Chinese Slough Off Old Barriers to Divorce

"In traditional neighborhoods, everyone knew each other," Yuan said. "Now those mediation committees just do administrative work. People will not accept their intervention anymore. Your parents, your uncle, your aunts are all over the place now. Everybody has become more individualized."

Divorce laws have also changed several times since 1980, when a new marriage law first made estrangement a reason to grant divorce. Divorce was also granted if mediation failed in cases of bigamy, violence, gambling, drug abuse or lack of mutual affection.

The most recent revisions came in 2003. Courts no longer automatically reject first-time divorce applications or require long waiting periods before reapplying; people can now get divorced in a matter of minutes.

Although women still confront negative consequences when they divorce -- it can adversely affect promotions, Communist Party membership and overseas training opportunities -- the stigma is less than it was, especially among young people.

"In the old days, people would point at you as if you were a whore. It would be very hard to date," said Wu, who has gone out with three men since her divorce, each just once. "I used to think I could never tell anyone I was divorced."

It has not been easy adjusting, but Wu had another source of support: a Shanghai-based divorce counseling center that in two years has opened 30 offices across China. Its year-old Web site has an online community of more than 1 million registered members.

The Wei-Qing Counseling Center says it has had about 2,700 people walk through its doors. More than half of the clients complain of loveless marriages. About 20 percent suffer from sexless marriages. Another 20 percent are so hostile that founder Shu Xin immediately recommends divorce.

Most clients, however, ask him to help analyze and save their marriages, which he does for up to $105 an hour or up to $658 a day. Business is booming. Earlier this year, Shu said, he made $79,000 from one client.

Even in the case of a husband's infidelity, the women try to hang on. "They say, 'I'm a phoenix, how could a common squirrel just come and occupy my nest?' " Shu said, adding that most of the men have already found an ideal partner and want help obtaining a smooth divorce without hurting their wives.

"In my dad's time, when they had marital trouble, the first thing was to go to their parents or bosses or workers union or women's federation and ask them to educate their spouse," Shu said. But with the proliferation of cellphones, computers and online dating, people are not only having casual sex but are also beginning to ask strangers how to improve their love lives.

Recently, the general manager of a computer company came to Shu after his desire for a divorce produced suicide threats from his wife, who also threatened to harm their 12-year-old daughter. Shu met repeatedly with the wife and called in faraway relatives to help soothe her. In the end she got a big apartment, a Buick and $263,000. The husband got his divorce. It took three months.

Experts note that spikes in the divorce rate are not an entirely new phenomenon in China. Divorce temporarily increased in the early 1950s, for example, after China's civil war and the passage of laws banning concubines. Back then, as now, women began to step out of family-centered roles; with jobs came independence and the will to leave unhappy marriages.

For Wu, although being a newly single mom has meant more work, she has no regrets about splitting with her husband.

"If I talked about these issues last year, I wouldn't be able to control my tears. When I got divorced, friends asked me how I could bear it, especially with a 3-month-old. But I had faith, and I knew I could depend on myself," she said. "I knew I had to work hard to give my daughter a better life."

Researchers Jin Ling in Shanghai and Robert E. Thomason in Washington contributed to this report.