The 21st century will be the Asian century, just as the 19th century was the European century and the 20th century the American century. Of this, there can be no doubt. From the year AD1 to 1820, the two largest economies of the world were those of China and India. The past 200 years of Western domination of world history were therefore a major historical aberration. All aberrations come to a natural end. Already in 2019, in Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) terms, three of the four largest economies are Asian. The top four are China, USA, India and Japan. By 2029, the Asian share of global Gross National Product (GNP) will be even larger.

While there can be no doubt that the 21st century will be an Asian century, there is some doubt as to whether it will be a happy Asian century. With all the great shifts of power taking place in Asia, there are natural fears that Asia will be torn apart by geopolitical conflicts. Indeed, over twenty years ago, an eminent American political scientist, Aaron L. Friedberg, predicted that “Europe’s past could be Asia’s future”.  Just as the great shifts of power in Europe at the end of the 19th century led to great European wars in the 20th century, the same could happen in Asia.

Many in the West believe that Asia is even more prone to conflict and division because, unlike Europe, there are no common cultural links between the different Asian societies. Asia, in this European perspective, was always divided and will always remain divided. This perception is mistaken. Actually, before the European colonial era, Asia was deeply connected. As Professor Farish Noor says:

“In his book, Asia Before Europe: Economy and Civilisation of the Indian Ocean from the Rise of Islam to 1750 (1990), Dr K. N. Chaudhuri noted that from Yemen to China, almost the entire land mass of Asia was connected via a network of terrestrial and maritime trading routes long before the continent was carved up by the colonial powers in earnest from the late 18th century onwards.”

A small personal story about my Asian identity will help to reinforce the point about deep connectivities in Asia. I was born to two Hindu Sindhi parents in Singapore in 1948. As a result, I can feel a direct cultural connection with over a billion Hindus in south Asia. Similarly, nine of the ten southeast Asian states have an Indic cultural base. Hence, when I see the Ramayana and Mahabharata performed in these nine states, I also feel directly connected with them. Over 550 million people live in this Indic space. […]

OUTLINE

• Seven pillars of Western wisdom
• Asian geopolitics
• The great cultural Renaissance

Kishore Mahbubani is Professor of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore. A former diplomat, he was Singapore's permanent representative to the United Nations. He is also the author of Has the West Lost It?, London, Penguin Press, 2018.