Revisiting Chinese stratification: An investigation of the basic prosperity class

• In Event: 4367 - Section on Asia and Asian America Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable 100min: 6. Life Course and Stratification

Abstract

From the perspective of social appearance and entertainment consumption, this article investigates the relation between social class and lifestyle in urban China by analyzing data originating from the China Family Panel Studies (CFPS). First, the authors focus on the space of consumption and its relation to the social space, underlining the existence of three consumption groups: “the eat sour”, “the happy few”, and “the parsimonious consumers”. In the second section, the authors suggest that the parsimonious consumers may constitute a social class composed of households with varying socio-economic resources but a lifestyle similarly patterned by a high degree of life uncertainty. In light of these distinctions, the authors invite to revisit China social stratification.

Authors

• Langyi Tian, Columbia University

• Aurélien Boucher, Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen

• Feng Sun, Tsinghua University