The western world, steeped in capitalism, raised the question of whether there existed an alternative to democracy. This came against the backdrop of the democratization wave, of which one result is the notable failure in (Post-Soviet) Russia.

Democracy as the one and only government-type for economic development was taken down from the pedestal and put on trial ; the Asian tigers and the failed democracies were put on the stand.

However, 4 years ago (1993), Paul Krugman, an economist like Sen, refuted the idea that the Asian economies were different in any special way. What the empirical evidence pointed to was a very high savings rate (with the savings used for investment), increasing labour force participation (more people worked, more females worked, and people worked longer hours), and a sudden spurt of education. Not that these are bad (nor are they good), but as a method of economic growth, they are unsustainable – for savings cannot exceed 100%, labour participation cannot exceed the number of working adults, and where can we go after every citizen has a degree?
— Link To: The Myth of Asia’s Miracle http://web.mit.edu/krugman/www/myth.html

It should be noted that Sen’s essay was an argument against the prevailing confusion regarding the hype of what was called the (East) Asian Miracle. (As smallvice commented,) Paul Krugman noted the similarities of the Asian Miracle to the growth spurt in communist Soviet. At that time, the alternative was communism. Now, it’s “Asian Values”.

More importantly, Sen’s (as well as Krugman’s) essay gave a broad and reasoned refutation against a post-hoc conclusion drawn from the Asian Miracle. By deeper analysis, they clarified whether the correlation of Asian values with exceptional economic growth was indeed imitable causation, or merely coincidence.

And this is where I have to disagree with the author, for the author, while being similar in thesis to Sen’s essay, does not follow its spirit. Sen concluded the non-significance of “Asian Values” in economic growth as well as in history. The author has furthered it, and concluded against “Asian Values” (espoused by our governments), but with the same fallible post-hoc method that Sen argued against.

Curiously, 3 months after Sen gave his paper to a lecture, the Asian financial markets coughed (July 1997, The start of the Asian Financial Crisis 1997).

It surprises me that you find what I say so surprising.

“I am surprised this came from you. Tripe from such an intelligent man. Tell me Singaporedaddy, what makes up a “good” system? People right. So if you have “good” people, a corollary of that is of course “good” systems. How could they even be treated differently. Aren’t they for all intents and purposes, one of the same reality?”

You have absolutely no idea what you are saying; let be paraphrase you: what you’re saying is you can put the cart before the horse and somehow manage to break the land speed record. Well, I’ve got news for you; you CANNOT.

And there is a very good reason why that’s impossible; if you look at the winners, doesn’t matter whether it’s a country, political party, hedge fund, family unit or even a chocolate cake deli; the system MUST always come FIRST; once some idiot circumvents the system; that’s when all the problems comes in; doesn’t matter; whether its an investor who just decides to plonk all his nest eggs into a fund bc he liked or trusted someone; two pilots who decide to skip the checklist during take off, a hedge fund investors who didnt bother to drill deep enough or even a pastry chef that decides to wipe his ass with a chocolate cake instead of toilet paper; MY POINT is this; when someone, somewhere shortcuts the system by skipping a step; that’s when everything just unravels and goes to the dogs.

And why do I consider Confucionism such a decrepit and lousy thoughtware?

Bc it’s simply the preferred tool of how bent politicians, businessmen and wife abusers usually jimmy the system; they use confucionism in the way a con man uses hypnosis to confuse you and rip u off, its really not so different from trying to explain every malevolent happening in human history by using the quatrains of Nostradamus; it can be interepted to justify virtually ANY imperative under the sun from why my car didn’t start today to why an pint sized auntie in SUV from hell tried to run me over this morning to why the ice in the polar ice cap is melting – so to me not ONLY is it worthless, it’s DANGEROUS – as that also means it can be also used to justify everything from why you should just shut up and never question your leaders (elders); to everything from condoning mass genocide in the name of Mickey Mouse.

What you need to understand abt the analects of Confucious is they will always remain DANGEROUS; only bc they aren’t nearly whole disquisitions as they are vignettes. And that means whatever meaning they are supposed to convey lies in the interpretation and NEVER the text / So what you need to understand here is they are very different from something like Isaac Newton’s The Principia: Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy where if you are stuck in lets say page 70; you can go and refer to the bibliography to flesh out the missing links. Not at all; Confucionism is management by fortune cookie wisdom e.g Man who fight with wife all day get no piece at night – Passionate kiss like spider’s web, soon lead to undoing of fly – so on and so forth.

I mean if this was such a great social evolutionary thoughtware as you said; have you ever considered why did the Magna Carta even bother to run the full gamut of 63 clauses? Why did the Bill of Rights have to have nearly 340 appendixes and annextures? Why do you think we build high powered telescopes and regularly send space probes to discover more about the Universe? Could it be because we can never crack the mysteries of life by just reading the words at the back of a chewing wrapper?

What do you think?

SD

From the dawn of human intelligence, we have been seeking the right way of life and debates have been played out through centuries to hammer out a set of governing rules that hope to protect the interest of the people but as we all know no rules or regulations can cover 100% of its people interest regardless of the system each country adopts, simply because we are HUMAN BEINGS with a thinking mind of our own. The values of anything we see vary widely. Ideologist and Pragmatist simply cannot co-exist.

