The Epidemic of Domestic Violence in China Rough Draft

Published in

The Ends of Globalization

9 min readApr 21, 2022

Ma Jinyu, a victim of domestic violence, recounts her traumatic past: “The beating continued throughout the night and into the next morning. My clothes were soaked in blood and I had no idea where the blood came from” (James). Dong Ru’s story is too gruesome to hear: “I was beaten to the point of being unable to move, and then tied up for this sterilization operation” (Tang). What can be more heartbreaking? The reluctance and rejection of local authorities and the police in China when the victims approach them for help. The local authorities simply sent a victim back home with “I do not live in your home and I have not seen him beating you” while the police dodged responsibility and encouraged another victim to seek reconciliation, “you have a special relationship with him, he is your ex-husband, you guys should work this out by yourself.” (Rauhala). Victim Dai Xiaolei summarizes the hidden epidemic of domestic violence in China in one sentence: “Nobody will care unless I’m beaten to death” (ibid.). Although there is anti-domestic violence law in place, China’s domestic violence problem remains a dilemma due to legal loopholes, poor enforcement, and contradictory traditional cultural values. For guidance, we can imitate the tactics of developed countries such as New Zealand and Canada. Although an ultimate transition from party-state to citizen-state is an ideal solution, I believe legal reforms complemented with educational measures provide a more realistic plan to prevent domestic violence in China.

In the 1995 State Council’s National Program for Women’s Development, the term “domestic violence” first entered the Chinese lexicon (qtd. in Ogletree and de Silva de Alwis 270). Thirty years later, the Chinese government legislated the first Anti-Domestic Violence Law, in which Article 2 defines domestic violence as “physical, psychological or other infractions between family members affected through the use of methods such as beatings, restraints, maiming, restrictions on physical liberty as well as recurrent verbal abuse or intimidation” (“Anti-Domestic Violence Law”). It is important to note that this legal definition has flaws since it doesn’t include unmarried couples. Since “the prevalence rate for domestic violence in China is estimated at approximately thirty to thirty-six percent, and more than ninety percent of the victims are women” (de Silva de Alwis, 266), we can conclude that intimate partner violence by the man constitutes as the most common type of domestic violence in China. Thus, I will solely focus on domestic violence against women and its implications.

While domestic violence cases root in the unequal distribution of power between men and women, the traditional cultural values of China better explain the high occurrences of domestic violence. Confucianism, the pillar of traditional Chinese culture, “spreads patriarchal values of female submissiveness. Violence against female family members is normalized and even encouraged, as shown in sayings like ‘a beating shows intimacy and a scolding shows love’” (Mak). The violence against wives is a norm because the man is “一家之主” (the head of the family), and that position of authority gives men the power to control their wives. Thus, domestic violence is largely overlooked and “has never been considered as a significant social and legislative issue simply because it pertains to a ‘private matter’” (Zhao 220). This cultural phenomenon explains why China excluded domestic violence in family and marriage laws for years until the implementation of the Anti-Domestic Violence Law in 2015. To further dissect the implication of Confucian values, women are encouraged to focus on the private sphere of life so that men can tend to work. Away from the workplace and society, “women with limited or no economic resources who are restricted by socially-constructed sexual stereotypes and forced to be passive are more likely to suffer from physical abuse in the home” (qtd. in Zhao 221). In other words, Chinese women are often trapped in abusive marriages and without channels to the outside world, these victims do not even realize their partners are in the wrong. It should be no surprise then that with Confucian patriarchal values, domestic violence in China has been brushed aside for too long, leaving too many women in desperation. Fortunately, modern China has seen the awakening of women and their advocacy for gender equality and some progress has been made in addressing domestic violence. To understand why domestic abuse still persists at such a high rate, we first need to examine the historical attempts to combat the problem.

Before reaching the national stage, women’s groups advocated for changes at the local level. “By the end of 2004, twenty-two provinces had established regulations, measures, or opinions against domestic violence” (“China’s Progress in Human Rights in 2004”). However, since these statistics came from the government’s official White Paper, there is an underlying bias in praising the government’s work. Furthermore, I think local measures were insufficient because the political system in China does not give local governments enough authority to develop and enforce a sophisticated domestic violence prevention strategy. Rangita Silva de Alwis, a globally recognized international women’s rights expert and a law professor at the University of Pennsylvania, notes that domestic violence “services are the exception rather than the norm in China” (279). By ‘services,’ she is specifically referring to domestic violence hotlines, complaint channels, and stations for asylum, therapy, and legal aid. While these services are important for victims, they are not preventive measures and thus fail to solve the problem from its roots. I reached the same conclusion as Professor Silva de Alwis — there was an “urgent charge to any national domestic violence law” (ibid.). In 2015, the Chinese government took a huge step forward with the legislation of Anti-Domestic Violence Law, and President Xi was even invited to headline the U.N. Women Summit the same year (Rauhala). Despite public optimism, I believe the national legislation has not worked effectively to be the end-all solution to domestic violence. In hindsight, why did the much-celebrated legislation fail to meet the anticipations?

