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How Does Culture Matter?

Chapter
2
Amartya Sen

Introduction
Sociologists, anthropologists, and historians have often commented on
the tendency of economists to pay inadequate attention to culture in
investigating the operation of societies in general and the process of
development in [Link] we can consider many counterexamples
to the alleged neglect of culture by economists, beginning at least with
Adam Smith (1776/1976, 1790/1976), John Stuart Mill (1859/1974, 1861/
1962), or Alfred Marshall (1891), nevertheless, as a general criticism, the
charge is, to a considerable extent, justified.
This neglect (or perhaps more accurately, comparative indifference) is
worth remedying, and economists can fruitfully pay more attention to the
influence of culture on economic and social matters. Further, develop-
ment agencies such as the World Bank may also reflect, at least to some
extent, this neglect, if only because they are so predominately influenced
by the thinking of economists and financial experts.1 The economists’
skepticism of the role of culture may thus be indirectly reflected in the
outlooks and approaches of institutions like the World Bank. No matter
how serious this neglect is (and here assessments can differ), the cultural
dimension of development requires closer scrutiny in development analy-
sis. It is important to investigate the different ways—and they can be very
diverse—in which culture should be taken into account in examining the
challenges of development, and in assessing the demands of sound eco-
nomic strategies.
The issue is not whether culture matters, to consider the title of an
important and highly successful book jointly edited by Lawrence Harri-
son and Samuel Huntington (2000). That it must be, given the pervasive
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38 Sen

influence of culture in human life. The real issue, rather, is how—not

whether—culture matters. What are the different ways in which culture
may influence development? How can the influences be better under-
stood, and how might they modify or alter the development policies that
seem appropriate? The interest lies in the nature and forms of the con-
nections and on their implications for action and policy, not merely in the
general—and hardly deniable—belief that culture does matter.
I discuss these “how” questions in this essay, but in the process I must
also take up some “how not” questions. There is some evidence, I shall
argue, that in the anxiety to take adequate note of the role of culture, there
is sometimes a temptation to take rather formulaic and simplistic views of
the impact of culture on the process of development. For example, there
seem to be many supporters of the belief—held explicitly or by implica-
tion—that the fates of countries are effectively sealed by the nature of their
respective [Link] would be not only a heroic oversimplification, but
it would also entail some assignment of hopelessness to countries that are
seen as having the “wrong” kind of [Link] is not just politically and
ethically repulsive, but more immediately, it is, I would argue, also epis-
temic nonsense. So a second object of this essay is to take up these “how
not” issues.
The third object of the chapter is to discuss the role of learning from
each other in the field of culture. Even though such transmission and edu-
cation may be an integral part of the process of development, their role is
frequently underestimated. Indeed, since each culture is often taken, not
implausibly, to be unique, there can be a tendency to take a somewhat
insular view of culture. In understanding the process of development, this
can be particularly deceptive and substantively counterproductive. Indeed,
one of the most important roles of culture lies in the possibility of learn-
ing from each other, rather than celebrating or lamenting the rigidly
delineated cultural boxes in which the people of the world are firmly
classified by muscular taxonomists.
Finally, while discussing the importance of intercultural and intercoun-
try communication, I must also discuss the threat—real or perceived—of
globalization and the asymmetry of power in the contemporary world.
The view that local cultures are in danger of destruction has often been
expressed, and the belief that something should be done to resist this can
have considerable plausibility. How this possible threat should be under-
stood and what can be done to address—and if necessary counter—it are
also important subjects for development analysis. That is the fourth and
final issue that I intend to scrutinize.
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How Does Culture Matter? 39

