Has Highest Jayne Marks 488 Gender Imbalance The East Asia-Pacific region DIRECTOR, ONLINE PUBLISHING: ‘Bare Branches’ Todd Baldwin 489 Some 30-50 million Chinese has the highest boy/girl ratios. men won’t find wives. At Issue 491 Are sex-selective abortions Copyright © 2011 CQ Press, A Division of Trafficking, Kidnapping really “elective”? SAGE. SAGE reserves all copyright and other 489 and Crime rights herein, unless pre vi ous ly spec i fied in The scarcity of women is Voices from Abroad writing. No part of this publication may be fueling the sex trade. 498 Headlines and editorials from reproduced electronically or otherwise, with - around the world. out prior written permission. Un au tho rized re pro duc tion or trans mis sion of SAGE copy - OUTLOOK right ed material is a violation of federal law FOR FURTHER RESEARCH car ry ing civil fines of up to $100,000. Cultural Shifts? 492 For More Information CQ Press is a registered trademark of Con - Some say the gender 495 gressional Quarterly Inc. imbalance will worsen Organizations to contact. before improving. CQ Global Researcher is pub lished twice Bibliography monthly online in PDF and HTML format by 496 Selected sources used. CQ Press, a division of SAGE Publications . IDEBARS AND RAPHICS Annual full-service electronic subscriptions S G The Next Step start at $500. For pricing, call 1-800-834-9020, 497 Additional articles. China and India Have the ext. 1906. To purchase CQ Global Researcher 476 Most Male Births electronic rights, visit www.cqpress.com or Citing CQ Global Researcher call 866-427-7737. At least 160 million baby 497 Sample bibliography formats. girls are “missing.”

Cover: AFP/Getty Images/Raveendran

474 CQ Global Researcher Gendercide Crisis BY ROBERT KIENER

lation of the United States,” THE ISSUES says award-winning journalist Mara Hvistendahl, a Beijing- s attendants in a based correspondent for Sci - morgue in Karachi, ence magazine and author of A Pakistan, tenderly the 2011 book Unnatural Se - washed the bodies of two tiny lection: Choosing Boys Over lifeless infants — both girls — Girls and the Consequences of volunteer Mohammed Saleem a World Full of Men. 8 explained that they had been In addition to China and found dead in a garbage dump. India, “sex-selective abortions,” “They can only have been or pregnancies terminated one or two days old” when they solely because of the gender were left to die, he said. 1 of the fetus, have claimed In another Karachi morgue thousands of female lives in a visitor was shown a walk- Taiwan, the Balkans, Arme - in freezer containing five linen nia, Georgia and even among pouches, each about the size some immigrant populations of a loaf of bread. Inside each in the United States and other z e

was the tiny corpse of a new - p industrialized nations. o L

born, also abandoned at birth. And the toll is rising, as e p

Such gruesome scenes are p modern ultrasound and i l i common in Pakistan, where h P abortion facilities have be - / s

last year more than 1,200 e come increasingly wide - g a

newborns were killed and m spread in recent decades. I

y t

abandoned — about 100 a t Up to 12 million girls were 2 e month. About nine out of G aborted in India alone over /

3 P 10 of the victims were girls. F the past 30 years, accord - A “Sometimes they hang Far more boys than girls are born in China, creating a massive ing to a recent Lancet study. them, and sometimes they kill shortage of females. Abortions of female fetuses have While about 2 million girls’ by the knife, and sometimes skyrocketed since 1980, when prenatal gender-detection deaths were attributed to we find bodies which have technology came into widespread use just as China was gender-selective abortions instituting its one-child population-control policy. The resulting been burned,” said Anwar shortage of females means that by 2030, when these two young during the 1980s, the toll in Kazmi, a manager of the boys from Shanghai will be looking for brides, only one in five India increased to 6 million Edhi Foundation, Pakistan’s Chinese men — up to 50 million — won’t be able to find a wife. during the 2000s — or about largest private social service 600,000 per year. 9 agency. 4 The number of such care for their husband and his fam - Although abortion statistics are not murders in Pakistan was up 20 per - ily. Many other girls die soon after generally released in China, the state- cent in 2010 over 2009, and many of - birth from neglect or starvation — run media reported in 2009 that more ficials say hundreds of other bodies part of what some experts call “a than 13 million abortions were per - are never found. 5 global war on baby girls.” 6 formed that year alone . 10 While no Why is this horrific slaughter of in - Indeed, over the last 30 years at one really knows how many of those fants happening? In Pakistan, as in least 160 million baby girls have been were female, a Chinese researcher in several other countries, girls are often aborted or killed because of their sex 1996 found that 85 percent of all abort - killed at birth or aborted because in South and East Asia alone, ac - ed fetuses in rural Zhejiang Province, they are viewed as economic liabil - cording to demographers such as on the southeastern coast, were fe - ities for whom an expensive dowry Christophe Guilmoto, at the Paris- males. 11 And demographers point to could be required. Boys are preferred based Research Institute for Devel - China’s heavily skewed ratio of male- because in such cultures males tra - opment (IRD). 7 to-female births to further confirm that ditionally care for their aging par - “The number of these ‘missing girls’ the vast majority of abortions must have ents, while daughters leave home to is more than the entire female popu - been females.

www.globalresearcher.com Oct. 4, 2011 475 GENDERCIDE CRISIS

China and India Have the Most Male Births Far more boys than girls are born in China, India and a handful of other countries with traditional preferences for boys. According to demographers, at least 160 million baby girls have been aborted or killed after birth because of their sex in South and East Asia alone over the last 30 years — more than the entire female population of the United States. Experts say the increases are the result of easy access to inexpensive sonograms (to determine fetal sex) and gender-selective abortions. China’s one-child policy is also blamed for part of the country’s gender imbalance: 113 boys are born for every 100 girls (a 1.13 ratio of male-to-female births).

Comparing Global Sex Ratios

MACEDONIA ALBANIA GEORGIA AZERBAIJAN PAKISTAN SAN MARINO

CHINA TAIWAN INDIA VIETNAM

SINGAPORE

Male-to-Female GRENADA Birth Ratio: 1.01-1.019 1.02-1.049 1.05-1.079 1.08-1.10 Above 1.1

Source: “Sex Ratio,” The World Factbook , Central Intelligence Agency, 2011, https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/Þelds/ 2018.html; and “Pakistan Demographic Survey,” 2007. Map by Lewis Agrell

Worldwide, between 102 and 106 Fund, 113 boys are born for every 100 American Enterprise Institute (AEI). “This males normally are born for every 100 girls in China; the ratio is 112 to 100 is a phenomenon utterly without nat - females — a ratio that has held con - in India and 110 per 100 females in ural precedent in human history.” 13 stant for as long as populations have Pakistan. 12 (See chart, p. 480. ) “Girls are seen as a burden, as a been measured. In China, however, Population experts say such high property which belongs to somebody that ratio jumped to around 108 males sex ratios are biologically impossible else, so people see that as a waste of per 100 females in the late 1980s, and without outside intervention. “These money and the wasting of an education to a significantly skewed 124 males sex ratios have become completely un - of a girl,” explained Bhagyashri Dengle, by the early 2000s. Today, according hinged,” wrote Nicholas Eberstadt, a executive director of Plan India, a chil - to the United Nations Population demographer with the conservative dren’s advocacy group in New Delhi.

476 CQ Global Researcher “Then, when the girl gets married, the families have a big, heavy dowry.” 14 The Scope of Asia’s “Missing” Female Problem In a handful of Asian cultures, tra - Asia is “missing” 160 million females who were either aborted or killed at birth dition obligates brides’ families to pay cash or goods to a groom’s family. over the last 30 years. The total exceeds the 2010 female population of the (See sidebar, p. 478. ) Although banned United States as well as the total number of casualties from all of the major in India since 1961, the practice is still wars of the 20th century. widespread, especially in rural areas, Putting Asia’s Missing Females in Perspective where a dowry can cost a family sev - (in millions) eral times its annual income. 200 As a World Health Organization (WHO) report notes, “Female infanti - 160 157 cide is still practiced in many parts of 150 the world, sometimes through direct violence but also by intentional ne - 100 glect or starvation. This is particular - 116-132 ly the case where male children are considered more valuable than females. 50 This attitude may also be manifested in traditions such as costly dowry oblig - 0 ations placed on the families of prospec - Missing Asian Females in the Casualties from major tive brides.” 15 females U.S., 2010 20th-century wars* Many refer to the prejudice for males as “son preference,” and it is reflect - * Korean War (2 million); Vietnam War (350,000); Soviet Revolution (7 million); Stalin’s Great ed in ancient traditions. A Chinese Purge (10 million); World War I (35 million); World War II (including Holocaust and Chinese poem from the first millennium B.C. Revolutions) (62-78 million). proclaims: “When a son is born/Let Sources: Christophe Z. Guilmoto, “Sex-ratio imbalance in Asia: Trends, consequences and policy him sleep on the bed/Clothe him with responses,” UNFPA; U.S. Census Bureau; Digital History ; Spartacus Educational; BBC News; PBS; fine clothes/And give him jade to play Telegraph , October 2008 . . ./When a daughter is born,/Let her sleep on the ground,/Wrap her in in Asia, allowing a fetus’ gender to be women have fewer babies. In the late common wrappings,/And give broken determined safely and cheaply. 1960s, for instance, the average Asian tiles to play.” 16 Use of the machines spread rapidly woman had 5.7 children, one of them In India, the well-known saying, in India and China. A clinic ad in India, likely a boy. By 2006 family size had “raising a daughter is like watering for instance, reminds customers of the dropped to 2.3 children, and the your neighbor’s garden,” reflects the huge economic costs of bearing a fe - chances of having a boy had fallen belief that sons are typically seen as male child: “Better 5,000 rupees [about to 24 percent. 19 In China, meanwhile, breadwinners who will eventually care $100] now than 500,000 later.” 17 the government decreed that couples for their aging parents, while daugh - Sex-selective abortions boomed as should have only one child. To get a ters will leave to take care of their patients who wanted a son, but could son, couples would often sacrifice husband’s family. An Indian proverb never bring themselves to kill a baby their unborn daughter. bluntly notes, “Eighteen goddess-like daughter, chose abortion. So many “It’s a combination of factors,” says daughters are not equal to one son females were aborted that China and demographer Eberstadt. “There is the with a hump.” India eventually made it illegal for longstanding and widespread prefer - Although cultural preferences for sons ultrasound operators to disclose the ence for boys, rapidly spreading pre - go back for millennia, the number of sex of the fetus to parents. Today natal sex-determination technology and female abortions has skyrocketed since 36,000 registered sonography centers declining fertility rates.” * 1980, when China instituted its one- operate in India — and countless oth - Population-control programs fund - child policy, aimed at controlling run - ers illegally. 18 ed by Western organizations, such as away population growth. That’s also the Falling birth rates also contributed year when the General Electric Co. to the rise in sex-selective abortions. * The fertility rate is the average number of (GE) began selling ultrasound machines As education and income levels rise, children a woman has over her lifetime.

www.globalresearcher.com Oct. 4, 2011 477 GENDERCIDE CRISIS the World Bank and the International and prostitution are on the rise — all nomic and social planning, and last year, Planned Parenthood Federation, fur - attributed at least in part to the gen - on its 30th anniversary, the government ther contributed to the problem, claims der imbalance. showed no signs of scrapping it. Hvistendahl. Many of the programs, As demographers, human rights ex - Li Bin, head of China’s National Pop - which advocated abortion and family perts and policymakers confront what ulation and Family Planning Commis - planning, influenced strict population some have called a rising tide of gen - sion, confirmed there were no imme - targets in China, India and elsewhere, dercide, here are some of the ques - diate plans to change the policy. she says. tions they are asking: “Historical change doesn’t come easi - Due to China and India’s massive ly, and I . . . extend profound grati - populations, their sex-ratio imbalances Should China rescind its one- tude to all, to the people in particu - are affecting the global ratio of men child policy? lar, for their support of the national to women. “The world is undergoing When China introduced its one-child course,” Li said. “So, we will stick to a demographic shift that is tilting our policy in September 1980, the govern - the family planning policy in the com - population in favor of men,” Hvisten - ment said it was a temporary measure ing decades.” 21 dahl explains, predicting massive reper - to offset high unemployment and food According to its backers, the one- cussions in the future. shortages. “In 30 years, when our cur - child policy has played a key role in “For example,” she notes, “by 2030 rent extreme population growth eases, China’s stunning economic progress by: one in five Chinese men will not be we can then adopt a different popula - • Reducing the nation’s population able to find a wife.” Already there are tion policy,” the Communist Party Cen - growth by as much as 400 mil - reports of Chinese men having to im - tral Committee said. 20 lion people; port foreign brides, and human traf - Since then, however, the policy has • Helping China conserve food and ficking, kidnapping, forced marriages become a cornerstone of China’s eco - energy; Banned Dowry System Perpetuates Infanticide Families kill or abort baby girls to avoid — or get — the illegal payments.

