ABSTRACT
This chapter introduces some of the key cultural and institutional systems that govern life in China and discusses the ways in which they have changed as economic reforms have unfolded. It focuses on the changes in Chinese senses of individuality that have coincided with China's entry into the global economy. The chapter looks at the Party-state, systems of allocation (such as work units), and the family. It also introduces some of the consequences of these institutional arrangements. All of these are social institutions that are important in Chinese life, and all have undergone dramatic changes in the era of economic reform. One of the key formal institutions that have influenced the issue of individualism must be the one-child policy, as it is inconceivable to imagine that raising an entire generation of single children would not shape notions of individualism and groupism.
