Future-oriented studies

Other titles in the Future-oriented Studies Series

New technologies and development
Biotechnologies in perspective
Culture des îles et développementjlslands' culture and development
Biotechnologies in developing countries: present and future.
Vol. 1: Regional and national survey
From anticipation to action: A handbook of strategic prospective

T h e three objectives of the Future-oriented Studies transverse

p r o g r a m m e are as follows:
• to highlight the future developments in U N E S C O ' s fields
of competence;
• to strengthen U N E S C O ' s clearing-house function in the field
of future-oriented studies;
• to promote training activities in future-oriented research
and studies.
T h e futures
of cultures

U N E S C O Publishing
T h e authors are responsible for the choice and the
presentation of the facts contained in this book and for
the opinions expressed therein, which are not necessarily
those of U N E S C O and do not commit the Organization.

T h e designations employed and the presentation of

material throughout this publication do not imply the
expression of any opinion whatsoever on the part of
U N E S C O concerning the legal status of any country,
territory, city or area or of its authorities, or concerning
the delimitation of its frontiers or boundaries.

Published in 1994 by the United Nations Educational,

Scientific and Cultural Organization
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Printed in France
Preface

T h e present publication presents a synthesis of the results of the project

entitled ' T h e Futures of Cultures' which was launched in 1990 within
the framework of the Future-oriented Studies Programme. O n e of the
aims of the project was to identify, at the regional and interregional
levels, emergent trends and foreseeable changes in the field of
interactions between cultural development, cultural identities and
pluralistic (or multicultural) societies.
T h e implementation of the project, co-ordinated by M r s Eleonora
Masini, gave rise to several meetings. A meeting of a consultative
working group of experts at U N E S C O Headquarters (9-10 January
1990) identified six main trends: the globalization of the Western
cultural modernization 'model', a product of increasing worldwide
interdependence; the growing influence of the cultural on the economy,
most striking in the case of n e w technologies; the process of the
uniformization and homogenization of cultures and cultural values; the
pluricultural dimension of almost all societies in the more industrialized
countries; the rise of resistance phenomena or of cultural affirmation as
a reaction to this movement of 'standardization' of cultures; and the
emergence of new cultures, engendered by scientific and technical
progress.
These general working assumptions were debated and applied to
different regional and interregional 'cases' at the following meetings: at
Barcelona (13-15 September 1991) in co-operation with the Centre
U N E S C O de Catalunya and the Centre Cátala de Prospectiva (Africa
and Latin America); at Bangkok (8-11 February 1993) in co-operation
with the U N E S C O Principal Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific
and R U S H S A P (Asia); and at Mantua (1-3 April 1993) in co-
operation with the Politécnico di Milano (western Mediterranean). T h e
proceedings of these meetings have appeared in several publications: in
The Futures of Culture^ Vol. I (December 1991) and Vol. II (March
1992), ( U N E S C O documents produced by the Future-oriented
Studies Programme) and in The Futures ofAsian Cultures (published by
the U N E S C O Principal Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific,
Bangkok, in 1993).
T h e present publication includes the synoptic report on the results
of the Futures of Cultures (by M r s Masini), as well as a selection of the
most pertinent regional contributions, revised and updated by their
authors.

Division of Studies and Programming (BEP/BP), UNESCO

Contents

Eleonora Masini
T h e futures of cultures: an overview 9
Denis Goulet
Development and cultural resistance in Latin America: prospects 29
Rodolfo Stavenhagen
Cultural struggles and development in Latin America 43
Ashis Nandy and Giri Deshingkar
T h e futures of cultures: an Asian perspective 61
Susantha Goonatilake
T h e futures of Asian cultures: between localization
and globalization 67
Ziauddin Sardar
Asian cultures: between programmed and desired futures 83
Sohail Inayatullah
Disintegration and reintegration: the futures of Asian cultures 93
Kazuo Mizuta
T h e futures of Japanese cultures 105
Godwin Sogolo
Continuity-in-change: alternative scenarios for the futures
of African cultures 123
Elikia M'Bokolo
African cultures and the crisis of contemporary Africa 139
Augusto Perelli and Abdelkader Sid Ahmed
T h e futures of cultures in the western Mediterranean 153
T h e futures of cultures: an overview
Eleonora Masini

Introduction
Globalization versus localization
Cultural change
Alternative trends
Global scenarios
Regional scenarios
Conclusions: areas of action for international co-operation

Introduction
Throughout the project, the terms 'future' and 'culture' have been used
in their plural sense: 'futures' and 'cultures'. In describing or thinking
about the future, w e always think in terms of there being several futures.
According to de Jouvenel, people choose from m a n y 'possible'
alternative futures, of which s o m e are m o r e probable and others m o r e
desirable. It is, he says, an extraordinary event if the probable and the
desirable coincide. Similarly, it is n o w generally accepted by anthro-
pological theory that there are m a n y different cultures. In the
developing multicultural society, m a n y m o r e coagulations are likely to
emerge from different cultures at different historical m o m e n t s .
T h e emphasis in this context is on 'living communities of cultures'
as linked to future developments. T h e role of cultures in futures studies
has b e c o m e increasingly important in the last decade.

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 Eleonora Masini

PART ONE: GLOBAL TRENDS

Globalization versus localization

Globalization has undoubtedly occurred in the w a k e of economic
processes. If these economic processes are indeed global - as are also
political processes with the transfer of political values and, to s o m e
extent, technological processes (albeit only partially because they d o
not spread homogeneously) - the s a m e cannot be said of cultural global-
ization, which is very m u c h linked to the response to this process of the
various cultures.
Referring to the state of culture today and the processes w e are
witnessing, Denis Goulet writes that

all cultures and cultural values are assaulted by powerful forces of

standardization. These forces homogenize, dilute and relegate diverse cultures
to purely ornamental, vestigial or marginal positions in society. T h e first
standardizing force is technology, especially media technology. Television,
film, radio, electronic musical devices, computers and telephones operate,
together and cumulatively, as potent vectors of such values as individualism,
hedonistic self-gratification, consumerism and shallow thinking. T h e second
standardizing force is the modern state, a political institution which is
bureaucratic, centralizing, legalistic and inclined to assert control over ideas,
resources and the 'rules of the game' in all spheres of h u m a n activity. T h e third
standardizing force is the spread of managerial organization as the best way of
making decisions and co-ordinating actions in all institutions. Increasingly,
government leaders must function as managers, as must university presidents,
of directors of foundations, airline officials, heads of hospitals and scientific
associations.
T h e result of these standardizing influences is massive cultural destruction,
dilution and assimilation.

Ashis N a n d y and Giri Deshingkar, looking at the spread of the m a s s

media, challenge the view of globalization, claiming that those w h o
despair of the spread of m a s s culture have already signed 'the epitaph of
culture'. If mass culture is able to spread, this is only because of the
growing emphasis o n objectivity, o n science and technology, which are
not considered to be value carriers, and the consequent stripping away
of values from cultures. According to these authors, culture is not being
substituted by a superficial 'entertainment' culture. Being 'inner-
directed' (though sensitive to time a n d space), the non-resistance or
weakening of cultures is d u e precisely to this loss of values. H e n c e , it
would b e m o r e appropriate to speak of the erosion rather than the

10
 The futures of cultures: an overview

globalization of cultures. T h e erosion of cultures, N a n d y claims, started

with the Enlightenment and was further reinforced by the colonial,
economic and political process based on urbanization and indus-
trialization. These processes paved the way for the so-called cultural
globalization of the 'erosion' of existing cultures, creating a v a c u u m of
values or, according to G o d w i n Sogolo, an 'alienation' from values.
T h u s the process of globalization is a multifaceted one: imitative, hostile
and reactive.
Exclusion from this globalization process - or the decision of certain
cultures to remain behind and not be part of the progress paradigm,
according to which science and technology offer the only solution -
generates hostility, with the emergence of localisms or even nationalisms
in the effort to regain self-esteem through the self-assertion of cultures.

THE CORE-PERIPHERY APPROACH

T h e duality between globalization and localization can perhaps be

better understood if seen in terms of a core and a periphery of cultures
as w a s done in the project by m a n y authors, starting with Sogolo.
Despite the strong impact of the dominant culture, which involves
m a n y aspects of everyday life, and basic priorities, certain aspects of
culture appear not to change. T h e hypothesis is that there is a core and
a periphery of cultures, the former often emerging in relation to such
important events as birth, marriage and death, and at least symbolically
maintaining its identity. This concept emerged in the search to establish
whether there is a limit beyond which a culture becomes another
culture. T h e core-periphery idea seems to indicate that the core is the
limit beyond which a culture keeps its identity or, rather, the people
belonging to that culture d o so in their basic choices.
This idea would seem very m u c h in line with the 'dynamicity' of
cultures described by Elikia M ' B o k o l o in relation to African cultures.
M ' B o k o l o stresses the cenrrality of 'living cultures' for both the present
and the future, and the so-called 'resistance' of cultures versus the
' m u s e u m ' culture view expressed by m a n y in the project.
T h e core-periphery concept would also seem relevant to the phases
experienced by the weaker cultures (in terms of technology) w h e n they
c o m e into contact with the stronger: acceptance, reaction, hostility and
possibly synthesis m a y well be linked to the defence or non-defence of
the core in absorbing the external culture.
W e are living in a period of increasing migratory tides, for reasons
that m a y be economic, political or ecological, or related to increased

11
 Eleonora Masini

communication, both visual and verbal. N o t only are cultures coming

increasingly into contact with each other; they are coming into contact
increasingly rapidly, with a far greater impact and far less time in which
to adapt. Sogolo gives some extremely interesting examples of core-
periphery dynamics in relation to Africa.
Sohail Inayatullah uses the terms core and periphery in a quite
different way. T h e core is the dominant culture, which is 'weak in
identity but strong on capital' and individual mobility (perhaps the
erosion principle is linked to power). B y periphery Inayatullah means
the local cultures, which are 'strong in identity but weak in intellectual,
social, capital and physical mobility'. T h e strength of the local culture is
to stay alive, to remain a living culture, to resist.
Under the impact of major trends, people m a y still find ways of
understanding (even if conflicting) but they create n e w coagulations.
T h e term coagulation expresses better than aggregation the internal
relations between people of different cultures w h e n w e understand
culture as an inner-directed process.
M a n y people see some aspect, some form of the globalization
process as inevitable in the future. T h e important point is what the
dynamics are at the local level and what n e w coagulations and
aggregations will occur. W h a t is the 'continuity-in-change' which
relates to 'living communities'?
T h e contrast between globalization and localism is to s o m e extent
reflected in popular productions which are the expression of h o w the
different cultures d o or do not respond and react. T h e core elements of
the culture which d o not change or erode are frequently expressed in
what is referred to as 'popular art', which s o m e h o w survives and resists
the impact of the global culture.

' M E S T I Z A T I O N ' OF C U L T U R E S

A n issue that stems precisely from the encounter of different cultures,

s o m e stronger than others, m a y well become increasingly important in
multicultural societies. O n e which will inevitably develop due to the
increased contact between different cultures has been aptly described
by Alonso Concheiro: Latin Americans almost obsessively question
their being, as if they had lost their origins in the traumas of the
conquest. T h e intensive and extensive 'mestization' process which took
place after the conquest created and sustained the duality of origin
which has marked Latin Americans culturally:

12
 The futures of cultures: an overview

In Latin America, although the Indian heritage (and in some countries, the
vivid, exuberant Black as well) is still strong, o n the whole the dominant
cultural texture is that of the mestizos, the cross-breeds. O u r culture is closer to
Western culture (that is to say, to the European tradition) than to any other;
perhaps today it is closer to that part of it as represented by the United States.
A s such, as a product of mestization, it is a young culture.

C U L T U R A L IDENTITY A N D RESISTANCE OF C U L T U R E S

Cultural identity is at the centre of m u c h of the debate o n globalization

of cultures versus localism. In practical terms, the co-existence of
different cultural identities is provoking conflicts that did not arise in the
past, w h e n communities s e e m e d able to maintain their identity even in
environments with totally different identities, as w a s the case of migrant
groups in the United States, C a n a d a , Australia a n d Latin America. T h e
speed of the m o r e recent waves of migration m a k e s adaptation m o r e
difficult a n d identities m o r e rigid as, for example, with the Turkish
population in G e r m a n y or the Senegalese c o m m u n i t y in Italy.
Quite independent of the pace of change a n d the particular historical
m o m e n t , there is a growing awareness of the right of every identity to
survive by its o w n values, a n d of the need to find a w a y of respecting other
identities w h i c h have the s a m e rights. Cultural identity thus c o m e s close
to nationalism. This leads u s to the issue of the nation-state and ethnicity.
M ' B o k o l o c o m p a r e s the politicians' use of culture to build
nationalism with the ' m u s e u m ' view of culture, though claiming that it
is n o n e the less a use of culture or, to use N a n d y ' s expression, a 'politics
of culture'. M ' B o k o l o ' s view is related to Africa a n d to the fact that the
states emerging from colonialism did not constitute nations. Cultures
were thus assigned b y politicians with the task of developing a national
spirit a n d acting as the ' c e m e n t ' of the n e w nations. In M ' B o k o l o ' s
opinion this use presupposes a certain view of culture: the elective
concept of nation, in w h i c h a group of people has the benefit of being
entitled to belong to that nation; or a n ethnicistic concept of nation, with
the grouping of people sharing certain biological or cultural charac-
teristics. T h i s is the direction being pursued b y African politicians,
according to M ' B o k o l o .
N a n d y sees the increasing emergence of cultures of resistance.
T h e s e are only visible o n the margins of the d o m i n a n t forces a n d are
expressed b y those w h o are not part of the d o m i n a n t globalization
process or are trying to break away from it. Culture thus b e c o m e s a w a y
of resisting m o d e r n institutions a n d the m o r e destructive forces of the
d o m i n a n t culture, of not accepting oppressive forces. Perhaps it is only

13
 Eleonora Masini

certain parts of cultures - the core - that have the capacity to resist.
Perhaps resistance lies in the positive force of difference, the capacity of
non-dominant cultures to avoid ossification and the ' m u s e u m ' fate, as
the distilled h u m a n and collective experience covering hundreds of
years which cannot easily be destroyed.
Cultures of resistance are a combination of social change and
culture in relation to dominant forces. Cultural enclaves are n o longer
possible in a world of rapid change, but in cultural terms it appears that
a certain dynamic between what resists and what is eliminated is crucial.
Indeed the homogenization typical of the 1960s and 1970s is today
challenged by the so-called 'continuity-in-change' of culture. Resis-
tance is the capacity to recognize one's culture and criticize what m a y
h a r m it. This does not necessarily imply destroying the other culture or
accepting it indiscriminately, but taking what is acceptable and retaining
the capacity to oppose domination.

Cultural change
CULTURE AND DEVELOPMENT

Culture was not part of m a n y development policies from the 1960s u p

to the end of the 1980s. Since then, however, there has been growing
discussion o n whether culture can be accepted as the core of develop-
m e n t . If the answer is affirmative, then development must be accepted
as being diversified, based on different value systems, and less imitative
and measurable than a purely Western-based model.
According to Goulet, in terms of development the world is currently
regressing to an economic growth paradigm and the boundaries
between the economic and political aspects are disappearing. A n e w
paradigm for development is also emerging in a variety of contexts. It is
based o n the primacy of basic-needs satisfaction with non-material
values taking prority over economic development. M o r e recently,
however Goulet speaks of development as a two-edged sword, striving
towards material goods and technological progress as well as towards
freedom of choice and greater independence:

Notwithstanding the hegemony of the economic growth model, . . . new

approaches to development are being tested out in the practice of numerous
communities and movements. Their priority values are the primacy of needs
and human rights over the accumulation of wealth; participation; ecological
sanity; the building of community; and the equitable distribution of benefits
arising from economic and technological advances.

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 The futures of cultures: an overview

ETHNOCIDE AND ETHNODEVELOPMENT

T h e above point is well developed b y Rodolfo Stavenhagen:

Ethnocide m a y be defined briefly as die process whereby a culturally distinct

people (usually termed an ethnie or an ethnic group) loses its identity due to
policies designed to erode its land and resource base, the use of its language, its
o w n social and political institutions as well as its traditions, art forms, religious
practices and cultural values. W h e n such policies are carried out systematically
by governments (whatever the pretext: social progress, national unity, eco-
nomic development, military security) then such governments are guilty of
ethnocide. W h e n the process occurs due to the more impersonal forces of
economic development, cultural change and modernization, yet not guided by
any specific government policy, it is still ethnocidal as to its effects but m a y be
labelled, in sociological or anthropological terms, simply social change or
acculturation.

Stavenhagen places a different emphasis o n the crucial importance of

the nation in relation to culture: nations d o not utilize culture as a
cohesive force, but wilfully destroy it a n d incorporate it in the major
culture (usually that of the governing forces). H e stresses that social,
e c o n o m i c a n d cultural changes are universal p h e n o m e n a , as n o
population remains static over time. W e can only talk of ethnocide w h e n
the changes (whether imposed or spontaneous) cause an ethnie to lose
its capacity to reproduce itself biologically or socially and m a k e it
unable to maintain its value systems.
Stavenhagen also gives us an excellent description of another
emerging trend in contrast to the previous o n e for Latin A m e r i c a :
ethnodevelopment.

Ethnodevelopment, like the concept of self-reliant development which was

current in the 1970s, means looking inwards; it means finding in the group's
o w n culture the resources and creative force necessary to confront the
challenges of the modern, changing world. . . . Ethnodevelopment does not
m e a n blurring the very real social and economic class divisions which
characterize the modern world capitalist system by stirring up some artificial
'tribalism'. Rather, it assumes that not only class but also emnic identity and
community are socially integrating principles. . . . Ethnodevelopment, finally,
means rethinking the nature and objectives of local-level development projects,
from hydroelectric d a m s to the introduction of plantation crops, by keeping in
mind, first and foremost, the needs, desires, cultural specificities and grass-
roots participation of the indigenous groups themselves.

15
 Eleonora Masini

CULTURAL GOODS AS
A CONTRIBUTION TO DEVELOPMENT

O n e aspect of the Futures of Cultures project concerns interrelations

between the different cultures of the M a g h r e b and Italy, Catalonia and
France. This part of the project was co-ordinated by Augusto Perelli of
the Milan Polytechnic.
Filali Ansari underlined that in the contacts between the various
cultural worlds of the western Mediterranean, over and beyond the
fairly superficial exchanges of consumer goods between the regions,
there is a far deeper relationship and exchange of ideas. Nacib from
Algeria emphasizes the 'shock' between two cultures: the northern,
Latin, Christian culture and the southern, Islamic/Berber culture. Again
there is a reference to cultural resistance over and beyond any political
resistance. Nacib comments that in addition to the subtlety of different
forms of education, religion and so on, there is evidence of a strong
impact of the dominant culture through the media in the M a g h r e b , as
indeed throughout the Mediterranean. T h e satellite broadcasting of
foreign programmes has a far greater impact on the population of the
area than does local television. According to these authors, it initially
seemed possible to transmit a variety of different messages through this
m e d i u m , whereas in fact the ultimate result has been the diffusion of
only foreign culture.
T h u s even in a situation where it is understood that there can be a
' m o d e r n ' use of the original culture in terms of art and artefacts, it
m u s t not be forgotten that the interrelation between cultures is also
mediated by n e w technological communication devices which can alter
a situation of selection. It is interesting that this mediation should be so
strong in an environment such as the western Mediterranean, where
there has been an exchange of cultures in terms of values and
knowledge for centuries.
Another important point is that this globalization process has
coincided with the emergence of differentiation and the need to
reinforce local information. It is interesting to recall h o w in Asia it was
stressed that cultural differentiation has persisted despite the
globalization of information and that the original art forms still play a
strong role in Asian countries. T h e basic hypothesis was that there is a
link between artefacts (relation to early cultural roots) and the need to
meet n e w requirements and use n e w tools, whether mechanical,
electronic or in terms of market-oriented organization, as they b e c o m e
available. Conceptually, the idea is that cultural and artistic values must
find n e w forms of expression if they are to survive in the present and

16
 The futures of cultures: an overview

especially in the future. Such values are thus not eliminated but manage
to persist by adapting to the n e w requirements.
H e n c e the importance of harmonizing early art forms and artistic
tradition with the requirements of the present. T h e issue is two-
pronged: there is a need, o n the one hand, to preserve creative
differentiation and, on the other, not to become cut off from the global
context. According to s o m e people, the strength of the globalizing
process will eventually destroy local capacities and the battle is lost from
the outset. For others, preservation is possible.

Alternative trends
O n e alternative trend is the acceptance of the heterogeneity of cultures;
in other words, the awareness that the coexistence of different cultures
does not necessarily lead to conflicts and tensions. According to
Susantha Goonatilake, the heterogeneity of cultures, produced by
increasingly rapid communications and forced exchanges, m a y lead to
a kind of cultural liberation, defeating cultural conflicts and permitting
the coexistence of difference. Contacts between cultures used to be
limited essentially to contacts between the weak and the strong (the
latter influencing the former, but not vice versa). Different packages of
information n o w encroach u p o n all cultures, with the weaker cultures
also being able to influence the stronger. Therefore, cultural purity as
such n o longer exists. Goonatilake explains that in the past the
hegemonic structures imposed themselves in a crude fashion (as, for
example, in Latin America and in a less virulent manner in the
nineteenth and twentieth centuries with the economic and cultural
colonization of the industrial era). This is no longer true: there is n o
longer one dominant locus. T h e changes taking place in the United
States or in the O E C D countries still have an influence, but even the
poorest country n o w has a voice in what the author calls the 'globe-
girdling electronic babel'. H e believes that this babel m a y bring about a
heterogeneity of cultures.
Other alternative trends are described by Giri Deshingkar and Ashis
N a n d y , Qin Linzheng, and Mushakoji. According to Deshingkar and
N a n d y , cultural encounters are always ambiguous; assertions and
accommodation always go together, while competition for cultural
space has been the norm. H u m a n k i n d is becoming wary of self-
destructive competition. According to Qin Linzheng, most traditional
Asian cultures possess a quality of balance and closure which enables
them to retain their conventions and cultural heritage. Cultures in Asia

17
 Eleonora Masini

are 'mutually melting and integrative, uneven and influential with each
other', although s o m e m a y have stood out from the others at different
historical m o m e n t s .
Qin Linzheng stresses the vitality of the Asian (and Chinese)
cultures and the m a n y very different cultures based o n religions
(Buddhism, Islam, Taoism) and cultures (Confucianism). All have
retained their specific behaviour system, w a y of life, language,
economic system, social organization and religious beliefs and rites.
With reference to Japan, Qin Linzheng claims that this country has
been successful in integrating traditional Chinese and Western culture.
T h e importing of Western market systems and political organization
has not encroached u p o n the country's traditional social organization.
Similar patterns appear to be present in the whole of southern and
South-East Asia: in the Republic of Korea, Singapore, Taiwan and,
m o r e recently, Thailand. According to Qin Linzheng, it is n o w
accepted that there is not one pattern of modernization - the 'European'
one - but m a n y patterns, just as there is not one culture but m a n y . T h e
remarkable progress m a d e by Japan and other Asian countries is, h e
says, proof of this differentiation. H e believes that a 'selection' and
'reconstruction' of cultures is involved in this process.
Reconstruction involves the selection of a goal, after the selection
within the cultural framework, which in turn sets a situation of
realization of the goal and hence a desirable future for culture. In the
reconstruction phase the original culture is transformed and a n e w
culture established, but always on the basis of cultural identity. Q i n
Linzheng believes that Asia is n o w open to modernization and that this
process will vary and m a y even be completely different, depending o n
the particular society and culture. T h u s , differences in the m o d e r n -
ization process are the result of differences in cultural traditions and
historical situations. T h e ways and m e a n s of achieving modernization
are in themselves multicultural even if the goal is the same. Certain
cultural futures m a y be impossible - total Westernization or a return to
tradition - but others are not only possible but probable.
Mushakoji refers to the process of 'occultation' of pre-modern
concepts. With the emergence of the concept of the nation-state
(derived from the West), the nation-state assumed m a n y functions
previously performed in society by a variety of institutions. In a situa-
tion of global complexity, in which the m o d e r n state appears to b e
incapable of managing chaos, the successfully occulted pre-modern
concepts re-emerge in various ways in Japan and m a k e a different kind
of nation-state, one that is m o r e able to operate in a complex society.
While the occultation of pre-modern concepts m a y have been indis-

18
 The futures of cultures: an overview

pensable in Western societies because endogenous to the culture, in

non-Western societies the occultation has two outcomes: in s o m e cases
it contributes to solving complex situations and in others it creates
potentially explosive situations. Mushakoji believes that the Western
concepts and institutions adopted by non-Western cultures - J a p a n and
other newly industrialized countries - have taken o n different shapes
and are the outcome of a highly selective process based also o n cultural
consonance. Mushakoji takes the idea of selection a step further than
Qin Linzheng. Not only does the selection involve choosing one of the
m a n y models, but also choosing critically certain elements from within
the particular culture.
T h e differences that exist in the processes of transformation of non-
Western societies are therefore the result of a complex interaction
between domestic and international factors. For Mushakoji,

the introduction of formal and universal Western concepts, such as 'nation',

'freedom', 'democracy' and 'human rights' mobilized intellectuals and other
social strata in the different non-Western regions, giving their social
movements a leading 'Utopia'. The élites in power borrowed 'status-quo-
oriented' Western concepts like 'national development' to buttress their legi-
timacy through these 'ideologies'. T h e international movements of social
transformation thus had an international basis in Western formal values.

E v e n the quite local, specific counter-movements, based on the support

of local differentiations, developed s o m e kind of c o m m o n front across
borders by formulating their c o m m o n cause through Western concepts.
Ziauddin Sardar believes that 'the colonial powers have consciously
and systematically suppressed the traditional culture in Asia and tried
and somewhat succeeded in replacing it with their o w n perception of
culture'. This was done by replacing a n u m b e r of images - the images
that Asian societies h a d of their o w n cultures and therefore of
themselves and their identity - with the one dominant image of Western
culture as a 'standard civilization'. According to Sardar, it is the self-
perception of the non-cultures which is eroded and not a selection and
utilization in the terms of the reconstruction described by Mushakoji.
T h e colonial heritage of the nation-state, seen by Mushakoji as
consonant with a conception that already existed in Japanese tradition,
is seen by Sardar as destroying ethnic clusters, 'ripping apart religious
and ethnic communities'. This is another important point: the
importing of the concept of the nation-state actually destroyed previous
ethnic groupings. In this case, the nation-state is considered by m a n y as
an internalized value which, in being imported, destroys the capacity of
the different ethnic and religious groups or even nations to coexist and

19
 Eleonora Masini

prevents the emergence of conceptions of nation other than the Western

one. This has certainly not helped solve conflicts.
Technology seems to pave the way for cultural change in the
encounter of different cultures. T h e strength and depth of the same
technology can, according to Nandy, have different impacts, depending
o n the strength of the core beliefs of the culture. Rapid transportation can
lead to the eroding of cultural differences, but it can also lead to greater
awareness of the other. N a n d y thus believes that culture can also have an
impact o n technology and that science and technology are currently
moving from an exclusive focus o n innovation to the acceptance of
traditional, perhaps even marginal, knowledge systems. This is due to the
strength of cultural tradition and also the emergence offlawsin Western-
based science and technology (environmental pollution and so on).

PART TWO: SCENARIOS

Global scenarios
T h e scenarios emerge from the thinking of the participants in the
project as visions based o n their experience. T h e y are not intended to
be rigorous scenarios, built in a step-by-step manner. It is believed that
they m a y be useful in the context of a reflection o n the complex issue of
cultures. Scenarios are, in any case, not a description of what will
happen, but of what might happen if certain conditions are present. A s
such, they constitute an important aid for choices and decisions as well
as for clarification of choices in the present.
First, there is the pessimistic scenario in which all cultures, and
especially living community cultures, become bastardized or reduced to
the ' m u s e u m ' role where they can d o no h a r m . Indeed, there is a
m u s e u m element even w h e n living communities are visited in their
natural environment. In this scenario the criterion of perception of the
culture plays an important role. If the criteria are imported, the culture
will die from within, as there will be n o strong local criteria to oppose
the external ones. This scenario gathers strength from the attraction of
the benefits of the dominant culture, in areas such as health and
economic growth; in the wake of these advantages, the world will be
m a d e to have one culture.
In another scenario there is an attempt to combine culture and
change, tradition and modernity. It might be referred to as 'continuity-

20
 The futures of cultures: an overview

in-change' or the 'dual-track' scenario. T h e implication is that the core

elements of the culture are strong. These elements can acquire other
connotations o n the periphery, while the strength of the culture is
preserved.
Another scenario is the resistance scenario, based on the assumption
that m a n y cultures have resisted the dominant ones. It is not so m u c h a
matter of continuity-in-change as actual resistance to cultural colo-
nialism. T h e question to be asked is whether this resistance is the result
of opposition to change (which occurs in any case) or is a willed
resistance that requires s o m e kind of support, be it economic or from
the outside.
In the fourth scenario, the Gaia scenario, all cultures recognize - for
survival and not for their enrichment - that n o culture is complete in
itself.
T h e fifth scenario is the jungle/babel or heterogeneity scenario
fostered by communication technologies and biotechnologies. Accor-
ding to this view, given the development of such technologies, n o
culture will be able to develop within itself, and all cultures will
inevitably be influenced by information deriving from other cultures.
This kind of influence, fostered by the development of Western
technology, will transform the transfer of information from different
cultures and m a y help to lessen conflict.
T h e sixth scenario describes the domination of a non-Western
culture, the possibility of an oriental culture exerting an influence on
other cultures, following the selection/ reconstruction process that takes
place in the cultural 'consonance' process referred to by Mushakoji.

Regional scenarios
AFRICAN SCENARIOS

T h e scenarios described by M ' B o k o l o as seen from a Western

perspective are the following:
1. T h e most negative scenario is a c o m m o n scenario built on the worst
evils currently befalling Africa: famine, desertification, wars, A I D S .
These will lead to Africa's increasing marginalization from the rest
of the world and to an emergency set of operations necessary for
physical and cultural survival.
2. T h e most desirable scenario is that proposed by Western non-
governmental organizations ( N G O s ) for w h o m Africa represents
the last chance of survival for a civilization unfortunately lost in the

21
 Eleonora Masini

West. T h o u g h poor in economic terms, Africa is rich in values and

will overcome all its problems thanks to these values. In a certain
sense, those living in the Northern hemisphere have a lesson to learn
from Africa.
3. T h e most probable scenario is that envisaged by politicians and
economists w h o attribute Africa's problems to a lack of managerial
skills. T h e Western economic and political model is the only possible
model for Africa, which is lagging behind other parts of the world
because it is late in developing these skills.
It is interesting to compare the above scenarios with the following
scenarios by M ' B o k o l o , as seen from an African perspective:
1. T h e most desirable scenario for the African people is the one
considered the least desirable by the West. It is based on the views of
African historians, economists and ideologists: Africa should be left
to itself. Despite slavery, exploitation and humiliation, Africa has
always managed to resist external intrusion. Even the decolonization
process has been co-opted through the actions of African politicians
linked in some w a y or another to the West. In this scenario the
crucial word is surely resistance. Sogolo also describes a scenario of
resistance, evidence of which he sees even in the early search for
roots immediately after independence.
2. M'Bokolo's worst scenario is the one seen as most probable by the
West, with Africa being dependent on the West. Economic neo-
liberalism submerges all social and cultural issues in an 'eco-
nomicistic' perception. This is what Sogolo describes in terms of the
assimilation by all African cultures of the Western model in the wake
of economic and political transfers from the West. In this scenario,
according to Sogolo, all African countries arefinallyassimilated by
Western culture. Education is patterned on the Western system.
Political organization will be literally parcelled from the West and
grafted onto Africa.
3. A third scenario described by M ' B o k o l o is similar to the previous
one, though it leaves some space for dialogue between the West and
Africa. It is based o n the view that Africans not only have the wealth
of their o w n traditions and roots but also the m e a n s to experiment
as they wish in developing their o w n alternative models in cultural as
well as in economic, political and social spheres. For Sogolo, despite
the dominant presence of the West and the attractions of the
industrialized world, 'no matter h o w powerful these influences m a y
be, the core elements of African culture are not likely to succumb to
total assimilation'; Africans will continue to live with this dualism of
cultures in a process referred to as 'continuity-in-change'. This

22
 The futures of cultures: an overview

process will have a cumulative effect of widening the African

cultural horizon without doing m u c h d a m a g e to its identity. Sogolo
finds evidence to support this view in areas in which African culture
has been in contact a n d in contrast with foreign culture for m a n y
years: medicine a n d religion. T h e basis of this scenario is that the
core of African cultures has remained a n d will remain untouched,jíi¡\^t¡0/)
spite of Western innovations. T h e r e are, of course, petyshera*
changes, as in rituals or infrastructures for medicine, but the core
element resists. ''%Jft/ #•* ^, \ "2- .
:
• - ' -Hi r- " '' * • •• • 2

; " \ ^ S-rf / S > »-% """ i 3 :

\ \ • •<*:- . Q / / C
• r- \ ' /S~
LATIN A M E R I C A N SCENARIOS \'W, \ /¿2'.'
1. O n e scenario (as seen b y Alonso Concheiro) is the continuous» ^ , xm^v
ongoing self-questioning of the Latin A m e r i c a n people, a kind of
constant adolescent state of inner questioning. This emerges from
the contrast of living within a multicultural society a n d being part of
the mestization deriving from a duality of cultures, with a nostalgia
for the past a n d unease at having to use extraneous instruments. In
temporal terms, the past is sought after a n d the future a d r e a m ,
hardly connected to reality, though maintaining great confidence
and drive in, a n d towards, the future.
2 . T h e scenario described b y Stavenhagen is a scenario of ethno-
development, combining revival a n d renewal in Latin A m e r i c a , a
process that is already u n d e r w a y with the revival of the indigenous
population. Ethnodevelopment involves looking inwards for one's
strengths a n d finding within oneself the internal creativity
necessary to face u p to the challenges of a changing world. E t h n o -
development is not a retreat to a m u s e u m tradition or nation-
building in w h i c h culture is seen as the c e m e n t of the nation (as w a s
seen for Africa b y M ' B o k o l o ) , but 'enriching the c o m p l e x ,
multicultural fabric of m a n y m o d e r n states b y recognizing the
legitimate aspirations of the culturally distinct ethnies w h i c h m a k e
u p the national w h o l e ' .
3 . Another scenario b y Stavenhagen describes ethnocide for Latin
America. T h i s scenario contradicts the traditional image of Latin
America as the land of Utopia a n d opportunity, showing the slow
(conscious or unconscious) destruction of the indigenous p o p u -
lations over time. After centuries of exploitation, these peoples have
b e c o m e the victims of development plans.

23
 Eleonora Masini

ASIAN SCENARIOS

T h e Gaia future of cultures is the m a i n point presented by N a n d y and

Deshingkar in their paper. According to this approach, n o culture is
complete in itself. Culture can take its model from ecological processes
and the feedback system. For N a n d y ,

an extreme version of the Gaia hypothesis insists that if humankind comes to

pose a threat to the survival of the biosphere, the latter may, being a self-
correcting system, eliminate humankind as a biological species, as it has already
done in the case of some other species. A Gaia of cultures may similarly
establish a cultural order where ethnocidal cultures - such as the m o d e m
'universal' one - might be destroyed in the long run through the natural process
of cultural change.... O n the other hand, such a Gaia of cultures assumes that
a culture's self-definition is always in dialogue with the cultural selves of other
cultures. N o culture has ever been an island entirely unto itself. Each culture
uses one or more cultural others as a means of self-enrichment and creative
internal changes. In other words, no cultural self-definition is ever complete
without taking into account - and without the capacity to take into account -
other cultures and other self-definitions. If any culture is to have a future, m a n y
cultures, too, need to have a lively existence in the future.

T h e second scenario is the 'babel' or jungle scenario, fostered mainly by

communication technology in combination with biotechnologies. In the
future, it will be impossible for any culture to be pure; all cultures will
change in s o m e w a y under the impact of other cultures. This will
produce less conflict a n d avoid any authoritarianism deriving from a
notion of cultural purity.
Another scenario is one that seemed to be inevitable. This is the
scenario of 'scientifization' and industrialization, which has two sub-
scenarios:
1. Western cultures and their capacities in terms of science, technology
and industry, which seem to solve basic problems, will pervade Asia
and destroy cultural differentiation.
2. T h e original cultures will coexist with Western cultures. T h e y will
not be destroyed, but will salvage the 'core' of the culture. In this
scenario, the theory of selection and reconstruction, as well as that
of the occultation of specific aspects of the culture, seems to reflect
confidence in the strength of east Asian cultures.
A fourth scenario is cultural multidimensionality. W i t h accelerated
migration, people are increasingly being born in one country, are
educated in another, w o r k in another and have parents belonging to
different cultures. T h e result is a multidimensional person w h o (a) has
to construct him- or herself (Sardar) - a painful, though necessary,

24
 The futures of cultures: an overview

process; (b) has to m a k e a choice, decide which culture, or which mix

of cultures, he or she wants to belong to; (c) has to undergo constant
negotiation with the self and others in a process of continuous
interaction (Goonatilake); and (d) is involved in a complete breakdown
of the self, leading to a variety of selves (Inayatullah).
A further scenario is the future domination of the oriental model,
which is able to choose what it needs from Western culture while
retaining its o w n culture of harmony. T h e basis of such a culture is
c o m m o n l y believed to be the Confucian set of principles.

WESTERN MEDITERRANEAN SCENARIOS

T h e first scenario here is one of complete closure widiin the specific

traditions, the only option being that of maintaining cultures, and
probably eventually tending towards the m u s e u m option.
T h e second scenario is the double-track scenario. In this case, the
receiving culture, be it Italian, Catalonian or Maghrebi, selects what is
useful (organizational or marketing capacities) but is not 'conta-
minated' by the other culture. O f course, the point is h o w strong the
receiving culture must be to remain untouched. Perhaps the Italian
culture with its long mercantile tradition, or Catalonian culture with its
organizational capacities, can tolerate the strain precisely because they
have a strong counterpart in the actualfieldof influence of the external
culture.
O n e can imagine a third scenario in which local and artistic
creativity is destroyed by the dominant culture, which focuses almost
exclusively on economic aspects and tends to ignore social and cultural
aspects.

Conclusions: areas of action

for international co-operation

1. At the present time, under the strain of rapid change, it is imperative

to understand the relationship between culture and social change.
2. There is no longer one dominant culture accepted by all. This
change of perspective is the outcome of a process of awareness
within non-Western cultures.
3. Over and beyond the domination or non-domination of Western
culture, scientific and technological capacity, and the distribution of

25
 Eleonora Masini

power (economic and political), lies the fact that education must be
differentiated within the different cultures. T h e Western approach
to education and culture is not necessarily accepted by developing
countries. W e must be aware of the existence of a strong culture of
resistance in these countries.
4. T h e ' m u s e u m ' approach to cultures is no longer viable. T h e n e w
awareness of people is coupled with a strong drive to consider
cultures as living communities. Cultures which are alive in terms of
values, choices of action and behaviour must be saved, for they have
in them the force of die future.
5. W e must be aware of continuity-in-change. If this is ignored, other
serious issues can re-emerge. S o m e changes will be accepted by
populations and others never, in spite of a superficial acceptance.
S o m e parts of culture undergo change, others do not. So there is a
need to develop an understanding of die subtleties of cultural mixes
before deciding on possible policies.
6. In the future, it will be increasingly c o m m o n for people to live
simultaneously within several different cultures: dieir parents might
belong to another culture, they m a y have migrated, they m a y be
refugees and so on. This will produce complex reactions, with
individuals having constantly to m a k e a choice as to w h o they are
and whattiieyare about, constandy negotiating within tfiemselves.
This aspect will need to be carefully monitored if conflicts or
occulted elements are not to emerge. Teachers need to be trained to
understand such complexity, the focus being on the people w h o will
be living in die future multicultural society.
7. Cultures will receive and sometimes accept influences from all
directions. Studies could be carried out to detect mese influences
which are part of the future.
8. U N E S C O ' s role is especially important in a world of rapid global
communication and die consequent awareness of die self and omers
in terms of capacities, rights and responsibilities. Recognition of
one's individual rights must also imply die recognition and respect
of die rights of odiers. U N E S C O should continue to foster
awareness in diis direction, die guiding principle being mat no
culture is complete in itself. U N E S C O shouldtiiereforemaintain an
awareness of die existence of m a n y alternatives. Intiiisway it would
contribute to m e understanding of the differences and at the same
time of m e need for the survival of m a n y living cultures.

