Will the West Survive the Challenge of the Non West?

Why the West will continue to Triumph?

The centre of gravity of economic activity, it is held, is moving to Asia and in turn Asia is recovering its power and glory that it lost to the West following the west’s renaissance. The confluence of renaissance ideas and capitalism created conditions that were propitious for the west’s rise and concomitantly the decline of the non west (a disaggregated and a heterogeneous category). This state of affairs, it is held, is changing as the non west, especially Asia, discovers the magic of capitalism and adopts in a curious case of mimesis some of the salient attributes of western rationality and renaissance ideas. While this mimetic process may take place in an idiom and the institutional setting formulated and crystallized by the west, the non west is bound to overtake the west in almost all indices. As a corollary, the west is doomed and its ‘supremacy’-institutional, ideational, and economic- will give away to different civilizational forces that constitute the non west. This assessment gaining currency and some sort of acceptance in many intellectual and lay circles begs a set of questions the foremost of which is: Is this alleged decline of the west correct? Is the west really losing its vitality and vigor to the non west? Or is this just a figment of the imagination lent credence by some processes of globalization that are dispersing economic power and activity? What really constitutes the west? What are the animating ideas of the west? What is its gravamen and core? And is this core or core set of ideas under challenge from a different but compelling paradigm?

The answer to the core question, around which the rest of the questions revolve, is a firm NO. The west is not in decline and will not decline. The reason for the confidence in this assertion goes to the heart of the nature of the west. The west is not a geographical zone. It is instead an idea or a set of ideas from which assumptions about the individual, the state, society, and economics flows. It needs to be pointed out here the west in contention here is the Anglophone and the Anglo-Saxon west. Renaissance may have originated in Europe or Western Europe but it’s thrust-ideationally and in practice- has long since migrated elsewhere. The core of the west or the idea of the west revolves around what Thomas Paine called the Rights of Man. That is, a set of rights which accrue to human beings purely on account of being human. This revolutionary idea which placed the individual and his/her rights at the centre is purely a western idea. The rest is mere commentary.

This elevation or putting on the pedestal the rights of man blends into what Francis Fukuyama in his magnus opus, the controversial and much commented upon tome, The End of History and the Last Man’ into thymos or thymotic pride. That is, an innate sense of justice among individuals and the related belief that they have a certain worth. And that this worth is recognized by others.Human rights and thymos- a greek term- together mean that every individual has and values dignity and individual human rights, both in theory and practice give meaning to existence. Again, to repeat, while human dignity may be a concept that every culture puts some value on, human rights and their associated corollaries are a purely western idea. These sets of rights too all and sundry give an individual a sense of worth, reach efflorescence and aspire for the ‘good life’. The non west, unfortunately, has a rather dismal record on these aspects.

Human rights, along with the development of capitalism, to iterate the cliché, and the concomitant development of institutions and ideas like democracy, constitute the west’s gravamen and give it an edge. Other cultures can but only replicate or imitate these paradigms and ideas. None can pioneer or even challenge the west on these core ideas. This then constitutes the west’s strength and the idea of the west can thus not be displaced.

The non west can only imitate. It cannot offer either a sustained challenge or even assault the west on these formidable ideas. Or offer an alternate and compelling paradigm. And therein is dispelled the notion that the west is in decline. The non west first is a disaggregated mass and cannot come up as homogenous entity challenging the west. More importantly, whatever challenge can this disaggregated mass throw up will be formulated in the idiom formulated and defined by the west. That is, with some mutation and change, the challenge if it does take place, will be formulated in the principles delineated in this piece. This axiomatically means victory neither for the non west nor the west conventionally defines. It would constitute a victor for the ideas of the west. The world then becomes the west at large. The question of a zero sum victory for a civilization or a culture does not arise.

These principles are so interwoven and integral to the concept and idea of the west that a fear of backsliding is impossible. What needs to be done is to help spread these ideas and principles to other peoples. This would not be the so called civilizing mission of the west but the nudging of ideas whose power has only proved to be structurally immense and appealing. It is there fore about time that western countries get their act together and display to the world the immense soft power of ideas. The question is decline is moot. Good ideas never die. They however need constant nurturing.