This paper attempts to trace the origins of Max Weber's concept of "disenchantment"(Entzauberung) and its associated narrative through a combination of etymological analysis and and intellectual genealogy. It identifies two primary sources: German Romanticism represented by Schiller, and the 17th-century Dutch theologian Balthasar Bekker. In his work The Gods of Greece, Schiller introduced the concept of "de-deification" (Entgötterung), which was not merely a nostalgic or anti-Enlightenment gesture, but an attempt to improve humanity through the divine. German Romantics placed significant emphasis on "witchcraft" or "magic" (Zauber), proposing monism and aesthetics as pathways to overcome the shortcomings of a mechanistic worldview; Meanwhile Bekker's anti-witchcraft stance, drawing upon Cartesian dualism, argues for the ineffectiveness of witchcraft in defense of faith. Both approaches left their own unresolved issues: German Romanticism's aesthetic solution remained accessible only to a small intellectual elite, failing to address society as a whole, while its anthropomorphic theology proved unrealistic. Bekker's anti-witchcraft position, on the other hand, encountered two formidable challenges: the relationship between magic and religion, and the universal history of human religion. Weber's writings during World War I synthesised insights from both sources, addressing their respective unresolved problems to complete a "closure" of critical inquiry. On one hand, he recognized the void of meaning in modern civilization, advocating for "vocation"(Beruf) to combat the existential weariness; on the other, he proposed a historical schema of religious development, where the "disenchantment of religion" spilling over into the "disenchantment of the world", which in turn created room for discussions of "re-enchantment" against the backdrop of the "clash of the gods".
Against the backdrop of China's transition to a sustained low-fertility regime, marriage—as the institutional foundation of childbearing—has drawn increasing attention for its role in shaping fertility patterns. This study employs microdata from four waves of China's population censuses (1990-2020) and applies a conditional decomposition method to estimate the structural contribution of marital status to changes in fertility levels among women of reproductive age. In addition, it incorporates provincial-level panel data to examine regional heterogeneity in the relationship between marriage and fertility. The results show that although the overall structure of marital status remained stable over the past three decades, the structural contribution of marital status to fertility change has increased significantly once age and education are controlled for. The effect is more pronounced in urban areas, though rural areas also display a steadily rising trend. Findings from provincial panel analyses further indicate that the explanatory power of marital status is closely associated with regional socioeconomic development, and that the interaction between shifts in marital structure and fertility norms varies across provinces.Theoretically, this study engages with the ongoing debate over the applicability of the Second Demographic Transition (SDT) theory in the Chinese context. By foregrounding institutional and structural dimensions, this study extends global demographic theories to non-Western contexts and contributes to the construction of a localized theoretical framework for understanding Chinese fertility behaviors. It highlights the persistent misalignment between structural inertia and shifting fertility values, offering a new lens to explain the persistence of the lowest fertility rates in China.
This paper examines the Shanghai left-wing youth movement during the National Revolution (1924-1927) through the lens of generational succession in the nation-building movement of the 20th century. By tracing the origins of China's youth movement, it elucidates why left-wing youth developed nation-building blueprints distinct from those of the constitutionalist gentry elites in southeastern China. The study first investigates May Fourth youth organizations (notably the Young China Association) to trace the origins of the National Revolution-era leftist youth movement, analyzing how young intellectuals subjectively perceived their role in national construction. Influenced by the idea of a nation as an organic entity inherent in youth culture, young people sought to establish spiritual identification between the individual and the nation-state. This drove their self-transformation according to national ideals and formation of new collectives to forge an integrated modern nation. The transcendental idealism and anarchist ethics prevailing among youth inclined them toward reforming traditional social organizations and ethical relationships mediating between individual and state. Consequently, they rejected the legitimacy of southeastern gentry elites' modernization model based on "gentry-administered democracy".This divergence produced contrasting orientations: the gentry's reforms exhibited an engineering-technical approach-continuing Ming-Qing local autonomy traditions while incorporating American influences to create a modernization program integrating pragmatic education, constitutional campaigns, and national industries. Left-wing youth conversely articulated a moral ethos centered on social justice and nationalism. During the National Revolution, Shanghai's leftist youth reshaped ideological discourse through party organs, revolutionary universities, militant publications, and student federations. These institutions reconfigured young people's consciousness and behavioral patterns, prompting them to interpret self and society through Marxist frameworks. Ultimately, this fostered a materialist worldview encompassing both cosmic and social orders, alongside a collectivist philosophy of life.