n Sagarpur, a lower-middle-class area in New Delhi, Kul - often can be the equivalent of several years of income, which want wept as she described how her husband and his fam - can ruin a poor family. Moreover, dissatisfaction with the amount Iily — desperate for a male heir — beat her regularly and of the dowry often results in violence, such as “bride burning,” forced her to have abortions until she bore a son. torture, murder or the forced suicide of a young wife. Dowry- After she had three daughters, she said, the family became related crimes are difficult to prosecute, however, because they enraged and once even tried to set her on fire. “They were often are disguised as accidents or suicides. angry. They didn’t want girls in the family,” she recalled. “They To avoid having to pay a dowry, many poor parents who wanted boys so they could get fat dowries” from the brides’ cannot afford prenatal gender testing or an abortion will kill their families. 1 infant girls instead. In Pakistan last year, about 100 newborns a The mother-in-law told Kulwant that her husband would di - month (most of them girls) were killed and left in garbage dumps vorce her “if I didn’t bear a son,” Kulwant recalled. Whenev - or by the side of the road. ( See main story, p. 475. ) er she got pregnant again, the family forced her to have a Families also are driven to abort or kill baby girls by the sonogram to determine the sex of the fetus and then ordered Asian tradition that a son supports his elderly parents while her to abort female fetuses three times until she finally pro - married daughters care for their husbands and aging inlaws. duced a boy. Sons “are the equivalent of an Indian 401(k) retirement plan,” Such stories are commonplace in India and other countries writes Prabhat Jha, director of the Centre for Global Health Re - where a preference for sons is driven in part by the dowry search at the University of Toronto. ( See “At Issue,” p. 491. ) system, a traditional marriage custom that India outlawed 40 “The parents feel that the boy is a help for the future, years ago. Dowries — once observed in much of the ancient where the girls are a liability,” said Kailash Satyarethi, a world — have disappeared in most cultures but still hold sway founder of the India-based human rights group Global March. in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and parts of China. “If we spend money on her, then we have to spend money Dowries typically are cash or goods, such as expensive tele - on her marriage, dowry probably, and then if something goes vision sets and appliances, that a bride’s family must give the wrong, then we are always sufferers. So better that that girl groom and his family at marriage. The amount demanded today is not born.” 2

478 CQ Global Researcher Dowry abuses led to the 1961 Dowry Prohibition Act, which prohibits the request, payment or acceptance of a dowry. Viola - tions are punishable by fines and up to six months in jail, but en - forcement is lax. More than 8,300 dowry-related deaths were re - 3 L ported in India in 2009; only one-third resulted in convictions. D / G

Ironically, with up to 160 million Asian women “missing” S J

r

due to sex-selective abortions and the murder of newborn girls, u h t

a critical shortage of marriageable women has developed in a M

countries such as India and China. As a result, experts say, . B / s

some families will be able to demand a higher “bride price” r e t

for their daughters — money or goods paid by a groom’s fam - u e

ily to a bride’s family. Much less common than dowries, the R paying of a bride price is another ancient marriage tradition New appliances — part of her initial dowry — surround Indian bride still practiced in some rural areas of India, China, Thailand and Nisha Sharma as she displays her wedding invitation. Sharma parts of Africa. balked when her fiancée’s family made additional dowry demands. She called off their wedding just hours before the ceremony in Already, many men in India who cannot afford a bride price New Delhi. Fear of someday facing ruinous dowry demands are becoming resigned to the fact that they may never marry. prompts many Indian parents to abort female fetuses. Babulal Yadav, a 50-year-old farmer from the Indian state of

Haryana, where men far outnumber women, said, “I’m used to 2 4 Corey Flintoff, “Selective abortions blamed for girl shortage in India,” NPR, being alone. But I want a son.” April 14, 2011, www.npr.org/2011/04/14/135417647/in-india-number-of-female- — Robert Kiener children-drops. 3 See National Crimes Records Bureau, “Figures at a Glance, 2009,” http:// ncrb.nic.in/CII%202009/cii-2009/figure%20at%20a%20glance.pdf. 1 Geeta Pandey, “India’s unwanted girls,” BBC, May 22, 2011, www.bbc.co.uk/ 4 “Haryana’s lonely bachelors,” The Economist , March 4, 2010, www.economist. news/world-south-asia-13264301. com/node/15604465.

• Allowing children to be better emy of Social Sciences. “All these are the international community to pressure educated and receive better health obstacles to economic development China to revoke the one-child policy.” care; and, and environmental protection. The gov - When U.S. Vice President Joe Biden • Allowing parents to save more ernment is already finding it difficult visited China recently and told his hosts, money, which in turn has enabled to control the birthrate because of the “Your policy has been one which I banks to fund huge infrastructure huge population. Even if we follow fully understand — I’m not second- expansion projects. the existing family-planning policy, the guessing — of one child per family,” Furthermore, say one-child propo - population will grow by more than 10 he was immediately attacked for ap - nents, a smaller population helps million a year.” 22 pearing to sanction the policy. House boost personal income, improves the But critics say it is time to abolish the Speaker John Boehner, R-Pa., like Biden, environment and guarantees a better policy. Many, especially anti-abortion ad - a Roman Catholic, echoed many West - quality of life. “People who oppose vocates, claim it violates reproductive ern critics of the policy: “No govern - the family-planning policy should con - rights. Reggie Littlejohn, an American ment on Earth has the authority to sider some pressing problems we are attorney who founded Women’s Rights place quotas on the value of innocent already facing: depleting water sources, Without Frontiers, an international coali - human life, or treat life as an eco - receding underground water tables, tion that opposes forced abortion and nomic commodity that can be regu - pollution of rivers and lakes, deserti - sexual slavery in China, says, “For the lated and taken away on a whim by fication, accelerating extinction of Chinese Communist Party to function as the state.” 23 species, rising emission of greenhouse ‘womb police,’ wielding the very power Critics say the policy not only has gases and fast-disappearing natural re - of life and death over the people of resulted in the deaths of millions of sources,” said Li Xiaoping, a researcher China is a terrible violation of both girls but also has skewed China’s sex with the Institute of Population and women’s rights and human rights. After ratios to the point that today millions Labor Economy at the Chinese Acad - 30 years of such a legacy, it is time for of Chinese men cannot find wives.

www.globalresearcher.com Oct. 4, 2011 479 GENDERCIDE CRISIS

Wei, a professor at Renmin Universi - Asian Countries Have Most Males ty’s Population and Development Re - search Institute. And there will be Seven of the 10 countries with the world’s highest male-to-female birth ratios fewer working-age citizens to support are in Asia, led by China with 113 males born for every 100 females (a sex this aging population, he added. 28 ratio of 1.13). Despite the mounting criticism of its one-child policy and the resultant Countries with Highest Male-to-Female jump in sex-selective abortions, China Birth Ratios, 2011 (est.) shows little evidence that it plans to abolish the policy. “The momentum of China 1.133 fast growth in our population has been Armenia 1.124 controlled effectively, thanks to the India 1.120 family-planning policy,” explained Ma Albania 1.118 Jiantang, head of the National Bureau Vietnam 1.117 of Statistics. 29 China has, however, at - Azerbaijan 1.116 tempted to stave off female abortions Georgia 1.113 by allowing rural families, where son Pakistan 1.100 preference is strongest, to have a sec - Grenada 1.098 ond child if their first is a girl. San Marino 1.095 Some experts say the jump in sex- selective abortions and skewed sex ra - World average 1.070 tios should convince the government 0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0 1.2 to change its stance. Mu Guangzong, Source: “Sex Ratio,” The World Factbook , Central Intelligence Agency, 2011, https://www.cia. a professor of demography at Beijing gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/Þelds/2018.html; “Pakistan Demographic Survey,” 2007 University, noted, “Having a balanced population is more important and “The one-child limit is too extreme,” longevity. Eventually, experts say, challenging than curbing the size of said Ye Tingfang, a historian at the each child from a one-child family the population.” 30 Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. will have to care for two parents and Activist Littlejohn is more critical: “It violates nature’s law, and in the four grandparents. By 2040, accord - “China’s one-child policy causes more long run will lead to Mother Nature’s ing to some estimates, China will have violence against women and girls than revenge.” 24 400 million people over 65, a quar - any other policy on Earth, than any of - Other observers note that the drop ter of the population. Chinese com - ficial policy in the history of the world.” in China’s fertility rate, from 5.8 chil - panies are already reporting shortages dren per woman, on average, in of young workers. 26 Should abortions be more re - 1950 t o an estimated 1.4 children As The Economist noted recently, stricted, in order to prevent sex- today, reduces the need for the 13.3 percent of China’s population is selective abortions? policy. 25 “The one-child policy was over age 60 — up from 10.3 percent The shocking reality of Asia’s 160 unnecessary,” says Steven W. Mosh - in 2000, while those under 14 dropped million “missing girls” has intensified er, president of the Population Re - from 23 percent of the population to the debate over the morality of — and search Institute, a self-described “pro- 17 percent. “A continuation of these justification for — abortion. life” group in Virginia. “Birth rates trends will place ever-greater burdens Abortion foes — especially those in were already falling in the 1970s and on the working young who must sup - the West — call the region’s hundreds would probably have continued to port their elderly kin, as well as on of thousands of sex-selective abortions fall to today’s rates because of government-run pension and health- “murders,” and describe the aborted fe - China’s urbanization, industrialization care systems,” the magazine said. male fetuses as “victims.” For abortion and rising levels of education.” “China’s great ‘demographic dividend’ opponents, voluntarily terminating a Many observers say Mother Na - (a rising share of working-age adults) pregnancy is not a right, and is never ture’s “revenge” already can be seen is almost over.” 27 acceptable. New York Times columnist in the rapid aging of China’s popu - Seniors’ pensions and health-care Ross Douthat says the debate over sex- lation, the result of the one-child pol - expenses will become a “very severe selective abortions should not be about icy, lower fertility rates and increased burden” on China’s budget, said Chen the morality of sex selection but about

480 CQ Global Researcher abortion itself: “The tragedy of the 160 an abortion. “We call them ‘coffee- bar issue of sex-selective abortion?” asks million missing girls isn’t that they’re abortions,’ ” he explained, “She comes Mosher, of the Population Research In - ‘missing,’ ” he wrote recently. “The in for an abortion and relaxes at a stitute. “I challenge the National Or - tragedy is that they’re dead.” 31 coffee bar afterwards. By the early ganization for Women and other fem - But women’s-rights activists argue 1990s, no one who didn’t want a daugh - inist groups to join us in the battle to that banning or drastically restricting ter needed to have one.” 33 ban this terrible form of sex discrim - abortions takes away a woman’s right For anti-abortionists the argument ination that is killing so many unborn to choose whether to have an abor - against sex-selective abortion is clear- baby girls. Their continued silence tion. Legal abortions are relatively new cut: Abortion is wrong under any cir - only facilitates the killing.” to Asia, they note, and outlawing them cumstances. Period. When asked to explain the organi - would curtail women’s rights. “No one But organizations that support zation’s position on sex-selective abor - in Asia who is combating sex selec - abortion or family planning face a tion, NOW president Terry O’Neill never tion is arguing that the appropriate re - action to decades of violating women’s rights is to swing in the opposite di - rection and violate them further,” says author Hvistendahl. “Just as a woman should not be forced to abort a want - ed pregnancy, she should not be forced to carry an unwanted preg - nancy to term.” And prohibiting all abortions will force women to “seek out back-street, unsafe abortionists,” warns University n of Toronto professor of public health a r d

