Why the West?

Steven Dutch, Professor Emeritus, Natural and Applied Sciences,University of Wisconsin - GreenBay

Key Observations:

Western Europe discovered the scientific method and theconnection between science and technology before many oldersocieties.
Japan independently developed many of the qualities requiredfor success in science and technology.
Many other cultures are rapidly acquiring science andtechnology.

The West was first, not unique.
To explain the success of the West in science and technology,we need to identify and focus on the cultural conditioning that was mostdistinctive to the West.
Crucial attributes are likely also to show up in the culturalconditioning of Japan.
These attributes can be learned; other cultures are doing just that.

“Western Culture” is a Serial Culture
- Not Bound to Any One Group in Space or Time
Goldilocks Syndrome: Not too Little, Not too Much, but“Just Right”
- Isolation
- Challenge and Threat
- Fragmentation and Unification
- Authority versus Individualism
Repeated Episodes of Hybridization and Synthesis
- Judaeo-Christian Synthesis
- Anglo-Viking-Norman Synthesis
- Medieval Synthesis
Loss and Recovery of Classical Civilization
- Stimulus for Directed Change
- Attainable Goal
- Related: Loss and Recovery of East-West Contact
Attitude Toward Change
- Can be Desirable
- Can be Controlled
- Can be Initiated
Autonomy, Autonomy, Autonomy
- Emphasis on Time – Individuals have Agendas
- Stimulus to Innovation – Can Effect Change
Fragmentation
- No One Group or Institution had a total lock
Pragmatic
- Tendency to Prefer Results Above:
  - Ideology
  - Religion
  - Class Distinctions
  - Machismo
- Ideological Disputes Often Disguised as Practical Issues

Stability: Unstable. Sooner or later change will happen, even if the society stays isolated.
Examples: Pre-contact Hawaii, other isolated tribal societies. Easter Island, about as isolated as a society can get, collapsed from internal warfare and environmental destruction before Europeans arrived.

Stability: Unstable. Sooner or later a change too powerful to exclude is bound to happen.
Examples: Ming China, Inquisition Spain, Khomeini's Iran

Stability: Probably unstable. Sooner or later a change agent will probably appear that is too powerful or too resistant to assimilate.
Examples: China throughout its history has been the type example of this response.

Stability: Most stable
Examples:
- The West and Japan have repeatedly synthesized foreign innovations into their own societies.
- Turkey in modern times made a conscious decision to change its orientation from the Middle East to Europe.
- Plains Indians domesticated wild horses descended from Eurpean stock and utilized them before ever meeting a European.

Stability: Stable but permanently changes the society. Any society receiving a great enough shock will be traumatized temporarily, but in some societies traumas have been great enough or repeated enough to imprint the character of the society.
Examples: South after Civil War: lasted a few decades, largely effaced by later synthesis with modernization.
Russia: repeated traumas show up in deep pathos in arts and resignation and patience toward hardships.
Islamic World after 1258: never recovered former intellectual vitality

Stability: Probably temporary by its very nature: leads eventually to synthesis, traumatization or extinction.
Examples: Present Third World

Some societies had too much of certain stimuli, others too little, and the West was "just right"

Europe was just isolated enough to avoid being overwhelmed completely, but not so isolated as to be completely unaware of outside influences.
Europe was just weak enough that it was often forced to cope with external threats and incursions, but never so weak as to be completely overrun.
Europe was fragmented enough to avoid a stifling uniformity, but not so fragmented it could not communicate or cooperate.
The collapse of Rome allowed northern European institutions to evolve, but Rome still provided an intellectual framework, a unifying scholarly language, and eventually a stimulus to reconstruct and surpass ancient achievements.

We are justified in forcing our ways on others
(The West)
Outsiders have nothing to teach us
(Roman Empire, China)
Our way of life is the only possible way
(Hawaii, other isolated societies)
"Honor" must be preserved at all costs
(Middle East, Mediterranean, Latin America, U.S. inner cities)

The Wheel:

Contrast to cultures where Good and Evil are equally primordial

Created 27 Dec 1997, Last Update 4 Jun 1997