ABSTRACT
Sinologists have devoted a great deal of attention to the study of family origin and mobility of official gentry in China. This chapter focuses on a "political kin unit" as a means of understanding the family origin of local officials in the late Ch'ing period. Merit and talent were indeed rewarded. Studies of career mobility show that family background had influence but that seniority was a more important determinant of official advancemen. Family origin is usually investigated on the basis of the status and profession of the subject's forebears, namely his father, grandfather, and great-grandfather. Such methodology is influenced by Western studies on social mobility, which tend to correlate parental status with the subject's status and career. The law delineated a group of related kin whom the government thought would be likely to coalesce to promote their family interests at the expense of the government.
