The social change accompanying the “Four modernization” calls for a reconsideration of analytical perspectives of the Chinese family. Given the present status of Chinese society, the hitherto common perspective of the new family in a socialist society has already lost its validity. Moreover, the historical materialisticfeminism approach which has attracted attention in recent years, poses problems with the historical actuality of the Chinese family.
In contrast to these perspectives, this paper focuses on the ambiguous complementarity of gender in family, and clarifies the basic conditions for achieving ambiguous complementarity in family life, by analyzing the existing state of Chinese society. As such, the purpose of this study is to look for an alternative way of family life in industrial society.
Through a case study of urban and rural families in Shanghai, it is made clear that to restore the independence of family activity and to diversify family functions are essential conditions. Furthermore, it is possible to show that the foundation of these conditions exist in the culture of the people's daily life, which is prone to oppose the domination of state, both in the urban and rural family.