I came away from this article without understanding what the "Western Model" is. Does anyone have an accurate and concise definition of the model this article is attacking?<p>Is the "Western Model" Christianity or atheism? Does it involve capitalism or social democracy? Does it involve interventionism or isolationism? Should the government tarriff imports, or subsidize national industry? Does the "West" nationalize industry, or privatize it? Is constantly raising taxes and expanding the government "Western" or "Eastern"?
I don't think you can argue that the western ego isn't bruised and battered in recent times. There have been a lot of false starts in the past 20 years where we were hopeful western ideas would take hold in places where they haven't:<p>- Fall of the USSR, and what appears to be its rise again<p>- Arab spring turning into unstable nation states, instead of nice representative democracies<p>- Iraq<p>- Afghanistan (time will tell)<p>Then again, this article ignores the swelling middle class in a lot of southeast Asia. And also, conflict exists everywhere and is often a defining characteristic for nations. For example, the author didn't seem to have a true grasp of American history. The most important war we've ever fought was with ourselves, turning us from a loose collection of states into a single nation-state. Why is it surprising that other countries are going through that on their own watch?
If the Western Model is so broken, why are so many people from all over the world risking their lives trying to get into Western countries? There are economic reasons (probably for the majority), but there's also the powerful appeal of democracy, justice, freedom of speech, acceptance of so-called alternative lifestyles, freedom of religion and other human rights. It would be a mistake to reduce the Western model to hardcore profit driven capitalism.
Regardless of whether you agree or not, it's very interesting in that it's challenging the merits of things we take for granted as being "good".