Description
Where once the idea of “civilization” had been widely critiqued and dismissed, scholars of International Relations have increasingly taken the concept seriously not least because of political actors’ explicit references in contemporary politics. This paper contributes to these discussions by surveying the extant conceptions of civilization in the Asia-Pacific/Indo-Pacific region(s). The emergence of civilizationism is rooted in the universalization of liberal order as a standard of modernity since the 19th century. This has enabled the ideational hegemony of Western, self-proclaimed liberal states, from the context of imperial colonization to contemporary norms of liberal international order. Competing notions of “civilization” developed and adapted under these conditions, such as (but not limited to): the Japanese call to “Leave Asia and enter Europe” in the late 19th century; the emergence and resurgence of anti-secular and anti-colonial Hindutva ideology; or the (re-)deployment of Tianxia (“all under heaven”) in China’s Belt and Road Initiative. In surveying non-Western understandings of “civilization” this paper has three aims: the first is to demonstrate the development of civlizationsim historically. The second objective is to critically assess the understanding of statehood developed in these civilizationist ideologies. More broadly, the paper clarifies the diversity of ideas within the broad umbrella of civilizationism.
