Научная статья на тему 'Expanding civil global connectivity and its impact on Chinese society: a research note of microperspective of globalization'

Expanding civil global connectivity and its impact on Chinese society: a research note of microperspective of globalization Текст научной статьи по специальности «Экономика и бизнес»

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Ключевые слова
глобальное взаимодействие / микроглобализация / глобальные социальные связи / локальные трансформации / китайское общество / global connectivity / micro globalization / global social ties / local transformation / Chinese society

Аннотация научной статьи по экономике и бизнесу, автор научной работы — Sun Jiaming

В соответствии с макромоделью глобализации, фокусирующейся на общих тенденциях межгосударственного торгового, коммерческого и культурного взаимодействия и укоренившейся в основах теории глобализации, данная статья представляет микромодель глобализации, основанную на различных видах деятельности индивидуума: глобальных контактах, межнациональных социальных связях, а также глобальной гражданской активности. Посредством этих видов оценивается индивидуальная включенность в глобальную сеть и измеряется уровень интеграции в глобальное гражданское общество. Автор акцентирует внимание на расширяющейся глобальной гражданской взаимосвязи в Китае за последние десятилетия, что привело к укреплению ее влияния на местное сообщество и интеграции глобальных ориентаций и практик. Исследование о расширении глобального гражданского взаимодействия и его влиянии на местное общество показало, что расширение глобальной связи – это бесценный человеческий опыт социализации и создания эффективной стратегии страны в плане улучшения ее экономического и культурного развития. Сильное и обширное глобальное взаимодействие укрепит локальную совместимость и адаптивность и, как результат, приведет к локальным общественным трансформациям.

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РАСШИРЕНИЕ ГЛОБАЛЬНОГО ВЗАИМОДЕЙСТВИЯ И ЕГО ВЛИЯНИЕ НА КИТАЙСКОЕ ОБЩЕСТВО: ИССЛЕДОВАНИЕ МИКРОПЕРСПЕКТИВЫ ГЛОБАЛИЗАЦИИ

As corresponding to the macro model of globalization focusing on overall trends of cross-countries trading, business and cultural diffusion that currently rooted in the school of globalization theory, this paper applies a micro model of globalization which anchors on individual activities in the trend of globalization, such as global contacts, cross national social ties, and global civil activities by which individual global connectivity is appreciated, and expected to be a measurement of integrating to the global civil society in this scheme. This paper focuses on the expanding global civil connectivity in China recent decades brought about strengthening impact on local society and integrating of global orientations and practices. The study on expanding global civil connectivity and its impact on local society suggests that widening global connectivity is an invaluable experience for an individual to refresh his/her global socialization and an sufficient mechanics and effective strategy for a country to upgrade its economic and cultural development. Strong and extensive global connectivity will reinforce local compatibility and adaptability, eventually leading to local societal transformations.

Текст научной работы на тему «Expanding civil global connectivity and its impact on Chinese society: a research note of microperspective of globalization»

УДК 316.422

SUN JIAMING,

Professor, Department of Sociology, Fudan University

expanding civil global connectivity

AND ITS impact ON CHINESE SOCIETY: A RESEARCH NOTE OF MICRO pERSpECTIVE OF GLOBALIZATION

As corresponding to the macro model of globalization focusing on overall trends of cross-countries trading, business and cultural diffusion that currently rooted in the school of globalization theory, this paper applies a micro model of globalization which anchors on individual activities in the trend of globalization, such as global contacts, cross national social ties, and global civil activities by which individual global connectivity is appreciated, and expected to be a measurement of integrating to the global civil society in this scheme. This paper focuses on the expanding global civil connectivity in China recent decades brought about strengthening impact on local society and integrating of global orientations and practices.

The study on expanding global civil connectivity and its impact on local society suggests that widening global connectivity is an invaluable experience for an individual to refresh his/her global socialization and an sufficient mechanics and effective strategy for a country to upgrade its economic and cultural development. Strong and extensive global connectivity will reinforce local compatibility and adaptability, eventually leading to local societal transformations.