The Anti-Domestic Violence Law proves to be underperforming because the legal scope is too narrow to protect abused women. Even though domestic abuse is now considered a crime and a valid reason for divorce, “criminal liability can only arise if the violence constitutes ‘severe harm’” (qtd. in Silva de Alwis 267). This requirement of ‘severe harm’ explains the previously mentioned complaint from Dai Xiaolei, who points out that the authorities do not take her claim seriously unless she is moribund (Rauhala). Thus, instead of seeking criminal charges, victims seek protection from a written warning (告诫书). Although Article 16 of the Law clearly states that a written warning must be issued regardless of the severity of domestic violence, in practice, “the police will normally respond to the victim’s appeal for a written warning only when the violence could constitute an administrative or criminal violation, and this has to be based on a hospital’s authentication of injury together with other evidence” (qtd. in Jiang 7). These legal loopholes related to the severity of violence and evidence-gathering are burdensome barriers that the battered victims have to deal with. As a result, the offender can easily get away with their alleged crime, “abusing” the legal process. Much to the disappointment of feminists who fought hard for the Anti-Domestic Violence Law, the poor enforcement of the legislation adds to the legal loopholes.

The low level and frequency of punishment that arises from domestic violence charges weaken the Law in practice. According to Article 260 of Criminal Law in China, the domestic abuse sentence is less than two years in prison, and if the conduct results in severe harm or death, the sentence may go up to seven years (“Full Text of the Criminal Law”). However, the editors of the Journal of Shandong Women’s University point out that Article 260 describes the charges against men in intimate partner violence, and in contrast to the legislation, if the wife abuses the husband to death, she will face a life sentence or a death sentence with reprieve (“Differences between Chinese and Foreign Marriage Laws”). More worrisomely, “Chinese lawyers believe these punishments are rarely issued” (Silva de Alwis 267). The problem looms large because the same logic applies to protection orders, the cornerstone of legal remedies for domestic violence. Even after the Anti-Domestic Violence Law was passed, acquiring a protection order does not seem to become easier (Jiang 7), and “a fine of no more than 1000 yuan (about US $141) is imposed on violators of restraining orders and, in serious cases, an ensuing incarceration of a maximum of 15 days is imposed” (Qi et al. 388). Due to the infrequent issuing of domestic violence charges and the mild consequences of violating protection orders, the Anti-Domestic Violence Law and Criminal Law in China fails to prevent perpetrators from being abusive.

Going beyond the legislation and enforcement weaknesses limited to the legal realm, the political and cultural forces further explain why the Anti-Domestic Violence Law did not work on its own. While China resorts to the statute which publicly punishes domestic violence, it encourages the use of mediation instead of protecting the victims (Jiang 4). This contradiction in the efforts to combat domestic violence arises from the Chinese government’s aim of maintaining social harmony. Behind this government agenda is the traditional Chinese saying “家和万事兴” (harmonious families cultivates prosperity). Instead of protecting the victims, the cultural inclination is to repair toxic and abusive marriages. Therefore, it is no surprise that “empirical evidence shows that judges try hard to mediate when an application for a protection order is lodged. In some cases, the personal protection order was exploited as an instrument for reaching a reconciliation outcome in domestic violence cases’’ (ibid.). As a result, the courts leave domestic violence parties to resolve the matter in hopes of reconciliation even though there are legal statutes in place. Learning from the past failures to combat domestic violence, there is only one remaining question: what are better solutions?

To create a successful strategy for combating domestic violence, we should examine how developed countries deal with the issue and adopt advantageous tactics. To broaden the legal scope of domestic violence crimes, China can recreate New Zealand’s Family Violence Act for the eradication of domestic violence. This statute “does not limit domestic violence to offenses committed within a homestead but even outside, and it further states that domestic violence is not a private affair” (qtd. in Alsehaimi and Helal 110). China should learn from New Zealand’s legislation to clearly define the types of domestic violence and identify all kinds of victims, not only focusing on those in marriages. Another important takeaway is to acknowledge domestic violence as a public affair, which will help China work on its cultural tradition of denying an unsuccessful and abusive marital relationship. Canada’s Domestic Violence Court Programs lend key insight as well, for they “ensure that offenders are sentenced to either jail time or fines depending on the time committed” (ibid.). By working closely with victims, police officers, and witnesses, Canada’s social programs strengthen the practice of domestic violence law, an area that China needs improvement on. Looking at the bigger picture, “most developed countries are reported to have training programs that help in the prevention of domestic violence. These training programs are offered to various people, including professionals dealing with domestic violence cases and the general public” (111). Developed countries’ model of training programs teaches China to offer more guidance to judges and police officers while simultaneously increasing the awareness of the general public about domestic violence.

After seeking guidance from developed countries, China may resort to international organizations and laws. International law increases the strength of domestic violence legal protections; according to The Washington Post, “as the time since a country has ratified the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) increases (by about eight years), countries are most (23.4 percent) likely to adopt full legal protections against domestic violence” (Richards and Haglund). Fortunately, China ratified CEDAW in 1980 and has been taking recommendations for better frameworks (“CEDAW”). In addition to existing global treaties, Chinese activists should draw on ideas from “global social policy and transnational alliances created via international and global meetings” (Hester 453). All in all, international laws and alliances provide helpful counseling and offer innovative ideas to China, whose judicial reforms in response to domestic violence are quite recent.