Asian Value

Review Essay ------ Are "Asian Values" really that unique? by Charles Wolfe Jr.

Main Argument

Wolfe argued that the "Asian Values" is not really that unique by citing empirical evidence to prove the fallacy of two premises: first, that Asian values are pervasively shared among the dozen countries and 2.7 billion people in Asian region (including India), and second, that these values are unique, hence distinctly different from "Western values" (Wolfe 2002, pg. 85).

Key Points

The economic development in Asia in the 1980s and through the mid 1990s had been attributed to the virtues, which was described as the "Asian Values". The Asian Values stands for the Confucian precepts of work, frugality, and hierarchy (Wolfe 2002, pg.85).

During the Asia's financial meltdown from mid-1997 through 1998, questions had been raised on the relevance and uniqueness of "Asian Values". The other dimensions of "Asian Values" were also faulted by the likes of Paul Krugman at MIT as major contributors to Asia's financial meltdown from mid-1997 through 1998. The other dimensions of "Asian Values", such as excessive loyalty to family, clan and otherwise in-group, were said to be the source of Asia's financial crisis for leading to nepotism, cronyism and corruption (Wolfe 2002, pg.86).

The nepotism, cronyism and corruption bred by other dimensions of "Asian Values" were blamed for cumulative economic distortions and resources misallocations which in turn precipitated the Asian financial crisis in 1997 (Wolfe 2002, pg.85).

The empirical evidence was cited to prove that "Asian Value" is not that really unique by Wolfe (2002, pg. 86) was a survey conducted by Japan's prestigious Dentsu Institute for Human Studies. The survey was conducted twice. First