Welcome to Sisyphus Highway: In Depth.

In the previous episode, we discussed how state policy, market reform, and educational institutions changed the meaning of resources and the life chances of different generations.

As a new social structure gradually stabilizes, another question appears:Will people who already occupy advantaged positions pass their resources to the next generation? After rising through education, will a generation gradually close the door behind itself once it becomes the elite?

This episode examines the formation and intergenerational continuity of political and intellectual elites.

From Feng Junqi’s County Cadres to discussion of why disadvantaged students are increasingly distant from top universities, from J. D. Vance and Hillbilly Elegy to China’s “classes of 1977 and 1978,” the “Class of ’92,” and actresses born around 1985, we invite you to consider:How much of success comes from individual effort, and how much from family resources, historical windows, and existing networks? As competition shifts from “competing through the child” to “competing through the parents,” can a humble family still produce an eminent child?

 

- County Cadres: how does a county’s political elite take shape?

- Drinking, card games, and gifts: how do informal relationships affect formal institutions?

- How do political families emerge and persist across generations?

- “Small-town Brahmins”: why would people rather drift through large cities?

- Why are disadvantaged students increasingly distant from top universities?

- Did independent admissions discover talent or screen people out?

- Why did education become Chinese society’s faith in class mobility?

- America’s “eminent child from a humble family” through Hillbilly Elegy

- After escaping one’s class of origin, can a person still represent the group left behind?

- The “classes of 1977 and 1978,” the “Class of ’92,” and actresses born around 1985: why do elites have such distinct generational divisions?

- From elitism to paternalism: when competition becomes “competing through the parents”