Challenges to Asian public intellectuals

• Main Authors: Kuo, Pao Kun, Wee, C. J. Wan-Ling
• Other Authors: School of Humanities
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: 2022
• Subjects: Humanities::History; Creativity and Culture; War and Southeast and East Asia
• Online Access: https://hdl.handle.net/10356/155605
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

Kuo reflects upon the Pacific War and what he feels holds post-war Japanese culture back from attaining “genuine greatness,” given a capacity enabled by its early modernising efforts for “the liberation of the self, the democratisation of society and … the realisation of the knowledge-based mode of production and exchange.” He also argues that nations in East and Southeast Asia share a similar socio-political “baggage with Japan — chiefly the semi-feudal [and also nationalistic] culture which impedes our [joint] fuller entry into modernity.” The challenge for Asian intellectuals — and particularly for Southeast Asians with their complex and multiple cultural makeup — is to initiate dialogue as to how regional diversity and “civilisational assets” can be turned into a “living multiculture” that will be an advantage for “the region’s long-term progress and prosperity.”.