26
 The futures of cultures: an overview

References
A T A L , Y . 1993. Asian Cultures: W h a t Destination? The Futures of Asian
Cultures. Bangkok, U N E S C O Principal Regional Office for Asia and the
Pacific.
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società in transizione: Italiani ed Italo-Canadesi negli anni ottanta. Milan,
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B A R B I E R I - M A S I N I , E . ; D A T O R , J.; R U D G E R S , S. (eds.j. 1991. The Future of
Development. Paris, U N E S C O . (A selection of papers presented at the tenth
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C O N C H E I R O , A . A . 1992. T h e Futures of Culture in Latin America. The
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The Future of Communication and Cultural Identity in an Interdependent World.
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F I L A L I - A N S A R I , A . 1993. Maghreb: modernisation et identités culturelles. (Paper
presented at the International Seminar ' L e Futur de la Culture dans la
Méditerranée occidentale', M a n t u a . )
G A R I T A , L . (ed.). 1986. The Futures of Peace/Los Futuros de la Paz. Proceedings
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G O O N A T I L A K E , S . 1993. Future of Asian Cultures: Between Localization and
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G O U L E T , D . 1991. Culture and Development for the Future. The Futures of
Culture, Vol. I: Meeting of the Working Group on the Futures of Culture
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UNESCO.
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I N A Y A T U L L A H , S. 1993. Frames of Reference, the Breakdown of the Self and
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K O T H A R I , R . 1974. Footsteps into the Future. N e w Delhi, Orient Longman.
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M U S H A K O J I , K . 1992. Multilateralism in a Multicultural World - Notes for a
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M U S H A K O J I , K . 1993. Post-modern Cultural Development in East Asia: Beyond

the Japanese Version of Confucianism. The Futures of Asian Cultures.
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N A N D Y , A . ; D E S H I N G K A R , G . 1993. T h e Futures of Cultures: A n Asian
Perspective. The Futures of Asian Cultures. Bangkok, U N E S C O Principal
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P O L A K , F . 1973. The Image of the Future. Amsterdam, Elsevier Scientific
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Nuova.
Q I N L I N Z H E N G . 1993. Selection and Reconstruction: Cultural Change in Asia.
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S A R D A R , Z . 1979. The Future of Muslim Civilization. London, C r o o m H e l m .
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28
Development and cultural resistance
in Latin America: prospects
Denis Goulet

Introduction
Culture and development for the future
Cultural resistance in Latin America: prospects
Conclusions

Introduction
Will economic and technological progress destroy cultural diversities
which have been a precious heritage since the origins of h u m a n history?
T h e 'meaning systems' of all societies - their philosophies, religions and
ensemble of symbols and myths - have brought to hundreds of millions
of their m e m b e r s a sense of identity, an ultimate explanation of the
significance of life and death, and assigned them a place and a role in
the cosmic order of things. Are these meaning systems d o o m e d to
disappear under the steamroller effects of a single global mass culture
characterized by electronic media, consumer gadgets, occupational
mobility and globally transmitted role models?
O r , conversely, will the explosive release of ancient ethnic, racial and
linguistic passions, due to political liberations n o w proceeding apace
throughout the world, destroy all possibilities of genuine development
founded on universal solidarity? Will w e witness a return of inter-
cultural discrimination and of intolerant local chauvinisms breeding
wars over boundaries?
Such are the questions which thrust themselves u p o n those w h o
ponder the futures of culture and development. H o w d o culture and
development relate to one another? W h a t are the cultural dimensions of
development and the developmental implications of culture?

29
 Denis Goulet

Culture and development for the future

Notwithstanding the hegemony of the economic growth model, a n e w
development paradigm is in gestation. N e w approaches to development
are being tested out in the practice of numerous communities and
movements. Their priority values are the primacy of needs and h u m a n
rights over the accumulation of wealth; participation; ecological sanity;
the building of community; and the equitable distribution of benefits
arising from economic and technological advances.
All cultures and cultural values are assaulted by powerful forces of
standardization. These forces homogenize, dilute and relegate diverse
cultures to purely ornamental, vestigial or marginal positions in society.
T h e first standardizing force is technology, especially media technology.
Television, film, radio, electronic musical devices, computers and tele-
phones operate, together and cumulatively, as potent vectors of such
values as individualism, hedonistic self-gratification, consumerism and
shallow thinking. T h e second standardizing force is the m o d e r n state, a
political institution which is bureaucratic, centralizing, legalistic and
inclined to assert control over ideas, resources and the 'rules of the
g a m e ' in all spheres of h u m a n activity. T h e third standardizing force is
the spread of managerial organization as the best w a y of making
decisions and co-ordinating actions in all institutions. Increasingly,
government leaders must function as managers, as must university
presidents, directors of foundations, airline officials, heads of hospitals
and scientific associations.
T h e result of these standardizing influences is massive cultural
destruction, dilution and assimilation. T h e very pervasiveness of these
damaging forces, however, gives rise to growing manifestations of cul-
tural affirmation and resistance.
In a pessimistic scenario, cultures and authentic cultural values will,
throughout the world, be bastardized or reduced to marginal or
ornamental roles in most national societies and regional or local
communities. In the United States, for example, traditional Indian
p o w w o w s (community meetings for purposes of making political and
economic decisions, worship and ritual dancing) have b e c o m e mere
recreational appendages for the entertainment of visitors to a m u s e m e n t
parks or folklore festivals.
In a n optimistic scenario, humanity advances in global solidarity
and practises ecological and economic concertation as a responsible
steward of the cosmos. N u m e r o u s vital and authentic cultures flourish,
each proud of its identity while actively rejoicing in differences
exhibited by other cultures. H u m a n beings everywhere nurture the

30
 Development and cultural resistance in Latin America: prospects

conscious possession of several partial and overlapping identities, while

relativizing each of these identities in recognition of their primary
allegiance to the h u m a n species. Cultural communities plunge crea-
tively into their roots and find therein n e w ways of being m o d e r n and of
contributing, out of their cultural patrimony, precious values to the
universal h u m a n culture currently in gestation.
Cultural policy actions should aim at making the optimistic scenario
m o r e likely than the pessimistic one. Educational efforts and policy
measures in such spheres as linguistic strategy, the teaching of history
and literature, the promotion of the arts, and rules governing court
procedures, must be identified and adopted with a view to strength-
ening the forces of cultural affirmation while countering the standard-
izing forces described above.
Transcultural contacts and exchanges should proceed according to a
fusion model of interaction. Fusion models of cultural interaction are
opposed to two contrasting extremes: the violent conquest or assimilation
of one culture; and the passive surrender of weaker cultures to stronger
ones. Fusion in cross-cultural encounters (for example, the meeting of
traditional wisdoms with scientific rationality) presupposes mutual
acculturation. T h e key to success is the elimination of all triumphalism
and the acceptance of reciprocity. Partners to cultural exchanges must
c o m e together as equals having a c o m m o n purpose.
Accordingly, both domestically within nations and in international
arenas, pluralistic development strategies are needed. Economic growth
is a legitimate development objective, as are distributional equity, the
institutionalization of h u m a n rights, the pursuit of ecological w i s d o m
and the fostering of authentic cultural diversity. This is w h y , in all
societies, planned policies, programmes and projects must negotiate
s o m e optimal m i x of these diverse (and sometimes conflicting)
development objectives. N o single one of these can be absolutized or
given reductionist authority over the others.
A n e w model of decision-making is required, one which integrates,
by joint negotiation, three distinct rationalities: the technical, the poli-
tical and the ethical.1 Each rationality obeys its o w n proper logic, poses
its o w n goals and adopts a preferred modus operandi. Problems arise
(resulting in flawed decisions) because each tends to reduce the other
two to its preferred vision of ends and procedures.
U N E S C O can publicize, legitimize and assist. T o publicize is to
educate, to disseminate, to render manifest the culturally destructive

1. Denis Goulet, 'Three Rationalities in Development Decision-Making', World

Development, Vol. 14, N o . 2, 1986, pp. 301-17.

31
 Denis Goulet

effects of monolithic development strategies. W h a t is needed is not

denunciation but analysis and illustration. U N E S C O can accomplish this
task by publications, by staging events and by promoting and supporting
(financially, morally, institutionally and logistically) movements dedicated
to cultural vitality, cultural diversity and cultural resistance.
T h e dominant view today holds that only one m o d e of rationality is
legitimate, objective and valid, namely, the rationality based on a
scientific epistemology which reduces truth and objective knowledge to
what is quantifiable and statistically measurable. Legitimizing proceeds
in two ways: one is negative, by destroying the monopoly of legitimacy
currently claimed by reductionist, one-dimensional views of history,
society, evolution and theories of knowledge. T h e other is positive, by
demonstrating h o w divergent m o d e s of rationality are n o less scientific
and valid than science-based cognition.2
Assistance m a y take the form of providing technical aid to cultural
communities struggling for survival and vitality. It m a y also take the form
of persuading governments to adopt cultural policies which actively
promote diversity of language, economic viability of diverse cultural
communities and pluralistic legal systems. U N E S C O m a y likewise help
by staging events such as international gatherings of cultural communities
of struggle, thus providing them with a forum for networking in solidarity
and giving a voice to those w h o have none. T h e larger objective is to con-
duct an ongoing dialogue a m o n g cultures: a dialogue of traditional with
m o d e r n cultures, of dominant m o d e r n cultures based o n science and
technology with other cultures founded o n different conceptions of
rationality.

Cultural resistance in Latin America: prospects

It is preferable to speak of 'living communities of culture' rather than
'cultures'. T h e latter term evokes something abstract, whereas the
former suggests vital societies animated by their values. Living c o m -
munities of culture have three characteristics:
1. A c o m m o n system of signifying and normative values. Signifying
values give meaning to existence in its totality; normative values
supply behavioural rules as to h o w life should be lived.

2. See Denis Goulet, 'In Defense of Cultural Rights: Technology, Tradition and
Conflicting Models of Rationality', Human Rights Quarterly (Baltimore, M d . , Johns
Hopkins University Press), 1981, pp. 1-18.

32
 Development and cultural resistance in Latin America: prospects

2. S o m e shared basis for people to identify themselves as m e m b e r s of

a single group: a c o m m o n territory, history, language, religion, race
or ancestors.
3. T h e will or decision to be primarily self-identified as a m e m b e r of a
given community.
A living community of culture displays economic, social and political
vigour. Clearly, not all communities of culture exhibit this vitality: some
survive within larger societies merely as incidental adornments or as
relics of the past. A n d living communities are not necessarily or always
sovereign political units.
Although it is their community of culture which confers m e m b e r s of
society their primary identification and value allegiance, individuals
m a y also maintain secondary identities and loyalties. Indeed, cultural
communities themselves usually possess several partial overlapping
identities and loyalty systems. In addition to the factors mentioned
above - religion, history, language - other bases for identification also
exist. Individuals m a y identify themselves as belonging to a worldwide
fellowship of scholars, athletes or musicians, for example: this is func-
tional identification. O r one m a y identify oneself on the basis of some
shared interest as a soccer fan, bird-watcher or photographer.
Latin American populations are formed from three basic elements:
native Indian ethnies, an African component and European stock,
mainly Spanish and Portuguese.3 A fourth component comprises
diverse immigrant groups - Japanese, Chinese, Italian, G e r m a n , Swiss
and Korean - which have c o m e to Latin America over the last century
and a half. Over four centuries of miscegenation m e a n that Latin
American communities of culture, even today, lack a clear identity. Their
identity is fluid and fragile, not fully integrated and forever oscillating
between self-definitions as Indian, European or of mixed stock.
Latin America's cultural communities are dualistic in other ways
too. T h e literary dichotomy of Ariel and Caliban captures this duality
well: Latins are both idealistic and materialistic, simultaneously
dreamers and pragmatists. A n d Latin American culture groups are at
once outward- and inward-looking. O n the one hand, they look
outwards and are mimetic: in the nineteenth century they imitated
French philosophy (Comte's positivism) or British social mores; in this
century, the dominant cultural model copied is the United States. At the
same time, however, Latin American cultural communities remain
intensely inward-looking. Throughout the continent endless debates
rage over what it means to be distinctively Bolivian, Guatemalan or

3. Manuel Zapata Olivella, El hombre colombiano, Bogotá, Canal Ramirez-Antares, 1974.

33
 Denis Goulet

Venezuelan. Everywhere one finds an abiding preoccupation with the

internal boundaries of cultural definition.
T h e role played by geography in shaping Latin America's collective
psyche is immense. Its cultures are profoundly marked by vast
distances, large spaces and huge stretches of land, sky and terrain -
mountains, deserts, forests.
A c o m m o n attitude towards politics and governments is likewise
discernible across the varied gamut of Latin American cultures. M o s t
nations gained their independence through revolutionary struggle and,
not surprisingly, people's attitude towards government remains one of
suspicion. T h e y instinctively adopt an adversarial posture towards
governments, even those they have freely elected. Argentina's Jorge Luis
Borges wrote: ' T h e Latin American is a person, not a citizen. T h e state
is impersonal: the Latin only conceives of a personal relationship.'4
History records that cultural communities can preserve their identity
over long periods of time even under conditions of extreme duress, thanks
to 'secondary adaptation'.5 Secondary adaptation occurs w h e n an
oppressed community of culture exhibits subservience in its surface
behaviour, an apparent servility which lulls the dominant cultural group
into complacency and lessened repressive vigilance. At a 'secondary' or
covert level, however, the oppressed group engages in cultural resistance:
in code language it affirms its sense of identity and pride, mounts
educational campaigns against domination, at times even organizes open
revolts. African communities in north-eastern Brazil practised secondary
adaptation behind the cultural 'mask' of such 'innocent' activities as
capoeira and candomblé. Plantation slaves in the United States educated
themselves, organized and resisted behind the 'mask' of folk-tale sessions
and the singing of spirituals. In all pre-modern societies a vital nexus links
signifying to normative values.6 Modernity shatters this nexus and not all
societies can survive the assault.
At present, two large culture groups are emerging in Latin America.
T h efirstis what the political scientist Fred Riggs7 calls prismatic dual
cultures. A prism receives undifferentiated white light and refracts it into
all colours of the spectrum. Similarly, culture groups receive outside

4. Jorge Luis Borges, Otras investigaciones, p. 51, Bueno Aires, E m e c o , 1960. Cited in
Alfredo L . de R o m a n a , ' T h e Autonomous Economy', Interculture (Montreal), Fall
1989, (Issue N o . 105), p. 109.
5. See ' L a persistance des valeurs autochtones', Interculture (Montreal),
January-March 1985.
6. T h e vital nexus is analysed and illustrated in Denis Goulet, ' A n Ethical Model for the
Study of Values', Harvard Educational Review, Vol. 41, N o . 2, M a y 1971, pp. 205-27.
7. Fred W . Riggs, Administration in Developing Countries: The Theory of Prismatic
Society,. Boston, Mass., Houghton Mifflin, 1964.

34
 Development and cultural resistance in Latin America: prospects

influences such as technology, a rationality system or a style of work

through s o m e demonstration effect, proposed political alliance or the
example of visitors. In response, Riggs explains, receiving societies trans-
form the n e w behaviours or institutions so that these take o n different
forms w h e n absorbed into local settings. This is evident in Latin Ameri-
can history: the conquest of Mexico a n d Peru by Spain and its subse-
quent territorial extensions, as well as the forcible seizure by Portugal of
Brazil and the westward expansion by bandeirantes, produced syncretism
on a vast scale. Behind Spanish and Portuguese forms - institutions, laws,
creeds, beliefs and buildings - indigenous beliefs, symbols and practices
persisted. Devout Catholics in Brazil or Haiti m a k e novenas to the Virgin
M a r y ; at the same time they consult a Mae-do-terreiro or a voodoo priest
for blessings, purification and other spiritual ministrations. Artistic
syncretism is manifest in hybrid forms of music, dance and dress. N e w
prismatic cultures are n o w emerging as the proportional mix of European
with African and Indian cultural elements is constantly altered under the
twin stimuli of modernity and demographic mobility.
A second emerging culture is that of m o d e r n capitalist development,
based o n a model of rationality derived from science and technology.
This culture is predominantly urban and looks disparagingly on the
countryside. It attaches great importance to a person's functional iden-
tification as doctor, teacher, factory worker, clerk or manager. M o d e r n
Latin Americans pattern their behaviour o n North American models of
consumption leisure and status attribution. Consumption itself becomes
an important status symbol, signified in the brand of automobile,
electronic equipment or sports gear one o w n s .
Latin America's n e w élites are primarily scientific, technical,
financial and managerial; their value system is cosmopolitan, secular,
pluralistic, relativistic. These n e w élites are the principal shapers of
political life, although not necessarily of cultural life. T o give one
example, progressive liberation theologians in Latin America have
m a d e their m a r k within Christianity at large, but the masses still practise
popular religion, with pilgrimages to sanctuaries and promises to saints.
Moreover, even m o d e r n individuals often retain traditional patterns of
behaviour in their private domestic lives.

C U L T U R A L RESISTANCE

W h e n m o d e r n technology is transferred to societies other than those of

origin, it imposes its logic of uniformity o n the tools and m o d e s of work.
Practices relating to work and leisure are far more constitutive of a culture

35
 Denis Goulet

than such external features as dress, music or artistic wares. A s one former
m e m b e r of the United K i n g d o m Parliament notes: 'Culture, after all, is
about people and patterns of everyday life - not m o n u m e n t s and
souvenirs.'* S o m e uniformities are doubtless inevitable in modernization
processes but, as they m a k e their choices, development planners should
beware of the high price in cultural dilution exacted by standardizing
m o d e r n technology. In order to preserve cultural diversity, planners
should select work-related technologies which protect that diversity. Their
decisions have great bearing not only o n the quality of work and its
meaning in people's lives but also on their patterns of consumption, the
degree of urbanization deemed acceptable in their societies and the scale of
the institutions they will choose. These are the vital arenas where the battle
for cultural survival will be w o n or lost. This is not to suggest that the fine
arts are unimportant, but simply that they are easily relegated to the
periphery of cultural values w h e n technology sets the pace in daily living.
N o w h e r e d o the values vectored by m o d e r n technology so quickly
assert their primacy as in the behaviour of the business and professional
élites. N o t only their language but their dress, ethical codes and stylistic
preferences rapidly b e c o m e modelled o n those of rich-world counter-
parts. Standardization is not always to be regretted. Nevertheless, since
these élites constitute 'significant others', imitated by the masses in their
aspirations, one is less than sanguine about the long-term viability of a
plurality of rich cultures. O n the streets of L a Paz one still sees peasant
w o m e n in traditional garb alongside bankers wearing pin-striped suits.
Although such residual and picturesque signs of cultural diversity m a y
coexist, a deeper question remains. W h o s e values dominate in the
planning of school curricula or television programmes? Will the
Bolivian peasant w o m a n ' s children be m o r e powerfully influenced by
the banker's n e w values than his children will be by the old Q u e c h u a
values that both their grandparents shared?
Technology transfers impose a high price in cultural destruction.
This price can be minimized by deliberate policy measures only if the
danger of cultural homogenization inherent in technology transfers is
recognized. Moreover, resistant cultures are often the victims of
generalized psychological, behavioural and linguistic discrimination,
and at times even of physical marginalization as they are relegated to the
boundaries of s o m e territory.9

8. George Young, 'Tourism: Blessing or Blight?', Development Digest, Vol. 13, N o . 1,

January 1975, p. 49.
9. For an analysis of marginalization, see Denis Goulet and Marco Walshok, 'Values
a m o n g Underdeveloped Marginals: T h e Case of Spanish Gypsies', Comparative
Studies in Society and History, Vol. 13, 1971, pp. 451-72.

36
 Development and cultural resistance in Latin America: prospects

Three conditions must be met if cultural resistance is to succeed.

First, if they are to defend their authentic identity, threatened
communities must become plural cultures. T h e y need to revitalize their
o w n m o d e s of living, their economic and legal systems, their language
and traditions. Old traditions are ratified by each n e w generation only if
they prove functional for this generation. Those traditions are cons-
tantly being altered because, at any given time, traditional societies
contain in their midst a n u m b e r of deviant m e m b e r s w h o challenge the
basic values of their societies. H o w living communities c o m e to terms
with deviants is an important cultural datum. T h e most basic sense in
which a cultural group under attack must b e c o m e pluralistic, however,
is that it must in s o m e way b e c o m e m o d e r n , at least to the extent of
coming to understand modernity's values, institutions, m o d e s of
knowing and definitions of problems. Pre-modern cultures cannot resist
m o d e r n technology and its underlying rationality unless they critically
understand that technology and that rationality, and unless they harness
s o m e of technology's preferred instruments to turn them against their
originators, to 'fight culturalfirewithfire'.Cultures at risk must learn
h o w to use the m o d e r n media and legal systems, as well as the political
power and the economic mechanisms by which wealth is circulated in
m o d e r n societies. At least in this limited sense, every culture must
b e c o m e a plural culture.
T h e second condition of successful resistance is that a community
of culture must possess a minimal economic base which gives it s o m e
measure of control over the speed and direction at which it will develop
its resources.10 N o cultural community that lacks m i n i m u m economic
security can gain mastery over its destiny: it will be thrust into the role
of an eternal supplicant of resources, to be tolerated only on the wider
society's terms.
A third requirement of cultural resistance is that communities in
jeopardy must play some political role. A n active political role m a y be
necessary to defend the community's right to settle disputes a m o n g its
m e m b e r s according to its o w n legal procedures, to protect itself against
discrimination in society at large or to conduct schooling in its o w n
language. A community m a y also need to wage political combat in
order to define its status vis-à-vis the state. Even if communities of
culture d o not engage in overt political activity, they m a y need to
conduct public education campaigns in order to gain psychological
respect from the institutions of society, from mainstream cultural
groups and from citizens at large.

10. See 'L'Économicide', Interculture (Montreal), N o . 98, Winter^fanuary 1988.

37
 Denis Goulet

DIFFERENTIATION OF C U L T U R E S

M a n y culture groups which, in the past, have not actively projected

their identity n o w seek to reverse the earlier assimilation. In the past,
economic or political necessity forced m a n y groups to accept a level of
cultural assimilation to larger societies which they n o w contest. Only by
reasserting their differentiated cultural identity can Quechua Indians in
Bolivia, M a p u c h e s in Chile and Brazilians of African origin press
collective claims u p o n society.
A s modernization penetrates all aspects of life (school, family, work,
recreation) ever more deeply, cultural communities seek a differentiated
identity for still another reason: in order to be differentiated from the
passe-partout culture of modernity that is founded o n homogenized
technology and consumption. Consumerist images are necessarily
mimetic and, therefore, standardized. Thirty years ago young people
everywhere, if they wished to be modern, listened to the Beatles; they n o w
listen to Michael Jackson and M a d o n n a . M o d e r n technology imposes
itself in uniform fashion, and a highly standardized managerial ethos is
gaining sway worldwide. Indeed, technology itself is rapidly displacing
other cultures and imposing itself as a culture in its o w n right. ' '
Alongside growing differentiation, an emerging global culture is in
gestation. D u e to the internationalization of production, and the collapse
of national barriers under the assault of freely circulating goods, images,
information, m o n e y and people, n o physical locale can any longer serve
as the exclusive h o m e ground of a single culture. T h e impulses of
acculturation flow everywhere, rapidly and pervasively. People every-
where are coming to view themselves as m e m b e r s of the wider h u m a n
family. M a y a n farmers in Guatemala, rubber tappers in Rondônia
(Brazil) and Argentine cattle-ranchers all sense that they belong to a
larger h u m a n community. It becomes increasingly difficult for any of us
to define ourselves solely as citizens of a particular nation, adepts of a
particular religion, m e m b e r s of a particular linguistic or racial group.
M e d i a technology, penetrating deeply into the inner recesses of our
consciousness, makes us aware that the destinies of other h u m a n beings
o n our planet relate to our o w n lot. A global culture is in gestation.

11. O n technology as a displacer of cultures, see Denis Goulet, The Uncertain Promise,
pp. 243-51, N e w York, N e w Horizons Press, 1989.

38
 Development and cultural resistance in Latin America: prospects

PROSPECTS

G r o u p s whose rationale of existence centres on n o m a d i s m m a y find it

impossible to survive, as lands become m o r e densely populated and as
pressures u p o n shrinking natural resources grow at a geometric rate.
Perhaps the best that can be achieved is that such cultural communities
'buy time' to m a k e gradual adjustments to n e w forms of existence they
m a y adopt in the future.
Small dispersed populations m a y alsofindit impossible to survive as
coherent vital cultures. A m i n i m u m n u m b e r of people is required if a
culture is to maintain itself and its institutions at a bottom threshold of
genetic and social vitality. Other cultural communities, however, m a y
successfully develop dual identities, value allegiances, institutions and
behaviours in ways which protect their fundamental values and identity.
O n what terms will they survive, however? Will it be as economically
viable and culturally integral units living in isolation, or o n the margins
of national societies to which they are politically attached? Will they
carve a niche in the dominant societies that envelop them to live therein
as vital small enclaves, as Mennonites have done in Paraguay and
Miskitos in Nicaragua? O r will they avoid ethical and behavioural
assimilation but none the less function with ease in the midst of an alien
wider cultural milieu, thus exhibiting the prismatic effect whereby
modernity is refracted behaviourally in terms of culturally specific social
organization and living patterns?
In broad, worldwide terms, the prospects for cultural diversity
bifurcate in two opposite directions. In a pessimistic scenario, cultures
and authentic cultural values throughout the world are diluted and
'bastardized', or reduced to marginal or ornamental roles in most national
societies and regional or local communities. In an optimistic scenario,
humanity advances in global solidarity and practises environmental and
economic conservation as the responsible steward of the cosmos. Vital
and authentic cultures abound, each proud of its identity while actively
rejoicing in the differences exhibited by other cultures. H u m a n beings
everywhere nurture a sense of possessing several partial and overlapping
cultural identities, while relativizing each of these in recognition of their
primary allegiance to the h u m a n species. Cultural communities plunge
creatively into their roots and find therein n e w ways of being modern and
of contributing, out of their cultural patrimony, precious values to the
universal h u m a n culture n o w in gestation.
It is possible that s o m e Latin American cultural communities m a y
survive in ways which e m b o d y neither the optimistic nor the pessimistic
scenario. Such cultural groups m a y reject development, consumerism

39
 Denis Goulet

and m o d e r n technology altogether and find ways of subsisting, perhaps

at a modest level of well-being, while preserving distinctive religious,
ethnic, linguistic a n d artistic patterns of life. Perhaps the entire
development enterprise itself and the trappings of modernity attaching
to it (specialized institutions, large-scale activities, urban settlement
patterns, an exploitative approach to resources) will prove unsustain-
able in the long term. In this scenario, groups which can survive with
s o m e measure of cultural vitality are communities devoted to pre-
m o d e r n agriculture in the m o d e of tribal, ethnic or extended family
solidarity. T h e normative value system of such communities could
successfully place limits on their m e m b e r s ' desire for goods and
services. These societies might even generate a modest surplus of
wealth to be used for artistic achievements in music, painting, sculp-
ture, architecture, dance, recreation or sport. Moreover, present-day
nation-states in Latin America might conceivably split u p into a larger
n u m b e r of decentralized national entities or subnational bio-regions,
each enjoying a considerable degree of autarchy.
Given the forces at work to destroy and dilute cultures, the
pessimistic scenario appears the m o r e likely. But history is always full of
surprises. Furthermore, the cultural policies formulated today should
aim to create the conditions and incentives that m a k e the optimistic
scenario m o r e likely and feasible tomorrow.

Conclusions
T h e forces operating to dilute, assimilate and destroy cultural
communities are so great that the future of m a n y such communities is
uncertain. Authentic cultural diversity, expressing with integrity and
vitality diverse m o d e s of being and of social organization, is d o o m e d
unless the positive value of such diversity is recognized. Development
planners at every level must incorporate the active defence of cultural
diversity into their decisions about resource use. S u c h active defence
must not be treated as a mere external factor in the cost-benefit
equation.
Several years ago I interviewed an Indian cacique in eastern
Paraguay. T h e forest inhabited by his tribe had been obliterated to
construct the Icaray D a m . T h e chief lamented the destruction of his
people's sylvan habitat and the dispersal of his remaining subjects into
cities where their identity and values would quickly be lost. H e grieved
most bitterly, however, because the young m e n of his tribe would n o
longer perform the sacred dance in the forest. I asked w h y the sacred

40
 Development and cultural resistance in Latin America: prospects

dance was so important. 'Because it is what holds the cosmos together,'

he replied. Unless w e preserve diverse, economically vital, politically
vigorous and socially autonomous living communities of culture, w e
cannot keep the cosmos together or assure the planet's survival.12

12. Denis Goulet, 'Biological Diversity and Ethical Development,' Ciencia e Trópico
(Recife, Brazil), Vol. 20, N o . 1, January 1992.

41
Cultural struggles and
development in Latin America
Rodolfo Stavenhagerí

'•? UNESCO I,
-" ... — m í S» '

T h e region as a cultural area

M
•3\ L Ü ¿ D I JS-I
Cultural conflicts and history
,\
National culture versus Indian cultures •V¿?;£< /
• ^

Ethnodevelopment and alternative cultural policies

T h e region as a cultural area

T o outside observers several facts s e e m to characterize the Latin
A m e r i c a n region as a cultural area: its basic cultural unity, its identity as
part of so-called Western civilization and its early incorporation into the
process of economic development a n d social and political m o d e r n -
ization (when c o m p a r e d to other countries of the Third W o r l d ) . A s
regards its basic unity, scholars point to the fact that in m o s t countries
Spanish is the official language and, except for Brazil, other national
languages of colonial origin are only sparsely represented in the area
( G u y a n a , Haiti, Suriname, Belize a n d the small island states of the
Caribbean). M o r e o v e r , in m o s t countries R o m a n Catholicism is the
dominant religion and the role of the Catholic C h u r c h has been
historically important, though in recent years Protestantism has m a d e
significant inroads in the region.
Precisely because of these factors, linked to a 300-year European
colonial presence, the Latin American élites and ruling classes have
strongly identified with Western civilization since the emergence of the
area's independent republics in the nineteenth century. B y so doing,
these élites c o m m o n l y ignored and frequently denied the cultural
contributions of the indigenous American peoples as well as those w h o

Research Professor at El Colegio de México. Some of the issues dealt with in this
paper have been developed by the author elsewhere, particularly in The Ethnic
Question: Conflicts, Development and Human Rights, Tokyo, United Nations
University Press, 1990.

43
 Rodolfo Stavenhagen

were brought in slavery and servitude, mainly from Africa (numerous

indentured servants were also imported from India to the Caribbean).
In contrast to the later processes of colonial implantation and
decolonization in Africa and Asia, the Latin American experience has
several unique features which deserve mention. In thefirstplace, the
colonial economy took shape during the early stages of world m e r -
cantilist and capitalist expansion, thus allowing for the evolution of local
structures of production and capital accumulation. While these did
indeed set the stage for the dependency relationships which c a m e to
characterize the region as a whole, they also allowed for the early de-
velopment of endogenous structures of social domination and control
within the emerging international division of labour. T h e relative
economic unity of the region during the colonial period turned into
disunity and fragmentation after political independence from Spain in
the early nineteenth century.
Second, while the history of the relations between the European
colonists and the indigenous peoples has been varied and complex, in
general a dominant 'settler' society was superimposed o n the native
populations, thus creating a n e w kind of syncretic culture which resul-
ted in the mixed or mestizo societies that have received the attention of
so m a n y of the region's scholars and politicians.
Moreover, numerous ethnic and racial strands have contributed to
the composition of the area's population. In the Caribbean during the
sixteenth century, and in the interior of South America u p to the early
twentieth century, indigenous peoples were the victims of genocide.
M a n y were massacred and exterminated - an often neglected chapter of
the region's history. T h e remaining indigenous peoples, particularly in
the Andean and Mesoamerican highlands, were conquered and inte-
grated into the colonial system. After the extermination of the indi-
genous populations of the Caribbean, African slaves were brought to
work the sugar plantations of the islands and the adjacent areas (the
north-eastern coast of South America, principally). During the nine-
teenth and early twentieth centuries, after the abolition of the African
slave trade, East Indian indentured plantation workers were brought to
the British colonies in the Caribbean region. T h e Iberian colonizers and
settlers represented an unending population stream during three
centuries of colonial rule. Again, in the nineteenth and twentieth
centuries, European immigrants from southern and central Europe
settled in numerous Latin American countries, particularly in the
Southern C o n e . M o r e recently, immigrants from Asia (China and
Japan) have added their contribution to the ethnic m a k e - u p of the
region. In fact, Latin America has a long and chequered history of

44
 Cultural struggles and development in Latin America

immigration, which has resulted in a heterogeneous, multi-ethnic, cul-

turally diversified population.
Another distinguishing feature of the Latin American social struc-
ture has been the relatively rigid and hierarchical stratification system
based originally on rural landowning patterns (large estates and
plantations, subordinate peasant labour). This in turn became asso-
ciated with a vertically ordered political structure, characterized by
caciquismo and caudillismo (personal charismatic leadership and power-
wielding by élite strongmen) and the prevalence in all spheres of life of
a patron-client relationship, which has been a perennial obstacle to the
emergence of democratic political institutions. T h e rise of mass politics
in the twentieth century and its frequent expression through populist
parties and regimes, alternating in power with repressive military dicta-
torships, has only strengthened this hierarchical system.
U r b a n and industrial modernization c a m e relatively late to Latin
America, if compared with the countries of the North. T h e rural roots
of contemporary Latin America can still be seen in the cultural ethos of
the region, even if most countries are n o w classified as predominantly
urban (but only in the last few decades). T h e conflict between urban
and rural has appeared time and again throughout the region's history
and is often expressed in the literature. A s a result of massive internal
migrations and the rapid urbanization of recent decades (particularly
since the 1950s), s o m e observers have noted the 'ruralization' or
'peasantization' of Latin America's cities, by which they m e a n that the
life-styles, aspirations and concerns of millions of people undergoing
rapid social change are still linked to the ways of life of the traditional
rural environment.
T h e year 1992 w a s proclaimed thefifthcentennial of the 'Disco-
very of America' and numerous governments joined together to carry
out official celebrations of this event which undoubtedly changed the
course of history. But whereas s o m e would celebrate the expansion of
Western civilization, the 'conversion of the heathen', thefirstm o d e r n
steps towards the integration of a true world economy, others believe
that there was little to celebrate and m o r e on which to meditate. T h e
Black populations of the Americas r e m e m b e r over three centuries of
slavery and the slave trade, giving rise to the racism and racial
discrimination whose victims they continue to be to this day. T h e
indigenous peoples are a reminder to the world that the 'Discovery'
and subsequent conquest and colonization of the Americas marked the
beginning of their genocide and ethnocide, and indigenous
organizations around the world decided instead to c o m m e m o r a t e 5 0 0
years of resistance to exploitation and oppression. It is significant that

45
 Rodolfo Stavenhagen

half a millennium after the European invasion of the Americas, the

ideological battle over the true meaning of this 'Encounter of T w o
Worlds' is still being fought.2

Cultural conflicts and history

Today's cultural conflicts in Latin America and the Caribbean can
hardly be understood without reference to the history of the European
colonial empires in the area. T h e conquest of the Aztec, M a y a and Inca
peoples, as well as other less-well-known cultures, by the Spaniards at
the beginning of the sixteenth century marked the beginning of the
hegemony of the Spanish empire in the Western world during more
than a century and a half; at the same time it presaged its future and
inevitable demise. Spain was thefirststate in modern times to organize
and administer a vast colonial system over three centuries which
functioned at three levels: economic, political and cultural. T h o u g h
Spain was later displaced by the Netherlands, France and England as a
world power, the Spanish 'seaborne empire' definitely marked the
historical evolution of America and the world.3
F r o m the beginning of the colonial system, humanist voices were
raised against the 'destruction of the Indies' (Bartolomé de las Casas)
and in favour of the rights of the Indians to defend themselves and to
exist as sovereign nations, but these voices were silenced or ignored for
reasons of state. Spanish philosophers and theologians (Francisco de
Vitoria, Ginés Sepúlveda) held lengthy debates about the nature of the
' N e w World' and its natives, about the moral and religious justification
of the conquest and the subordination of the Indians to the will of the
crown. Later they developed theories about the moral underpinnings of
the state and the characteristics of governance. In this the Spanish
philosophers distinguished themselves from the political philosophers
in England w h o were more concerned with the social contract and the
civil liberties of individuals. These two contrasting approaches to poli-
tical philosophy still condition current debates in Latin America. 4
T h e economic and social polarization of the colonial system also
fashioned a cultural dichotomy. O n the one hand there was the culture
of the Spaniards and the dominant criollos ('creóles': the word refers not

2. See, for example, Miguel Molina Martínez, La leyenda negra, Madrid, Nerea, 1991.
Martinez examines the 'Black Legend' which, ever since the sixteenth century, is
said to have disparaged Spain's civilizing effort in the N e w World.
3. J. H . Parry, TTie Spanish Seaborne Empire, N e w York, Knopf, 1966.
4 . See Richard Morse, El espejo de Próspero, Mexico City, Siglo X X I , 1982.

46
 Cultural struggles and development in Latin America

to the mixture of Whites and Blacks as in the Caribbean but to the local
descendants of the early Spanish settlers w h o acquired a different
identity from that of the inhabitants of the metropolis). O n the other
hand there developed the various popular cultures of the subordinate
ethnic groups (natives, blacks, mestizos and the various mixed 'castes'
that resulted from intermarriage and miscegenation). T h e conversion
to Christianity of the Indians modified their religious life profoundly;
the indigenous popular and folk faiths became a syncretism of Iberian
Catholicism, pre-Hispanic religions and African cults. It has been noted
that the indigenous peoples adopted the formal and superficial aspects
of colonial Catholicism for obvious reasons of self-defence and survival
(the Inquisition weighed heavily o n daily lives), but basically maintained
their native beliefs and practices. This syncretism can be seen in cere-
monies, rituals, beliefs and liturgy, as well as in the wealth of folk
legends and myths. M a n y ancient practices of the Indians were forbid-
den and persecuted by the ecclesiastical authorities, but they were
practised in secret, became modified and adapted to n e w circumstances
even into m o d e r n times. Something similar occurred a m o n g the Afri-
can religions which the slaves brought to Brazil and which to this day
are practised with great vitality, providing the country's popular cul-
tures with their o w n specific identities (candomblé, macumba and so on).
Needless to say, popular Catholicism and voodoo have combined to
give Haiti a particular character as well.
Colonial domination also had an impact on the organization of
territory and space. In Cuzco, Quito and Mexico the conquerors built
their capitals o n the ruins of the ancient indigenous urban centres, a
politically astute m o v e inasmuch as the city controlled the territory. In
other areas, the European settlers founded towns and cities, forced the
dispersed population to concentrate there and dominated the sur-
rounding countryside from these n e w urban centres in which the
governor's palace, the military barracks and the church surrounding the
central square invariably became the material expression of the power
structure. These were centres of administration and government, m a r -
kets and trade, sites of schools or universities, tribunals and bishoprics.
Here civil and religious power, the market and the military, the public
and private spheres joined in magnificent union. Since those times, the
city has dominated the countryside in Latin America, even though u p to
recently the agrarian society and its social structures had profoundly
marked the rest of society. Given the pre-eminence of urban life in the
political and economic domination of Latin America, some authors have
underlined the existence of two cultures, the urban and the rural, which
have competed for hegemony in Latin America u p to the present day.

