The political factors that focused attention on the ‘‘East Asian challenge’’
remain in place, however. East Asian economies have been recovering and
relative to the rest of the world this region does not look badly oV. China in
particular looks set to become an economic and political heavyweight with
the power seriously to challenge the hegemony of Western liberal democratic
values in international forums. Thus, one hears frequent calls for cross-
cultural dialogue between ‘‘the West’’ and ‘‘the East’’ designed to understand
the other ‘‘side,’’ if only to avert misunderstandings and conXicts that might
otherwise have been prevented.
From a theoretical point of view, however, it must be conceded that the
oYcial debate on Asian values has not provided much of a challenge to
dominant Western political outlooks. The main problem is that the debate
has been led by Asian leaders who seem to be motivated primarily by political
considerations, rather than by a sincere desire to make a constructive contri-
bution to the debate on feasible and desirable alternatives to Western-style
politics and philosophy. Thus, it was easy to dismiss—rightly so, in most
cases—the Asian challenge as nothing but a self-serving ploy by government
leaders to justify their authoritarian rule in the face of increasing demands for
democracy at home and abroad.
Still, it would be a mistake to assume that nothing of theoretical sign-
iWcance has emerged from East Asia. The debate on Asian values has also
prompted critical intellectuals in the region to reXect on how they can locate
themselves in a debate on human rights and democracy in which they had not
previously played a substantial part. Neither wholly rejecting nor wholly
endorsing the values and practices ordinarily realized through a liberal
democratic political regime, these intellectuals are drawing on their own
cultural traditions and exploring areas of commonality and diVerence with
the West. Although often less provocative than the views of their govern-
ments—in the sense that few argue for the wholesale rejection of Western-
style liberal democracy with an East Asian alternative—these unoYcial East
Asian viewpoints may oVer more lasting contributions to the debate on
‘‘universalism’’ vs. ‘‘particularism’’ in contemporary political theory. Let me
(brieXy) note three relatively persuasive East Asian arguments 2 for cultural
particularism that contrast with traditional Western arguments for liberal
universalism:
2 I do not mean to imply that these arguments are distinctly or uniquely East Asian, only that they
have been put forward by East Asian scholars and critics of late.
266 daniel a. bell