How we pay for meals, and how it shows we are more common than different
I hope to explore two different practices when it comes to paying for meals, and what it reveals about us.
The behaviour (thought to be) famous among the Chinese (or even more generally, Asians) is that after a meal, one person offers to foot the entire bill. What may even seem unreasonable or strange is that, sometimes, families and friends could end up ‘fighting’ over who will pay for everyone, dragging it out over some time, which seems disproportionate to the simple task of choosing someone to pay. Indeed, the American sitcom Fresh off the Boat, about a Chinese immigrant family, featured such a “polite fight” after a meal. However, as explained in Peking University’s International Student Guide, it “is not a real fight”.
This contrasts with ‘going Dutch’, commonly attributed to Westerners, where each person pays for their own meal.
However, despite simplistic generalisations that individualistic Westerners ‘go Dutch’ and the more collectivist Chinese pay for everyone’s meal, I show that not only is there variation, exception, and evolution in the Chinese behaviour to pay for everyone’s meal, but I also argue both behaviours actually stem from deeper, common values that all of us share.
Motivations behind ‘fighting’ to pay for everyone’s meal versus ‘going Dutch’
In my own social circle, we ‘go Dutch’. Although Singapore is majority-Chinese, growing up, I have been taught to take responsibility for my own expenses, even for a cheap meal. The principle is to not take advantage of others. Perhaps more importantly, the goal is to not be perceived as taking advantage of others and ‘lose face’ — to become someone who needs to rely on and burden others (a social ‘leech’), or not even have the little money needed to pay for his own sustenance. For Western countries, it seems ‘going Dutch’ is rooted in an individualistic mindset where, according to Dutch social psychologist Geert Hofstede, people are expected to look after themselves.
On the other hand, it seems that paying for everyone is a typical behaviour of the Chinese, even among peers. A Chinese-born friend of mine shared that insisting to pay for everyone’s meal is something others in Singapore find strange. He explained that the motivation in footing the bill is to “show [his] hospitality and respect”, and that he “values the friendship”. It is generally the case that the Chinese have a higher-context communication: spending money on someone implies high interest in the relationship.
If we appreciate this motivation, then we can understand why this ‘fight’ is actually reasonable, even necessary. The fight is not really a decision-making process to determine who pays (as in the case of ‘going Dutch’, which assigns the ‘payer’ to the ‘consumer’), but a ritual act. Who pays does not really matter. Instead, the ritual provides an important platform to show how much the Chinese value the relationship at hand, reaffirming the shared value of community among everyone (If Hofstede’s scores are right, China has an individualistic score of only 20 out of 100.) Indeed, in Confucianism, ritual helps inculcate shared values by providing a space — the ritual space — to forge ideal relationships.
Affirming shared values through passionate ‘disputes’ is not restricted to the Chinese, just that it plays out in different contexts. Consider White House press briefings, especially during the Trump years which increasingly featured dramatic confrontations. Many news channels would air them live, paying much attention to them, even though little information is actually communicated. As NYU journalism professor Jay Rosen explains, there is a “temptation towards self-dramatization and theatric[s], for its own sake”.
It is ultimately a show; a ritual. This is because when journalists “spar” with the officeholder, it looks like accountability to the public. The platform reaffirms a shared value in American politics, regardless of whether information is actually transmitted and accountability is actually held. Indeed, confrontations are appealing not just because of its entertaining aspect, but precisely because it is a poignant expression of accountability being demanded.
However, as with the ‘fight’ over who pays for everyone’s meal, it is, as Rosen says, ‘play-acting’, where the journalist is shown to be a “heroic battler for the truth”, and similarly, the pay-offerer is shown to be battling for the honour to pay for everyone whom he so honours to the extent he wants to do so.
Similarly, when the Chinese ‘fight’ over who pays, it is a way to show how sincere and passionate they are in valuing the relationship, to the extent they ‘fight’ for the honour to pay for everyone. Far from being strange, the ‘fight’ reflects just how deep and strongly-held the value of community is, something that we can appreciate, even if we find it hard to replicate for ourselves.
Variations and exceptions
Still, it turns out it is too simplistic to have only 2 distinct behaviours and that someone from a particular culture must fall into one or the other always. In Singapore, ‘going Dutch’ is not a universal practice in all situations. While it is the default among peers, there is a situation when the bill is covered by one person, just as the Chinese generally do — when the offeror is a superior. When I was serving in the army or participating in internships, our superior would usually treat everyone in the department. (This is regardless of race: I have had a Chinese, Malay, Indian and Eurasian superior who has done this.) Whenever I offered to pay (which I still do, every time, not wanting to be entitled and assuming it to be the case), they would shrug it off, explaining that it is “natural” for a superior, who earns more, to treat his subordinates, and that when I became a superior, it would be my turn to treat my own subordinates. Even in Western culture, ‘going Dutch’ is not popular when it comes to a specific type of meal — the first date — where it is seen as chivalrous for men to treat women to a meal.
There are also variations, in thought and practice, among the Chinese. Even if most do not practise it, 70% of netizens do not detest ‘going Dutch’. Indeed, an elderly couple in northern China has ‘gone Dutch’ for 30 years and a Sina Weibo online poll of more than 120,000 netizens found that a sizeable 17% of Chinese support this practice among married couples. A 2015 survey by a public opinion agency under Shanghai’s Bureau of Statistics also found that 30% are not against ‘going Dutch’ for household expenses. While the methodology of online polls may not be extremely rigorous, it shows that cultural practices are not strictly binary, either/or categories. Therefore, as is the case of a large country with rich, within-country differences, there are exceptions and variations for different situations and purposes.