47
 Rodolfo Stavenhagen

At the beginning of the colonial period, Christian missionaries studied

the indigenous languages and used them for the purpose of
evangelization. Primers, missals and dictionaries of the principal native
languages were prepared and printed. These languages were taught in the
special schools created for the sons of the eminent native families (the
Spaniards wanted to create an indigenous aristocracy at their o w n
service). In Paraguay, Guaraní even became in time the national vehicular
language. But in 1770 Emperor Charles III of Spain decreed that
henceforth the use of Indian languages in civilian and religious affairs was
to be banned: the native tongues were reduced to the sphere of daily life
in the indigenous family and community. T h u s the polarization of culture
into two well-defined social strata was consolidated: the dominators and
the dominated.
Ever since the early sixteenth century America has been identified in
the European mind as the site of real and possible Utopias. In western
Mexico (Michoacán), the friar Vasco de Quiroga wanted to create an
ideal society inspired by T h o m a s More's Utopia. Later, the Jesuits
established their theocratic communities in Paraguay, only to be
expelled from America towards the end of the eighteenth century. T h e
contradictions between the Christian preachings of the friars and the
bleak social and economic reality of everyday life for the colonized
indigenous populations increased over time. In m a n y parts of the con-
tinent the indigenous resistance to colonization never ceased or did so
only quite late. After the demographic disaster of the sixteenth century,
the indigenous population increased again slowly. U p to very recently,
in most A n d e a n and Mesoamerican countries the indigenous p o p u -
lation was always the oppressed numerical majority, albeit a political
and sociological 'minority'. T h e collective m e m o r y of their lost liberty
and sovereignty was kept alive a m o n g the indigenous peoples by their
oral traditions and clandestine religious cults, as well as the images of
ruined cities of ancient splendour. Linked as they were to the injustices,
the oppression and the exploitation of colonialism, these remembrances
gave rise to numerous millenarian and messianic social and political
movements which at times were capable of mobilizing tens of thousands
of partisans and adherents. T h e y were, however, invariably and cruelly
crushed by the colonial governments.
Towards the end of the eighteenth century, European ideas of the
Enlightenment as well as the democratic principles of the American
Revolution penetrated Latin America's élites. T h e latter's political cons-
ciousness w a s awakened through the influence of the French Revo-
lution, the Napoleonic invasion of Spain and the political upheaval in
that country at the turn of the nineteenth century. A s has frequently

48
 Cultural struggles and development in Latin America

happened in history, the masses rose in arms at the call of the leaders of
the independence movements (Bolivar, Hidalgo and others) but they
did not reap m a n y benefits from the demise of the Spanish empire. T h e
local ruling classes, particularly the landowners, were able to transform
political independence into a victory over the popular classes. Political
independence was appropriated by the old and n e w ruling classes of the
landowning oligarchy and the nascent urban bourgeoisie. T h e place of
the Spaniards w h o were expelled or emigrated was soon taken over by
merchants and traders from France, England and the United States
w h o , along with their wares and capital, also brought their European
cultural models.
Political independence posed an enormous challenge to the n e w
rulers: h o w to forge new nations, h o w to be accepted by the 'civilized
nations' of the world, h o w to govern heterogeneous and dispersed popu-
lations in a vast and hostile geography. T h e answer was the development
of a nationalist ideology, one that was not exempt from idealism and
romanticism, and that was to characterize political philosophy and the
education systems in Latin America well into the twentieth century.
Latin America's intellectuals took it upon themselves in the
nineteenth century to build their national cultures or rather, as might be
said today, to invent them out of the ruins of the Spanish empire and
out of the multitude of regional and fragmented micro-societies which
m a d e u p the n e w republics but which could hardly be considered as
finished and coherent nations. T h e liberals and positivists were inspired
by the United States and northern Europe; the conservatives looked for
their model in traditional Spain and France. Both currents, however,
had in c o m m o n that they spoke for the interests of the minority ruling
classes and that they shared an elitist, limited vision of society. T h e
ethnic and cultural heterogeneity of the Latin American nations was
considered to be an obstacle to national integration and progress.
T h e disintegration of the colonial economy and administration
contributed to the fragmentation and atomization of social and eco-
nomic space. T h e area's reintegration into the world market was only to
c o m e years later, towards the end of the nineteenth century, with the
expansion of capitalism. National society continued to be highly stra-
tified, both economically and socially, despite the adoption of institutions
that were formally democratic. T h e landed oligarchy based its power o n
the concentration of làndownership and this only increased with the
introduction of n e w export crops and the attendant exploitation of rural
labour. Caudillismo, caciquismo and patron-client relationships became
the dominant forms of political domination and social control and are
n o w a permanent element of the political culture in Latin America.

49
 Rodolfo Stavenhagen

T h e intellectual élites despaired of the contradictions between the

'formal' country (republican, democratic, institutional, legalistic) and
the 'real' country (backward, violent, hierarchical, traditional). T h e y
soon adopted racially and geographically deterministic ideologies,
borrowed from Europe and the United States, in an attempt to explain
the perennial instability and backwardness of their nations. T h e y n o
longer blamed solely the colonial heritage of Spain, but also the hostile
geographic environment with its mountains, jungles and deserts and,
above all, the ethnic characteristics of the Indian stratum of the p o p u -
lation, which w a s still the majority in m a n y of the republics at the
beginning of the twentieth century. Liberals and conservatives agreed
that the indigenous peoples and cultures which still existed in Latin
America had to disappear.
T h e national project generated by these ideologues and early 'nation-
builders' excluded the indigenous peoples. In the Southern C o n e
countries, this vision turned into genocidal military campaigns against
the Indians, in the service of the landowners and the European settlers
and reminiscent of the American Frontier. In other regions, the official
language and culture were imposed o n the Indian peasantry through the
religious and state-sponsored education systems. National law became
the only recognized legal system; the traditional political and legal
authorities and institutions of the indigenous communities, as well as
their communally held lands, were disregarded and taken over by the
state or turned over to private landed interests. B y accelerating a rapid
process of assimilation and incorporation of indigenous peoples into the
n e w nations being formed, the cultural destruction of the Indians w a s
hastened. This was carried out in the n a m e of progress and civilization.
Today w e call this process ethnocide (see page 5 4 below). In the n e w
national culture invented and fostered by the urban élites there was n o
place for the cultures of the native, aboriginal peoples of America.
In order to hasten the process of nation-building as imagined by the
criollo governing élites, numerous countries promoted immigration from
Europe. This policy coincided with the expansion of the agricultural
frontier and the introduction of n e w export crops such as coffee and
cotton which were labour-intensive. Foreign immigration w a s also
expected to 'Westernize' and 'Whiten' the local populations. T h e racist
theories which had become popular in Europe during the second half of
the nineteenth century provided ideological justification for such policies
in Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, Venezuela, Costa Rica, Mexico and other
countries. (A slightly different pattern emerged in the British Caribbean
countries, including Guyana, where East Indian plantation labour w a s
introduced in the nineteenth century.) T h e racist ideology has by n o

50
 Cultural struggles and development in Latin America

m e a n s disappeared from the élite culture in Latin America, but for

obvious reasons of recent history it has been largely discredited.
T h e major ethnic fact of the twentieth century, in the countries
where the Indians had not been completely exterminated, was the rapid
growth of the mestizo (i.e. the biologically mixed) population. T h e
'pure' Whites (if there ever was such a category, and of course the
concept of a White race itself corresponds to no k n o w n scientifically
established fact) were rapidly diminishing in numbers, as w a s their
relative proportion in the total population of the 'pure' Indians. T h e
mestizo population also occupied the middle rungs of the social and
economic stratification system and has been increasingly identified in
recent years with the growing Latin American 'middle classes'. It did
not take long for the intellectuals to discover formerly u n k n o w n virtues
in the mestizos. Soon, they were considered to have incorporated the
best features of the two original races (the White and the Indian) which
had intervened in their make-up. T h e y became the bearers of the n e w
concept of nationality which evolved together with the strengthening of
the nation-state. T h e rise of the mestizo, n o w extolled in literature,
social science and political discourse, coincided with the growing
political presence of middle-class parties and social movements which,
by the middle of the twentieth century, had practically displaced the
m o r e traditional oligarchic parties from the centre of the stage. José
Vasconcelos, a Mexican philosopher a n d educator of the twentieth
century called the mestizos a 'cosmic race' and augured a major role for
Latin America in world history.5
'Mestizo-America' was a concept that anthropologists liked to use in
order to distinguish those countries with large Indian populations from
the mainly Southern C o n e countries from which the Indians had
practically disappeared. T h e term mestizo nowadays refers not only to
the process of racial mixture, but rather to the process of cultural
syncretism or acculturation, whereby the two great cultural traditions
which clashed in the sixteenth century have become meshed in a single
emerging global culture, which in each one of the countries concerned
is n o w considered to be the 'national' culture - at least so goes the argu-
m e n t wielded by those w h o see in the figure of the mestizo the kernel of
nationalism and national unity.
Indigenous peoples are no longer considered to be racially inferior to
Whites and mestizos, but Indian cultures are thought to be backward,
traditional and not conducive to progress and modernity. Furthermore,

5. José Vasconcelos, La raza cósmica, misión de la raza iberoamericana, Paris, Agencia

Mundial de Librería, 1925.

51
 Rodolfo Stavenhagen

the existence of a diversity of Indian cultures, distinct from the

dominant, Western, urban culture of the wielders of political and eco-
nomic power, has been seen as undermining efforts towards national
unity and development. T h u s the 'solution' found by governments and
social scientists in the twentieth century has been to further what has
variously been called acculturation, assimilation, incorporation or inte-
gration. For this purpose, governments have set u p specialized insti-
tutions and have followed specific policies in the educational, cultural,
economic and socialfieldsdesigned to 'integrate' the Indian populations
into the so-called national mainstream.

National culture versus Indian cultures

In m o d e r n Latin America, the concept of 'national culture' w a s
predicated u p o n the idea that Indian cultures d o not exist. W h e n , as in
most countries, their existence could not simply be wished away, it w a s
stated that they have nothing or little to d o with national culture, at any
rate, very little to contribute to it (their greatness, if any, lies in the histo-
rical past). Indigenous cultures, if they were recognized at all, were con-
sidered only as diminished remnants of their former splendour and were
thought to be naturally disappearing; therefore, the best that an enlight-
ened government could do w a s to hasten their demise. In this fashion, so
the argument went, not only were national culture and unity strengthened
but the indigenous peoples themselves would benefit greatly in terms of
material and spiritual development, modernization and progress.
Modernization, national integration and development b e c a m e the
political catchwords of the twentieth century and states fashioned
different kinds of policies accordingly: investment, infrastructure,
industrialization, urbanization, education. In s o m e instances, national
revolutionary or populist regimes attempted to transform the traditional
hierarchical social structures of inequality and injustice through re-
formist measures such as land redistribution, or to strengthen the
domestic market through import-substitution policies. In most cases,
however, economic development strategies have reinforced inequalities
(albeit in a modernized form) and accentuated regional and social
disparities. In the heyday of 'economic development', during the two or
three decades after the Second World W a r , it w a s held that economic
growth policies would contribute to closing the gap between the ' m o -
dern' and the 'traditional' sectors; the 'dual society' would tend to
disappear and the 'backward' regions and populations would catch u p
with the m o d e r n , urban centres. While things have changed consi-

52
 Cultural struggles and development in Latin America

derably in both the modern and the traditional sectors over the last two
or three decades, in fact a n e w kind of polarization has developed.
Economic development policies which have benefited the n e w urban
and rural upper classes, the n e w bourgeoisies, the n e w and fast-growing
middle sectors, have hardly brought solace to millions of poor peasants
and urban shanty-town dwellers.
During the years of crisis (the 1970s and 1980s) the rich grew
richer and the poor grew poorer in Latin America. This is shown not
only in income-distribution figures but also in terms of standards of
living and quality of life (housing, health, education, nutrition, employ-
ment and other indicators), which have worsened in relative and
sometimes even in absolute terms in most countries.6 Economists have
pointed to the fact that the 1980s were a lost decade for the region; per
capita incomes dropped to the same level as in the early 1970s.7 A n d
these average figures mask growing internal disparities. Millions of
internal migrants have become marginal shanty-town dwellers with no
hope for improvement within their lifetime. T h e rural-to-urban process
of migration, which used to be hailed as a signal of progress, has
become a m o v e from rural hovel to urban shanty-town.
Hardest hit and most vulnerable in this process have been the
indigenous peoples. Whereas in some countries Indians represent
relatively small and regionally isolated minorities, in others they make
up fully half if not more of the population (Guatemala, Bolivia, Peru,
Ecuador and parts of Mexico and Colombia). Here, the Indians are
'sociological' but not numerical minorities. In all of Latin America,
there are over 4 0 0 different Indian ethnic groups, each with its o w n
language and distinctive culture and way of life. T h e y range from small
bands of isolated jungle-dwellers, whose physical survival is constantly
threatened by the advancing frontier of the national society, to the
several-million-strong Indian peasant societies of the Andean
highlands. While estimates vary and census returns are unreliable, a safe
estimate is that Indian populations today might well represent around
40 million people on the subcontinent (about 10 per cent of the total
population of Latin America), and their numbers are growing.
In recent decades, after centuries of exploitation and margi-
nalization, not only have m a n y indigenous peoples become the eco-
nomic victims of all sorts of development schemes, but they have been
physically destroyed as viable groups. Quite frequently their collective

6. See the Annual Reports on the Economic Situation in Latin America, published by the
Economic Commission for Latin America.
7. Gert Rosenthal, 'Balance preliminar de la economía latinoamericana en 1989',
Comercio Exterior, Vol. 40, N o . 2, 1990.

53
 Rodolfo Stavenhagen

disappearance as identifiable communities is not simply a regrettable

by-product of development, but actually the stated or implicit policy
objective of the development planners. In contrast to the weaker social
classes (peasants, artisans, workers in traditional manufactures, small
traders, specialists in obsolete services, or simply m e m b e r s of c o m -
munities in depressed areas) w h o suffer the backlash or the unintended
consequences of development, indigenous groups are in m a n y cases the
victims of a deliberate strategy of destruction by the state or a country's
dominant élites: this is c o m m o n l y referred to as ethnocide or cultural
genocide.
Ethnocide entails two principal aspects: one is economic and the
other is cultural. Economic ethnocide is embedded in the theory and
practice of development. It means that all pre-modern forms of eco-
nomic organization must necessarily disappear to m a k e w a y for either
private or multinational capitalism or state-planned socialism or mixes
thereof. Cultural ethnocide means that all subnational ethnic units must
disappear to m a k e way for the overarching nation-state, the behemoth
of our times. Development and nation-building have b e c o m e the major
economic and political ideologies of the last quarter century or m o r e .
Both of them, as traditionally expounded by statesmen and academics
alike, have been ethnocidal in that they imply the destruction and/or
disappearance of non-integrated, separate ethnic units. This is fre-
quently carried out in the n a m e of national unity and integration, pro-
gress and, of course, development.
Governments generally tend to deny that they commit ethnocide.
T h e concept, after all, has rather distasteful implications. T h e y usually
affirm that their policies are intended to improve the situation of a par-
ticular distinct ethnic group, that their aim is simply to grant backward/
traditional/marginal/primitive groups (the terms used m a y vary from
region to region) the same rights and opportunities as everyone else.
Sometimes, however, state policies are clear: indigenous groups must
assimilate or integrate for the good of the country, and of course for
their o w n good.
Ethnocide m a y be defined briefly as the process whereby a culturally
distinct people (usually termed an ethnie or an ethnic group) loses its
identity due to policies designed to erode its land and resource base, the
use of its language, its o w n social and political institutions as well as its
traditions, art forms, religious practices and cultural values. W h e n such
policies are carried out systematically by governments (whatever the
pretext: social progress, national unity, economic development, military
security) then such governments are guilty of ethnocide. W h e n the
process occurs due to the more impersonal forces of economic develop-

54
 Cultural struggles and development in Latin America

ment, cultural change and modernization, yet not guided by any

specific government policy, it is still ethnocidal as to its effects but m a y
be labelled, in sociological or anthropological terms, simply social
change or acculturation.
M a n y economic development projects m a y be labelled ethnocidal,
even w h e n ethnocide is not clearly their objective. If economic develop-
ment is to serve the people, then ethnocidal development should be
considered a contradiction in terms. Yet it occurs frequently for two
principal reasons. First, m a n y development projects and programmes are
designed for reasons which have little to d o with the well-being of the
people, but rather with political, financial, external interests and so o n ,
and their execution will mainly benefit technocrats, bureaucrats, ambi-
tious politicians or multinational corporations. Second, those responsible
for development projects and programmes are usually fairly ignorant
about the situation of the indigenous peoples, are uninterested in the
problem and frequently hold such groups in contempt. This is parti-
cularly the case w h e n the dominant state ideology is based on the concept
of a single nation which'rejects and lacks respect for those other, hetero-
n o m o u s ethnies, as has traditionally been the case in Latin America.
Whereas most countries in the area are multi-ethnic, few states
acknowledge this fact and only s o m e of them have established specific
legal safeguards and policies for the protection of the indigenous peoples
within the borders (legal safeguards that are usually more honoured in
the breach than in the application). Governments generally argue that by
providing equal rights and opportunities for all their citizens, they are
respecting the cultural specificities of particular indigenous groups. This
is of course not entirely correct: the practice is usually different from the
theory. M o s t states have an explicit or implicit assimilationist bias and
despite the formal recognition of fundamental liberties and individual
h u m a n rights, the indigenous peoples are usually at a disadvantage vis-à-
vis the state.
A c o m m o n feature of m a n y indigenous peoples is that their
traditional habitat has only recently b e c o m e the object of 'national
development planning'. Areas which used to be remote and isolated
from national decision-making centres have n o w become 'poles of
growth', reserves of vast quantities of sometimes strategic mineral and
other natural resources, the sites of costly d a m s and mining enterprises,
the targets of land development and settlement schemes. For
technocrats and planners, multinational corporations and poor, landless
squatters, such areas have become a ' n e w frontier'.
T h e first and principal attack o n the way of life of indigenous
peoples is u p o n their land and environmental resource base. T h e loss of

55
 Rodolfo Stavenhagen

land and territory has helped to eradicate m a n y peoples around the

world. It is probably the principal factor in the ongoing process of
ethnocide of which they are the continuing victims. For indigenous
peoples, land is not only a productive resource, an economic factor.
L a n d is habitat, territory, the basis for social organization, cultural
identification and political viability; it is frequently associated with
myth, symbols and religion. L a n d is the essential element in the cultural
reproduction of the group.
Development planners and indigenous peoples continue to clash
over the issue of land; what for the former is simply a factor in economic
calculus, for the latter constitutes a vital necessity for survival. L a n d
development for the planners stands in stark contradiction to the signi-
ficance of land for indigenous peoples. A s long as this contradiction is
not solved, ethnocide will continue in the n a m e of development.
Besides the issue of land, ethnocide proceeds by other ways and
means: the monetary economy, which creates n e w consumer needs,
brings in n e w products and displaces old ones; traditional occupations
disappear and there is a penetration of wage labour into the economy;
the national school system introduces not only the official or dominant
language but also different values and attitudes which replace traditional
ones. In short, the process of modernization and secularization (so dear
to the development sociologists of the 1950s and 1960s) has contributed
to irreversible ethnocide in m a n y parts of Latin America. S o m e govern-
ments also adopt clear-cut policies of the forced assimilation of ethnic
minorities: prohibiting the use of the vernacular language in schools and
public places; imposing the national or official language as the only one
taught in the schools; forcing people to change the traditional names
which identified them as belonging to a given indigenous community;
destroying their sacred places or burial grounds; imposing forced reli-
gious conversions and so o n . Only perhaps since the mid-1970s, have
governments and official agencies b e c o m e aware of the h u m a n impli-
cations of savage, impersonal, technocratic development. It is vital that
the h u m a n and social factors of development plans are carefully studied
and taken into consideration before any major policy decisions are taken.
T h e World Bank recently decided to m a k e credit for major development
projects in the Third World contingent upon safeguards for the well-
being of tribal peoples. This policy has been applied in the Brazilian
A m a z o n . Governments have been pressured into passing legislation for
the protection of indigenous cultures and communities. Unfortunately,
such safeguards and legislation frequently exist on paper only.

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 Cultural struggles and development in Latin America

Ethnodevelopment and alternative cultural policies

N o one has understood the dangers of ethnocide better than the
indigenous peoples themselves. In placing their problems before inter-
national public opinion, they have been aided by a n u m b e r of inter-
governmental, non-governmental, academic, professional and h u m a n
rights organizations. T h e gist of their various activities has been the
recognition of the need for a n e w approach to the problem of the
economic and social development of ethnically distinct peoples within
the context of the m o d e r n so-called nation-state. A s against policies
which lead to ethnocide or preserve internal colonialism, there has
arisen a call for self-determination, autonomy and ethnodevelopment.
This m e a n s basically that indigenous peoples d e m a n d the right to
decide their o w n affairs; to participate in the decision-making bodies
and processes where their future is discussed and decided; to political
representation and participation; to respect for their traditions and cul-
tures; and to the freedom to choose what kind of development, if any,
they want. Ethnodevelopment m e a n s that an ethnie, whether indi-
genous, tribal or other, maintains control over its o w n land, resources,
social organization and culture, and is free to negotiate the kind of
relationship it wishes to have with the state.
Ethnodevelopment, like the concept of self-reliant development
which w a s current in the 1970s, m e a n s looking inwards; it m e a n s
finding in the group's o w n culture the resources and creative force
necessary to confront the challenges of the m o d e r n , changing world. It
does not m e a n autarky or self-imposed isolation, and m u c h less a retreat
into a m u s e u m of 'tradition', though ethnies that m a y wish to remain
isolated (as some tropical forest tribes in the A m a z o n basin) should by
all m e a n s be free to enjoy the basic h u m a n right of isolation.
Ethnodevelopment does not m e a n breaking u p existing nations and
subverting the process of nation-building (a major task of our time,
particularly in the Third World), but rather redefining the nature of
nation-building and enriching the complex, multicultural fabric of
m a n y m o d e r n states by recognizing the legitimate aspirations of the
culturally distinct ethnies which m a k e u p the national whole. Ethno-
development does not m e a n blurring the very real social and economic
class divisions which characterize the m o d e r n world capitalist system by
stirring u p some artificial 'tribalism'. Rather, it assumes that not only
class but also ethnic identity and community are socially integrating
principles. T h u s class-based social movements in the modern world can
only benefit and improve their performance if they recognize the
validity and legitimacy of ethnic d e m a n d s (such as has occurred in the

57
 Rodolfo Stavenhagen

revolutionary m o v e m e n t in Guatemala). Ethnodevelopment, finally,

m e a n s rethinking the nature a n d objectives of local-level development
projects, from hydroelectric d a m s to the introduction of plantation
crops, by keeping in m i n d , first and foremost, the needs, desires,
cultural specificities and grass-roots participation of the indigenous
groups themselves.
B y the early 1970s in several parts of Latin America, a n u m b e r of
militant Indian organizations had sprung u p which in one w a y or another
d e m a n d e d a change in official policies as well as respect for their cultures
and recognition of their o w n Indian identities. Indigenous intellectuals,
w h o had gone through the official school systems, developed arguments
for alternative cultural policies. Governments and public opinion be-
c a m e increasingly aware that the Indian peoples were not merely living
vestiges of s o m e historical past to be thrown in the dustbin of history, but
dynamic social forces w h o were demanding their rightful place in con-
temporary society o n their o w n terms (and not o n those decided for
them by elitist intellectuals, political ideologues, government bureau-
crats, foreign missionaries or international technocrats).
A United Nations report r e c o m m e n d s that

in multi-ethnic societies, action must always be based on criteria which, at least

in principle, assert the equality of the cultural rights of the various ethnic
groups. T h e state has the obvious obligation to formulate and implement a
cultural policy which will, among other things, create the necessary conditions
for the coexistence and harmonious development of the various ethnic groups
living in its territory, either under pluralist provisions which guarantee that one
group will not interfere with another, or under other programmes which
guarantee equal and genuine opportunities for all.x

T h u s the question arises as to whether there exists a h u m a n right to

cultural identity. It seems that the international community is m o v i n g in
this direction, though the concept itself is o p e n to discussion. Certainly
the indigenous peoples are demanding that such a right be recognized
internationally and domestically.
In this respect, two basic issues arise which have not yet been solved.
T h e first relates to the process of cultural change, adaptation and
reinterpretation. Indigenous cultures are not static, and n o protective
cultural policy should be designed to keep them, as it were, as living
m u s e u m s , an accusation which is often levelled at those w h o d e m a n d
protection for indigenous cultures. T h e solution is that indigenous

8. José R . Martínez C o b o , Study of tlie Problem of Discrimination against Indigenous

Populations, N e w York, United Nations, 1987.

58
 Cultural struggles and development in Latin America

peoples should be allowed to m a n a g e their o w n cultural affairs and

develop their o w n cultural potential, with the support of, but without
the interference by, the state. W h y is state support necessary? Because
if left entirely o n their o w n , these cultures would indeed tend to
disappear as a result of ethnocidal processes which take place in society
with or without state intervention.
T h e other basic issue regarding a possible h u m a n right to cultural
identity is that certain traditions and customs in indigenous cultures are
considered by outside (mainly Western) observers to be in violation of
universal individual h u m a n rights (for example, the formal and social
inferiority of w o m e n ) . W h i c h has priority: the collective right to cultural
identity or the universal individual h u m a n right to liberty and equality?
T h e question has not yet been answered satisfactorily.
A s Latin America prepares to enter the twenty-first century, the
accumulated contradictions of the tendencies outlined in the previous
pages point to the existence of a profound societal crisis. Like all crises,
this represents a historical m o m e n t of opportunity which, if dealt with
adequately, will enable the nations of Latin America to emerge renewed
and strengthened o n the world scene. M a n y observers have noted the
increasing 'ungovernability' of these nations by the traditional m e a n s of
authoritarian or elitist politics. T h e civil society has responded by a
virtual explosion of popular and grass-roots movements which challenge
established forms of governance.
Neo-liberal economics and the globalization of the market e c o n o m y
have undeniably led to some spectacular successes, but they have also
produced greater social inequalities and exclusions. In response, alter-
native local-level development efforts to improve living standards and
well-being at the bottom of the scale rather than macro-level growth
rates are being taken u p seriously by millions of peasants, urban
workers, marginal populations and indigenous peoples.
Finally, the concept of the unitary, culturally homogeneous nation-
state n o w stands challenged by alternative cultural models proposed by
indigenous movements and organizations, w h o struggle for a place
within the wider multicultural, multi-ethnic, multinational society. Such
are the options that Latin America faces as the twentieth century draws
to a close.

59
T h e futures of cultures: an Asian
perspective
Ashis Nandy and Giri Deshingkar

The onslaught of the dominant global culture

Traditional cultures as resistance
A new Gaia of cultures?

T h e onslaught of the dominant global

culture

It is not just the state, the market or the culture industry which has
brought into question the futures of cultures. T h e open-endedness, the
valuelessness, the apparent objectivity of science and the demonstrable
effectiveness of technology have together progressively stripped away
reasons to value intrinsically o n e meaning system or way of life above
another. W e are thus left with not only a disenchanted world, but very
weak capabilities to sustain or defend the core of any culture which
cannot be validated by m o d e r n science or by criteria thrown u p , directly
or indirectly, by m o d e r n science. M a n y kinds of meaning systems
survive in m o d e r n societies, but they are seen as handy, transient m e a n s
of organizing unavoidable h u m a n subjectivity, all potentially trivial in
their epistemological and political status, even if unequal in their moral
standing. N o one ascribes any transcendental value to them; no one
believes them to have eternal relevance.
In Europe, it was the aspiration of the Enlightenment which started
the erosion of cultures. T h e Enlightenment preached that, with reason
as the arbiter of h u m a n affairs, h u m a n beings would shed their
traditional allegiances and particularistic identities and unite in a
universal civilization grounded in generic humanity and rational ethics.
In the non-European world, cultures c a m e to be destroyed by the
combined h e g e m o n y of the Enlightenment project and its product,
m o d e r n science and technology. Both were introduced into that world

61
 Ashis Nandy and Giri Deshingkar

by colonialism. A n d they were accepted with alacrity by the n o n -

European élites in order to overcome their perceived cultural 'back-
wardness' and to alleviate the n e w poverty which was a by-product of
colonialism itself. Contrast this with the spread of Buddhism from India
which enriched other cultures without replacing them.
O n c e culture was m a d e to vacate m u c h of the space it had occupied
previously, whatfilledthe void gradually in the West was mass-pro-
duced entertainment. It occupied large spaces where the society had
already been homogenized and atomized by the vigorous processes of
industrialization and urbanization. Popular culture of the pre-industrial
era also c a m e under siege. With the widening of the cultural gap bet-
ween the aristocracy and the upper classes on the one hand and the
rural and urban lower classes o n the other, especially with the spread of
democratic sentiments a m o n g the latter, the upper classes began to
perceive both a cultural and a political threat from the 'vile, unwashed
multitudes'. Popular culture c a m e to be seen as vulgar, rude and devoid
of any lasting value: the very antithesis of the classical culture inherited
by the upper classes.

Traditional cultures as resistance

Both forms of encroachment o n culture, the Enlightenment project and
a political economy based on science, technology and development,
continue to be resisted by those w h o have not yet been 'massified'. Even
within the massified, atomized sections, resistance comes from two
sources: (a) there is the loss of a community life which is still a living
m e m o r y in almost all non-Western societies and (b) the nature of work
in a massified, atomized society is purely instrumental; machine pro-
duction has no communicative relationship with nature. In h u m a n
history, work has always been a cultural activity engaged in transforming
nature. W h e n work becomes purely instrumental, there is resistance to
work; such resistance often takes cultural forms. T h e resistance is, of
course, explained away as a romantic, quasi-Luddite retrogression to the
past. It is seen as an inability to face u p to the task of building a blueprint
for the future based o n the Enlightenment vision which, according to
m a n y , is the last word o n h u m a n social ingenuity.
W h e r e and w h e n such resistance survives, it manifests itself in
various ways. A t one extreme, there are those like Gandhi w h o seek to
use traditions to break the stranglehold of the dominant monoculture of
the present. T h e y use the past in the w a y that m o d e r n Europe in the
sixteenth and seventeenth centuries went back to its Hellenic traditions

62
 The futures of cultures: an Asian perspective

to legitimize its break with medievalism. ' At the other extreme, there are
forms of passive resistance. In that m o d e , people accept s o m e elements
of the mass culture while holding fast to the core of their o w n culture. In
China, for example, traditional medicine has not lost its hold even
a m o n g the modernizing élite. In H o n g K o n g , the architects and builders
of virtually every n e w building continue to rely on feng shui (geomancy),
that is, the future m o v e m e n t of spirits through the doors and windows.
Japan offers a good example of living in two cultural worlds: Western
clothes at work and yukata at h o m e . Similarly, in India a scientist m a y
practise science in the laboratory and puja rituals at h o m e .
In between are those w h o occupy the space vacated by the
modernists to declare themselves the sole protectors of culture. T h e y
find a ready clientele a m o n g those whose community life has not fully
collapsed but is under all-round attack, w h o sense their culture as under
threat and have a sense of desperation about it. Even in the West, the
Enlightenment project has suffered a setback. In s o m e cases, resistance
appears to be feeble and on the periphery as, for example, in the form
of anti-consumerist movements, vegetarianism and/or critiques of big
science and mega-technology. Mystical religious cults, invariably
described as 'irrational', are nevertheless growing. Resistance moves
closer to the centre if international mass culture affects areas at the core
of one's identity, such as one's o w n language. This kind of cultural
sensitivity has grown, for example, in France and is growing in India.
Elsewhere resistance has c o m e in a m u c h more militant form: resurgent
ethnicities, militant 'fundamentalist' religions, such as in the former
Yugoslavia, parts of the former Soviet Union, Algeria, Ethiopia, the
Sudan and Somalia, a m o n g others. T h e non-Western world is riddled
with violent assertions of ethnicity and religion.
T h e n e w assertions of culture can be distinguished from the lived
culture of the past in two ways. O n e is self-awareness about belonging to
a culture and acting u p o n it, such as temple-building and the avoidance
of beef by Hindu immigrants in the West, for example. Practices which
c a m e naturally in the past n o w become acts of awareness. This can, of
course, be read as another indicator of the loss of culture or of a decline
in confidence in one's o w n culture. O n e becomes conscious of one's
breathing only w h e n it becomes difficult. A s the expatriate Indians in the
West begin to fear the loss of culture either in their o w n lifetime or their
children's, they begin to flaunt their culture more aggressively. Culture
becomes the marker of one's threatened selfhood in a mass society.

1. That use of Hellenism was not balanced, impartial or objective; it certainly did not
do justice to the entirety of the culture of ancient Greece. It was also, on one level,
an invention of a tradition for contemporary purposes.

63
 Ashis Nandy and Girt Deshingkar

T h e second difference is participation in political life as cultural

entities. It is this that accounts for the violence and conflict w h e n asserting
one's culture in a hostile cultural milieu. In fact,fightingfor one's culture
in a different cultural terrain becomes a means of fending off the
awareness that one might be losing one's culture inside. T h e future of
cultures is thus intimately tied u p with the politics of culture. A n d that
politics in turn can be very m u c h a symbolic act, even involving violence.
It is a truism that technology contributes to cultural change. T h e
printing press, particularly movable type, brought about numerous
cultural changes, as did rapid means of transportation and c o m m u n i -
cation. But it is n o w abundantly clear that technology does not determine
cultural change on a one-to-one basis. T h e same technologies, whether of
mass production or commmunication or information management,
impact differently o n different cultural entities, depending on the strength
of their core beliefs and h o w these beliefs are patterned. Movable type,
printing and other means of mass communication can bring not only
science, technology and politics to a wider audience, but with equal
efficiency the Bible, the Koran, Buddhist and Confucian classics and
other products of high culture. Rapid transportation can lead to the
melting of cultural differences, but it can equally produce cultural
awareness through greater interpersonal encounters. Computers can be
put at the service of astrology and match-making for marriages. Culture
confidence, whether traditionally maintained or newly acquired, can not
only shape changes in cultural content, but can change technologies
themselves. Electrically stimulated acupuncture is one example that
comes to mind. M a n y forms of biotechnology are extensions of tradi-
tional practices. T h e spread and the growing popularity of alternative
medicine represent a clear case of traditional theories challenging, with
increasing success, conventional m o d e r n medicine.

A new Gaia of cultures?

Although alternative theories, technologies and practices still remain o n
the periphery, the attitude within the scientific and technological c o m -
munity has m o v e d from total rejection through cautious curiosity to
partial acceptance. A recovery of the respectability given to tradition in
the past has b e c o m e possible because the deep structures of traditional
culture have survived and the hegemonizing m o d e r n knowledge system
is beginning to be seen as deeply flawed.
In addition, unlike m a n y traditional sciences and technologies which
openly define their o w n limits in terms of geography, time and culture,

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 The futures of cultures: an Asian perspective

the knowledge system of m o d e r n science and technology is not only

steamrolling and relentlessly universalizing in its thrust, but also
ethnocidal; it does not stop at neglecting culture, it seeks to destroy it.
This is the other side of the much-vaunted universality of m o d e r n
science. For example, m a n y aspects of the 'culture' of m o d e r n science
and technology have s h o w n remarkable cross-cultural resilience, relia-
bility and validity. Nuclear research establishments everywhere have
spawned the same culture, with the s a m e configuration of areas of
secrecy, surveillance and miniaturized police-state-like estates. T h e y
resemble each other even in their architecture.
While celebrating the return of cultures, in defiance of the
universalizing thrust of mass-produced culture, it is far from clear what
the relationship will be a m o n g the reasserted, born-again or 'returned'
cultures - and between the returned cultures, such as that of the
expatriate Indians in the United K i n g d o m , and the living cultures of
those unselfconsciously immersed in traditions in India. In the history
of humankind, with the partial exceptions of India and China, cultural
entities have been, for the most part, in conflict with one another. Such
conflictual relationships m a y well be exacerbated w h e n returned or
reasserted cultures b e c o m e even m o r e politically active. Cultural
militancy has already appeared on the world scene.
This is by no means inevitable. Cultural encounters are always ambi-
guous; assertion and accommodation often go together. After millennia
of warfare and having arrived at nuclear nihilism, better sense began to
prevail. N o w the nuclear arms race is being reversed. Ecological concerns
are asserting themselves in the development process after a decades-long
quest for unlimited economic growth. Attempts are being m a d e in
G A T T rounds to moderate cut-throat economic competition. Alternative
medicine manages to coexist with conventional medicine. In short, there
is a trend towards an ecology of existence if only to banish the spectre of
ethnocide. Despite periods of madness, people discover that the self is the
other's other and even confrontation with the other leads to a response to
the other. A Gaia of the cultural world is today distinctly imaginable for
the futures of cultures.
A n extreme version of the Gaia hypothesis insists that if humankind
comes to pose a threat to the survival of the biosphere, the latter m a y ,
being a self-correcting system, eliminate humankind as a biological
species, as it has already done in the case of some other species. A Gaia
of cultures m a y similarly establish a cultural order where ethnocidal
cultures might be destroyed in the long run through the natural process
of cultural change. There are already signs that the present dominant
global mass culture has begun to eat into the vitals of Western culture,

65
 Ashis Nandy and Giri Deshingkar

its mother culture, itself. O n the other hand, such a Gaia of cultures
assumes that a culture's self-definition is always in dialogue with the
cultural selves of other cultures. N o culture has ever been an island
entirely unto itself. Each culture uses one or m o r e cultural others as a
m e a n s of self-enrichment and creative internal changes. In other words,
no cultural self-definition is ever complete without taking into account
other cultures and other self-definitions. If any culture is to have a
future, m a n y cultures, too, need to have a lively existence in the future.

66
T h e futures of Asian cultures:
between localization and globalization
Susantha Goonatilake

Introduction
Localization
Communities: face-to-face, cross-border and virtual
Dynamics of interpenetrating communities
T h e drama on the Asian stage
Economic influences
Conclusions

Introduction
Asia's different subregions have broad c o m m o n cultural features which
give them recognizable flavours, just as Europe, in spite of all its
differences, has a c o m m o n flavour that is recognizable to a person from
a different cultural region. This is partly due to certain c o m m o n cultural
threads that have criss-crossed the different Asian subregions in the past.
These cross-connecting threads have included Buddhism, Confucian-
ism, Islam and to a lesser extent Hinduism. In addition, other cultural
threads, knowledge systems and technologies have been exchanged
within the Asian region, again giving rise to regional flavours.
In addition to these c o m m o n features, there are m a n y narrower
subcultures in Asia. Such subcultures are due to differences of language,
religion, ethnicity, tribe, class and, in southern Asia, caste. Southern Asia
probably has the greatest n u m b e r of such subcultures and eastern Asia
probably the least. These regional cultures and local subcultures are
today in a dynamic relationship with a globalizing one, which is strad-
dling the world and whose roots are largely in the European cultural
arena. T h e interplay of these two cultural strands will be a strong deter-
minant of Asia's cultural futures.
Culture generally is the m e a n s and the wherewithal through which
people deal with their environment, the environment being their social
worlds of fellow h u m a n beings as well as their physical environment.
T h e acculturization process occurs essentially within those social
groups arising from structural cleavages that divide society into classes
and other strata. Subcultures corresponding to these strata are learnt,

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 Susantha Goonatilake

internalized and transmitted d o w n generations within a framework esta-

blished by these social cleavages. T h e social structure becomes the
skeletal framework d o w n which culture has been transmitted by each
generation. T h u s 'a given culture trait can be fully understood only if
seen as the end point of specific sequences of events reaching back into
the remote past'.1
T h e complexities of the current Asian world are such that today
different technologies, different forms of ownership, different traditions
and different social stratification arrangements not entirely based o n
one given m o d e of production jostle with each other in a continuously
unfolding historical process. Here, various interacting social divisions
such as those of class, creed, ethnicity and (in southern Asia) caste have
their parallel lineages of culture. It is also these lineages that provide the
fault-lines for the cultural conflicts that are taking place in certain parts
of the Asian region. T h e y also constitute the exit and entry channels
from and into the globalizing processes of culture.
These two contradictory historical processes, globalization and
localization, operate simultaneously. T h e globalizing tendency brings the
world together as one through several processes, including economic
and technological ones. T h e localizing tendency - expressed in its
extreme form by a n u m b e r of insurgencies on ethnic, religious and other
local identities - acts in the opposite direction. These two processes have
a pervasive effect o n the Asian region and the future of Asian cultures is
best viewed through their respective dynamics.

Localization
All contemporary Asian societies possess almost all the historically
derived social groups and societal forms and/or their cultural adjuncts.
These several cleavages of culture provide m a n y potential fault-lines. T h e
mobilization based o n the basis of local identities occurs o n cleavages of
religion, race, tribe, language or, in the case of southern Asia, caste. A s
different m o d e s of ownership, as well as different technologies, conti-
nuously reshape the socio-economic system, cleavages based on class also
form an important set of dynamic subcultures.
In the larger entities in Asia, very m a n y of these fault-lines of culture
exist. T h u s , India has all the major religions in the world represented in
sizeable numbers - Hindus, Muslims, Buddhists, Jains, Zoroastrians,
Sikhs and Christians. India's languages belong to several major families,

1. C . Kluckhohn. Mirror for Man, New York, Fawcett World Library, 1959.

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 The futures of Asian cultures: between localization and globalization

with over 12 major languages and m o r e than 500 dialects. In addition,

because of the presence of all the major m o d e r n industries and forms of
industrial ownership, India has all the major class and professional
cleavages of the industrial world.
Divisive tendencies based o n some of these social fault-lines,
especially those of ethnicity and religion, have today reached a dramatic
form globally, as illustrated by the number of non-interstate armed
conflicts. In 1990 there were 33 major armed internal conflicts, that is,
those resulting in more than 1,000 casualties. In contrast, only 1 interstate
conflict, namely between India and Pakistan, took over a 1,000 lives in
that year,2 but this too has a religious underpinning in that Pakistan was
created for religious reasons and the antagonisms over Kashmir are also
based on religion.

