The Chinese Concepts of Guanxi, Mianzi, Renqing and Bao: Their Interrelationships and Implications for International Business

Alvin M. Chan, University of Western Sydney

Abstract

While the study of the emic (cultural-specific) Chinese concepts of guanxi (relation), mianzi (prestige face), renqing (favour) and bao (reciprocity) is not new, there were very few studies on the interrelationships of these concepts. This paper looks at the literal and connotative meanings of these indigenous concepts and discusses the interrelationships of these concepts and their implications for international marketers doing business with the Chinese in China as well as in other countries. Analogies can also be extended to other collectivist cultures whereas the interdependent-self is more emphasised than the independent-self in society.

Introduction

Read any handbook or guidebook on how to do business with China or the Chinese and it is not difficult to identity that guanxi (relation), mianzi (prestige face) and renqing (favour) are arguably the three most important issues mentioned (e.g., see Ambler and Witzel, 2004; Crombie, 2005; Pecotich and Shultz II, 2006). And, the art of practicing these concepts is manifested in the behaviour of gift-giving in anticipation of reciprocative paybacks (bao) in order to maintain a harmonious long-term relationship (Chan, Denton and Tsang, 2003). To the very extreme, this may even result in unethical behaviours like bribery, etc. (e.g., see Millington, Eberhardt and Wilkinson, 2005).

In the social science and business literature, there are numerous studies on the conceptual and practical significance of the Chinese concepts of guanxi, mianzi, renqing and bao (e.g., see Bond, 1996; Fang, 1999; Yang, 1989), however, there were very few studies on the interweaving relationships among these concepts with probably the only exception of Hwang (1987).

In the following, we will firstly discuss the literal and connotative meanings of the Chinese concepts of guanxi, mianzi, renqing and bao. We will then explain the Hwang (1987) face-and-favour model of resource allocation in depicting the interrelationships among these concepts. Lastly, we will discuss the implications of the Hwang (1987) conceptual framework for international marketers doing business with the Chinese and other collectivist cultures.

The Chinese Concept of Guanxi

The Chinese phrase "guanxi" is made up of two characters. Apart from the meaning of relation, the Chinese character "guan" also means a gate or a hurdle, and "xi" refers to a tie, a relationship, or a connection. So guanxi literally means "pass the gate and get connected" (Lee and Dawes, 2005). The concept of guanxi refers to interpersonal relationships or connections in almost every realm of life in the Chinese culture, from kinship to friendship and from politics to business. The Chinese concept of guanxi differs from the Western concept of networking in that the latter is typically impersonal and mostly at the organisational level. However, favour exchanges amongst members of the guanxi network are

not solely commercial, but also social, involving the exchange of renqing and the giving of mianzi (Luo, 1997b).

Yang (1992) distinguished three groups of Chinese relationships: (1) jiajen (family members), shoujen (relatives outside the family, friends, neighbours, classmates, and colleagues), and shengjen (strangers). These distinctions are consistent with Hwangs (1987) conception of the three major guanxi categories in Chinese societies.

Chang and Holt (1991) identified four common methods that one might establish guanxi with another: (1) appealing to kin relations; (2) pointing to a previous association; (3) using in-group connections or mediators; or (4) social interaction requiring social skills such as the ability to play the renqing (favour) game.

Empirical evidence suggested that guanxi-based business variables have profound and positive impacts on the efficiency and growth of companies doing business in China (e.g., see Luo, 1997a; Luo and Chen, 1997; So and Speece, 2000).

The Chinese Concept of Mianzi

While it is argued that face behaviour is universal, the concept of face is Chinese in origin and is a literal translation of the Chinse terms of mianzi and lian (Goffman, 1955; Ho, 1976). Hu (1944, p. 45-46) made very clear distinctions between the two Chinese words for face: lien (or lian) and mien (or mian):

Of the two words for face: lien and mien, the latter is by far the older, being found in ancient literature. Mien has acquired a figurative meaning referring to the relation between ego and society as early as the fourth century B.C. Lien is a more modern term, the earliest reference cited in the Kang-hsi Dictionary dating from the Yuan Dynasty (1277-1367). This word seems to have originated somewhere in North China and gradually to have supplanted mien in the physical sense, and also to have acquired some of its figurative meaning. Meanwhile, mien, with the meaningless syllable tzu (zi) attached, had developed different connotations.

