Aging & Social Change: Tenth Interdisciplinary Conference

Abstract

This study explores how far specific institutional regulations towards social benefits in the context of social policies could prevent women-poverty risk in China in the fourteenth-nineteenth century and how far these benefits interact with each other. The paper relates particularly to two perspectives of social benefits, “Outside Marriage Benefits” and “Inside Marriage Benefits”. In the theoretical debate over women’s living situation in ancient China, women are often considered as appendant attached to the family. We argue that specific social policies towards the above-mentioned benefits helped to reduce women’s poverty risk in China and different benefit approaches interact with each other. In order to evaluate this theoretical assumption, this research investigates the generosity of the social benefits from two perspectives. “Outside Marriage Benefits” include owning fortune from the original family, dowry, assistance benefit from public property from the clan and government assistance subsidy and job income. The benefit defined as “Inside Marriage Benefits” include widow’s inheritance benefit and single-mothers’ benefits. This paper introduces a multi-dimensional approach to measure the generosity of social policy towards these social benefits and poverty risks of Chinese women. The empirical study is based on analysis of institutional regulations of social policy and historical records. It turns out that we get a better understanding of how women made their living in the entirely male-dominated society and how social policies prevent or leave gaps open to women-poverty risk if we analyze the role of different combination of women’s social benefits.