Culture and Privilege in Capitalist Asia - Jurusan Antropologi ...

CULTURAL RELATIONS AND THE NEW RICH 3
sections of humanity imagine each other. What is most interesting about this
perspective is its persistence, despite ample evidence and numerous studies, that
demonstrate: first, the wide cultural variance in both Asia and the West; secondly,
the interconnected processes of cultural change and globalisation in which all
societies are to differing degrees caught up; and thirdly, the significant tensions
centred on class and status differences that are present throughout Asia as well as
the West. These points are demonstrated throughout this book.
The East/West cultural distinction rests on a dualism that, for a long time, has
informed the literature on social change and industrialisation in Asia, Africa and
Latin America. This concerns the relationship between Europe and its Other, the
former colonies that make up most of the so-called Third World (Said 1978;
Barker et al. 1985; Bhabha 1994). One influential paradigm, associated with 1960s’
modernisation theory, is that which distinguished between the ‘modern’ cultures of
the West and ‘traditional’ cultures of the ‘Third World’. More recently, discussions
have been concerned with differences between the European industrial revolution
and the industrial transformation that has been taking place in Asia over the last
few decades. Much of this discussion bears a strong resemblance to modernisation
theory, the difference now being that Asia’s traditions are seen to be propelling it
forward rather than backward, as was asserted in the earlier model.
Where the earlier model looked for embryonic Western social and cultural
elements as a sign of development, today these elements are often looked upon as
superficial, or, in Tai’s words, as a ‘facade’. Thus proponents of this culturalist
paradigm now tend to look sceptically upon the use, in Asian contexts, of a social
theory developed in the context of industrialising Europe (Pye 1985: 7—10). Some
are especially concerned about the use of class theory, and the adoption of such
concepts as ‘bourgeoisie’ and ‘proletariat’, which are thought to carry with them
too much Eurocentric cultural baggage. This problem is evident in a large body of
literature which argues that Asian capitalists and, indeed, Asian capitalism are
somehow spurious because they do not conform to an idealised model based on
the European experience. 3
Undoubtedly there are significant dangers in superimposing on contemporary
Asian societies concepts and ideal types that were developed in nineteenth-century
Europe. Even apart from variant socio-cultural milieux, the passing of the colonial
era and marked differences in technology, communications, corporate organisation
and global political relations, all make the contemporary industrialisation of Asia
different to that of eighteenth-and nineteenth-century Europe. Yet there are also
significant commonalities. First, capitalist transformation in both periods and
regions has entailed the generalised production of commodities and the rise of
owners of capital to positions of social prominence. Secondly, even if there may be
significant historical differences between the two periods, there are important
shared contemporary experiences founded in a global political economy that is no
longer so constrained by spatial considerations (Harvey 1989; Sassen 1991).
Thirdly, concepts like class that have arisen in the West continue to be debated
and qualified. It may be less the case that analytical concepts developed in nineteenth-