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| 婚姻律师杂志>>原创论文>> Get A Clear
View of Shanghai Foreign Marriage and Divorce |
Get A Clear View of Shanghai Foreign
Marriage and Divorce |
Shanghai, one of the most important international
cities in the Far East, has attracted more and more foreigners. There
are 19239 foreigners working in Shanghai in 2002 and all foreigners
will be around 100000 including the people staying for business or
other reasons. Foreigners coming from Japan, America, Korean, Singapore,
Malaysia, German, Australia, France, Canada, and England take the
first ten positions of the working foreigners in Shanghai. As far
as the proportion of the occupation, Japan is 33.3%, America is 11.7%,
Korea is 8.8% and Singapore is 8.1%. With the rising of the number
of the foreigner staying in Shanghai and the cooperation with outside
world, the foreign divorce has also been increased day after day.
Now, 3 of 100 new couples are foreign marriage in Shanghai, which
ranks first in China. From 1996 to 2002, the foreign marriage registered
in Shanghai has exceeded 21000. That means, there are 3000 foreign
couples registered every year. This number is 7 times to 1980’s. Nowadays,
more than ten couples get the marriage certification from the Shanghai
foreign marriage registration office per day.
The characters of the foreign marriage in Shanghai
First, the overcast of such marriage is very wide.
The foreigners in Shanghai foreign marriage come from all over the
world. Foreigners from approximately 50 countries and areas including
all the continent except Antarctica marry in Shanghai. In such marriage,
most foreigners are Japanese who occupy 39.6% of the number of the
foreign marriage. As Japan is the biggest trade association in Shanghai,
more and more Shanghai people get married with Japanese. The second
is Taiwanese, which take 30% of the number. Shanghai has become the
favorite investment place to Taiwanese. Up to now, 50 companies ranking
the first 100 consortiums in Taiwan has invested in Shanghai for more
than 120 items while 60 stock companies have established 160 projects
in Shanghai. The information given by the government shows Taiwan
had invested 8000 million dollars to Shanghai till October last year.
With the warming up of the investment, more and more Taiwanese choose
staying in Shanghai and now there are 30000 Taiwanese in Shanghai.
The third is America, which takes 9.1 of the number, and several other
comparatively concentrated countries are Australia (6.1%), Hong Kong
(5.1%), Canada (3.9%) and Europe (5.7%). From early 1980’s to 1990’s,
most Shanghai people like choosing Chinese with foreign nationality,
overseas Chinese and Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan person to marry because
both parties have same culture tradition and no language barrier.
With the great progress of Shanghai people’s language level and the
high education, the party in the foreign marriage has multi-characters.
Second, “a Shanghai girl with a foreign boy”, “an old man with a
young lady”, such kinds of marriage take the major type of the foreign
marriage in Shanghai.
20 years ago, the foreign marriage in Shanghai were almost in the
type of a Shanghai girl with a foreign boy and that causes the men
in the foreign marriage are average 10.5 years older than the women.
13% of such couples are in two generations. The record of the age
difference is made in 1996 with 54 years between the man and the woman.
The bridegroom is a 81 years old elder from America while the bride
from Shanghai is only 27 years old when they married. Generally speaking,
utility reasons take a great part in the Shanghai foreign marriage
as the foreign men have an obvious advantage in the economic conditions
and that makes the women give up the age difference.
Third, the kind of “a Shanghai man with a foreign girl”
has increased.
There are 300 man married a foreign girl every year now. The proportion
of such marriage has increased from 8.5% to 11.3%. In the 21000 couples
of foreign marriage, there are 2331 foreign girls from 1996 to 2002.
The age of the couples is very close in such kind and it ranks from
20 to 49. The average wedding age is around 35 which a little older
than the average marriage age in Shanghai. It reflects more and more
foreigners like going to Shanghai for development, which creating
chances for Shanghai men contact foreign women. Such kind of marriage
is for the love reason. It also reflects the economic position of
Shanghai and China has been advanced constantly.
Forth, the other character is that both parties have a high education
level. In the foreign marriage of Shanghai, the bridegroom and the
bride have all been well educated. In the type of “foreign man with
a Shanghai girl”, 47.8% of the foreigners have junior college degree
or above with 23.8 of the girls have junior college degree. This education
structure has exceeded far away from the average level of Shanghai
women’s education level. With compare, the man and the woman in the
third type of the foreigner marriage in Shanghai get same education
lever. 37.4% of Shanghai men in the marriage have junior college degree
(only 14.6% of the local people have such level). The percentage of
the foreign girls with junior college degree is bigger than the man.
The chief reason caused this situation is that foreigners always
work in the foreign owned enterprises or foreign company representatives,
only the person with good education or junior college degree can be
the member of such companies and contact the foreigners. Such people
have good foreign language communication skills and they can communicate
with the foreigners without and language barrier.
The foreign divorce causes a big trouble
Nowadays, more and more Chinese divorce from the foreigner soon
after the marriage especially for those who settled abroad after marriage.
In 1997, 30% of the foreign marriage with a Japanese husband and a
Chinese wife had divorced, 35% of the marriage with a Japanese wife
with a Chinese husband. The main reasons caused such circs is:
I. Separated in two places
After they get married, the foreigners always go back home or other
countries while the other party of the marriage don’t want to lever
China or can’t get the visa immediately, which caused both parties
live in two places. Though the communication is more convenient with
the modern technology, the communication by using language still can’t
release the lonely feelings. Emotion is changed by the environment
and the deep-set base of the marriage is difficult to meet the separated
life.