Communities: face-to-face,
cross-border and virtual

Cultures are knit together by communication between their m e m b e r s ,

and they break d o w n or grow into larger wholes w h e n these links and
patterns of communication change. T h e future of the interplay between
globalizing and localizing tendencies lies in the links between these
different cultural worlds.
There are several types of cultural communities in Asia today. T h e
information contents of these cultural communities inhabit the con-
stituent m e m b e r s ' minds and it is the exchange of these contents that
binds them together. First, there are communities that share the same
geographic space and have the potential for face-to-face contact with
each other. Next, there are m e m b e r s of the same community w h o are in
different geographic locations, perhaps because of migration to other
countries, and w h o are therefore not in a position to enjoy face-to-face
contact. These communities m a y be based on criteria of religion, race
and ethnicity but transcend national boundaries. T h u s over 25 per cent
of Sikhs in India live outside the Punjab and over 60 per cent of Tamils
in Sri Lanka live in predominantly non-Tamil areas. In addition, there
are significant segments of these and other separatist communities living
in foreign countries.

2. K . Lindten, B . Heldt, K . Nordquist and P . Wallesteen, 'Major Armed Conflicts in

1990', SIPRI Yearbook 1991 (Theme: World Armaments and Disarmament),
pp. 345-6.

69
 Susantha Goonatilake

Professional groups increasingly belong to the class of transborder

communities. T h e m o d e r n physicist, doctor or engineer finds his or her
overseas compatriots talking a near identical professional language and
so they exist in a c o m m o n universe of discourse. T h e y are bound
together by the content of their disciplines, their practices and their
professional norms. Their subject-matter changes constantly every few
years and the links across borders are vital for the lateral exchange of
essential knowledge. T h e employees of transnational corporations w h o
have to exchange lateral information, especially at the professional level,
also belong to this category of transborder community.
In the same category, though to a lesser extent, are the auxiliary staff
and skilled workers associated with these professions such as technicians,
nurses or skilled workers. T h e knowledge of these groups changes too,
and requires lateral cross-border communication to upgrade them
constantly. But some of that n e w information can, of course, c o m e
diachronically from the professionals in their o w n territories w h o had
been exposed to newer transborder professional knowledge.
Less influenced by transborder contacts are traditional craftspeople
such as carpenters and masons. T h e y had earlier lived professional lives
where information w a s largely handed d o w n from generation to
generation within a nation, with little or n o knowledge transmitted
laterally across borders, because n e w developments were few and far
between.
In addition to these communities, there is another transborder set of
communities that are increasingly being linked daily by the global chains
of electronic media. These include bankers and traders of currency and
stocks w h o are bound together by the c o m m o n electronic transborder
data flows that have been described earlier. T h e y exchange information
very rapidly across borders and have a sense of immediacy as they
communicate with, support or compete electronically with foreign-
based compatriots. These electronic communities generally constitute
what have been termed 'virtual communities'. 3
Transborder communities of a less universal kind such as those of
religion and ethnicity are also being connected through the exploding
telecommunication links. T h u s substantial segments of the population
of the areas of ethnic tension live outside their territory, both nationally
and internationally, and increasingly communicate electronically. T h e
localization tendency is helped by telecommunications across the

3. M . M . Riel and J. A . Levin, 'Building Electronic Communities: Successes and Failure

in Computer Networking', Instructional Science, N o . 19, pp. 145-69; M . J. Stuve,
'Exploring Virtual Classrooms: Network Communication in a Cross-cultural
Context', Intelligent Tutoring Media, Vol. 2, N o . 2, M a y 1991.

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 The futures of Asian cultures: between localization and globalization

localizing group. In fact, these tele-links often provide some of the most
vital avenues for both information-gathering and propaganda for the
militant operations of these communities. But these 'local' electronic
communities are intimately e m b e d d e d within the larger electronic
community, including the latter's massive and m o r e universal tech-
nology support group.

Dynamics of interpenetrating communities

In the days w h e n communities were simple and relatively isolated, a
person generally occupied one cultural realm. This was the role to
which individuals were inducted, largely through primary socialization.
B y and large, they lived out their lives within this cultural identity, albeit
with a few changes as they crossed different age boundaries. But, as
they could not be the same age at the same time at any given time, they
had at any given m o m e n t one single cultural identity. These cultural
identities were, in simpler societies, c o m m o n to the whole community,
a person being socialized to almost all the group's activities.
With the increased differentiation of society, cultural cleavages
occurred on the basis of class, profession and craft group. But within
broad limits, a cultural identity once acquired tended to remain. With
increased social and geographic mobility, especially after the onset of
industrialization, these cultural certainties began to shift, a person in his
or her lifetime being able to occupy one or more cultural identities.
T h e conventional view of a nation is of a group of individuals living
in a c o m m o n territory with a c o m m o n cultural and racial background
and with shared values, customs and traditions, including those of
religion and/or language.4 But with contemporary changes in the global
cultural processes, through communications, economics, travel and
migration, these constituents have split u p so that they tend not to
coincide today in one territory. Different cultural communities spread
their tentacles across geographic areas, and draw their m e m b e r s
together o n several cross-boundary links, giving rise to several geo-
graphically separated subcultures such as those based o n ethnic,
religious, class or other links.
T h u s one m a y be born in country A , receive primary socialization
through religion B , secondary socialization through predominantly
European science C , military training D o n Chinese military strategy,
4. B . Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections of the Origin and Spread of
Nationalism, London, Verso, 1983; E . J. H o b s b a w m , Nations and Nationalism since
1780, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1990.

71
 Susantha Goonatilake

work in country E , be employed by an international traded c o m p a n y F,

upgrade or change one's profession through a n e w training package G ,
receive a transnational global cultural package H through radio and T V
and travel in country J. Today's self is thus encroached u p o n
dynamically by m a n y shifting cultures. In s o m e of the poorer countries,
m u c h of this p h e n o m e n o n m a y be restricted to certain migratory
sections or refugees or to the country's élite. But in the last case, the
multiple cultural residues on the élite are then transmitted at least
partially d o w n to the rest of the population.
It is in the above shifting subcultures that the drama of the future of
Asian cultures, between globalization and localization, is being played
out. Although cultures exist in different social groups, their contents are
physically located in different h u m a n minds. It is in minds that cultural
residues collect, accommodating and jostling with each other. It is in
these mental reservoirs that the various urges for, as well as the h u m a n
results of, globalization and localization occur.
O n e individual self could today live in several of these cultural
worlds. A n individual could be a m e m b e r of his or her face-to-face
community, transborder expatriate community or virtual electronic
community. Each of these communities could also contain different
subgroups. T h e contents of a citizen's mind are thus increasingly c o m -
posed of elements that are not exclusive to a country, ethnic group or
religion. T h u s n o firm separatism is objectively possible within an indi-
vidual's internal cultural world, nor is it viable in a real sense in today's
world. A cultural 'Lebanonization' of the m i n d occurs, with multiple
frames of reference for action, corresponding to each subculture. In
fact, studies of industrial organizations in developing countries under-
going rapid transformation have revealed that such multiple frames
existed even before the advent of electronic communities. 5
In this sense, unlike in the case of a remote past, any search for
absolute fundamentalist sovereignty is d o o m e d . Today, one cannot
without contradictions 'build socialism in one country' or a regime of
pure Islam. Eastern Europe, China and C a m b o d i a have all, in this
sense, imploded from their earlier searches for purity because of the
dynamics of these multiple identities. T h e e n e m y is no longer across the
border, it is within, it is part of oneself.
Separatist struggles for cultural purity today, whether based o n
ethnicity, religion or class, ultimately lead only to partial and Pyrrhic
cultural victories. For s o m e time, the victorious separatist unit could

5. S. Goonatilake, 'Environmental Influence on an Industrial Organization in Ceylon',

Modern Ceylon Studies (Peradeniya), Vol. 3, N o . 1, July 1972.

72
 The futures of Asian cultures: between localization and globalization

exist isolated in its collective, conscious imagination. But in its

unconscious psyche, the ' e n e m y ' is regrouping within, re-establishing
tentacles across mental boundaries, tentacles that reach to the inner
individual soul. N o single subculture has exclusive access to an indi-
vidual mind; no one culture o w n s it exclusively.
If one were to view the m i n d as a vessel with different layers of
cultural packages stored in it, one would obtain a measure of the relative
importance of these multiple cultural contents. O n e can get such a
measure by considering the rates of growth of knowledge and the length
of socialization in the several domains. T h e relative rates of growth in
this multilayered cultural system are not all equal. Revealed religion or
strongly held political positions are, by definition, sacred to varying
degrees and so not subject to m u c h change. But the other contents
change very rapidly. According to s o m e estimates, the contents of the
scientific professions double every ten years or so.6 T h e electronic
globalizing processes change this knowledge m u c h m o r e rapidly:
keeping u p with it has n o w b e c o m e as difficult as 'drinking water from
a fire hose'. 7 T h e static, purist core of culture increasingly becomes a
smaller and smaller residue as the accelerated growth in the other
cultural packages continues.
T h e relative 'amounts' of the different contents of cultures are also
indicated by the length of time required to acquire them. In simpler
societies, where the total knowledge held by society is small, there is a
very simple division of labour, and so all individuals have a large amount
of knowledge in c o m m o n . " In classical pre-industrial societies with a
relatively low division of labour, the individual learns within a few years,
mostly by participation in the family, at work and in religious worship, in
temple or mosque. Sometimes, as in the case of craftspeople or religious
occupations, a longer apprenticeship is required for socialization.9
In an industrial society, eleven to sixteen years of formal full-time
instruction are necessary to instruct a person.10 For m o r e exacting roles,
this period of training both within the formal education system, such as
school or university, as well as the workplace, could be extended u p to
another ten years. In the last decade or so, there have been calls for
lifelong learning, a d e m a n d that has n o w become m o r e urgent because

6. D . J. de Solía Price, Little Science, Big Science, London, Macmillan, 1963.

7. M . M . Waldrop, 'Learning to Drink from a Fire Hose', Science, N o . 248, 11 M a y
1990, pp. 674-5.
8. P . L . Berger and T . Luckmann, The Social Construction of Reality: A Treatise in the
Sociology of Knowledge, pp. 183-94, N e w York, Doubleday, 1967.
9. P . Worsley, Introducing Sociology, p. 115, Harmondsworth (United Kingdom),
Penguin, 1970.
10. Ibid., p. 163.

73
 Susantha Goonatilake

of the rapid growth of n e w knowledge. T h e relative length of socia-

lization, as information increases, must by its very nature, in the long
run, increasingly push the purist culture towards a relatively minor role.
T h e question that must be raised is whether these processes are in
one sense leading to an inevitable domination of a unipolar world. Will
cultural and political liberation struggles become not only unfashionable
over the next few decades, but also ultimately impossible? T h e answer
must be approached indirectly.
T h e present hegemonic structures are very different from the earlier
global ones. T h u s the case of Christianization following the mercantile
explorations of Latin America was a crude, one-way imposition. A
single religion dominated. In the cultural colonization of the industrial
era, in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the imposition was
a larger package of culture, less virulent than the religious fanaticism of
the sixteenth century, but still beholden generally to o n e mother
country, say Great Britain or France.
T h e contents of the present global information network are partially
the local parochialism of the dominant countries writ large, and which
had emerged from the internal cultural dynamics of these countries. Yet
there is n o single dominant locus. T h e United States still predominates,
and a group of industrialized countries such as the O E C D collectively has
a greater influence. Yet the globalization process trades currencies,
ownership and also partially identities across the entire global system.
Multinationals increasingly indulge in cross-marriages, a m o n g the
dominant group but no longer within one territory. N o single player
dominates absolutely, like a S u n King. T h e whole is increasingly
becoming greater than any single constituent, as is illustrated by the
central banks' current difficulties in controlling their o w n currencies.
A n d even the poorest country, although drawn into an unequal
relationship, has its weak voice registered in the commercial 'consensus'
of the globe-girdling electronic babble. This includes the possibility, as
countries b e c o m e m o r e porous tofinancialtransactions and shares are
increasingly traded across all national boundaries, of s o m e elements of
the remotest country owning s o m e part of the global economic girdle.
Further, the globalizing technological package has elements that
specifically target local subcultures. Niche production and niche
marketing in the post-Fordist phase fit into this pattern. S o does the
tendency towards narrow-casting (as opposed to broadcasting) targeted
at narrow subcultures in the mass media that m a n y n e w communication
technologies will soon deliver.
In this transactional world of globalizing information, there have
been cases of cultural elements (because of the particular play of social

74
 The futures of Asian cultures: between localization and globalization

forces) of even the weakest elements emerging as a dominant force.

O n e such example, which could be a paradigm for the future of such
processes outside the dominant European culture, has been the growth
of jazz and related music of the ex-slaves of America, to become a
dominant musical form in m a n y parts of the world. This is due to a
variety of social and cultural factors, including powerful commercial
forces that identified important market opportunities.
T h e eventual role of pre-Western culture in this hegemonizing
whole can be examined by taking the case of the premier example of a
non-Western nation becoming industrialized, namely Japan. In its
opening u p to the West, it used slogans such as ' W a k o n Yosai' (Western
Civilization, Japanese Spirit). In theory, this meant an attempt to stamp
traditional Japanese culture o n Western science, technology and other
cultural imports. But this attempt did not erode the process of
exponential growth of the imported packages in relation to the
traditional one. A n d today that guiding spirit virtually does not exist for
such packages as science and even the fine arts, except in the well-
described Japanese social organization of products.
This guiding role for tradition in the exponentially expanding core of
science and technology could be one way for the local culture to deal with
the globalizing hegemony. Under such a model, Islam could in theory act
as a core guiding the expanding non-Islamic cultural system. A n d , unlike
Japan, such a sieve could - again in theory - absorb Western science and
technology and leave aside, say, Western music or thefinearts.

The drama on the Asian stage

If the above are the broader general dynamics of local and global culture
in the coming decades, h o w will they manifest themselves concretely in
the Asian case?
At the time of its forced opening to the West by Perry's Black Ships,
Japan was forced to deal directly with the West, an issue that it had
avoided for several centuries as it shunned European powers in the time
of isolation. During the Meiji Restoration that followed, Japan decided
on an avid process of Westernization. Although this Westernization was
selective, as can be seen from the slogan ' W a k o n Yosai"1 it was actually
a m u c h larger transformation where a variety of Western cultural
aspects were absorbed as universal, civilized and modern. These

11. M . Y . Yoshino, Japan's Managerial System- Tractom and Innovation, p. 21, Cambridge,
Mass., M I T Press, 1968.

75
 Susantha Goonatilake

included Western forms of dress, music, all the fine arts and the syl-
labuses of entire education systems (except Japanese language and
history), including philosophy. O n e area that was not Westernized was
that related to forms of group social relations derived from Japan's
Confucian past. Today Japan is to a south Asian very m u c h a Western
nation culturally, except for its language and social relations. If a
Japanese speaks of philosophy, it is only Western philosophy. Music,
both classical and popular, is also largely Western, as anyone w h o listens
to music on Japanese radio or T V soon discovers.
In China, too, the major thrust of the C o m m u n i s t Revolution was a
rejection not only of the social relations of its past, but also m a n y of
segments of its past culture. T h e Cultural Revolution was an extreme
case, but even after a stop had been put to its excesses, several parts of
the earlier cultural heritage were excised. Although traditional music,
language and literature survive, large chunks of the cultural past have
been wiped out. A n d those w h o write knowingly of China's past cultural
and philosophical systems are perhaps to be found more outside the
mainland, as exemplified by such journals as Philosophy East and West.
T h e cultural continuity with its past which exists in the West, in spite of
major transformations, is therefore m u c h less in the case of China.
Eastern Asia also went through major changes in the economic
underpinnings of its past traditions, through desirable land reforms in
China, Japan, Korea and Taiwan. These speeded u p the transformation
of their economies and also their cultural underpinnings by changing
the scaffolding d o w n which their traditional cultures were transmitted.
T h e cultural changes envisaged by their modernizing élites, the
effects of authoritarian regimes (as, say, in Tibet), combined with their
Confucian ethos, has seen the muting of east Asian fissiparous
tendencies.12 T h u s China has m a n y sub-ethnic groups and m a n y local
traditions, but their expressions have not emerged into major conflicts.13
Although such nationalist expressions exist in eastern Asia, they are in a
relatively muted form.
T h e south Asian region, in contrast, has had a m u c h greater
preoccupation with its past in its attempts to transform to the m o d e r n
world. O n e possible explanation is that it was more under colonialism
and direct Western domination than eastern Asia. T h e debates in the
nineteenth and early twentieth centuries in southern Asia associated
with such figures as R a m M o h u n Roy, Sri Arubundio, Vivekananda,

12. S. Goonatilake, 'Reconceptualizing the Cultural Dynamics of the Future', Futures

(Guildford, United Kingdom), Vol. 24, N o . 10, December 1992.
13. L . J. Moser, 'Racial, Ethnic and Subethnic Conflict among the Chinese',
International Journal of Group Tensions, Vol. 19, N o . 2, Summer 1989, pp. 97-116.

76
 The futures of Asian cultures: between localization and globalization

A n a n d a C o o m a r a s w a m y , Sayyid A h m a d K h a n , Gandhi and Anagarika

Dharmpala addressed the problems of the present with constant
reference to the past heritage. Continuity with past traditions was
considered important, including the intellectual heritage which was
taken seriously as part of the universal heritage of humankind. T h e
flavour of the latter position is illustrated by the use, at the time, of
philosophical traditions drawn from the Upanishads or the B u d d h a in
the south Asian searches for its future.14
This response of south Asians was in contrast to the well-known
colonial views of Macaulay, according to w h o m 'a single shelf of a good
European history was worth the whole native literature of India and
Arabia'.15 H e therefore urged that a class of south Asians should be
trained w h o were 'Indian in blood and colour, but English in taste, in
opinions, in morals, and in intellect':16 these would be the guides to the
region's future. This, it should be noted, is closer to the Japanese Meiji
project of ' B u m m e i Kaika' (Civilization and Enlightenment)17 where
Macaulay-type changes were undertaken by the Japanese themselves,
than to the project preferred by south Asian reformers.
Southern Asia's concern with its past culture, combined with the
lack of changes in agrarian production relations as occurred in China,
Japan, Korea and Taiwan, has seen the survival of m a n y earlier south
Asian production relations as well as their associated cultural elements.
T h e cultural lineages in southern Asia dierefore remain to an extent
uninterrupted, as does the legitimacy of their contents.
T h e result in southern Asia is the survival of a strong local flavour in
dress, music and philosophy. Its classical music is m u c h more wide-
spread than the European variety, as is its popular music, which has a
very local flavour. Philosophical issues chartered millennia earlier are
taught and researched in m a n y universities. T h e past cultural heritage is
living and finds a vibrant place in intellectual and cultural life.
T h e contrast in attitudes to the past between southern and eastern
Asia is exemplified in heightened form in the Chinese and Japanese
responses to the Indian poet Rabindranath Tagore w h e n he visited these
countries in the early years of the twentieth century as Asia'sfirstNobel
Prize-winner. After the initial enthusiasm, he w a s denounced as an

14. K . M . Panikkar, Asia and Western Dominance, p. 241, London, Allen & Unwin, 1953;
Ananda Guruge (ed.), Return to Righteousness, Colombo, Government Press, 1965.
15. Quoted in M . Edwards, British India 1772-1947, p. 125, London, Sidgwick &
Jackson, 1967.
16. Ibid.
17. R . J. Ballon, 'The Dynamics of the Nation State: Japan's Industrial Society', The
Changing Patterns of Industrial Relations, p. 32, Japan Institute of Labour, Tokyo,
1961.

77
 Susantha Goonatilake

'emissary of a failed civilization' w h e n he began to preach o n 'Asian

spirituality' which he contrasted with Western modernism. 18
T h e other side of this south Asian enthusiasm for the past, c o m -
bined with the lack of changes in agrarian relations - part of the
scaffolding for transmission of the earlier culture - is represented by the
persistence of caste and strong class inequalities. It also helps foster the
current fissiparous tendencies and narrower nationalisms which are
expressed in the current ethnic conflicts in Afghanistan, Bangladesh,
India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.
A m i d w a y situation to southern and eastern Asia probably exists in
South-East Asia - parts of 'Indo-China' - where ethnic tensions do
exist in M y a n m a r , the L a o People's Democratic Republic, Viet N a m ,
Cambodia, Indonesia and the Philippines. But thesefissiparousten-
dencies have been partly 'contained'. For example, in Thailand there is
an ethnic mosaic that includes Chinese, H o and hill tribes, which has
begun to result in sporadic outbursts, but these are, relative to southern
Asia, muted conflicts.'9
These intuitive snapshots of culture in the Asian region are a rough
approximation of the present. For the future, one has to chart the
cultural dynamics of the localization and globalization tendencies in
economic, social and cultural processes.

Economic influences
Over the last few decades, the Asian region has become the major
centre of economic growth in the world. T h e economies of southern
and eastern Asia had a growth rate of 7 per cent in their gross domestic
product ( G D P ) and the south Asian region of 5.3 per cent20 for the
decade 1981-90. 21 T h e world average during this period w a s 3.2 per
cent.22 T h e comparative figure for the developed countries (which
included Japan) was 3 per cent.2'
T h e entire Asian region is also today rapidly integrating itself with
the world economy, knocking d o w n tariff barriers and opening stock
exchanges to global trading. Further, governments in the region are

18. S. N . Hay, Asian Ideas of East and West- Tagore and his Critics in Japan, China and
India, Cambridge, Mass, Harvard University Press, 1970.
19. C . Prachuabmoh, and C . Satha-Anand, 'Thailand: A Mosaic of Ethnic Tensions
under Control', Ethnic Studies Report, Vol. 3, 1 January 1985, pp. 22-31.
20. World Development Report, p. 206, Washington, D . C . , World Bank, 1991.
21. World Economy Survey, p . 3, N e w York, United Nations, 1990.
22. Ibid., p. 1.
23. Ibid.

78
 The futures of Asian cultures: between localization and globalization

avidly wooing foreign investors with incentive packages. Part of this

foreign investment comes from within the region (as w h e n Japanese,
Koreans or Taiwanese invest in South-East Asia) and part comes from
outside the region, for example, from Europe and North America.
Associated with this economic activity are facets of culture which result
in cross-border cultural traffic.
Because of these economic changes, eastern Asia - and to a lesser
extent South-East Asia - are thus being rapidly drawn into this
accompanying European-dominated cultural traffic. This process,
combined with the relative lack of these subregions' connectedness with
their past cultures, implies that their past local cultures will not have a
strong continuity with the n e w cultures n o w being constructed in their
countries (except for social relations, including family ties).
Within southern Asia, the present tendencies of militant local exclu-
sivity will, in certain cases, probably stretch on to the immediate future.
But these local identities, for which militant struggles are n o w being
carried out, were partly created in earlier centuries within a cultural
discourse with those immediate neighbours or even with those groups in
their midst, w h o have n o w been declared their adversaries in the struggle.
This was the case in Punjab, Kashmir and the Tamil regions of Sri Lanka.
T h e south Asian state has clamped d o w n heavily o n separatist
movements such as those in Kashmir, Punjab, A s s a m and the pre-
dominantly Tamil region of Sri Lanka. Conversely, there have been to
varying degrees exercises in ethnic cleansing by the respective separatist
groups themselves. It seems unlikely, however, that the present separ-
atist movements will lead to independent states, largely because the
geopolitics of the region will not allow it.
In the unlikely event of separatism, what would its outcome be in the
cultural sphere, especially if combined with ethnically cleansed p o p u -
lations? There would probably be a decade or two of strong cultural
assertion. B u t at the same time, cultural elements drawn from outside the
national boundaries would necessarily creep in, as perhaps has already
occurred to some extent in the Islamic Republic of Iran. This creeping
in would be governed by the general processes described earlier.
It should also be noted that in the Asian region as a whole - unlike
previous centuries w h e n Buddhism, Confucianism, Hinduism, Islam
and Taoism criss-crossed the region - porosity to cross-regional cul-
tural influences as between western, southern, South-East and eastern
Asia, of cultural elements drawn from their historical cultures can be
expected to decrease. Cross-cultural influences m a y exist, as for
example in the adoption of a Japanese electronic device. But that cul-
tural artefact would have had very little to do with the past cultural

79
 Susantha Goonatilake

lineage of Japan, except say for certain attitudes to work and

organization on which its manufacture depended.
In the long run, with the exponential growth of scientific knowledge
and with m a n y people being increasingly drawn into more science- and
technology-based m o d e s of production and economic activity, the
globalization tendency m a y be expected to predominate. Further, the
growth of scientific knowledge spawns a multiplicity of n e w subcultures
in the form of an explosion of disciplines and subdisciplines. But this
observation has to be seen in a more nuanced light.
There would still be strong pockets of local elements in the local
cultural lineages. T h e sources feeding them would c o m e from within
the lineage, from its immediate subregion and from the globalization
package. But global cultural processes would be the dominant source of
n e w cultural elements, especially those relating to science and techno-
logy. Yet the constituents of this global culture, especially those relating
to science and technology, although based o n the European foundations
of the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries, are today being relocated in
m a n y Asian countries. This global culture carries with it the historical
stamp of Europe. Today, however, its audience is global.
There are several examples of cultural elements drawn from non-
European sources which have fed the global system and become
legitimized. These include in art, for example, the influence of the Japa-
nese woodcut on Impressionism, the influence of West African masks and
Oceanic art on Braque and Picasso and the influence of Japanese
architecture on modern architecture.24 South Asian influences on the
non-fine arts include surgery during the eighteenth century,25 and lin-
guistics,26 philosophy and psychology in the nineteenth and twentieth
centuries.27 O n e could also usefully recall here Dale's observation of the
south Asian influences on the Americans William James, Charles
A . M o o r e , Santayana, Emerson and Irving Babbitt which helped to
enlarge the American debates on epistemology, psychology and the self.28
O f the more formal knowledge systems, there are m a n y examples in
the medicalfieldof items taken from the pharmacopoeia of Asia and
used successfully. Such attempts in medicine also include thefieldsof

24. S. Goonatilake, Crippled Minds: An Exploration into Colonial Culture, pp. 7 3 - 4 ,

Vikas, 1982.
25. C . A . Alvares, Homo Faber: Technology and Culture in India, China and the West
1500-1972, p. 63, B o m b a y , Allied Publishers Private Ltd, 1979.
26. P . P . Wiener (ed.), Dictionary of the History of Ideas, p. 67, N e w York, Scribner's,
1973.
27. A . H . Maslow, Towards a Psychology of Being, N e w York, Van Nostrand, 1968.
28. D . Riepe, 'The Indian Influence in American Philosophy: Emerson to Moore',
Philosophy East and West, Vol. 17, N o . 14, January-October 1967, pp. 124-37.

80
 The futures of Asian cultures: between localization and globalization

bio-feedback and m i n d - b o d y healing, which have been influenced by

proven Asian techniques. These stress-reduction techniques have bor-
rowed heavily from Eastern sources and include those using direct
classical Asian meditation methods.
A major current formal attempt to use Asian concepts is being
undertaken by a group of young Indian scientists and sponsored by
India's major scientific bodies. Here, scientists trained formally in the
Western tradition are attempting to m i n e their traditional knowledge for
use in Western scientific enterprise. This p r o g r a m m e is making a wide-
ranging exploration in thefieldsof mathematics, logic, linguistics and
the cognitive sciences for possible areas of splicing-in.29 A s an example,
m e m b e r s of the p r o g r a m m e have pointed out that the Jain tradition
developed a system of transfinite mathematics separate from the West
that could have m o d e r n uses. Another practical example of the use of
south Asian models of mental processing is in artificial intelligence (AI).
Indian researchers, in collaboration with American colleagues, have
successfully used the approaches of thefifth-centuryB C grammarian
Panini to develop software for machine translation.3"
Francisco Várela,31 a leading theoretical biologist and student of
cognitive science and artificial intelligence, has stated that the infusion
of Buddhist ideas into Western science would have as great an impact as
did the Renaissance rediscovery of Greek thought.32 H o w far this m a y
be true is for the future to decide. But it is clear that one could oppor-
tunistically capture cultural and knowledge elements from the far-flung
regions of Asia and incorporate them in the globalizing whole.
In trying to catch u p with the West, east Asians have given less
thought to the aspect of incorporating their past knowledge stores into
the contemporary knowledge enterprise. South Asians have tried to use
the past but, in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, they have largely
emphasized the presumed 'spiritual' aspects. It is in the m o r e m u n d a n e ,
material aspects, however, that Asian cultural elements could be fruit-
fully used. It is in identifying cultural elements from the Asian lineages
and incorporating them into the larger globalizing whole that their

29. N . Singh, Temporality and Logical Structure: An Indian Perspective, N e w Delhi,

N I S T A D S , 1990; N . Singh, Research Proposal Foundations and Methodology of
Theoretical Sciences, N e w Delhi, N I S T A D S , 1991.
30. R . Briggs, 'Knowledge Representation in Sanskrit and Artificial Intelligence', AI
Magazine, Vol. 6, N o . 1, Spring 1985; R . Briggs, Shastric Sanskrit as a Machine
Translation Interlingua, paper presented at the workshop on 'Panini and Artificial
Intelligence,' Bangalore, Indian Institute of Science, 1986.
31. F. J. Várela, E . T h o m p s o n and E . Rosch, The Embodied Mind: Cognitive Science and
Human Experience, Cambridge, Mass., M I T Press, 1991.
32. Ibid., p. 22.

81
 Susantha Goonatilake

preservation lies, m u c h more so than in fundamentalist searches for

d o o m e d cultural purities.

Conclusions
O n e can see pointers to aspects of such a future Asian society in two
national examples, India and the United States. Both have their cultural
problems and have had persistent inequalities. Yet both have accom-
modated to varying degrees a strong mix of subcultures. Although India
has several insurgencies, it should be remembered that its large cities
have been bustling cosmopolitan mixtures. In the same locality, there
have been overlapping universes of culture and of structures of meaning,
drawn from language, caste, class and religion. T h e y constitute a cultural
babble of the means to cope with the world, a veritable 'speaking tree'."
T h e United States has had one of the world's worst examples of race
relations, and is far from a melting-pot. Yet it too possesses examples of
the same jostling, viable multiple cultures that w e see in India. In m a n y
American cities, communities from different parts of the world exist
side by side. For example, in one area of N e w York - Elmhurst - over
130 nationalities exist in an area half a mile square and live culturally
overlapping and relatively accommodating lives.34 In a developed
country like the United States, these overlaps extend beyond the ethnic
group to the profession, to electronic virtual communities. T h e selves
here are multidimensional and, in that sense, are a potential precursor
of the emergent global future.
But so, increasingly is India. In addition to the cultural mosaic
derived from earlier times, it is today criss-crossed by cultural domains
of the n e w professions as well as of growing pockets of electronic virtual
communities. Several years ago, India was one of thefirstcountries to
experiment with the uses of satellites for village education. Today, in the
form of software exports, it is a developing-country pioneer in elec-
tronic telecommuting.
T h e dominant image of the futures of cultures in Asia will probably
be of such jostling cultures. A s Asia is transformed under strong
economic and technological forces, its cultures are being transmuted.
Its past and future implode as localizing and globalizing tendencies
interact. T h e ensuing cultural admixture will be a major pointer to the
future culture of the world as a whole.

33. R . Lannoy, The Speaking Tree: A Study of Indian Culture and Society, London,
Oxford University Press.
34. New York Times, 24 January 1993.

82
Asian cultures: between
programmed and desired futures
Ziauddin Sardar

Introduction
Three scenarios
Desirable futures

Introduction
Asia is the h o m e of two of the oldest, and one of the youngest, civi-
lizations of the world. China, India and Islam have a rich cultural
heritage and world-views that are best described as traditional - that is
to say, these civilizations are alive to history and their unique and
sentient traditions. For these civilizations, culture is not what people do,
but an attitude of mind, a mental outlook, a world-view. While they
evolve, grow a n d are even modified, Asian cultures d o not, indeed
cannot, cut themselves off from their sustaining roots. T o a very large
extent, Asian cultures are a priori given: individuals m o v e in a culture
towards a collective ideal of society. H u m a n behaviour m a y modify a
culture but it does not define it. T h e definition comes from the world-
view that the society accepts as a matter of faith.
T h e defining m o d e s of Asian culture are thus its m o d e s of
knowing, being and doing. It encompasses a society's view of k n o w -
ledge and what it believes to be its rightful sources. It embodies a
society's w a y of becoming: what it sees as the goals of h u m a n existence.
A n d it incorporates a society's ideals of behaviour: what it holds as
essential, valuable and desirable in n o r m s of h u m a n conduct. Asian
cultures, indeed most non-Western cultures, guide individual beha-
viour towards what the society holds as essential, valuable and desi-
rable; it is in this sense that culture forms the basis of the choices,
transactions and h u m a n relations of Asian societies. T h u s the Asian
idea of culture is diametrically opposed to the concept of culture as it
has evolved in the West.

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Moreover, the Asian notion of culture is non-hierarchical. In the

Western framework, it is unthinkable for a peasant - simply because he
or she is a peasant - to appreciate Wordsworth, Shelley or Eliot. But if
one stops peasants in the Punjab and asks them about their favourite
poets, they will not only defend their choice but recite numerous ghazals
from their beloved anthologies. In Europe, only a certain class of
individual goes to the opera. In the Indian subcontinent, however,
mushairas (poetry recitals) and qawwalis (music concerts) are patro-
nized by all classes in society. Similarly, as is widely acknowledged, there
is n o distinction in Asian art between aesthetics and utility. Beautiful art
objects and items by master craftspeople are produced not just to be
appreciated - in die West, this often means to be placed in a m u s e u m -
but also to be used. Cultural expression and creativity in Asia have not
been the privilege of a select class or a group of individuals; tradi-
tionally, they are open to all. All can participate in cultural expression;
all can appreciate and 'consume' its end products; and there has never
been such a concept as 'high' or 'low' culture.
Contemporary Asia is the product of a colonial past and a fragmented
and unstable present. T h e fragmentation is evident on all levels: indi-
vidual, c o m m u n a l , national and regional. T h e individual is split between
his or her traditional identity and a 'modernized' environment that labels
that identity as intrinsically inferior. T h e various communities have no
avenues for the creative expressions of cultural authenticity and are
locked in a life-and-death struggle between religious fundamentalism on
the one hand and unchecked Westernization on the other. Nations are
being torn apart by the ruling élite with its o w n cultural visions and the
vast majority of citizens w h o wish to proceed in a diametrically opposite
direction. A n d the region itself is divided between small, thoroughly
Westernized economic havens and extensive, densely populated countries
where people with traditional outlooks have been submerged in an ocean
of poverty. Cultural alienation, social dislocation, religious and secular
fundamentalism, rampant Westernization, independence movements,
habitual violence and pockets of conspicuous affluence tend to be the
n o r m . In thinking about die future of Asian cultures, w e need to keep this
fragmented present, as well as the suffocating colonial past, firmly in view.

Three scenarios
Asia faces three possible cultural futures in the next twenty years. W e can
call thefirstof these the 'more of the same' scenario. Here, a delicate
balance is reached witfiin the overall pattern of fragmentation and

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 Asian cuitares: between programmed and desired futures

imbalance. D e m a n d s for cultural autonomy from various ethnic

minorities continue but so does the suppression of cultural groups by
nation-states without satisfactory resolutions, in endlessly perpetual
cycles. Internal strife and violence will drain the resources of m a n y
countries, drawing them away from such important areas as education,
rural development and eradication of poverty. T h u s illiteracy, urban-
ization, unemployment, social strife, ethnic violence, poverty in absolute
terms and the gap between the conspicuously rich and abjectly poor - as
described in numerous E S C A P reports, for example, Social Development
Strategy for the ESCAP Region Towards the Year 2000 and Beyond
( E S C A P , 1992) - will increase across the region in general and southern
Asia, central Asia and Indonesia and the Philippines in South-East Asia
in particular. T h e newly industrialized countries, as well as those seeking
to attain that status, will continue o n their present trajectory in the near
future until they hit the inevitable protectionist measures from the
United States and the European Union. Japan will o w n a great deal of the
assets in the newly industrialized states and will become the main
(economic) imperial power in Asia.
Cultural fragmentation and alienation will thus become the n o r m in
the region. M a n y indigenous cultures and ethnic groups such as the tribal
cultures of Thailand (Wijeyewardene, 1990) and the forest people of
Borneo could be displaced and suffer irreparable damage. Constant strife
between, on the one hand, ethnic groups pursuing cultural 'authenticity'
and expression and, on the other, ruling and urban Westernized élites
seeking to suppress them in the n a m e of progress and national identity
will m a k e all cultural exchanges banal and meaningless. This will lead to
pile-up after pile-up on the highway of future history.
T h e second possible future can be termed the 'fossilization of
alternatives' scenario (see Atal, 1988). This involves the ruling élite, with
state power and military might behind them, winning the day for Western
secularism and market economies. T h e fundamentalists and movements
for cultural and territorial autonomy are not just forcibly suppressed but
their political and economic options are shown to be fossilized in history
and tradition, and thus quite irrelevant to the modern world. T o s o m e
extent, the fundamentalists are already doing this: they look back to a
romanticized past and project an arcane and obscurantist framework of
thought. Their political programmes - where these actually exist - are
unreal and their experience of managing a modern state is either non-
existent or has been a dismal failure (for example, Jamaat-e-Islami's
participation in General Zia's government in Pakistan or the management
of Kalantan state in Malaysia by P A S , the Malaysian Islamic opposition).
It can also be shown that m a n y independence movements in Asia are

85
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seeking to establish states which would not be viable economically. T h u s

an independent Khalistan or an independent Sind would suffer from
what is k n o w n in the development literature as 'small-country problems';
such states would not possess enough resources to survive economically
and would become client states of their big neighbours.
T h e 'fossilization of alternatives' would actually m e a n a large-scale
triumph of the monolithic and hierarchical culture of Western civilization,
with all its implications for globalization and standardization. Asia would
become a large bazaar where all sorts of consumable local world-views
and artefacts would vie for attention with Western consumer goods,
fashionable life-styles and cultural artefacts. Authentic Asian traditions
would cave in and exist only as exotic consumables. Post-modernism
would rule.
O n e future expression of the 'fossilization of alternatives' might be
the 'Singaporization' of m u c h of Asia. B y 'Singaporization' is meant
attempts to duplicate the success of the city-state m o d e l of Singapore:
sanitized, semi-authoritarian open markets with an ethnic gloss over a
thoroughly solid Westernized core. Emerging tigers such as Thailand
could b e c o m e like Singapore, reflecting its economic success as well as
its total assimilation and absorption into Western culture; Taiwan and
the Republic of Korea, to a very large extent, already look like Changi
Airport. Other South-East Asian countries such as Indonesia and the
Philippines would culturally emulate Singapore without actually acqui-
ring its economic benefits. Elsewhere, special economic zones and
Westernized enclaves developed to attract foreign investment would
become Westernized city-states within traditional nation-states.
In this scenario, all aspects of culture would b e c o m e 'commodified'.
Genuine traditional culture would exist only as artefacts in m u s e u m s .
Tradition would b e c o m e a voyeuristic commodity to be packaged and
paraded in front of tourists. Just as the sensuality of Thai culture has
been packaged as a m o d e r n sex industry, aspects of traditional life-
styles, customs, art forms and the performing arts would be packaged
as commodities for an increasing n u m b e r of tourists locally and for
export abroad. Living, breathing and authentic expressions of n o n -
Western cultures and life-styles would be buried under the sheer weight,
power of projection, and insatiable ability to penetrate every aspect of
h u m a n thought and behaviour, of Western culture. T o some extent this
is already happening.
A possible silver lining in this scenario is the 'Malaysian model'.
Countries on the verge of industrialization, like Thailand and Indonesia,
and countries with a reasonably developed scientific and technological
infrastructure, like India and Pakistan, could choose to follow the

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 Asian cultures: between programmed and desired futures

example of Malaysia rather than Singapore. Here different ethnic,

religious and class-based cultures actually share power within an agreed
framework instead of the state being dominated by a single, self-
interested, authoritarian, Westernized élite. This enables different cul-
tural groups to guard and enhance what they see as the most important
aspects of their culture. Political power at the disposal of minorities
ensures s o m e measure of success in promoting cultural authenticity and
traditional life-styles. W e thus have oasis of a m o d i c u m of authenticity
and cultural expression within an overall pattern of Westernization - the
top end of post-modernism.
T h e adoption of the Malaysian m o d e l by other Asian states depends
on two basic factors. T o begin with, it hangs on the continuing eco-
nomic success of Malaysia as well as its ability to inspire others with its
model by achieving genuine multiculturalism. A n d it requires not just
democracy, but also a negotiated system of power-sharing a m o n g diff-
erent cultural groups. This implies a level of cultural awareness a m o n g
the ruling élite that has hitherto been absent elsewhere in Asia.
T h e third option for cultural futures in Asia is the 'Balkanization'
scenario. Here, the Asian states collapse under the weight of virulent
nationalism, the forces of fundamentalism and d e m a n d s for indepen-
dence by ethnic minorities. S o m e of these countries have a long history
of minority groups engaged in a bloody struggle for liberation and self-
rule. Although success has eluded the liberation m o v e m e n t s so far, it is
always possible that they m a y succeed in the near future.
This is a bloody and frightening scenario. It could lead to a total
destabilization of the region with all its attendant consequences. While
Balkanization would lead to a more authentic cultural expression and
life-style for certain minorities, for others, self-rule in a small, unstable
nation-state could m e a n the suppression of cultural expression because
of an abject economic dependency. It is quite insane to talk of cultural
expression and the promotion of traditional life-styles under such
circumstances. It is highly likely that self-rule for m a n y ethnic minorities
in Asia will produce similar experiences.
T h e three scenarios for cultural futures in Asia are not totally inde-
pendent of each other. It is probable that Balkanization m a y proceed to-
gether with Westernization, thus further suppressing the emergence of any
viable cultural and political alternatives. In the social and cultural spheres,
the industrial world's control over the Asian people could increase expo-
nentially. Asian states have already, consciously or unconsciously, impor-
ted Western models of education, communications, cognitive structures,
health-care systems, population planning, co-operatives, housing and
transportation systems, even modes for the expression of dissent. These

87
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models are not only profoundly unsuitable and inappropriate for solving
the basic needs of the majority of people in Asia; they also promote the
self-fulfilment or self-realization of the three future scenarios of Asian
cultures. T h e existing models of thought and action could thus propel Asia
towards three highly tenacious and contentious cultural futures.
N o n e of the above scenarios is desirable. Desirable futures would
have to be delineated consciously, planned m u c h m o r e acutely and
worked for systematically.