Keywords: global connectivity, micro globalization, global social ties, local transformation, Chinese society.

РАСШИРЕНИЕ ГЛОБАЛЬНОГО ВЗАИМОДЕЙСТВИЯ И ЕГО ВЛИЯНИЕ НА КИТАЙСКОЕ ОБЩЕСТВО: ИССЛЕДОВАНИЕ МИКРОПЕРСПЕКТИВЫ ГЛОБАЛИЗАЦИИ

В соответствии с макромоделью глобализации, фокусирующейся на общих тенденциях межгосударственного торгового, коммерческого и культурного взаимодействия и укоренившейся в основах теории глобализации, данная статья представляет микромодель глобализации, основанную на различных видах деятельности индивидуума: глобальных контактах, межнациональных социальных связях, а также глобальной гражданской активности. Посредством этих видов оценивается индивидуальная включенность в глобальную сеть и измеряется уровень интеграции в глобальное гражданское общество. Автор акцентирует внимание на расширяющейся глобальной гражданской взаимосвязи в Китае за последние десятилетия, что привело к укреплению ее влияния на местное сообщество и интеграции глобальных ориента-ций и практик. Исследование о расширении глобального гражданского взаимодействия и его влиянии на местное общество показало, что расширение глобальной связи - это бесценный человеческий опыт социализации и создания эффективной стратегии страны в плане улучшения ее экономического и культурного развития. Сильное и обширное глобальное взаимодействие укрепит локальную совместимость и адаптивность и, как результат, приведет к локальным общественным трансформациям.

Ключевые слова: глобальное взаимодействие, микроглобализация, глобальные социальные связи, локальные трансформации, китайское общество.

Introduction

Human being has been weaving commercial and cultural connections since before the first camel caravan ventured afield [1]. In the 19th century the postal service, newspapers, transcontinental railroads, and great steam-powered ships wrought fundamental changes. Telegraph, telephone, radio, and television tied tighter and more intricate knots between individuals and the wider world. Now computers, the Internet, wireless cellular phones, cable TV, and cheaper jet transportation have accelerated and complicated these connections [2; 3].

Evidence suggests that the flux over boundaries in the last few decades has increased at an accelerating rate. Not only capital, goods, information, but also human being activities extend their areas to beyond their own countries. Once such invisible but vital boundaries become meaningless, at least being loosen [4]. World trade in the last decades has developed rapidly; global Internet covers virtually everywhere; virtual state is emerging [5]. Scholars have realized as capital has become increasingly mobile, advanced nations have come to recognize that exporting is no longer the only means to economic growth, in instead, by produce overseas for the foreign market. Not only capital, but also anything can be diffused or transmitted easily over the boundaries. People around the world virtually are linking together via global network [6]. Such global network becomes a driving force of economic development of cultural transformation that encourages, stimulates, and to a degree even coordinates all kinds of activities [7; 8; 9; 10].

The Setting of the Research

Once a traditional society, which has been seen as sleep tiger1, China has been emerging as a vigorously developing country with huge change in economic, culture, and society, in which global civil connectivity plays a vital role. Theoretically, global civil connectivity has two ways of traffic: in-bound and out-bound. The former can be seen as from the global to the local; the later, from the local to the global. Both in-bound and out-bound traffics are all the matter of cross boundary contacts or connections. As the case of China, worldwide civil contacts in history of China may provide us to better understand the importance of civil connectivity in modern development.

The effectiveness of China's open door policies has varied over time after it was adopted in the early 1980s, when few foreign investors came. As the economy grew and reforms widened and deepened, global connectivity in China become more extensive and its attractiveness for FDI increased. China has responded to globalization by speeding up economic reforms, especially in terms of forcing its business firms to meet international competition and playing by the market rules [11].