On the physical level, both lian and mian(zi) mean the physical face. On the connotative level, mianzi stands for the kind of prestige or reputation achieved through getting on in life, through success and ostentation; mianzi is accumulated by means of personal effort or clever maneuvering. Mianzi is therefore a kind of recognition ego dependent on the external environment. Lian is the respect of the group for a man with a good moral reputation; it represents the confidence of society in the integrity of egos moral character, the loss of which makes it impossible for a person to function properly within the community. Lian is therefore both a social sanction for enforcing moral standards and an internalised sanction (Hu, 1944). Hu (1944) indicated that the Western concept of face corresponds to the Chinese mianzi but is lacking in the connotation of lian.

The loss of mianzi simply means that a person does not deserve the honour or glory. However, a sense of self-blame or shame is association with the loss of lian as a result of wrong-doing regardless of the presence of an audience (Bond and Hwang, 1986). The importance of lian in day to day life of the Chinese is reflected in the old saying: Every person needs lian; every tree needs bark. As Hu (1994, p. 63) put it, A person with a feeling for lien can be trusted implicitly, for lien is worth more than a fortune to those who value it.

Redding and Ng (1982) also found that the fear of losing lian formed the basis for the informal system of contracts and agreements that is common in Chinese businesses, but mianzi entered much more into everyday transactions as a form of social currency.

Results of an online survey conducted by the Sina Corporation (1998), one of Chinas largest Internet Service Provides, on Chinese respondents attitudes towards mianzi indicated that of the 1235 responses, 83.2 % thought that in Chinese social interactions, mianzi is very important and 12.1% thought that it is somewhat important (2.7% not important and 1.9% no opinion). When asked their opinions towards mianzi as a cultural phenomenon, although 27.8% agreed that it is a cultural rubbish and should be thrown away, more that half of the respondents (52.0%) suggested that it is neither good nor bad; it is useful anyway and some 15.7% of the respondents actually thought that it is very good; good for communication with others; a small percentage (4.8%) of the respondents thought that have or do not have mianzi does not matter.

The above survey results do not just indicate the importance of mianzi in the Chinese culture; they also reflect the interdependence of the concepts of mianzi and guanxi in social and business interactions in Chinese societies. However, it must be pointed out that mianzi is a necessary, but insufficient, condition to build guanxi in China.

The Chinese Concepts of Renqing and Bao

The Chinese character ren literally means a person or a human being and qing literally means emotion or feeling. The concept of renqing has three implications in the Chinese culture: (1) renqing indicates the affective responses of an individual confronting different situations; (2) renqing means a resource that an individual can present to another as a gift in the course of social interaction; and (3) renqing connotes the social norms by which one has to abide in order to get along well with other people (Gabrenya, Jr. and Hwang, 1996).

The Chinese concept of bao is inseparable from the concept of renqing as reflected in the old Chinese saying that (repaying) renqing is more pressing than that of (repaying) debt. Yang (1957) elaborated extensively on how the concept of bao works in the Chinese culture:

The Chinese believe that reciprocity of action (favor and hatred, reward and punishment) between man and man, and indeed between men and supernatural beings, should be as certain as a cause and effect relationship, and, therefore, when a Chinese acts, he normally anticipates a response on return. (Yang, 1957, p. 291)

The Chinese concept of bao differs from the Western concept of reciprocity in that the units involved in the Chinese concept of bao are mostly families, not individuals. I.e., the return of renqing does not have to be directed towards the original giver; it can be directed towards other family members or even close acquaintances (Yang, 1989).

The Interrelationships among Guanxi, Mianzi, Renqing and Bao

Based on social exchange theory, Hwang (1987) developed a conceptual face-and-favour model of resource allocation for fathoming the dynamic relationships among the Chinese concepts of guanxi, mianzi, renqing and bao (see Figure 1).

This simplified dyadic interaction between the petitioner and the resources allocator depicted in Figure 1 can be extended to interpret the interactions among more people. In the interaction process, the two parties may interchangeably play the role of petitioner and allocator at different times.