There are always considerable tensions between the state building and the reproduction of elite families. Clarifying the basic strategies and changes in the cooperation of elite family organizations in the early state power expansion is crucial to understanding the interaction between state governance and social structure. This research uses exponential random graph model(ERGM) and the Song Dynasty dataset from the China Biographical Database (CBDB) to examine the two marriage logics of elite families based on status matching and sheltered sharing, as well as the impact of the Xining Reform on the "matching by status" and "long-standing alliance" marriage modes under these two logics. The research finds that in the early stage of transition from a traditional to a modern state, social mobility increases but state power remains relatively limited. Elite families exhibit low risk preference and conservative behavior patterns. Their marriage strategies are mainly manifested as negative matching based on ascribed status and positive matching based on achieved status from the perspective of individual traits, as well as the continuation of hereditary patronage relationships and the suppression of oppressive patronage relationships from the perspective of relational structure. As the nation building process accelerates, the expansion of state power dominated by utilitarianism, centralization and institutionalization influences the reproduction strategies of the elite by adjusting the social redistribution mechanism, prompting them to adopt more open and risk-taking marriage strategies: on the one hand, increased social openness reduces homogeneous marriages among elite families based on positive status matching, and on the other hand, the expansion of state power strengthens the external pressure and internal demand for elite families to focus on clans, hence promoting the positive influence of sheltered relationships among previous generations on the intermarriages of subsequent generations. The research findings reveal the complex picture of the interaction, coordination, and integration between the "state" and the "family" in the early state building process in China.
Existing research on Chinese apprenticeship system has primarily focused on its characteristics as a form of wage labor, while failing to address the underlying ethics of action-specifically, the distinctive "patriarchal" features inherent to the system. From the perspective of behavioural ethics, the possibility of establishing a master-apprentice relationship lies in the tendency to integrate new social relationships outside the family into existing ethical frameworks. Pre-Qin Confucian literatures encapsulate the ethical essence of master-apprentice bonds as "between affection(En) and righteousness(Yi)": the character-building objectives of their interactions define the ethical dimension of "Yi"; while their shared daily life and moral exchanges grounded in shared values define the ethical dimension of "En". This ethical relationship manifested in mourning rituals through the practice of three-year period of "mourning with the heart".The master-apprentice relationship exhibits remarkable flexibility in China's historical records: on the one hand, while quasi-familial phenomena were commonplace in Chinese society, written norms lacked explicit standards for such a relationship, rendering it exceptionally adaptable compared to other social relations. On the other hand, the master-apprentice relation had appeared intermittently throughout historical records, with its visibility generally correlating with the prominence of Confucian thought movements outside official institutions. This flexibility stem from the subjectivity with which actors perceive bonds of obligation and gratitude. Unlike foundational Confucian relationships such as father-son or monarch-subject, the master-apprentice relationship lacked objectively defined criteria. It was not anchored in clear blood ties or contractual agreements, consequently, the ritual system was incapable of imposing rigid and one-size-fits-all rules. Instead, it preserved a foundation of basic etiquette while allowing actors to express sentiments based on subjective emotions. This dual-dimensional perception of affection(En) and righteousness(Yi) continues to shape contemporary Chinese interpersonal interactions.
Using the primary and secondary education system as a case study, this paper examines the impact mechanism of public opinion in the digital age on grassroots governance. Departing from previous risk governance research that treats information transmission as an exogenous parameter, this article constructs an analytical framework of "information transmission transformation + governance structure transition + risk constraint reshaping", and introduces two concepts of "public visibility" and "superior visibility". This framework reveals the triple mechanism through which public opinion reshapes grassroots governance. At the level of information transmission, the traditional closed and hierarchical information control model is replaced by a two-way feedback mechanism. Horizontally, the public transforms from passive recipients of information to active producers, significantly enhancing information visibility through digital media and other channels. Vertically, information transcends hierarchical barriers, achieving direct access to higher levels of government, thereby weakening the original information advantage of the grassroots government. At the level of governance structure, public opinion promotes a transition from fragmented governance to collaborative governance. The public directly participates in the governance process through the expression of public opinion, shifting from external monitors to internal participants. Higher-level governments, leveraging digital monitoring tools, oversee local affairs much more closely, breaking down traditional boundaries of territorial administration and forming a horizontally and vertically coordinated governance network. At the level of risk constraints, the enhanced dual visibility of information subjects the grassroots governments to the dual pressures of public scrutiny and higher-level supervision, transforming grassroots risk constraints from elastic to rigid, and significantly compressing the risk avoidance space. The governance transformation driven by public opinion also spawns new structural contradictions: an inversion of governance capacity and responsibility risk, and a conflict between governance logic and the governance environment, leaving the grassroots facing unprecedented governance dilemmas. This paper provides a novel theoretical perspective for understanding governance transformation in the digital age.
