Guanxi, Networks and Economic Development: The Impact of Cultural Connections
01 Jan 2013-
TL;DR: In this article, the authors explore the mechanics of guanxi in an organizational setting, focusing on the use of interpersonal relationships within Chinese firms to discover how firms initiate, build and use Guanxi networks.
Abstract: The purpose of this study is to explore the mechanics of guanxi in an organizational setting, focusing on the use of interpersonal relationships within Chinese firms to discover how firms initiate, build and use guanxi networks. Two richly detailed case studies document changes that take place over time in two distinct networks with respect to key actors and their contacts. This research also investigates patterns of social structure that emerge over time in these two distinct cases looking at brokerage relationships, network density, and dyadic redundancy in three waves at six month intervals. The cases are dissimilar in all aspects except absolute size demonstrating the universal use of guanxi across time, geographic location, specific industries, and firm experience. Dynamic network visualization is used to highlight the sequence and rate of activity in each network to identify salient changes. The findings show that firms seek to improve their organizational guanxi by improving existing employees’ guanxi quality within the firm and by recruiting new actors from outside the firm. Additionally, firms use organizational guanxi to expand their networks by forming cooperative partnerships with complementary organizations that enhance the attributes or potential of both organizations. And finally, firms initially exploit brokerage in organizational guanxi, then attempt to stabilize the network by fostering new ties to exclusive contacts.
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TL;DR: The authors explored the history of early-modern and modern China, from the seventeenth century to the present, examining the rise and fall of China's last empire, the emergence of a modern nation-state, the sources and development of revolution, and the implications of complex social, political, cultural, and economic transformations in the People's Republic of China.
Abstract: This course explores the history of early-modern and modern China, from the seventeenth century to the present. We will examine the rise and fall of China’s last empire, the emergence of a modern nation-state, the sources and development of revolution, and the implications of complex social, political, cultural, and economic transformations in the People’s Republic of China. Course materials include scholarly monographs, a memoir, primary sources, and visual and material artifacts that offer diverse perspectives. We will meet twice a week for a combination of lectures, discussion, and viewing of visual texts.
339 citations
Book•
01 Jan 1982
TL;DR: This paper analyzed Chinese commercial negotiating practices for two reasons: the first is to minimize future misunderstandings in such activities, and the second is to provide guidance for government-to-government negotiations.
Abstract: Abstract : This study analyzes Chinese commercial negotiating practices for two reasons. The first is to minimize future misunderstandings in such activities, and the second is to provide guidance for government-to-government negotiations. The research procedure used involved interviews with American businessmen and bankers with extensive experience in the China trade, and--in order to control for American cultural factors--interviews with comparable Japanese bankers and businessmen. What was learned from the experiences of businessmen is to value in government-to-government negotiations, even though there are substantial differences between commercial and diplomatic relationships. At present both Beijing and Washington seek a more cooperative and complementary relationship. (Author)
213 citations
TL;DR: The rational choice approach to social behaviour rationality, egoism and social atomism models of the actor rationality, action and deliberation individualism, and social structure was proposed in this article.
Abstract: The rational choice approach to social behaviour rationality, egoism and social atomism models of the actor rationality, action and deliberation individualism and social structure.
154 citations
TL;DR: A comprehensive critical examination of China's folk architectural forms is presented in this article, where the authors provide a study of the environmental, historical and social factors that influence housing forms for nearly a quarter of the world's population.
Abstract: A comprehensive critical examination of China's folk architectural forms. Together with its companion volume, \"China's Living Houses: Folk Beliefs, Symbols, and Household Ornamentation\", it provides a study of the environmental, historical and social factors that influence housing forms for nearly a quarter of the world's population. Both books draw on the author's 30 years of fieldwork and travel in China, as well as on published and unpublished material in many languages. The work begins by tracing the interest in Chinese vernacular buildings in the 20th century. Early chapters detail common and distinctive spatial components, including the interior and exterior modular spaces that are axiomatic components of most Chinese dwellings as well as conventional structural components and building materials that are common in Chinese construction. Later chapters examine representative housing types in the three broad cultural realms - northern, southern and western - into which China has been divided. Knapp completes his survey with an exploration of China's old dwellings in the context of the rapid economic and social changes that are destroying so many of them.
50 citations
References
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31 Jan 1996
108 citations
"Guanxi, Networks and Economic Devel..." refers background in this paper
...The very threat of censure from the community, which may be manifest in the form gossip, reputation, or outright ostracization is enough to assure conformity (see Hu 1944, 61; Redding 1996, 37-38; and Farrer 2002)....
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Book•
01 Jan 1982
TL;DR: In this article, the authors present an overview of the history of the school system before and after the Cultural Revolution in China and its effect on higher education in the 1970s and 1980s.
Abstract: AcknowledgementsIntroductionI. The Sixties: Impending Crisis1. Up the School Ladder2. The Senior High School Bulge and Dwindling Career Openings3. Flawed Reforms: Rural and Urban Alternatives to the Regular Ladder4. Memorization and Tests5. Student Ideals and Competition: The Gathering Storm6. The Cultural RevolutionII. After the Cultural Revolution: The Disastrous Leap Into a New School System7. Back to School, 1968-19708. Down to the Countryside9. Troubled Schools, 1970-197610. The Fight Over Higher EducationEpilogue: The Return of the Old Order, 1977-1980Appendix A: The Debates Over TalentAppendix B: The Upper Reaches of the Pre-Cultural Revolution Ladder: Into and Out of the UniversitiesAppendix C: The Course Curricula and Daily Schedules of High Schools Before and After the Cultural RevolutionSources and Abbreviations Used in NotesNotesFor Further ReadingIndex
105 citations
105 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the author was a Postdoctoral Training Fellow of the Social Science Research Council (SRC) and made use of the SRC Grant SOC 73-05489 to Carnegie-Mellon University.
Abstract: Partial support was provided by the National Science Foundation, Grant SOC 73-05489 to Carnegie-Mellon University. Revisions were made while the author was a Postdoctoral Training Fellow of the Social Science Research Council. This chapter is an abbreviated version of Technical Report 305, University of Minnesota, School of Statistics. I wish to thank Joseph Galaskiewicz for comments on the manuscript.
101 citations
TL;DR: The authors studied the political battle surrounding Deng Xiaoping's quasi-imperial tour of southern China in early 1992, which was the most dramatic political incident to occur between the Tiananmen crackdown in June 1989 and the Fourteenth Party Congress in October 1992.
Abstract: In both the Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping eras, Chinese politics has been dominated by a small group of party and military elite. This article seeks to address how this ruling elite makes policy through a study of the political battle surrounding Deng Xiaoping's quasiimperial tour of southern China in early 1992. This tour was the most dramatic political incident to occur between the Tiananmen crackdown in June 1989 and the Fourteenth Party Congress in October 1992. Indicative of a historical pattern that characterized the elite politics of the postTiananmen regime, the tour provided a preview of the Congress. A number of prominent academics, including Roderick MacFarquhar, Lowell Dittmer, and Avery Goldstein, argue quite persuasively that political power in Beijing is intensely personalistic. In examining policy disputes and power contests among individual leaders, their research efforts focus on the informal structure of the political regime. 1 Lucian Pye asserts that in Chinese politics "power considerations are generally decisive," and policy is thus largely determined with respect to the personal consequences of the policy decision on the individual policymaker or faction. Pye argues that "Chinese leaders are granted great flexibility and find it easy to shift their positions as circumstances change."2 This argument contrasts with
100 citations