Desirable futures
T h e underlying theme of the three possible scenarios is the perpetual
tension (at best) and conflict (at worst) between tradition and modernity
in Asia. W h a t is cultural in Asian societies is simultaneously traditional.
Cultural anxiety, cultural expression, cultural conflict, cultural d o m i -
nation - everything cultural is intrinsically connected with the image and
perception of tradition in Asian societies. Working towards desirable
futures thus requires tackling tradition; and that means evolving strategies
for promoting cultural authenticity and cultural autonomy.
In an Asian context, the rethinking of the concept of tradition is
m o r e a process of recovery of its indigenous meaning and a
development of its inherent potential to produce stable autochthonous
change. It principally requires serious study of the m e a n s by which the
corpus of traditional world-views ossified and became fossilized; and an
examination of the mechanism by which tradition was confined and
removed from authority in ever-increasing areas of social, political and
economic life and turned into the preserve of private, domestic and
exotic peasant 'cultural' expression. T h e corollary of this inquiry is the
recovery of an understanding of theflexibility,adaptability and wide
parameters of what tradition actually meant and was, a n d can again be,
capable of achieving. Only under the tutelage of a recovery of
indigenous history can tradition m a k e the volte-face from being a
backward-looking imposition of the formal attributes of a romanticized
golden age to being a n appreciation of principles of the past that are
future-oriented.
Cultural authenticity simply m e a n s that traditional physical,
intellectual and spiritual environments and values should be respected
and accorded their proper place in society. H o w can this be done? First,
by seeing traditional systems as a source of strength a n d a reservoir of
solutions to people's problems. Second, by emphasizing indigenous
development that stems from traditions and by encouraging the n o r m s ,

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 Asian cultures: between programmed and desired futures

language, beliefs, arts and crafts of a people - the very factors that
provide meaning, identity and richness in the lives of Asian people. T h e
corollary of all this is a sensible check o n the onslaught of Western
patterns of consumption and those consumer goods that represent the
omnipotence of technology - the very factors that induce dependency,
thwart self-reliance and expose Asian societies to physical and mental
domination. A s R e d d y (1988) has so elegantly pointed out, appropriate
technology is m o r e sophisticated intellectually and just as technological
as the dominant consumer variant. T h e distinction is that appropriate
technology submits itself to m o r e demanding, indigenous cultural and
h u m a n e social and economic criteria. It is not the abandonment of
technological advance but the refashioning of what criteria determine
whether an advance has been m a d e , and the devising of whole n e w
criteria to generate locally n e w processes of production and products to
satisfy local needs. T h e very expression of cultural authenticity, leading
to a degree of self-reliance, self-respect and pride, transforms a culture
into a force of resistance. Desirable futures require the articulation of
strategies for cultural authenticity and hence the transformation of
traditions into cultures of resistance.
But w e must not be romantic about traditions and traditional
cultures. T h e y d o not, and cannot, provide us with answers to every
problem that the m o d e r n world throws at Asian societies. There is also
a great deal in Asian cultures that is far from desirable. There has always
been indigenous obscurantism, and all those other characteristics that
generate negative traits, by whatever standards this is judged. Moreover,
Asian cultures suffer from a great deal of ossification and obscurantism.
However, there is nothing per se in Asian cultures that circumvents
change, growth, evolution. It is change forced by external, dominating
influences that produces the disjunctions and rupture that are cause for
concern and are often resisted. T h e issue is to change within m e a n -
ingful boundaries without destroying the very roots which give Asian
cultures their defining characteristics.
T h e desirable futures option makes it necessary to work towards
releasing those internal forces of dynamism and change that are
intrinsic to all cultures. For example, within Islam the dynamic prin-
ciple of ijtihad (sustained and reasoned struggle for innovation and
adjusting to change) has been neglected and forgotten for centuries. A
strategy for a desirable future for Islamic cultures would articulate
methods for the rediscovery of this principle - a rediscovery which
would lead to the reformulation of Islamic tradition into contemporary
configurations. Other cultures have similar principles hidden from
view: the challenge is to bring them to the fore and use them to redis-

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cover cultural heritage in forms that e m p o w e r and resist the onslaught

of virulent modernity and post-modernism. In other words, desirable
futures require Asian cultures to define and shape their o w n modernity.
In shaping their unique modernities, Asian cultures would need to
rediscover and apply their m o d e s of knowing and doing to contem-
porary problems and situations. Exciting work in this regard has already
begun and needs to be enhanced and promoted. For example, the work
o n rediscovering Indian logic, philosophy and mathematics, described
by Goonatilake (1992) and Siriniva (1988), is designed to 'de-fossilize'
and breathe life into genuine alternatives. Similarly, recent develop-
ments in rediscovering a contemporary Islamic science, 'the Islami-
zation of knowledge' debate discussed by Davies (1988), the extensive
research and practical work done on Islamic economics (Chapra, 1992,
and numerous others) and the increasing awareness of shaping
aumentic Islamic futures (Sardar, 1979; 1985) are producing both
theoretical and practical alternatives to Western ways of thinking and
acting. It is developments such as these which will transform Asian
cultures into contesting cultures and demonstrate the existence of
pragmatic alternatives to the dominant culture of the West.
Desirable futures also d e m a n d strategies for cultural autonomy.
Cultural autonomy does not m e a n isolating a culture from the outside
world or shunning the benefits of modern society. It means simply the
ability and the power to m a k e one's o w n choices based on one's o w n
culture and tradition. Contrary to popular belief, cultural autonomy does
not compromise 'national sovereignty'; it is not an invariant threat to
unstable nation-states. There are two dimensions of cultural autonomy.
T h e external dimension requires Asian countries to seek their economic
and political development with the accent on local traditions and cultures.
T h e internal dimension requires the nation-state to provide space and
freedom for ethnic minorities within its boundaries to realize their full
cultural potential, make their o w n choices and articulate their o w n
cultural alternatives.
T h e recovery of tradition should focus on the rediscovery of the
means of stable plurality within communities and states. Asia is virtually
the only area where this desperately needed h u m a n resource can be
championed. Ironically, given contemporary events, it is the only logical
place to search for actual, working, historical models of pluralism and
multiculturalism that are not based o n secularism. It should also lead to
the preservation of what is good and life-enhancing in traditional thought;
legal, economic and political arrangements for the equal participation of
all cultures in wealth and social opportunity; the elimination of distrust
between cultural groups; the encouragement of meaningful c o m m u n i -

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cation between peoples and cultures; and the elimination of extremist

positions and actions. T h u s strategies for cultural autonomy are a sine qua
non for shaping desirable futures.

References
A T A L , Y . 1988. Anticipating the Futures: Asia-Pacific Region. Futures Research
Quarterly, Winter 1988, pp. 15-27.
C H A P R A , M . U . 1992. Islam and the Economic Challenge. Leicester (United
K i n g d o m ) , Islamic Foundation.
D A V I E S , M . W . 1988. Knowing One Another: Shaping an Islamic Anthropology.
L o n d o n , Mansell.
E S C A P . 1992. Social Development Strategy for the ESCAP Region Towards the
Year 2000 and Beyond. Bangkok, United Nations.
G O O N A T I L A K E , S . 1992. T h e Voyages of Discovery and the Loss and
Rediscovery of 'Others' ' Knowledge. Impact of Science on Society (Paris,
U N E S C O ) , No. 167, pp. 241-64.
R E D D Y , A. K . N . 1988. Appropriate Technology: A Reassessment. In:
Z . Sardar (ed.), The Revenge of Athena: Science, Exploitation and the Third
World. L o n d o n , Mansell.
S A R D A R , Z . 1979. The Future of Muslim Civilization. L o n d o n , C r o o m H e l m .
(2nd ed., L o n d o n , Mansell, 1987.)
. 1985. Islamic Futures: The Shapes of Ideas to Come. London, Mansell.
S C H L O S S S T E I N , S . 1991. Asia's New Little Dragons. Chicago, Contemporary
Books.
SIRINIVA, M . D . 1988. Logical and Methodological Foundations of Indian
Science. In: Z . Sardar (ed.), The Revenge ofAthena: Science, Exploitation and
the Third World. L o n d o n , Mansell.
W I J E Y E W A R D E N E , G . (ed.). 1990. Ethnic Groups Across National Boundaries in
Mainland Southeast Asia. Singapore, Institute of Southeast Asian Studies.

91
Disintegration and reintegration:
the futures of Asian cultures
Sohail Inayatullah
Introduction
Towards a critical futures studies
State/airport culture: the intangible asset programme of the Republic
of Korea and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea
Han and resentment
Schizophrenia as the model of the future
Alternative scenarios
Technology and culture
Conclusions

Introduction
In discussing the futures of Asian cultures here, w e will take a variety of
perspectives. Beginning with an epistemological approach in which w e
will examine h o w the 'cultural' is constituted, particularly official culture,
w e will m o v e o n to an analysis of culture, gender and structure. W e will
then reflect on the futures of cultures from the model of schizophrenia,
using it as a w a y to c o m m e n t o n peripheral challenges to centre and
pseudo-culture. W e will conclude with an assessment of the impact of
n e w technologies o n traditional and m o d e r n images of culture.

Towards a critical futures studies

O u r approach is to focus o n the understandings w e give to the future,
thereby exploring a range of alternative futures. W e thus seek to bring into
the discourse different possible meanings of what constitutes culture
instead of forecasting a particular version of it. Culture then ceases to be
an essentialized reified category but becomes a particular w a y of knowing
that has historically c o m e about at the expense of other possible cultures.
Even though w e m a y construct culture in humanist terms as our possible
saviour, no culture is innocent; every reality displaces another possibility.
'Culture' then exists centrally in the 'political', the ability to define what is
important and what is insignificant; what is real. This takes culture away
from frivolous discussions of eating, dress and smell (although these too
can tell us a great deal), or even values and habits, to culture as resistance.

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 Sohail Inayatullah

Defining culture as resistance leads to a more critical analysis of the

role of culture in social change. In Hawaii, for example, local people have
defined themselves by speaking pidgin English. While ridiculed by
mainland Americans from the United States as poor English, pidgin
English serves to differentiate outsiders and insiders and to help insiders
gain some advantage in an island that has increasingly lost control of its
o w n future through integration into the world capitalist system (parti-
cularly United States mainland culture). Through local resistance efforts
- language, music and dance, as well as efforts to regain lost land -
Hawaiian culture intends to return to its traditional cosmology and
thereby cease to represent a romanticized orientalist narrative of cultural
harmony, the land of swaying coconut trees and hula girls (Trask, 1993).
T h e recovery of Hawaiian cosmology then becomes the best defence
against modernity's 'commodification' of the native.
Within our theoretical perspective, w e do not abandon scenarios,
focusing only on critical analysis. Rather, scenarios b e c o m e textual stra-
tegic tools to distance us from the present, to gain a fresh perspective o n
cultures.

State/airport culture: the intangible asset

programme of the Republic of Korea and
the Democratic People's Republic of Korea

A s an important case-study, both the Democratic People's Republic of

Korea and the Republic of Korea are conscious of the possibility of
losing their culture because of Japanese imperialism and Westernization
(pseudo-culture). T h e y have therefore m a d e it state policy to save their
culture, to collect it for the future, to assert sovereignty.
Culture has b e c o m e a central strategy in moving forwards and
competing on the world stage. A s with other Third World nations
(conscious of becoming significant players o n the worldfield),culture
has been given official status; it is n o w sponsored m u c h as in the feudal
era w h e n a wealthy merchant would sponsor an artist. B u t in both
republics, this is m o r e than merely creating an Institute for the Arts, to
spur creativity; rather, culture is seen as a national asset, part of the
drive towards full independence. T h e Republic of Korea has gone:
further: it has established an Office of Cultural Assets which designates
certain individuals as 'Intangible Cultural Assets'. U p o n designation, a
n u m b e r is assigned to the individual. W h e n the Asset dies, the most
senior student is given Intangible Cultural Asset status (Howard, 1986).

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 Disintegration and reintegration: the futures of Asian cultures

It is the state, then, that bears the onus of cultural preservation. O f

course, the Republic of Korea believes that it is only in the Democratic
People's Republic of Korea that culture has been 'officialized'; in the
former, it is tradition that is being kept alive. Yet the contradictions are
obvious. Pansori (story-telling), for example, cannot be preserved through
state power. It is an organic, interactive form of entertainment - c o m -
munity culture - based on ridiculing authority, uncovering moral duplicity
and engaging in frank sexual talk. Attempts to m a k e it 'timeless' risk losing
the innovativeness of the art form. Art and culture as vehicles of limiting
power or enhancing cultural resistance instead become re-situated in the
context and power of the state. Moreover, while traditional Confucian
culture was community-based, in the Intangible Cultural Asset pro-
g r a m m e culture becomes individually based; the group dimension of the
art is re-represented as the state. Ultimately, this is not very different from
efforts by the Democratic People's Republic of Korea to develop an art
and culture based on the glorification of K i m D Sung. In defence of
preservation efforts by the Republic of Korea, m a n y people fear that,
without state support, culture will become Westernized - fast music and
commodified culture - with local dress, food and music marginalized.
Even if official recognition preserves the past, it does so at a cost, for
it forces artists to endear themselves to the special board that decides w h o
will become an Intangible Cultural Asset. Art becomes technical,
patterned itself after recent successes, not creative but imitative. T h u s
Intangible Cultural Assets remove themselves from that which they claim
to represent, the history of the people. Culture becomes 'museumized'
even as individual artists gain recognition. Culture is seen either as
Western or as traditional Korean; efforts to develop other forms of art
have n o space in this binary opposition. Moreover, if a post-Asian art or
culture developed, it would probably be critical and transcendent of both.
W o u l d w e then be able to recognize it as art or culture?
T h e logical extension of state art is what is c o m m o n l y seen at
airports: a few icons representing the nation's glorious past, present and
future, to be c o n s u m e d quickly before one's flight is called.1 Hawaii has
excelled at this with hula girls, lets and music to greet disembarking
passengers. (Far m o r e indicative of actual culture would be not the hula
but immigration warnings, customs procedures, dogs searching for
contraband and other entry requirements.)2

1. Indeed, in one American television show, Cheers, one of the main characters spends
his week of vacation at the airport since that is the hub of cultural interaction.
2. From these w e can learn h o w a nation sees the other and discover w h o can enter
freely and w h o is searched.

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 Sohail Inayatullah

Commodification and officialization are thus the two main trends

creating Asia's future. In thefirst,recent Western categories of beauty
and culture are imported and Asian as well as indigenous categories of
thought denied. In the second, culture is controlled by official boards; art
is necessary to unify a nation and to imply a distance, a measure of
sovereignty, from other cultures. Extrapolating from this, w e can i m a -
gine a scenario in which all the world's cultural assets are lined u p and
numbered. With instant-access video technologies, w e will then be easily
able to locate a nation and call for Intangible Cultural Asset n u m b e r
4,500 and have it played for us. But by that time, real culture will again
have spontaneously developed outside of conventional discourse, in
other places. Culture is not state-owned or state-run; it is resistance,
constantly slithering out of attempts to capture it, ever escaping the
official discourse. It is intangible, neither realizable nor quantifiable. It is
quite different from the state Intangible Cultural Asset p r o g r a m m e
which, in its attempt to preserve that which is considered intangible (art
and beauty), has left the world of metaphor and interpretation and
entered the economic and political discourse. Even dissidence might find
itself being allocated an Intangible Cultural Asset number. 3 O f course,
the positive side is that culture is protected from the commodification of
capitalism, from the market - a market which would prefer electric
guitars to kagyam.4
But which cultural period should be protected? Korea, for example,
has been matriarchal (shamanistic), then Buddhist, then Confucian and
finally m o d e r n . During the Japanese occupation, traditional Korean
ways were sloganized but these were of the medieval C h o s ô n period, a
time of considerable oppression of w o m e n . Nationalist leaders chose
not to recover the social relations of the shamanistic or Buddhist period;
rather, they used the more state-oriented and hierarchically rigid
C h o s ô n period as a defence against Japanese imperialism. Each nation
or collectivity has m a n y pasts, m a n y cultural histories which can be
appropriated in the creation of a future. T h r o u g h the recovery of the
Confucian Chosôn, a strong nation based on 'Korean ways' w a s
created, but at the cost of the suppression of w o m e n ' s rights and labour
participation in the political economy: the championing of one cultural
history meant the suppression of another.

3. I a m indebted to Ashis N a n d y for this intriguing point.

4. Traditional Korean instrument - a zither.

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 Disintegration and reintegration: the futures of Asian cultures

Han and resentment

For Korean w o m e n , the result of these practices has been resentment.
In Women and Han in the Chosôn Period, Young H e e Lee (1992) 5 argues
that the rigidity of the neo-Confucian structure of male dominance did
not give females an escape valve - what resulted w a s han, or deep
resentment. With further justification from Buddhism, w o m e n were
told to accept their suffering and live with their karma. M e n could
escape the rigid family structure through kisaeng (dancing girls) and
mistresses, but w o m e n could not. While Korea is traditionally k n o w n as
the ' L a n d of the Morning C a l m ' , underneath this calm lie centuries of
han. M e n , too, enter the han discourse, not from the problems of daily
life but from the shame of m a n y defeats by the Chinese and Japanese. It
is a territorial han based o n lack of national sovereignty (now further
exacerbated by the division of Korea).
O u t of this han, this sustained suffering, c a m e n e wfieldsof w o m e n ' s
literature and w o m e n ' s expression - kisaeng shijo (songs of dancing
girls), minyo (folk songs) and naebang kasa (songs of the court). Because
oí han, a great, albeit invisible, cultural renaissance resulted. This was the
people's resistance to patriarchy. Is this the world future: not structural
change or implosion but deep repression and resentment? In the Korean
context, even shamanism (which has allowed for occasional individual
transcendence) and Christianity (which has energized w o m e n into social
groups but without changing the male neo-Confucian social structure)
have not succeeded in transforming han. T h e feminist m o v e m e n t has
often been sidetracked by nationalist efforts, as is the case in Korea,
where w o m e n ' s resistance to the Japanese became far more important
than the transformation of patriarchy ( O h , 1982). Moreover, in the
larger Asian context, feminism has been seen as a Western force; the
search for a w o m e n ' s m o v e m e n t that is authentic to the history and
categories of Asian w o m e n is still in its formative phase (Jayawardena,
1986). With further Westernization (in the form of east Asian capi-
talism), w e can expect increased han, especially for w o m e n , unless an
Asian w o m e n ' s perspective (a post-feminist voice) combining ancient
shamanistic principles and modern social organization can transform
w o m e n ' s condition.
F r o m the Asian w o m e n ' s perspective, han is the dominant cultural
formation of the future. Han could also be a precursor to the breakdown
of the self, especially as Westernization and travel intensify w o m e n ' s

5. See also Young H e e Lee and Sohail Inayatullah, Understanding Traditional and
Modem Korean Women's Literature (in press).

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 Sohail Inayatullah

resentment. While a united Korea might lead to an attempt to u n d o

thousands of years of han for male Koreans, a transformation of
patriarchy still seems far off.
Central to any understanding of the futures of Asian cultures is
w o m e n ' s experience of their social reality and their efforts to negotiate
patriarchal social relations. Moreover, Asian strategies in dealing with
power - whether colonialism or developmentalism - have a strong han
component: the face shown, for example, to the colonialist (the 'lazy
worker' image in the Philippines) is markedly different from the face
shown to one's o w n class and ethnicity.
Part of the return to the shamanistic past will be a recovery not of
spirituality (the search for unity of the self with the cosmos) but of
spiritualism, a search for connectedness with the dead. With the
breakdown of modern society and the inability of modern spaces and
categories of thought to provide answers, it is to the spirit that people
willflock.At the same time, w e should anticipate increased and stronger
w o m e n ' s movements, both working alone and tied into ecological, co-
operative and consumer associations. A n e w Asian w o m e n ' s culture
might emerge from these efforts.

Schizophrenia as the model of the future

T h e most important future trend is the rise of cultures of schizophrenia,
of madness. In the Asian setting, the schizophrenic has been located less
in the medical that in the mystical discourse. Like the Hindu and B u d -
dhist sage, the schizophrenic has understood that life is suffering; but
instead of transcending the suffering and creating a n e w self or a no-self
that is enlightened, the self breaks d o w n and is neither normal nor
enlightened. T h e schizophrenic, unable to transcend ignorance and
fear, yet critical of conventional models of reality, can neither opt for an
earlier time w h e n life was simple (the mythological vision of traditional
society) nor live with the duplicity of the modern self. A n epistemo-
logically open pluralist self with a high degree of psychological
integration remains a distant possibility. T h u s while schizophrenics
reveal the irrationality of our rationality, they do so from a position of
paranoia (an exaggeration of fear) not metanoia (which is a trans-
cendence of fear). For example, schizophrenics believe that they are
G o d and that everyone else is not.
Schizophrenia can be viewed from a cultural perspective, helping us
understand what each culture sees as normal and as aberrant behaviour.
O n e possible scenario for the future is a world where schizophrenia is

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normal. Without any dominant model of the real, and in the midst of
the end of the modern world, with the post-Asian world still shaping
(ideally an integrated yet pluralist perspective), no coherent vision of
self, culture or future exists. Unlike other eras where there was an
authoritative discourse (an agreed-upon world-view), there exists a
plethora of discourses of selves, each vying for supremacy.
At the level of the individual, Ball (1985) has argued that the key
trend of the future is the lack of a responsible self, the end of any
integrated set of experiences and functions. T h e self is n o w merely
impression-management, created for social convenience. For Ball, there
is a direct historical relationship between criminality and individuation.
Within this context, with the breakdown of the self and n o self to
apprehend, the key problem for society in the future will be criminality,
since responsibility will be problematic. T h u s one could commit a
crime without knowing which self was active.
T h e Asian self is particularly susceptible: it is caught between con-
flicting cultural demands (tradition, colonialism, nationalism and
globalism), between rapid economic growth and rapid impoverishment,
between the breakdown of the traditional Asian self and the lack of a
n e w self. O f course, w e would expect this to resolve itself differently in
eastern Asia, China, southern Asia, South-East Asia and western Asia
as the cultural forces vary from region to region. However, even as
epistemology, economy and polity break d o w n , there is a search for a
n e w integrative model; whether this model will be the recovery of a
particular past - ancient, classical or feudal - or the creation of a post-
Asian model remains to be seen.

Alternative scenarios
Besides han and schizophrenia, what other scenarios are likely in the
near future? T h e most likely possibility is the universalization of east
Asian culture. Whereas Western culture was previously paraded before
the rest of humanity as the standard, oriental culture has been gaining
ground in recent years. It is considered m u c h less exploitative of nature,
m o r e open than Western epistemology existing in an ecology of
statements of truth and m u c h closer to traditional culture w h e n the
cosmos, society and the individual were seen to be in harmony, before
commodification, developmentalism and centre-periphery structures
became the universal drivers.
However, one dimension of universality might be theriseof a sensate
Asia. Lee K u a n Y e w wondered if there was any solution to the rampant

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sexuality of east Asians.6 With an emerging capitalist southern China

connecting with H o n g K o n g and Taiwan, w e can assume that sex is the
future of eastern Asia, with Confucianism providing the commodification
of w o m e n ( w o m e n as servers of m e n ) and Buddhism removing any guilt
related to sex. Instead of the myth of a billion consumers of Coca-Cola,
w e can well imagine a billion sexually repressed Chinese waiting for a
modernist China with fast time, fast sex and fast music. Eastern Asia
would become the centre of modernist music, art and sexuality for the
twenty-first century, taking over from the exhausted West. Only A I D S
and virtual sex stand in the way. With developments in the latter, w e could
see dramatic transformations in both Bangkok and Manila, sex having
m o v e d to the virtual mind instead of the bodies of young village girls.
Along with sensate culture, vegetarianism, ceremonialized politeness
and meditative practices are likely to b e c o m e universal. Far less likely are
complex social relations in which discourse is understood not because of
what is uttered but because of w h o utters it and w h e n it is uttered (this is
far less likely to b e c o m e universal since it is too difficult for other cultures
to gain entry into this social network).
W h a t are s o m e less likely scenarios? O n e can easily imagine a
Manila-Calcutta-Bombay-Dubai axis as a next major centre of culture in
the twenty-first century. Besides a c o m m o n experience of oppression
(allowing the possibille return swing of the cultural pendulum), there are
factors such as a sophisticated and deep mysticism, a rich artistic heritage
and an advanced intellectual climate providing high culture. In addition
B o m b a y , as the centre of cinema audiences, provides mass culture. For
instance, on one side there is someone like the late P. R . Sarkar - following
in the footsteps of Gandhi and Tagore - with his thousands of spiritual
songs; a range of n e w indigenous theories of science, society and culture;
numerous social movements as well as ecological centres to create a n e w
society and artists' and writers' associations to legitimize and enliven it;
and on the other side Ûiefilm mass culture that provides a voice counter
to the 'pop' of the West. All these combine to provide the necessary
ingredients for cultural revival. In addition, Star T V ' s Asian Music
Television, with its local Asian celebrity video jockeys, provides the
provocative youth dimension to this cultural rethinking. T h e concern
then is not H o n g K o n g (the h o m e of Star T V ) or Calcutta, since culture
n o w spreads through satellites creating an Asian Cyberspace, which will

6. O f course, neo-Confucianism and its oppression of w o m e n might have something

to do with this. T h e exact quote is 'the libido of the sex crazed yellow races'. I a m
indebted to John Cole for providing this surprisingly racist quote, although the
source has yet to be confirmed. But for more on Lee K u a n Y e w , see his speech, ' T h e
Vision for Asia', The Muslim, 20 March 1992.

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 Disintegration and reintegration: the futures of Asian cultures

flourish to n e w levels once electronic communications highways like

Internet become the daily fare in Asia.
A resurgent Philippines is also a possible scenario. Centuries of
resistance, of failed revolutions, of cultural eclecticism, of mysticism
and pseudo-culture m a k e the Philippines a potential cultural centre.
This is m o r e likely than the present rich Asian states, where modernity
and the victory of the official discourse have produced wealth but at the
expense of trimming of deviance - Singapore is the obvious example.
Islam as a cultural force is possible but, since it is politically in
decline, this m a y force a rigidification of culture, a straightening of
diversity, so as to uphold the State and the Text. Conversely, if decline
leads to inner reflection and self-criticism, cultural renewal and crea-
tivity are possible. Islam would then have to reconstruct itself as a
cultural epistemological force and not as a political statist force. With
the breakdown of the Soviet Union a n d the potential breakdown of
China, w e could easily see a cultural renaissance in three areas: an
Islamic south-west, a Westernized H o n g K o n g (or Taiwan after 1997)
and a Manila-Calcutta-Bombay-Dubai crescent.

Technology and culture

T h e foregoing has focused o n social and political forces, but h o w might
advances in technology transform Asian cultures? N e w technologies
will have a far wider impact than television and video. In some ways
they will intensify Westernization and in other ways they will transform
it. T h e y will also transform our understanding of social reality, nature
and h u m a n culture, displacing all three. N e w forms of resistance
against the technologies will also result. With virtual reality, technology
will have finally captured nature and m a d e it obsolete.
But cultures need not be h u m a n , they can also be robotic; robots can
be sentient creatures, potentially living with h u m a n beings and even
displacing them. Concomitant with ways of thinking that see everything
as alive (quantum physics, Hawaiian cosmology, Buddhism, animism
and Indian thought) and with advances in artificial intelligence, w e can
envisage a time w h e n robots will be seen as alive.
For capitalists, these n e w technologies promise a renewal, a rejuve-
nation from the exhaustion that has set in. T h e y promise to revive the idea
of progress and push back the notions of cultural revival, ethnic history
and local knowledge. T h u s it is not cultural humanists w h o will revitalize
the dying modern world, but the n e w technologies and the cultural codes
embedded in them. These n e w technologies pose dramatic problems for

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those w h o consider the natural asfixedinstead of as constantly changing

and in the process of re-creation. Fundamentalists, in particular, will find
the next twenty or thirty years the best and worst times for their
movements: the best because the forces of tradition willflockto them; the
worst because the technological imperative and humanity's struggle
constantly to re-create itself (and thus nature) will not easily be reversed.
It is important to remember that technologies in themselves will be
redefined in this process as not merely material processes but mental and
spiritual processes embedded in particular cultures. This redefinition will
c o m e about from non-Western interpretations of science (Inayatullah,
1991; Rudreshananda, 1993; Sheldrake, 1992).
W e can hope for models of the future that result from co-operation.
According to the scientist L y n n Margulis (1992), competition m a y be
natural at the level of m a m m a l s , but at the microlevel of the cell an
ecology of co-operation (where differences lead to higher unity) is nor-
mal. T h e cells need each other; through each other they can transform.
T h e success of our cellular system might be a far better model in pro-
viding cultural hope than the failure of the war and competition model.
O n c e again, while the model of co-operation provides an alternative,
m o r e hopeful vision of Asia, n e w technologies promise to continue the
process of the unravelling of the Asian self and Asian society and to
create the conditions for a post-Asian culture as well as n e w forms of
cultural resistance. A m o n g the forms of resistance w e can expect is a
return to the classical life-cycle or seasonal aspects of Asian time. Part
of the 'recovery of culture' project is regaining the traditional sense of
time - time as friendship, as sitting around a tree and placing relation-
ships ahead of economic gain or personal ambition, as living in the w a y
G o d meant the world to be. N e w technologies, however, enter tradi-
tional time and disrupt local culture. T h e automobile is an excellent
example. Pakistanis drive as fast as they can to reach their destination,
even going so far as to drive on the pavement. O n c e they have arrived,
however, they then wait for hours for friends to show u p or for a
bureaucrat to arrive. O r one m a y rush to arrive for tea-time - where one
ritually relaxes. In the car, modernity becomes pervasive; the speed-
ometer stares at the driver (there is no sun and m o o n contrast or images
of the seasons or other historical symbols). T h e car is a an imported
technology with no local meanings attached to it.
With modernization w e should expect a decreased emphasis on the
classical model of time, o n the degeneration of time from the Golden Era
to the Iron Age. But culture as a response to the economism of modernity
is precisely about the pluralism of time, about living in m a n y types of time
without allowing any one to dominate, particularly linear time. Other

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people see cultural revival as part of a return to a more natural type of time,
cognizant that all societiesriseand fall, all economies go u p and down.

Conclusions
W e have discussed m a n y possible cultural futures, the most important
of which are: the unravelling of the traditional Asian self; w o m e n ' s
cultural futures, particularly the role oí hart as the emotion of the future;
the breakdown of the self and culture; the schizophrenic model of
unending differences; the universalization of oriental culture; a n e w
cultural renaissance from the periphery; and technological cultures
from virtual reality, genetic engineering and robotics.
W h a t is important is a vision of n e w cultures: not visions that take
away the possibility of n e w cultures, but visions like the Renaissance
which created ever new visions. In this sense, it is essential tofindunity
within our differences. T h e imagery of a bouquet of roses (with some of
the roses virtual, some genetically derived and others grown in the soil),
symbolizing individual cultures and planetary culture, remains an
important integrative dream - a post-Asian dream perhaps.

References
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CENTER F O R K O R E A N S T U D I E S . 1992. Korean Music and Performing Arts.
University of Hawaii.
D U D L E Y , M . ; K I O N I , A . 1990. Man, Gods and Nature. Honolulu, K a Kane O
K a Malo Press.
F O U C A U L T , M . 1971. The Order of Things. N e w York, Vintage Books.
. 1984. The Foucault Reader. Edited by Paul Rabinow. N e w York,
Pantheon Books.
G A L T U N G , J. 1990. Cultural Violence. Journal of Peace Research, Vol. 27, N o . 3.
H O W A R D , K . 1986. Korea's Intangible Cultural Assets. Korea Journal.
I N A Y A T U L L A H , S. 1990. Deconstructing and Reconstructing the Future.
Futures (Guildford, United Kingdom).
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Kingdom).
J A Y A W A R D E N A , K . 1986. Feminism and Nationalism in the Third World.
London/Delhi, Zed Books/Kali For W o m e n .
L E E , Y . H . 1992. Women and Han in the Chosôn Period. Honolulu, University of
Hawaii. ( M . A . thesis.)

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L E E , Y . H . ; I N A Y A T U L L A H , S. In press. Understanding Traditional and Modern

Korean Women's Literature.
L O V E L O C K , J. 1988. The Ages of Gata: A Biography of Our Living Earth. N e w
York, W . W . Norton & Co.
M A R G U L I S , L . 1992. Life After Competition. Edges, Vol. 4, N o . 3.
M A R G U L I S , L . ; S A G A N , D . 1986. Origins of Sex: Three Billion Years of Genetic
Recombination. N e w Haven, Yale University Press.
O H , B . 1982. From Three Obediences to Patriotism and Nationalism:
Women's Status in Korea up to 1945. Korea Journal.
R U D R E S H A N A N D A , A . A . 1993. Microvita: Unifying Science and Spirituality.
New Renaissance, Vol. 4, N o . 1.
S H E L D R A K E , R . 1992. Shaman, Scientists or Charlatan. Interview by
A. Nethery and A . Lucas in 21 C.
T H O M P S O N , W . I.; S P A N G L E R , D . 1991. Reimagination of the World. Santa Fe,
N . M . , Bear & Co.
T O R R E Y , E. F. 1988. Surviving Schizophrenia. N e w York, Harper & R o w .
T R A S K , H . K . 1993. From a Native Daughter: Colonialism and Sovereignty in
Hawaii. Maine, C o m m o n Courage Press.
Y E W , L . K . 1992. T h e Vision for Asia. The Muslim.

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T h e futures of Japanese cultures
Kazuo Mizuta

Current trends
Scenarios - —— w-s

Current trends
NATURAL ENVIRONMENT

T h e natural environment includes climate (temperature, rainfall and

humidity), fauna andflora.O n e of the most striking characteristics of
the Japanese climate is the rainy season, which begins in the middle of
June and lasts until the middle of July. A n important point concerning
the rainy season is that this is when farmers usually begin planting rice.
A series of ceremonies, from offering grain at local shrines, to receiving
young rice plants from the local protective kamt, precedes the planting.
During the s u m m e r the farmers watch over theirfieldswith intense
care, and wish for a good crop in the autumn. There are, naturally, a
n u m b e r of expressions to describe various aspects of rice planting. A n
expression such as tauematsuri (rice-planting ceremony) is an active
word in daily life. Another expression like 'The rice ears droop d o w n as
they grow full' is often used by managers to their employees. T h e
metaphor of ripe rice with its head bowing carries a message: w h e n the
employees, too, become mature, they should b o w their heads to others
and be humble. T h e managers emphasize the importance of being
humble rather than being too opinionated.
Fauna also play a particular cultural role, simply because people in
Japan are familiar with certain insects, birds and other animals. O n
insects andfish,the noted translator of The Tale of Genji, Seidensticker,
explains some of the problems of translation. Referring to the various
insects beloved by the Japanese, he mentions that there are no insect-

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 Kazuo Mizuta

dealers in the West. Children in cities today buy bell crickets or beetles
at a department store. A s for the bell crickets, the n a m e itself is a
creation of the translator. T h e kind of cricket mentioned in the Japanese
classic is a variation of the cricket which exists in the West.
Another factor of the physical environment, and one which can have
an effect mentally, is the spaciousness of a country. Japan, an island
country, is mountainous and has very littleflatland, unlike continental
North America. In a small basin like Kyoto, mountains are always in
sight. Mountains can be one of the factors that generate certain lin-
guistic forms and cultural values such as 'smallness', 'closeness' and
'narrowness'; these space-limiting expressions are not only c o m m o n l y
used, they are also an indicator of everyday values. A n expression like
'the big sky country' is not part of the active vocabulary. T h e spacious
house is an almost impossible dream for the average Japanese, and since
land for housing is limited, developers cut out narrow strips at the foot
of mountains to build houses. After torrential rain in the rainy season,
or when a typhoon comes in s u m m e r or autumn, mountain landslides
often occur and cause a great deal of damage.

SOCIO-PSYCHOLOGICAL FORCES

T h e most difficult thing for a foreigner studying Japanese is to

understand properly the emotional or personal meaning of an expres-
sion. B y the emotional meaning of a word, I m e a n a mass of associations
- likes, dislikes or various degrees of attachment; in other words, the
frame of reference is different for each person. A non-native speaker
will not be able to understand them simply because the culture is alien.
A value like 'freedom' has a certain shade, and does not correspond
exactly to the same expression in the American context. H u m a n k i n d is
understood, in this culture, to be h u m a n beings in relation to others,
rather than single and separate individuals. In this context, freedom
remains an abstract value.
T h e expression ' I ' m going back to m y h o m e town during the obon
week' presents the American with a n e w phase of the socio-psycho-
logical forces at work in the Japanese language and, more importantly,
the Japanese mentality. T h e obon (or All Souls' D a y ) week promises one
of the longest holidays for millions of workers in the middle of August.
There are family gatherings, visits to ancestral tombs and leisure time
away from work. Ageing parents w h o still live where they brought u p
their children expect them back h o m e to spend a few nights together.
T h e dead should be particularly remembered during this week. T h e

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living pay their respects to their ancestors. T h e m e m b e r s of the younger

generation, whatever sect of B u d d h i s m they belong to, visit ancestral
tombs and pray that the spirits of the dead m a y rest in peace. T h e sense
of continuity from grandparents to the present generations forces
millions of people onto roads, trains, planes and boats. T h e Tokyo
megalopolis is vacated, and those w h o cherish childhood memories
return to their h o m e towns to be reunited with families and friends.
T h e Japanese believe that spirits exist in almost anything visible or
tangible - a sword, for example. A m a n would identify with this spirit
w h e n he watched his son leave h o m e as a soldier, or w h e n he saw a bird
flying. O n these occasions, by attaching himself to the spirit, he could
fortify his o w n spirit. People imagined spirits living in the air m o r e often
than in any other place. This was natural, in view of the belief that
spirits escaped from dead bodies in the form of vapour. T h u s , in s m o k e ,
people saw spirits rising.
T h e Heian courtiers cultivated a poetic, Hitomaro-like recognition
of things, with an exaggerated emphasis o n melancholy perception. T h e
height of aesthetic appreciation w a s to cry. O n the day of Genji's
initiation ceremony, the Emperor cried at the irresistibly charming sight
of Genji dancing. T h e courtiers' sensitivity was cultivated to the point
of the exclamatory recognition of the changing, evanescent beauties of
nature: morning mist,firefliesby water, coloured leaves by moonlight,
snow-covered pine needles and so o n . T h e feeling of sadness involved
in this sensory recognition is, with a little intellectualization, transferred
and applied to h u m a n affairs: departure, the death of a friend and even
a happy encounter. Nature and h u m a n affairs, as a total reality, are not
separate with regard to sensory perception; this close identification
between them is so great a part of Japanese poetic sensitivity that it has
lasted from the M a n y o ancestors to the Heian courtiers, through the
samurai mentality and d o w n to the present. A mixture of intelligent and
emotional ways of thinking is a clue to the Japanese mentality.