Weber's concept of "charisma" refers to a highly personalized "extraordinary" and the "effect" of needing to be recognized by others, and these two elements constitute the internal tension of charisma. Charisma in modern democratic politics is largely manifested as the demagogic ability. The theoretical implication of "demagogy" is that the "effect" of charisma replaces "extraordinary". The complexity lies in the fact that charisma in this sense must, at the level of real-world efficacy, transcend all structures of domination or authority—a task that appears to demand a form of charisma endowed with absolute "extraordinary". Different from interpreting "demagogy" from a political perspective, this article attempts to start from Weber's comparative study of religions and explore what kind of ethical situation can shape the charisma and enable "effect" to replace "extraordinary". The study found that whether in the case of sorcerers, prophets, or religious virtuosos, the bearers of charisma, no matter how they express their individualized "extraordinary", inevitably confront the "effect" that simultaneously negates this very extraordinary. This inherent tension allows both to coexist, yet the resulting charisma becomes entwined with the establishment of "status distinctions" and "structures of domination". Such cultural configurations cannot be reconciled with the "anti-domination" logic of "charismatic democratization", nor with the consequent "demagogy" it engenders. The shaping of charisma by Protestant Calvinism and other Protestant sects absolutely denied the significance of charisma's "effect", making charisma completely "extraordinary". This charisma, however, creates the condition for the full acceptance of "effect". Therefore, the power of charisma in modern politics is no longer achieved by emphasizing differences with others but rather by emphasizing commonalities with others, which lays a key ideological foundation for "demagogy".
In an era of increasingly industrialized and scientific food production, the emotional appeal of Chinese consumers' pursuit of unprocessed and "back-to-basics" food is particularly noteworthy. This paper examines the development history of Sanmen mud crab(scylla serrata), designated as a national geographical indication (GI) as well as an agricultural GI brand, through three distinct phases. First, in its pre-industrial production period, the "natural" endowment attributed to local crabs by Sanmen people laid an unspoken foundational consensus for its subsequent industrialization. Second, the making of "Sanmen mud crab" brand both inherits and reconstructs the "natural" quality from its pre-industrial phase. However, as its brand value and market share grew, tensions emerged between local and out-of-town crabs, between formula and natural feeding, and the pursuit of size versus freshness/sweetness, putting its "natural" endowment at risk. In the third phase, returning university graduates moved beyond the dualistic imagination of science and nature, employing scientific methods to rebuild aquaculture environments and practices, thereby, to a certain extent, managed to overcome the "natural endowment" crisis.The growth history of the Sanmen mud crab reveals that the Chinese fascination with natural food is rooted in a profound emotional structure connecting to "nature". This emotional structure, cultivated by a long agricultural civilization, is universal to humanity, yet it is further developed and reinforced by Daoist philosophy, and Daoist and Chinese traditional medicinal practices, as exemplified by the Chineses understanding of "soil"(土), which is unique to Chinese civilisation. Modernity, by distancing itself from nature and highlighting food risks and human mobility, has activated this emotional structure, leading Chinese people, even amidst industrial civilization, to seek sustenance from the agricultural past. This phenomenon is encapsulated by the phrase: "the more modern, the more 'natural'". Unearthing the specific forms of emotional structures underlying human production and consumption behaviors is an attempt to explore the emotional underpinnings of the meaning of human life, raising the possibility of sociology as a "study of life".
