I frequently hear about people complaining about the "Westernization" of Thailand.
This mostly comes from long-term expats who have seen changes over a number of years. It reminds them of the country they left. And they don't like it.
While it's true that in general Thailand values the material and superficial, I'm not sure that this new. Even if it is a new phenomenon, it's arrogant of us to place our views above the wishes of the people.
If the people of Thailand want to be able to purchase cars, nicer phones, clothes, etc and be proud of them, that's their choice.
However even more arrogant I feel is to refer to the process as "Westernization".
Westernization refers to the process of a country adopting "Western" cultural values, although what is considered Western is not very clearly defined.
In Thailand, many people refer to Westernization as an increasing strictness of rules and regulation and a primary concern for material wellbeing (read: money).
But I think we consider these things Western simply because those cultures got there first.
We forget how much Western culture has changed in the last 100 years alone. Looking back at classic black and white movies shows me a time I can barely imagine.
In fact in many ways, the mentality of Chiang Mai residents often make me think of the TV series "Mad Men". Men were expected to philander and take control of a situation, and women were expected to be accommodating and look after a man. Gender roles were simpler then, and I think thats what many of the old timers seem to like about being in Thailand.
In the series there is even an episode when many of the wives find a single lady weird because she walks for pleasure instead of necessity. In Chiang Mai, nobody walks unless they have to. Outside of running for exercise, a person who walks for pleasure is considered a bit weird.
Western civilization has had hundreds of years of challenging paradigms that many other cultures haven't experienced, at least not to the same degree. Particularly starting with the French revolution, the idea was implanted that it was possible to overthrow a government, if they moved en masse.
America followed with a civil war and the rising of first wave feminism which resulted in the abolition of slavery and gaining women the right to vote, now considered basic human rights. In fact, many countries were ahead of Western countries in terms of human rights at this stage.
World War II had another huge change in terms of labor relations and gender roles. When men went to war, women had to do what were considered mens jobs at home. And when the war was over, women didn't want to give up their jobs. This gave rise to second wave feminism, which dealt with questions on gender roles in family and society.
This was in the 60s and 70s, only about 40 years ago, or a little over one generation. Considering the amount of changes that took place over the past 100 years in the West, places like Thailand are catching up fast.
This of course is not to mention a large period of near poverty for the masses from the beginning of the industrial age until after world war II (with the exception of the roaring 1920s). Economic equality and the emerging middle class hasn't been a phenomenon for most of western societies until about 60 years ago.
Much of this kind of development around the world seems to follow a similar pattern such as increased standard of living, and increased regulation and adherence to rule of law. Thailand is no exception to this.
I don't believe Western culture is superior. But neither is the culture here. They both have good and bad points. The sad thing about Modernization is that most cultures replace all old traditions with new. Some old traditions are good and healthy and should be kept. Some are not good or healthy and should be changed.
In the west we have rapidly gone from a culture of automatic respect to automatic disrespect. We disrespect elders and authority who may (or may not) have more experience than us or something valuable to contribute to society. We are so alert for any injury to our pride that we become unnecessarily aggressive to strangers. Thailand is not like this yet, but it's starting to happen.
I would like to believe that cultural development is like a pendulum. It swings back and forth from one extreme to another, but becomes closer and closer towards a better balance with time.
I believe we are observing in Western cultures a desire to revert back to some traditions of the past. The idea of community and morality is becoming increasingly talked about and I think this is a good sign.
But the west had to go through a period of great material wealth (80s and 90s) to realize that material wealth alone doesn't provide happiness, something else is missing.
Thailand needs to go through its period to realize the same thing. It is only just starting to enter this period.
We are seeing more cultures adopting similar values in their own fashion, especially here in Asia. It's time we stop referring to these cultures as becoming "Westernized" and start thinking of them as becoming "Modernized".
