THE CULTURE OF POLITICAL ECONOMY,
OR
THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF CULTURE
The Constitution of Cultural Diversity in Southeast Asian
Development Strategies
(A RESEARCH AND ADVOCACY AGENDA)
Bonn Juego
PhD Fellow
Global Development Studies
Aalborg University, Denmark
E-mail: bonn@ihis.aau.dk
30 April 2009
55 Bandung 55 Conference
Jakarta, Indonesia
RESEARCH PROBLEM
How is cultural diversity constituted in
the domestic development strategies
of the Philippines, Malaysia, and
Singapore?
WHY?
OPERATIONALISATION
 Cultural Diversity
Plurality
of shared identities,
of groups of people
with shared culture,
making up a society
OPERATIONALISATION
 Constitution of Cultural Diversity
(How is cultural diversity constituted?)

Gramsci (1971) – Formation of new social regime:

either “ORGANIC”,

or “ARBITRARY, RATIONALISTIC, AND WILLED”
Depending on the regime's success/failure to realise
“STRUCTURED COHERENCE” among
'the political', 'the economic', and 'the cultural'
HYPOTHESIS
Culture of Political Economy, or
the Political Economy of Culture?
The drive for global capitalist competitiveness
transcends
the nature of cultural diversity.
(Capitalism can exist with or without cultural diversity.)
SCOPE
Post-1997 Southeast Asia
Global Political Economy of Development, 1980s - 2009
(General Characteristics)
Washington Consensus
(1st Generation Neo-liberal
Reforms, 1980s - mid-1990’s)
Post-Washington Consensus
(2nd Generation Neo-liberal Reforms,
mid-1990’s - 2009)
Scope: Limited macroeconomic
policies
Scope: broader, more extensive and
intrusive policies
Goal: ‘open market economy’
Goal: ‘global competitiveness’
Approach: ‘shock’ tactics; ‘sound
macroeconomic principles’
Approach: ‘deep’ institutional and
behavioural/cultural change
• SAPs (privatisation,
deregulation, liberalisation,
etc)
• Rollback of the state
• ‘flexible’ labour, ‘human capital’
• ‘social capital’: non-market
responses to market
imperfections
Diverse Southeast Asian Cases:
Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore
General Characteristics of Social Relations in Globalising Southeast Asia
Philippines
‘The Political’
(State Form)
Neo-liberal
Malaysia
Neo-statist
Singapore
Neo-corporatist
Society
‘The Economic’
‘The Cultural’
(Economic Policies)
(Cultural Diversity)
Market-led, serviceHomogenous (with peoples
oriented, and partially
acknowledging one Filipino
agricultural
race); cultural diversity based
largely on linguistic locales
and religion)
Focus on manufacturing Heterogeneous; internal
and services
diversity with three major
races: Malay, Chinese, and
Indian
Strong manufacturing
Largely homogenous, yet
sector and knowledge- increasingly becoming
intensive services
heterogeneous with the
incorporation of foreign
workers
Diverse Social Relations in Southeast Asia
Diverse Political Regimes, Economic Structures, and Cultural Orientations
LITERATURES ON CULTURAL DIVERSITY
Evolutionary Economics
Business Studies

Causality between:


Culturally-diverse workforce;
and
Firm's organisation,
behaviour, performance
GAP
Theory of the firm



No such thing as “representative
firm”
Focus on factors exogenous to
firms
National Systems of Innovation
(NSI) Approaches

Freeman-Lundvall-Nelson:
focus on developed,
relatively homogenous,
Scandinavian societies
GAP
Explore idea of 'tacit knowledge'

culture and cultural diversity for
Third World development

Social sciences and
(International) Political
economics
Economy
Discursive
•
•


“culturalisation of economic
life”
“cultural materialism”
Reification of the market

Abstraction of the economy
into mathematical
calculations
Aglietta-Lipietz-Boyer: “French Régulation
Approach”

US & Europe (Atlantic Fordism);

Latin America ('populist' ISI);

East Asia (developmental state)

Post-régulation approach

“transnational state”: outside-in approach
GAP
Context-specific phenomena;
Ideational-Material nexus
GAP
Dynamism and specificity of Southeast
Asia
Internal reorganisation of the state
Regional and intra-regional variation in
a broadly comparative framework
CONSTITUTIVE Discourse:
Culture in Political Economy of Development
“The central conservative truth is that it is culture, not politics, that determines the
success of a society. The central liberal truth is that politics can change a culture and
save it from itself.”
(Daniel Patrick Moynihan)
“Asian Values” and Development:
A Constitutive Dominant Discourse
●
CONTEXT
'East Asian Miracle':
rapid growth with
equity thru state
intervention
○
●
HPAE, NICs
Proponents: former
state leaders of (semi)authoritarian regimes
○
○
○
Mahathir bin
Mohamad (MY)
Lee Kuan Yew (SG)
Le Peng (CN)
●
●
CONTENT
An Asian thing
A culturally-based
'given' that cannot be
wished away
1. acceptance of hierarchy
and the need for social
harmony
●
CRITIQUE
Conceptually false
○
●
Politically suspicious
○
2. respect and reverence
for family
●
3. benevolence in
government
diversity of cultures,
traditions, religions,
and histories in Asia
justification for
authoritarianism
Economically bad
○
Resulted in the 1997
Asian economic
crisis
NORMATIVE Discourse:
Culture for Political Economy of Development

Amartya Sen: “Development as
freedom”
Culture is among development's
ends and means.