After 1980's of opening policy in China, global civil connectivity has been rapidly increased. The table 1 provides a comparison in foreign civil related notarial documents in the year 1988 and 2000. In year 2000, births notarial documents

1 Whether Napoleon really said it or not, the forecast attributed to him is likely to be essentially correct: "China is a sleeping giant. When it wakes, it will move the world".

and schooling notarial documents are ranking first and second reaching 396,150 (29,96 % of the total) and 282,585 (21,37 % of the total) respectively. Notarial documents of marital status (18,09 %) and kinship confirmation (19,83 %) are also higher than any other types. This four types of notarial documents occupied 89,3 % of total foreign civil related notarial document cases. Comparing with that in year 1988, overall increment is about 5.75 times. Particularly, Survival and Residence increased 14.88 times which ranked the first, Child Adoption increased 13.14 times, Schooling increased 9.74 times, which implied that civil contacts, particular in social ties of Chinese over boundaries have been increased much quick within a decade or so.

Privatization in enterprises after 1980's, plays a bigger role in expanding global civil connectivity in China. For example, Shanghai's local private companies are looking for foreign investment that may effort to help local companies expand into overseas markets and enhance their cooperation with foreign counterparts. About 74,200 private enterprises are registered with the Shanghai Administrative Bureau of Industry and Commerce. About 150,000 investors are involved in private enterprises, which have capital worth 44.3 billion yuan ($5.4 billion). The first foreign-funded private business in Shanghai also opened 1992. The city has more than 240 private ventures with foreign investment and 2,500 businesses engaged in export processing and foreign trade.

The municipal government announced then that it would take measures to boost the private economy and expects the private economy to help the city as it re-structures and debt-ridden State-owned enterprises. Private enterprises could employ some laid-off workers and even buy debt-ridden enterprises, lease them or purchase shares [12].

The open door policy rescued China's economy from being mired in an isolated and planning-based system and upgraded it to market oriented with open global ties. Global integration has become the Chinese orthodoxy. The buzzword for China today is "jiegui", which means linking up to the global market and implies that China is willing to accept international practices and plays by the global rules of the game.

As Buchanan describes overseas Chinese built a "bamboo network" that is the unique economic power of the ethnic Chinese who are dispersed across Asia and the world. Now they have invested heavily in their ancestral homeland, and become, by far, China's largest source of "foreign capital" (Buchanan et al. 1998). Those entrepreneurs invest more than money. Their special contribution to ventures in the People's Republic has been the entrepreneurial and managerial effectiveness they lend to such efforts. This has been a vital factor in China's recent economic surge (Buchanan et al. 1998).

Initially and through the 1980s, the flow of foreign capital into China was limited as the Chinese economy was caught between plan and market. Rapid growth and liberalization of the Chinese economy in the 1990s have made the Chinese economy a much more attractive investment destination. From 1993 to 1997, China was the second largest recipient of foreign direct investment, behind just the United States. Overall, it appears that the Chinese economy is now substantially more open

to foreign investors than China's East Asian neighbors (Japan, Korea and Taiwan) at a comparable stage of development. According to Lardy (1994: 66), China has had "one of the most liberal foreign investment environments in the developing world". Foreign specialists were invited to assist in the modernization process, joint ventures with foreign capitalists, and multinational conglomerates proliferated. About 145,000 foreign-invested ventures have employed 17.5 million people, accounting for 11 percent of China's non-agricultural work force. The significance of this should not be minimized for a country like China, which has such a large population with growing employment problems.

For instance, Guangzhou is a famous overseas Chinese hometown of China and a metropolis with the largest number of overseas Chinese. According to statistics, there are 1.35 million compatriots and relatives abroad, out of which there are 520,000 overseas Chinese and overseas Chinese with foreign nationalities, who are distributed in 116 countries and regions throughout the world. There are 830,000 Hong Kong and Macao compatriots and over one million relatives of the returned overseas Chinese, Hong Kong and Macao compatriots, and Since 1986,298 persons have been granted the title of Guangzhou's honorary citizens in 10 batches so as to commend them for their contributions to the hometown [13].

