Pub Date : 2021-09-14DOI: 10.1177/2057150X211041908
Qingbo Huang, Yu Xie
Mindset, growth or fixed, refers to two different beliefs people hold about the underlying nature of ability, and was first put forward by the psychologist Carol Dweck. The central role of mindset in motivation, self-regulation and interpersonal processes has been the subject of growing research interest, but there are few discussions of mindset in the context of China. Using the China Family Panel Studies, this study aims to offer a comprehensive understanding of social-demographic correlates of mindset in China. Following the psychological literature, we construct a binary status of mindset via exploratory factor analysis. We find that place of origin (rural or urban), educational level, employment status and life-course events are correlated to mindset. It is also determined that mindset acts as a fundamental psychological factor strongly associated with multiple outcomes, including educational attainment, cognitive skills, attitudes and subject well-being.
{"title":"Social-demographic correlates of mindset in China","authors":"Qingbo Huang, Yu Xie","doi":"10.1177/2057150X211041908","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/2057150X211041908","url":null,"abstract":"Mindset, growth or fixed, refers to two different beliefs people hold about the underlying nature of ability, and was first put forward by the psychologist Carol Dweck. The central role of mindset in motivation, self-regulation and interpersonal processes has been the subject of growing research interest, but there are few discussions of mindset in the context of China. Using the China Family Panel Studies, this study aims to offer a comprehensive understanding of social-demographic correlates of mindset in China. Following the psychological literature, we construct a binary status of mindset via exploratory factor analysis. We find that place of origin (rural or urban), educational level, employment status and life-course events are correlated to mindset. It is also determined that mindset acts as a fundamental psychological factor strongly associated with multiple outcomes, including educational attainment, cognitive skills, attitudes and subject well-being.","PeriodicalId":37302,"journal":{"name":"社会","volume":"7 1","pages":"497 - 513"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2021-09-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44697991","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-07-01DOI: 10.1177/2057150X211031056
Yueh-Luen Hu
Existing literature on national governance models has focused on the analysis of long-term, stable public organizational processes between different levels of governmental and social organizations. In contemporary China, a considerable part of the organization and implementation process in public services relies on cooperation among different local governmental institutions and social groups. This type of process is characterized by short-termism and instability. This paper uses the perspective of the “control rights” theory to analyze the relationship between the three parties: the principal, management, and the implementation agency in the case of the phenomenon of grading criteria variation in the grading of history as a subject in the gaokao (college-entrance examination) of Province X. This paper shows that although the relationship shows a high degree of correlation, the three parties do not belong to the same bureaucratic organization and lack administrative oversight within the process, which increases the uncertainty in negotiation and maneuvering, resulting in two issues: First, the principal party and management party often have divergent views on targets. With the advantage of controlling incentive distribution, the principal party is able to involve itself in the inspection and evaluation of policy implementation, and therefore maintains the ability to arbitrarily intervene in the process. Second, implementation agency behavior is constantly influenced and modified by feedback from the principal party and the management party, and vice versa. In the process of continuous feedback and adjustment, the three parties gradually reach their own shared understanding of policy implementation that becomes the cause of local variation in grading standards. This paper suggests that unstable public organization process is an important area of study on contemporary Chinese governance. Control rights theory can be further explored as an analytic tool and strategies of various social forces in gaining organizational control should also be investigated in depth.