Prabhat Jha, founder of Toronto’s Cen - n e e v

tre for Global Health Research. a R /

Carmen Barroso, regional director of s e g the International Planned Parenthood a m I

Federation (IPPF), noted, “Sex-selective y t t abortion will not be eliminated by re - e G / stricting access to abortion. In fact, it P F A will only increase the already high risk Women’s-rights activists in New Delhi in May 2006 protest the continued use of sex- of death or injury due to unsafe abor - selective abortion to eliminate female fetuses. Because of a cultural preference for sons, tion. The solution to skewed sex ratios pregnant women in India are often coerced by their husband’s families to abort a fetus is simple: invest in the health and rights if it is determined to be a girl, even though it is illegal to perform an ultrasound of girls and women.” 32 or an abortion for gender-preference purposes. New Delhi obstetrician Puneet Bedi believes India should do more to clamp tricky dilemma: After years of cam - replied to CQ Global Researcher ’s re - down on the illegal sex-selective abor - paigning for a woman’s right to de - peated requests for an interview. tions. “There are medical justifications cide whether to keep or end a preg - Some abortion advocates claim that for some abortions, and I am not in nancy, it’s hard now to attack women anti-abortionists are using the sex - favor of banning those,” he explains. for abusing that right. Thus, many are selective abortion issue to advance “But there is no excuse for a sex - reluctant to condemn sex-selective their own agenda. “Anti-abortion selective abortion, which is simply fe - abortions outright. The U.S.-based Na - groups and pundits have proven all male feticide. You can choose tional Organization for Women (NOW), too eager to take on the issue, though whether you want to be a parent, but for example, has been largely silent they seem far more interested in dri - once you do, you cannot choose on the issue. And its reticence leads ving home restrictions on abortion whether it’s a boy or a girl, tall or many to believe NOW is reluctant to than they do in increasing the num - short, black or white.” be seen opposing an indefensible type ber of women in the world and pro - Bedi explains that in India there is of abortion. tecting the rights of women at risk,” often little guilt connected with having “Where are the feminists on the writes Hvistendahl. 34

www.globalresearcher.com Oct. 4, 2011 481 GENDERCIDE CRISIS

With many countries already banning abortion to the full extent of the law,” West during the 1960s, with many sex-selective abortions, few activists think the statement said. “Such an outcome scholars predicting an imminent pop - they can get nations to ban or further would represent a further violation of ulation explosion, including Stanford restrict abortions. Activists do, however, their rights to life and health as guar - University professor of population stud - hope they can get governments to en - anteed in international human rights ies Paul Ehrlich, author of the 1968 force existing laws banning sex-selective treaties and committed to in interna - bestseller The Population Bomb. abortions and abuses of ultrasound. tional development agreements.” 35 If “a simple method could be found Often criticized by both pro- and Eberstadt, the American Enterprise to guarantee that first-born children were anti-abortionists, international agencies Institute demographer, has called for a males, then population-control problems such as the United Nations Population global war on abortion. “To eradicate in many areas would be somewhat eased,” Fund (UNFPA) must walk a fine line sex-selective abortion, we must con - he wrote, pointing out that in many when addressing the issue of abor - vince the world that destroying female countries “couples with only female chil - dren keep trying, in hope of a son.” 37 Ehrlich was not the only one to suggest that approach to curbing pop - ulation growth. “Before long, sex se - “There is no excuse for a sex-selective abortion, lection emerged as a favored solution for the world’s growing population, es - which is simply female feticide. You can choose pecially in the developing world,” says Hvistendahl. whether you want to be a parent, but once you do, Birth-control programs, some advo - you cannot choose whether it’s a boy or a girl, cating abortions, were supported by a wide range of organizations. Indeed, tall or short, black or white. ” even President Nixon’s Secretary of State, Henry Kissinger, in 1974 signed — Puneet Bedi, a classified U.S. government memo that stated, “Abortion is vital to the solution” New Delhi obstetrician of world population growth.” 38 Efforts to study sex-selective abortion were extensive. For example: • In 1975, with funding from the tions. “These are human rights issues,” fetuses is horribly wrong,” he wrote. Rockefeller Foundation, doctors at explains Aminata Toure, chief of the “We need something akin to the abo - a government hospital in India UNFPA’s Gender, Human Rights and litionist movement: a moral campaign began sex-selective abortion trials, Culture Branch. “We are not about to waged globally, with the victories de - offering free amniocentesis * for go into a country and begin dictating clared one conscience at a time.” 36 poor women and then helping on such sensitive issues. Our main aim them, if they so chose, to abort is to solve this problem by raising the Did the West cause Asia’s epidem - the fetus on the basis of sex. An status of women.” ic of sex-selective abortions? estimated 1,000 women carrying In June, the UNFPA and four other When journalist Hvistendahl began female fetuses underwent abor - U.N. agencies issued a joint statement researching sex-selective abortion sev - tions. The doctors touted the on sex-selective abortions for the first eral years ago, she didn’t know it may study as a population-control ex - time. Although it referred to “gender- have been exported to developing periment, and sex-selective abor - biased sex selection” rather than using countries by Western nations such as tion spread throughout India. 39 the term “sex-selective abortion,” the the United States. • In 1976 International Planned statement warned against banning abor - “It wasn’t until I went to India and Parenthood Federation (IPPF) tions outright. met activists who told me to investi - “States have an obligation to ensure gate the history of American popula - * Amniocentesis involves removing some am - that these injustices are addressed with - tion organizations that I found the link,” niotic fluid from a pregnant woman’s uterus out exposing women to the risk of death she explains. to diagnose generic disorders but was also or serious injury by denying them ac - Concern about uncontrolled global used to determine the sex of the fetus before cess to needed services, such as safe population growth was intense in the sonograms were introduced.

482 CQ Global Researcher India’s Gender Gap Is Growing Gender-selective abortions have spread across India, resulting in up to 12 million fewer Indian girls being born over the past 30 years, according to a new study. Boys are more valued in Indian culture, and inexpensive sonograms are now widely available, making sex-selective abortions popular. Over the last decade, the percentage of the Indian population living in states with a very low ratio of fewer than 915 girls per 1,000 boys has more than doubled (bar graph). Ratio of Girls to Boys, 2001 and 2011 (per 1,000 boys under age 6)

Girls per 1,000 boys ≤ 915 916–950 ≥ 951 2001 No data 2011

Percent of India’s Population in States with Under 915 Girls per 1,000 Boys 2001 27% 2011 56%

Source: “Selective Abortion May Account for Up to 12 Million Missing Girls in India,” Centre for Global Health Research, Unive rsity of Toronto, May 24, 2011,www.cghr.org/index.php/2011/05/selective-abortion-may-account-for-up-to-12-million-missing-girls-in-india-new-lancet-study /. Map by Lewis Agrell

medical director Malcolm Potts policy was instituted, agencies such tion for the way in which their wrote, “Early abortion is safe, ef - as the UNPFA and the IPPF nonethe - governments have marshaled the fective, cheap and potentially the less increased funding of China’s resources necessary to imple - easiest method to administer.” 40 population-control program. “For ment population policies on a Others supported sex selection in example, notes Hvistendahl, “as massive scale.” 41 acad emic papers and government- late as 1983 IPPF requested in - Bedi, the Delhi-based obstetrician sponsored seminars. creased funding for China.” and anti-sex-selection activist, says that • Although many reports described • Also in 1983, the UNFPA praised both before and after abortion was le - coerced and sex-selective abor - one-child policies, noting, “We galized in India in 1971, “huge amounts tions in China after the one-child must record our deep apprecia - of Western money flowed into this

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country to fund population control. Deng Xiaoping. This was a period of Many of India’s elite doctors were isolation and modest opening-up, when trained by the West, and they were China was not much interested in West - BACKGROUND encouraged to see sex-selective abor - ern advice.” 44 tion . . . as a medical procedure.” Others note that while the West Early sex-selective abortions in India may have influenced and funded ear - were performed openly at government lier population programs in develop - An Ancient Practice hospitals. 42 “The West had a lot of ing countries, sex-selective abortions influence in making abortion accept - have steadily increased without West - nthropologists believe that infanti - able here,” says Bedi. “Eventually, with ern support. “The American establish - cide has been practiced through - the coming of amniocentesis and the ment helped create the problem, but A out history. Some historians claim that ready availability of ultrasound tech - now it’s metastasizing on its own,” ex - infanticide rates ranged from 15-50 per - nology, sex-selective abortions prolif - plained New York Times columnist cent of children born during prehis - erated. They were actually marketed Douthat. “The population-control move - toric times. 47 Finding enough food here in India.” Bedi now describes ment is a shadow of its former self, was a persistent problem, and killing ultrasound machines as “weapons of yet sex selection has spread inexorably offspring was seen as a way to pre - mass destruction.” with access to abortion.” 45 vent starvation. Others strongly disagree that the West Stung by criticism of its earlier role in As famed British biologist Charles is responsible “for the proliferation of funding such programs, the United Na - Darwin noted in his landmark 1871 ultrasound machines and their use in tions Population Fund no longer sup - book, The Descent of Man , “[Thomas] India and China,” explains the Univer - ports population-control programs. But Malthus has discussed these several sity of Toronto’s Jha. “They are a med - critics like Hvistendahl and others be - checks, but he does not lay stress ical innovation and would have been lieve the UNFPA is not doing enough to enough on what is probably the most adopted regardless of who was fund - directly combat sex selection, partly be - important of all, namely infanticide, ing or promoting them. This is simply cause it is afraid of getting tangled up especially of female infants, and the a worldwide diffusion of technology in abortion politics. “The agency’s lega - habit of procuring abortion. These prac - that was inevitable.” cy in the developing world continues to tices now prevail in many quarters of Likewise, evolutionary biologist Richard haunt its leaders, to the detriment of the world; and infanticide seems for - Dawkins at Oxford University said, “The women worldwide,” she says. “It is re - merly to have prevailed.” 48 ability to know the sex of a fetus is an luctant to address sex selection directly.” Prejudice against daughters — or a inevitable byproduct of medical benefits The UNFPA’s Toure disagrees, say - preference for sons — was another such as amniocentesis, ultrasound scan - ing the agency “has been raising common reason for female infanticide. ning and other techniques for the diag - alarms about this odious practice for In ancient Greece and Rome, infants nosis of serious problems. Should sci - more than 20 years. We called atten - who were handicapped or the “wrong” entists have refrained from developing tion to China’s skewed sex ratio when sex sometimes were left “exposed” after useful techniques, for fear of how they it first became apparent in the 1990 birth — typically placed inside a pot might be misused by others?” 43 census, and our advocacy helped per - left beside a road. A letter written by Others argue that it’s “demeaning” suade the government to outlaw sex a first century B.C. Roman husband to to think that the West could have so selection in 1994.” Since then, the fund his pregnant wife warned, “if it is a much influence abroad on such a sen - has sponsored forums and studies on male, let it live; if it is a female, ex - sitive issue. “Do you really believe that the causes and likely consequences of pose it.” 49 China or India could be that influenced sex selection in China and elsewhere. Because girls required expensive by the United States?” asks Paris-based “UNFPA has been a prominent leader dowries in Roman times, they were demographer Guilmoto. “It’s ridiculous.” in advocating against sex selection and considered of less value than males. China was essentially closed to the other practices that discriminate against In addition, sons could become wage West at the time, and there is little ev - girls and women,” she adds. earners and contribute to the family’s idence that it was influenced by the Rather than the West and other out - upkeep. A Roman maxim observed, West, said a reviewer of Hvistendahl’s side influences, many believe the true “Everyone raises a son, including a book: “China’s coercive population- blame lies with “the cultural and reli - poor man, but even a rich man will control policies were developed in the gious practices that despise and dis - abandon a daughter.” 50 late 1970s, at the end of the Cultural criminate against women in the first Revolution and the early reforms of place,” said biologist Dawkins. 46 Continued on p. 487