Overseas Chinese promoted local social and economic development invaluable and it can also be seen the case of Jinjiang, South Fujian province. Jinjiang is a famous qiaoxiang (overseas Chinese native hometown) with a population of 995,000, Jinjiang is the place of origin for 2.1 million overseas Jinjiangnese, who live in Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan, Southeast Asia and other countries. Since China's open door policy and economic reforms began in 1978, the income per capita in Jinjiang has increased from 58 yuan in 1978 up to 6,000 yuan in 1997. As a consequence, Jinjiang has been one of the fifteen most advanced cities in China in terms of its overall economic development.

Overseas Chinese have played an important role in the creation of the Jinjiang economic miracle since the 1980s. From 1984 to 1997, Jinjiang utilized foreign investment of US$1.73 billion. Among the 2400 foreign-funded operations, more than 90 per cent were invested by overseas Jinjiangnese. In 1997, the output of the overseas Jinjiangnese enterprises reached RMB 16.8 billion, which comprised 52 per cent of the total GDP in the city. Social welfare donations are another important impact made by the overseas Jinjiangnese in their hometowns. Between 1994 and 1997, the city received overseas donations worth RMB 528 million. It was reported that about 60 per cent of the donations were used to support local educational development. More than 400 schools benefited from the donations. These statistics strongly suggest that hometown connections are indubitably an advantageous factor in the advancement of Jinjiang social and economic development [13].

The importance of overseas investment to the Chinese economy cannot be overestimated. In 1997, 145,000 overseas-invested companies employed 17.5 million or 11 % of China's non-agricultural workforce and produced 14 percent of the industrial output. They also generated over 12 % of tax revenue and made more than 13 % of

total annual fixed-asset investment. Even more impressively, they accounted for 47 % (US$152.6 billion) of China's foreign trade volume in 1997, up from 26,43 % in 1992. Most importantly, the overseas-invested businesses now account for even greater shares of the marginal increases in these indicators as China's state and collective enterprises have had much difficulty in recent years (JJRB, 7 January 1998). Investment from overseas now spearheads China's involvement in the world economy.

Data and Methods

For the main empirical analysis, the data set1 came from Shanghai's Pudong new economic zone. Since Shanghai is rapid developed coastal city of China, historically there are many connections with the global, particular in recent decades; therefore, Shanghai has been an ideal place to do this research. The main foci of that survey with a sample of randomly selected residents were global connectivity, consumer behavior and modern values in Shanghai. The questionnaire consists of five sections. The first section includes such variables age, gender, marital status, education, occupation, income, housing conditions, and area of residence. The second section contains questions regarding personal consumer behaviors in terms of a globally vs. a locally oriented life style. The third section includes questions about culture and values. The fourth section includes questions related to the extent of modernization and globalization in terms of individual values. The last section includes the extent of modernization and globalization of the city.

Global civil connectivity implies connections between persons who have different national and cultural identities, through variety of mutual interaction by sharing common interests and exchanging material and ideas. In this study, we created index of global connectivity, which is based on observed variables such as "have been working in foreign firm", "have been abroad", "have relatives abroad", and "often surf foreign web sites" for the analysis. Those four variables are either indicating a person physically contacting foreign countries or socially connecting abroad.

Structure Equation Modeling (SEM) and regression analysis are used to estimate the effects, either direct effect and indirect effect, of global connectivity on people's consumer behaviors and attitudes, which are measured in terms of purchasing global brand-name products and preference for foreign fast food, and so on. While different measures of global connectivity will be the main independent predictors, a variety of social-demographic characteristics and human resource variables will be taken into account in this study.

Hypothesis

Hypothesis 1. The stronger global connectivity a person have, the higher probability the person is engaged in demanding of global products, and more likely for the person to adapt to global consumer behaviors.