{"title":"Variation in criteria of examination grades from the perspective of “control rights” theory: An analysis of the grading of history as a subject in the new gaokao","authors":"Yueh-Luen Hu","doi":"10.1177/2057150X211031056","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/2057150X211031056","url":null,"abstract":"Existing literature on national governance models has focused on the analysis of long-term, stable public organizational processes between different levels of governmental and social organizations. In contemporary China, a considerable part of the organization and implementation process in public services relies on cooperation among different local governmental institutions and social groups. This type of process is characterized by short-termism and instability. This paper uses the perspective of the “control rights” theory to analyze the relationship between the three parties: the principal, management, and the implementation agency in the case of the phenomenon of grading criteria variation in the grading of history as a subject in the gaokao (college-entrance examination) of Province X. This paper shows that although the relationship shows a high degree of correlation, the three parties do not belong to the same bureaucratic organization and lack administrative oversight within the process, which increases the uncertainty in negotiation and maneuvering, resulting in two issues: First, the principal party and management party often have divergent views on targets. With the advantage of controlling incentive distribution, the principal party is able to involve itself in the inspection and evaluation of policy implementation, and therefore maintains the ability to arbitrarily intervene in the process. Second, implementation agency behavior is constantly influenced and modified by feedback from the principal party and the management party, and vice versa. In the process of continuous feedback and adjustment, the three parties gradually reach their own shared understanding of policy implementation that becomes the cause of local variation in grading standards. This paper suggests that unstable public organization process is an important area of study on contemporary Chinese governance. Control rights theory can be further explored as an analytic tool and strategies of various social forces in gaining organizational control should also be investigated in depth.","PeriodicalId":37302,"journal":{"name":"社会","volume":"7 1","pages":"444 - 469"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2021-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/2057150X211031056","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49311010","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-07-01DOI: 10.1177/2057150X211023235
Angran Li, Anning Hu
Prior empirical research on the relationship between socioeconomic status (SES) and meritocratic attitudes has yielded inconsistent findings. This study contributes to the existing literature by examining the heterogeneous relationship between SES and meritocratic beliefs and perceptions across community socioeconomic contexts in China. Using nationally representative data from the China Family Panel Studies, the results show that individual SES is positively related to support for meritocratic beliefs, but negatively associated with perceptions of meritocracy. Moreover, SES disparities in meritocratic beliefs are more salient in socioeconomically disadvantaged and unequal communities, where residents with relatively higher SES are more likely to hold meritocratic beliefs. In contrast, SES gaps in meritocratic perceptions are more significant in socioeconomically advantaged and homogeneous communities, where individuals with relatively lower SES are more likely to perceive the allocation of resources as meritocratic. These findings provide theoretical insights for understanding how self-interest and system justification theories may jointly explain social origin disparities in public attitudes about meritocracy.
{"title":"Community contexts, socioeconomic status, and meritocratic beliefs and perceptions in China","authors":"Angran Li, Anning Hu","doi":"10.1177/2057150X211023235","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/2057150X211023235","url":null,"abstract":"Prior empirical research on the relationship between socioeconomic status (SES) and meritocratic attitudes has yielded inconsistent findings. This study contributes to the existing literature by examining the heterogeneous relationship between SES and meritocratic beliefs and perceptions across community socioeconomic contexts in China. Using nationally representative data from the China Family Panel Studies, the results show that individual SES is positively related to support for meritocratic beliefs, but negatively associated with perceptions of meritocracy. Moreover, SES disparities in meritocratic beliefs are more salient in socioeconomically disadvantaged and unequal communities, where residents with relatively higher SES are more likely to hold meritocratic beliefs. In contrast, SES gaps in meritocratic perceptions are more significant in socioeconomically advantaged and homogeneous communities, where individuals with relatively lower SES are more likely to perceive the allocation of resources as meritocratic. These findings provide theoretical insights for understanding how self-interest and system justification theories may jointly explain social origin disparities in public attitudes about meritocracy.","PeriodicalId":37302,"journal":{"name":"社会","volume":"7 1","pages":"470 - 493"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2021-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/2057150X211023235","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43078072","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-07-01DOI: 10.1177/2057150X211028357
Fan Zhang, Yuxiao Wu
Previous studies on social stratification and intergenerational mobility have mostly focused on the effects of parents on their children’s socioeconomic status (SES) attainment, but less attention has been paid to the important role played by grandparents in the life chances of their grandchildren, and its underlying mechanism. By analyzing a national survey sample data of junior high school students in China, this study examines the influence factors of living with grandparents and their effect on the academic performance of adolescents, and the intermediate mechanism. The study finds that (a) three-generation cohabitation occurs when there is a functional need for the nuclear family, and children with lower SES, working mothers, or single-parent families are more likely to experience cohabitation between grandparents and grandchildren; (b) living with grandparents has significant positive effects on adolescents’ academic performance after controlling for other factors; (c) the effect of living with grandparents is moderated by the family’s SES and family structure, and students from lower-SES or single-parent families benefit more from living with grandparents; and (d) living with grandparents to a certain extent benefits grandchildren’s academic performance by enhancing family social capital investment. Households in which grandparents cohabit invest significantly more in the social capital of children than those who do not have grandparents cohabiting. The results of this study show that in modern society, family kinship networks still play a very important role in the status attainment and social mobility of individuals. Therefore, scholars should pay more attention to the important role of extended families in social stratification and mobility and its micro-mechanisms.
