Stanley: For some years now, my stock reply to the question: “Could China

and Japan fight a war for supremacy in north Asia?” has been: “Well, if

they hold off for a decade or two, they’ll have to fight it on the

shuffleboard court.”

The lack of interest in marriage and childbearing among young urban Chinese

women is one of the most striking features of China today, and a popular

topic of conversation among Chinese people. Out in the sticks, of course,

peasant women are still expected to produce a son — and a spare, too, if

they can finesse local birth-control regs (which they increasingly can). In

the cities, though, childbearing is way, way down the priority list of the

average young Chinese woman.