The East in the West, "Introduction: the West's problem with the East" (1996), Jack Goody.

Résumé du document

Jack Goody (born 1919) is a British social anthropologist. He tries to understand the specific role which written communication has played in the development of social and cultural institutions in contemporary societies. He has also written on the history of the family and the anthropology of inheritance. He is member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the British Academy. Jack Goody questions many assumptions about the Uniqueness of the West and so, allows the development of better explanatory theories. He particularly directs his book to the Western anthropologists, who often consider the miraculous accomplishments of the West as a basic assumption in their work, and as a global and long-standing character. It's worth studying this because it has implications for social science and above all, for the perception of ourselves and of others.

Extraits

[...] But all these theories don't take into account that the East was advance” during the Middle Ages. All the more, the rapid growth of the economy, the technology and the systems of knowledge in Asia outdated these theories. Scholars first spoke about Japanese exceptionalism. But again, the development of Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore and South Korea invalidated this thesis. Others provided cultural explanations. For Bellah, the religion played a favourable role in the Japanese economy, as Protestantism did in Europe. [...]

[...] He also wrote on the history of the family and the anthropology of inheritance (http://www.nationmaster.com/encyclopedia/Jack-Goody). He is member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the British Academy (http://www.lemonde.fr/savoirs-et-connaissances/article/2001/09/28/jack- goody-qu-est-ce-que-l-esprit_228226_3328.html). Jack Goody wants to question many assumptions about the Uniqueness of the West and so to allow the development of better explanatory theories. He particularly directs his book to the Western anthropologists, who often consider the “miraculous” accomplishments of the West as a basic assumption in their work, and as a global and long-standing character. [...]

[...] All the more it would be too restrictive to include Asia and Africa in the same category, for example. But according to jack Goody, the major problem is rather our tendency to divide the oriental civilisations from our own. I think that Jack Goody doesn't take enough into account progress that has been made in the theories, which become less and less ethnocentric: for example, Rostow's stages of development that were based on the industrial revolution in England and explained the “absence of development” of the East are today replaced by theories explaining the “underdevelopment” of some countries in the East and the fairly negative role of the West in this phenomenon, like those from Arghiri Emmanuel (theory of the unequal exchange) or Prebish (theory of the dependence). [...]

[...] But one question remains: How can we explain the advance of the West from the Renaissance to today? He thinks that the reasons for achievements in West and East are contingent. Nothing proves that there are structural reasons for it and those who claimed it were often mesmerised by their natural egocentricity. To solve this latter problem, he proposes to take into account a wider span of world history than that from 1600 to the present day. He insists on the theories relativity in the time: as Berger says, what was earlier considered an obstacle to the development, like Confucianism, can be seen today as a facilitator.In conclusion, we need to reconsider the East and the West. [...]

[...] The classical economists thought there was a large gap between the East and the West, concerning the standard of living, the accumulation of knowledge and the political systems. Thirdly, in the nineteenth century, the Uniqueness of the West was explained thanks to its rationality and entrepreneurial skills that it possessed alone and that allowed the development of capitalism (Weber's theory).Fourthly, there are also today various world-systems theories that try to explain this Uniqueness. They emphasise the recent changes in the world but classify all the systems in relation to the West and “primitivise” Eastern institutions in unacceptable ways. [...]