Weaving uncertainty: backloaded institutions and calculated improvisation in children’s fashion production
Abstract
Abstract This study examines the cultural logic of uncertainty in China’s children’s fashion industry, and shows why familiar coordination devices, such as Order Fairs, remain peripheral to this market. I identify a “backloaded institution,” a system where post-production exchange provides the footing for production itself. Producers operate under high uncertainty regarding both meaning and relation, making goods without orders or guarantees. Their risk-taking holds because a secondary clearance market emerges to provide massive, culturally grounded liquidity. This study thus identifies an institution that does not function to predict the future, but to create a liquid present in which multiple futures can be tested.
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Record history
| When | Event | Field | Old | New |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-06-18 19:37:53.011249+00:00 | identifier_assigned | DSEID | DSEID-000-4978497 |