文化与家族企业跨代创业:代际传承中的文化嵌入

Culture and Transgenerational Entrepreneurship in Family Firms:Cultural Embedding in Generational Succession

作为家族企业传承期的重要活动,跨代创业强调多世代成员间的共同参与,根植于生产生活及人际交往的文化是影响经济行为的深层次因素。然而,现有研究普遍将文化视为一种建构力量,与制度环境或个体认知直接相关,对文化的内在作用路径缺乏完整解析,而文化嵌入视角的引入可以使关注点转向社会关系,为厘清中间过程提供必要条件。基于此,本文以淄博市陶琉产业中的4家家族企业为对象,采用多案例研究方法,扎根中华优秀传统文化复兴背景下的跨代创业实践,探索代际传承中家族企业的文化嵌入过程。研究发现,文化对家族企业跨代创业的影响历经“社会关系—关系嵌入—社会互动”的路径,并遵循“文化唤起—嵌入强化—协作关系—战略选择”的逻辑。具体而言,传统文化分别借助处世哲学、人伦秩序及规则框架三层面所对应的嵌入路径,强化了跨代创业团队内的协作关系,并进一步体现在协调、合作倾向与跨代创业几种模式间的联系上。本文通过构建文化嵌入的系统分析框架,全面阐述了文化如何经由社会关系和社会互动对经济行为施加影响的微观机理,为中国传统家族企业的跨代成长和发展提供了理论依据和实践启示。

As an important activity during the period of generational succession of family firms,transgenerational entrepreneurship emphasizes the collective participation of multi-generational members.The culture rooted in production,life,and interpersonal communication is a deep-seated factor that influences economic behavior.Existing research generally views culture as a constructive force directly related to institutional environment or individual cognition,lacking a complete analysis of the internal role of culture.The introduction of the cultural embeddedness perspective can shift the focus to social relationships and create necessary conditions for clarifying the intermediate process.This paper takes four family firms in the ceramics and glass industry in Zibo City as the object,adopts a multi-case study method,and explores the cultural embeddedness of family firm succession against the background of traditional culture revival.The research data mainly come from first-hand information obtained from multiple rounds of interviews and rich secondary data.This paper demonstrates that culture exerts a multi-level progressive influence on transgenerational entrepreneurship within family firms,following a trajectory of “social relationships-relational embeddedness-social interaction”,and adhering to the logic of“cultural awakening-embedding reinforcement-collaborative relationships-strategic choices”.Specifically,the thinking patterns,value orientations,and ethical norms embodied in traditional culture are internalized as the widespread social psychology through repeated emphasis in social practices.By sharing mental models within the intergenerational management team,connecting the trust network and jointly building the authority system,it can realize the regeneration and continuation of member relations.The differentiated relational effects in this process result in two types of social interactions:coordination and cooperation within the team,which give rise to transgenerational entrepreneurship models of rejuvenation,innovation,renewal and conflict through different forms of collaboration.This paper makes three theoretical contributions.Firstly,it constructs the mediating role path of cultural embeddedness,reveals the complete process mechanism of culture's influence on transgenerational entrepreneurship by introducing three levels of social relationships and two types of social interactions,and responds to the attention to the cultural level in economic sociology.Secondly,it clarifies three paths of culture influencing social collaboration from the perspective of relationship,reconciles the binary opposition between relationship analysis and cultural analysis in economic sociology,and truly understands the complexity behind the embeddedness of economic behavior.Finally,it shifts the focus of transgenerational entrepreneurship research from individual behavioral decision-making to intergenerational interaction games,explores cultural correlations between collaboration patterns and transgenerational entrepreneurship types through the analysis of inherent connections of different levels of embeddedness.This paper also has practical significance.Transgenerational entrepreneurship teams need to respect differences,clarify their respective roles,and work towards common goals under the leadership of leaders.Leaders should establish a rule framework that combines modern management concepts with the essence of traditional culture,promote trust development,and encourage the exchange of multiple views,so as to give full play to individual initiative and ensure the efficient and stable operation of an organization during the succession period.It is also suggested that the government and relevant departments strengthen the exploration and promotion of traditional cultural values,stimulate the public's pride and identity in the culture they belong to,cultivate a sense of community,and promote social development and progress.