Having the world’s lowest fertility rate, South Korea faces a complex demographic crisis amid an intense gender war, where marriage and childrearing have become politicized. As a response to the government’s pro-natalist policies aimed at reinforcing the country’s demographic security and an increasing economic precarity among young Koreans, radical feminists have taken a political stance against patriarchal and conservative expectations placed upon women in Korean society. Articulated around the 4B movement, they say no to sex, dating, marriage, and children, reinforcing a growing trend for Korea’s demographic future.
BY Laia Corxet Solé
South Korea has the lowest fertility rate in the world [1]. Its population started shrinking in 2020, when the number of deaths surpassed the number of births due to a consistently lowering amount of expected births per woman in reproductive age [2]. As the fertility rate now stands at 0,78 [3] – far below the 2.1 one needed to ensure a stable population without migration [4] – the UN predicts that the country’s current 51 million population could be reduced by half by the end of the century [5].
The demographic crisis the country has been experiencing for over a decade has been widely attributed to the economic precarity experienced by most young South Koreans [6]. The staggering cost of living and child-rearing discourages many from getting married or starting a family. Moreover, over half the women of reproductive age in the country express no intention of having children due to the increased difficulties and pressures placed upon them in Korea’s deeply patriarchal society and sexist job market [7].
The government’s response represented a turn towards pro-natalist policies to encourage a surge in childbirths, which serves as the main backdrop for the emergence of a feminist movement that refuses marriage and childbearing as a political stance against the country’s deeply entrenched patriarchal culture: the 4B movement [8].
Demographic crisis: a security issue
Demographic security is a crucial component of a country’s national security [9] because it concerns the most central element of a country’s interests: its citizens. If national security is interested in a country’s survival, nothing becomes more important than the continued existence of its population. Consequently, population growth, fertility, and mortality rates, or population ageing, emerge as pressing security issues.
Population degrowth – a decrease in population due to higher death rates than fertility rates – creates several problems for a country’s social and economic security by putting pressure on available resources [10]. A plethora of crucial issues hinges on a country maintaining its population, such as economic growth, the quantity and quality of labour and human capital, as well as the sustainability of welfare programs, all of which are crucial elements for a country’s national security [11]. Ultimately, a country needs newborns to survive.
Aware of this predicament, the South Korean government has tried to increase fertility rates through programs providing support through the traditional patriarchal institution of the family, such as childcare benefits, low-interest mortgages for newly married couples, or expanded maternity and paternity leave [12]. Despite investing more than $200 billion in the last 16 years [13], such policies have not produced the desired effect [14], and South Korean women keep distancing themselves from the possibility of becoming mothers.
Korea’s demographic crisis is not only an economic issue but a structural one. Patriarchal culture is deeply entrenched in all aspects of life for South Korean women. Gender norms, discrimination in the workplace, strongly enforced beauty standards, unequal distribution of childcare and domestic tasks, and widespread domestic and sexual violence are some of the issues that Korean feminists place at the forefront of their existence [15]. Consequently, the current pro-natalist policies will not effectively increase fertility rates in the country. It can be argued that they do precisely the contrary. By politicizing marriage and childrearing, they provide a political framework for radical feminists to articulate their grievances, which they have done through the rejection of the patriarchal expectations that define a woman’s life in South Korea [16].
The 4B movement
The 4B movement is a mostly digital collective of women which rose to prominence in 2019 around four main tenants: no marriage, no childrearing, no dating, and no (heterosexual) sexual relationship (비혼 bihon, 비출산 bichulsan, 비연애 biyeonae, 비섹스 bisekseu). This movement, whose numbers are not clear but have been estimated to be somewhere between 5.000 and 50.000 members [17], represents a direct challenge to the patriarchal state and the pro-natalist policies which frame women’s bodies and their reproductive capacity as an instrument for the state’s ‘future-making' [18].
Korean feminists participating in the 4B movement actively challenge the multiple ways gendered pressures are enforced in a conservative society. They do so not only by withdrawing from the dating scene, but also by dismissing the country’s pervasive beauty standards and consumerist practices associated with them [19]. They challenge the traditionally expected life path of marriage and family while denouncing the discrimination women face in the Korean job market – where women earn 31% less than their male co-workers [20] – both when they are single and when they decide to become mothers [21].
The movement represents an answer to the country's management of its deep demographic crisis, but also a threat to its democratic security. While the government has sought to increase fertility rates by promoting a traditional family model, these feminists reject the instrumentalization of their reproductive capacities and choose to remove themselves from a society they deem unsavable [22]. A growing narrative promoted by men’s collectives, but also echoed by both mainstream media and the current government, placing the blame for low fertility rates on feminism and dismissing the wide number of claims made by Korea’s feminists only serves to embolden radical stances such as the 4B movement [23]. By doubling down on pro-natalist policies based on a conservative patriarchal model, South Korea’s government fails to address one of the main issues underpinning its demographic crisis: women are fed up with a society telling them their ultimate role in life is getting married and being dedicated mothers, having to give up their dreams and submitting to their husbands while the government tells them they must reproduce to save the country.
