Contemporary articles citing Stark D (1992) E Eur Polit Soc

transformation, reproduction, market, circulation, socialism, postcommunist, selection, chinese, hybrid, disintegration

Chang, Kuang-chi. 2011. "A Path to Understanding Guanxi in China's Transitional Economy: Variations on Network Behavior*." Sociological Theory. 29:4 315-339. Link
Current research on guanxi (Chinese social connections) suffers from conceptual confusion. This article presents a new theoretical framework for understanding guanxi in the face of China's economic and social transformations. Guanxi is viewed as a purposive network behavior that can take different strategic forms, such as accessing, bridging, and embedding. Pairing this conceptualization with a social-evolutionary framework, I argue that the emergence and increasing or decreasing prevalence of each form over time result from (1) a combination of factors at three analytical levelsmicroagency, mesonetwork, and macroinstitutionaland (2) endogenous processes of selection. By focusing on behavioral forms and their evolution, this framework is able to bridge divides in the guanxi literature, provide a foundation for comparative studies of network behavior across societies, and connect the study of guanxi with economic sociology more broadly.

SZELENYI, I & B SZELENYI. 1994. "Why Socialism Failed - Toward a Theory of System Breakdown - Causes of Disintegration of East European State Socialism." Theory and Society. 23:2 211-231. Link

LIN, N. 1995. "Local Market Socialism - Local Corporatism in Action in Rural China." Theory and Society. 24:3 301-354. Link

Szelenyi, I & S Szelenyi. 1995. "Circulation or Reproduction of Elites During the Postcommunist Transformation of Eastern Europe - Introduction." Theory and Society. 24:5 615-638. Link

Szelenyi, S, I Szelenyi & I Kovach. 1995. "The Making of the Hungarian Postcommunist Elite: Circulation in Politics, Reproduction in the Economy." Theory and Society. 24:5 697-722. Link

Hass, JK. 1999. "The Great Transition: the Dynamics of Market Transitions and the Case of Russia, 1991-1995." Theory and Society. 28:3 383-424. Link

Nee, V & Y Cao. 1999. "Path Dependent Societal Transformation: Stratification in Hybrid Mixed Economies." Theory and Society. 28:6 799-834. Link