SOCIAL R E L A T I O N S

Japanese social relations in the world of business have been observed as

similar to those of a village community. Seniority, conservatism, passivity,
the importance of continuity - all these conservative values hold people
together. Workers never think of their working hours in terms of a nine-to-
five shift, but as a continuous process of keeping in touch with their fellows,
and while this process goes on, business gets taken care of. In this context,
working hard, even after hours, is a visible part of behavioural patterns.

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Over the last quarter of a century, Japan's economic development

has taken a leap forward. T h e Japanese n o w enjoy a tenfold increase in
personal income compared with twenty-five years ago. A s people have
b e c o m e richer and the n u m b e r of so-called middle-class families has
increased, n e w styles of family living have developed. While people go
blindly after m o r e m o n e y , nuclear families and single-parent families
have increased. T h e nuclear family, by definition, can be a single person
w h o lives independently of other family m e m b e r s , or a single-parent
family with either a mother or a father, or a family without children. A
family of three (parents and one child) accounts for m o r e than 4 0 per
cent of all nuclear families in Japan.
These families have been affected not only economically, but
spiritually as well. Economic success has meant more jobs and m o r e
working w o m e n and the number of two-income families has naturally
increased. Parents, and consequently the family itself, have progressed
from pre-war, seniority-oriented vertical values to post-war, individual-
oriented democratic values. In the process, parents have become con-
fused as to what values they should hold on to, especially w h e n bringing
u p their children. T h e younger parents have chosen democratic values.
It is c o m m o n l y accepted that w o m e n have become stronger and m e n
weaker in post-war Japan. Inevitably, the family situation has also
undergone an extensive transition; the mother has become ever stronger
(working, fewer children, more involved in domestic decision-making)
while the father has lost some of his authority. T h e m a n in the family,
however, has kept his position as the decision-maker.
T h e post-war generation has inherited a great sum of new cultural
experiences and values. This generation has also inherited most of the
society's conservative values, such as seniority-oriented (or vertical) think-
ing, haji (shame), amae (dependency) and law-abiding consciousness.
It is important to note, however, that the younger generations have at
the same time learned some n e w values - the basic value of democracy,
the sovereignty of the people, w o m e n ' s suffrage, individualistic
thinking - and that work and play are two separate things. Individualistic
thinking, for example, is most apparent in the increased n u m b e r of
young people w h o want to find their future spouse themselves. Although
arranged marriages are still popular, more and more young people are
finding their o w n partners. T h e n e w social conditions, such as a higher
income, have increased the sense of personal freedom and encouraged
young people to think for themselves. For the parents, the higher income
has allowed them to send their children to higher-education institutions.
Along with the democratization of the higher-education system, more
than 4 0 per cent of high-school students n o w go to higher-education

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institutions, such as vocational training schools, junior colleges and

universities. Education is one way for the Japanese to realize the Japanese
dream, which m a y be self-improvement, self-realization or a better
position and better income.
T h e lure of a better income has enticed young people out of rural
areas and into cities where jobs are available. T h e consequence is that
m a n y elderly farmers face a serious labour shortage, due to the rapid
industrialization of the nation. Their sons and daughters have gone to
work in automobile plants or o n computer assembly lines. These young
people m a y nevertheless take a weekend off to attend rice-planting
ceremonies. T h e h o m e town is, thus, a place away from h o m e and those
w h o live away from the town where they were born n o w cause traffic
jams across the country twice a year, namely, during the s u m m e r obon
vacation and the winter N e w Year's D a y holidays.

SOCIAL CHANGE

M o r e w o m e n than in the past n o w receive higher education. O n e has

only to see the desire of hard-working parents (mostly the father in this
case) to send their children to higher-education institutions. This desire
is a reflection of parental love and of those w h o have been disadvan-
taged because of their lack of education. Fathers try to give their
children the best (especially those things that the fathers themselves d o
not have). Boys have been given priority. T h e great change has
occurred in greater expectations for girls. Girls born after the war have
received more education than the generation before the war. T h e
majority go to a junior college which functions more as a finishing
school. Unlike the United States, there are not m a n y co-eds w h o major
in engineering, agriculture or business.
Having studied at higher-education institutions, and with access to
information on n e w behavioural patterns, w o m e n have become more
conscious of the need to develop their o w n potential. T h e y n o w begin
working before they get married and start raising a family. A m o n g those
w h o do not receive a higher education at college, social changes have
emerged from reading magazines, for example, those containing classi-
fied ads.
T h e development and sale of hi-tech products have contributed to
Japanese economic success. A s soon as the country opened u p to the rest
of the world at the end of the nineteenth century, not only the government
but the private sector vigorously imported and adapted modern Western
technologies. Steam engines, electricity and construction methods using

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concrete were quickly developed. After a century-long endeavour of

trying to catch up with the West, Japan has achieved remarkable success.
Today's nuclear family is partly a result of the mental transformation
that has occurred in the post-war generation. Values such as indi-
vidualism and freedom have been learned through education and have
helped w o m e n to m a k e decisions by themselves. Today's w o m e n are more
interested in realizing their o w n dreams than were the traditional w o m e n
of the past. A great n u m b e r of them m o v e out of their parents' h o m e as
soon as they get married. They grow up, more or less independent and
individualistic. It is apparent that this mentality is one reason for smaller
families; the average family size was 5 in 1920, but by 1978 the number
had decreased to 3.45, and to 2.91 by 1992. While the same decrease took
fifty years in the United States, it took only ten years in Japan.
Another important change is that people are living m u c h longer
than a generation ago. T h e pre-war trend of m o r e births and more
deaths has changed to fewer births and longer life-spans: 75.91 years
for males and 81.77 for females (1989 figures). This is due to better
diet, hygiene, medical care and so on. T h e death rate has decreased
rapidly from 16.81 per 1,000 in 1935 to 6.1 per 1,000 (figures adjusted
with age groups) in 1989.
Since a society with more elderly people is emerging, care of the
elderly, lifelong education and social involvement after retirement are
becoming important issues. Families must adjust their life-style to
provide space and time for their elderly m e m b e r s . A social system for
care of the elderly at h o m e is needed. People at this stage of life are not
so interested in professional (or vocational) training for more money.
T h e y are interested, rather, in doing something for their o w n personal
satisfaction.
A change in the concept of 'family' is also taking place. Those w h o
marry and have chidren, generally seek pleasure in a happy family life.
Togetherness, mutual co-operation and consideration for other m e m b e r s
are considered important. In a normal situation, these values are the
source of happiness for a family. It has been claimed that the centre of a
married couple's domestic concern has shifted from 'everything-is-for-
the children' behaviour to giving more priority to themselves.
Meanwhile, this social change has led people to adopt n e w life-
styles. For younger people, dating has become a part of their life. M o r e
parents are sending their children to higher-education institutions and
people have higher disposable incomes.
A n increasing n u m b e r of companies have started to adopt a five-day
working week. T h e n e w system provides working people and their
families with a long weekend. S o m e policy-makers are concerned with

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the question of educating the public on h o w to spend their leisure

hours. S o m e people seem to want to work longer. T h e prevalent social
environment, however, still does not allow working people to 'take it
easy'. M a n y people (especially those in their late twenties to early fifties)
are planning to build a n e w house and those w h o already o w n their
h o m e are planning to enlarge or improve it. T h e average house or
apartment (65 m 2 - 8 0 m 2 ) cost from 30 million yen ($150,000) to
60 million yen ($300,000). A n average housing unit in a city costs
approximately eight times more than the average annual income. After
fifteen years' work, a college graduate with a family of three or four
children cannot quite afford to buy an apartment.
Extensive measures for helping company employees to buy a house
are n o w available. T h e housing agency gives priority to applicants w h o
live with elderly parents. Three-generation households are not u n c o m -
m o n . There is also a very strong desire to o w n one's o w n house rather
than an apartment in a high-rise block, in spite of the fact that a house
is m u c h m o r e expensive than an apartment. T h e desire for and the cost
of a house have forced people to m o v e farther out of the city. Suburban
development has followed, together with more urbanization problems,
such as the need for n e w roads and sewerage, and longer train rides.
M o r e than 8 0 minutes' commuting time is the 'happy' lot of millions of
these n e w house-owners. A house facing south, in an environment with
clean air, is even more expensive. People also prefer a site that is
convenient, close to a station, a shopping centre and so on. T h e
distance to work, school and market is also considered important.

Women

T h e n u m b e r of working w o m e n has gradually increased over the years

since the last war. T h e 1992 labour statistics recorded 65,780,000
working people aged between 15 and 65 or over, of w h o m 38,990,000
were m e n (including 2 per cent unemployed) and 26,790,000 were
w o m e n (including 2 per cent unemployed). T h e same statistics for 1984
indicated a total number of 57,670,000 workers, of w h o m 34,850,000
were m e n and 22,820,000 w o m e n .
T h e majority of w o m e n work o n a part-time basis in the service
industries. Their average wage is 5 0 0 - 6 0 0 yen (approx. $2.50 - 3.00)
an hour. There is not m u c h difference in these hourly wages between
m e n and w o m e n , but w o m e n w h o have a full-time job are certainly
discriminated against w h e n it comes to salary. A m o n g college graduates
w h o started working for a manufacturer, m e n received an average
monthly salary of 181,700 yen ($908) in 1991, while w o m e n received

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175,900 yen ($879), a difference of 5,800 yen (829). Over the years
this small difference increases. Female workers are also discriminated
against in other areas such as promotion, further vocational training and
the kind of jobs open to them in the company.
In the lastfifteenyears there has been an increase of almost 50 per
cent in working w o m e n between the ages of 40 and 54. Figures show
that the two-income family has increased and that those families then
begin to experience n e w social problems, such as a higher divorce rate.
W h e n compared to that of other countries, Japan's divorce rate is
relatively low. But it is interesting to see m o r e divorces in marriages of
ten to twenty years: these accounted for m o r e than 4 4 per cent of the
total divorcesfiledin 1985. T h e divorce rate a m o n g those w h o have
been married for ten to fifteen years has doubled in the last thirty years.
It is not easy to cite specific reasons for divorces of this type. T h e trend,
however, seems to indicate that a higher income m a y be helping w o m e n
to become more independent.
Within these changing social environments, the most popular aim
by far is to get married; 95 per cent of the Japanese marry before the age
of 40. In 1991 the average age of marriage was 28.4 for males and 25.9
for females.

Children

Children have tried hard to live u p to the aspirations of their parents.

S o m e of them have clearly suffered emotionally from a lack of attention
from parents w h o have been all too busy. T h e sharp rise in juvenile
delinquency shows what effect this has had o n family life. A m o n g young
people w h o have committed crimes, the 14- and 15-year-olds stand out.
Words like 'Study hard' often came from the mother and sounded
harsh. Nevertheless, the children tackled heaps of h o m e w o r k and knew
deep d o w n inside that these harsh words were a sign of love. Meanwhile,
the house became crowded with appliances. T h e mother had started
working and was not around w h e n the children came h o m e . T h e father
had also become invisible. H e had disappeared from the domestic scene,
the only place where children shared time with their parents, and hi-tech
T V games became the partners of high-school children.
Invisible undercurrents persistently influence the w a y the Japanese
are today. T h e business-warrior is a descendant of the samurai warrior-
servant. While today's business-warriors m a y notfighto n a battlefield,
their on-the-job tasks are similar to those of the samurai of old. Back
h o m e , however, they are no more than grown-up babies w h o are taken
care of by their 'mothers'. T h e mother manages the household like the

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sun goddess, Amaterasuomikami, w h o controls everything under the

sun by emitting the generative force. There is a division of labour or
roles within marriage. T h e combination, however, makes a harmonious
whole. A family is an ecological unit in which individual freedom is
extremely curtailed. M e m b e r s of the family unit are well aware that if
one element upsets the balance, then a chain reaction will follow and
lead to destruction. G r o w n m e n and w o m e n are not considered real
grown-ups until they are married. But w h e n married, both are expected
to assume greater responsibility. Togetherness, respect for other family
m e m b e r s and reciprocity compose the cultural and historical
consciousness of the Japanese people.

Scenarios
A R O S Y SCENARIO FOR T H E YEAR 2010?

In its report published on 27 October 1989 (Yomiuri Shinbun, Editorial),

the Ministry of Natural Resources and Energy assessed m e a n G N P
growth u p to the year 2000 at 4 per cent, gradually declining to 3 per
cent from then on. T h e price for one barrel of oil will be $30 u p to the
year 2000, but by 2010 it will have risen to $45. T h e demand for energy
in 2010 will, however, be 1.4 times greater than in 1989. H o w should
Japan cope with this situation?
T h e report assumes four rather radical situations. O n e of the most
interesting cases is that in which no nuclear power plants are built. In this
case, the Japanese economy will depend more o n oil and natural gas.
Carbon dioxide will then increase sharply by about 1.4 per cent: Japan
should try to avoid this by all means. A t the Hague meeting in 1989,
ministers of the environment discussed freezing the total exhaust of
carbon dioxide in the developed countries at the present rate by the year
2000. Today Japan uses oil and coal to supply approximately three-
quarters of its energy consumption. Planners realize they cannot depend
on fossil fuel. O n the other hand, if Japan uses only nuclear power plants
to generate the necessary energy and keep to the present level of carbon
dioxide exhaust, it will need to build seventy more such plants. It is
impossible to do this, however: there is neither enough popular support
for more plants nor sufficient space for them. T h e best solution is to
supply the necessary energy from mixed resources, such as oil, coal,
natural gas, nuclear power and so on.
Japanese policy-makers and United States leaders have agreed to
maintain the security treaty. Although relying on this treaty, Japan will

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not sit back, but will go out of its way to help its neighbours achieve goals
of various kinds. T h e country needs to secure a constant energy supply;
the government will be diplomatically prudent and will carry out policies
such as economic co-operation, technology transfer and the provision of
aid to other nations.
With a tacit agreement that the world situation is moving towards
peace, local governments must be optimistic for the twenty-first century
and the following projects and plans are possible. Hyogo Prefecture, for
example, as one of the leading industrialized areas of the western central
industrial complexes, is especially enthusiastic about making itself a
prosperous hi-tech, high-quality community. Its expectation for a better
future is based o n the opening of the n e w Kansai International Airport
and the Great Akashi Bridge, which will be completed in four years. T h e
municipal government has a long list of projects, from the major bridge
project to the completion of a cable T V network in a small rural
community. H y o g o Prefecture planners are obviously thinking ahead to
make the area a better, more sophisticated hi-tech community.
Another important system for the next century is the development
of a hi-tech intelligent information network. T h e m a x i m u m use of
C A T V combined with satellite will be the key. T h e satellite ( J C - S A T or
S C C ) will be connected with receivers on earth, such as the H y o g o
transfer centre. T h e tele-message programme-supply companies and
the other groups of the C A T V centre will send programmes to each
household. S o m e cities, such as Amagasaki, Nishinomiya, Itami and
Ashiya, have already begun using the C A T V services, while smaller
communities like Goshiki started broadcasting the C A T V programmes
in April 1994.
In addition to the hardware system mentioned above, groups of
professional councillors, housewives, volunteers and students, such as
the 500 Leadership Committee, have been formed and are already
functioning. T h e y will learn leadership and cultivate a sense of res-
ponsibility towards various community projects. T h e committee started
its activities in 1988 by holding a seminar which was attended by parti-
cipants from all parts of the prefecture. It plans to hold the prefecture-
wide seminar once a year. T h e municipal government plans to build a
centre for sports and recreation to support the activities of the 500
Leadership Committee.
Demographic statistics show that Japan is a rapidly ageing society.
B y the middle of the twenty-first century, one out of every four citizens
will be 65 or older. T h e current life-span of a Japanese is 8 0 years. T h e
municipal government tries to promote various ways and means of
meeting the challenges of the time. Securing a workforce that can serve

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the aged, as well as providing the necessary facilities, will be a

tremendous task. Welfare measures will also involve voluntary co-
operation: measures that help develop a society in which m e n and
w o m e n can coexist in harmony, that promote education for equality
between m e n and w o m e n and that create opportunities for w o m e n .
Rehabilitation facilities run by the municipal government are being
reorganized and updated. Twenty-two care centres for the aged are in
operation at present and will increase to thirty-four by the year 2000.
Institutions like centres for the aged are in great d e m a n d in isolated
areas; service centres for the aged will increase from ten to twenty by the
year 2000.
Other measures will create a suitable environment to improve the
quality of life. T o achieve an advanced level of quality environment, the
municipal government plans to co-ordinate projects to increase the social
capital, such as high-quality houses, general land development and so on.
T h e creation of more amenities or living quarters by utilizing waterfronts
and greenery is an urgent measure the municipal government has to
implement. A m o n g related projects, the municipal government plans to
create new-town communities at various sites in the prefecture.

A Q U A L I T Y LIFE SCENARIO

Japan can expect steady economic growth and can secure sustainable
development. T h e demographic records present n e w future situations,
such as m o r e w o m e n in the work force, an ageing society, and a medicare
burden for young people w h o will work fewer hours but will seek a better
quality of life. T h e fact that Japanese voters recently chose the n e w
coalition party to be responsible for managing the country m a y indicate
that people want a new government to c o m e u p with a series of policies
to improve the quality of life. This includes improving the social capital
- sewage systems, recreation facilities, the introduction of a shorter
working week, a more efficient work-place, and better h o m e facilities for
the elderly so that they can be taken care of more easily at h o m e .
T h e Equal Opportunity Act for Hiring M e n and W o m e n , which
c a m e into effect in 1985, encourages firms to recruit more w o m e n .
W o m e n will be given m o r e opportunities to become involved not only
in the h o m e but also socially. Highly educated w o m e n are ready to
contribute what they have learned to businesses, organizations and n e w
leadership. T h e classical m y t h that the place of the m a n is at work and
the place of the w o m a n at h o m e will almost be a thing of the past, and a
person will be evaluated according to his or her training.

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Double-income families are n o w c o m m o n and more w o m e n with

children are working. It was once necessary for both husband and wife
to work to m a k e ends meet, but double-income families today work to
realize their dreams. T h e social milieu has changed in such a w a y that
m e n are n o w tolerant of working with w o m e n , especially in thefieldsof
developing n e w merchandise or creating n e w projects. W o m e n are
needed in the development of n e w durable products such as h o m e
appliances or housing. These professional w o m e n will certainly be
holding executive positions by the m i d twenty-first century. T h e y can
be m u c h tougher negotiators than the business samurai of today.
Roles will gradually be decided according to an individual's charac-
ter, ability or training. At h o m e , Japanese housewives have already been
functioning as the minister offinance(husbands usually let their wives
manage domestic expenditure, including their pocket m o n e y ) and the
minister of health and hygiene (when the children fall sick, the mother is
the first person the children consult and it is the wife w h o warns her
husband not to stay out too late after work).
However, this will not necessarily lead to a massive increase in
broken homes. M o r e conservative household situations, like a family of
parents and children, will still be the main trend, while the n u m b e r of
nuclear families will increase sharply in the future.
Young Japanese are already showing signs of marrying late or staying
single longer than did the previous generation. Families with fewer
children are also o n the increase. T h e average family numbered 5.03 in
1935 and 2.91 in 1992. T h e decrease in the number of children reflects
the socialization of w o m e n . Japan will see more of this type of family in
the future, but the majority of people will remain conservative, that is,
they will maintain the tradition of family-oriented interdependency.
Trends in w o m e n ' s socialization in Japanese culture m a y follow two
courses: one group of highly educated w o m e n m a y pursue their career
goals, while another group will choose, after a few years of work, to stay
at h o m e and pursue their self-fulfilment within the family.
There are also m a n y families where three generations live together.
T h e figure for 1985 was 36.9 per cent of all families, the highest per-
centage a m o n g the developed countries, and it will remain high in the
future. It is estimated that in the year 2040 about 28 per cent of the
population will be aged 65 and over.
O n e of the most gloomy scenes that the demographic picture
projects involves the aged. M a n y aged parents are choosing to live away
from their children while both of them are fine and healthy. If one of
them falls sick or dies, the other will want to live with his or her children,
and the majority of children will accept this situation. Problems that

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m a y occur will be those of house-care and financing. T h e younger

generation in the twenty-first century must shoulder the burden of
paying taxes to be channelled to medicare, welfare or insurance. W h e n
a young family lives with a parent or a parent is sick, extra care will be
required, and more work and responsibility will fall on the housewife.
Those w h o have to look after aged parents at h o m e will face a shortage
of help in terms of nurses and h o m e help, and extra expenditure will be
a great burden.
T h e increasing number of old people is already presenting n e w
problems. O n the spiritual level, h o w to die or h o w to prepare oneself
for a peaceful death is an urgent concern. T h e old people w h o have
worked so hard to secure happiness and have achieved a certain level of
comfort are n o w in their seventies, the last phase of their lives, during
which they should prepare themselves for death at h o m e , in an old
people's h o m e or in a medicare centre.
N e w medical approaches are expected to cultivate n e w ethical
attitudes towards death. Doctors and technicians, researchers in the
pharmacological sciences and microbiologists have all been interested
in tackling disease but not in the mental attitudes of patients. B y the mid
twenty-first century, most cancers are likely to be curable. T h e n death
itself will pose a n e w question: w h e n should one be able to terminate
one's life? Being bedridden will not be a popular choice in the middle of
the n e w century.
N e w organizations, where people can learn h o w to take care of old
or sick family m e m b e r s , will be necessary in the coming age, along with
a n e w education system where people can train to be professional
nurses, counsellors or therapists. Private and public efforts will c o m -
bine to create a n e w caring system. A n advanced community will pro-
bably be linked to larger networks via telecommunications systems. T h e
system will utilize C A T V for medical diagnosis and assistance involving
the patient, doctors, counsellors and officials.
Changes will also take place in thefieldof education. Restructuring
the old curriculum will follow. A measure like introducing a hearing test
as part of the language examinations for college entrance is a good
indication. T h e n e w measure implies that Japanese education will
emphasize more realistic, problem-solving, interdisciplinary and
holistic approaches. Japanese campuses are already seeing some foreign
students, but there will be increasing numbers of them across the
country. M o r e college lectures will be delivered in English, which will be
the standard world language in the twenty-first century.
A m o r e enjoyable single life is also part of the future. People
between the ages of 15 and 65 will work fewer hours a week and will

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have a three- to four-day working week. Staying single will be less of a

problem. M o r e people m a y postpone marriage to a m u c h later date;
before marriage they m a y plan to buy a fashionable car, a house;
membership of a prestigious club, a sailing boat and so on. T h e
inconvenience of being single will be solved by the development of
various services, from ready-to-cook food to the automatic control of
living quarters. A n electric oven will heat the main dish at the planned
time; a total security system will keep the front door closed, take
telephone messages, tape T V programmes, run a bath. T h e quality of
life will be an important goal.
Flexible working hours will offer employees more freedom. T h e n e w
Kansai International Airport will be open twenty-four hours a day and
will require a varied distribution of the labour force. Working people will
be able to choose the hours that suit their personal schedule. T h e y will
also be able to choose their work-place, which m a y be a satellite office,
making it possible for them to avoid the rush-hour crowds. Younger
workers will try to spend more time at clubs or associations of their o w n
choice. M o r e associations where single people can meet will be open, and
clubs catering for single people will generate new business. Those w h o
choose to stay single will none the less be in need of friendly company. A
social demand like this will promote a new style of cohabitation for people
w h o are not necessarily connected by love, but rather for the sake of
company. This will be a n e w version of the extended family. Those w h o
prefer to stay with a partner, marry, and become a double-income no-
kids family will try to achieve their dream of self-fulfilment.
With political stability and steady economic growth, the desire for
better-quality living will be stronger than ever before. Yet the d e m o -
graphic and economic structure does not promise such a rosy scenario
in the future. Rather, the Japanese economy will soon face a dramatic
labour shortage, which is already apparent in thefieldof manual labour.
Japan is witnessing a sharp increase in the number of incoming
foreigners looking for jobs. In 1982 approximately 50,000 foreigners
were working in Japan; this n u m b e r had increased to 163,000 by 1990.
According to a Ministry of Labour report, the larger the companies, the
m o r e immigrants they employ. Immigrants are mostly employed in
fields such as construction, services, manufacturing, engineering,
research and development, translation, interpreting, finance, insurance,
office work and sales. T h e majority of companies say that foreigners are
recruited for what they can do rather than because they are foreigners.
Another major reason is that a c o m p a n y needs foreigners to negotiate
with or to entertain their foreign customers. But for immigrant workers
in this culture, m a n y elements like promotion or limited communication

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m e a n that evaluation in terms of salaries, wages and so on causes

problems simply because each element is rooted in the cultural context.
Restructuring the Japanese economy has forced business operations
out of the country to overseas headquarters. Approximately 600,000
Japanese n o w live and work overseas; 64.4 per cent of them are with
business firms. T h e majority of those w h o live outside Japan live in the
United States, but there will be an increase in those living and working
in other parts of the world in the twenty-first century. This mobilization
of people demands n e w information in n e w areas. T h e borderless eco-
n o m y requires a n e w kind of education, especially interdisciplinary
approaches to n e w situations.

T H E PACIFIC C E N T U R Y S C E N A R I O

There is a growing awareness that the centre of world interest is shifting

from the Atlantic basin to the Pacific basin, and that within two or three
generations a n e w Pacific community will emerge. While telecom-
munications and mass air transportation systems have m a d e the world
smaller, the remarkable economic development that took place in
Western Europe, the United States and Japan over recent generations is
n o w happening in Pacific basin countries such as the Republic of
Korea, Taiwan and Singapore. Multinational companies and millions of
travellers are seeing what appears to be a borderless world.
A m o n g opinion-makers w h o have expressed their views on the Pacific
century, N o r m a n Macrae (deputy editor of The Economist) published an
essay called ' T h e Pacific Century, 1975-2075' in the 4 January 1975
issue of the journal. Summarizing his observations on socio-economic
trends in Japan and the rest of the world, he opined that w e were n o w in
the Pacific century. According to Macrae, the British led thefirstglorious
century of 1775-1875, bequeathing to the rest of the world dreams of
wealth through modernization and exploitation. T h e dream was inherited
in the following century, from 1875 to 1975, by the go-getters of the
United States. N o w , the heritage of the century that began in 1975 rests
in the hands of the 'embarrassed heir' of the Far East.
Referring to the period from 1975 to 2075 as the Pacific era,
Macrae observed with wry h u m o u r that 'most Westerners resent these
sorts of projections'. T h e resentment surely comes from envy, for Japan
and other dynamic Asian economies are doing well, while the West is
not. Japan is not free from the fear of natural disasters such as typhoons,
earthquakes and volcanic eruptions, as Macrae says. N o r is the region
free from political conflicts.

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T h e reorganization of economic structures in Europe and North

America as economic blocs will soon also take place in the north-east
corner of the Pacific. T h e Asian Trade Center in Osaka will be
completed in a few years' time and will promote regional trade. T h e
area has already accumulated experience from the free ports of H o n g
K o n g and Singapore. T h e n e w addition in Osaka will m a k e trade
connections between these ports m u c h easier. T h e old harbours of
Hakata, Pusan, N a h a , Taipei, Shanghai and Manila will eventually be
incorporated to establish a n e w economic bloc in the north-east corner
of the Pacific, or by way of the n e w Asian tunnel that will be built under
the Tsushima Islands. T h e Japanese archipelago and the Korean
peninsula will be connected and the whole region will be one large
economic zone.
S o m e decades ago East and West met face to face in the Pacific basin
countries, with the result that diverse forms of nations and cultures n o w
coexist. This complex political, economic and ethical mixture will be the
start of a n e w Pacific culture and community. For the future, Pacific
peoples will have to rely o n this situation for a prosperous existence.
Pacific culture must promote the rebirth of humankind by considering
balance and harmony in modernization and nation-building. T o make it
c o m e into being, one should be encouraged by the hope that its strength
will promote a m o r e lasting peace.
W h e n Macrae said, 'Eastward, look, the land is bright,' a message
was brought h o m e . T h e Pacific age m a y be just ahead of us. However,
one immediate concern for Japan is its relations with the United States.
Japanese-American relations today cannot remain strong without a
concern for the European Union and the n e w dynamic Asian
economies. Yet concern for the welfare of the people in the Pacific area
should not be solely economic, but should reflect various views and
interests.
T h e Japanese Government has encouraged exports, especially to the
American market; over the years, trade between the two countries has
resulted in a great imbalance. T o counteract this, the two governments
have adopted various measures. A s a possible solution, the United
States is suggesting that Japan become its partner. American leaders
want Japan to share a bigger burden. This means that Japan should
assume more political and military responsibility. Japanese leaders are
hesitant to share this military burden, with good reason. Since there is a
strong public anti-war feeling, a military build-up would meet with
great resistance a m o n g the people.
T h e problems left behind by the present generation, such as the
politico-economic changes that are causing such strains in the former

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Soviet Union and Eastern bloc countries - pollution (air, water and
soil), high technology (electronic, micro-biological technologies, space
science) and the population explosion - will all be tackled to maintain a
habitable planet. Meanwhile, the entirely n e w alternative of decen-
tralization m a y affect the habits of the Japanese. They will witness the
transfer of capital complexes and m o r e power will shift to local govern-
ments or to the private sector.
S o m e world leaders are uncomfortable with the overwhelming
Japanese economic presence in the world. T h e y cannot understand the
Japanese people or h o w they think. T o counteract this, the Japanese
must go all out to promote an understanding of themselves. A pax
japónica is to a certain degree inevitable in the neighbouring countries.
T h e colonizing power of Great Britain was worldwide, just as American
popular culture is today. A custom like taking off one's shoes before
entering a h o m e can be adopted by anyone. Sing-along music machines
will provide people all over the world with the means to enjoy singing.
W h e n Japanese ways become dominant, there m a y be a crisis of cultural
identity. T h e Japanese must then learn h o w to deal with the ensuing
problems.
Promoting a better understanding of Japanese culture is a good
beginning, but it is not all. At the same time, Japan has to take the
initiative to secure for itself a better understanding of the multiracial
and multireligious backgrounds of Pacific area countries. Japanese
leaders must realize that it is essential for the future leaders of the
Pacific community to have an understanding of multicultural situations.
This understanding should be cultivated in a give-and-take context. It
cannot be a one-sided exploitation, as was the case in the past. It must
be an approach that no developed Western power has ever taken.
T h e level of development in the Pacific basin countries varies. While
most young executives in m a n y countries are interested in promoting
science and technology to help them modernize, another group is
interested in energy problems, pollution and protecting the environ-
ment. Still others want to promote a cultural renaissance, that is, an
emotional awareness of shared interests and c o m m o n identity as h u m a n
beings, 'a sense of world citizenship' in the words of Edwin Reishauer
or, according to Walter Anderson, the author of To Govern Evolution, an
awareness of global culture.
As part of the measures to be adopted, various institutions and
foundations will be organized to develop h u m a n resources or to
encourage artistic performance. T h e development of a 'third-culture
mentality' will be a key issue in the area of education. T h e situation where
people of one culture meet, for whatever reason, with people of another

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culture is called a cross-cultural situation. Since I believe that those with

different cultural backgrounds will not easily lose what they have acquired
in their mother culture, I prefer to call a cross-cultural situation a 'third-
culture situation'. T h efirstculture is one's mother culture and the second
culture is one's partner's. T h e dikd-culture situation occurs w h e n m o r e
than two people from different cultures try something together: business,
negotiations, social gatherings and so on. While the term 'cross-cultural'
emphasizes the dynamic aspects of such contacts, the term 'third culture'
m a y suggest a m o r e static view. Nevertheless, both terms try to express
the implications of the same situation.

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Continuity-in-change :
alternative scenarios for
the futures of African cultures
Godwin Sogolo

Introduction
Scenario 1: assimilation
Scenario 2: cultural revival
Scenario 3: continuity-in-change

Introduction
T h e nature of Africa can hardly be discussed without looking back at the
epochal history of colonization and the attendant European expansion
which engulfed the continent during the nineteenth and twentieth
centuries. T h e total result of this experience was that African societies
were thrown into a state of irreversible social crisis.' In a significant
sense, I agree with P. E Ekeh that the effects of colonialism were similar
to those of the Industrial Revolution and the French Revolution in
Europe. 2 In both the European experience and the African situation, the
societies affected have never been the same since. T h e difference,
however, is that colonialism in Africa was a clash of cultures which led to
certain social formations that today present the m o d e r n world with the
worst crisis in h u m a n experience. I use 'culture' here in a very broad
sense to m e a n the totality of a people's w a y of life, covering m o d e s of
living, economic patterns, politics, recreation, thought systems, religion
and social organization. It w a s this totality that clashed with Western
innovations, resulting in cultural conflicts that are yet to be resolved,
even in post-colonial Africa. T h e conflict permeates nearly all aspects of
African culture, from religion to science, from politics to economics and
from morality to general social perceptions. I call it the worst crisis in

1. G . Sogolo, 'Imperatives of Social Change: Africa and the West', The Futures of
Culture, Vol. II: The Prospects for Africa and Latin America, pp. 19-33, Paris, Future-
oriented Studies Programme, U N E S C O , 1992.
2. P. P. Ekeh, Colonialism and Social Structure, pp. 11-12, Ibadan, Ibadan University
Press, 1983. (Inaugural lecture delivered at the University of Ibadan.)

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 Godwin Sogolo

h u m a n experience because it has created the problem of cultural identity

for Africans w h o are n o w torn between two systems. In this sense,
colonialism in Africa differs from the two historical revolutions in
Europe where, in spite of major changes, remarkable elements of
continuity remained.
T h e aim of this paper is not to reconstruct the historical past of
Africa; nor is it to conduct an inquiry into s o m e imaginary possibilities.
Instead, I should like to examine the existing social structures and
processes that have arisen out of that past. Although the rumblings of
these n e w African social formations have yet to settle d o w n , the influence
of external forces and efforts by Africans to mould them into enduring
shapes point to a n u m b e r of possible future directions. In examining
s o m e of these scenarios, I shall draw on a distinction I have already m a d e
between the resistant core elements of culture and the malleable,
peripheral elements that are amenable to future assimilation. T h e most
favoured direction of cultural development in Africa, I conclude, is that
of 'continuity-in-change', a process that would widen the horizon of
African culture but without doing m u c h d a m a g e to its identity.
It is important at the outset to restate the African predicament, the
root of which is a multiplicity of conflicts arising from the imposition of
Western values and institutions o n indigenous African systems. In a
n u m b e r of areas, there has been fusion or assimilation to the extent that
it is difficult to distinguish what is European from what is African.
However, as Ekeh's typology of the resultant effects of colonialism
indicates, there are what he calls the 'migrant social structures', the
forms of which were received but without the corresponding values:

In colonized Africa, it was the organization of Europe, not its culture, that
dazzled the colonized Africa. In a large sense, there was considerable resistance
to the acceptance of European culture; but the organizational fragments that
came with colonization were absorbed without discrimination... the European
organizational pieces mat came to us were virtually disembodied of their moral
contents, of their substratum of implicating ethics.1

T h e migrant institutions, most of which were imported wholesale,

include state apparatus such as legislatures, law courts, bureaucracy,
universities, political parties, the military and so on.
First, the whole colonial package w a s perceived by the receiving
cultures as foreign. S o too were the formal institutional structures that
c a m e with it. This perception has been a major source of alienation and
sometimes outright resistance. For instance, the impression is still

3. Ekeh, op. cit., p. 17.

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 Continuity-in-change: alternative scenarios for the futures of African cultures

widespread a m o n g m a n y contemporary Africans of the post-

independence era that the civil service, universities, law courts and so
on are the White m a n ' s institutions, while Africans work only to earn a
living. This same alienation, which led several colonial administrations
to adopt the system of indirect rule in some parts of Africa, still persists
years after independence. Whether they are in the hands of Africans or
not, the belief persists that all political institutions are alien impositions.
In spite of this apparent awareness of the dangers of the Western
model of development, the policies and actions of most African political
leaders do not seem to be directed at a search for alternatives. Instead,
they continue to import products of Western technology, industrial
tools and machinery, giving the impression that they are set to follow
the Western model of development. It must be admitted that the search
for alternative models is not a process that can be hurried. Besides, it
requires expertise and resources, both of which are lacking in Africa.
T w o important considerations appear to fuel the suspicious
response by Africans to the call for alternative models of development.
O n e is that a large n u m b e r of those w h o advocate these alternatives are
Westerners w h o themselves d o not seem to m a k e similar efforts at
reorienting their o w n development. T h e other is that the realities of
contemporary events show clearly that industrial success determines
the sway of political power and hence domination of the international
scene. T o this w e m a y add that the dominant cultures of the world,
particularly Western cultures, are dominant precisely because they are
an integral part of a successful material experiment.