Karl Marx pioneered one of classical traditions in historical sociology. In order to explore the uniqueness of Karl Marx's historical sociology, it is essential to delve into its methodological foundations. This study traces the formation and evolution of the methodological basis of Marx's historical sociology through his four distinct understandings of "history". In his critique of German historicism, particularly Hegel's philosophy of history, Marx developed the first relatively complete methodological framework for historical sociology: the historical deduction of production. This approach employs historical deduction, taking production as its logical starting point of historical analysis to deduce the formation of human society, thereby achieving a conclusion of social history over extended periods. In The Communist Manifesto, Marx refined this methodology through his historical analysis of "class". By critiquing Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, Marx began to consider how to apply dialectics to political economy. Thus, Marx developed a more refined methodological framework for his historical sociology—"Dialectics of Phenomena in History"—whereby any existence is historically generated, and entities in the process of generation can only approximate the factuality of existence through continuous "sublation"("Aufhebung") within the historical process. When confronting different analytical objectives, one must first establish distinct historical phenomena according to dialectical logic. When confronting historical phenomena serving different cognitive purposes, one must select distinct causal analysis strategies. In response to the critique of Capital, Marx made further, albeit unfinished, reflections on the conditionality and non-necessity of generative history. Rethinking the methodological foundations of Karl Marx's historical sociology also provides insights for historical sociology research oriented towards social theory.
Based on the generational distribution of personnel within Danwei, this study conducts a case analysis of a county-level taxation agency in central China, and examinesthe historical impact of generational succession on the behavior and internal ecology of Danwei, discussing the evolution of the mores in Danwei. The study finds that intergenerational relationship is the key clue to understanding the evolution of Danwei. In 1980s, Danwei recruited a significant number of Zidi of the workers(children of employees) by securing funding quotas and administrative allocations. During this period, the intergenerational relationships within Danwei had familial characteristics, centered around formal and informal interactions between "first-generation workers" and "second-generation workers (Zidi)". This led to the formation of a compound authority structure where kinship and formal institutions were interwoven, maintaining effective functioning of Danwei. However, since the turn of the 21st Century, after the retirement of the old workers and the personnel system reform, the"Zidi Danwei" gradually declined, and Danwei began a process of "de-kinship" transformation. The "second-generation workers (Zidi)" and the "third-generation workers (students)" no longer engaged in "quasi-family" interactions, reversing the intergenerational status, breaking the compound authority structure before, and also shaping the new behaviors and norms of Danwei. Across both historical phases, intergenerational relationship remained pervasively embedded in the organizational functioning of Danwei, continuously shaping the evolution of its formal and informal institutions.The intergenerational relationship forms the mores which functions formal institutions. It is also an important perspective to study Danwei in the future.
As a pioneer in the study of Chinese social history, Tao Xisheng was influenced by Henry Maine and Hu Peihui. He was the first to connect the study of the system of mourning apparel with social sciences, using his "One-foundationism "theory to point out that the "family" in Chinese society was constituted by the dual principles of qinqin (affection for kin) and zunzun (respect for superiors). He argued that the zunzun principle had shaped the unique nature of the "family" in Chinese society, making it not simply a blood relationship, and it was the key to understanding the "family" in Chinese society. Unlike contemporary scholars who explore the ethical spirit of the "family" through the system of mourning apparel, Tao's research originated from modern critiques of the family. His early social-historical study of the system of mourning apparel approached the subject through the lens of power rather than moral values. In his later years, Tao reflected deeply on this and emphasized the "relativism" nature of the zunzun principle.Tao's intellectual evolution from constructing and then rejecting a systematic theory that interpreted the zunzun principle through paternal authority, significantly exposed the theoretical difficulties since the late Qing dynasty by excessively relying on power domination, especially the uncritical use of paternal authority to understand the "family" in Chinese society. Tao's early interpretation of paternal authority was based on a static society. However, in his later years, despite affirming traditional family values, he did not recreate a new pastoral-idyllic static societal scene. Instead, he revealed the subtle tension and dynamic balance between the values and dominative dimensions of the "family." This dynamic perspective suggests to contemporary researchers the inherent openness of the "family" in traditional Chinese society. It also offers valuable insights for understanding the spiritual underpinnings of the family in present-day Chinese society.