Connections
It is particularly important to identify the different ways in which cul-
ture can matter to development (Rao and Walton, this volume;Wolfensohn
2000). The following categories would seem to have some immediacy as
well as far-reaching relevance.
1. Culture as a constitutive part of [Link] can begin with the basic
question: what is development for? The furtherance of well-being and
freedoms that we seek in development cannot but include the enrichment
of human lives through literature, music, fine arts, and other forms of cul-
tural expression and practice, which we have reason to [Link] Julius
Caesar said of Cassius,“He hears no music: seldom he smiles,” this was not
meant to be high praise for Cassius’s quality of life. To have a high GNP
per head but little music, arts, literature, etc., would not amount to a major
developmental success. In one form or another, culture engulfs our lives,
our desires, our frustrations, our ambitions, and the freedoms that we
seek.2 The freedom and opportunity for cultural activities are among the
basic freedoms the enhancement of which can be seen to be constitutive
of development.3
2. Economically remunerative cultural activities and [Link] activities
that are economically remunerative may be directly or indirectly depend-
ent on cultural facilities and more generally on the cultural environment.4
The linkage of tourism with cultural sites (including historical ones) is
obvious enough.5 The presence or absence of crime or welcoming tradi-
tions may also be critical to tourism and in general to domestic as well as
cross-boundary interactions. Music, dancing, and other cultural activities
may also have a large commercial—often global—[Link] presence of
centers of such artistic activities can, in addition, help to attract people to
particular countries or regions, with various indirect effects.
There can, of course, be room for doubt as to whether cultural—
including religious—objects or sites should be used for the purpose of
earning money, and it may well be decided that in some cases, in which
the significance of the objects or sites are threatened by commercial use,
the opportunity of earning an income should be forgone. But even after
excluding commercial uses that can be threatening, there will tend to
remain plenty of other opportunities to combine economic use with cul-
tural pursuits. Furthermore, people who come to visit well-administered
sites of cultural or religious importance, without any direct commercial
involvement, could still, indirectly, boost the tourist trade of the country
or region as a whole.
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40 Sen

3. Cultural factors influence economic behavior. Even though some econo-

mists have been tempted by the idea that all human beings behave in
much the same way (for example, relentlessly maximize their self-interest
defined in a thoroughly insulated way), there is plenty of evidence to indi-
cate that this is not in general so. Cultural influences can make a major
difference to work ethics, responsible conduct, spirited motivation,
dynamic management, entrepreneurial initiatives, willingness to take risks,
and a variety of other aspects of human behavior which can be critical to
economic success (Sen 1973, 1982; Basu 1980; Hirschman 1982; Margolis
1982; Akerlof 1984; Frank 1985, 1988; Granovetter 1985; Elster 1986;
Mansbridge 1990; Ostrom 1990, 1998; Greif 1994a,b; Brittan and Hamlin
1995; Fukuyama 1995; Zamagni 1995; Becker 1996; Hausman and
McPherson 1996; Frey 1997a,b; Ben-Ner and Putterman 1998; Akerlof
and Kranton 2000;Throsby 2001).
Also, successful operation of an exchange economy depends on mutual
trust and implicit norms. When these behavioral modes are plentifully
there, it is easy to overlook their role. But when they have to be cultivated,
that lacuna can be a major barrier to economic success. There are plenty
of examples of the problems faced in precapitalist economies because of
the underdevelopment of basic virtues of commerce and business.
The culture of behavior relates to many other features of economic
success. It relates, for example, to the prevalence or absence of economic
corruption and its linkages with organized crime. In Italian discussions on
this subject, in which I was privileged to take part through advising the
Anti-Mafia Commission of the Italian parliament, the role and reach of
implicit values was much discussed.6 Culture also has an important role in
encouraging environment-friendly behavior (Ostrom 1990, 1998; Putnam,
Leonardi, and Nanetti 1993; Putnam 1993). The behavioral contribution
of culture would vary with the challenges encountered in the process of
economic development.
4. Culture and political participation. Participation in civil interactions and
political activities is influenced by cultural conditions. The tradition of
public discussion and participatory interactions can be very critical to the
process of politics, and can be important for the establishment, preserva-
tion, and practice of [Link] culture of participation can be a crit-
ical civic virtue, as was extensively discussed by Condorcet, among other
leading thinkers of European Enlightenment (Condorcet 1795/1955;
Hume 1777/1966; Smith 1790/1976).
Aristotle did, of course, point out that human beings tend to have a
natural inclination toward civil interaction with each other. And yet the
extent of political participation can vary between societies. In particular,
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How Does Culture Matter? 41