{"title":"Living with grandparents: Multi-generational families and the academic performance of grandchildren in China","authors":"Fan Zhang, Yuxiao Wu","doi":"10.1177/2057150X211028357","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/2057150X211028357","url":null,"abstract":"Previous studies on social stratification and intergenerational mobility have mostly focused on the effects of parents on their children’s socioeconomic status (SES) attainment, but less attention has been paid to the important role played by grandparents in the life chances of their grandchildren, and its underlying mechanism. By analyzing a national survey sample data of junior high school students in China, this study examines the influence factors of living with grandparents and their effect on the academic performance of adolescents, and the intermediate mechanism. The study finds that (a) three-generation cohabitation occurs when there is a functional need for the nuclear family, and children with lower SES, working mothers, or single-parent families are more likely to experience cohabitation between grandparents and grandchildren; (b) living with grandparents has significant positive effects on adolescents’ academic performance after controlling for other factors; (c) the effect of living with grandparents is moderated by the family’s SES and family structure, and students from lower-SES or single-parent families benefit more from living with grandparents; and (d) living with grandparents to a certain extent benefits grandchildren’s academic performance by enhancing family social capital investment. Households in which grandparents cohabit invest significantly more in the social capital of children than those who do not have grandparents cohabiting. The results of this study show that in modern society, family kinship networks still play a very important role in the status attainment and social mobility of individuals. Therefore, scholars should pay more attention to the important role of extended families in social stratification and mobility and its micro-mechanisms.","PeriodicalId":37302,"journal":{"name":"社会","volume":"7 1","pages":"413 - 443"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2021-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/2057150X211028357","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47032880","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-07-01DOI: 10.1177/2057150X211027407
Jingdong Qu
Beginning in the Yin-Zhou and Qin-Han periods, development of the Chinese imperial system revolved around the dialectical tension between the “enfeoffmental system of fiefdom” (fengjian zhi, or the fengjian system) and the bureaucratic prefectural system (junxian zhi, or the junxian system). In Fei Xiaotong’s words, this was a dual-track politics of the “power of the monarch” and the “power of the gentry”. Under the enfeoffmental system of fiefdom, the relationship between the monarch and his kinsfolk was governed by the Confucian hierarchical principle of “favoring the intimate” (qin-qin) and “respecting the superior” (zun-zun), and ritualized by the patriarchal order of clan, mourning rites, and ancestral worship. In addition, the “mandate of Heaven” solidified an organic relationship between the emperor and his subjects and became the foundation for monarchical rule. The bureaucratic prefectural system highlighted the historical change since the Warring States period, which had abolished the enfeoffmental fiefdom system and given birth to the concept of “all-under-Heaven” (gong tianxia). Thinkers like Wang Fuzhi and Gu Yanwu placed emphasis on the enfeoffmental system of fiefdom as a counterpart of to the bureaucratic prefectural system which helped break up the centralization of power and renew the debate on the dialectic between “public” and “private”. In sum, the enfeoffmental system of fiefdom in China still needs to be clarified through re-examining the Classics.