Culture is development; and
development is culture.
As means: Using culture for
development because of its
considerable importance.
As ends: Culture as an expression
of the 'good life'.
Culture in Contemporary Development Strategies

Aalborg School: 'learning economy' – tacit knowledge
(Bengt-Åke Lundvall, et al.)
National Systems of Innovation
Culture embodies 'tacit knowledge'.
'tacit knowledge': 'know-how' (skills) embedded in
culture – difficult to transmit, cannot be codified, or
written down

Culture as source of 'Competitive Advantage'
(Michael Porter, et al.)
Globalisation: allows sourcing from anywhere
'Economic culture': hard-to-imitate competitive
advantage (a niche market)
Cultural differences give rise to distinctive
product and services (international
specialisation)
RESEARCH OBJECTIVES
To examine the constitutive role of cultural
diversity in development strategies
1. co-evolution of the ideational and material aspects
intrinsic in the development process

Overcoming reductionism or essentialism
2. cultural diversity in the political economy of development
and the specificity of the Southeast Asian region

Highlighting factors, phenomena, processes left unstated,
repressed, and marginalised in official dominant discourses
THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
CPE + EDE

Critical Political Economy

Development as a “social relation” – both “ideational” and “material”
SOCIAL RELATIONS: ‘the political’, ‘the economic’, ‘the cultural’, ‘the ecological’,
‘the gender’, and all the other spheres of the society are organically connected to,
not separate from, one another

Evolutionary Development Economics

non-equilibrium, non-physics based, and non-mathematical approach to economic phenomena

focus on the economy, and not economics

‘social variables’ (state, culture, civil society, values, etc.) excluded in mainstream economics
CPE + EDE:
Cultural diversity in the development strategies of the Philippines, Malaysia,
and Singapore across time and space
Differences and specificities in national situations in particular historical
moment in the context of social relations
METHODOLOGY
Culture of political economy,
or Political Economy of culture?
Social regime: either ‘organic’, or
‘arbitrary, rationalistic, and willed’

Culture of political economy (organic)


Political Economy of culture (willed)
Extensive reference

Official documents and development plans:


Philippines, Malaysia, and Singapore (post-1997 crisis)
Policy papers and reports: Multilateral institutions and regional associations - WB,
IMF, WTO, UN, ADB, APEC, ASEAN

domestic social forces in policy advice and policy-making
PRELIMINARIES: (Culture & Capitalist Development)
UNESCO
Universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity (2001)

Art. 3: Cultural diversity as a factor in
development
“Cultural diversity widens the range
of options open to everyone; it is
one of the roots of development,
understood not simply in terms of
economic growth, but also as a
means to achieve a more
satisfactory intellectual, emotional,
moral and spiritual existence.”

Art. 8: Cultural goods and services:
commodities of a unique kind
PRELIMINARIES: (Culture & Capitalist Development)
ASIAN DEVELOPMENT BANK
FDI Regimes: Some Stylized Facts
Asian Development Outlook
2004

Feature
(a) FDI History
(b) FDI Presence
(c) Trade Regime
(d) International Connections
(e) FDI Regime in Practice
(f) Institutional Quality
(g) Human Capital
'Cultural diversity': implicit in
the idea of “human capital”.
PRELIMINARIES: (Culture & Capitalist Development)
WORLD BANK
Social Capital: The missing link in development

Sources of Social Capital


families, communities, firms, civil society, public
sector, ethnicity, gender
Social Capital Implementation Framework
(SCIF)

Social Capital: 'norms and networks that enable
collective action'
5 Key Dimensions of Social Capital
1. Groups and networks (to promote and protect
personal relationships)
2. Trust and Solidarity (to foster cohesion and
collective action)
3. Collective Action and Cooperation (to resolve
communal issues)
4. Social Cohesion and Inclusion (to mitigate risk of
conflict thru participation)
5. Information and Communication (to improve
access to information)
COMMENT: Since 1990 the Washington Institutions
have provided a string of red herrings...
‘get the prices right’
‘get the property rights right’
‘get the institutions right’
‘get the governance right’
‘get the competitiveness right’
‘get the innovations right’
‘get the entrepreneurship right’
‘get the education right’
’get the climate right’
’get the diseases right’
‘get the culture right’
Missing dimension:
‘GET THE ECONOMIC ACTIVITIES RIGHT’
CONTRIBUTION TO KNOWLEDGE OF THIS RESEARCH AGENDA

Co-evolution of material and ideational:

constitutive role of cultural diversity in
development strategies
Culture
Political
Economy
1. Origin: historical question
2. Evolution (process of change): conjoint impact

Specificities of Southeast Asia

national differences within a broadly comparative
framework
Analysing the constitution of cultural diversity
within social relations in which it is constituted...

General Characteristics of Social Relations in Globalising Southeast Asia
Philippines
‘The Political’
(State Form)
Neo-liberal
Malaysia
Neo-statist
Singapore
Neo-corporatist
Society
‘The Economic’
‘The Cultural’
(Economic Policies)
(Cultural Diversity)
Market-led, serviceHomogenous (with peoples
oriented, and partially
acknowledging one Filipino
agricultural
race); cultural diversity based
largely on linguistic locales
and religion)
Focus on manufacturing Heterogeneous; internal
and services
diversity with three major
races: Malay, Chinese, and
Indian
Strong manufacturing
Largely homogenous, yet
sector and knowledge- increasingly becoming
intensive services
heterogeneous with the
incorporation of foreign
workers
OVERALL CONTRIBUTION OF THIS RESEARCH AGENDA

Co-evolution of material and ideational
constitutive role of cultural diversity in development
strategies

Specificities of Southeast Asia
national differences within a broadly comparative
framework

Exploration of appropriate “social relations” for real
development
“polity-economy-culture” blend in harmonious synergy
—Bonn Juego - 30 April 2009, Jakarta (bonnjuego@yahoo.com)