Commentary

Summary

Wu Yu-Shan, a distinguished Taiwanese political scientist, points out that Western success was based on power, undergirded by technology and organization. In response, Pacific Asia attempted to achieve modernization by four routes. Western liberalism was stillborn in China, as was Meiji-style conservative modernization. Mao’s approach could best be called “confused modernization,” a mix of state socialism and disastrous experiments like the Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution. What worked in Korea and Taiwan was authoritarian politics and state capitalism, and with Deng Xiaoping this became China’s path as well.