II. The Chinese girls’ utilitarian.
Many Shanghai girls look marrying a foreigner as a way to change
the life style other than a happy and forever matters. They have never
stayed abroad and hanker for the car, house and life outside China.
After they went to abroad, they found the big difference with their
imagination and it made big fall to them. The spouses always have
big difference in age, interesting which made the marriage life little
of color. A marriage without an emotion basis will be ended with pains.
Mr. liu, 36 years old, graduate from Shanghai engineer and technology
university, worked in a German owned company after graduation. Later,
he was appointed to work in Siemens and got the German nationality.
He married a German woman before but divorced because of the different
characters. Mr. liu wants to marry a Chinese girl as the advantage
of the Chinese traditional culture. In 2001, Mr. liu went back Shanghai
to visit his relatives, he met a 23-year-old Shanghai lady, Miss Wang.
After one week’s communication, Miss Wang wanted to marry but Mr.
liu thought it was too early. Miss Wang insisted registering the marriage
in the month Mr. Liu stayed in Shanghai so that Mr. liu registered
and got the certification notarized. After the spring festival 2002,
Mr. liu help with Miss Wang’s visa and brought her to German. After
Miss Wang went to German, She found it was very common for Mr. Liu
to have cars and house there. They lived in a rented apartment. Mr.
liu should pay a very high income tax though his salary was high,
little money can be left after tax. Mr. liu’s work is very busy and
he had no time going on travel with Miss Wang around the Europe. To
Miss Wang’s disappointment, she went back China and refused to go
back German with Mr. liu and brought the divorce suit to the court
with the request of economic help.
III. Marrying a foreigner is the instrument to go abroad
Some women make use of marrying a foreigner to get visa or green
card so that they can go abroad for further study or settle down there.
This intention can be refracted by the popular service of the foreign
marriage introduce. Ms. Li met a Japanese named Zhongjing by agency
and they got married soon. After marriage, Ms. Li asked him to help
with her visa. Mr. Zhongjing appointed an immigration office to deal
with the related procedures and asked Ms. Li to take out 1800000 yen(
around 150000 RMB). After Ms. Li collected the money, she transferred
the money to the immigration office’s account. Her visa can’t be given
because she had been criminal punished before. Ms. Li wanted to divorce
Mr. Zhongjing by agreement but he refused coming back China to divorce.
At last, Ms. Li had to hire a attorney and sued to the court.
IV. Different countries and areas have different marriage
procedures so that the divorce is always caused by one party’s fault.
Ms Chen( 28 years old) met Mr. Pan(34 years old) when she worked
in a FOE and they got married in Shanghai in 2001. Mr. pan went back
Taiwan soon after the marriage. Later, Ms Chen knew Mr. Pan married
8 years ago in Taiwan by accident. Mr. Pan can get the certification
showing he hasn’t married only because the registration procedure
is not necessary in Taiwan. The marriage is effective established
after a marriage ceremony with to witness there. The no spouse certification
for Taiwanese is made according to the registered information in the
personal files. If they don’t go to register their marriage in Taiwan,
such certification is mendacious. Mr. Pan could get the marriage certification
in Shanghai because his marriage in Taiwan wasn’t registered. According
to the Two Side’s Relation Statute in Taiwan, The marriage or divorce
effectiveness of a marriage between a Taiwanese and a mainland person
shall be decided by the Taiwan law while the divorce reason of such
marriage shall also be depended on the Taiwan law. Taiwan doesn’t
admit the marriage made in mainland because the difference in the
marriage establishment. Ms Chen was very angry with the fact and wanted
to divorce but Mr. Pan refuse to divorce in mainland. Ms Chen had
to bring the case to the court and apply for their invalid marriage
V. the difference in nationality, custom, conception and
language caused the marriage lacks of self-identity and adscription
feelings.
In fact, the uncertainty of the foreign marriage is more
than the local marriage. Chinese people think the couple should be
matched for marriage but the foreign marriage lacks of the same culture
and both parties have big difference in language, custom, religion
and etc. If they can’t span these obstructions, they can only divorce.
Miss Mei met an Australia boy Belen in Shanghai and they fell in
love at the first sight. They married soon. After marriage, Miss Mei
went to Australia with her husband disregarding her family’s disagree.
Belen has his own villa and sports car and he can supply a abundant
life to Miss Mei. Miss Mei felt very lonely after she lived there
for a period of time. She had no one to talk with, no neighbors, no
delicious Chinese foods. To her trouble, Belen is a Nazarene and he
takes long time on religion matters. Belen advised Miss Mei join Christianism.
Those little things before marriage became the shadow affecting the
love between them. After one year, Miss Mei counldn’t endure any more
and divorced soon after she went back Shanghai.
The foreign divorce appears romantic but actually it is instability.
To reduce such instability needs the development and progress of the
society, needs the communication with outside world, needs decreasing
the inequality between man and woman, needs both parties’ engaging
in the marriage understanding and respect. You should be careful when
choosing a foreign marriage.
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