ABSTRACT
In this Chapter I examine several inter-connected processes that have structured contemporary village socioeconomic inequality in Ganglong Township. Some of these processes go back decades—and perhaps even centuries. I am not suggesting that these historical determinants are the only important determinants of well-being in 1994; there are surely other historical and contemporary factors which may be as strong as the ones I outline and test in this chapter. 1 Having said this, however, I believe that the explanation I unfold below for why some villages are doing better than others is an important contribution to comparative development studies in rural China, providing food for thought for those interested in post-socialist transitions and socioeconomic development in particular. Key concepts from economic sociology—institutions, institutional inertia, path dependence and social and human capital—are very useful in explaining how many macrolevel policies and processes are articulated, often in unexpected ways, at the grassroots level.
