Fei Xiaotong's Comparative Theory of Chinese Culture: Its Relevance for Contemporary Cross-disciplinary Research on Chinese 'Collectivism'

Abstract

This article argues in favour of the triangulation of emic and etic methods in the comparative study of culture, taking China as a case. Starting from an indig-enous theory of cultural comparisons, Fei Xiaotong's concepts of 'group pattern' (tuanti geju) versus 'differential pattern' (chaxu geju), I review the contemporary literature on 'collectivism' in social psychology and management sciences. The article shows that Fei anticipated major revisions of this concept, resulting into a multi-aspectual approach that distinguishes 'individualism', 'collectivism', 'vertical/horizontal relations' and 'relational/categorial embeddedness'. In this frame, Fei's characterisation of Chinese culture can be restated in terms of the aspects of 'individualism', 'relational embeddedness' and 'verticality'. I argue that Fei's anticipation of modern research may be rooted in a feedback of culture-bound cognition to theory formation. Taking Chinese networks and Chinese popular religion as examples, the validity of this approach is further confirmed.