Hypothesis 2. Person who has established stronger global connectivity, such as surf foreign web sites, and visit foreign countries are more likely to have global orientation. Therefore, have an ability to adapt and integrate with the global culture.

1 The data set came from a research project conducted by Professor Xiangming Chen in University of Illinois at Chicago (with Professor Anthony Orum and Professor Nancy Chen) on Shanghai As A Rising Global City funded by the Chiang Ching-Kuo Foundation 1998.

Hypothesis 3. Younger people, holding global connectivity constantly, tend to consume more global products and pursue global fashion more aggressively. Age as a non-achieved status of individual may play an important role in moderating his/ her global connectivity and attitudes toward global culture. People in different age display different attitudes and behaviors in consumption of global products. Age is critical variable of examining the changing of people's consumer orientation.

Hypothesis 4. Higher educational attainment, higher income, and more prestigious occupation induce stronger global connectivity, brought larger gap of social stratification. Education, income, and occupation, as achieved statuses, with personal global connectivity are important measurement of social stratification in global era.

Descriptive Statistics

The percentage of different type of global connections with their social demographic attributes is stated here. From gender section, among total 345 cases of male, have been working in foreign company has 17,86 %, have been abroad 18,34 %, (female is 9,49 % among 253 cases), Often surf foreign web site reaches 39,13 %. Male's average global connections are higher than female (24,76 % vs. 21,40 %). Among age groups, age 19-34 group gets 25,93 % of "have been working in foreign company" this age group also has highest percentage (65,26 %) in often surf foreign web sites. Apparently, this age group has more than double of high percentage (34,41 %) in average global connections comparing to the age group 51 and over (16,30 %).

In household income section, we can see that the higher in income, the more global connections. Household incomes at 4000 and over reach their all kinds of global connection at 35,77 % to 62,32 %, with overall average at 43,46 %. The section of education attainment presents it's almost the same pattern like that of household income, with University, graduate student have 48,00 % of overall average.

In terms of occupations, Company executives have highest percentage (around 50 %) for average global connections. It implied that they are the most that have been working in foreign firm, visited foreign countries, have relatives abroad, and often surf foreign web sites among the occupations. However, manufacturing workers (average 13,09 %), unemployed (11,67 %), and former (2,82 %) are lower in their global connections. Interestingly, students (any level of education who is not belong to a specific category above) have lower percentage at "have been working in foreign firm" (4,71 %) and "have been abroad" (3,41 %) except "often surf foreign web sites" (67,42 %). Their overall rate reaches the highest in 25,50 %.

Findings and Discussion

Changing Consumer Behaviors

Massive global civil connectivity might be a new phenomenon in the age of globalization. For instance, consumers, regardless of their nationalities or countries, are willing to experience and utilize varying styles and cultural artifacts for varying purposes. Global civil connectivity is catalyzing this desire. From this point of view, globalization is a process by which diffusion of all-different forms and styles across the world. To some extent, consumer is ready to have Italian for lunch and Chinese

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Fig. 1. Increasing Global Connectivity with Probability of Have Eaten McDonald's-Like Fast Food

for dinner, not only changing diets, but also the personalities-to reveal his/he virtually "a global consumer". The possibilities of such representational consumption in terms of life styles and behaviors "originating" from a variety of countries and cultures are opening up all across the world [14].

Fig. 1 shows personal global connections with per capita income categories to predict probability of eaten McDonald's-like fast food in China. The overall trend of probability of eaten McDonald's-like fast food is increasing along with personal global connections increased. However, three categories of per capita income differs in their probabilities with high income goes to steadily increasing, and lower income, however, shows its diversification from lower global connectivity to high global connectivity. The gap between low income and high income tends to narrow along with their personal global connectivity increased. Apparently, it indicates the variable of personal global connectivity has mediates the probability of eaten McDonald's-like fast food. It is a demonstration of personal global connectivity intervening personal global consumer behaviors.

