March to Modernity

The March to Modernity, coined by Kishore Mahbubani, is Asia's march to material and social well-being which ultimately leads to a more stable and peaceful world. Asia’s modernity was first achieved by Japan, and sequentially the Four Tigers, China and India followed its path of achieving fast economic growth, all of which completely and partially embraced the West’s free market economic system.

Globalization

The March to Modernity is one of the three possible scenarios, and the most probable, of how the world will develop to be between the East and the West. It reflects Mahbubani's optimistic views about globalization in Asia. According to this concept, Asia’s modernity first characterized by its economic success is associated with material well-being which helps people to get out of abject poverty and from which people achieve a sense of self-worth and personal freedom. When material necessities are satisfied, social benefits entail by facilitating the improvement of people’s living standards, from health, life expectancy, education and rule of law. When these two conditions are met, Mahbubani believes, the March to Modernity will result in “ethical universe” in which “peace and prosperity” are sustained by “responsible stakeholders in the modern world” and in which the West and the East embrace together to make a more balanced global world.

The other two possible scenarios include:

• The Retreat into Fortresses in which the West becomes threatened by Asia's success and becomes inflexible and protective of its own interests, and
• The Triumph of the West in which the West, having positioned itself as a superpower after the Cold War, tries to help other countries adopt Western values and become "cultural clones of the West."

Reasons for Asia's rise

In his book, The New Asian Hemisphere, Kishore Mahbubani explains seven pillars of Western wisdom that have contributed to Asia's march to modernity:

1. Free-market economics
2. Science and technology
3. Meritocracy
4. Pragmatism
5. Culture of peace
6. Rule of law
7. Education

Cases of Asia's modernity

Kishore Mahbubanisuggests two significant cases of Asia's modernity; China and India.

• China

According to 'The China Modernization Report', China measures its modernization level with two assessment criteria; first stage, "industrialization and urbanization" and second stage, a "knowledge-driven and information-driven" society. The 2007 China Modernization Report predicts that by 2015, China will have reached modernization "to the level of developed nations in 1960".

• India

Cell phone revolution in India shows how "just one modern instrument" impact modernization. It is not just spread of mobile but spread of communication and information.

See also

Kishore_Mahbubani

Further reading

• Mahbubani, Kishore (2001). Can Asians Think? Understanding the Divide Between East and West. Steerforth, ISBN 978-1-58642-033-8
• Francis Fukuyama (1992). "The End of History and the Last Man." The National Interest,

== References ==

Mahbubani, Kishore (2008). The New Asian Hemisphere: The Irresistible Shift of Global Power to the East. New York: PublicAffairs. pp. 22. ISBN 978-1-58648-466-8.