China is the only country in the world to have imposed a mandatory limit on childbirth - it's called the One Child Policy (OCP) and it has stipulated that couples in some areas of China are only allowed to have one child. Any more than one and they have to pay a fine.
It isn't a blanket restriction; different areas have different approaches. It applies mostly to urban areas, and people in rural areas are generally allowed two children. The result (some sources claim) is that China has reduced its birthrate from 5 to about 1.7.
It isn't without critics though. The main arguments against it are:
• Because of the low status of women in Chinese society, some couples have resorted to aborting a female child. The extent of this isn't clear, but some studies say that by 2020 China will ahve 30 million fewer girls than boys.
• Urban families have only 1 child on an income 3 times higher than the average rural family, who may have 2 or more (in unrestricted areas). This means urban children are often spoilt and rural children brought up in poverty. The OCP has therefore widened social divisions of wealth.
Any radical and experimental social system is going to have drawbacks, especially at first.
Is China right to have implemented this policy?
Should more nations do the same?
Might there have been less coercive ways of achieving the same result?