Chinese Journal of Sociology ›› 2019, Vol. 39 ›› Issue (2): 1-30.

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The Huang Renyu Paradox and the Logic of the Empire

ZHOU Xueguang   

  1. Department of Sociology, Stanford University
  • Online:2019-03-20 Published:2019-03-20

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Abstract:

In a series of writings, historian Huang Renyu (Ray Huang) depicted a paradoxical phenomenon in the Chinese history-the coexistence of loose-coupling in China's governance on the one hand and the resilience and stability of political order on the other. The Huang Renyu Paradox has been observed throughout the long Chinese history: The stability and perpetuation of dynasties and royal successions were coupled with a bureaucratic apparatus whose downward reach had never gone beyond the county level. This article aims to interpret the Huang Renyu Paradox in light of the unified ideology based on the civil examination institution in the Chinese history.It has been observed in the organization literature that there is a substitution effect between professionalization and bureaucratization. That is, a lower level of bureaucratization tends to accompany a higher level of professionalization in formal organizations. Drawing on this insight, I argue that there is a similar substitution effect between ideological unification and organizational solidarity in China's governance. In particular, the unified official ideology, sustained by the institution of civil examination, played a central role in the making of the Huang Renyu Paradox. The civil examination can be seen as a professionalization process of official-scholars who became the carriers of the official ideology, in the form of Confucianism. The unified ideology provided the isomorphic institutional basis across different localities, areas, and layers of the bureaucracy, and hence the integration of the empire, giving rise to a loose-coupling system of governance in the Chinese history. Specifically, the civil examination institution led to (1) horizontally, the mutual diffusion and intertwining between formal and informal institutions across the boundaries of the Chinese bureaucracy, and (2) vertically, the link between the state and society that shifted between ceremonial and substantive authority. These lines of arguments are illustrated drawing on recent historical research on social history, legal history, and local and kinship organizations.This article concludes with the observation that, in contemporary China, the mode of governance experienced a significant turn, a shift from governance on the basis of a unified ideology to organizational solidarity. The institutional building based on formal organizations has generated a set of salient characteristics as well as challenges for the governance of China today.

Key words: The logic of the empire, unified ideology, organizational solidarity, Huang Renyu Paradox, loose coupling