ABSTRACT
The “white-collar” group has received increasing attention in recent years from research in China on social structure and stratification. It is a common view to link “white-collar workers” to career, education, income, and consumption levels. Research on the social functions of Chinese white-collar workers tends to deviate from the actual situation. This chapter focuses on the social function of contemporary Shanghai white-collar workers, and explains the formation mechanism and social psychology of this group, and then determines precisely how a social structure forms with white-collar workers as the main constituent. Proponents of the theoretical presupposition hold that the extent of the role of the white-collar group in society depends on its scale, and the income, cultural literacy and occupational safety among its members. The Shanghai’s white-collar group, which grew up during a process of “rapid group combination” and “internal high-speed flow”, has formed distinctive features in its social mentality.