Fig. 2 shows the gaps of probability of preferable of foreign brand clothes between age groups and their change along with personal global connectivity. Apparently, age 14-18 has the highest probability (0.48-0.98) than the other age groups. The old has the lowest probability of preferable of foreign brand clothes (0.1-0.6). However, along with personal global connectivity increment, overall probabilities reach their higher levels. It implies PGC intervene the probability of preferable of foreign brand clothes.

Obviously, an important factor causing the difference of consumer behavior contributes to personal global connectivity that has impacted many aspects of

age 14-18 -a-age 19-34

age 35-50 -age 51-over

Fig. 2. Personal global connectivity with age groups to predicts the probability of Preferable of foreign brand clothes in China

individual behaviors. These evidences confirm Hypothesis 1 that stronger global connectivity a person have, the higher probability the person is engaged in demanding of global products, and more likely for the person to adapt to global consumer behaviors. Moreover, global brand products, the standardization of goods and services such as McDonalds and Coca-Cola, for example, may have established a kind of consumer "cosmopolitanism" by allowing people from different parts of the World to share the same culinary experience of a Big Mac or the "real thing" [15].

Fashioning of Cosmopolitan Orientation

Globalization and global orientation are two parallel processes: the practice and the ideology. Cross-boundaries trading and high speed Internet provide driving force to promote global orientation in most development countries. Strong global orientation in consumption, a sort of consumer cosmopolitanism, can be seen variety aspects of people's lives in China recent decades. In Shanghai, young people prefer to watch U.S. movies. MGM/UA Communications Company, Paramount Pictures, and Universal Studios-made movies and television programs can be easier to watch in Shanghai recent decades comparing 20 years ago. "On Wednesday nights in Shanghai more than 70 % of the television audience tunes in to watch Hunter, an American police show" [16]. Being seen as a tool of communication, English is becoming the world's first truly universal language. In Shanghai, hundreds and thousands students learn English in school, which is a mandatory course in most school; some of them are preparing to take the TOEFL test. People can access a variety of English materials and learn the Western culture as well. The special English TV

program and English broadcast systems have been established since the early 1990. There are also some English newspapers, and some are locally issued, which can be easily found out at newsstands in any corner of commercial streets. The city has also launched an "Information Port Project", aiming to give great development momentum to Internet-related business. The Shanghai Online, a local Internet network, has increased his users dramatically since its opening.

In order to analysis multivariable in the study, we employed Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) to help analysis. SEM is a statistical methodology used by economists, educational researchers, marketing researchers, and a variety of social and behavioral scientists. One reason for its pervasive use in many scientific fields of study is that structural equation modeling provides researchers with a comprehensive method for the quantification and testing of theories [17]. In addition, SEM models also enable researchers to study both the direct and indirect effects of the various variables included in a model. Direct effects are the effects that go directly from one variable to a second variable. Indirect effects are the effects between two variables that are mediated by one or more intervening variables. The combination of direct and indirect effects makes up the total effect of the explanatory variable on a dependent variable. Thus, if an indirect effect does not receive proper attention, the relationship between two variables of interest may not be fully considered [17].

Variables in the equation system usually include observed variables and unobserved latent variables that are not directly measured but relate to observed variables. This modeling technique assumes a causal structure among a set of latent variables, and that the observed variables are indicators of the latent variables. The latent variables may appear as linear combinations of observed variables, or they may be intervening variables in a causal chain [18]. In SEM path diagram, latent constructs (unobserved variables) are shown in ellipses, observed variables are shown in rectangles. Arrows pointing from ellipses to the rectangles are equivalent to factor loading in factor analysis. Factor analysis includes both component analysis and common factor analysis.

