For all of Mr. Xi’s calls on women to take up the cause of having babies, the party’s efforts are unlikely to bolster the birthrate enough to reverse the countr

For all of Mr. Xi’s calls on women to take up the cause of having babies, the party’s efforts are unlikely to bolster the birthrate enough to reverse the country’s population decline. That is, unless it is willing to resort to more punitive measures to disadvantage or marginalize women who choose not to have children. While unlikely, it is something that Fubing Su, a political science professor at Vassar College, said was not completely out of the question. During the “one-child” policy, the party resorted to fines, forced abortions and sterilizations in an attempt to slow population growth for decades until it ended the restrictions in 2015.