This paper provides an analytical review of the social science literature onguanxi. The focus of this review is on the prevalence and the increasing significance ofguanxiduring China's post-1978 reforms, which were implemented to move the country towards a market economy. Since then, researchers have engaged in debates on whatguanxiactually means to Chinese people in the past and today, how it has been adaptive to ongoing institutional transformations, and why its influence in economic, social, and political spheres can stabilize, increase or decrease with market reforms and economic growth. The author provides a synthesis of these debates before offering a theoretical framework which provides an understanding of the dynamics ofguanxithrough the changing degrees of institutional uncertainty and market competition. Survey findings on the increasing use ofguanxiin labour markets from 1978 to 2009 are presented to illustrate the usefulness of this framework. In the conclusion, the author argues thatguanxiis a five-level variable, and that the nature and forms ofguanxiinfluence are contingent upon whetherguanxiis a tie of connectivity, a sentimental tie, a sentiment-derived instrumental tie, an instrumental-particular tie, or an obligational tie that facilitates power and money exchanges. This five-level conceptualization is aimed at advancing future scholarship ofguanxiin China's rapidly changing society.

Despite the major cultural and political differences between the United States and China, in both countries access to jobs is supposed to be guided by fair and equitable procedures. In the US, there is a presumption of an open labor market in which potential employees compete on the basis of their qualifications, where the fairness of decisions is guided by anti-discrimination laws and normative organizational policies. In China, although there is a history of close relationships that guide the exchange of favors, following the 1949 revolution, Communist Party leaders were given the authority to allocate positions in ways that were supposed to eliminate special privileges of class and background. Yet recent research has suggested that social connections are an important part of getting a job in both the US and China for two-thirds to three-quarters of job seekers. In the US context, such connections are described as social capital. In the Chinese context, connections are defined asguanxi. In this article, we review research on labor market processes in both the US and China to address three important questions: (a) How can we understand the similar functioning of labor markets in such distinct cultural and political systems as the US and China? (b) What are the mechanisms or processes by which people find jobs in the US and China, and how are people able to access these mechanisms or processes in the context of constraining social structures and legal environments? and (c) What are the theoretical implications of the ‘generalized particularism’ that seems to shape labor markets in both the US and China.

This paper develops a new concept called virus-combat social capital and presents relevant findings from a survey of 3009 Chinese WeChat networkers. Virus-combat social capital is defined by the intensity and extensity of social connectedness under conditions of physical isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic. The survey shows that as compared to their counterparts, Chinese people with higher virus-combat social capital consistently do better in both behavioral responses and measures of quality of life.

This study presents three case studies intended to examine Chinese private firms’ reliance on guanxi-oriented governance structure under different degrees of market rationality. Our findings show that regardless of their profitability goal, employment size, and organizational complexity, the three companies under study rely rather equally on their central players’ guanxi circle as the governance structure. Furthermore, when someone is permitted to enter this guanxi circle and exercise a certain degree of managerial authority, both job competence and personal trust of this person are simultaneously evaluated. We interpret these findings not as evidence of conflict between market rationality and guanxi favouritism, but as evidence for Weberian elective affinity between the two seemingly conflicting principles.