Fig. 3, the path diagram of structural equation modeling, shows that PGC has a strong direct positive effect on Global orientation (.66). Hypothesis 2 has approved here. Of all the observed variables that yield PGC, often surfing foreign Web sites (W4) has the largest weight on PGC (.55), while working for a foreign company (W1) and has been abroad (W2) are the second (.46). It implies both variables quite influence individual's global orientation. Regarding global orientation, X1 "When buying, I always pay attention to brand name goods from foreign countries" (.83) and X3 "I always prefer foreign brand goods to domestic ones" (.77) have larger factor weights on the latent variable. So call global orientation of consumption has been truly presented by these variables, particular those with larger factors ones. It also indicates the key components of global orientation here.

The exogenous demographic and socioeconomic variables in the model show meaningful coefficients. Educational attainment (Edu) has high standardized coefficient (.51) on PGC, comparing with Per capita income (.46). They indicate that

higher educated person with high per capita income, the more personal global connectivity. Hypothesis 3 has been affirmed here. Interestingly, however, the direct effects of education and per capita income on global orientation are negative (-.28, and -.09). It yields a meaningful perception that education and per capita income they are not leading to global orientation, only personal global connectivity enlarges their effects on it. In another words, global connectivity mediates education, and income on global orientation. It's undoubted that age has strong negative effect on PGC (-.14) and has its negative direct effect (-.16) on global orientation either. It tells us that the younger, the more personal global connectivity (it also implies the enthusiasm of young people for surfing foreign web sites, since the factor on PGC is .56 higher than the rest) comparing the older, and the younger, the higher of global orientation. Hypothesis 3 gets it's firmly support here. The two-headed arrows over Age, Education, and Per capita income point to their correlation. Age indicates its negative correlation with educational attainment (-.31), and per capita (-.12), which indicate age has strong impact on education attainment and per capita income that old people have low level education attainment and low income. Education has high positive correlation with Per capita reflects high education attainment leads to high per capita income.

The squared multiple r = 0.27 on the above of the ellipse of GOC means that the model of PGC with GOC has correlation between them. The overall model is statistically significant (Chi-square = 238.747, degrees of freedom = 37, probability level = 0.000). The model fitness indicators, such as NFI (normal fit index) and CFI (comparative fit index) are 0.97, and 0.975, respectively, which are very good fitness.

Conclusions

Global connectivity makes China much stronger than ever before. As we have known China has long history of global contacts and that has been much intensive after applying market system in 1980's. The primary purpose of opening policy in China was to rescue Chinese economy from the slurry of planning system, however it impulses people to break the isolated society and generate great opportunity for Chinese connecting the global that make a huge potential treasure for Chinese.

While expanding personal global connectivity, the person himself gets global socialization. Stronger global connectivity reshapes Chinese and make them more openness and acceptable by global society. As our data revealed that personal global connectivity mediates person's demographic and socioeconomic characteristic toward global products, and orientation. The more global connectivity, the more likely consume global products, and the more global orientation.

As aggressive level of individual person, local society has been transformed through massive global connectivity. Global connectivity has been an important criterion of social stratification in China, and it may continue a certain period of time in future. Chinese local society has been changed by economic reform and opening policy, which is from institutional framework and pressure. Personal global connectivity impacted Chinese society by its rooted civil activities and exogenous force. Both internal and external, grass root and institutional driving force will make Chinese society more reliable and stronger in the world.

As a new approach to study globalization and global civil society, the perspective of global connectivity in local society may bring a fresh idea to the forum of abstraction discussion on globalization. Strictly speaking, the study has some limitation. The principle of limitation is the sample size. This study was designed in the United States, and operated in Shanghai, due to funding and human resource limitation; the sample size is around 600 cases. Although theoretically the size is enough to make decent statistical analysis, the sample coverage is not large enough to the huge city. The second limitation is the designing. Originally this study is to explore the globalization and consumer cultural change only; we didn't make clear sense of global connectivity as an important independent and latent variable to this study. There are many variables with its sufficiency and distinction may be designed in global connectivity for further study. We may modify this approach of global connectivity for further study.

References

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Date accepted 18.10.2015.

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