For the Chinese, the promise of Deng Xiaoping's far-reaching reforms has often meant unexpected social strains. They range from huge student demonstrations for more political freedom to cases of spectacular corruption and a tolerance for economic inequality. But few have been as deeply unsettling as a new aura of sexual permissiveness that has sprung up with the reforms. For years officials in Beijing tried to ward off the threat by warning unwary citizens about the evils of sex. Their efforts were ignored. These days the government permits public lectures and seminars for government workers on such previously forbidden subjects as masturbation, premarital pregnancy and sex crimes, and the talks are attracting overflow crowds across the country. "We hear much about China's four modernizations," says Shanghai Sociology Professor Liu Dalin. "We should add a fifth one: the modernization of the senses."
A decade after the Communist Party sanctioned the return of the profit motive, sex is once again for sale on the busy streets and crowded back alleys of China. Venereal disease -- an affliction that was officially eradicated under Chairman Mao -- has quadrupled in cities like Shanghai. Meanwhile, millions of Chinese, newly exposed to Western ideas, have fallen prey to notions of romantic love and sexual fulfillment. An estimated 60% of Chinese are said to be dissatisfied with their spouses. Mandatory counseling has not prevented more than half a million divorces a year. Police crackdowns have failed to stem underground sales of pornographic books and videos. "The Chinese are like people who have been in the dark a long time," says Liu, who is China's best-known sexologist. "Suddenly, when the windows are opened, they feel dizzy."
The antidote? Liu prescribes information, information and more information. He lectures frequently on sex, has written 30 best-selling books on love, sex and marriage, and helped start a new magazine called Sex Education. Largely as a result of lobbying by Liu and his colleagues, the state has agreed to fund experimental sex-education courses in 6,000 middle schools across the country. Contrary to the views of conservative elements within the party leadership, educators see China's sexual reawakening not so much a threat to public morality as a sign of progress. "If people are not hedonistic to a degree, as well as capitalistic, the society cannot be modernized," says Dr. Wu Minlun, a Hong Kong psychiatrist and advocate of sex education.
Dr. Wu and Liu, who sometimes lecture together, share a philosophy that owes more to common sense and The Joy of Sex than to Marx. Liu, for example, does not condone premarital sex, but he considers it a fact of life for up to 30% of Chinese youth. The trend, he often explains to parents, is a consequence of China's "one couple, one child" policy of population control. The late marriages and subsequent late births encouraged by the policy, he believes, "do not conform to the physiological development of human beings." People reach their sexual prime toward the end of their teens, and are likely to do what comes naturally long before it is officially sanctioned.