Is man becoming Westernised in the name of modernization?

Answer 1

It is a mistake to view the world in terms of Western, Eastern, or Middle Eastern thought or culture. Much of the oriental or Eastern culture has embraced many aspects of the Western culture without losing their own distinctly Eastern world view. The Middle East seems torn between embracing and whole heartedly rejecting modernization let alone Western culture and yet somehow remains distinctly Middle Eastern in their culture. Modernization is a reality that has been happening amongst civilizations since before the Bronze age, indeed, since the advent of humans harnessing fire modernization has been the obvious phenomenon that followed. Of course, when humanity was learning how to harness fire and build a better wheel it is doubtful they thought about the world in terms of West, East and Middle East. The Westernization of world cultures is a fairly modern concept in the whole modernization of the world.

It should also be noted that as the East and Middle Eastern countries opened up more to Western culture, Western culture in turn opened up more to Eastern and Middle Eastern cultures. Sun Tsu's The Art of War is read by many military strategists in the West, as well as many businessmen of the West and Middle East. Islam is one of the fastest growing religions in the world. The world, in its steady march towards modernization seems to adapt and adopt each others cultures as a matter of course. There is as much Easternization happening in the world as there is Westernization and the current conflicts in the Middle East have as much to do with a Western worlds fear of Middle Easternization as any other factor. The world is the world and we who live on it are quite simply people and whether we were raised to embrace Western, Eastern, or other concepts of this world is only one facet of what makes us all so darn human.