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Chinese-Filipino Fertility Differences in Cagayan de Oro: Some Findings from a Medium-Sized Philippine City

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 April 2011

Extract

While increasing sociological and anthropological attention has been directed towards the position of the Chinese in the Philippines, such research has often lacked a quantitative orientation. Perhaps owing to the intense concern centring on the political question of citizenship rights, there have as yet been a few empirical analyses of the attitudes and behaviour of persons of Chinese descent in the Philippines. Even studies designed to investigate Chinese “assimilation” to Philippine culture have been characterized more by a concern with political and legal questions than by an interest in social theory or research methodologies.

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Articles
Copyright
Copyright © The National University of Singapore 1981

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References

1 Bulatao, Rodolfo A., Ethnic Attitudes in Five Philippine Cities (Quezon City, 1973)Google Scholar; and Eitzen, D. Stanley, “Two Minorities: The Jews of Poland and the Chinese of the Philippines”, Majority and Minority: The Dynamics of Racial and Ethnic Relations, ed., Yetman, Norman R. and Steele, C. Hoy (Boston, 1971), pp. 117–38Google Scholar.

2 See, e. g., Jacques Amyot, S. J., The Manila Chinese: Familism in the Philippine Environment, IPC Monographs no. 2 (Institute of Philippine Culture, Ateneo de Manila, Quezon City, 1973)Google Scholar; and Omohundro, John, “Chinese Merchant Society in the Philippines”, Philippine Sociological Review 21, no. 2 (Apr. 1973): 169–80Google Scholar.

3 Sevent y per cent of the Chinese heads of household in our Cagayan de Oro sample were classified as “white collar” or “skilled” workers, as compared to only 45. 6% of Filipino household heads. Similarly, 70. 8% of the Chinese husbands and 54. 8% of their wives had graduated from high school, as compared t o only 53. 6% and 44. 4%, respectively, of Filipino husbands and wives.

4 A useful summary of the literature is provided by Mason, Karenet al, Social and Economic Correlates of Family Fertility: A Survey of the Evidence, RTI Project SU-518 (Research Triangle Institute, Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, 1971)Google Scholar.

5 Bonacich, Edna, “A Theory of Middleman Minorities”, American Sociological Review 38, no. 5 (Oct. 1973): 583–94.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

6 “Characteristic patterns of decision-making differ vastly between traditional and modern societies. In order to describe the differences Weber used the notion of modes of orientation. … We shall describe three modes - traditional, short-run hedonistic, and purposive-rational. …

“From a decision viewpoint, a crucial difference among the modes of orientation is the future time-perspective. The traditional mode of orientation implies no crystallized future time-perspective for the individual. There is no sequential decision-making. The individual acting in the traditional mode selects the same alternative that he selected before with no recourse to new information. …

“The individual acting in the short-run hedonistic mode has a very brief future time perspective. … In order to predict the behavior of a person acting in the short-run hedonistic mode, we would need to estimate highly evanescent situational factors. …

“The individual acting in the purposive-rational mode has an elaborate time perspective extending far into the future. His calculation of likelihoods and of utilities is complex and intricate, and is very sensitive to new information. …

“The illustration of these notions with fertility is found in the demographic transition. The high fertility in the first stage is a consequence of a set of customs which are adhered to by persons acting in the traditional mode of orientation. The innovators who adopt family planning are persons acting in the purposive-rational mode. …

Beshers, James M., Population Processes in Social Systems (New York, 1967), 8588Google Scholar.

7 Goldscheider, Calvin and Uhlenberg, Peter R., “Minority Group Status and Fertility”, American Journal of Sociology 74, no. 4 (Jan. 1969): 370–71.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed

8 Roberts, Robert E. and Lee, Eun S., “Minority Group Status and Fertility Revisited”, American Journal of Sociology 80, no. 2 (Sept. 1974): 503–23.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed

9 It is worth noting, however, that the “insecurities” of the Chinese as an ethnic group may be lessened somewhat in a provincial city such as Cagayan de Oro. Amyot, for example, notes that “Chinese-Filipino relationships are much smoother and friendlier in the provinces than in Manila”, while an earlier study of the Chinese community in Cagayan de Oro concluded that “in Cagayan, since very early times, there has been a genuine and sincere sympathy between the Chinese in the community and the rest of the citizenry”. Amyot, S. J., op. cit., 77Google Scholar ; and Francisco, R.Demetrio, S. J., “Jus Soli: A Matter of Social Justice”, Philippine-Chinese Profile: Essays and Studies, ed. Charles, J.McCarthy, S. J. (Manila, 1974), p. 157Google Scholar.

