Zhengxu Wang, Democratization in Confucian East Asia: Citizen Politics in China, Japan, Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan

Abstract

This book studies the impact of modernization on value change and the impact of value change on democracy in six East Asian societies: China, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Singapore and Vietnam, with an emphasis on China’s experience. Based on four waves of World Value Survey (WVS) data, the author assesses the relations between economic development, self expression values and democracy in these countries. In the lineage of Inglehart and Welzel’s theory of post-materialism and self expression values, the author studied the level of self expression values in these Asian societies. While Inglehart’s studies focused on society level, the author sought to determine the relations between values and politics at the individual level. The first three chapters of the book have a good theoretical discussion of the relations between democratic values, democratization and democratic consolidation. In Chapter Four the author carefully explains his choice of test variables and his measurement methods. In the chapter, the author shows clearly that economic development in recent decades has brought about a higher level of self expression values in the six East Asian societies. There was a clear increase of self expression values in these six societies from the 1930s to 1990s, confirming the intergenerational value change thesis. In Chapter Five, the author shows education is an important factor in increasing self expression values in these six societies. In particular, college education makes a qualitative difference, the impact of which is greater than the effects of the extra years of education in college. Part III (Chapters Six to Eight) studied the relations between prodemocratic values and democratic politics. Chapter Six showed that people who have higher self expression values have higher protest potential. Chapter Seven shows that self expression values have a positive contribution on civil involvement. Chapter Eight explains the anomaly of high political trust in China. The author tests several East Asia (2010) 27:209–210 DOI 10.1007/s12140-010-9108-x