The relationship between expertise and organizational structures has long been marked by both interdependence and tension, a dynamic particularly evident in technology collaboration between hospitals at different hierarchical tiers. Existing studies on healthcare resource integration have predominantly focused on institutional barriers while overlooking the complex mechanisms underlying the operation of knowledge. This paper, based on an organizational-professional interaction framework, presents a case study of a county-level hospital integrating into a "medical consortium" system and receiving technical support from a higher-level hospital. The study conceptualizes the knowledge practice dilemma triggered by institutional integration as "knowledge misalignment", wherein the relationships between hospitals, physicians, and medical technologies are reconstructed during consolidation, leading to inefficient knowledge operations in circulation, application, and interaction. This misalignment result in unintended consequences such as upward migration and concentration of patients and functional overlap, thereby deviating from the policy objectives of the "tiered healthcare delivery system". Specifically, in terms of knowledge flow, physicians are constrained by organizational boundaries and career development incentives, leading to the short-term and inefficient nature of cross-institutional practice; in knowledge application, the mismatch between advanced technologies and primary healthcare settings increases medical risks; and in knowledge interaction, the unequal relationship between senior and junior doctors reinforces the dominance of specialized expertise, further marginalizing primary care. These mechanisms reveal the deep-seated challenges in healthcare resource integration. This study expands the sociological perspective on cross-level healthcare integration and critically reflects on the institutional tensions in China's pursuit of healthcare equity: professional knowledge systems are not merely passive objects controlled by administrative power, but rather closely intertwined with organizational conditions, constituting an integral element within the hierarchical structure of healthcare.
Health education constitutes one of China's current administrative public health service programs and serves as a critical component of grassroots health governance. It encompasses professionally defined health knowledge and the manner in which individuals apply their understanding of health, thereby transcends purely administrative domain. The true significance of health education lies in its role within the specific governance process. Drawing on fieldwork conducted in two counties, this paper attempts to construct a framework for comprehending the logic of "governance of life," taking the health education program as a central thread. The prevalence of chronic diseases in aging rural areas is escalating. Against this backdrop, knowledge of preventive medicine provides a set of knowledge that defines healthy lifestyle. If healthy living is viewed as a private matter, health knowledge can only assist individuals in their efforts to solve their own problems, and government intervention may be perceived as a form of social control. Nevertheless, this paper demonstrates that, in the operation of China's grassroots governance, health knowledge is not accurately imparted to individuals, but rather travels in a contextualized and embedded manner to affect the daily lives of rural residents as an integrated community. Through the health education program, actors within and outside the government system and the medical profession work jointly to create a public governance sphere for addressing healthy living issues. This sphere is constituted by both formal institutions and informal social networks (Guanxi), which are mutually reinforcing and basically inseparable. This paper argues that, in the era of chronic diseases, the instinctive pursuit of personal health has emerged as a potent force for social integration. It reflects a shared vision of an orderly social life while simultaneously serving as a reference to governmentality, enabling state involvement in local everyday life.
This study investigates the emergence of meritocratic professionalism among Chinese musicians in Germany. The Chinese and German societies differ in terms of both culture and institutions, which results in differences in the meaning, construction, and social consequences of interpersonal relationships. In Chinese Society, the guanxi-oriented concept is one of the most important guiding principles for handling all aspects of social life. The organizational structure of Chinese society is characterized by the chaxugeju, in which people distinguish insiders from outsiders in a self-centered, gradational way. In such a system, guanxi are often built on (quasi-)ascribed ties such as kinship. In contrast, the German classical music field exhibits a typical community-oriented logic of relationship building, which emphasizes achieved community formation based on individual interests or affinities. In the German classical music field, the general trajectory of professional socialization leads musicians to gradually internalize the significance of both social relationships and professional skills, fostering an integrated professionalism that values both dimensions. However, influenced by the guanxi ethic embedded in the chaxugeju pattern, Chinese musicians often cannot fully perceive and understand the local logic of social embeddedness grounded in professional communities, resulting in an overwhelming emphasis on skill embeddedness and the development of meritocratic professionalism. By displaying the concrete process through how new professional values emerge among Chinese migrants, this study moves a step forward from prevailing accounts that conceptualize cross-cultural adaptation as a process of selectively adopting or combining pre-existing cultures. It demonstrates that such new values may not derive directly from the migrants' culture of origin nor fully align with the host culture, but instead take shape as novel cultural forms constructed through the tensions between the two which shaped by the interplay of multiple dimensions of embeddedness.