484 CQ Global Researcher Chronology

1980 sex determination. . . . South Korea 1950s-1970s China’s “temporary” one-child policy raises penalties for physicians who Abortion as population-control begins nationwide. provide prenatal sex determination. method spreads throughout Asia, with help of Western funding. 1987 1995 Bombay (now Mmbai) has 248 U.N.’s Fourth World Conference on 1953 ultrasound clinics offering sex- Women, in Beijing, classifies fe - Abortion becomes widely accessible determination services, up from male infanticide and prenatal sex in China. fewer than 10 in 1982. selection as acts of violence against women. 1960 1983 Vietnam legalizes abortion. U.N. Fund for Population Activities • — predecessor of today’s U.N. 1962 Population Fund (UNFPA) — Concerns about burgeoning popu - praises China’s one-child policy. 2000s-Present lation prompts South Korea to in - As sex ratios at birth become stitute a national family-planning 1985-1989 increasingly skewed, nations try campaign. China allows couples in rural to alter the gender misbalance. areas and those with daughters to 1968 have a second child. 2002 Stanford professor of population Nepal legalizes abortion but bans studies Paul Ehrlich warns in The 1987 prenatal sex determination and Population Bomb of impending South Korea bans prenatal sex de - sex-selective abortion. . . . China’s disaster if world population growth termination. . . . Indian society of census indicates the sex ratio of continues unchecked. obstetricians and gynecologists newborns is 116 boys to 100 girls. finds that out of 8,000 abortions, 1971 7,999 occurred after tests showed 2003 Law legalizing abortion goes into a female fetus. Vietnam bans sex-selective abor - effect in India. tion and all forms of sex determi - 1989 nation. 1973 China bans prenatal sex determi - South Korea legalizes abortions. nation and pre-implantation sex 2006 selection. The average number of children 1975 an Asian woman will have (her Rockefeller Foundation funds sex- 1990 fertility rate) drops to 2.3 children selective abortion trials at a gov - New York Review of Books publishes — from 5.7 in the late 1960s. ernment hospital in India. Nobel-Prize winning economist Amartya Sen’s essay on Asia’s 100 2010 1976 million missing females. . . . More India’s fertility rate drops to 2.7 Alarmed at India’s growing popula - than 116 Korean boys are born for children per woman — from 5.7 tion, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi every 100 girls. in the mid-1960s. establishes a program that sterilizes more than 7.8 million men between 1991 2011 in 1976-1977. UNFPA raises the issue of China’s Publication of book Unnatural Se - gender imbalance — the first in - lection re-ignites the global debate • ternational agency to speak out on sex-selective abortion when it about the problem. claims that 160 million females are “missing” from Asia. . . . China an - 1980s-1990s 1994 nounces a crackdown on anyone China’s one-child policy and China, with more than 100,000 ultra - using ultrasound to determine fetal drooping fertility rates lead to sound machines, bans sex-selective gender or performing sex-selective skewed birth ratios. abortion. . . . India bans prenatal abortions.

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How South Korea Reversed Anti-Female Bias Within a generation, women’s roles changed dramatically.

n South Korea, long one of Asia’s most patriarchal societies, men will soon find it difficult to find a wife. And because the having a son was the dream of almost every young couple. nation’s birth rate has dropped dramatically, the government is I“One son is worth 10 daughters,” goes a once-common saying. urging couples to have children — boys or girls. So when amniocentesis and ultrasound enabled couples to discover the sex of their unborn child, more and more cou - ples began aborting female fetuses. By 1990, so many were opting for sex-selective abortions that more than 117 Korean boys were born for every 100 girls — one of the highest birth sex ratios in the world . 1 The heavily skewed ratios prompted the government to ban prenatal gender selection. To underscore its concern, officials launched media campaigns designed to raise the status of fe -

males. For instance, the Love Your Daughter campaign featured e J 2 - the slogan, “One daughter raised well is worth 10 sons!” n o e Y

Because of the country’s closely controlled health system, g

the ban on sex selection and other factors, the sex ratio grad - n u J / ually improved. By 2007 it had dropped to a much less alarm - s e

3 4 g ing 107. Today it is around 106. a m I “Enforcement and media campaigns were only part of the y t t

solution,” says Paris-based demographer Christophe Guilmoto. e G “You also have to take into account South Korea’s changing / P F

society.” Two decades of dramatic economic growth had trans - A formed the nation’s agrarian society into an industrialized one, Daughters are now treasured in South Korea thanks to a massive he points out, resulting in fundamental changes. government campaign to reverse patriarchal, anti-female attitudes Rapid urbanization and a growing desire for smaller fami - that by 1990 had severely skewed gender ratios. Above, a girl plays happily in a fountain in downtown Seoul on June 20, 2011. lies also helped lower the ratio. Strengthening of the nation’s social safety net also helped to undercut the necessity of hav - ing a male child who, tradition dictated, would support his Newspaper executive Park He-ran, now in her 60s, remembers parents in their old age. Parents also began making and sav - how in an earlier era, when other women learned that she ing more money, having to depend less on their grown chil - had three sons and no daughters, they would enviously ask dren for economic support in their later years. what her secret was. Today, “They say they are sorry for my “The changing role of women has also made a major dif - misfortune,” she said. “Within a generation I have turned from ference,” explains Guilmoto. “They are working more and in the luckiest woman possible to a pitiful mother.” 8 better jobs, have more rights and have become more valuable. Their status and respect have vastly improved.” In 1981 fewer — Robert Kiener than one in 10 Korean women attended college, now it’s more than six out of 10. 5 1 “Gendercide: the worldwide war on baby girls,” The Economist , March 4, A 2010 survey reflects the startling change in preference for 2010, www.economist.com/node/15636231. 2 Choe Sang-hun, “Where boys were king, a shift toward baby girls,” The sons. Thirty-eight percent of expectant Korean mothers want - New York Times , Dec. 23, 2007, www.nytimes.com/2007/12/23/world/asia/ ed a daughter, compared to 31 percent who wanted a son. 23skorea.html?pagewanted=all. Among fathers-to-be, 37 percent wanted a daughter and 29 3 Ibid. percent a son. 6 4 CIA World Factbook. The diminished concern about sex-selective abortions led 5 Sang-hun, op. cit. the government recently to remove the ban on learning the 6 Lim Yung Suk, “S Korean parents now prefer daughters over sons,” Chan - nel News Asia , Feb. 18, 2010, www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/eastasia/view/ gender of a fetus. 1038190/1/.html. But Korea’s population problems are not completely solved. 7 “The gender ratio gets worse for marriageable Korean men,” Chosun Ilbo , There are 190,000 more men ages 29-33 than women ages 26- June 14, 2011, http://english.chosun.com/site/data/html_dir/2011/06/14/ 2011061400321.html. 30. By 2013 male 29-33-year-olds in Korea will outnumber 8 Sang-hun, op. cit. women by 360,000. 7 A large group of marriageable Korean

486 CQ Global Researcher Continued from p. 484 ner and were heads of their house - “Even if China’s population multi - In male-dominated ancient Persia, fe - holds. Under Mogul rule, however, re - plies many times, she is fully capable males also were seen as an economic strictions were placed on women, and of finding a solution; the solution is burden to a family with limited resources, their social status declined. By 600 B.C. production. . . . Of all things in the and infant girls were sometimes buried women had become subservient to world, people are the most precious,” alive immediately after birth. 51 men, were largely confined to their said Mao, outlawing birth control and In the seventh century A.D., the Mus - homes and could marry only if their contraceptives. 61 lim Prophet Muhammad expressly for - families paid big dowries. 57 China’s population exploded, and bade female infanticide. According to “It is clear that the onerous costs birth control was introduced in 1958, the Koran, “buried girls” will rise out involved with the raising of a girl, and only to be banned under the ruinous of their graves on Judgment Day and eventually providing her an appropri - Great Leap Forward, Mao’s attempt to ask why they were killed. 52 “And do ate marriage dowry, was the single modernize the economy. By 1962 the not kill your children for fear of pover - most important factor in allowing so - population had outstripped food ty,” the Koran also warns, “we give them cial acceptance of the murder at birth supply, and a massive famine claimed sustenance and yourselves too; surely in India,” explained Milner. 58 more than 30 million lives. 62 A pro - to kill them is a great wrong.” 53 The cultural preference for sons, paganda campaign and a government- In China, instances of female infanti - who traditionally take care of their el - sponsored population-control pro - cide are recorded as early as the sixth derly parents, also helped lower the gram saw China’s population drop by century B.C. Because girls would leave status of women. The murder of baby half between 1970 and 1976. Over - home when married, they were seen an girls is so common in India that it has population was still a concern, how - “expendable luxury,” historian Stephen its own term: kuzhippa , or “baby in - ever, and the one-child policy was in - Milner wrote. According to an ancient tended for the burial pit.” 59 troduced in 1980. Chinese proverb: “As to children, a father Nineteenth-century British colo - Meanwhile, birth control was in - and mother when they produce a boy nial overlords in India were so troduced in Indian hospitals in the congratulate one another, but when they shocked by female infanticide that 1950s, but the government did not in - produce a girl, they put it to death.” 54 they tried to quantify the problem. stitute family-planning programs until Female infanticide continued After a special 1868 census showed the late 1960s. In 1971, the Medical throughout Chinese history. In the late that only 22 percent of the people Termination of Pregnancy Act legal - 19th century, a missionary in China in communities suspected of com - ized abortion for several reasons, in - interviewed 40 women, who reported mitting infanticide were females, they cluding “the failure of a contraceptive having given birth to 183 sons and passed the Female Infanticide Act, device.” 63 175 daughters. But only 53 of the girls which punished infanticide with a jail By 1977 the population had reached had survived to age 10, compared with term of up to six months and al - 620 million, and Prime Minister Indira 126 of the boys. The missionary noted, lowed undernourished girls to be Gandhi pushed through a harsh pro - “by their own account the women had taken from their parents. 60 gram that called for mandatory ster - destroyed 78 of their daughters.” 55 By the 1901 census the situation ilization of males who had already According to American historian and had improved markedly to an overall fathered two children. Between April anthropologist Sarah Blaffer Hrdy, “In male-to-female sex ratio of 102.9 boys 1976 and January 1977, more than large cities like Beijing, wagons made per 100 females. Within a century, how - 7.8 million sterilizations were per - scheduled rounds in the early morn - ever, India’s sex ratio imbalance would formed. The government untruthful - ing to collect corpses of unwanted climb to alarming heights. ly claimed the sterilizations were vol - daughters that had been soundlessly untarily accepted, and the controversial drowned in a bucket of milk while program contributed to Gandhi’s failed the mother looked away.” One mother, Population Worries re-election bid. 64 Hrdy writes, reported killing 11 new - In 1962, South Korea, then one of born daughters. 56 n the middle of the 20th century, the world’s poorest countries, instituted While girls are much less valued Iwhen Mao Zedong’s Communist Party a family-planning campaign after the than boys in India today, that was not took control, China boasted that its government of Park Chung-hee became always the case. From 1500 to 800 B.C., half-billion population — more than concerned that the nation’s rapidly Indian women enjoyed equal status triple the size of the United States – growing population was undermining with men. They could become priests, gave China an economic advantage economic growth. The fertility rate fell had an equal say in choosing a part - over other countries. from 6.1 in 1960 to 4.2 in 1970. 65

www.globalresearcher.com Oct. 4, 2011 487 GENDERCIDE CRISIS

erated in South Korea, Singapore, Tai - East Asia Has Highest Gender Imbalance wan and especially in India, where they appeared in the remotest villages. The East Asia-PaciÞc region has the world’s highest number of baby boys — Clinics offering ultrasound services 113 per 100 girls — and South Asia has the second-highest number. popped up throughout India. In Bom - Sub-Saharan Africa has the lowest number of boys born per 100 females. bay alone, the number jumped from Blamed largely on the use of sex-selective abortion, high gender disparities at less than 10 in 1982 to 248 by 1987 . 70 birth in China and India — which together account for more than a third of There are between 70,000 and the world’s population — have signiÞcantly skewed the average global birth 100,000 ultrasound machines in India ratio, which is now 1.07. today, but fewer than half are regis - tered with the government, even though Male Births by Region, 2010 it is required by the 1994 Pre-natal (per 100 females) Diagnostics Technique Act. East Asia and PaciÞc 113 The widespread availability of ul - trasound testing had a dramatic ef - Excluding China 105 fect on sex-selective abortions. Ac - South Asia 107 cording to a 1987 study of 8,000 Excluding India 105 abortions, 7,999 occurred after tests Central, Eastern Europe and former Soviet republics 106 showed a female fetus. In another Middle East and North Africa 105 large study, 97 percent of the fetus - Latin America and Caribbean 105 es were female; the rest were of un - determined sex. 71 Sub-Saharan Africa 104 Developing countries (including India and China) 107 World 107 ‘Momentous Problem’