{"title":"Double-track governance in traditional Chinese society: Dialectics between the enfeoffment system of fiefdom and the bureaucratic prefectural system","authors":"Jingdong Qu","doi":"10.1177/2057150X211027407","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/2057150X211027407","url":null,"abstract":"Beginning in the Yin-Zhou and Qin-Han periods, development of the Chinese imperial system revolved around the dialectical tension between the “enfeoffmental system of fiefdom” (fengjian zhi, or the fengjian system) and the bureaucratic prefectural system (junxian zhi, or the junxian system). In Fei Xiaotong’s words, this was a dual-track politics of the “power of the monarch” and the “power of the gentry”. Under the enfeoffmental system of fiefdom, the relationship between the monarch and his kinsfolk was governed by the Confucian hierarchical principle of “favoring the intimate” (qin-qin) and “respecting the superior” (zun-zun), and ritualized by the patriarchal order of clan, mourning rites, and ancestral worship. In addition, the “mandate of Heaven” solidified an organic relationship between the emperor and his subjects and became the foundation for monarchical rule. The bureaucratic prefectural system highlighted the historical change since the Warring States period, which had abolished the enfeoffmental fiefdom system and given birth to the concept of “all-under-Heaven” (gong tianxia). Thinkers like Wang Fuzhi and Gu Yanwu placed emphasis on the enfeoffmental system of fiefdom as a counterpart of to the bureaucratic prefectural system which helped break up the centralization of power and renew the debate on the dialectic between “public” and “private”. In sum, the enfeoffmental system of fiefdom in China still needs to be clarified through re-examining the Classics.","PeriodicalId":37302,"journal":{"name":"社会","volume":"7 1","pages":"347 - 389"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2021-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/2057150X211027407","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44002043","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The party–government relationship is central in the governance of the People’s Republic of China, with its key characteristic being the former’s dominance over the latter. Focusing on personnel management practices and the resulting patterns of personnel flow across positions and offices in the Chinese bureaucracy, we examine the party–government relationship in light of personnel flows across the party and government sectors, and the offices/bureaus and positions therein, in the context of a large, multilayered Chinese bureaucracy. Previous research in this field has evinced two different lines of inquiry. The first focuses on personnel flows in the Chinese bureaucracy, with an emphasis on individual-level career trajectories, mobility patterns, and associated incentive mechanisms, wherein party–government relations are given minimal attention. The second tends to provide descriptive or normative accounts of party–government relations and their historical evolution but has not examined these relations in a quantitative and analytical manner. Our study builds on and goes beyond these existing studies in several ways. First, we propose a perspective that focuses on personnel management and patterns of personnel flow across positions and offices in the party–government relationship. We take the existing party–government structures as our starting point and examine how personnel flow patterns, or the lack thereof, provide information on the degree of personnel mixing between, and the interconnectedness or separateness of, the party and government sectors, areas, and offices. Second, we develop a set of analytical dimensions and measures to capture different aspects of the party–government relationship, such as the degree of stability and specialization in party and government positions and offices. We also propose measures of personnel mixing and interconnectedness between party and government offices. Third, we apply these analytical dimensions and measures to systematically examine the multifaceted patterns of personnel flow and the resulting party–government relations in a large Chinese bureaucracy at the provincial, municipal, and county levels in an entire province, between 1990 and 2008, with over 40,000 key officials and over 300,000 person–year records. Our findings show that there are noticeable variations in patterns of personnel flow among party and government positions and offices, with the former experiencing higher rates of mobility and more generalist characteristics. On the other hand, we also find considerable mixing and interconnectedness among positions and offices between the party and government sectors. These findings suggest that, in the Chinese bureaucracy, party–government positions are organized into an integrated hierarchical order whose boundaries are formal in structure but fluid in terms of personnel flows, especially in those key positions in different administrative jurisdictions.