Scenario 1: assimilation
In spite, therefore, of its real and potential dangers, the industrial
success of the West, and in particular its material attractions, seem to
have a certain compelling influence on the development orientation of
Africans. Another w a y of making the point is that the forces of Western
civilization do not leave m u c h of Africa with the choice of an alternative
future. This leads directly to thefirstscenario I want to examine. It is
the possibility that Western civilization will in the future assimilate the
totality of African cultures. Let us consider this scenario in relation to all
the major social forces existing in contemporary Africa.
A s mentioned above, post-colonial Africa is torn between two
cultures, the indigenous elements and Western imports. T h e indications
are clear in almost all segments of African cultures. O n e example is the
education system, which plays a dominant role in the process of

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socialization. Educational institutions in Africa are patterned according

to Western models whose structures and m o d e of learning were in-
herited. Major textbooks are foreign in content and instruction is
conducted mainly in European languages. In religion, traditional
African beliefs and modes of worship stand side by side with
Christianity to which m a n y Africans have been converted. T h e same is
true of major social institutions, political and economic structures,
bureaucratic establishments and so on, which were literally grafted by
the West onto Africa. T h e effect of all this is that indigenous institutions
have either withered away or have been dwarfed by their Western
counterparts.
Given that since independence, the influence of these Western
values and institutions has continued to grow in Africa, might it not be
assumed that the trend will continue and lead to total assimilation? A
n u m b e r of global events in the recent past seem to support this scenario.
In thefinalyears of this century, the West seems to have installed itself
as a pre-eminent superpower over all the nations of the world, including
those of Africa. T h e source of this power is mainly economic although
its sway goes beyond. With their economic strength, Western nations
are able to use major financial institutions - the I M F , the World Bank,
the L o n d o n and Paris Clubs or, indeed, such bodies as the G r o u p of
Seven - to indicate to weaker nations the directions of social change.
T h e forms and pace of economic adjustment n o w taking place in
Africa could, I believe, have otherwise been without external
influences, particularly from the West. This is also true of the upsurge
of pro-democracy movements and political changes n o w sweeping
through the continent of Africa. O f course, every such institutional
change affects the culture of the people, their values and intellectual
perception. That is to say that the dominant role of the West in
economic and political matters could, in a wide sense, be interpreted
as a process of cultural conquest. It seems that in this process, African
nations are the most vulnerable victims, partly because of their
economic weakness and partly because the West already has a cultural
grip on them.
T h e assumption here is that with the increasing pressure of Western
social institutions, particularly political structures and economic m o d e s
of production, the total cultural perception in Africa will wither away so
that the African will become a European in all respects except perhaps
for location, race and colour. This rendition of the meaning of 'total
cultural assimilation' m a y appear a little extreme, yet it is near enough
to the truth. However, culture is a complex phenomenon. A n essential
part of this complexity is that every h u m a n culture contains what I have

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called core elements 4 w h o s e enduring character tends to resist change

n o matter h o w forceful. In contrast, there are the peripheral elements of
culture w h i c h easily dissolve or blend into n e w forms without affecting
the essential being of a given culture.
It is true that the forms of e c o n o m i c or political institutions
operating in a society constitute an integral part of the culture. B u t the
situation in post-colonial Africa seems to be an exception. T h e r e are
democratic institutions without the attendant democratic spirit a n d
capitalist structures devoid of the attitudinal c o m p o n e n t s . T h e spirit
a n d attitude are part of the larger core elements of African culture, not
significantly altered b y the implementation of foreign institutional
structures. For instance, in a culture with the strong belief that political
authority is divinely acquired or that age is a determinant of political
right, a n institution based o n equal franchise of 'one m a n , o n e vote'
hardly works. N o r does an e c o n o m i c m o d e l founded o n extreme
individualism a n d the profit motive function efficiently in a culture
dominated by c o m m u n a l sentiments.
O n e practical example is the extended family structure in Africa,
where considerations extraneous to commercial judgements affect the
growth a n d development of several businesses. Personnel are often
recruited not o n the criteria of merit a n d competence but o n c o m m u n a l
ties. Another example concerns the choice of political leadership. In
m o s t African nations, the struggle for political p o w e r is determined m o r e
by ethnic interests than b y political c o m p e t e n c e . M o s t of these practical
difficulties that affect the assimilation of Africa into the Western m o d e l
of development are deeply rooted in the cultural values of the people.
T h e total assimilation of African cultures appears difficult because of
these core elements that are highly resistant to change.
T h e r e are also items of culture in Africa which, in content a n d
perception, d o not appear to have a n y exact equivalents in Western
cultures. Traditional African religion is a g o o d example. While religion
everywhere performs the primary function of spiritual fulfilment, the
conception a n d role that Africans attribute to the p h e n o m e n o n are
nevertheless radically distinct from those of a m o d e r n Westerner. It is
important, for instance, to note that the bifurcation between the natural
a n d the supernatural u p o n which the Christian religious doctrine is
constructed does not exist in African thought. A s H o r t o n rightly
observes: 'African religion is essentially "this-worldly"; that is, it is
concerned with the explanation, prediction a n d control of space-time
events.'5 Unlike the Christian G o d , African gods are believed to
4. Sogolo, op. cit., p. 19.
5. R . Horton, 'African Conversion', Africa, Vol. 4 1 , N o . 11, 1971, p. 88.

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 Godwin Sogolo

intervene almost as partners and to play a role in people's day-to-day

living.6 T h e crisis for most Africans w h o were converted to Christianity
was that the problems that they and their gods used to solve together
here on earth were left in their hands, with the promise that s o m e 'after-
life' would offer something better. In other words, traditional Africans
believed that the Christian G o d did not take sufficient notice of the
worldly affairs of humankind.
T h e importance of this doctrinal opposition between Christianity
and African traditional religion is that the former has failed to b e c o m e a
suitable substitute for the latter. T o avoid a spiritual v a c u u m , m a n y
Africans battle with the question: ' H o w can I be an African and a
Christian?'7 Quite often, they m a n a g e to live with the intellectual conflict
of subscribing to two religions. In recent times, the surge of African
Churches with an emphasis o n problem-solving, faith-healing and cures
shows the extent to which Christianity is losing its grip o n Africans.
Religion in Africa is one area of culture which challenges the possibility
of total assimilation by Western innovations.
In this regard, it is important to stress the complex nature of culture
as an integrated whole. Here, the definition of culture offered by
Kroeber a n d Kluckholm is most appealing:

Culture consists of patterns, explicit or implicit, of and for behaviour, acquired

and transmitted by symbols, constituting the distinctive achievements of
human groups, including their embodiments in artefacts; the essential core of
culture consists of traditional (i.e. historically derived and selected) ideas and
their attached values; culture systems may, on the one hand, be considered as
products of action, on the other as conditioning elements of future action.1*

Here w e m u s t note m e two major components of every culture, namely

the aesthetic aspect and the pragmatic aspect, the former being the
people's expressive valuation and appreciation of the world as they
perceive it and the latter, their m o d e s of thought, utilization and quest
for understanding and controlling their environment. In their integrated
form, both aspects of culture constitute a potent force of resistance
against change and absorption.

6. J. D . Y . Peel, Aladura: A Religious Movement among the Yoruba, London, Oxford

University Press, 1968.
7. K . Wiredu, 'Problems in Africa's Self-identification in the Contemporary World', in
Alvin Diemer (ed.), Philosophy and Problem of its Identity, p. 220, Frankfurt-am-
Main, Verlag Peter Lang G m b H , 1985.
8. A . L . Kroeber and C . Kluckholm, Culture: A Critical Review of Conceptions and
Definitions, p. 181, Cambridge, Mass., 1952.

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 Continuity-in-change: alternative scenarios for the futures of African cultures

Scenario 2 : cultural revival

In the case of Africa, the resistant elements of culture became a
powerful impetus soon after independence for the rise of cultural
nationalism and the urge to revive or sustain those aspects of culture
swept away or threatened by modernity. T h e second scenario I wish to
examine, then, is the idea that African societies can re-create their past
through programmes of cultural revival. Although it is not as forceful
n o w as it w a s in early post-colonial Africa, cultural nationalism has
b e c o m e an official policy of nearly all independent African nations.
Colonialism caused a great deal of cultural and spiritual disorientation
just as it led to several other distortions. Cultural nationalism could,
therefore, be said to be an aspect of colonial emancipation. Perhaps this
explains the ideological content of the attempt at cultural revival. It was an
effort by Africans to reassert themselves, wanting, as it were, to brush
aside colonialism as if it had never happened. It was based on the well-
k n o w n expressions of the 'African personality' and 'Négritude'. T o a
great extent, cultural nationalism w a s more than a mere ideological
m o v e m e n t . Leopold Senghor's formulation of Négritude, for instance,
was an intellectual quest for an irreducible essence of the cultural identity
of the Africans.
Inevitably, the m o v e m e n t conferred o n traditional African culture an
inestimable value, almost a universe of harmony and pure coherence.
M o s t of it was manifest from the vast literature produced by African
scholars w h o painted the African past as the happiest ever and as the
'good old days' during which Africans were most at ease with
themselves. This romantic vision was pursued with vigour through art
festivals, rituals of re-creation and ceremonies aimed at promoting all
aspects of African traditional cultures. Bureaucratic institutions, minis-
tries and research centres were set u p mainly for the purpose of cultural
revival. Today, m a n y of these institutions still exist with the same
structure and purpose. It is, however, difficult to assess the success or
failure of this m o v e m e n t , considering the continued impact of alien
cultures, especially those of the West. Suffice it to say that the m o v e m e n t
merely emphasized the peripheral elements of African culture, the
restoration of myths, African arts, traditional ceremonies, folklore,
costumes, music, dance and so on. N o t m u c h of it touched o n the core
areas of African cultures such as the people's thought systems, world-
views and m o d e s of perceiving reality.
T h e point, however, is that cultural nationalism rests o n very
powerful sentiments tied to the search for identity in a situation of
cultural crisis. Moreover, it was perceived as almost the only response to

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Africa's humiliation and the devaluation of its institutions under

colonialism. There is n o doubt that the continent as a whole is in search
of cultural identity. W h a t is not clear is whether the w a y out lies in this
attempt at a retreat into the past.
Although cultural naturalism seems to thrive on an excessive
valuation of the African past, its presuppositions contain a great deal of
truth. O n e , for instance, is that African cultures are m o r e h u m a n e and
m o r e spiritually fulfilling than Western development with its excessive
individualism. A m u c h m o r e compelling force is the right of a people to
self-assertion and to the search for cultural and spiritual fulfilment.
Today most Africans find greater h a r m o n y and security in the past of
their cultures than in the distortions offered by the present. Besides,
there can be no cultural identity without a historical past and as such the
search for that past has its o w n intrinsic merit.
However, the attempt to re-create the past must reckon seriously
with the realities of social change. This is where cultural nationalism
seems to fail: the m o v e m e n t suffers from an inability to accept the facts
of history and the dynamics of social change. After the colonial epoch,
cultural life in Africa can never be the same again. Contemporary Africa
has entered into n e w forms of social relations with the m o d e r n world; w e
need to meet n e w challenges posed by a scientific and industrial world
that is always changing. N o matter h o w rich our past cultures, the ideas,
techniques and values which they offered are n o w inadequate to meet
Africa's contemporary needs and interest. In short, m o d e r n develop-
ments have rendered certain traditional African ways of life impotent in
confronting the d e m a n d s of m o d e r n life. Irele stresses the point:

It is of no practical significance n o w to us to be told that our forebears

constructed the Pyramids, if today w e can't build and maintain by ourselves the
roads and bridges w e require to facilitate communication between ourselves, if
w e still have to depend on the alien to provide for us the necessities of modern
civilization, if we can't bring the required level of efficiency and imagination to
the management of our environment.9

C h a n g e is a complex p h e n o m e n o n which is, sometimes, irreversible

once it has occurred. A notable aspect of change in Africa due to
colonialism involved n e w tastes, n e w m o d e s of production, n e w ideas,
etc., which are difficult to discard. All this is m a d e m o r e complex by the
widening of cultural horizons, external influences and n e w forms of
international relations. T h o u g h there is merit in Africa wanting to re-

9. F . A . Irele, In Praise of Alienation, p. 22, Ibadan, Ibadan University Press, 1992.

Inaugural lecture delivered at the University of Ibadan.

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 Continuity-in-change: alternative scenarios for the futures of African cultures

create its past, the realities of m o d e r n living m a k e this impossible. For

example, most African nations survive today by their continued invol-
vement in foreign economic transactions, import and export trade.
Withdrawal from this international network is n o longer a viable option.
Irele is right w h e n he says that

our situation is that the modern institutions w e now operate, the material
furniture of our modern universe, the ideas that are making their inexorable
way among us, are creating a new context of life and meanings to which every
single individual has perforce to relate in one form or another.10

Also, widespread political changes in Eastern Europe, particularly the

m o r e recent upheavals in the former Soviet Union, have spread all over
the world, including Africa. In other words, African nations are part of
this wave of political changes and therefore d o not have die choice of
opting out for some traditional political institutions yet to be assessed by
m o d e r n standards. Apart from the fact that history cannot be reversed,
sustained international pressure o n African nations to embark o n
political reforms makes it difficult for any society to return to the past,
no matter h o w desirable.
In the possible scenarios so far examined, I have been cautious not to
confuse a desirable future with a future suggested by the existing cultural
situation in Africa. That is not to suggest that a future projection of this
sort can be entirely value-free. After all, our main objective should go
beyond the mere statement of the facts as they are or of the direction in
which they point. Knowledge of all this is valuable in so far as it offers us
the opportunity of reshaping Africa's social m a p along options which w e
consider to be desirable.
A s mentioned at the beginning of this paper, the impact of Western
innovations o n Africa has resulted in an increasing marginalization of
traditional cultures and ways of life. A s s o m e scholars put it, Africans
have b e c o m e strangers in their o w n land, having found themselves in a
process of cultural transition that leads to serious tensions and various
conditions of stress.

Scenario 3: continuity-in-change
In this cultural crisis, the continued influence of the West, the forces of
imperialism and neo-colonialism are dominant factors. S o are the
attractions of modern industrialization which continue to shape a n d

10. Ibid., p. 14.

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 Godwin Sogolo

reshape the contour of the African cultural landscape. Yet, n o matter h o w

powerful these influences m a y be, the core elements of African culture are
not likely to succumb to total assimilation. N o r is the attempt by Africans
to retreat into the past a viable option, in view of the nature of social
change, particularly the forces of modernization. That leaves us with a
future scenario in which Africa will continue to grapple with the existing
cultural dualism in a process which I call continuity-in-change. This pro-
cess will have the cumulative effect of widening the African cultural
horizon but without doing m u c h damage to its identity. T h e supportive
evidence in favour of this scenario is to be found in nearly every area of
African culture that has been in confrontation with modernity over the
years. In this analysis, I have chosen two core areas of African culture -
religion and traditional medicine - which, though they have changed in
structure and practice, retain strong elements of the past.
A s in all cultures, religion fulfils the spiritual needs of the people
although its structure and form are determined by the cosmology of a
given community. Before the advent of Christianity and Islam in Africa,
traditional religion was composed of the belief in and worship of spiritual
agencies, gods, ancestors and a host of other deities. A n essential
character of these religious entities was their concern for the predi-
cament of humankind here and n o w . A s J. D . Y . Peel rightly observes, the
main creed of traditional African religion was this-worldly, aimed at the
explanation, prediction and control of events in people's day-to-day
lives. ' ' This was in contrast to the doctrinal principles of the imported
world religions, whose main concern was other-worldly, the search for
spiritual salvation in s o m e world to c o m e . In spite of this doctrinal
difference, missionary evangelization still resulted in the conversion of a
great n u m b e r of Africans to the n e w religions.
T h e p h e n o m e n o n of religious conversion in Africa is itself a
complex issue whose initial success was attributed to various other
attractions that c a m e with the colonial package: Western education,
c o m m e r c e and industry. Yet these attractions were not enough to
dissolve the internal conflicts between the confronting religions. A s
Africans became better acquainted with the n e w religions, it soon
dawned o n m a n y of them that they were being asked to part ways with
their gods, that the problems which they and their spiritual agents used
to solve together were being left in their o w n hands. This realization led
to the formation of n e w religious sects which revived elements of the
traditional while maintaining the newly imposed structures of the
m o d e r n . In Nigeria, particularly, these newly established 'African

11. Peel, op. cit.j pp. 294-5.

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 Continuiiy-in-change: alternative scenarios for the futures of African cultures

Churches', such as Aladura, Christ Apostolic C h u r c h , C h e r u b i m a n d

Seraphim, proclaimed the power to r e m e d y the ills of individuals and of
society through d r e a m s , visions, prayers and other spiritual techniques.
In doing this, the n e w religious sects still maintained a strong
attachment to the Bible and other written scriptures of the orthodox
Christian religion. Again, this mixture emphasizes the element of
continuity between the old and the n e w .
It is important to note that during Christian proselytism in Africa,
attempts were m a d e to identify the Christian G o d with the indigenous
s u p r e m e being as perceived by Africans. In so doing, African spiritual
agencies were portrayed as either irrelevant or downright evil. Chris-
tianity, in particular, has been rigid in its insistence that Africans accept
nothing short of the official doctrine. Until very recently, it did not
tolerate even minor deviations in ritual or belief. N o t only were African
deities referred to as d e m o n s ; they were believed to have n o place within
the Christian scheme.
A n important aspect of the religious confrontation between Africa
a n d the West has been the widening of the spiritual horizon. Before the
advent of the world religions, African spiritual agencies were markedly
local in character and function. Their domains did not go beyond the
primordial communities in which they were called u p o n to account for
significant events of social relations. H o w e v e r , the local boundaries have
since been weakened d u e to economic and political developments a n d
subsequent urban migration. For m o s t urban migrants, the duality of
local religious culture a n d Christianity/Islam has b e c o m e a w a y of
grappling with a n e w social reality. Robin H o r t o n describes the
situation thus:

Converts to the world religions form a continuum, ranging from the m a n

whose ritual approaches to the supreme being in mosque or church are just an
occasional extra in religious life largely taken up with the cults of the lesser
spirits, through the m a n for w h o m the cults of the spirits are of about equal
importance, to the m a n whose approaches to the supreme being take the whole
of his religious life.12

In this religious tug-of-war, the attitudes of the t w o world religions are

perhaps important in projecting into the future. Islam, for instance, has
been observed to be a great deal m o r e tolerant than Christianity, the
former being m o r e willing to accept those w h o c o m e from a continuum
rather than a b a n d of n e w converts. Unlike Christianity, Islam does not
criticize those w h o lie towards the pagan end of the continuum.

12. Horton, op. cit., p. 104.

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 Godwin Sogolo

Nothing, perhaps, is m o r e difficult to change than a people's

cosmology and habits of thought. While the world religions will continue
to have an impact o n the peripheral elements of African traditional
religions, perhaps with minor changes in ritual and belief, the core
doctrinal aspects will persist. T h e result is a mixture of the traditional and
the m o d e r n which today characterizes the practice of religion in Africa.
M y proposition, then, is that this process of continuity-in-change will lead
to an increasing globalization of African religious m o d e s of thought.
In support of the s a m e thesis, I n o w consider the relation between
Western science and African traditional medical notions. Social
relations play a dominant role in the African m o d e of explaining events.
This is evident from the practice of traditional medicine in which moral
considerations play a significant role. A n important aspect of the
African conception of health and disease is that it is the whole h u m a n
body that is considered to be either well or in a diseased state rather than
merely s o m e particular part of the body.
Unlike in the West, where patients, w h e n consulting the physician,
often give a hint as to what part of the body they think is afflicted, the
traditional African (except in the case of easily identifiable anatomical
parts of the body or external injuries due to an accident) is generally non-
specific as to the part of the body afflicted by disease. Even the healer
consulted does not press for such specific information. This n o n -
specificity in associating diseases with parts of the body is clear from the
fact that, generally, traditional healers do not start their diagnosis of illness
by a physical examination of the patient's body. Their primary concern is
with the patient's background in socio-cultural and in divine/supernatural
relations. T h u s a given illness or disease is generally explained by
references to several causes, s o m e of which, in m o d e r n scientific thought,
m a y appear to be logically incompatible. A n African healer m a y attribute
a disease to a scientific/natural cause, not too dissimilar to the germ theory
of m o d e r n medicine, yet m a y also believe that the same disease is 'caused'
by supernatural forces. T h e healer would then proceed to cure the disease
in these two seemingly incompatible directions.
Normally, any such conception of illness that appeals to
supernatural forces, deities, spirits, witchcraft and so o n is classified as
a form of animism, which, in fact, is c o m m o n in the history of every
society. For example, early medical practice in Scotland took this form
in which, according to M . Clough, 'healing lay in propitiating the
powers (supernatural) against which the patient might have offended'.I3

13. M . Clough, 'Early Healing', in R . Passmore (ed.), Proceedings of the Royal College of
Physicians of Edinburgh Tercentenary Congress, p . 183, 1981.

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 Continuity-in-change: alternative scenarios for the futures of African cultures

Such supernatural factors play an important role in almost all pre-

literate (ancient and contemporary) societies. It is c o m m o n for m o d e r n
scientific thinkers to read irrationality into this supernatural approach to
medical healing. However, in relation to the African conception of
health and illness, this impression is misleading. Although apparently
animistic in outlook, the traditional African conception of disease or
illness conforms, at least in part, with the basic n o r m s of m o d e r n
medical practice.
Basically, the causes of illness in traditional African thought fall into
two major categories, the primary and the secondary. Primary causes of
illness are those predisposing factors that are not directly explicable in
physical terms. S o m e of these factors take the form of supernatural
entities such as deities, spirits, witches; others are stress-induced, either
as a result of the victim's contravention of c o m m u n a l morality or his or
her strained relationship with other persons within the community.
Secondary causes, on the other hand, involve direct causal connection
similar to the cause-effect relation of the germ theory in orthodox
m o d e r n medicine. If for instance, a m a n is suffering from stomach ache
and acute diarrhoea and he is vomiting, he is suspected to have eaten
s o m e 'poisoned' food. It has been reported that in Yoruba, ete (leprosy)
is spread either by spiders, or through chewing sticks on whichflieshave
landed, or by drinking 'local gin'.14 T h e Yoruba concept kokoro, syno-
n y m o u s in meaning with ' g e r m ' in English, suggests that there are in the
culture non-metaphysical/causal explanations of disease. Such expla-
nations m a y lack the theoretical details of m o d e r n medicine but they are,
in principle, similar to diagnoses in m o d e r n medicine - their truth or
otherwise being irrelevant. T h e main concern here is with primary
causes of illness and their possible relation with secondary causes.
Normally, any explanation that draws o n supernatural forces is
regarded as incompatible with the principles of science u p o n which
m o d e r n medicine rests. In fact, the scientist would see such an
explanation as a direct violation of the principles of science. T h e
connection between the two is always missed. Yet m o d e r n medical
practitioners would find it difficult to deny that, for instance, stress
reduces the natural resistance of the body to certain diseases, so that
people in a state of stress are more vulnerable to an affliction than those
w h o are not socially disturbed.
It is important to distinguish between the African concept of stress
and that of the West. Executives in the West could suffer from stress if

14. U . Maclean, Magical Medicine: A Nigerian Case Study, p. 87, Harmondsworth

(United K i n g d o m ) , Penguin, 1971.

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 Godwin Sogolo

their business was o n the verge of collapse; a heavy day's work without
rest could lead to such a state. O r anxiety over possible contingencies
could induce stress. In traditional Africa, stress is mainly due to a
strained relationship either with one's spiritual agents or with other
persons within one's community. It could also be due to a feeling of
guilt arising from a breach of c o m m u n a l norms. For example, if an
African m a n were involved in an adulterous act with his brother's wife -
whether or not this act was detected - he would experience stress,
having disturbed his social harmony. If he cheated his neighbour, w a s
cruel to his family or had offended his community, the anxiety that
would follow could take the form of phobias, either of 'bewitchment' or
of the affliction of diseases. Such an African would feel vulnerable and
that feeling alone could result in real vulnerability.
T h e parallel to this in m o d e r n orthodox medicine is the practice
whereby medical scientists explain certain diseases by a conjunction of
the germ theory and the patient's reduced resistance due to stress. T h e
possible difference between this and the corresponding primary and
secondary explanations of traditional African thought is that Western
medical science has at its disposal a well-systematized body of theories
while the African system operates o n a piecemeal basis of trial and error.
It should be noted, however, that not all orthodox medical physicians are
theoreticians in the scientific sense of the word. There are m a n y whose
practice is based o n trial and error - they follow the germ theory without
knowing or being able to articulate its mechanisms. In the same way, it
could be said that traditional African healers follow certain principles
without being able to say exactly what these principles are. Unlike the
m o d e r n physician w h o has to rely almost entirely o n the p h a r m a -
cological efficacy of drugs, a cure for the traditional African healer is
directed towards the two targets of primary and secondary causes. T h e
healer m a y be confident of the pharmacological activities of herbs, but
that is not all. T h e herbs are efficacious, it is believed, only if the primary
causes have been taken care of. T h e herbalist is thus also a diviner, which
gives the profession a metaphysical outlook. But, again, this could be
misleading. T h e point is that the primary causes result in the weakening
of the defence mechanisms of the body. A cure in this respect simply
m e a n s restoring the body to a state of increased capacity to heal itself, a
state in which the pharmacological efficacy of the drugs is maximized.
There are conceptual difficulties with any such account which
draws simultaneously o n both natural and non-natural forces. W h e r e
the non-natural forces are social or psychological factors, the problems
m a y be adequately handled by psychoanalysis. But in Africa, where the
causes of illness are a blend of supernatural forces (gods, deities, spirits,

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 Continuity-in-change: alternative scenarios for the futures of African cultures

etc.) and natural forces (germs, parasites, kokoro, etc.), the apparent
difficulty that emerges is similar to the body/mind problem, a sub-
species of the general issue of h o w a non-physical entity can possibly
interact with a physical entity.
T h e point of the scenario I have described above, using religion and
traditional medicine as examples, is essentially that the core areas of
African cultures have remained unchanged in spite of Western
innovations. This trend is likely to continue in the future. W h a t is
needed, however, is an in-depth understanding of this process of
continuity-in-change to be able to reconcile areas of theoretical
similarity between the traditional and the m o d e r n . M u c h of this can be
accomplished through education and intellectual reorientation.
Africans should begin to understand that there are diverse cultural
approaches to the same reality.

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African cultures and the crisis
of contemporary Africa
Elikia M'Bokob

T h e African crisis: long term, short term

T h e economic crisis and its implications
T h e crisis of African identities

T h e African crisis: long term, short term

O n the evidence of all the indicators, whether quantitative or qualitative,
it is stating the obvious to say that Africa as a whole is today in the grip
of a major crisis. In terms of the picture that Africans and the outside
world have of each other, the finding itself is presented in a spirit calling
forth what are often very old attitudes, both in the West and in Africa,
about the future of Africa and its ability to take responsibility for itself.
In the West the disciples of what has b e c o m e k n o w n as 'Afro-pes-
simism' see in the crisis an opportunity for the rehabilitation of colo-
nialism as an exemplary exercise in 'successful' development. T h e y also
see it as proof that Africa is incapable of progress o n its o w n , whether
measured against the West's economic, political or cultural models or its
o w n - which, incidentally, Africa has not so far managed to construct.
Lastly, they argue that Europeans are w r o n g to nurse for ever a 'guilty
conscience' about Africa.1 Others o n the contrary, mainly in Africa, d o
not see the crisis as specifically African but as blatant evidence of the
general bankruptcy of Western models and as an opportunity finally
given to Africa to put its o w n capabilities to the test.
A s regards the nature of the crisis, there seem to be several
irreconcilably opposed c a m p s . There are those for w h o m the issue is
essentially economic, attributed by s o m e to the imbalances, inequalities
a n d injustices of the world economic market and by others to the
1. P . Bruckner, Le sanglot de l'homme blanc, Paris, Éditions du Seuil, 1983; Y . Lacoste,
Contre les anti-tiers-mondistes et contre certains tiers-mondistes, Paris, L a Découverte,
1985.

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 Elikia M'Bokolo

Africans' o w n m i s m a n a g e m e n t of resources and opportunities that

were n o worse to start with than in other parts of the world and, in
particular, the South. N e x t there are those for w h o m the crisis is
essentially political - one of government and hence power, but also o n e
of confidence, mainly affecting the people and its relations with that
power. Lastly, there are those for w h o m the crisis is worldwide and
apparent at all levels of social life. W e have developed this standpoint
elsewhere ( M ' B o k o l o , 1985 and 1992c); it is the basis of our analytical
thinking o n African cultures.
M o s t economists, and the majority of those w h o maintain that the
African crisis is primarily of an economic nature, trace its first signs back
to the early 1970s and its aggravation and general extension to the
1980s. 2 T h e defenders of the essentially political explanation are also
those most attached to the short-term theory (Braudel, 1969, pp. 4 4 - 7 ) .
T h e general challenge to political systems, thefirstsigns of which s o m e
(Toulabor, 1986) see as contemporary with the coming of the post-
colonial dictatorships, really developed in the late 1980s and early 1990s
w h e n the world context was m o r e favourable to democratic values and
systems. If, conversely, the African crisis is seen as part of a general
world crisis, it is impossible not to view it as a long-term p h e n o m e n o n .
But h o w far does it go back? Basil Davidson's answer is as follows:

The crisis of modern Africa did not begin with new (European) imperialism.
Although, later, the colonial invasion brought with it disorder and confusion,
the invaders were not at the origin of die tragedy. Around 1850 the age-old
charters were already becoming devalued; the phenomenon was not general
nor did it develop everywhere at m e same pace. Sometimes it was marked by
m e very scale of the influence of these charters. They had served as the found-
ation for several centuries of highly varied growth and culture. Civilizations of
considerable technological inventiveness, witii great artistic achievements to
their credit and which had developed ingenious methods of solving conflicts at
the level of both the individual and the community, had culminated in systems
of proverbial wisdom and faith. The latter, offering hope and consolation in all
the major events of living and dying seemed proof, in their venerable strength,
against the ravages of time. However, even prior to 1850, mese systems had
begun to look insecure and although tradition may have continued to satisfy
peoples like the Karimojong or the Lugbara who lived at the frontiers of a

2. It must be pointed out, however, that s o m e economists have long been working o n
the theory that the crisis of the African economies is a 'structural' crisis brought about
by the emergence of the capitalist 'world economy' (I. Wallerstein) and kept going by
the incessant imbalances of this 'system'. See, inter alia, the writings of Samir A m i n
{L'accumulation à l'échelle mondiale. Critique de la théorie du sous-développement, Paris,
Anthropos 1971; and Le développement inégal. Essai sur les formations sociales du
capitalisme périphérique, Paris, Les Éditions de Minuit, 1973) and Walter Rodney
(How Europe Underdeveloped Africa, L o n d o n , Bogle-L'Ouverture, 1972).

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 African cultures and the crisis of contemporary Africa

changing world, others like their contemporaries in Western Europe found

themselves caught up in a 'brutal revolution' whose causes seemed no less
mysterious [Davidson, 1971, pp. 223-4 ].

Here w e propose to look simply at the contemporary phase of the

African crisis. O n e of its particular features is that, though the rural
exodus is continuing, a reverse 'back-to-the-village' m o v e m e n t is under
way in m a n y countries. Sometimes these are town-born people, part-
icularly a m o n g the young and well-off social classes, w h o take the
aspirations and frustrations of the townsfolk with them to the rural
population. T h e emergence and consolidation of a 'rural capitalism' has
long been observed a m o n g the rural people themselves (Hill, 1969),
contributing to m u c h closer social relations between town and country.
Confined early on to a small number of countries (Ghana, Côte d'Ivoire,
C a m e r o o n ) , the phenomenon has n o w spread widely throughout the
continent. Although observation of certain phenomena is m o r e clear-cut
in urban environments, the fact remains that most of the dynamics under
consideration relate - with greater or lesser intensity, depending on the
location - to all social categories.

T h e economic crisis and its implications

In some phases of the development of the capitalist 'world economy',
Africans have shown themselves to be imaginative and active partners,
well-versed in all market-economy strategies and skilled at accumulating
profits. This was particularly the case during the Industrial Revolution
during the nineteenth century (M'Bokolo, 1992a, pp. 96-199). But the
current characteristics and trends of the modern African economy stem
more directly,first,from colonization and what it did by w a y of 'making
the most o f indigenous resources and, second, from the 'development
policies' that came thereafter. In a unique and linear view of h u m a n
development, the colonizers' understanding was that Africa, in its turn,
had to slot into the world economic system. T h e colonizers' image of
Blacks in general, and of Africans in particular, was of people w h o were
lazy, individualistic, unaware of the constraints of time, improvident and
wasteful, in short, lacking all the qualities needed for the smooth
operation of modern capitalism. For their o w n good, therefore, the
Africans had to be frog-marched into the modern economy. It was also
clear that this n e w economy had to function so as to promote the interest
of European states and businesses. Since then, the relations that Africans
have had with the modern economy have been essentially based o n
ambiguity: some have eagerly embraced the n e w economy as the symbol

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of modernity and unarguable proof of social success, while others have

rejected it forcefully as the privileged instrument of foreign domination.
T h e government systems born of colonialism have not reversed the
trend, walling themselves up, in their turn, in the logic of 'authoritarian
modernization' (M'Bokolo, \992d). T h e only innovation was to stipulate
that the necessarily positive spin-off from the economic effort would n o
longer accrue to the old colonial metropolises but exclusively to the n o w
sovereign African nations. T h e consequence is that an enormous gulf has
opened u p in Africa itself between those enriched by agricultural and
mining profits and 'technological safaris' o n the one hand and those
receiving n o share in the m a n n a of development on the other.
Recognition of these inequalities has been and still is one of the
stimuli behind contemporary artistic and cultural creation in Africa.
Indeed, denunciation of these growing imbalances, contrary to the
promises of independence, is central to the most striking cultural works,
whether they belong - to use a debatable but convenient distinction - to
the 'culture of letters' or to 'popular culture', which thus join in sharing
this continuing attitude. In the 'culture of letters', which tended to
confine itself to condemning colonialism and praising ancestral Africa,
n e w currents of thought have been gaining ground in which vigorous
criticism of the continent's present shortcomings is very m u c h to the
fore. T h e reader is referred to works by some of the founders of the
genre: for example, the novels of A h m a d o u K o u r o u m a {Les soleils des
indépendances, 1968) and Ngugi w a Thiong'o {Petals of Blood) and the
films of Sembène O u s m a n e . U n d e r the 'popular culture' heading, the
success of m a n y musicians of the 1960s (like Franklin Boukaka) and
even of today (like Fela Anikulapo Kuti) owes m u c h to the vigour of
their denunciation of the prevailing system.
Since the 1980s, the experts of the international finance institutions
have stopped talking about escaping from the logic of the 'world
economy' and the 'market economy'. Their only ambition is to rationalize
the management of the African economies so that they m a y more easily
be integrated into the world economy. But this rationalization, in turn, is
at a prohibitive social cost and further intensifies social polarization. This
general background generates lasting cultural movements that can be
studied from three angles: initiative, management and forecasting. W e are
nowadays familiar with the scale of what is k n o w n as the 'informal sector'
of African economies. T h o u g h its contribution is difficult if not impos-
sible to quantify, its extent is evident in both urban and rural environ-
ments. Touré (1985) has shown clearly the importance of informal
activities in the urban milieu, but it must not be deduced therefrom that
rural society is i m m u n e . With its special features due to the war, the

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 African cultures and the crisis of contemporary Africa

example of M o z a m b i q u e and others shows that the ndumba ñengue

markets of urban centres are the ideal place for selling agricultural
produce and supplying country areas with industrial products. In his
detailed study of the hierarchical structure of the magendo agents in
U g a n d a , Nabuguzi (1992) has shown the essential role of the farming
population, not just those w h o grow crops for export (tea and coffee in
particular) but also those w h o supply food to the local market. It is also
plain that all social categories are actively involved. T h e working classes
rub shoulders with the wealthiest and those holding the most secure
positions. At the top of the pyramid of magendo agents in U g a n d a , for
example, there are the mafuta mingi (literally 'those w h o are full of fat')
and the imagendo-ists\ often to be found at the highest levels of
government and business. T h e same is true of other African states, not
only those in obvious crisis like Zaire but also some relatively stable
countries. Participation in the informal e c o n o m y varies with sex and age
group, with children in the least remunerative sectors and w o m e n
monopolizing - as they have for a long time - certain highly rewarding
activities like the trade in fabrics. All activities are mixed together:
agricultural production, particularly in the crop-growing urban peri-
meters, craft-trade production and the processing of agricultural pro-
duce, trade and also finance and banking in the framework of savings
activities via the 'tontines'.
These practices relate to different conceptions regarding the nature of
existence, ranging from a basic survival strategy to a real life ethic.
Survival strategy is the attitude of an individual, confined to the short
term and sometimes even to each day as it comes. B y life ethic w e m e a n
the upholding of certain values such as work, saving, thrift and the pursuit
of profit, often associated with the 'capitalist ethic'. A life ethic concerns a
group and almost always relates to a set of practices developed over a long
period, sometimes spanning several generations. It is not by chance that
this life ethic is connected with certain ethnic formations k n o w n to have
long participated in the trade economy, even before European
penetration (e.g. the Hausa and the Dyula) or since the early days of
colonization (e.g. the Korooko and the Bamileke).
In the context of persistent scarcity, tensions between individual
aspirations and collective solidarity have b e c o m e an ever-present feature
of the 'African situation' (Mazrui). A m o n g the most observant watchers
of social change, it is novelists, journalists, musicians and popular artists
w h o have placed most emphasis on the (difficult) emergence of the
individual and individualism. Reports of daily events in African towns
are full of these little details - arguments, trials, crimes - reflecting the
difficulty of preserving or renewing the cohesion of communities both

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 Elikia M'Bokolo

old (families, clans, neighbourhood links, 'ethnic groups', etc.) and n e w

(friendships a m o n g neighbourhoods, at school and at work). T h e great
musical work of 'Franco' L u a m b o Makiadi of Zaire is also a remarkable
depiction, in the tragi-comic genre, of the breaching of these fellowships
through social disturbances bound u p with the exercise of political
power and the enjoyment of the associated privileges. D o e s this m e a n
that the future belongs to this n e w individualism? Nothing is less certain.
Alongside s o m e old solidarities, n e w ones are seen to be arising which
are, perhaps, even m o r e promising for a dynamic future. In western
Africa, cultural networks that frequently go back to the remote past, like
the Mandingo, Dyula and Hausa networks, based o n identity of religion
(Islam), language, history (real or invented) and activities (trade), are
currently showing evidence of exceptional dynamism. But n e w koine,
too, are being formed, as in central and southern Africa with the rebirth
of itinerant 'informal' trade (in luxury items like objets d'art and
diamonds and in mass-consumption goods). Their extreme poles are in
Zaire and South Africa and their connecting lines pass through Zambia,
Malawi, M o z a m b i q u e and Swaziland.
In these circumstances, the pessimism often displayed w h e n talking
about the future of Africa, in particular its economic future, needs
correcting. This pessimism is of European origin and sometimes surfaces
a m o n g African élites. It implies that Africa has got off to a bad start, so to
speak, on the road m a p p e d out by the industrialized states of Europe. A
careful examination of social trends, however, shows that other pers-
pectives are at work. It would also appear that the attachment of certain
African social categories to the market economy as organized in practice
in Africa, and to the present forms of triumphant liberalism, needs to be
tempered to allow for the contrary trends, which are opposed to
'materialism' and to the imbalances that accompany this conception of
social organization. T h e intensity of religious phenomena, for example, is
so unquestionable that m a n y people seem to see an explosion of
spirituality. S o m e of these phenomena appear to point in the direction of
a worsening of the inequalities and imbalances inherent in m o d e r n
economic practice and access to political power.
T h efirstcase is what has been called 'the return of paganism'. T h e
pilot survey carried out in Abidjan by Touré and Konaté (1990) gives
results that are probably valid for most African towns. These two
sociologists show that a large majority of Abidjanis (60 per cent of the
sample) offer sacrifices regardless of the religion to which they say they
belong (81 per cent of animists, 7 0 per cent of Muslims and 3 0 - 5 0 per
cent of Christians), their ethnic origin (50-80 per cent depending o n
ethnic group), age, sex or social position. Young people facing exami-

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 African cuitares and the crisis of contemporary Africa

nations or looking for theirfirstjob, and politicians in need of advice,

consult the gods as d o tradespeople and w o m e n competing for a
husband. Even non-Africans - Europeans a n d Lebanese - have n o
qualms about offering sacrifices. T h u s , in spite of apparent syncretisms,
the old beliefs and cults seem to be coming back in force. However, the
problems that lead townsfolk back to traditional and ancient practices are
those of m o d e r n and daily life (school examinations, job-hunting, c o m -
petitive recruitment, disappointments in love, health and so on) where
the individual is directly involved and challenged to invent orfindhis or
her o w n specific and exclusive solution.
Another case is that of the various 'sects' of foreign inspiration
dreamed u p by those in power to strengthen the fragile bonds holding
the governing team together and to inspire a wholesome respect a m o n g
the opposition: their political rivals, church people and intellectuals, and
representatives of the working classes, all of them excluded from these
secret societies. In Zaire, for example, the ruling Mobutists set u p a
greatly feared brotherhood, probably in the late 1980s, called the 'Prima
Curia', which b o u n d the chief personalities in the regime together in
absolute fellowship and on pain of death for m e m b e r s violating its rules.
T h e creation of Masonic structures more or less all over Africa,
independent of the European orders that set them u p and generally
under the c o m m a n d of the leaders of the state, confirms the spread of
this strategy of controlling groups using practices and structures that
draw s o m e or m u c h of their inspiration from certain religions with the
object of making class privilege permanent.
Alongside this multiplication of religious movements, however,
contrary and probably m o r e numerous trends also exist in the direction
of greater solidarity. First, there are the African Messianic and syncretic
prophetic cults, clearly a very ancient p h e n o m e n o n since theyfirstm a d e
their appearance in the K i n g d o m of K o n g o as early as the seventeenth
century, before spreading to southern and central Africa but also to
Nigeria and Côte d'Ivoire at the end of the nineteenth century and the
beginning of the twentieth. Today's ' n e w ' Churches therefore need to be
seen in the light of a long-running continuity. Next there is the mass
growth in prayer networks and groups which, unlike prophetic cults, d o
not break away from the established Churches but c a m p o n their
periphery. Lastly - and for the veryfirsttime - the established Churches
themselves appear to be being forced to change to suit these n e w
requirements. A significant feature of this trend is the vigour of the
theological debate, particularly a m o n g the church people of central
Africa (Cameroon, Zaire and C o n g o ) as is the emergence of specific
'rites', e.g. the 'Zairian rite' authorized by the Vatican and infusing

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elements drawn from various Zairian traditions into the saying of the
M a s s and in the vestments of the officiating ministers.
These prophetic cults, prayer groups and African rites in
established Churches betray several deep-lying trends in the social
body. First, they are a response to the need for solidarity. In every case,
these structures act as networks of mutual aid and assistance between
'brothers and sisters' faced with economic difficulties and the trials of
life. But they are also an original answer to therapeutic needs,
formulated with all the more vigour in that the health situation
continues to deteriorate.