Source: “Boys and Girls in the Life Cycle,” UNICEF, 2011, www.childinfo.org/Þles/Gender_lo_res.pdf fter demographers, other experts Aand journalists began publicizing With Asia adding millions of citizens wrote journalist Hvistendahl. They be - the fate of Asia’s “missing” girls,” gov - to the global population, Western ob - lieved that larger populations resulted ernments began to take action. Many servers were growing increasingly con - in more poverty, which was a fertile cited Nobel-Prize winning Indian cerned. Ehrlich’s 1968 book painted a ground for the spread of communism. economist Amartya Sen’s 1990 essay grim picture: “The battle to feed all of The introduction of amniocentesis to in the New York Review of Books , “More humanity is over,” he wrote. “In the 1970s Asia in the mid-1970s gave prospective Than 100 Million Women Are Miss - hundreds of millions of people will parents an expensive and risky way to ing,” as a wakeup call. Missing females, starve to death in spite of any crash pro - discover the sex of their coming chil - Sen wrote, are “clearly one of the more grams embarked upon now. At this late dren. By the early 1980s, the procedure momentous, and neglected, problems date, nothing can prevent a substantial was so common in India that it was facing the world today.” 72 increase in the world death rate.” 66 known as the “sex test.” 67 In fact, in By the late 1980s governments re - During the 1960s and ’70s the Rock - a study of 11,000 couples who had un - alized that sex-selective abortions efeller Foundation, World Bank and dergone the procedure, nearly all ad - were producing skewed sex ratios and other organizations widely promoted mitted to using it “for the purpose of instituted strict controls on prenatal — and funded — birth control and aborting unborn female fetuses.” 68 sex selection. South Korea led the way population-control programs in the The arrival of far less expensive in 1987, followed by China in 1989, developing world. The efforts led to ultrasound technology in the 1980s India in 1994, Nepal in 2002 and Viet - claims the programs reflected the West’s brought the sex test to the masses. In nam in 2003. Restrictions included view that Asia’s growing population the late 1970s China imported ultra - limiting ultrasound use to authorized posed a threat. sound machines from the United States, clinics and making it illegal to reveal “Many in Washington were more con - most made by General Electric, and the sex of the fetus (except on med - cerned with the effect population growth in the 1980s began manufacturing them; ical grounds). 73 Sex-selective abor - was having on geopolitics as opposed by 1994 the country had more than tions were also banned in most coun - to the environment or the economy,” 100,000. 69 The machines also prolif - tries. At the Fourth World Conference

488 CQ Global Researcher on Women in Beijing in 1995, the United Nations listed both female in - fanticide and prenatal gender selection as acts of violence against women. Despite the bans, ultrasound usage has steadily increased and, based on sex ratios, so have sex-selective abor - tions. Enforcement has been spotty, and there have been few prosecutions. i

It is hard to prove that an ultrasound h s e operator has revealed the sex of a r u Q fetus; they may use verbal clues or r i nonverbal gestures (such as a “thumbs m a A /

up” if it is a boy). And while there s e g are frequent government crackdowns, a m I few violators are caught. y t t

Proving an abortion is sex selective is e G / equally difficult. Because ultrasounds P F and abortions are often done at sepa - A rate facilities, it is hard to prove a link. An abandoned baby girl sleeps safely at the Edhi Foundation, Pakistan’s largest charity. To battle the nation’s rampant gendercide, the foundation provides rows of empty cradles Few believe laws or prohibitions outside its offices, with signs urging: “Do not murder. Lay them here.” In 2010, about will do much to change the skewed 100 newborns — mostly girls — were killed and dumped in Pakistan sex ratios that have resulted from the each month, up 20 percent over 2009. widespread killing of unborn females unless societies stop valuing boys over his chance of finding a wife is “almost The shortage of women has begun girls. “Laws are good because they may zero.” Like tens of millions of other changing Indian society in alarming ways. act as a deterrent,” but sex-selective single men in China, known as “bare Brides’ families often ask for exorbitant abortions continue underground be - branches,” he is the victim of the na - “bride prices” – or money from a prospec - cause “people find more devious ways,” tion’s skewed sex ratios. tive groom — a reversal of the tradi - said Ravinder Kaur, a professor of so - Male residents of dirt-poor rural tional dowry system. ( See sidebar, p. 478. ) ciology at New Delhi’s Indian Institute settlements like Banzhushan — dubbed There are also reports of instances of Technology. 74 “bachelor villages” — have annual in - in which brides abscond with bride comes of less than $100, and the very prices worth several years’ of income. few marriageable women born in the “This women shortage is destabiliz - village usually are lured away by ing our community,” said Mohabbat more prosperous suitors from other Singh Chauhan, a community leader CURRENT 75 78 villages . Duan’s problem is common in Siyani. throughout China, and it will get worse If the present birth ratio continues, SITUATION over time. During the next two decades, by 2021 India will have 20 percent according to Li Shuzhuo, a professor of more men than women. 79 population studies at Xi’an Jiaotong ‘Bare Branches’ University in Xian, 30-50 million men will be unable to find wives. 76 Trafficking, Kidnapping India is also suffering from a short - and Crime he alarming shortage of females age of women. In the remote farming Tcaused by sex-selective abortions village of Siyani in Gujarat, Girish Rathod he scarcity of women in Asia means and female infanticide is changing the has been looking for a wife for 15 Tgirls are now seen as valuable com - fabric of Asian societies. years — since he was 20. “I am not modities on the black market, fueling In Banzhushan, a village perched alone in my search for a wife,” he said. a burgeoning sex trade in the region. high in the mountains of China’s cen - “Seventy percent of men in this village “The lack of women contributes to tral Hunan Province, 35-year old farmer are unmarried because we have very greater demand for prostituted women Duan Biansheng confesses sadly that few women to choose from.” 77 and girls . . . fueling the demand for

www.globalresearcher.com Oct. 4, 2011 489 GENDERCIDE CRISIS

victims of trafficking,” said Mark Lagon, ed by young, unmarried, low-status the sex of a fetus or performing who oversaw human rights issues at males,” said a recent study. “Because sex-selective abortions. Penalties the U.S. State Department during the they may lack a stake in the existing range from loss of medical licenses George W. Bush administration. 80 “The social order, it is feared that they will to criminal charges. 90 impact is obvious. It’s creating a ‘Wild become bound together in an outcast Given the difficulty of proving that West’ sex industry in China.” 81 culture, turning to antisocial behaviour an abortion was performed for sex- The situation in China is leading to and organized crime, thereby threat - selection purposes, most activists do “a new tsunami of demand” for sex traf - ening societal stability and security.” not hold out much hope for major fickers, according to Laura J. Lederer, a G. D. Bakshi, a senior fellow at the success. “China, for example, has shown former U.S. Department of State senior New Delhi-based security think tank little interest in prosecuting offenders,” adviser on trafficking and founder of Vivekananda International Foundation, says activist Littlejohn, of Women’s Rights The Protection Project, an anti-trafficking warns that the large numbers of un - Without Frontiers. “If it was really in - legal research institute at Johns Hopkins married men could lead to “the crimi - terested in saving lives, it would drop University. The State Department’s 2009 nalisation of society.” Shortages of fe - its one-child policy.” “Trafficking in Persons” report describes males “will aggravate aggressive Others applaud the countries for at China as a “source, transit and destina - tendencies — whether they manifest in least acknowledging the problem, pub - tion country for men, women and chil - internal conflict, armed rebellions or you licizing it and raising penalties. How - dren trafficked for the purposes of forced try and externalize conflict,” he said. ever, many experts believe that aware - labor and sexual exploitation.” 82 Although China, India, Vietnam ness and education are better “carrots” Many young girls are “bought” by and other nations have outlawed sex- than the “stick” of prosecution. farmers to guarantee wives for their selective abortion and prenatal gender- young sons when they come of age. testing, the laws have generally not Others who desire a bride but don’t want been strictly enforced. However, stung Valuing Girls to pay a high bride price resort to kid - by increasingly skewed birth ratios and napping. In July, police rescued 179 ba - international criticism, officials have re - he best way to solve the “missing bies, most of them girls, from kidnap - cently pledged to renew efforts to crack Tgirls” problem, says UNFPA’s pers. According to China’s state media, down on such abuses: Toure, is for communities to be edu - 39,194 cases of human trafficking have • In April, Indian Prime Minister cated as to “how necessary and valu - been reported since April 2009. 83 Manmohan Singh described the able females are to society.” It’s a long While spikes in trafficking, kidnap - killing of girls as a “national shame” process, she admits, calling for “pa - ping and prostitution can easily be and ordered policy planners to in - tience, planning and creativity.” Sim - traced to shortages of women, some crease efforts to stop sex-selective ply put, all countries need to raise the experts also say the rising population abortion. “The falling child sex ratio value of girls and women. of frustrated single men accounts for is an indictment of our social val - French demographer Guilmoto says rising crime rates. Indeed, a study in ues,” he said. 87 In a one-month that once daughters are offered better ed - China found that a 1 percent increase campaign the government seized ucational opportunities, they will be seen in the sex ratio (at birth) resulted in a 32 illegal ultrasound machines. 88 as less of an economic burden to fami - 5- to 6-point increase in the crime rate. • In May the Taiwanese Health Min - lies and will be more valued. One way “The increasing maleness of the young istry said it would impose fines on to do that, among other things, is to adult population in China may account doctors who perform sex-selective change “laws and customs that prevent for as much as a third of the overall rise abortions and revoke their licens - women from inheriting property,” he adds. in crime,” said the report’s author. 84 es under the new Physicians Act, Programs are being established to China’s crime rate has nearly doubled which forbids sex-selective abor - encourage parents to value their daugh - over the last two decades. 85 And be - tions. Officials also are considering ters and eschew sex-selective abor - tween 2003 and 2007, rape cases in India revising the law to allow offend - tions. For instance, India offers a stipend jumped by more than 30 percent and ers to face criminal charges . 89 of about $3,000 to parents who raise abductions by 50 percent. 86 • In an effort to achieve “a signif - and educate a girl until she is 18. Officials fear that the country’s icant rebalancing” of the sex ratio Under the Care for Girls program in “bare branches” are becoming even at birth by 2015, China recently parts of rural China, parents who have more aggressive. “Cross-cultural evi - announced an eight-month, multi- two girls get about a $150 annual life - dence shows that the overwhelming ministry crackdown on anyone time pension, plus educational bene - majority of violent crime is perpetrat - using ultrasound to determine Continued on p. 492

490 CQ Global Researcher At Issue:

Areyes sex-selective abortions really “elective”?

