An Extended Definition of Guanxi
There is a special type of social networking in China that called “Guanxi”. Guanxi is a
important feature of Chinese society, it can be translated or expressed as someone’s social
network or relationship. Guanxi is often used in business, there is no doubt that both
Chinese and American culture emphasize interpersonal relationship in a successful
business. In China businessmen have to deal with complex Guanxi in order to
achievement, but for non-Chinese audience, it is hard to have a good express about this
word.
In United State and most of the Western countries, social networking or relationship,
especially those in business are often linguistic equivalents, so does in China(Lo, 2012).
However, it is not always that linguistic equivalents in China. There is will always the
situation with stronger parties and weaker parties, they seemed like equal position on the
face, but when doing business or having negotiation it is obviously that one of them is on
the dominant position. Unlike United State, guaixi can be an instrumental relationship in
business, although it seemed unrecognized in Chinese culture.
The most distinctive characteristic of Guanxi is that it is completely personal, it is used to
describe personal relationships between people(Fang, 2011). Also there are different types
of Guanxi, the most common in daily life is the connection with family. This kind of
relationship is similar around the world, family member rely on each other with
unconditional trust, they persuade low reward or zero reward. Family member will protect
each other. Connection with family is the basic relationship of one person, it is also the
