Constance Goh (1906–1996) was a

Chinese Chinese can refer to: * Something related to China * Chinese people, people of Chinese nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity **''Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic concept of the Chinese nation ** List of ethnic groups in China, people of va ...

Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, borde ...

family planning Family planning is the consideration of the number of children a person wishes to have, including the choice to have no children, and the age at which they wish to have them. Things that may play a role on family planning decisions include marita ...

activist. In 1949, she founded the Singapore Family Planning Association, which dramatically reduced the national

birth rate The birth rate for a given period is the total number of live human births per 1,000 population divided by the length of the period in years. The number of live births is normally taken from a universal registration system for births; populati ...

Biography

Goh was born to a

Presbyterian Presbyterianism is a part of the Reformed tradition within Protestantism that broke from the Roman Catholic Church in Scotland by John Knox, who was a priest at St. Giles Cathedral (Church of Scotland). Presbyterian churches derive their nam ...

family in

Xiamen Xiamen ( , ; ), also known as Amoy (, from Hokkien pronunciation ), is a sub-provincial city in southeastern Fujian, People's Republic of China, beside the Taiwan Strait. It is divided into six districts: Huli, Siming, Jimei, Tong'an, ...

, China in 1906. Her father worked in a different city and kept

concubines Concubinage is an interpersonal and sexual relationship between a man and a woman in which the couple does not want, or cannot enter into a full marriage. Concubinage and marriage are often regarded as similar but mutually exclusive. Concubin ...

; this led Goh's mother to accept a job in

in 1918. Goh moved to Singapore with her mother and returned to

Shanghai Shanghai (; , , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ) is one of the four direct-administered municipalities of the People's Republic of China (PRC). The city is located on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the Huangpu River flow ...

in 1924 to attend Shanghai Baptist College, although her limited knowledge of

classical Chinese Classical Chinese, also known as Literary Chinese (古文 ''gǔwén'' "ancient text", or 文言 ''wényán'' "text speak", meaning "literary language/speech"; modern vernacular: 文言文 ''wényánwén'' "text speak text", meaning "literar ...

kept her from graduating. She took courses in

sociology Sociology is a social science that focuses on society, human social behavior, patterns of Interpersonal ties, social relationships, social interaction, and aspects of culture associated with everyday life. It uses various methods of Empirical ...

, and as part of the course work she visited prisons, courts, farms and factories. She said that seeing girls as young as eight years old working in factories with poor conditions "distressed me profoundly". Goh returned to Singapore in 1930, where she studied at a teachers' training school and taught for a year before marrying her husband, Goh Kok Kee, a

public health Public health is "the science and art of preventing disease, prolonging life and promoting health through the organized efforts and informed choices of society, organizations, public and private, communities and individuals". Analyzing the det ...

doctor, in 1932. After World War II, she opened a government-funded centre that provided meals to children whose parents could not afford to feed them. It was then that she began to think about

measures to discourage couples from starting large families that they could not afford to support. She founded the Singapore Family Planning Association (SFPA) in 1949, and shortly afterwards Singapore's first family planning clinic was opened on her husband's medical practice. The organisation operated covertly at first, since Goh was concerned about reactions from the public and the government. They mainly offered female contraception in the form of

cervical cap The cervical cap is a form of barrier contraception. A cervical cap fits over the cervix and blocks sperm from entering the uterus through the external orifice of the uterus, called the ''os''. Terminology The term ''cervical cap'' has been ...

s, since men were largely reluctant to use

condom A condom is a sheath-shaped barrier device used during sexual intercourse to reduce the probability of pregnancy or a sexually transmitted infection (STI). There are both male and female condoms. With proper use—and use at every act of in ...

s and many women sought contraceptive advice without their husbands' knowledge. The Singapore Family Planning Association received its first government grant in 1951, and in 1963 Prime Minister

Lee Kuan Yew Lee Kuan Yew (16 September 1923 – 23 March 2015), born Harry Lee Kuan Yew, often referred to by his initials LKY, was a Singaporean lawyer and statesman who served as Prime Minister of Singapore between 1959 and 1990, and Secretary-General o ...

attended an

International Planned Parenthood Federation The International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF) is a global non-governmental organisation with the broad aims of promoting sexual and reproductive health, and advocating the right of individuals to make their own choices in family p ...

conference hosted by the Singapore association and publicly declared his support for family planning. The SFPA became a government agency in 1966; by then, Singapore's

had decreased from 45 per 1,000 when the SFPA was established to 30 per 1,000. Goh was made a

Member of the Order of the British Empire The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding contributions to the arts and sciences, work with charitable and welfare organisations, and public service outside the civil service. It was established o ...

in 1951 for her family planning advocacy. After her death in 1996, she was posthumously inducted into the

Singapore Women's Hall of Fame The Singapore Women's Hall of Fame is a virtual hall of fame that honors and documents the lives of historically significant women in Singapore. The hall is the creation of the Singapore Council of Women's Organisations (SCWO), and grew out of an ea ...

in 2014.

References

Citations

Bibliography

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Goh, Constance 1906 births 1996 deaths Singaporean women's rights activists Singaporean educators Chinese women activists Chinese schoolteachers Members of the Order of the British Empire People from Xiamen Chinese emigrants to British Malaya 20th-century Singaporean educators