PRABHAT JHA , MD, D.PHIL. REGGIE LITTLEJOHN DIRECTOR , C ENTRE FOR GLOBAL HEALTH PRESIDENT , W OMEN ’S RIGHTS WITHOUT RESEARCH , U NIVERSITY OF TORONTO FRONTIERS

WRITTEN FOR CQ GLOBAL RESEARCHER , WRITTEN FOR CQ GLOBAL RESEARCHER , OCTOBER 2011 OCTOBER 2011

p to 12 million females were aborted selectively be - ome say sex-selective abortion is protected by a woman’s fore birth in India between 1980 and 2010 — about right to choose to terminate a pregnancy for any reason. u half just in the last decade. But four factors indicate s This view ignores the crushing social, economic, political that selective abortion is mostly an elective choice used by Indian and personal pressures that trample pregnant women carrying parents to control their family composition. girls in cultures with a strong son preference. All too often, First, over the past 20 years Indian girl-to-boy ratios fell for women in these cultures do not “select” their daughters for second births if the first child was a girl — but not if it was abortion. They are forced. a boy. Thus, Indian families appear to be allowing nature to In China, for example, the birth ratio of girls to boys is the decide the gender of their first child. But to ensure that they most skewed in the world: only 100 girls are born for every have at least one boy, more parents are aborting their second 120 boys in some places. Sons traditionally carry on the fami - child if ultrasound shows it to be a girl. ly name, work the fields and take care of their parents in old Second, unlike China, India does not enforce a one-child age. A daughter joins her husband’s family at marriage. There policy, so selective abortion of first births is not occurring, is an Asian proverb: “Raising a girl is like watering someone according to ythe data. Thired, declines isn girl-to-boy ratios for else’s garden.” nChina’s one-child po olicy exacerbates the under - second or later births were larger in better-educated and lying son preference. When couples are restricted to one wealthier households than in illiterate and poorer households, child, women often become the focus of intense pressure to and declines did not differ between Hindus and Muslims. ensure a boy. Coercion of female fertility choices would not be expected to A woman need not be dragged out of her home and show such patterns. strapped down to a table to be a victim of forced abortion. Finally, while large in absolute numbers, selective abortion Persistent emotional pressure, estrangement from the extended accounts for only a small minority (about 2-4 percent in 2010) family, threat of abandonment or divorce, verbal abuse and of all pregnancies carrying a girl. domestic violence often overpower women who otherwise While fertility has fallen substantially, Indians’ preference for would choose to keep their daughters. sons has not changed. (Sons traditionally care for their elderly Systematic, sex-selective abortion constitutes gendercide, parents in India, so they are the equivalent of an Indian 401K which has resulted in an estimated 37 million more men than retirement plan.) As income and education levels rise, more women in China today. The presence of these “excess males” Indian households can act on their son preference, and sex- is the driving force behind human trafficking and sexual slavery, selective abortion has spread widely. Today most Indians live not only within China but from surrounding nations as well. in communities where selective abortion of girls is common. Finally, China has the highest female suicide rate in the world. The road back to gender balance in India will be long and According to the World Health Organization, 500 women a difficult, but correct decisions can help make it possible. Re - day end their lives in China — further depleting the numbers stricting ultrasound or abortions may do more harm than of women. good. Routine ultrasound improves prenatal health, and re - A U.N. expert has estimated that the world is missing up stricting abortions could increase maternal deaths from unsafe to 200 million women — more than the total casualties of all abortions. India already loses more mothers in childbirth than the wars of the 20th century. And like war casualties, these any other country. women are not “missing.” They are dead. And unlike China, India can take advantage of its rich tra - It is a woman’s right to choose to give birth to her daughters. dition of public debate. The 2011 census can provide local Together, China and India comprise one third of the world’s data to enable community debates. In response to publicity, population. The fact that one-third of the world’s women are selective abortions appear already to have slowed somewhat being deprived of their right to bear girls is the biggest in North India since 2006. Finally, India’s government must do women’s rights abuse on Earth. It deserves a passionate re - a better job of shutting down the small number of physicians sponse from groups that stand for women’s rights. Forced who pno rofit from unlawful testing and abortion. abortion is not a choice.

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Continued from p. 490 Women,” depicts a village in the future an optimist, and I believe that in time fits. 91 Posters that once warned cou - that is populated by men only. the status of women around the world, ples it was illegal to have more than Changing long-held beliefs and tra - especially in nations where sex selec - one child have been replaced by signs ditions will be a challenge, but a noble tion is skewing the birth ratios, will extolling the virtues of having a daugh - one, notes Mosher, of the Population rise enough so there will no longer ter. Signs such as “You can abort it. But Research Institute: “Human beings are be a preference for boys over girls. you cannot give birth to it!” have been the ultimate resource — the one re - But we have a long way to go to help replaced in some areas by signs say - source you cannot do without.” make that happen.” She and others hope raising women’s status via educational and awareness programs will offset the long-held cul - tural and traditional customs of son preference. “Where are the feminists on the issue of sex-selective “There is hope,” says Paris-based abortion? . . . Their continued silence only demographer Guilmoto. “We are al - ready seeing some small signs of im - facilitates the killing. ” provement in parts of India. As more people become aware of the problem, — Steven W. Mosher, more are taking action to combat it.” Many point to South Korea where President, Population Research Institute skewed birth ratios have returned to more normal rates as a model to fol - low. ( See sidebar, p. 486. ) But some experts, like Toronto Uni - ing, “It is forbidden to discriminate versity’s Jha, believe the problem will against, mistreat or abandon baby girls,” In Karachi, the Edhi Foundation’s get worse before it gets better. “We and, “Our current family planning pol - Kazmi says change will come slowly. need to see real changes on the sup - icy is this, ‘Pay attention to the issue of In the meantime, his organization keeps ply side, such as governments crack - gender imbalance,’ ” and “Boy or Girl? more than 300 cradles in front of its ing down on illegal services, and so - Let Nature decide.” 92 offices throughout Pakistan so families cietal shifts, such as governments In India, doctors known as “girl child can drop off unwanted newborns instituting social security programs, be - champions” are working to convince (mostly girls). fore we will see numbers drop,” says their colleagues not to abort female fe - “It’s for awareness — please don’t kill Jha. Already, he says, there is evidence tuses. 93 Nongovernmental organiza - your innocent babies,” he said. 96 of some slight cultural shifts, such as tions support publicity campaigns pro - married women taking care of both moting the value of women and organize their aging parents and their in-laws. sting operations to help document “But until all these changes take hold, clinics that offer illegal sex-selective UTLOOK which will take decades,” he admits, 94 O abortions. “the problem will get worse before Plan India in New Delhi launched getting better.” an awareness program this year, Let Guilmoto and other demographers Girls Be Born. “I think we really need Cultural Shifts? admit that it is too late to help most to reach out to young people [to] cre - of the millions of “bare branches” — ate an awareness, to change attitudes the men in India, China and elsewhere and dispel the notion that having a hich scenario do you want, who will not be able to find wives. boy is better than a girl,” said execu - “W the good one or the bad one?” “We need to ask: How will society tive director Dengle. “Girls aren’t a says the UNFPA’s Toure when asked change to accommodate these guys?” sect; they are as good as boys.” 95 what the gender-imbalance problem he says. “Will they be forced to mi - Even Indian soap operas are drama - will look like in the future. grate? Will they be husbands of the tizing the harm India’s skewed birth “Some people see this crisis widen - same wife? Will societies need to have ratio is causing. The Indian movie, ing, but I don’t agree. I think we are new marriage rules? There are so “Matrubhoomi: A Nation Without making progress,” she explains. “I am many things we can’t imagine now.” In

492 CQ Global Researcher 20 years, he explains, governments won’t year, 40 years after Mao declared: p. 3, www.unfpa.org/webdav/site/global/ shared/ be as worried about sex-selective abor - “Times have changed, and today men documents/publications/2010/guide note_pre tions continuing to occur, but they’ll and women are equal. . . . Women natal_sexselection.pdf . 13 still be dealing with the effects of hold up half the sky.” 99 Eberstadt, op. cit. 14 today’s skewed birth rates. Sayah, op. cit. 15 “Addressing violence against women and By 2020 China will have more than achieving the Millennium Development Goals,” 20 million excess men of marriageable Notes World Health Organization, www.who.int/gen age. India, Pakistan and Taiwan will also der/documents/women_MDGs_report/en/index have men who won’t be able to find 1 “Newborn baby killings on the increase in 6.html . 16 wives. Author Hvistendahl says, “In both Pakistan,” Undhimmi, Jan. 17, 2011, http://und Eric Baculinao, “China grapples with lega - China and India, nationalism is taking himmi.com/2011/01/17/newborn-baby-killings - cy of its missing girls,” MSNBC, Sept. 14, 2004, hold among these restless young men, on-the-increase-in-pakistan /. www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5953508/ns/world_ and the governments are uneasy about 2 “Infanticide on the rise: 1210 babies found news/t/china-grapples-legacy-its-missing-girls /. 17 them.” A surplus of males in China in dead in 2010 says Edhi,” Express Tribune , Tina Rosenberg, “The daughter deficit,” The the 19th century contributed to a series Jan. 18, 2011, http://tribune.com.pk/story/105 New York Times , Aug. 19, 2009, www.nytimes. of rebellions that ultimately toppled the 019/infanticide-on-the-rise-in-pakistan-statistics /. com/2009/08/23/magazine/23FOB-idealab-t. 3 Reza Sayah, “Killing of infants on the rise html?pagewanted=all . emperor, she points out. 18 in Pakistan,” CNN.com, July 20, 2011, http:// Savita Verma, “Law against sex selection fails “Leaders in Beijing and New Delhi to save girl children,” India Today , April 1, 2011, will be hard-pressed to address the articles.cnn.com/2011-07-20/world/pakistan. infanticide_1_edhi-foundation-abdul-sattar-edhi- http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/law-against- potentially grave social instability that karachi?_s=PM:WORLD . sex-selection-fails-to-save-girl-children/1/1339 their countries’ ever-increasing num - 4 Ibid. 99.html . 19 bers of bare branches may produce 5 “Newborn baby killings on the increase in Mara Hvistendahl, Unnatural Selection: in the next few decades,” noted one Pakistan,” op. cit. Choosing Boys Over Girls, and the Conse - study. To counter that threat, govern - 6 Nicholas Eberstadt, “The Global War Against quences of a World Full of Men (2011), p. 10. 20 ments “may be inclined to move in a Baby Girls,” American Enterprise Institute, 2007, Malcolm Moore, “Thirty years of China’s more authoritarian direction.” 97 www.aei.org/docLib/20070105_eberstadtspeech. one-child policy,” Daily Telegraph , Sept. 25, For at least the next 20 years, ob - pdf . 2010, www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/ 7 asia/china/8024862/Thirty-years-of-Chinas-one- servers believe trafficking, prostitution, Christophe Z. Guilmoto, “Sex-ratio imbalance in Asia: Trends, consequences and policy re - child-policy.html . kidnapping and rising crime rates — 21 Alexa Olesen, “One-child policy in China all problems linked to the sex ratio sponses,” United Nations Population Fund, www. unfpa.org/gender/docs/studies/summaries/ will not be relaxed,” The Christian Science imbalance — are likely to soar in af - regional_analysis.pdf . Monitor , Sept. 28, 2010, www.csmonitor.com/ fected countries. 8 Mara Hvistendahl, “Unnatural Selection,” Psy - World/Latest-News-Wires/2010/0928/One-child- And some experts say the problem chology Today , July 5, 2011, www.psychology policy-in-China-will-not-be-relaxed . 22 could be exacerbated by new advances today.com/articles/201107/unnatural-selection . Li Xiaoping, “We need to reduce, not in - in fetal DNA testing, which allow the 9 Prabhat Jha, et al. , “Trends in selective abor - crease, population,” China Daily , Feb. 1, 2010, fetal sex to be determined only seven tions of girls in India: analysis of nationally www.chinadaily.com.cn/cndy/2010-02/01/con weeks after conception, eliminating representative birth histories from 1990 to 2005 tent_9404650.htm . 23 the need for ultrasound. 98 And other and census data from 1991 to 2011,” Lancet , Michael A. Memoli, “Biden dismisses criti - cism of comment on China’s one-child policy,” new technologies, such as preimplan - May 24, 2011, www.thelancet.com/journals/ Los Angeles Times , Aug. 26, 2011, http://articles. tation genetic diagnosis and sperm sort - lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(11)60649-1/abstract . 10 latimes.com/2011/aug/26/news/la-pn-biden- ing, allow parents to choose the sex “China has more than 13 million abortions a year,” CNN, July 30, 2009, http://articles.cnn. one-child-20110826 . of their offspring. Both have spread 24 com/2009-07-30/world/china.abortions.millions_ “Consultative conference: ‘The government throughout the world, including China 1_abortions-family-planning-policy-birth-con must end the one-child rule,’ ” AsiaNews.it, and India, and will make sex selec - trol-method?_s=PM:WORLD . March 16, 2007, www.asianews.it/index.php? tion easier but harder to police, es - 11 Yaqiang Yi and William M Mason, “Prenatal l=en&art=8757 . 25 pecially as the new technologies be - Sex-Selective Abortion and High Sex Ratio at “China’s Population: The most surprising come cheaper and more accessible. Birth in Rural China: A Case Study in Henan demographic crisis,” The Economist , May 5, 2011 , Until a society values females as Province,” California Center for Population Re - www.economist.com/node/18651512 . 26 much as males, girls’ lives will con - search, 2005, p. 3, http://escholarship.org/uc/item/ Malcolm Moore, “China’s workforce ‘dries up,’ ” Telegraph , March 27, 2011, www.telegraph. tinue to be threatened by cultural and 8j01443f . 12 co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/china/8409513/ societal prejudices. And millions of girls “UNFPA guidance note on prenatal sex se - lection,” United Nations Population Fund, UNFPA, Chinas- workforce-dries-up.html . For background, will continue to be murdered each see Alan Greenblatt, “The Graying Planet,” CQ

