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An Evidence-Based Typology of Asian Societies: What Do Asian Societies Look Like from the Bottom Up instead of Top Down?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 February 2017

TAKASHI INOGUCHI
TAKASHI INOGUCHI*
Affiliation:
University of Niigata Prefecture/University of Tokyoinoguchi@ioc.u-tokyo.ac.jp
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Abstract

In profiling Asian societies, such classical authors as Hegel, Marx, and Wittfogel have had considerable influence on the subject. They adopted power-centered approaches in characterizing Asian societies. This manuscript adopts the evidence-based approach with a bottom-up angle in constructing a people-centered typology of Asian societies. People's daily life satisfaction in 29 Asian societies is factor-analyzed with varimax rotation, society by society. Using the first two dimensions of factor analysis for each society, five types of Asian society are constructed: Ab, Ac, Ba, Bc, and Ca, where A means materialism in the primary, b means postmaterialism in the secondary, B means postmaterialism in the primary, a means materialism in the secondary, c means public sector dominance in the secondary, and C means public sector dominance in the primary. Ab societies include: Afghanistan, Indonesia, Japan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan. Ac societies include: China, South Korea, Taiwan, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Bangladesh, India, Nepal, and Mongolia. Ba societies include: Hong Kong, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, and Kyrgyzstan. Bc includes Brunei, the Philippines, Bhutan, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and Kazakhstan. Ca societies include: Singapore and the Maldives. Responses to questions about lifestyle priorities are also provided to corroborate and reinforce the above typology. Applicability of this method is open to non-Asian as well as Asian societies.

Type
Research Article
Information
Japanese Journal of Political Science , Volume 18 , Issue 1 , March 2017 , pp. 216 - 234
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2017 

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