Conclusion
South Korea’s demographic insecurity stems from the country’s deeply entrenched patriarchal institutions and beliefs. Korean women, faced with precarity and vulnerability in their professional and personal lives, are increasingly rejecting the expected path of motherhood not only in a challenge to patriarchy, but in refusing to engage with the patriarchal system perpetuated through traditional understandings of marriage and family. Low fertility in developed nations is not solely an economic issue caused by the growing inequality and precarity of the masses, but also a result of the high levels of gender inequity in multiple aspects of life in an individual-oriented society [24]. South Korea’s patriarchal strategy to deal with its demographic security will not be effective, because Korean women have said ‘enough’.
References
[1] Yoon, J., 2022. ‘South Korea Breaks Record for World’s Lowest Fertility Rate, Again.’ The New York Times. (24 August 2022). Available at: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/24/world/asia/south-korea-fertility-rate.html [Accessed May 8th 2023].
[2] Jung, H., 2023. ‘Opinion | Women in South Korea Are on Strike Against Being ‘Baby-Making Machines.’’ The New York Times. (27 January 2023) Available at: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/27/opinion/south-korea-fertility-rate-feminism.html [Accessed May 8th 2023].
[3] Ahn, A., 2023. ‘South Korea has the world's lowest fertility rate, a struggle with lessons for us all.’ NPR. (19 March 2023) Available at: https://www.npr.org/2023/03/19/1163341684/south-korea-fertility-rate [Accessed May 8th 2023].
[4] OECD, 2022. Demography - Fertility rates - OECD Data. Available at: http://data.oecd.org/pop/fertility-rates.htm [Accessed May 8th 2023].
[5] UN, 2022. World Population Prospects - Population Division - United Nations. Available at: https://population.un.org/wpp/Graphs/Probabilistic/POP/TOT/410 [Accessed May 8th 2023].
[6] Yi, H.J., 2022. ‘South Korea in demographic crisis as many stop having babies.’ AP News. Available at: https://apnews.com/article/health-business-south-korea-demographics-589d1cd13582f22498dc64a707c75a4d [Accessed May 8th 2023].
[7] Jung, ‘Women in South Korea Are on Strike’.
[8] Lee, J., Jeong, E., 2021. ‘The 4B movement: envisioning a feminist future with/in a non-reproductive future in Korea.’ Journal of Gender Studies 30(5), pp. 633–644. https://doi.org/10.1080/09589236.2021.1929097
[9] Zhyvko, Z., Stadnyk, M., Boyko, O., 2021. ‘Demographic Security: Key Threats and Means to Their Regulating.’ Economics, Finance and Management Review, 4(8) pp. 11–24. https://doi.org/10.36690/2674-5208-2021-4-11
[10] Ibid.
[11] Ibid., and Moon, K., 2015. ‘South Korea’s Demographic Changes and their Political Impact’. East Asia Policy Paper 6. [pdf] Centre For East Asia Policy Studies. Available at: https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/51180532.pdf
[12] Kim, S., 2019. ‘Reproductive technologies as population control: how pronatalist policies harm reproductive health in South Korea.’ Sexual and Reproductive Health Matters 27(2), pp. 6–12. https://doi.org/10.1080/26410397.2019.1610278
[13] Ahn, ‘South Korea has the world's lowest fertility rate
[14] Prince, S., 2021. ‘Pro-Natalist Policies in South Korea: Why Aren’t They Working?’ Medium. (10 April 2021) Available at: https://sherlyprince.medium.com/pro-natalist-policies-in-south-korea-why-arent-they-working-6270324b2507 [Accessed May 8th 2023].
[15] Sussman, A.L., 2023. ‘A World Without Men.’ The Cut. (8 March 2023) Available at: https://www.thecut.com/2023/03/4b-movement-feminism-south-korea.html [Accessed May 8th 2023].
[16] Lee and Jeong, ‘The 4B movement.’
[17] Sussman, ‘A World Without Men.’
[18] Lee and Jeong, ‘The 4B movement’ p.637.
[19] Ibid.
[20] OECD, n.d. Earnings and wages - Gender wage gap - OECD Data. Available at: http://data.oecd.org/earnwage/gender-wage-gap.htm [Accessed May 8th 2023].
[21] AFP, 2018. ‘Jobs for the boys under fire in South Korea.’ RTL Today. (14 November 2018). Available at: https://today.rtl.lu/news/business-and-tech/a/1266798.html [Accessed May 8th 2023].
[22] Jung, ‘Women in South Korea Are on Strike’.
[23] Yi, B.L., 2022. ‘No sex, no babies: South Korea's emerging feminists reject marriage.’ Reuters. (20 January 2022). Available at: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-southkorea-women-rights-idUSKBN1ZJ02Z [Accessed May 8th 2023].
[24] Bae, G.I., Kim, K.S., 2012. ‘A study on the influence of family values and birth policy on the wanted fertility rate.’ Korean Journal of Social Welfare Studies 43(3), pp. 239–266. https://doi.org/10.16999/kasws.2012.43.3.239