{"title":"The party–government relationship in the Chinese bureaucracy: Evidence from patterns of personnel flow","authors":"Xueguang Zhou, Yun Ai, Jianhua Ge, Huijun Gu, Ding Li, Lan Li, Qinglian Lu, Wei Zhao, Ling Zhu","doi":"10.1177/2057150X211031055","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/2057150X211031055","url":null,"abstract":"The party–government relationship is central in the governance of the People’s Republic of China, with its key characteristic being the former’s dominance over the latter. Focusing on personnel management practices and the resulting patterns of personnel flow across positions and offices in the Chinese bureaucracy, we examine the party–government relationship in light of personnel flows across the party and government sectors, and the offices/bureaus and positions therein, in the context of a large, multilayered Chinese bureaucracy. Previous research in this field has evinced two different lines of inquiry. The first focuses on personnel flows in the Chinese bureaucracy, with an emphasis on individual-level career trajectories, mobility patterns, and associated incentive mechanisms, wherein party–government relations are given minimal attention. The second tends to provide descriptive or normative accounts of party–government relations and their historical evolution but has not examined these relations in a quantitative and analytical manner. Our study builds on and goes beyond these existing studies in several ways. First, we propose a perspective that focuses on personnel management and patterns of personnel flow across positions and offices in the party–government relationship. We take the existing party–government structures as our starting point and examine how personnel flow patterns, or the lack thereof, provide information on the degree of personnel mixing between, and the interconnectedness or separateness of, the party and government sectors, areas, and offices. Second, we develop a set of analytical dimensions and measures to capture different aspects of the party–government relationship, such as the degree of stability and specialization in party and government positions and offices. We also propose measures of personnel mixing and interconnectedness between party and government offices. Third, we apply these analytical dimensions and measures to systematically examine the multifaceted patterns of personnel flow and the resulting party–government relations in a large Chinese bureaucracy at the provincial, municipal, and county levels in an entire province, between 1990 and 2008, with over 40,000 key officials and over 300,000 person–year records. Our findings show that there are noticeable variations in patterns of personnel flow among party and government positions and offices, with the former experiencing higher rates of mobility and more generalist characteristics. On the other hand, we also find considerable mixing and interconnectedness among positions and offices between the party and government sectors. These findings suggest that, in the Chinese bureaucracy, party–government positions are organized into an integrated hierarchical order whose boundaries are formal in structure but fluid in terms of personnel flows, especially in those key positions in different administrative jurisdictions.","PeriodicalId":37302,"journal":{"name":"社会","volume":"7 1","pages":"315 - 346"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2021-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/2057150X211031055","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47149510","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-07-01DOI: 10.1177/2057150X211027371
A. Li
This article discusses the meaning of public space and the problem of public reconstruction by means of sociological intervention through an experimental study of community formation and courtyard space rearrangement in the old neighborhood of Dashilar in Beijing. In the West, scholars regard public space as part of public life with political or social significance. In the courtyards of Dashilar, however, residents understand public space as important as a shared property of neighboring families that is separate from public life, as they are often acquainted with but alienated from one another. To grasp this different understanding of public space, this article first looks into the historical transformation of property rights in Dashilar. The courtyards in Dashilar have clearly been defined as state-owned urban space since the 1980s but have remained neglected in administration. Therefore, residents gradually encroached upon these courtyards that were owned by the state and divided them for private use. As this act of encroaching was rooted in the relationship between the state and the individual, the courtyards were not merely changed into privatized properties with specific functions, but became places for interactions between various actors. To reveal the complexity of these courtyards as public spaces, we discuss the expansion of private space by individuals in their daily life and the “public disturbances” initiated by temporary coalitions in space construction. This complexity of courtyards as public spaces can be well illustrated by two experiments of space rearrangement conducted in Dashilar. Both experiments introduced strong social interventions into space rearrangement: one attempted to rebuild social life in a courtyard, and the other worked on the public and private boundaries in a courtyard. The former experiment ended in failure while the latter was a success. The results of these two experiments tell us that public reconstruction is not just about rebuilding social interactions between people, but also about adjusting the state–individual relationship and establishing the rules of living together in public space.