political inclinations can be suppressed not only by authoritarian rules and

restrictions, but also by a “culture of fear” that political suppression can
[Link] can also be a “culture of indifference” drawing on skepti-
cism that turns into apathy. Political participation is critically important
for development, both through its effects on the assessment of ways and
means, and even through its role in the formation and consolidation of
values in terms of which development has to be assessed (Sen 1999).
5. Social solidarity and association. Aside from economic interactions and
political participation, even the operation of social solidarity and mutual
support can be strongly influenced by [Link] success of social living
is greatly dependent on what people may spontaneously do for each
[Link] can profoundly influence the working of the society, including
the care of its less fortunate members as well as preservation and guardian-
ship of common [Link] sense of closeness to others in the community
can be a major asset for that [Link] advantages flowing from sol-
idarity and supportive interactions have received much attention recently
through the literature on “social capital” (Ostrom 1990, 1998; Putnam,
Leonardi, and Nanetti 1993; Putnam 1993).7
This is an important new area of social [Link] is, however,
a need to scrutinize the nature of “social capital” as “capital”—in the sense
of a general purpose resource (as capital is taken to be). The same senti-
ments and inclinations can actually work in opposite directions, depend-
ing on the nature of the group involved. For example, solidarity within a
particular group (for example, long-term residents of a region) can go
with a less than friendly view of nonmembers of that group (such as new
immigrants).The influence of the same community-centered thinking can
be both positive for intracommunity relations and negative in generating
or sustaining exclusionary tendencies (including violent “anti-immigrant”
sentiments and actions, as can be observed in some regions of impeccable
“within community” solidarity). Identity-based thinking can have dicho-
tomous features, since a strong sense of group affiliation can have a
cementing role within that group while encouraging rather severe treat-
ment of nonmembers (seen as “others” who do not “belong”). If this
dichotomy is right, then it may be a mistake to treat “social capital” as a
general-purpose asset (as capital is, in general, taken to be), rather than as
an asset for some relations and a liability for [Link] is, thus, room for
some searching scrutiny of the nature and operation of the important, but
in some ways problematic, concept of “social capital.”
6. Cultural sites and recollection of past heritage. Another constructive pos-
sibility is the furtherance of a clearer and broader understanding of a
country’s or community’s past through systematic exploration of its cul-
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42 Sen

tural history. For example, by supporting historical excavations, explo-

rations and related research, development programs can help to facilitate a
fuller appreciation of the breadth of—and internal variations within—par-
ticular cultures and traditions. History often includes much greater vari-
ety of cultural influences and traditions than tends to be allowed by
intensely political—and frequently ahistorical—interpretations of the pres-
[Link] this is the case, historical objects, sites and records can help to
offset some of the frictions of confrontational modern politics.
For example,Arab history includes a long tradition of peaceful relation
with Jewish populations. Similarly, Indonesian past carries powerful
records of simultaneous flourishing of Hindu, Buddhist, and Confucian
cultures, side by side with the Islamic traditions. Butrint in Albania as a
historical site shows flourishing presence of Greek, Roman, and later
Christian cultures, as well as Islamic [Link] highlighting of a diverse
past that may go with the excavation, preservation, and accessibility of his-
torical objects and sites can, thus, have a possible role in promoting toler-
ation of diversity in contemporary settings, and in countering confronta-
tional use of “monocultural” readings of a nation’s past.
For example, the recent attempt by Hindu activists to see India as just
a “Hindu country,” in which practitioners of other religions must have a
less privileged position, clashes with the great diversity of Indian history.
This includes a thousand years of Buddhist predominance (with sites all
over India), a long history of Jain culture, conspicuous presence of
Christians from the fourth century and of Parsees from the eighth,
Muslim settlements of Arab traders in South India from about the same
time, massive interactions between Muslims and Hindus all over the coun-
try (including new departures in painting, music, literature, and architec-
ture), the birth and flourishing of Sikhism (as a new Indian religion that
drew on but departed from previous ones), and so [Link] recollection of
history can be a major ally in the cultivation of toleration and celebration
of diversity, and these are—directly and indirectly—among important fea-
tures of development.8
7. Cultural influences on value formation and evolution. Not only is it the
case that cultural factors figure among the ends and means of develop-
ment, they can also have a central role even in the formation of values.
This in turn can be influential in the identification of our ends and the
recognition of plausible and acceptable instruments to achieve those ends.
For example, open public discussion—itself a cultural achievement of
significance—can be powerfully influential in the emergence of new
norms and fresh priorities.
Indeed, value formation is an interactive process, and the culture of talk-
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How Does Culture Matter? 43

ing and listening can play a significant part in making these interactions pos-
sible. As new standards emerge, it is public discussion as well as proximate
emulation that may spread the new norms across a region and ultimately
between regions. For example, the emergence of norms of low fertility
rates, or nondiscrimination between boys and girls, or wanting to send chil-
dren to schools, and so on, are not only vitally important features of devel-
opment, they may be greatly influenced by a culture of free discussion and
open public debate, without political barriers or social suppression (Basu
1992; Sen, Germain, and Chen 1994; Drèze and Sen 1995, 2002).

