The Economist May 21st 2022 Asia 37
Turkmenistan
Last chance salon
A
triptothebeautysalonfora mani
cure followed by a lift home does not
usuallyconstitute an act of subversion. But
for women in Turkmenistan such everyday
activities are now against the law, subject
to fines of up to half the minimum month
ly wage. Beauticians who tend to them can
be jailed for 15 days.
The new rules, imposed last month, are
the brainchild of Serdar Berdymukhame
dov, Turkmenistan’s new president, who
took over from his longserving father,
Gurbanguly, after a rigged election in
March. Serdar’s youth—he is only 40 years
old—gave rise to tentative hopes among
some in the country that he might prove, if
not more liberal, at least less repressive
than his father. Yet the younger man is
turning out to be just as obsessed with mi
cromanaging the lives of his citizens.
It is not only manicures that are beyond
the pale. Everything from false eyelashes
to Botox injections is now restricted. No
explanation has been offered, nor any new
rules actually published. Lawenforce
ment officials simply cite an unofficial ban
on introducing “foreign objects” to the fe
male body, according to Turkmen.news, a
website based in the Netherlands. Women
have also been barred from travelling in
private vehicles with men to whom they
are not related. They can still take taxis—
but only so long as they sit in the back seat.
Police are enforcing the new rules with
relish. They have conducted raids in public
places and offices, demanding women re
move their facemasks so their lips can be
inspected for signs of enhancement. Pub
licsector employees have had to vow not
to dye their hair, use cosmetic procedures
or wear tight clothes. On May 14th Radio
Liberty, an Americanfunded media outlet,
reported that authorities in the city of Mary
were detaining couples, including married
ones, for such crimes as holding hands.
This is not the Berdymukhamedovs’
first assault on women’s rights. In 2018
Gurbanguly initiated an unofficial cam
paign against female drivers in which their
vehicles were impounded and their licenc
es confiscated on such flimsy grounds as
failing to keep all the required gear in the
firstaid kits drivers are supposed to carry.
Though Turkmenistan is 89% Muslim,
most of its people are not very observant
and the state is officially secular. The im
positions on women derive instead from
Turkmen tribal customs called adat, says
AkjaKepderi,a Turkmenresearcherwho
goesbya pseudonymtoprotectherfamily.
Adat dictates that women must stay at
home,“servingasabigwombforgiving
birthtolotsofchildren”,saysMsKepderi.
Rules published last month restrict
abortiontothefirstfiveweeksofpregnan
cy,ineffecta totalban.Thestate,which
lavishes rewards on women who have
eightormorechildren,presentsfemalesas
a “reproductivevessel”,saysAynabatYay
lymovaoftheProgresFoundation,which
promoteshealthliteracy.Thefertilityrate,
at2.7perwoman,hasbeenfallingforsev
eraldecades.
PublicprotestsarerareinTurkmenis
tan.Butwhentheydobreakout,theyare
generallyledbywomen,saysMsKepderi.
Themostfrequentcauseisa shortageof
food.TheolderBerdymukhamedov’spro
hibitionondrivingwasreportedlyeasedin
2020 after angry women disrupted the
workofdrivinglicenceoffices,demand
ingtheirapplicationsbeaccepted.Serdar’s
initialmovesinofficesuggestheislikely
tobeevenlessfemalefriendlythanhisfa
ther.Yetinimposingharshrestrictionson
halfthepopulation,hemaybestoringup
troubleforthefuture. n
A LMATY
The new president is clamping down
on women’s freedoms
Baby it’s old outside
Fertility rate, births per woman
Source:Population Reference Bureau *Or latest available
South Korea
Hong Kong
Macau
Taiwan
Singapore
Japan
China
0.50 2.52.01.51.0
10 2020*
Demography
NIMBYs v babies
S INGAPORE
Asia’s advanced economies now have
lower birth rates than Japan
T
he listof things for which Japan en
joys a global reputation includes deli
cious food, cuttingedge technology, an
oversupply of karaoke bars and an under
supply of babies. In 1990 it published a re
cordlow fertility rate for the previous
year—the socalled “1.57 shock”. For years it
has been seen as a harbinger of how rich
societies will age and shrink.
Much of Asia has now caught up with or
overtaken it. Japan’s fertility rate of 1.3 in
2020, the latest year for which comparable
figures are available, puts it on a par with
mainland China, according to the Popula
tion Research Bureau, an American outfit.
China’s birth rate is likely already to have
fallen behind Japan’s: there were 10.6m
Chinese births last year, down from 12m in
2020, a decline of 11%. The number of
births fell only 3% in Japan.
Japanese fertility is still ultralow com
pared with almost any society in human
history. Yet it is now higher than that of any
welloff East Asian or SouthEast Asian
economy. The numbers in Hong Kong, Ma
cau, Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan
ranged between 0.8 and 1.1 in 2020 (see
chart). Nor is this a temporary blip caused
by the pandemic: Japan’s figure was higher
than all those countries in 2019, too.
Rich, babyaverse Asian countries in
the region have three things in common.
First, their people rarely have children out
side marriage. Only around 2% of births in
Japan and South Korea are to unmarried
mothers, the lowest levels in the oecd, a
club of rich countries. In wealthy Western
countries that figure is typically between
30% and 60%. In China, the few who be
come pregnant out of wedlock are often
denied benefits. The region’s decline in
births has closely tracked a decline in mar
riages. The age at which people commit to
a lifetime of entanglement has also been
rising, further delaying childbearing.
A second shared factor is expensive
schooling. Pricey private tutoring and oth
er walletemptying forms of “shadow edu
cation”, as such extras are known, are com
mon in East Asia. The most frequent rea
son cited by Japanese couples for having
fewer children is the cost of raising and
educating them. Lucy Crehan, an educa
tion researcher, says that these problems
might be even worse in other parts of Asia.
Japanese pupils face their first highstakes
exams only at the age of 15. In contrast,
children in Shanghai and Singapore must
take such tests as early as primary school,
piling on the parental pressure to perform
and adding to the family’s tuition bills.
Yet it is the third factor that might ex
plain why Japan is outsprogging its rich
Asian peers. A flurry of research in recent
years suggests that high house prices cause
young couples to delay having children.
One paper found that an increase of
$10,000 in house prices in America led to a
5% increase in fertility rates among home
owners, but a 2.4% decrease among non
owners. Across much of East Asia and es
pecially in urban China, buying a home is
an uphill struggle for young people. South
Korea, whose fertility rate of 0.8 is the low
est in the region, correspondingly has a
housepricetoincome ratio (the number
of years of income needed to buy a home)