This issue presents diverse forms of one-parent families in Asia because of different demographic and socioeconomic developmental contexts. The 9 papers show how culture and policies could shape the impact of living with one parent on children’s well-being. As seen, one-parent families due to out-of-wedlock births remain rare in most Asian societies. One-parent families due to divorce have a relatively large share in more developed economies such as Japan, Korea, Taiwan, and Hong Kong, whereas internal migration is a more important cause of one-parent families in China and Vietnam. Death of a parent has been an important cause for Cambodian children to grow up with one or no parents in her recent history, and in India, more than half of the lone parents are widows. As in Western societies, most lone parents are mothers, and they are found to be more disadvantaged than lone fathers. Policies in all nine societies studied here provide limited support to lone parents.
From ARI organized Workshop “Growing Up in One-Parent Family in Asia”, 1-2 July 2014.
