After a considerable amount of time working in SE Asia and immersing myself in the intellectual life of these countries I am completely convinced that "Asian values" is a slogan that is cynically manipulated by dictators and self-intersted politicians who claim that "political stability" (ie. them holding onto their jobs and perks) is more significant than taking responsibility for prosecuting human rights abuses (which are often their own).

Can I urge you to read Yash Ghai's article in the Public Law Review (1997, from memory) about Asian values. By far the most compelling article on the topic.

Here here to the above poster's comments.

The importance of individual rights is that they give us some protection from the power of governments. "Asian values" are too often used as the excuse for Asian governments to deny those rights in the name of the collective, whose interests, of course, they claim to represent.

I have no problem with the author's family practising their values in the way that they do. That is their right. But upscale that to the level of governments and you take the road to totalitarianism.

As an aside, I've seen the way a number of Asian parents put enormous pressure on their children to succeed and honour the family and at times, quite frankly, it approaches the level of emotional abuse.

Jieh-Yung coins the term 'Asian' values to describe a 'different ethical structure' that operates in Asia (a complex geo-political cultural construct to put it mildly); but to me his formulation seems nothing more than words stretched to their very limit, if not beyond breaking point.

Jieh-Yung asserts that "Even human rights, which we assume in the West are universal, may be different depending on one’s culture, religion or family. Asian values have influenced and governed the lives of Asian cultures for centuries and as history has shown, its success is in its survival."

Let's be specific. Which human rights are not universal and where are human rights rendered less valid because of 'Asian' values? Free speech in China? Arbitary politically-motivated imprisonment in Malaysia or Burma? Child prostitution in India or Thailand? Slaughter by militia men in East Timor or Aceh or West Papua? Child labour in sweatshops in Bangladesh? Sexual violence against women in Cambodia? More than half the women in Nepal illitierate? And do on...and so on...

These situations can't be explained away or excused by reference to something as slippery as 'Asian' values which exist independently of the right to human dignity and freedom simply because of history - or a version of history that suits those currently in power.

When Jieh-Yung says: 'To sum it up, the community takes precedence over individuals, social and economic rights take precedence over civil and political rights and rights themselves are a matter of national sovereignty', you have to ask: who benefits and who suffers as a result of accepting such a skewed view of the world?

I think The Skeptic is right to claim "that 'Asian values' is a slogan that is cynically manipulated by dictators and self-interested politicians who claim that "political stability" (ie. them holding onto their jobs and perks) is more significant than taking responsibility for prosecuting human rights abuses (which are often their own)".

Speaking of how so called "values" can be used to create and justify any possible historical and political situation I think this reference re the "best intentions" of the USA can lead to unintended consequences.

1. http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/013107H.shtml

But are they really unintended?

In the contemporary scene, Asian Values, have been addressed by S. Gordon Redding and Robert Silin and Francis Hsu. The constructs, they offer; are personalism over professionalism, control over delegation, patrimonialism over equitable power, mistrust over trust, secretness over openness, and, familial atruism over community altruism [though Asian society is often classified, "collective", in a different sense, relating to the group].

Even guanxi is exists for it practical utlitity. The Asian Ethic is very different to that in West, especially, after the eighteen century French progressive thinkers.

Singapore is an interesting posit. They have a speakers' corner, where one can speak provided speakers receive a police permit and disclose to police what the they will speak about. Say a word against the system or the judicial process and PAP members will line to sue you.

And Singapore is oft' the cited as the model of Asian country.

The confucian view of the virtuous state does not sit well with many realities, especially, regarding business practices [perhaps in the case China, rooted in the Shang]

Should China wish/succeed to assert herself, as a world power, and, if historical traits, remain, then, deference, rather, than domination [Western trait], would be the expectation

I see the development of human ideas as similar to the development of a human being. Ideas have developed faster in the west than anywhere else, and so it has reached the messy stage of adolescence. Two hundred years ago the largely pre-democratic west was still in its childhood, and western values at that time were still family-based, and society-based, not unlike "Asian values" of today. Asian values will go enter a similar messy stage when they are ready to proceed, and the dictatorial regimes that are so common there now will fade away. In who-knows-how-many years, the west will presumably be the first society to reach a kind of mature adulthood, in which individual freedoms will be generally expressed widely, creatively, and responsibly, so that all of society will benefit.