Coate 1

Elyse Coate

ENG 1201

Prof Barnes

21 March 2021

Why has the One Child Policy violated Human Rights?

Over the course of 35 years, millions of Chinese children were aborted,

abandoned, adopted overseas, and taken away from their families. A large fraction of

China’s residents believed that the Chinese government did no wrong and thought that

what they did to the population was right. I will be discussing why the One-Child Policy

has violated human rights.

The United Nations made a declaration of human rights with 30 articles defining

universal human rights. Several of these rights were violated during the era of the One

Child Policy. This source is an important source because it will serve as a baseline for

my essay and what human rights are.

Another source that I will be using is China's Hidden Children: Abandonment,

Adoption, and the Human Costs of the One-Child Policy. I will be using this for showing

the favoritism in China during the policy.

Another source that I will be using is the account of a child that was abandoned

and adopted during the policy, my aunt. She was generous enough to give me her story

and tell me a little about her experience and people that she knows that have gone

through similar situations. I will be using this to show the favorability in China as well.
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One Child Nation, a documentary, will be one of the largest sources that I will use

as it has many examples of violation of human rights such as huma trafficking security

of person and more. This is going to be an invaluable source.

It’s a Girl, a documentary filmed during the policy that is also an invaluable

source that has examples that were not mentioned in the other documentary that will

add a lot to my paper.

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Works Cited

Coate, Brenna. Personal interview. March 4, 2021.

It’s A Girl. Directed by Evan Grae Davis, Shadowline Films LLC, 2013.

Johnson, Kay Ann. China's Hidden Children: Abandonment, Adoption, and the Human

Costs of the One-Child Policy. The University of Chicago Press, 2017.

One Child Nation. Directed by Nanfu Wang and Jialing Zhang, Amazon Studios, 2019.

“Universal Declaration of Human Rights.” United Nations, United Nations,

www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/.