Niklas Luhmann's social systems theory contains an implicit orientation toward a sociological enlightenment aimed at observing and describing functionally differentiated society through the theories and methods of sociology. This paper, taking Luhmann's 1967 Inaugural Lecture(Soziologische Aufklärung) as its guiding thread, systematically examines his program of sociological enlightenment. The importance of this manuscript lies in its establishment of the tone and direction for Luhmann's later development of social systems theory. It marks not only his declaration of a shift from empirical research to theoretical exploration but also provides a key to understanding his social systems theory. Firstly, the 1967 Inaugural Lecture outlines Luhmann's exploration of replacing subject-oriented rationality with system-oriented rationality in sociological enlightenment. It serves not only as a "manifesto" for social systems theory but also demonstrates Luhmann's ambition to construct a grand theory of society based on social systems. Secondly, to overcome the limitations of traditional functionalist systems theory, Luhmann transforms Parsons' structure-function system theory by employing a functional-structural system model. Epistemologically, this shift replaces the whole/part system paradigm with the system/environment paradigm, addressing the issue of societal complexity as a theoretical concern. Methodologically, it seeks to maximize the abstract potential of different system categories and extends system comparison to encompass as diverse a range of systems as possible. This paradigm seeks a new starting point for sociological self-understanding. Finally, the theoretical ambition of sociological enlightenment is not only a reflection on practical relevance but also a comprehensive theoretical reflection on social systems, which demands that social theory possesses the capacity for interdisciplinary connections and the ability to reflect on the theories of other functional areas in society. This provides an alternative perspective for understanding functionally differentiated societies and the positioning of sociological theory.
The concept of guanxi differs between Chinese and Western contexts. As an indigenous Chinese concept, guanxi embodies the feature of "universal particularism". This paper aims to explore this characteristic and attempt to construct an indigenous paradigm for the study of guanxi. Specifically, "particularism" is manifested in the fact that the understanding of all relationships is inseparable from specific actors and their contextual settings, nor can it be fully explained by existing structural indicators. "Universality", on the other hand, is reflected in the fact that all relational practices adhere to the ethical principles of a"differential mode of association", proposed by Fei Xiaotong, meaning that actors inevitably define relationships through an internal moral compass of"putting oneself in others' shoes". This makes "particularity" a universal logic that permeates different contexts.This paper argues that the core of understanding guanxi lies in grasping the "attitude" based on the actor's perspective. This attitude is a comprehensive consideration of objective factors such as identity foundations, degrees of closeness, and reciprocity, as well as subjective factors including interaction history, current circumstances, and the actor's mindset. It represents the actor's integrated internal judgment when faced with a specific individual. This research paradigm has achieved a dual theoretical shift in guanxi studies: first, it moves away from "instrumental rationality" towards an "ethical foundation", rejecting the simplification of guanxi as utilitarian tools for the exchange of interests. Instead, it first places relationships within the ethical framework of the "differential mode of association", emphasizing how moral practices such as"putting oneself in others' shoes" and "empathy" profoundly shape the dynamics of relationship; Second, it shifts from "structural analysis" to an "actor's perspective", transcending the binary division between formal and informal relationships, and focusing on how actors' subjective "attitudes" dynamically construct the overall nature of relationships.
In recent years, technological innovations represented by automation and generative artificial intelligence have accelerated the reshaping of labor markets. Against this backdrop, China's labor market has been simultaneously shaped by both traditional stratification structures and the growing skill premium, resulting in a more complex and dynamic landscape. Drawing on large-scale online recruitment as well as survey data, this study systematically examines the skill-based segmentation of China's labor market and how it interacts with traditional institutional divides. Key findings reveal that skill disparities have emerged as a critical dimension of labor market differentiation in China. Workers engaged in occupations requiring higher levels of abstract cognitive skills enjoy significant advantages over other skill groups in terms of employment risks, income levels, working conditions, and social security benefits. These advantages persist even after accounting for differences in human capital and institutional segmentation. Furthermore, skill stratification interacts heterogeneously with traditional institutional segmentation: institutional protections in the public sector mitigate market consequences of skill disparities- particularly in employment risks and earnings-whereas the hukou system fails to exhibit such buffering effects. Notably, wage gaps driven by skill differences are even more pronounced among urban hukou holders. Overall, the findings support our hypothesis that skills constitute a key dimension of labor market segmentation in contemporary China. The market has become increasingly differentiated along the axis of skill competitiveness, with workers possessing higher-level abstract cognitive skills occupying more advantageous positions in terms of market returns. At the same time, technology-driven skill premiums and pre-existing institutional logics jointly shape hierarchical orders, underscoring the complexity of "layered transitions" within China's modernization process.