In today’s term; if and only if we can break down the levels to state and family rules we may see a different perspective. What is good for one state may not apply to the neighboring or other state as again, it could be due to circumstance that engulf within or the cultural believes or the liking of “self proclaimed leaders” who prefers tyranny rule. Similarly, the teachings each family imbibe to their siblings varies from one another. Some inadvertently exercise authoritative and dictatorial approaches and others are more liberal and democratic.

However, fundamentally (speaking for myself), if and only if a balance of power can be drawn to ensure that there is sufficient transparency and accountability to guard against any system abusers, that in itself can be considered as the right and proper system to adopt. Whether calling it a democracy, dictatorial, communism or whatever name we accord to it becomes insignificant. What may seem to work today may become obsolete in the next century to come. The importance is how can or do we re-adapt and whether can we make the influence. It is indeed an individual’s choice to make it a reality.

The ultimate doings fall in the hands of the willingness and determination of each nation’s people with voting rights accorded making this choice and if given a chance to cast that sacred vote. Some or in fact many can argue that the lack of experiences of candidate seeking office had all but casted doubt in them. True, it is worth the while to consider this as one of the many selection criterions. However, when faced with a difficult choice of step taken towards seeing the light at the end of a tunnel versus a dive into the infinite black hole, I think the writings are on the wall.

Some comments have been disallowed because they do not refer or relate to the issues in the article.

Please refrain from bringing in other issues unrelated to the article or personal scores to settle.

Thanks.

Regards,
Andrew Loh

“I mean smart people don’t ever trust smart people; they usually put their faith in smart systems; the man is dispensable. And I tell you; if you mix this rule so much as even once; don’t be surprise; if you end up fat, lonely and poor one day, surviving on Khong Guan biscuits.”

I am surprised this came from you. Tripe from such an intelligent man. Tell me Singaporedaddy, what makes up a “good” system? People right. So if you have “good” people, a corollary of that is of course “good” systems. How could they even be treated differently. Aren’t they for all intents and purposes, one of the same reality?

I readily admit Asian values has often been abused in some quarters, notably in Burma and maybe even China, but if you look at the fundamental message of Confucianism as a comprehensive Chinese ethical and philosophical system. I dont believe it can so readily replicated, it is a product of social evolution. It stands probably in equal stature to maybe the bill of rights and the declaration of independence. It would be silly for us to throw away something that was endured the test of time.

This article is typical of what is usually produced online.its anti-establishment with a slant against PAP. The way I see it, there are some good things abt the West, but also bad. It is important to pick up the former and leave the latter alone.

It was meant to be a derogatory characterization of an inadequate political philosophy. Not realising this, these Asian leaders embraced these “Asian values” wholeheartedly but are now finding it increasingly difficult to defend their coherence. They are caught in a bind as to whether they should continue in obstinate defiance or not. The more and more desperate and outlandish claims made by their spokespersons are evidence of increasing self-doubt.

Indonesia and Malaysia will not embrace Confucianism as they have a totally different cultural foundation.

They were feudal before been colonized and will probably be run much in the same ways their former colonial masters are running theirs’(Europeans) now and You are right to say ‘more democratic’.

patriot

To me it’s very simple really.

You know every time someone rolls out some old man with a long beard wearing period costumes; it always pays to be slightly skeptical and mistrustful.

IMHO that’s usually the cue, when someone somewhere has probably run out of ideas and is trying real hard to sell you and me the whole idea of a super duper man or some homily sugary golden age that never once existed; someone who is probably Gandhi, Kennedy, Britney Spears, Oprah Winfrey, Warren Buffet and Mickey Mouse all rolled up into one nice happy package.

And the reason why they usually have to do that as I said is because there is no other way to convince you; they can’t sit down and work it through and tell you the fail safe systems or standard operation procedures etc – they just cannot – if they could why do they even need to mythologize their legitimacy with loads of kudos and pyrotechnics?

I mean smart people don’t ever trust smart people; they usually put their faith in smart systems; the man is dispensable. And I tell you; if you mix this rule so much as even once; don’t be surprise; if you end up fat, lonely and poor one day, surviving on Khong Guan biscuits.

I mean if you really sat down and thought real hard about this whole idea of Asian values; it doesn’t mean parochial, blind obedience and the nail that sticks up will be hammered down and all that sort of thing; if you really bothered to work things through from the inside out; you’ve probably discover the direct opposite; that real Asian values has always meant embracing diversity and differences.

I am reminded just around the time; when Protestants in Europe were busy burning heretics on the stake; Emperor Akhbar Khan had passed the most comprehensive set of laws in the world safeguarding freedom to worship; along with funding exploration of the sciences and the cultivation of the arts along with encouraging intellectuals of every ilk to gain entry into his court; so maybe you can just as well draw the straight line reference that the version of Asian values Mahatir and LKY were spouting once upon a time, never ever existed.

Thanks, this was a great article.

SD (Internet Liaison officer of the Brotherhood)

Be fair. The computer you wrote this rant on – whether PC or Mac – was likely 90 per cent made in China. Since you completed it I presume it wasn’t that shoddy?

I was shocked at the op-ed as well – the Soviet Union a 2? The US a 7? And Singapore a 10? Incredible.

You’re absolutely right, anyone with any sort of understanding of history knows how weak these statements are.

their behavior is nothing new…history has shown us that men like that behaves like that…and eventually gets thrown out no matter how many speeches they make.

Even countries like Indonesia and Malaysia have move up the notch in democracy.

What happened to us? Can the whole government thinks so painfully alike? It is true that groupthink has taken over our governance and even experts could not distinguish between true democracy and the adaptive one.

Shame on us.