From strong guanxi to weak guanxi: Connectivity in Chinese micro-charity

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  • 1 Faculty of Politics and Law, Zhaoqing University, Zhaoqing, China 2 Faculty of Education, Zhaoqing University, Zhaoqing, China

Online published: 2017-07-01

Abstract

Charity in China is deeply rooted in the guanxi tradition and mainly involves strong ties. In the wake of emerging social media, online charity (also known as micro-charity) has become increasingly popular over the past few years. People's participation in microcharity is afforded by the ubiquitous connectivity of social media. Their charitable behaviours are steered towards connecting, communicating, and eventually contributing to the formation of a powerful digital environment, which essentially diffuses the awareness of responsibility and commitment. Thus, the affordance of connectivity makes it possible for Chinese people to break from the traditional tightly-bounded close ties towards loosely-bounded networks in micro-charity. In addition, by drawing on some college students’ experiences, this article indicates that connectivity affords people’s active engagement with micro-charity, which in turn fosters their distinct subjectivity pertaining to a social life that is intertwined with new media technology

Cite this article

Xun Lin and Hua Huang . From strong guanxi to weak guanxi: Connectivity in Chinese micro-charity[J]. Chinese journal of sociology, 2017 , 3(3) : 473 -487 . DOI: 10.1177/2057150X17704810

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