10 Pirie, Peter, “Squatter Settlements in Kuala Lumpur Surveyed”, Asian and Pacific Census News letter 4, no. 3 (Feb. 1978): 910Google Scholar; Yeh, Steven, “Some Observations on Fertility Decline in Singapore”, Population Problems in the Pacific, ed. Tachi, Minora and Huramatsu, Minoru (Tokyo, 1971)Google Scholar; and Cho, Lee-Jay, Palmore, James A., and Saunders, Lyle, “Recent Fertility Trends in West Malaysia”, Demography 5, no. 2 (1968): 732–44CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

11 Amyot, S. J., op. cit., 122.Google Scholar

12 Jocano's anthropological account of the place of children in the Tagalog family system, for example, notes that “the term mag-anak is used to describe or define the family. … Mag-anak, as a structural concept is derived from the word anak (child) and the prefix mag- which implies ability to have, or intention in having, children. In other words, … having offsprings is central to the concept of the family.” Jocano, F. Lancia, “The Family in an Urban Community: An Ethnographic Study of the Life Cycle of Filipino Urban Dwellers” (Manila, 1974), p. 262Google Scholar.

13 Wu, Tsong-Shien, “The Value of Children, or Boy Preference?”, The Satisfactions and Costs of Children: Theories, Concepts, Methods, ed. Fawcett, James T. (Honolulu, 1972), p. 298.Google Scholar

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15 , Bonacich, op. cit., p. 586.Google Scholar

16 “The fundamental issue in demographic transition is the direction and magnitude of wealth flows or the net balance of the two flows - one from parents to children and the other from children to parents. … There is … a great divide … separating the earlier situation in which the net flow of wealth is towards parents and in which … high fertility is rational and the later situation in which the flow is toward children. …” Caldwell, John C., “Toward a Restatement of Demographic Transition Theory”, Population and Development Review 2, nos. 3 and 4 (Sept. -Dec. 1976): 344–45CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

17 Knodel, John and Prachuabmoh, Visid, The Fertility of Thai Women, Research Report no. 10 (Institute of Population Studies, Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok, 1973), pp. 5962.Google Scholar

18 Statistics on the population of Cagayan de Oro in 1975 are taken from Republic of the Philippines, National Census and Statistics Ofice, 1975 Integrated Census of the Population and Its Economic Activities, Misamis Oriental, vol. I, Population (Manila, 1975), Table 2Google Scholar. Statistics on Chinese citizenship are from Republic or the Philippines, National Census and Statistics Office, Final Report of the 1970 Census, vol. 1, Misamis Oriental (Manila, 1974), Table 111-12Google Scholar.

19 This, however, is uncertain in so far as a number of slum and squatter communities are also located outside of the poblacion. A more complete description of the sampling procedures used in the dual records project is to be found in Francis C. Madigan and Alejandro N. Herrin, New Approaches to the Measurement of Vital Rates in Developing Countries, Laboratories for Population Statistics, Reprint no. 18 (Chapel Hill, 1977).

20 See, e. g., Borhek, J. T., “Ethnic Group Cohesion”, American Journal of Sociology 76, no. 1 (July 1970): 35CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

21 “It is clear … why the Philippine Chinese deserve to be called a merchant society: over 70 percent of Iloilo's (Chinese) men are self-employed shopkeepers. Another 16 percent are either big businessmen or employees and managers of other merchants.” , Omohundro, op. cit., p. 173Google Scholar.

22 Costello, Michael A., “Trends and Differentials in Marital Fertility in Misamis Oriental Province, the Philippines”, Ph. D. diss. (University of Chicago, 1977), pp. 98102.Google Scholar

23 Currently married women in the dual records urban sample were used as the base population for the standardization procedure.

24 Teitelbaum, Michael S., “Relevance of Demographic Transition Theory for Developing Countries”, Science 88, no. 4187 (1975): 420–25.CrossRefGoogle Scholar