Many scholars have assumed a simple relationship between different indicators of social and
demographic development. The Princeton European Fertility Project severely criticized this approach,
and later work by anthropologists has also criticized this simple view. But much extant work continues
to embody a unilinear view of all aspects of development.
This paper examines demographic and social indicators of development of the eight largest nationalities
in Yunnan Province, based on micro-data from the 1982 and 1990 Censuses of China. Yunnan Province
had the largest number of different nationalities in substantial numbers of any Chinese province, the
largest eight of which had more than 500,000 members in Yunnan in 1990.
It was found that social and demographic measures did not vary together in the way many scholars have
expected. For example, it has been suggested that nationalities for which there is a highly masculine sex
ratio at birth will also have a large disparity in the chances of boys and girls to attend school. There was
little evidence of this. Hui had a very high sex ratio at birth but almost equal chances of boys and girls
attending school.
The total fertility rate in 1989-90 for the eight nationalities ranged from a low of 2.3 for the Han to a high
of 3.5 for the Miao. Five of the eight nationalities showed a sex ratio at birth in 1989-90 above 107 male
births per 100 female births, which is strong evidence that members of these nationalities were doing
something to limit the number of female infants reported in the census. Although Han exhibited the
lowest total fertility rate, the Dai, an almost totally rural nationality with a relatively low level of
education had the second lowest total fertility rate.
There were substantial improvements in education between 1982 and 1990. Between 1982 and 1990, the
proportion of both boys and girls who had ever attended school increased for every nationality. Some
have suggested that as the economic value of children increases, school enrollment will decline,
especially for girls. There is no sign of declines in school attendance in the period immediately before
1990. There was no evidence that the increased economic value of children led to any decrease in school
enrollment of girls.
For every nationality, boys were more likely to attend school than girls. Although the size of the gap in
education by gender tended to decline between 1982 and 1990, there were large differences among
groups. Some groups, such as Bai, with very high school attendance for boys, had a wider gender gap
than groups, such as Dai, with lower levels of school attendance for boys.
Females age 35-39 in 1990 in every nationality except Han and Dai showed a lower proportion who ever
attended school than members of adjacent cohorts. Those age 35-39 in 1990 were age 10 in the early
1960’s, at the time of the famine and its aftermath. These events seem to have had a stronger effect on
the education of members of minority nationalities than on Han. This points to the special vulnerability
of members of minority nationalities to the effects of economic and social hardship.
Data Used: 1% Sample of 1982 Census of China for Yunnan Province and 12.1% Sample of 1990
Census of China for Yunnan Province.