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Confucian Capitalism and the Paradox of Closure and Structural Holes in East Asian Firms

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 February 2015

Sun-Ki Chai  and
Mooweon Rhee
Sun-Ki Chai
Affiliation:
University of Hawaii, USA
Mooweon Rhee
Affiliation:
University of Hawaii, USA
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Abstract

A long-standing debate has taken place in the organizational sociology and social network literatures about the relative advantages of network closure versus structural holes in the generation of social capital. There is recent evidence that these advantages differ across cultures and between East Asia and the West in particular, but existing network models are unable to explain why or address cultural variation in general. This paper seeks to provide a solution by integrating a culture-embedded rational model of action into the social network model of structure, using this not only to re-examine the closure versus structural hole debate, but also to tie it to the literature on Confucian capitalism and the ‘East Asian Model’ of the firm. We argue that this integrated approach allows us to systematically analyse the relationship between culture and behaviour in networks and, more specifically, to explain why closure has been a more powerful source of productivity in East Asia than the West.

Keywords

Confucian capitalismEast Asian firmsnetwork closurestructural holes儒家资本主义、东亚企业、网络封闭、结构洞
Type
Articles
Information
Management and Organization Review , Volume 6 , Issue 1 , March 2010 , pp. 5 - 29
Copyright
Copyright © International Association for Chinese Management Research 2010

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