ABSTRACT
The analytic utility of the concepts ‘modernization’ and ‘modernity’ remains central to our understanding of contemporary social change. This chapter provides a brief overview of the evolution of modernization theory, reviewing the ‘convergence’ and ‘divergence’ theses. It treats ‘late modernity’ theory as an extension of conventional modernization theory, incorporating its insights about contemporary social conditions into the larger theoretical framework. The larger part of this chapter will be a review of the relationship between modernization and changes in value and personality, interpersonal relations, including gender relations, parent-child relations and intimacy, childhood and education – themes pertinent to this book’s empirical themes. The global trends reviewed in this chapter set the general backdrop to the more specific case of China concerning the transformation of youth experiences in the various life domains that this book will empirically examine.