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Global Researcher , March 15, 2011, pp. 133-156. 39 Mara Hvistendahl, “Where Have All the 52 “Muhammad: Legacy of a Prophet,” PBS, 2002, 27 “China’s Population: The most surprising Girls Gone?” Foreign Policy , June 27, 2011, www. www.pbs.org/muhammad/ma_women.shtml . demographic crisis,” op. cit. foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/06/27/where_ 53 “Introducing Islam,” (no date), www.intro 28 Peter Ford, “Will China ease its one-child have_all_the_girls_gone?page=full . ducingislam.org/info/moralsquran/page1.php . policy?” The Christian Science Monitor , Dec. 17, 40 Ibid. , p. 135. 54 Milner, op. cit. , p. 86. 2009, www.csmonitor.com/World/Global-Issues/ 41 Ibid. , p. 145. 55 “Harmful practices to the female body; Part 2009/1231/Will-China-ease-its-one-child-policy . 42 Soutik Biswas, “Sex selection: The forgotten IV female infanticide,” Telegraph , Aug. 20, 29 “China’s Population: The most surprising story,” BBC News, July 22, 2011, www.bbc. 2011, http://my.telegraph.co.uk/hatefsvoiceof demographic crisis,” op. cit. co.uk/news/14213136 . peace/hatefsvoice/381/harmful-practices-to-the- 30 Mu Guangzong, “A change is needed im - 43 Richard Dawkins, “Sex selection and the female-body-part-4-female-infanticide /. mediately,” China Daily , March 21, 2011, www. shortage of women: Is science to blame?” 56 Sarah Blaffer Hrdy, Mother Nature: A His - chinadaily.com.cn/opinion/2011-03/21/content_ The Richard Dawkins Foundation, June 18, tory of Mothers, Infants and Natural Selection 12200002.htm . 2011, http://richarddawkins.net/articles/639930- (1999), p. 320. 31 Ross Douthat, “160 million and counting,” sex-selection-and-the-shortage-of-women-is- 57 See Valerie M. Hudson, and Andrea M. The New York Times , June 26, 2011, www.ny science-to-blame . den Boer, Bare Branches (2004), p. 72. times.com/2011/06/27/opinion/27douthat.html . 44 “Cat got your tongue?” The Economist , Aug. 58 Larry Milner, “A brief history of infanticide,” 32 Carmen Barroso, letter in response to Mara 6, 2011, www.economist.com/node/21525348 . The Society for the Prevention of Infanticide, Hvistendahl, “Where Have All the Girls Gone?” 45 Ross Douthat, op. cit. http://infanticide.org/history.htm . Foreign Policy , June 27, 2011, www.foreign 46 Dawkins, op. cit. 59 Milner, op. cit. , p. 176. policy.com/articles/2011/06/27/where_have_all_ 47 See, for example, Joseph, B. Birdsell, “Some 60 Hudson and den Boer, op. cit. , p. 86. the_girls_gone . predictions for the Pleistocene based on equi - 61 Laursa Fitzpatrick, “A brief history of 33 “Brides bound by traditions,” The Washington librium systems among recent hunter gath - China’s one-child policy,” Time , July 27, 2009, Times , Feb. 26, 2007, www.washingtontimes. erers,” in Richard Lee and Irven DeVore, Man www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1912 com/news/2007/feb/26/20070226-115011-6073r /. the Hunter (1968), p. 239; and Laila Williamson, 861,00.html . 34 Ibid. “Infanticide: an anthropological analysis,” in 62 Amartya Sen, “The quality of life: India 35 “Preventing gender biased sex selection,” Marvin Kohl, Infanticide and the Value of Life versus China,” The New York Review of Books , World Health Organization, June 2011, p. v, (1978), pp. 61-75. May 12, 2011, www.nybooks.com/articles/ http://whqlibdoc.who.int/publications/2011/ 48 Carles Darwin, The Descent of Man (1872), archives/2011/may/12/quality-life-india-vs-china/ 9789241501460_eng.pdf . The four other or - p. 129, http://darwinsaid.wordpress.com/tag/ ?pagination=false . ganizations were the World Health Organiza - infanticide /. 63 Hudson and den Boer, op. cit. , p. 108. tion, the Office of the High Commissioner for 49 Mary R. Lefkowitz and Maureen B. Fant, 64 “The issue that inflamed India,” Time , April Human Rights, UNICEF and U.N. Women (the Women’s Life in Greece and Rome (2005), 4, 1977, www.time.com/time/magazine/article/ United Nations Entity for Gender Equality www.stoa.org/diotima/anthology/wlgr/wlgr- 0,9171,947859-1,00.html . and the Empowerment of Women). privatelife249.shtml . 65 “South Korea: The Society,” www.mongabay. 36 Nicholas Eberstadt, “Should sex selective 50 John Boswell, The Kindness of Strangers: com/reference/country_studies/south-korea/ abortions be outlawed, American Enterprise The abandonment of children in Western Eu - SOCIETY.html . Institute, May 23, 2008, www.aei.org/article/ rope from Late Antiquity to the Renaissance 66 Quoted in Ed Regis, “The Doomslayer,” 28040 . (1998), p. 102. Wired , May, 2002, www.wired.com/wired/ 37 Hvistendahl, Unnatural Selection , op. cit. , 51 Larry Stephen Milner, Hardness of archive/5.02/ffsimon_pr.html . p. 96. Heart/Hardness of Life: The Stain of Human 67 Hvistendahl, Unnatural Selection , op. cit. , 38 Ibid. , p. 127. Infanticide (2000), p. 227. p. 48. 68 Simon Johnson Williams, Lynda I. A. Birke and Gillian Bendelow, Debating Biology: So - About the Author ciological reflections on health, medicine, and society (2003), p. 187. Robert Kiener is an award-winning writer whose work 69 Hudson and den Boer, op. cit. , p. 171. has appeared in the London Sunday Times, The Christian 70 Rita Patel, “The Practice of Sex Selective Science Monitor , The Washington Post , Reader’s Digest , Time Abortion in India: May You Be the Mother Life Books, Asia Inc. and other publications. For more than of a Hundred Sons,” http://cgi.unc.edu/uploads/ two decades he lived and worked as an editor and cor - media_items/the-practice-of-sex-selective-abor respondent in Guam, Hong Kong, Canada and England and tion-in-india-may-you-be-the-mother-of-a-hun is now based in the United States. He frequently travels to dred-sons.original.pdf . 71 “GE machines used to break laws,” The Asia and Europe to report on international issues. He holds Washington Times , Feb. 28, 1997, www.wash an M.A. in Asian Studies from Hong Kong University and an ingtontimes.com/news/2007/feb/28/20070228- M.Phil. in International Relations from Cambridge University. 113751-7882r/?page=all#pagebreak . 72 Sen, op. cit.

494 CQ Global Researcher 73 Bela Ganatra, “Maintaining access to safe abortion and reducing sex imbalances in Asia,” 2008, www.ipas.org/Library/Other/Maintaining_ FOR MORE INFORMATION access_to_safe_abortion_reducing_sex_ratio_im Centre for Global Health Research , Li Ka Shing Knowledge Institute, St. Michael’s balances_in_Asia.pdf . Hospital, 30 Bond St., Toronto, Ontario, M5B 1W8, Canada ; (416) 864-6042 ; www. 74 “The aborting and starving of girls in India,” CGHR.org . Nonprofit organization affiliated with the University of Toronto; conducts World , May 4, 2011, http://online.worldmag. research that advances global health, with particular attention to the world’s poorest com/2011/05/04/the-aborting-and-starving-of- populations. girls-in-india /. 75 Tania Branigan, “China’s village of bachelors: Center for Reproductive Rights , 120 Wall St., 14th Floor, New York, NY 10005 ; no wives in sight in remote settlement,” (917) 637-3600 ; www.reproductiverights.org . Legal organization dedicated to ad - Guardian , Sept. 2, 2011, www.guardian.co.uk/ vancing women’s rights to reproductive health, self-determination and dignity world/2011/sep/02/china-village-of-bachelors/ around the world. print . 76 Ibid. Edhi Foundation , Sarafa Bazar, Boulton Market, Mithadar, Karachi, Pakistan ; 77 Nanama Keita and Sanjay Pandey, “A vil - 92 (21) 2413232 ; www.edhifoundation.com . Nonprofit that provides medical and lage of eternal bachelors,” Trustlaw , April 6, welfare services across Pakistan and offers free burials to unclaimed bodies. 2011, www.trust.org/trustlaw/news/a-village-of- eternal-bachelors . Human Rights Watch , 350 Fifth Ave., New York, NY 10118 ; (212) 290-4700 ; www.hrw.org . The largest U.S. human rights organization investigates abuses 78 Ibid. around the world, including those against children. 79 “Gendercide leaves Indian men without partners,” RT , April 6, 2011, http://rt.com/news/ Population Research Institute , 1190 Progress Dr., Suite 2D, P.O. Box 1559, men-boys-child-family /. Front Royal, VA 22630 ; (540) 622-5240 ; www.pop.org . International nonprofit that 80 Hvistendahl, Unnatural Selection , p. 185. aims to publicize and end coercive population control. 81 Cheryl Weztstein, “With 1-child policy, China missing girls,” The Washington Times , Jan. 27, United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) , 605 Third Ave., New York, NY 2010, www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/ 10158 ; (212) 297-5000 ; www.unfpa.org/public/home/news/pid/6727 . www.unfpa. jan/27/with-1-child-policy-china-missing-girls/? org . International development agency that promotes reproductive health, gender page=1 . equality and development strategies. 82 Ibid. 83 “China rescues dozens of infants from Women’s Rights Without Frontiers , P.O. Box 54401, San Jose, CA ; (310) 592-5722 ; human traffickers,” Reuters, July, 27, 2011, http:// www.womensrightswithoutfrontiers.org . International coalition opposed to forced uk.reuters.com/article/2011/07/27/uk-china- abortion and sterilization in China; seeks to raise awareness on the coercive nature trafficking-idUKTRE76Q0VA20110727 . of China’s one-child policy. 84 Quoted in Hvistendahl, Unnatural Selection , op. cit. , p. 222. World Population Program , International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, 85 Ibid. , p. 221. Schlossplatz 1, A-2361 Laxenburg, Austria ; 43 2236 807 0 ; www.iiasa.ac.at . Studies how population trends influence society, the economy and the natural environment. 86 Ibid. 87 “Indian PM dubs foeticide a ‘national shame,’ ” Straits Times , Agence France-Presse, 91 Beth Loyd, “China fears lopsided sex ratio The National , April 27, 2011, www.thenational. April 21, 2011, www.straitstimes.com/Breaking could spark crisis,” ABC News, Jan. 12, 2007, ae/news/worldwide/south-asia/lawyer- fights- News/Asia/Story/STIStory_659520.html . http://abcnews.go.com/International/story?id= female-foeticide-in-one-of-indias-affluent -states . 88 Malathy Iyer, “Registration of many seized 2790469&page=1 . 95 Reza Sayah, “Killing of infants on the rise in scanners may be suspended,” Times of India , 92 Peter Hitchens, “Gendercide: China’s shame - Pakistan,” CNN, July 20, 2011, http://articles.cnn. July 31, 2011, http://articles.timesofindia.india ful massacre of unborn girls means there will com/2011-07-20/world/pakistan.infanticide_1 times.com/2011-07-31/mumbai/29835523_1_ soon be 30m more men than women,” Daily _edhi-foundation-abdul-sattar-edhi-karachi?_ ultrasound-machines-pcpndt-act-sting-operations . Mail , April 10, 2010, www.dailymail.co.uk/news/ s=PM:WORLD . 89 “Taiwan warning over selective abortions,” article-1265068/China-The-worlds-new-super 96 Ibid. Hc2d.co.uk, May 18, 2011, www.hc2d.co.uk/ power-beginning-century-supremacy-alarming- 97 Hudson and den Boer, op. cit. , p. 263. content.php?contentId=18508 . surplus-males.html . 98 Arthur Caplan, “Fetal genetic testing: a trou - 90 Zhuang Ping, “Crackdown on sex selec - 93 “A killing obsession,” Deccan Herald , www. bling technology,” MSNBC, Aug. 9, 2011, www. tive abortions,” South China Morning Post , deccanherald.com/content/171270/a-killing- msnbc.msn.com/id/44078722/ns/health-health_ Aug. 17, 2011, http://topics.scmp.com/news/ obsession.html . care/t/fetal-genetic-testing-troubling-technology /. china-news-watch/article/Crackdown-on-sex- 94 Samanth Subramanian, “Lawyer fights fe - 99 Malik, Rashid, Chinese Entrepreneurs in the selective -. male foeticide in one of India’s affluent states,” Economic Development of China (1997), p. 116.

