Description
Book SynopsisKimberly Chong offers a rich ethnographic account of how a global management consultantcy translates and implements the logic of financialization in contemporary China.
Trade Review"In this well-written book, the author underscores for her readers how consultancy unfolds as a very crucial site for the consideration of the transformation, in China, of corporations as well as business ethics, employee performance and labor in general in the context of financialization." -- Augustine Adu Frimpong and Noah Kankam Kwarteng * African and Asian Studies *
"
Best Practice is an engaging ethnography based on immersive, multisited fieldwork, and is worth reading for anthropologists specializing in work, business, and capitalism, both inside and outside of China." -- Xinyan Peng * Anthropology of Work Review *
"Based on rich, immersive fieldwork, this book allows for understanding the complex social processes whereby 'financialization' takes place, as a combination of multiple repertoires such as shareholder value, modernization, nationalism, culturalism, state capitalism and the teleologies of globalization they facilitate." -- Horacio Ortiz * Asian Anthropology *
"Kimberly Chong’s
Best Practice offers a thought-provoking ethnography. . . . This book is an important addition to the rapidly expanding field of business anthropology." -- Tomoko Hamada * Anthropological Forum *
“The book should make for vital reading in graduate and undergraduate courses focusing on the anthropology of finance, cultural theories of value, ethical subject-making, and labor in post-Mao China.”
-- Michael M. Prentice * PoLAR *
“Best Practice speaks to many of the themes that interest scholars of cultural economy…. Chong is an anthropologist skilled in being both close to, and critically distant, from the field. But this should not underestimate the emotional and intellectual effort that has gone into this powerful book, which is a treasure trove of insights for scholars of cultural economy.”
-- Michael Power * Journal of Cultural Economy *
“In short, this ethnography is of groundbreaking value…. Any reader interested in the knowledge economy in contemporary China or anthropology of financialization in 21st century China is strongly encouraged to have a look at this book.” -- Jiangnan Li * Journal of International & Global Studies *
“As anthropology looks more deeply into contemporary institutions, including businesses, NGOs, and public entities, contributions such as Chong’s
Best Practice are going to become increasingly important to the discipline....
Best Practice illuminates new issues and possibilities in the increasingly global regime.” -- Allen W. Batteau * American Anthropologist *
Table of ContentsAcknowledgments vii
Introduction 1
1. High Performers: The Making of Financialized Subjects 35
2. Evaluating Humans: Financial Rationality and Practices of Performance-Related Pay 64
3. Reducing Costs: Shared Service Centers, Labor, and the Outsourcing Rationale 91
4. Training Value: The Moral and Political Project of Selling Consultancy 110
5. Client Sites: Liminality, Modernity, and Performances of Expertise 131
6. Building a Paradise: Post-Mao Visions of Transformation 151
7. Conspicuous Ethicizing: Corporate Culture, CSR, and Corporate Subjectivity 172
Conclusion 193
Notes 203
References 221
Index 241
