Counter-Reproductive Memory: Chinese Young Women Against State Pronatalism

Abstract: This article introduces the concept of "counter-reproductive memory" to analyze the complex interactions between China's evolving population management policies and the reproductive consciousness of its younger female generation. By tracing the policy shifts from the One-Child to the Universal Two-Child and subsequently the Three-Child Policy, this article reveals how the (post)memory of reproductive trauma and intergenerational silence has given rise to a resistant reproductive subjectivity. Drawing on in-depth interviews and a critical discursive analysis of online discussions, this article demonstrates how inherited collective memories of state-imposed reproductive controls continue to inform young women's skepticism toward state-driven pronatalist agendas. Counter-reproductive memory, as conceptualized in this article, serves as both a repository of past traumas and a critical lens through which these women challenge and resist the state's coercive reproductive policies. Despite the introduction of flexible policies like the Three-Child Policy, younger women's opposition persists, with their counter-reproductive memories exposing the contradictions and inconsistencies in the party-state's biopolitical governance as well as its perpetuation of reproductive trauma and controls from earlier policy eras. The article ultimately calls for a re-evaluation of China's reproductive policies within the broader framework of women's rights and autonomy and reproductive justice, and that meaningful policy reform must address the historical and ongoing impact of reproductive governance on women's bodies, choices, and political subjectivities.