{"title":"Public space without the public: State and individuals in courtyard space in Dashilar, Beijing","authors":"A. Li","doi":"10.1177/2057150X211027371","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/2057150X211027371","url":null,"abstract":"This article discusses the meaning of public space and the problem of public reconstruction by means of sociological intervention through an experimental study of community formation and courtyard space rearrangement in the old neighborhood of Dashilar in Beijing. In the West, scholars regard public space as part of public life with political or social significance. In the courtyards of Dashilar, however, residents understand public space as important as a shared property of neighboring families that is separate from public life, as they are often acquainted with but alienated from one another. To grasp this different understanding of public space, this article first looks into the historical transformation of property rights in Dashilar. The courtyards in Dashilar have clearly been defined as state-owned urban space since the 1980s but have remained neglected in administration. Therefore, residents gradually encroached upon these courtyards that were owned by the state and divided them for private use. As this act of encroaching was rooted in the relationship between the state and the individual, the courtyards were not merely changed into privatized properties with specific functions, but became places for interactions between various actors. To reveal the complexity of these courtyards as public spaces, we discuss the expansion of private space by individuals in their daily life and the “public disturbances” initiated by temporary coalitions in space construction. This complexity of courtyards as public spaces can be well illustrated by two experiments of space rearrangement conducted in Dashilar. Both experiments introduced strong social interventions into space rearrangement: one attempted to rebuild social life in a courtyard, and the other worked on the public and private boundaries in a courtyard. The former experiment ended in failure while the latter was a success. The results of these two experiments tell us that public reconstruction is not just about rebuilding social interactions between people, but also about adjusting the state–individual relationship and establishing the rules of living together in public space.","PeriodicalId":37302,"journal":{"name":"社会","volume":"7 1","pages":"390 - 412"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2021-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/2057150X211027371","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42155357","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-04-01DOI: 10.1177/2057150X211006938
Chadwick Wang, Kunyun Yang
Programmer interns are a distinctive group of precarious laborers. They undertake the same jobs as junior programmers with formal employment, while suffering from high pressure and earning low pay. Still, they are convinced that only a long-term internship can keep them on the right track of professional career development. We explore their consent-making through six months of fieldwork in an internet company, and propose the “enterprising-self” game to explain their subjective orientations. In the enterprising-self game, programmer interns become accustomed to identifying themselves with a particular type of quantifiable labor product, for instance, the positioning of “their” sticky notes on company whiteboards and the expected “T-levels” that represent their employability in the industry, by which their enterprising self is a by-product. Programmer interns seems to believe that, rather than higher education, state-owned enterprises, or multinational enterprises, only domestic internet companies can help them attain their enterprising selves. Even though the supervisor–intern relationship and the “gender game” of masculinity performance constitute part of the programmer interns’ enterprising-self game, the essence of the game has never been challenged and in some ways is only being reinforced. Though only a few lucky employees can win the game by attaining promotion to the senior engineer or management level, most of them still get lost in the “periodic” and “imperceptible” time of life as a programmer, which is characterized by full devotion to the company, until the “35-year-old crisis”.
