Lost Modernities - Text

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In Lost Modernities: China, Vietnam, Korea, and the Hazards of World History, Alexander Woodside examines the rise of meritocratic bureaucracies in China, Korea, and Vietnam starting in the 900’sCE. Woodside’s purpose is not merely to illustrate the evolving mechanics of these bureaucracies in Asia, but to challenge prevailing Eurocentric narratives of how to conceive modernity. Modernities begins with the Chinese effort to improve its government by transitioning from rule by a hereditary aristocracy to rule by a non-aristocratic bureaucracy selected through competitive examination. As the bureaucratic system spread into the neighboring state/regions of Vietnam and North Korea, Woodside argues that the creation of bureaucratic government created a new set of problems which had to be dealt with even as they solved others.

Amongst those challenges was the spread of the belief that problems such as poverty were created by, and therefore reflective of, the quality of government rather than a product of, say, weather. The belief that public organization could alleviate food shortages lead to a system of public welfare based on the stockpiling and systematic redistribution of rice in times of famine, but agricultural surpluses were inadequate to eliminate famine entirely. The misinterpretation meant a continuous, effort to return the government to a purer vision of the Confucian order , generally with mixed success.

While many were probably saved by this rudimentary public welfare system, it required a highly sophisticated bureaucratic structure to maintain it. Over time, the bureaucracy tended to see its tasks as goals in themselves rather than as functions of a higher authority. So the population was counted because the bureaucracy had a large staff for counting the population, not because the emperor needed to know how many people lived in a given province for tax purposes. The army of clerks and support staff necessary to execute such tasks could also generate their own priorities, as they remained in place for their entire careers but were supervised by bureaucrats transferred at regular intervals.

Further, Woodside argues that the sheer efficiency of the bureaucratic structure played havoc with the traditional loyalty system that had allowed the population to identify with their leaders in the aristocratic state. As these leaders were not elected by appointed on the basis of their performance on exams, the population had little emotional investment in the faceless men who collected their taxes. His contemporary analogy for this phenomenon is the European Union, an organization of appointed representatives barely understood and little regarded by their supposed constituencies.

In terms of the world-historical narrative addressed in the first section of this document, Woodside is implicitly challenging the positivist perspective, pointing out that all three societies rejected their meritocratic examination systems in the early years of the 20^th century when they proved unable to prevent Westernized states from battering their way into East Asia territories and economies.

Woodside goes on to argue that a desire for the structured sort of society Confucianism and the bureaucracies had given to Asian societies has been replaced in recent decades with an uncritical acceptance of science and rationality in the form of Western business philosophy. While provoking, as Vietnam and China remain ostensibly communist, it seems arguable that the transition is at best incomplete, and the pervasive retention of state monopolies in the Chinese economy suggests that Asian states might be creating rather different state and economic models than the ones they find in Western states.

The overall effect of Modernities is to simultaneously trace continuities and discontinuities in the political cultures of the Asian states which adopted bureaucracies, and to challenge the centrality of Europe in world historical narratives addressing the development and utility of governing institutions.

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Other reviews which may prove interesting:

Katrina Gulliver (Cambridge University), Journal of World History, Dec 2007, Vol. 18 Issue 4, p526-528, 3p.

http://www.historycooperative.org/journals/jwh/18.4/br_2.html

Dingxin Zhao (University of Chicago), American Journal of Sociology, Jul 2007, Vol. 113 Issue 1, p268-270, 3p.

http://www.library.ohiou.edu:2145/doi/abs/10.1086/520893

Martina Deuchler, (University of London), American Historical Review, Feb 2007, Vol. 112 Issue 1, p164-165, 2p.

http://www.library.ohiou.edu:2145/doi/abs/10.1086/ahr.112.1.164

Wang Gungwu, (East Asian Institute, Singapore), Pacific Review, Winter 2006, Vol. 79 Issue 4, p657-658, 2p.

http://www.library.ohiou.edu:2063/olj/sites/pa.html