She Left He Left: Marriage at the Crossroad in Contemporary China

This dissertation investigates the role of gender in generating and processing divorce litigation. Drawing on a probability sample of 1064 divorce litigation records and 33 in-depth interviews in a northern midsize city of China, my research demonstrates pronounced gender differences in motivations, experiences, and outcomes of divorce litigations. The first chapter shows that failing to provide economic resources was more likely to be cited by women but rarely cited by men. Husbands are held more accountable for providing economic resources. Failing to live up to the breadwinner norm can jeopardize the marriage, and particularly motivate women’s divorce. In the second chapter, I found that marital discords are not limited to nuclear households; extended family members play a significant role in influencing marriage stability. Types of complaints concerning in-laws are gendered, with women are more likely to complain about being victims of violence from their in-laws, and men are more likely to complain about their wives do not show enough respect to their parents. Last, I found adjudicated divorce outcomes regarding child custody differ significantly by gender. Yet, the effect differs between rural courts and urban courts. Compared to rural, urban courts are more likely to grant child custody to women. Overall, my dissertation contributes to the growing body of gender literature on how gender-based inequalities in marital life connect to and interact with other social institutions. Further, my research challenges the prediction that families in societies like China will converge into the Western model to become more nuclear and individualized. I find a great heterogeneity and a strong pattern of coexistence of individualism and familism in Chinese marriage and family life, which calls for more nuanced theories to capture the complexity of different cultural and institutional contexts.