www.globalresearcher.com Oct. 4, 2011 495 Bibliography Selected Sources

Books Kazmin , Amy , Pati Waldmeir and Girija Shivakumar , “Asia: heirs and spares,” Financial Times , July 10, 2011 . Connelly , Matthew , Fatal Misconception: The Struggle to This well-reported article examines the political, economic Control World Population , Belknap Press , 2010 . and social consequences caused by sex-selective abortion in A Columbia University historian examines 20th-century India and China. population-control programs and shows how they evolved into an oppressive international movement intent on sup - Sayah , Reza , “Killing of infants on the rise in Pakistan,” pressing population numbers in the developing world. CNN , July 20, 2010 , http://articles.cnn.com/2011-07-20/ world/pakistan.infanticide_1_edhi-foundation-abdul-sattar- Hrdy , Sarah Blaffer , Mother Nature: A History of Mothers, edhi-karachi?_s=PM:WORLD . Infants, and Natural Selection , Pantheon , 1999 . This Pakistan-based account explains how one charity is An anthropologist shows how female strategies as both dealing with the more than 1,200 newborn infants, mostly mothers and wives have shaped the process of evolution. girls, abandoned or killed at birth in Pakistan last year. Includes a chapter that explores how son preference has led to a shortage of women in Asia. Sen , Amartya , “More Than 100 Million Women Are Missing,” New York Review of Books , Dec. 20, 1990 . Hudson , Valerie M. , and Andrea M. den Boer , Bare A Nobel Prize-winning economist writes a landmark arti cle Branches: The Security Implications of Asia’s Surplus on Asia’s gender imbalance, cited by many as a “wakeup call” Male Population , MIT Press , 2004 . to the world about the skewed sex ratios in the region. Focusing largely on China and India, two academics explore the causes of Asia’s skewed sex ratios. The resulting surplus Reports and Studies of male population in the two countries poses a threat to both domestic and international security, they argue. “Preventing gender-biased sex selection,” World Health Organization , 2011 , www.unhcr.org/refworld/docid/4df Hvistendahl , Mara , Unnatural Selection: Choosing Boys 751442.html . Over Girls, and the Consequences of a World Full of Men , This interagency statement explores the background, causes Public Affairs , 2011 . and effects of sex-selection throughout the world. It includes a A China-based journalist examines how sex-selective abortions discussion on how patrilineal inheritance and a reliance on males have resulted in 160 million girls being “missing” from Asia. for economic support have resulted in son preference in Asia. She also looks into whether the West’s population-control pro - grams exacerbated the problem. Bhalotra , Sonia , and Tom Cochrane , “Where have all the young girls gone? Identification of sex selection in India,” Articles Centre for Market and Public Organisation , December 2010 , www.bristol.ac.uk/cmpo/publications/papers/2010/wp25 “The worldwide war on baby girls,” The Economist , 4.pdf . March 4, 2010 . This paper examines how having access to prenatal gen - This wide-ranging report examines how declining fertility, der testing has affected India’s sex ratio at birth. son preferences and new technologies are combining to pro - duce skewed sex ratios in Asia and elsewhere. Guilmoto , Christophe Z. , “Sex ratio imbalance in Asia: Trends, consequences and policy responses,” United Na - Hitchens , Peter , “Gendercide: China’s shameful massacre tions Population Fund , 2007 . of unborn girls means there will soon be 30m more men A noted French demographer presents a regional overview than women,” Daily Mail , April 10, 2010 . of the mechanisms and consequences of Asia’s growing gen - A British journalist travels through China to examine the der imbalances — and potential policy responses. nation’s one-child policy and its relationship to an ever-growing preference for sons instead of daughters. Zhu , Wei Xing , and Therese Hesketh , “China’s excess males, sex selective abortion, and one child policy: Hvistendahl , Mara , “Where Have All the Girls Gone?” analysis of data from 2005 national intercensus survey,” Foreign Policy , June 27, 2011 . BMJ (British Medical Journal ), 2009 . The author of Unnatural Selection summarizes the issue of An academic investigation examines how sex-selective abor - sex-selective abortion and claims that Western proponents of tion and China’s one-child policy have affected current trends population control influenced Asian nations to institute birth and geographical patterns in birth sex ratios. control measures such as gender-based abortions.

496 CQ Global Researcher The Next Step: Additional Articles from Current Periodicals

Changing Attitudes der imbalance by investigating doctors and medical institu - tions suspected of engaging in sex selection. Byung-joon , Koh , “ ‘Househusbands’ on the Rise Amid Changing View on Gender Roles,” Yonhap News Agency Gammage , Jeff , “Gender Imbalance Tilting the World To - (South Korea) , July 27, 2011 . ward Men,” Philadelphia Inquirer , June 21, 2011 , p. A1 . Changing economic conditions have led more South Ko - A growth in gender imbalances worldwide could lead to rean men to become stay-at-home dads, eliminating many more sex trafficking, prostitution, crime, sales of child brides gender stereotypes in the process. and kidnappings of girls.

Yeshwantrao , Nitin , “ ‘Crush Old Attitudes to Fix Skewed Showalter , Elaine , “It’s a Boy! And Another, and Another,” Sex Ratio,’ ” Times of India , July 14, 2011 , articles.timesof The Washington Post , July 3, 2011 , p. B4 . india.indiatimes.com/2011-07-13/mumbai/29768241_1_ Feminists blame gender imbalances on patriarchal cultural girl-child-female-foeticide-determination-tests . prejudice against girls and daughters, but experts say geopo - Perceptions over the inferiority of women in Indian society litical and economic forces also come into play. have led to increased abortion rates among women pregnant with girls, according to some of the country’s female doctors. Missing Girls

China’s One-Child Policy “Gender Gap in Missing Children Too?” The Hindu (India), Nov. 14, 2010 . “US Opposes Coercive Birth Limitation Policies of China,” The number of missing children in Bangalore, India, seems Press Trust of India , Aug. 24, 2011 , www.indiareport. to be on the rise, and girls who go missing far outnumber com/India-usa-uk-news/latest-news/1073786/Internation boys as they approach the age of adolescence. al/2/3/2 . U.S. Vice President Joe Biden says his country opposes all “Waging War on Women,” Evening Standard (England), aspects of China’s coercive birth-limitation policies, includ - July 21, 2011 . ing forced abortion and sterilization. Up to 160 million women are missing in Asia, more than the entire female population of the United States. LaFraniere , Sharon , “As China Ages, Birthrate Policy May Prove Difficult to Reverse,” The New York Times , Ditum , Sarah , “To Protect Girls, Women Must Have April 7, 2011 , p. A4 , www.nytimes.com/2011/04/07/world/ Rights,” Guardian Unlimited (England), June 6, 2011 , asia/07population.html?pagewanted=all . www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/belief/2011/jun/06/ The one-child policy is so ingrained in China that the gov - women-rights-sex-selective-abortion . ernment may be unable to encourage more births even if Studies show that sex-selective abortions are to blame for it tries. the high number of missing girls worldwide.

Ryan , Dan , “China’s Heartless One-Child Policy Is Abort - CITING CQ G LOBAL RESEARCHER ing Our Growth,” The Australian , Sept. 25, 2009 , p. 14 , Sample formats for citing these reports in a bibliography www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/one-child-policy- aborting-our-growth/story-e6frg6ux-1225779275709 . include the ones listed below. Preferred styles and formats China’s one-child policy has become deeply unpopular with vary, so please check with your instructor or professor. the country’s rural population, resulting in a gender imbal - ance exacerbated by a preference for male children. MLA STYLE Flamini, Roland. “Nuclear Proliferation.” CQ Global Re - Gender Imbalances searcher 1 Apr. 2007: 1-24.

“Vietnam Putting an End to Gender Selection,” Thai APA S TYLE Press Reports , Nov. 9, 2010 . Flamini, R. (2007, April 1). Nuclear proliferation. CQ Global The Vietnamese government is trying to reverse the coun - try’s imbalanced gender ratio by promoting a radical shift Researcher , 1, 1-24. in women’s roles within the family. CHICAGO STYLE Chao , Vincent Y. , and Shelley Huang , “Abortions Skew - Flamini, Roland. “Nuclear Proliferation.” CQ Global Researcher , ing Gender Ratio,” Taipei (Taiwan) Times , May 16, 2011 . April 1, 2007, 1-24. Taiwanese officials are trying to solve the problem of gen -

www.globalresearcher.com Oct. 4, 2011 497 Voices From Abroad:

PRABHAT JHA K. S. J ACOB JAMIR ARALIKAR “Although the Precon - ception and Prenatal Diag - Epidemiologist and Professor Son of infanticide nostic Techniques Act is in demographer Christian Medical College survivor place, which deters doctors University of Toronto India India and patients from sex de - termination tests, there is no Canada There’s more to it Paying it forward action plan to bring about “Female foeticide and in - “I am proud of my moth - coordination and coopera - Nature vs. technology tion among doctors and the “It appears that families fanticide are just the tip of er. After surviving the attempted the iceberg; there is a whole infanticide, she now helps government. Doctors should are saying, ‘Nature will de - voluntarily disclose informa - cide the first child, but we set of subtle and blatant dis - others fight social injustices like criminatory practices against dowry, eve-teasing [sexual tion about medical practi - are going to let technology tioners who resort to sex decide the second child if girls and women under var - harassment] and casteism.” ious pretexts. It is this large determination tests and the the first is a girl.’” Times of India, March 2011 base of discrimination against heinous practice of sex se - The Washington Post, May 2011 women that supports the de - lective abortions. . . . There clining sex ratio.” SANJAY GUPTE are very few cases where doctors are actually punished LI BIN The Hindu (India), April 2011 President for carrying out sex deter - Minister, Family Planning Federation of Obstetrics mination tests. The action Commission, China LIU QIAN and Gynaecological plan that we are demand - ing should focus on such Vice Health Minister Society of India errant doctors. . . .” Problems in favoritism China “Illegal fetal sex testing Identifying the perpe - Times of India, December 2010 and sex-selective abortions trators are the direct causes of the Explaining the imbalance long-term problem of a se - “The gender ratio imbalance rious skewing in the sex ratio [in China] can be attributed to in the mainland, which aris - multiple causes, including a es from a deeply rooted tra - traditional preference for sons, dition that favors boys.” the practice of arranging for sons to take care of elderly Chinadaily.com.cn, August 2011 parents, illegal sex-selective abortions and other factors.” MARA HVISTENDAHL Xinhua news agency (China) Asia Correspondent August 2011 Science Magazine China BHAGYASHRI DENGLE Executive Director U.S. is complicit Plan India “It took millions of dol - lars in funding from U.S. or - ‘Seen as a burden’ ganizations, along with thou - “Girls are seen as a burden sands of fieldworkers and a [in India], seen as a property good number of mobile which belongs to somebody clinics, for sex determina - else, so people see that as a tion and abortion to catch waste of money and the wast - on in the developing world.” ing of an education of a girl.” b b e Unnatural Selection (book) r

CNN, July 2011 G

June 2011 J C