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The New Marriage Law that was promulgated on 1 May
1950 gave women legal equality with men. In a sense, the law formed the
logical conclusion of the struggle that had started during the May Fourth Movement
(1919) to bring to an end the influences of the patriarchy and ageism
that existed in the feudal family system. In practice, the law followed
an earlier one that had been promulgated during the CCP's stay in the
Jiangxi Soviet in the early 1930s and incorporated experiences gained
in Yan'an. The implementation of the
Marriage Law overlapped the Land Reform movement in many places, particularly in the newly-liberated areas, and caused
considerable confusion.
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Chapter One, Article One of the law, for example,
defined that marriages should be based on the free choice of partners,
on monogamy, on equal rights for both sexes, and on the protection of
the lawful interests of women and children. Many of the elements of the
law had legislative antecedents and were less revolutionary than they
seemed. The freedom of choice regarding partners was a continuation of
rules set out in earlier Republican marriage regulations, as were the
freedom of divorce, the ban on polygamy and taking concubines, and the
ban on child marriages. The CCP introduced a number of new elements as
well. One of these was that couples were ordered to register their
marriages (or divorces) at state institutions.
Another new element provided by the marriage law was
that it defined relations between generations: children, parents and
grandparents had to live in harmonious relations and care for each
other. Despite these provisions, many elderly in particular were
prosecuted as 'landlords' when they resisted the new approach to
marriages, which often offended traditional attitudes and sensibilities
toward the choice of spouse and cohabitation.
The law led many to believe that its notion of 'free
love', i.e. marriages that were not coerced or arranged, actually meant
that people could have sex with whomever one wanted. On the other hand,
the introduction of the law also led to large numbers of
marriage-dispute cases, divorces, murders and suicides. Until 1955,
yearly propaganda campaigns were organized to publicize the law all
over the land. By then, more than 90% of all marriages had been
officially registered and these were considered to have been concluded
in free will.
Sources:
Neil J. Diamant, "Re-examining the Impact of the 1950 Marriage Law:
State Improvisation, Local Initiative and Rural Family Change", The
China Quarterly No. 161 (March 2000), pp. 171-198
Neil J. Diamant, "Making Love 'Legible' in China: Politics and Society
during the Enforcement of Civil Marriage Registration, 1950-66", Politics & Society, vol. 29 no. 3 (September 2001), pp. 447-480
E. Stuart Kirby (ed.), Contemporary China 1955 (London: Oxford University Press 1956)
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s.r.landsberger@let.leidenuniv.nl
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