Figure 1: A Theoretical Model of Face and Favour in Chinese Society

Source: Hwang (1987, p. 948)

Justice theories suggested that there are three justice norms that are used for social exchange for distributing resources within groups: (1) the equity rule which dictates that resources be distributed in proportion to individuals contributions; (2) the equality rule which dictates that resources be distributed equally among members regardless of their objective contributions; and (3) the need rule which dictates that resources be distributed to satisfy individuals legitimate needs regardless of their relative contributions (Hwang, 1987).

When the resource allocator is asked to mete out a social resource to benefit the petitioner, he or she will first consider: What is the guanxi between us? How strong is our guanxi? Hwang (1987) divided relationships into three categories which correspond with the three types of Chinese relationships identified by Yang (1992): Expressive ties are common within the jiajen relation (family members) and involves exchanges based primarily on need. The instrumental ties are based largely on equity principles and are most common within the shengjen relations (strangers). The mixed ties are based on influence and are common within the shoujen relationship (relatives outside the family, friends, neighbours, classmates, and colleagues) (Kwang, 1987; Yang, 1992).

Hwang (1987) argued that renqing is a variant of the universal equality rule and is much more elaborated and more tightly bound up with concept of bao. The principle of renqing is not only a normative standard for regulating social exchange but also a social mechanism that an individual can use to strive for desirable resources within hierarchically structure relationships while at the same time maintaining harmony and social order. The current outcome in the application of the renqing rule becomes input to the evaluation of future guanxi relationships. Concepts and behaviours similar to renqing can also be found in other collectivist societies

like the concept of on in the Japanese culture (Lebra, 1969) and the concept of chemyeon in the Korean culture (Choi and Kim, 2004).

In Chinese society, and similar collectivist societies, norms of reciprocity (bao) are intense, and these norms are heavily shaped by hierarchically structured network of social relations (guanxi) in which people are embedded, by the public nature of obligation, and by the long time period over which obligations are incurred through a self-conscious manipulation of face (mianzi) and related symbols.

Conclusions

The implications that can be drawn from the Hwang (1987) face-and-favour framework are that mianzi and renqing represent some kinds of social capital or resources in interpersonal interactions in Chinese society. To develop renqing is a precondition for the establishment and development of guanxi. The degree of renqing that two parties enjoy determines the strength of guanxi between them. The Chinese use different social exchange rules when dealing with in-group versus out-group relationships. It is of paramount importance for international marketers flocking into the lucrative China market to understand how to play the face (mianzi)-and-favour (renqing) game in their interactions with their Chinese counterparts to foster long-term relationship (guanxi) which often extends from an instrumental tie to an expressive tie in building wider social and business networks.

Leung and Chan (2003) demonstrated how the Hwang (1987) framework can provide guidance for foreign negotiators to use face work as a cultural strategy to negotiate through the complex business network in China. It will be interesting to see future research attempting to quantify the relationships between the concepts in the Hwang (1987) framework. Future research should also take into consideration the dynamic relationship between guanxi and the Chinese concept of xinyong (personal trust). Xinyong literally means the use or usefulness of trust. At a general level, xinyong refers to the integrity, credibility, trustworthiness, or the reputation and character of a person. In business, xinyong usually refers to a persons credit rating. Good guanxi fosters the development of reliable xinyong (Leung et al., 2005; Tong and Yong, 1998).

Analogies can also be drawn between the Chinese and other collectivist cultures which share similar emphasis on the interdependent-self rather than the independent-self (Markus and Kitayama, 1991). Experiences that Western companies gained from playing the face-and-favour game in the Chinese cultural context can be used when doing business with other collectivist cultures like Japan and Korea, vice versa.

Footnote

The transliteration system used in this paper for the Chinese terms guanxi, mianzi, lian, renqing and bao are based on the pinyin system which follows the Beijing pronunciation of standard Northern Chinese. In the Wade-Giles system, these five terms would be transliterated as kuan-his, mian-tze, lien, jen-chiing, and pao, respectively. Other Chinese terms mentioned in the paper follows the transliteration system adopted in the original source.

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