By abandoning its 37-year old one-child norm, the Chinese Communist Party has brought the curtain down on an authoritarian policy that subordinated human rights to coercive birth-control practices and produced far-reaching changes in the Chinese society.
This policy will return to the Chinese people, their basic fundamental right — the right to life and individual liberty — which no civilised state should have the power to take away from its citizens.
The nub of the matter is that there aren’t enough young people in China to ensure productivity in industry, agriculture, and the service sector — between them the thermometer of growth and development. As labour becomes scarce and wages rise, China’s manufacturing-led, export-driven economy will lose its competitiveness.