The rural express delivery program serves as a crucial measure for rural revitalization and holds significant importance for the integrated development in urban and rural areas. This study examines rural residents' strategies for picking up the deliveries as a case study and analyzes the social contexts underlying the implementation of express delivery logistics in rural society. It finds that the interplay between market system and social relation is a key factor in the successful implementation of the rural express delivery program. Rural residents adopt diverse strategies for receiving deliveries. They may choose to pick up packages while going to Ganji (market days), or utilize acquaintances to collect parcels on their behalf, and or even pay Modi (motorcycle taxi drivers) to retreat packages. These three distinct delivery collection strategies reflect the close relationship between market system and social relation in rural communities, and their varying forms of interplay. Picking up packages while going to Ganji represents market behaviours within social relation. This economic trade is deeply embedded in the cyclical patterns and order of rural social life and is the result of the stabilization of rural social relation. Social relation imbues the market with its unique character, further facilitating its function as a provider of market resources for rural residents. Asking acquaintances to pick up packages is a relational action within the market system, instrumentally utilizing the relational networks within the grassroots market structures and effectively sustaining market operations. As a model of market-relational integration, the unique occupation of Modi relies on acquaintance social networks. While the relational structure of rural society provides the foundation for its survival, it also constitutes an integral part of the rural market system. This study contributes to a deeper understanding of the relationship between market system and social relation in rural China and its impact on the development of modern industry and market.
Why can the project system be implemented in a stable, widespread and highly pervasive manner, and what operational logic does it demonstrate in specific governance practices?This paper distinguishes between two levels: the observational perspective and the analytical dimension. The former encompasses the relationship between the central and local governments, as well as that between the state and society; the latter includes the essential intent of the system, and the interactive practices of multiple subjects. Based on these two levels, this paper identifies four typical mechanisms: externality, principal-agent, legitimacy, and embeddedness, thereby providing a holistic interpretive framework for project-based governance. The externality mechanism addresses the spatial and temporal spillovers of project costs and benefits, while the ambiguous division of rights and responsibilities between central and local authorities leads to significant tensions. Moreover, it emphasizes the logic of public goods while failing to adequately capture the logic of modernization and development. The principal-agent mechanism focuses on analyzing the organizational transmission between central and local authorities, especially the multi-tasking problem, as well as the information asymmetry and ambiguity arising from different directions of specialised and localized knowledge. It also helps explain the bundling practices of economic development and social welfare, and the emerging phenomena of hybrid governance and project package contracting. The legitimacy mechanism explores how performance, procedural, and moral legitimacy are isomorphically and heterogeneously intertwined in complex project governance practices, and how are they manifested in grass-roots project operations. The embeddedness mechanism aims to clarify the "dual-track" politics and how it influences project operation modes and effectiveness.It also helps analyze the heterogeneity of project system, as well as the institutional changes of state governance. In addition to focusing on each mechanism separately, this paper also provides certain prospects from the perspectives of multi-dimensional and comprehensive interactions between multiple mechanisms.
In response to sweeping critiques of bureaucracy in Western intellectual discourse, the neo-Weberian tradition has adopted a global perspective to examine how bureaucratic institutions take shape across diverse institutional and cultural contexts. Seeking to recover the constructive potential of bureaucracy, this body of work reconsiders Weber's canonical features and explores their pragmatic and normative adaptations. Within this framework, particular attention has been paid to two themes—personal ties and adaptive rule-bending—both of which hold significant relevance for governance practices in China. This article traces the historical origins of the neo-Weberian research, reviews representative empirical studies centered on these two elements, and excavates the theoretical assumptions and normative commitments that underpin them. I argue that the so-called "revival of bureaucracy" is, at its core, a search for how value rationality might be re-integrated into systems increasingly dominated by formal rationality. The use of personal ties or adaptive rule-bending is treated as a strategic means through which morally conscious bureaucrats might absorb, recalibrate, and ultimately incorporate anti-bureaucratic elements into a rationalized administrative order. Yet this technocratic vision of bureaucratic moral agency rests on a universalizing assumption: that commitment to the public sphere, distinct from private interests, constitutes the sole legitimate foundation of bureaucratic ethics. This assumption overlooks the plural moral orders embedded in distinct institutional and historical contexts and forecloses the possibility of alternative sources of organizational legitimacy beyond the bureaucratic form itself. While the neo-Weberian framework offers valuable reparative insights, it remains confined by the limits of its own theoretical imagination. For scholars of Chinese governance, this calls for a renewed effort to locate moral and institutional foundations for bureaucracy that are rooted in indigenous historical experience and ethical traditions.
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