T h e crisis of African identities

T h e various ideologies of the 'Black conscience' are to a great extent the
result of the confrontation between Africa and the outside world, and
Europe in particular. Long-lasting cultural influences of this kind and on
this scale d o not appear to have arisen from the African interface with
Arab-Muslim societies or the Asian world. There is no shortage of
reasons for this. First, there are those to be found in the concrete
relations between Africa and Europe, the story of which is largely one of
violence (slavery and the slave trade, colonization, etc.). Just as
important as this 'objective' history, however, is the constant working-
over of the m e m o r y , whose agents in the social body are extremely
varied: the government, professional and amateur historians and cultural
creators but also the m a n y religious and lay rites ensuring the
reproduction of society. O n e of the most importantfieldsof this active
m e m o r y is - precisely - the painful history of relations between African
and European societies as shown, to take one example, by the vast
mobilization organized throughout Europe and in Black America for the
'Ouidah 9 2 ' festival held - apart from its bitter commemoration of
slavery - to celebrate the permanence and fraternity of the Black peoples.
Although the Arab countries in no way abstained from slavery and
the slave trade and although 'l'imaginaire arabo-musulman' (Chebel,
1993) is far from being an unvarying paean of praise for the African
continent, one of the myths on which Islam is founded is the fact that
the first muezzin was an Abyssinian Black, Bilal, w h o m the Prophet
M u h a m m o d lost n o time in freeing and making an example of
equality in G o d ' s eyes between people and between 'races'. Unlike
Christianity, which to this day sees its role as missionary, African
Islam became very quickly emancipated from its original Arab
parentage. T h e movements of M u s l i m renaissance and the return to a

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 African cultures and the crisis of contemporary Africa

pure Islam, observable today in m a n y West African countries, are

African in origin and have their roots in the late eighteenth and early
nineteenth centuries in the Senegalese Futa Tooro and with the Hausa
and Peuls of northern Nigeria.
T h e present renaissance of the ideologies of the Black conscience
takes m a n y forms at all levels of the population, including the élite. First
there is the 'Afro-centric' p h e n o m e n o n at the level of the intellectual
élite, with its focal centres in both North America and Black Africa.
Afro-centrism is reviving old slogans of cultural pan-Africanism such as
Africa as the 'cradle of humankind' and the 'anteriority of the Black
civilizations', with Europe as an ungrateful inheritor and the claim that
m a n y famous personalities in the world of literature, science and the
arts are of African blood. T o judge by certain productions of urban
painting and modern music, similar ideas are also current a m o n g the
people as a whole. Here there are all the signs offierceresistance, one of
the proofs of African cultural dynamism. However, while it must not be
forgotten that this resistance m a y in s o m e cases take the form of an
introverted and intolerant nationalism, alongside this continuing
cultural resistance, Africa remains extremely permeable and open to
various influences of Western origin. O n the one hand, the phenomena
k n o w n collectively as 'globalization' continue (M'Bokolo, 1992c) and,
on the other, the inferiority complex and attitudes of servile imitation
and submission, so well analysed by Frantz Fanon over forty years ago,
are far from cured. O n the contrary, it is as if these feelings were
intensified by the growing economic inequalities between Africa and the
West, 'Afro-pessimism' and the African continent's persistent diffi-
culties in solving its problems. This insidious alienation acts with
particular force a m o n g the urban youth, as the 'Miguelism' pheno-
m e n o n shows. Formed from the word Miguel, which signifies Europe in
the slang of the young people of Kinshasa, Miguelism applies to all the
beliefs and practices which assume Africa to be 'cursed' and which hold
u p Europe as an idyllic paradise and encourage its followers to d o
everything they can to reach this land of plenty, facility and excellence.
W h e n countries were winning their independence in the late 1950s
and early 1960s, the future of Africa's newly sovereign states seemed to
be compromised by what were quickly branded as 'tribalist' claims. T h e
difficulties took extreme forms in the largest countries in Black Africa,
namely C o n g o (Zaire) and Nigeria, both of which were fated to suffer
a protracted civil war. In general, the strength of the nationalist m o v e -
ments in their struggle against colonialism was everywhere endangered
by the emergence of ethnic and regional particularisms - a similar
situation applies today in South Africa, with the antagonism between

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the 'nationalist' A N C and Inkhata, which is identified with the Zulus

and therefore accused of 'tribalism'. T h e African political and intel-
lectual élites either recalled the fundamental unity and essential identity
of African cultures and civilizations or else argued that ethnicity was
above all a 'situational' fact, most individuals being in a position to claim
several identities (religious, linguistic, professional, national, etc.) and
selecting the particular one they wished to assume depending o n the
situation with which they were confronted. Still others maintained that
the strength of the n e w states would depend on their ability to build a
lasting 'sacred union' to carry out the difficult and exalting tasks of
national construction and economic development. T h e model adopted
by the n e w states emerging from colonization was borrowed from the
colonial Europe of the time: it was that of a centralized state that
crushed local particularities. T h e procedures used to put the model into
effect varied greatly with the geographical situation and the balance of
political power in each country. In most cases they had recourse to
authoritarian practices (one-party government, bans on 'tribal' associa-
tions, personality cult of the 'founder-fathers of the nation', the
rewriting of history, etc.) in order to suppress differences and exalt the
homogeneity and oneness of the nation.
T h e United Republic of Tanzania went its o w n way. Its special
feature was that of being fragmented into a large n u m b e r of ethnic and
regional formations that n o state, prior to colonization, had succeeded
in unifying. In addition, the countries that n o w m a k e u p the United
Republic of Tanzania were thoroughly exploited during the nineteenth
century by Arab traders established in Zanzibar and o n the coast. In
particular, there was the dispersion of the trading communities and
their settlement in towns set u p for the purpose, the growth of Islam
and, at the same time, the spread of Swahili, the language of trade,
m a d e u p of a mixture of Arabic and local tongues. T h e authorities of
the n e w state framed an original policy: they proclaimed Swahili as the
national language, the intended effect of which, through education and
cultural policy, was to fashion a n e w national identity.
It is remarkable that the opposition between 'nation' o n the one
hand and 'ethnic group' or 'region' on the other should have resurfaced
in the late 1980s and early 1990s and that it should be so alive
throughout Africa today. There seem, in fact, to be two parallel
movements. T h e first points towards the confirmation of 'nations' or,
m o r e precisely, the national spaces left by colonization. T h e territories
shaped by the old colonial powers seem to be regarded as the 'lesser evil'
in practically every case and few people seem to want to challenge them.
At the same time, however, there is another m o v e m e n t in the direction

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 African cultures and the crisis of contemporary Africa

of recognizing and affirming particularities that takes two forms. T h e

first is the widespread d e m a n d for 'federalism' as the most acceptable
way of running the national space. T h e second is the ideological pursuit
of independence whereby the administration and development of the
political regions, within the national space, and the product they yield
should be reserved solely for the people that 'belong' to those regions.
This unexpected return to local identities and regional demands must
be seen in relation to the n e w political outlook.
T h e change-over to democracy sets Africa a n u m b e r of problems,
s o m e of them related to culture. T h e first group of problems concerns
traditions; in practice, this means the continent's political history and its
present developments. T o what extent d o these traditions include the
experience of democracy? W h a t is democracy in traditional African
cultures? If such cultures include the democratic experience, can that
experience be regarded as still in progress - and at what level and in
what forms - in contemporary Africa? H o w could this democratic
culture and practice be modified to suit claims and concepts bearing the
same n a m e today (multi-party systems, exercise of power by
representatives of citizens and not by citizens themselves, technical
efficiency and so on)?
T h e second group of problems relates to the cultural impact of the
recent period, i.e. that of the winning of independence. In m a n y
countries, such as South Africa, Angola, Ethiopia, M o z a m b i q u e ,
Somalia and C h a d which have k n o w n unending civil war, the active
political culture is essentially one of violence. H o w can this culture be
reconciled with that of democracy, based as it is o n the sharing of
peace? Next, the recent period has given Africans, and young people in
particular, a belief in ' m e n of the m o m e n t ' and other 'founder-fathers'.
H o w can they be persuaded not to yield to the ease and seduction of
inaction and to take o n instead the job of citizen with all its rights and
obligations?
T o conclude, Africa m a y not be 'le conservatoire' (Denise Paulme)
but it certainly is one of the 'conservatoires' of mankind as regards both its
material resources and its cultural drives and mainsprings. In addition,
Africa today, because of the diffuse crisis through which it is passing, has
to solve a n u m b e r of problems similar to those of other continents and
cultural areas. A m a d o u H a m p a t é B â m a d e the point that Africa's good
fortune was to have started off later than the others and therefore to have
been able to see all of them, one after the other, stumble and fall at the
same obstacles. It is u p to Africa n o w to find out h o w to avoid these
pitfalls and to produce the responses required by our age.

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A M S E L L E , J. L . ; M ' B O K O L O , E . 1985. Au cœur de l'ethnie. Ethnicitè, tribalisme et
État en Afrique. Paris, L a Découverte.
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Afrique noire. Contributions à une problématique de la démocratie. Paris,
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B R A U D E L , F . 1969. Écrits sur l'histoire. Paris, Flammarion.
C H E B E L , M . 1993. L'imaginaire arabo-musulman. Paris, Presses Universitaires
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philosophie. Paris, François Maspéro.
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M B E M B E , J. A . 1985. Les jeunes et l'ordre politique en Afrique noire. Paris,
L'Harmattan.
M ' B O K O L O , E . 1985. L'Afrique au XXe siècle. Le continent convoité. Paris, L e
Seuil. (Points Histoire.)
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AUPELF.
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M E M E L - F O T É , H . 1991. D e s ancêtres fondateurs aux Pères de la nation.

Introduction à une anthropologie de la démocratie. Cahiers d'études
africaines, N o . 123, p p . 2 6 3 - 8 5 .
N A B U G U Z I , E . 1992. Le magendo, l'État et la société en Ouganda. Paris, École des
Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales. (Doctoral thesis.)
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conjoncture. Paris, Karthala.
T O U R É , A . ; K O N A T É , Y . 1990. Sacrifices dans la ville. Le citadin chez le devin en
Côte d'Ivoire. Abidjan, Éditions D o u g a .
W A I X E R S T E I N , I. 1980. Le système du monde du XV siècle à nos jours. Vol. 1 :
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Y O U N G , C . 1976. The Politics of Cultural Pluralism. Madison, W i s . , T h e
University of Wisconsin Press.

151
T h e futures of cultures in the
western Mediterranean
Augusto Perelli and Abdelkader Sid Ahmed

Introduction
From the culture of efficiency to the efficiency of culture
T h e creative Mediterranean
Local creativity: an indigenous development tool - the case of Italy
The futures of cultures and European-North African co-operation

Introduction
T h e western Mediterranean is an area of contact between a n u m b e r of
cultural families: the Arab-Islamic, French-speaking a n d Hispanic
worlds, and the Italian microcosm, each of these environmental
components (North Africa, France, Spain and Italy) representing the
spearhead of cultural families which spread beyond the arc of the
Mediterranean. North Africa is part of the Arab-Muslim family, just as
France forms part of the wider French-speaking world. In other words,
the cultural relationships in this region have extensions o n a world scale,
so that the region forms a sort of central node or 'sounding box' for the
cultural relations between universal civilizations.
A s far as the Arab cultural family is concerned, the outstanding event
of the last four orfivedecades has been the creation of a unified cultural
space, characterized by the existence of a single market for cultural
products. T h e educational and media policies adopted have m a d e a
substantial contribution to this end: in these countries, education and
audiovisual communications are almost completely Arabized.
In the wake of this p h e n o m e n o n , w e see today the emergence and
development of a kind of pan-Arab press. In recent years, Arab-
language cultural journals in the h u m a n and social sciences have already
introduced m o d e r n production techniques. It seems likely therefore that
thinking about the problems of humankind and society - deployed in
the same media - will reach a kind of unison, from one end of the Arab
world to the other. S o m e major daily papers in the Middle East,
together with others recently created in European capitals, have for

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 Augusto Perelli and Abdelkader Sid Ahmed

some years adopted m o d e r n technology to cover all events in the Arab

countries and print simultaneously in a growing n u m b e r of Arab and
Western capitals. E v e n the political and economic n e w s is tending to
become unified throughout the region.
T h e s a m e process appears to be affecting another type of m e d i u m :
satellite television. In North Africa, television has helped disseminate
Western culture by showing dubbed versions offilmsin French, Italian
and English. In the arsenal of instruments for spreading European
culture, the video recorder holds a significant place: in Algeria, for
example, it is estimated that there are 100,000 units, with 4 0 per cent of
the tapes being original and acquired abroad. Objectively speaking,
therefore, the cultural invasion so denounced by the opponents of
satellite television is not a recent and sudden p h e n o m e n o n . For this
reason, the advent of the satellite dish is seen as the natural development
of a dominant p h e n o m e n o n which changes vehicle as soon as technology
makes something better available.
T h e satellite dish has b e c o m e a p h e n o m e n o n of society. T h e roofs
of large Arab towns - and increasingly those of villages and hamlets -
bristle with reflectors. In Algeria alone, it is estimated that nearly 15
million people can today be reached by satellite. This popularization of
foreign television has awakened the old d e m o n s about a North Africa
divided into two. Views remain strongly divided about the effects of the
satellite dish.
T h e satellite dish appears to have m a n y supporters, w h o take the
view that satellite television is a cultural plus, offering richer and m o r e
varied information. C o m p a r e d with the inadequacy of local television,
the dish thus passes for a prodigious instrument of education and
culture, costing m u c h less than the amounts that would have to be
invested locally to produce the same broadcasts. In countries where
leisure is precious, satellite televisionfillsa gap with the social uses of
the dish. Research shows that the attraction resides in the technical
quality of programmes, the presentation of news bulletins, the clarity of
language, the choice offered to viewers and the level of cultural and
scientific broadcasts.
T h e opponents of the satellite dish - primarily the fundamentalists -
believe it is an instrument for perverting moral standards. Pornographic
films, indecent advertising and the erotic scenes in m a n y films c o m e u p
against and even shatter the standards and values of Islamic society. In
their eyes, satellite television is an enterprise aimed at social destab-
ilization and cultural alienation which threatens fourteen centuries of
community life. T h e supporters of a political Islam are not alone,
however: those w h o defend traditional culture, notably the oral literary

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and musical heritage, are in revolt against the satellite broadcasts which
they accuse of progressively casting aside popular song and poetry.
Similarly - but for reasons diametrically opposite to those of religious
fundamentalism - Marxist writers denounce the dish as being a super-
ficial gadget of modernism rather than one of its positive features.
At a time w h e n the patterns of Western cultures are becoming
globalized at a headlong pace (a process that is already occurring
through the conventional media and international communications),
satellite television can act as a unique catalyst. It offers families sound,
pictures and immediacy all at the s a m e time. Since the arrival of the dish,
m a n y foreign products that were previously u n k n o w n or unsuccessful
are enjoying an enviable commercial success in North Africa: the satellite
films themselves are an efficient demonstration of the reliability and
quality of the products being promoted. T h e impact on behaviour and
attitudes is no less significant.
In the face of this p h e n o m e n o n , which the modernists regard as a
windfall likely to m o v e minds in directions tried and tested by the
developed countries, and which the conservatives regard as a cultural
invasion unequalled in history, what cultural strategies will the North
African countries adopt at the d a w n of the twenty-first century? Will
they be forced to accommodate a fait accompli they regard as inevitable,
or will they be pleased to offer their citizens a spectacle at n o cost to
themselves? T h e issue is a delicate one: the impact of satellite television
on the traditions of the family unit, and of the television news on public
opinion, has not gone unnoticed by the political decision-makers. If they
reject the inevitable and refuse to ban the parabolic dish (a decision
which would be unpopular), there remain two options: substantially to
raise the intellectual level of the existing local television system to m a k e it
competitive; or to allow the emergence of multi-channel television,
which would m e a n permitting investment by private sources of capital.
Competition between different channels could lead to a qualitative
improvement in broadcasts and a n increase in the n u m b e r of pro-
g r a m m e s . This opportunity would also require political life in North
Africa to become democratic.
This example shows that cultural relations between the Mediter-
ranean regions are being formed along the lines of the 'mass
consumption' model, in other words, in accordance with the laws of a
market with somewhat unusual features, being characterized by an
exaggerated polarization (the North consumes the cultural products of
the South and exports a little 'surplus') and by a heightened selectivity
(certain cultural products are preferred at the expense of others).
Moreover, the n e w technologies, particularly in the communications

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field, are revolutionizing production processes around the world,

aggravating the wide gap that already exists between rich and poor
countries.
Nevertheless the innovations in the communications sector during
the last two decades have been underestimated, at least as regards their
structuring effects. T h e globalization of the economy and, even more,
of the methods of production and trade are inevitably conditioning and
structuring the w a y in which cultural 'goods' are produced, developed
and traded. This is one reason w h y any consideration of the futures of
cultures cannot disregard the economic and technological aspects that
underlie the process of globalization.
It is clear that these cultural industries represent a danger of
'deculturization' as well as an opportunity for n e w cultural develop-
ment. F r o m the purely economic standpoint, improving the cultural
level of a society is one of the fundamental conditions for creating an
environment that is favourable to increasing the productivity of its
various resources.
T h e prodigious expansion of technology has broadened the range of
information facilities and, as a result, of the cultural products available
to people at a reasonable price. This merely enhances the significance of
the remark m a d e at a U N E S C O Expert Meeting in Montreal in June
1980: 'Participation in cultural life and its corollary, the development of
indigenous cultural activities, are linked to the acceleration of social
progress and to the technological advances which have widened access
to the products of the mind.' T h e relationship between cultural develop-
m e n t , economic growth and technological development, o n the one
hand, and the realization that books reflecting the cultural values of a
particular society are the subject of industrial production o n the other
hand, is becoming crucial, in view of its application to the m e a n s of
mass consumption. In this context, what values can be placed o n the
concept of local development, w h e n recent technological and economic
changes underline the growing contradiction between indigenous cul-
tural policies and m o d e r n m e a n s of broadcasting? H o w is it possible to
preserve indigenous cultural expression and the pluralism of different
societies w h e n industrialization is tending, by its very nature, towards
standardized products and universality, and the logic of the media
reinforces the concentration of resources and the internationalization of
messages?
It must be acknowledged that cultural identity and certain forms of
local production are fully entitled to be seen as factors in development,
while incorporating germinating contributions from other cultural
areas, particularly in thefieldof science and technology.

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F r o m the culture of efficiency

to the efficiency of culture
T h e international pressures for greater harmonization in methods of
transaction, far beyond the standardization of measurement units,
packaging and electronic messages, also carry in them the threat of a
standardization of cultures and ways of thinking. In the South, this
threat is strongly felt. However, it represents only one facet of a reality
that is m u c h m o r e complex and m u c h less calamitous.
A s information and its underlying technologies (computers and
telecommunications) have increased in strategic value, their cost has
fallen steadily, under the twofold impact of technological advances and
fierce competition between the producers. T h e global information
economy n o w emerging could break the vicious circle of under-
development (where a country is forced into the cheap export of raw
materials whose prices fall continuously, while that which it needs most
- manufactured goods - become increasingly expensive). T h e current
changes in relative competitivity suggest that culture and efficiency m a y
possibly c o m e together through a reconciliation between the techno-
logies of mass production and the growing d e m a n d for 'made-to-
measure' products. It is this trend that has m a d e the small and m e d i u m -
sized enterprise ( S M E ) important once again in global competition. It
has allowed northern Italy to b e c o m e one of the world's leading centres
of craft industry production, Catalonia to turn into a world design
centre and Paris to remain the capital of high fashion.
It is this same trend which should today be turned to account in
North Africa so that the 'fertile detour', already initiated by the global
information e c o n o m y in the paths of culture, can be exploited here, too,
in order to redevelop the cultural heritage and output along the
southern shore of the Mediterranean. Rich in k n o w - h o w and m a n p o w e r
and in potential for enhancing local cultures, close to the most dynamic
areas of Europe, the Mediterranean regions seem ideally equipped and
positioned to benefit rapidly from this unusual situation.
T o achieve this will call for a vision, a will and a strategy. T h e battle
will have to be conducted on two fronts, each with its laws and
characteristics: supply, on the one hand, d e m a n d on the other. A s
regards the cultural supply, for example, North Africa faces the need to
satisfy two objectives that appear contradictory: awaiting the 'critical
mass' which will m a k e its cultural output economically viable; and
maintaining the diversity and creativity that are necessary if original
cultural production capacities are to be preserved. A s concerns the
identification and stimulation of d e m a n d , the countries of North Africa

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(and cultural co-operation in the western Mediterranean) need access to

the 'culture consumers' and an enhancement of the 'cultural product'.

T h e creative Mediterranean
Before reviewing the signs that are indicative of the creative
Mediterranean, it is important to stress that around the Mediterranean
there is work to be done at the source, related particularly to the cultural
heritage. T h e concept of heritage must be handled with great care,
because it often signifies a looking back to the past. Respect for the
heritage primarily m e a n s taking action to preserve it. This is probably
essential, so long as it does not tie us d o w n to a world that is fixed. It is
about a process of a very different kind that questions must be asked:
that of a renaissance. T h u s what is involved is a very different link to the
cultural heritage; one which aims to transform and metamorphose it.
This is the one which today is at work in the creative Mediterranean
m o v e m e n t . O n e m a y ask in which geo-cultural context the creative
Mediterranean is emerging. It appears that the Mediterranean is today
encircled by four political and cultural forces: Westernism, Euro-
centrism, 'nationality-ism' and Islamism.
T h efirstof these forces, Westernism, is a major process of cultural
homogenization, a sort of globalism moving towards establishing a
'global village' in which culture and entertainment are very naturally
mixed together. T h e Mediterranean is nevertheless resisting such a
m o v e m e n t , which tends to negate it as a cultural arena.
T h e second politico-cultural force n o w emerging with increasing
vigour is Eurocentrism. With the collapse of the C o m m u n i s t regimes in
the East, a continental outlook has opened up; in Europe, this has led to
the emergence of a kind of self-satisfaction, a continental m o v e m e n t of
introspection which, for some people, means the erection of a 'fortress
Europe' against the rest of the world and particularly against the South,
in other words against the Mediterranean.
T h e third politico-cultural force, which one could call 'nationality-
ism', is the affirmation of a particular and localized identity with an
unavoidable aspect of exclusion. A process of fragmentation is taking
place in the n a m e of collective identities that are introspective and do
not wish to form links with other cultures within any particular country.
It is appropriate here to draw a few lessons from a situation of this kind,
and to specify the rules that govern communication between cultures.
T h e first is to acknowledge that the other is different, and cannot be
converted or subsumed to bring it h o m e . T h e second rule is to declare

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immediately that there is a capability for defining a c o m m o n meaning

with the other. Mutual comprehension otherwise becomes impossible,
leading to a cultural relativism with irreducible identities simply coexis-
ting side-by-side.
T h e fourth politico-cultural force, manifest mainly on the southern
edge of the Mediterranean, is Islamism. This political usage of religion,
stemming from a re-invention of tradition, aims to 'turn modernity into
Islam'. In the contemporary Arab world, Islamism has imposed itself as
the principal opposing force.
Quite apart from these active forces, one can also formulate the
hypothesis that there is another prospect: the creative Mediterranean. A
striking example of this prospect is provided by the craft industry: while
rejected as a hindrance to the productivist and global model, the craft
industry is conversely often the subject of an unduly romantic and
conservative idealistic vision. A s an element of the cultural heritage, it is
a component of the cultural identity to be preserved from commercial
influences. This latter approach should be avoided because it traps the
craftspeople in a false dilemma between culture and industry.1 T h e craft
industry can stimulate creation and thus contribute to the social,
economic and cultural development of underprivileged Mediterranean
regions.
F r o m the social point of view, once the craft industry has found its
place in national and international markets, it is not only a source of
employment but also raises the standard of living of the craftspeople,
particularly those in rural areas, w h o are mostly subsistence farmers,
through the additional income produced. This is a powerful stimulant to
broadening the domestic market. F r o m the economic standpoint, w h e n
the craft industry has found its place in the export market, it can bring in
foreign currency. Meanwhile, expansion at h o m e can allow the local
manufacture of a number of industrial products to take the place of
imports. F r o m the cultural standpoint, the craft industry is a powerful
reflection of cultural identity. T h e raw materials and techniques used,
the forms and colours sought and the patterns selected all reflect the
craftspeople's o w n culture, but the craft industry can develop only in
countries where its products are consumed by local companies.
Another major advantage is that the craft industries d o not require a
costly industrial apparatus: large-scale h a n d m a d e production is
possible, using a network of small units and based u p o n systems of
production by the masses and not for the masses.
1. / . Venkatachellum, "Promotion of the Craft Industry in A C P Countries', Culture and
Industry (proceedings of the A C P / E E C Foundation Seminar, Paris, 9-12 July
1990), p. 1.

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 Augusto Perelli and Abdelkader Sid Ahmed

Downstream of the craft industry, there are all kinds of activities

whose economic and cultural importance needs no further emphasis:
for example, fashion, style and design. These activities - a form of
advanced services - can in one w a y be regarded as higher forms of the
craft industry. Their publicity value is also significant, as is their
considerable contribution to the added value of local products.
In conclusion, therefore, despite the m a n y practical obstacles to the
dissemination of the craft industry, it is imperative that the world of
economics should embrace culture for the reasons given and for the
world of culture to encompass technical and economic approaches by
becoming involved with the transformation the latter are imposing as
they rely on the forces for social change.

Local creativity: an indigenous

development tool - the case of Italy
A HISTORICAL PROCESS

F r o m the historical point of view, most of the craft industry or artistic

products that characterize the Italian 'system areas' appeared during
the nineteenth century, although certain activities (ceramics, textiles,
marble, etc.) have existed since time immemorial. In the beginning,
production was organized on a craft industry basis, with machines
being introduced only at the beginning of the twentieth century.
However the 'areas' m a d e their real industrial progress in the 1950s.
At that time, activities grew in an extensive manner: the factors
underlying development were the availability of skilled workers (with
which the 'areas' were traditionally well endowed) and the lack of any
substantial entry barriers (the cost of setting u p the factories was fairly
limited because of the technology used). Social mobility was at a fairly
high level and it was not unusual for workers to become entrepreneurs.
In general, the industrial structure was characterized by the presence of
a large number of small enterprises competing in a single market -
already highly specialized from the outset - and between w h o m therefore
there were no substantial productive relationships. This is what s o m e
authors have called an 'area of productive specialization'.2

2. For a definition of the 'area of productive specialization', the local productive system
and the area system, see G . Garofoli, 'Les systèmes de petites entreprises - u n cas
paradigmatique de développement endogène', in G . Benko and A . Liepietz, Les
régions qui gagnent, Paris, 1992.

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 The futures of cultures in the western Mediterranean

T h e 1960s and 1970s saw,first,the introduction of more capital-

intensive technologies and, second, the breakdown of the production
process into a large number of phases, most of which were subcontracted
out. A s a consequence, the number of enterprises involved in the process
increased, each specializing in one phase of production. At the same time,
there was also a development of the productive sectors that were c o m -
plementary to the predominant industry: as regards footwear, for
example, the mechanical engineering industry that produced machines
and components expanded fairly rapidly. Except in highly specific cases,
such as jewellery, the different 'areas' were transformed in this way into
'system areas' characterized by a substantial division of labour between
the enterprises and by relationships that were as m u c h infra-sectoral and
competitive as intersectoral and co-operative.3
In the 1970s, regions such as those involved in footwear, ceramics
and furniture were a m o n g the world's m o s t developed single-product
industrial zones. T h e far-reaching transformation in the labour force of
the 'areas' led to an equally profound socio-economic change; in
general, the introduction of activities marked by a high level of
vocational and artistic skill not only led to the rediscovery of forgotten
techniques and of knowledge which, although marginalized, was still
strong in the local collective m e m o r y , but also led to an inward
migratory flow of skilled workers w h o , in turn, m a d e a considerable
contribution to the cultural evolution of the regions concerned.
Hence socio-economic development was characterized by:
• the creation of a n e w class of entrepreneurs - local or immigrant -
whose initial 'capital' was their skills;
• a profound transformation in the role of the family which, in a country
characterized by unusually high levels of family savings (still today
a m o n g the highest in the world) became a place for the perpetuation of
skills, for the domestic division of labour, a locus for the accumulation
of capital and a small enterprise in the real sense of the term;
• the formation of family-based small and medium-sized enterprises
( S M E s ) which, while retaining their competitivity, worked towards
pooling activities. These were not conventional forms of co-
operative, which are u n c o m m o n in the 'system areas', but usually
involved the creation of c o m m o n services for the S M E s , playing a
fundamental role in generating a high degree of synergy; and
• the search for very high levels of technological innovation,
occasionally abandoning traditional methods in favour of m o r e
standardized approaches.

3. G . Garofoli, 'Le aree-sistema in Italia', Política ed Economía, Vol. 14, N o . 11.

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 Augusto Perelli and Abdelkader Sid Ahmed

It is also true that m a n y 'system areas' were affected b y the crisis

affecting the world e c o n o m y - a crisis coming from the outside, but with
strong internal components, which have not always m e t with propor-
tionate responses. Rather than generating joint strategies for tackling
local problems, the crisis turns the enterprises into rivals. Here the state,
and local institutions in particular, can play an important role: from
planning economic activities to the development of priority sectors; from
support for research (artistic and technological) to the mobilization of
savings and the implementation of a policy adapted from overseas trade.
This will all be possible and effective if, first, the cultural specificities are
retained and, second, all those concerned can be convinced to change
their behaviour; a m o v e towards innovation and originality with d u e
consideration for the cultural identity of a particular area.

IMPORTANCE OF THE 'TRADITION' FACTOR

In a study of the reasons for the success of the Italian 'system areas', the
economist Sebastiano Brusco has written: ' T h e main sources for
understanding and interpreting what took place are not the experts in
industrial policy w h o plan policies for marginalized regions, but
Hirschmann and Braudel' 4 (the reference is to Fernand Braudel, the
undoubted master of Mediterranean intellectual history). O n e of the
most important factors in the success of the 'system areas', a m o n g other
things, is precisely that of 'culture', with its broad meaning of k n o w -
h o w , local creativity and m a n p o w e r skills, rather than the sense of
'culture of production', meaning knowledge of the craft as a synthesis of
productive tradition, formal evolution and technological innovation.
In the typically agricultural region of M o d e n a , it was possible to
restart the old production of ceramics, based u p o n the manufacturing
tradition of Faenza (meaning pottery), a town not far from M o d e n a , a n d
also with local influential support (the D u k e s of M o d e n a ) . T h e
craftspeople managed to resist the temptation of introducing into daily
life the n e w European porcelains, which were highly fashionable at the
time, and undertook the development of the production of traditional
earthenware. It was precisely in these efforts to support local production
that w e see thefirsthappy combination of factors contributing to the
success of the operation, this being the 'invention' of the tile, the
prototype of a kind of manufacturing destined to become the basis of
outstanding economic growth. It should be remembered that, since the

4. A . Bagnasco, La cosiruzione sociale del mercato, Bologna, 1988.

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1960s, 25 per cent of the world ceramics production has been

manufactured in the area of Sassuolo, a tiny and ancient village in the
province of M o d e n a . T h e 'tradition' factor involves: a diffuse
professionalism of craftspeople active in ceramics production;
considerable availability of local resources and raw materials - although
not exclusive to Sassuolo, but distributed throughout the region between
the P o and the Appenines; and a local creativity traditionally applied to
the production of pottery, and subsequently 'recycled' to 'modern'
products such as tiles. T h e spread of the latter benefited, in turn, from
the changes in life-styles and dwellings introduced into European society
towards the end of the nineteenth century, which increasingly demanded
particular products in terms of hygiene, decor and price, three criteria
that tiles were able to meet.

IMPORTANCE OF THE 'INNOVATION' FACTOR

In manufacturing activities that are largely centred on professionalism

and k n o w - h o w , technological innovation is as important as design. T h e
most interesting example is the production of ceramics, where the
vertical integration of the manufacturing cycle, its concentration in
space, and the increasingly acute division of labour often accompanied
by subcontracting, run parallel with a continuously changing technology.
W h e n , for example, research and innovation resulted in the 'single firing'
technique being introduced to the ceramic district, which turned the
products of Sassuolo into world leaders, it was the district as a whole
which benefited, to the extent mat the 'system area' began to export not
only itsfinishedproducts but also its n e w systems of production.5
Another example is the production of marble in a small village to the
north of Verona, San Ambrogio di Valpolicella, where, from the end of
the 1970s, a time of stagnation both in marble production and in the
agriculture of the region, a n e w productive impetus was achieved by an
entirely unexpected combination of production factors. In the small
region to the north of Verona, large amounts of marble from all over the
world were imported, worked and re-exported. T h e marble was
unloaded at the port of Carrara, in Tuscany, and then transported to
Valpolicella by road. It was worked by immigrants from Africa (as is
most marble in Italy), using a n e w technique developed locally whereby
the slabs can be cut into m u c h thinner 'sheets' than is possible with

5. T . Sorrentino, 'Appunti per una storia del distretto cerámico di Sassuolo', Annali di
storia deU'impresa, Bologna, 1991.

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 Augusto Perelli and Abdelkader Sid Ahmed

traditional techniques. In this w a y the entire traditional production of

marble was restarted using local traditions, marble's artistic qualities
and the existing training school, and even by reintroducing activities
that had virtually disappeared, such as the restoration of historic
m o n u m e n t s , marquetry and monumental masonry production.

IMPORTANCE OF LOCAL PRODUCTION FACTORS:

TIME AND SPACE

Turning to Valenza P o - another small agricultural village in the P o

valley - 1,500 workshops employing 10,000 people today account for
50 per cent of the world's production of jewellery. A t the beginning of
the century, there was only a village of 6,000 people, high-grade but
limited farming and a dozen workshops producing jewellery inspired by
the Paris fashions of the time. T h e current situation is particularly
surprising w h e n one considers that Italy has to import all the gold and
precious stones needed (and this applies not only to Valenza, but also to
the industrial-scale production of jewellery in Vicenza and Arezzo) and
that the only local 'tradition' since the nineteenth century concerns a
small n u m b e r of silversmiths in the town of Alessandria.
Local creativity, the result of a substantial capacity for innovation
rather than reliance o n tradition, is closely linked to the advantages
stemming from the high spatial concentration of activities. This has
m a d e it possible, a m o n g other things, for a college to be set u p to train
jewellers, establishing a close link between training and production, and
the institution of certain services for small enterprises, an example
followed by other 'system areas' of the country. These services include
the negotiation of prices for gold and precious stones o n the world
market, the buying-in of technologies at international level, the organ-
ization of large jewellery shows, the acquisition of funding at favourable
rates and a presence on the world market, which today makes it possible
for production units employing six to ten people to export their products
to Japan and the United States.
This historical review shows that the development process is a long-
term one and that time plays a decisive role. Besides the Italian example,
the recent development of Catalonia, certain regions of M o r o c c o and of
n e w industrial countries shows h o w important it is for the development
process to continue over time. It is only in the long term that the
behaviour of the social actors can be differentiated; in other words, the
history, culture and institutions of a country are important in formu-
lating an understanding of its economic evolution.

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T H E R O L E OF T R A I N I N G A N D
T H E PUBLIC AUTHORITIES

In most of the experiments mentioned above, training schools have

played a major role. T h e close link between production and training has
been crucial throughout history in ensuring the transfer to production
of certain artistic innovations formulated in the school. T h e m o s t
striking case is that of jewellery where, for example, the 'fashion' factor
plays an important role and has contributed not only to the success of
Italian jewellery throughout the world but to the exports of Italian
products as a whole.
Training is perhaps the starting-point for a n e w policy of co-operation
around the Mediterranean. It can be used to enhance the local skills that
still exist almost everywhere in these countries. T h e chances for a restart
lie in the combination of the production factors mentioned above and in
the support of the local political authorities which, in the past, have been
a major factor in local economic growth. Although the 'system areas' -
with a higher performance in Italy than in Spain or Tunisia - are
characterized by a widespread spirit of entrepreneurship, whether
individual or collective, the history of these regions demonstrates the
importance of the public authorities, particularly the local authorities, in
supporting production activities, liberalizing customs regimes for certain
products, determining import levels, supporting exports and so o n .
These functions are not only as effective today as ever, but are becoming
even m o r e essential in the light of international competition that is
increasingly acute as the e c o n o m y is globalized.

T h e futures of cultures and

European-North African co-operation

It appears that the same problem is confronting both sides of the

Mediterranean, albeit in different ways. This is the problem of the
relation between tradition and modernity, between culturalism and
universalism. There is a major confrontation, in different forms,
between 'cultural relativism' and 'rationalism' or 'universalism'.
For the adepts of tradition and the partisans of cultural relativism,
the world consists of a juxtaposition of parallel and irreducible cultural
universes: cultural identities are virtually immutable and universal
ideals have no real influence o n the evolution of humankind. This type
of position seems to characterize certain approaches in the same w a y as

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 Augusto Perelli and Abdelkader Sid Ahmed

the trends k n o w n as 'post-modern'. Other thinkers support the idea that

all cultures are tending towards a universal commonality. Today the
rationalism which has been a feature of the rise to power of different
civilizations - Arab-Islamic and European - seems to be facing a severe
test.
In North Africa, as throughout the Arab world, liberalism has been
a brief interregnum between the traditional societies (before colonialism
in M o r o c c o , during colonialism in Egypt) during which rationalism
appeared to recover its influence with the advent of the age of ideo-
logies, and hence the return to forms of 'culturalism'. Besides the mass
movements, and in parallel with the culture of the masses dominated by
ideology, another lasting culture has been implanted into Arab societies.
This p h e n o m e n o n can be recognized by the diversity and richness of
the effects of civilization and the Arab-Islamic culture o n history. T h e
result is the emergence of a n e w historical awareness in the Arab world.
T h e Arab-Muslim past has been re-worked, re-modelled and is moving
away from the present.
It could be said that modernity is not coming to North Africa from
the expected direction. It is certainly not coming, as one might believe,
from contact with the West. O n the contrary, the reception of Western
T V programmes in North Africa, even though it affects certain types of
behaviour, at the same time merely reinforces the rejection of the
Western model by broad strata of the population. It contributes to
developing reflexes about identity rather than attenuating them. T h e
same media are also effecting in the expressions of North African
culture a far-reaching selection, favouring certain forms and certain
expressions at the expense of others. Modernity stems from this
renewed introspection by the North Africans and the other Arabs about
their fundamental representations.
It seems impossible in North Africa to counter the negative effects
of the globalization of the means of communication o n the local socio-
cultural development by government action alone. O n the other hand, it
does seem possible to consolidate the cultural zones, as regards
countries possessing similar cultures. T h e value of such a formula is
that it does not imply a political and economic convergence comparable
with that necessary for integration. T h e establishment of North African
communications networks and of c o m m o n scientific and research poles
are all entirely feasible in conjunction with Europe, and are likely to
stimulate sectoral forms of integration.
T h e same applies to methods of training. In thisfield,the imbalance
between North Africa and Europe appears greater than elsewhere,
while the invasion of images, sound and text is already a reality. In these

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circumstances, therefore, the mastery of these n e w techniques becomes

a prerequisite for North African survival, as the contours of a E u r o p e -
North Africa free-trade zone are being traced. But this latter project
could never succeed without taking into account the cultural dimension,
whose role in development is today fully recognized.
T h e creative and cultural innovation sectors are receiving careful
attention from the public and private authorities in m a n y countries,
including those of North Africa and Western Europe. These sectors
have a particularly large potential for creating employment. Giving them
access to international markets is a means of countering unemployment
and reinforcing national compeüüvity. This was done by the United
Nations Conference o n Trade and Development ( U N C T A D ) in 1991
w h e n it launched its 'Trade Efficiency Initiative'. Trade points have been
set u p in M o r o c c o (Casablanca), Algeria (Algiers) and Tunisia (Tunis).
O n the northern shores, an Italian trade point is being set u p at Bari, and
discussions have started which could lead to the creation of a French
trade point in Marseilles. T h u s elements are in place for the western
Mediterranean to play an exemplary role as part of the steps taken by the
United Nations towards trade efficiency, and for the cultural dimension
to play a leading part.

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