{"title":"Enterprising and lost: Professional lives of programmer interns","authors":"Chadwick Wang, Kunyun Yang","doi":"10.1177/2057150X211006938","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/2057150X211006938","url":null,"abstract":"Programmer interns are a distinctive group of precarious laborers. They undertake the same jobs as junior programmers with formal employment, while suffering from high pressure and earning low pay. Still, they are convinced that only a long-term internship can keep them on the right track of professional career development. We explore their consent-making through six months of fieldwork in an internet company, and propose the “enterprising-self” game to explain their subjective orientations. In the enterprising-self game, programmer interns become accustomed to identifying themselves with a particular type of quantifiable labor product, for instance, the positioning of “their” sticky notes on company whiteboards and the expected “T-levels” that represent their employability in the industry, by which their enterprising self is a by-product. Programmer interns seems to believe that, rather than higher education, state-owned enterprises, or multinational enterprises, only domestic internet companies can help them attain their enterprising selves. Even though the supervisor–intern relationship and the “gender game” of masculinity performance constitute part of the programmer interns’ enterprising-self game, the essence of the game has never been challenged and in some ways is only being reinforced. Though only a few lucky employees can win the game by attaining promotion to the senior engineer or management level, most of them still get lost in the “periodic” and “imperceptible” time of life as a programmer, which is characterized by full devotion to the company, until the “35-year-old crisis”.","PeriodicalId":37302,"journal":{"name":"社会","volume":"7 1","pages":"252 - 279"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2021-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/2057150X211006938","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41361951","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-04-01DOI: 10.1177/2057150X211007962
Changquan Jiao
Soon after implementing reforms to the tax-sharing system, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) implemented public budgeting reform, and thus formed a new kind of state governance system, the program system (PS). There are three categories of program expenditures available to local governments: “earmarked grants” from higher-level authorities; “non-grant program funds” from higher-level authorities; and program funds from same-level government departments. The convergence and reorganization of these three categories of program expenditure at the local level has, to a great extent, molded the fiscal structure of grassroots government in the PRC. The PS in essence does not mean discarding or surpassing the bureaucratic state system, rather, it is the active improvement and supplementing of the bureaucratic system by the state: a continuation and development of state regime construction. The overt purpose of the PS is to “solidify” budgetary constraints, while the underlying purpose is to enhance the government’s ability to respond to society. The two purposes present some tension in practice, as the rationalized and professionalized forms of governance that result do not necessarily enhance the ability to respond to public needs; in fact the reverse is quite possible.
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Pub Date : 2021-04-01DOI: 10.1177/2057150X211002982
Chengpu Yu, Wanlin Li, Mingfen Deng
Assisted reproductive technology (ART) is hailed as “the holy grail” for infertile patients in the mainstream narrative. The existing studies have clearly demonstrated how external social factors shape how ART is to be used, but they ignore the recipients of the technologies, and especially the experiences of women. Based on an investigation conducted in Z hospital’s reproductive center, this article regards embodiment as the methodological orientation for integrating socio-cultural context with female embodied experience in order to show their bio-social entanglement. As fieldwork evidence indicates, ART in practice is far from simple “hope technology”; instead, it throws women into a paradoxical world in which hope and anxiety coexist. Embodied experience, hope, and anxiety are transmitted through the bodies of women, which reveals the inscription of social-cultural context and technical uncertainty on the female body and, meanwhile, women actively learn strategies by which to cope with the technical uncertainty and moral pressures from local culture (including healing the body, folk religion, etc.), so as to hold onto infertility treatment with hope.
{"title":"Hope and anxiety: The study of female embodied experience with assisted reproductive technology","authors":"Chengpu Yu, Wanlin Li, Mingfen Deng","doi":"10.1177/2057150X211002982","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/2057150X211002982","url":null,"abstract":"Assisted reproductive technology (ART) is hailed as “the holy grail” for infertile patients in the mainstream narrative. The existing studies have clearly demonstrated how external social factors shape how ART is to be used, but they ignore the recipients of the technologies, and especially the experiences of women. Based on an investigation conducted in Z hospital’s reproductive center, this article regards embodiment as the methodological orientation for integrating socio-cultural context with female embodied experience in order to show their bio-social entanglement. As fieldwork evidence indicates, ART in practice is far from simple “hope technology”; instead, it throws women into a paradoxical world in which hope and anxiety coexist. Embodied experience, hope, and anxiety are transmitted through the bodies of women, which reveals the inscription of social-cultural context and technical uncertainty on the female body and, meanwhile, women actively learn strategies by which to cope with the technical uncertainty and moral pressures from local culture (including healing the body, folk religion, etc.), so as to hold onto infertility treatment with hope.","PeriodicalId":37302,"journal":{"name":"社会","volume":"7 1","pages":"138 - 170"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2021-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/2057150X211002982","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45247835","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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