How ‘fighting’ to pay for everyone’s meal has changed
Furthermore, behaviours change as the situation changes.
The emergence of payment apps with bill-splitting functions, such as WeChat Wallet and Alipay, have enabled more Chinese to ‘go Dutch’, as it saves them “the embarrassment of figuring out who owes what”. Perhaps, by automating the bill-splitting, it removes the practice from interfering with real-world social relations, making it less awkward, and thus acceptable.
Perhaps it is also because the Chinese are becoming more individualistic (From my classes, I learnt that the individualism scores of the Chinese has increased from 36 in the 1980s to 51 in the 2000s). In addition, ‘going Dutch’ is now more common among Chinese youth, more of whom are enrolled in colleges, and thus, not earning an official income. Indeed, there is even a Chinese term for it: “AA制”. If so, the situational constraint of income may be more significant than ‘traditional’ behaviours.
In sum, as the macrocnvironment changes and evolves (the rise of technological tools, longer education, external influence etc.), behaviour correspondingly changes as well, with younger and more-tech savvy Chinese ‘going Dutch’. Indeed, my Chinese-born friend eventually accepted the new behaviour, and practises ‘going Dutch’ while he is in Singapore. Even in the West, the previously chivalrous male paying for a meal could now be interpreted as insulting a woman’s dignity by “buying her”, reflecting changing attitudes as well.
How different cultural behaviours reflect common underlying values
Despite these contradictory behaviours (such that we might consider the other’s behaviour as strange or unreasonable), I argue they are based on common values that everyone shares.
For example, although the Chinese-born and Singaporean Chinese have completely different behaviours when paying for meals, it seems to be rooted in the same idea of not ‘losing face’. For the Chinese-born, it is to not be seen as stingy and calculating. For the Singaporean Chinese, it is to not be seen as relying on, or taking advantage of, others. Interestingly, this concern for the same ultimate value (not ‘losing face’) leads to different practices among the two Chinese groups. Perhaps particularities or different exposures (Singapore is more heterogenous — only 74% Chinese — and formerly British) could explain the difference.
One argument is that ‘going Dutch’ reflects a “distinction between […] Western and Eastern philosophy”, where Westerners are more individualist and Easterners (Asians) are more communitarian. However, I see two common values underlying both behaviours.
The first is respect. In the West, the motivation is to respect the dignity of others’ individual personhood: not taking advantage of someone by letting him/her pay for everyone, or not disrespecting someone else’s dignity by presuming that he/she cannot pay. In China, as explained by my friend, offering to pay also signifies one’s respect, but for the relationship. Being calculative and talking about money serves to demean the relationship and alienate other people. Hence, ultimately, both the Chinese and Westerners are showing respect for the other person, either individually, or relationally.
The second common value is fairness. In the West, by having each person pay for their own meal, it reflects individual fairness, as each person pays for his or her own expenses. For the Chinese, although the individual instance of paying for everyone else’s meals seems highly unfair, in subsequent rounds, it is expected to reciprocate (in Chinese, 礼尚往来). As also described by PKU’s International Student Guide, “[i]t is considered impolite to be always invited to dinner and never host a dinner.” The only difference is that in ‘going Dutch’, fairness plays out in a single meal, whereas in taking turns to pay, it plays out over several meals. Indeed, the monetary difference, over time, is likely insignificant.
Therefore, it is an overgeneralisation to categorise Westerners as individualistic and the Chinese as collectivistic, and thus have different behaviours. Instead, both value relationships (the collective) and both have individualistic concerns as well (to show chivalry or not lose face). Referring to the ‘onion model’ of culture, perhaps we should focus on our common core of humanity and shared values, instead of our differences in cultural practices, which are more peripheral.
Conclusion
In the 2006 Chinese drama Soldiers Sortie (士兵突击), after the troop helps one of their members to solve an urgent financial problem, the comrades brush it off, saying “there’s no such thing as paying back here”. The beneficiary insists. The commander then instructs that he be given the ledger, and says, “One must always pay back what is owed…. You guys [the troop] always only think about brotherhood and loyalty… but he is thinking about something else… not giving up his dignity for the sake of money.” The troop is silently impressed.
Whatever our thinking and whoever we are, as seen in the anecdote above, we can appreciate and internalise both the values of community and dignity — the issues reflected in the case study of paying for everyone versus ‘going Dutch’. There is no ‘right’ behaviour — all are based on motivations that are ultimately circular or dogmatic in their justification. One is not intrinsically better or more (un)reasonable than the other. Even the same value can result in contradictory practices, as seen above, depending on how you reason it.
Indeed, once we put in the effort to learn and appreciate the other’s perspective and the logic behind their behaviours, contradictory behaviours become reasonable and understandable in their own context. As Kishore Mahbubani explains, “there is a noncontradiction between American [Western] and Chinese civilisations” because “reason and logic… have universal applicability in all cultures… There is no reason why different civilisations cannot interact rationally with each other.”
In conclusion, while distinct differences will remain, if only we consciously make the effort to step into others’ shoes, and to independently think about the motivations and values behind their behaviour, we may discover that we have much more in common than we have different.
