Chinese Relax Into Divorce

The number of divorces in China has almost quadrupled in the past 20 years as attitudes towards a once a forbidden subject are relaxed.

More than 1.2 million people divorced in 2000, the China Daily reported. Experts say the number will soon be 2m a year.

About 35% of cases are ascribed to "dissatisfaction with sexual life, which [is] regarded as a crucial part of marriage," the report said. A survey in the north-eastern city of Shenyang concluded that more women opting for divorce to find "a new love".

But there is also a worrying rise in the number of family break-ups ascribed to domestic violence: another subject rarely discussed in the past.

In the socialist era when divorce, although legal, was often frowned upon applicants needed the permission of their workplace and were often strongly pressed to stay together.

The 1950 Marriage Law allowed divorce only "when mediation ... has failed to bring about a reconciliation". Community leaders saw it as their job to "persuade" couples to stay together.

Love or its absence in a relationship were regarded as signs of a bourgeois mentality. Many Chinese who grew up in the 60s and 70s recall cases of desperately unhappy marriages - sometimes their own.

A new law makes it possible to get a decree in a day, but bans cohabitation with someone other than a spouse: aimed at the growing problem of "second wives", which has revived memories of pre-revolutionary concubinage.

Marriage, which also needed "work unit" approval, has become easier too. Urban couples can easily spend 100,000 yuan (£9,000) or more on their wedding and traditional ceremonies with music and processions have been revived in rural areas.

A recent survey found widespread tolerance for living together before marriage, and there is less condemnation of the single and childless.