Integration
In seeing the role of culture in development, it is particularly important
to place culture in an adequately capacious framework. The reasons for
this are not hard to seek. First, influential as culture is, it is not uniquely
pivotal in determining our lives and identities. Other things, such as class,
race, gender, profession, and politics also matter, and can matter power-
fully. Our cultural identity is only one of many aspects of our self-
realization and is only one influence among a great many that can inspire
and influence what we do and how we do it. Further, our behavior
depends not only on our values and predispositions, but also on the hard
facts of the presence or absence of relevant institutions and on the incen-
tives—prudential or moral—they generate (North 1981, 1990; Ostrom
1990, 1998; Douglas 1992; Blau 1993; Goody 1996; Bowles 1998; Platteau
2000; Arizpe, this volume; Sen 1984).
Second, culture is not a homogeneous attribute—there can be great
variations even within the same general cultural milieu. Cultural deter-
minists often underestimate the extent of heterogeneity within what is
taken to be “one” distinct culture. Discordant voices are often “internal,”
rather than coming from outside. Since culture has many aspects, hetero-
geneity can also arise from the particular components of culture on which
we decide to concentrate (for example, whether we look particularly at
religion, or at literature, or at music, or generally at the style of living).9
Third, culture absolutely does not sit still. Any presumption of station-
arity—explicit or implicit—can be disastrously deceptive. To talk of, say,
the Hindu culture, or for that matter the Indian culture, taken to be well
defined in a temporally stationary way, not only overlooks the great vari-
ations within each of these categories, but also ignores their evolution and
their large variations over time. The temptation toward using cultural
determinism often takes the hopeless form of trying to fix the cultural
anchor on a rapidly moving boat.
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44 Sen

Finally, cultures interact with each other and cannot be seen as insu-
lated structures. The isolationalist view—often implicitly presumed—can
be deeply delusive (Goody 1996; Throsby 2001). Sometimes we may be
only vaguely aware how an influence came from outside, but it need not
be unimportant for that reason. For example, while chili was unknown in
India before the Portuguese brought it there in the 16th century, it is now
a thoroughly Indian spice.10 Cultural features—from the most trivial to the
most profound—can change radically, sometimes leaving little trace of the
past behind.
Taking culture to be independent, unchanging and unchangeable can
indeed be very problematic. But that, on the other hand, is no reason for
not taking full note of the importance of culture seen in an adequately
broad perspective. It is certainly possible to pay adequate attention to cul-
ture, along with taking into account all the qualifications just discussed.
Indeed, if culture is recognized to be nonhomogeneous, nonstatic, and
interactive, and if the importance of culture is integrated with rival sources
of influence, then culture can be a very positive and constructive part in
our understanding of human behavior and of social and economic devel-
opment.

Bigotry and Alienation

However, the “how not” issue does deserve extremely serious attention,
since rapid-fire cultural generalizations can not only undermine a deeper
understanding of the role of culture, but also serve as a tool of sectarian
prejudices, social discrimination, and even political tyranny. Simple cul-
tural generalizations have great power in fixing our way of thinking, and
often enough they are not just harmless fun. The fact that such general-
izations abound in popular beliefs and in informal communication is eas-
ily recognized. Not only are these underexamined implicit beliefs the sub-
ject matter of many racist jokes and ethnic slurs, they sometimes surface
as pernicious grand theories. When there is an accidental correlation
between cultural prejudice and social observation (no matter how casual),
a theory is born, and it may refuse to die even after the chance correlation
vanishes altogether.
For example, concocted jokes against the Irish (such crudities as “how
many Irishmen do you need to change a light bulb”), which have had
some currency in England for a long time, appeared to fit well with the
depressing predicament of the Irish economy, when the Irish economy
was doing quite badly. But when the Irish economy started growing
astonishingly rapidly—indeed faster than any other European economy (as
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How Does Culture Matter? 45

it did, for many years)—the cultural stereotyping and its allegedly pro-
found economic and social relevance were not junked as sheer and unmit-
igated rubbish. Theories have lives of their own, quite defiantly of the
phenomenal world that can be actually observed.
As it happens, cultural prejudice did play a role in the treatment that
Ireland received from the British government, and had a part even in the
nonprevention of the famines of the 1840s, which killed a higher propor-
tion of the population than in any other recorded famine. Joel Mokyr
(1983) has discussed the contribution of cultural alienation in London’s
treatment of Irish problems.11 As Lebow has argued, while poverty in
Britain was typically attributed to economic change and fluctuations, Irish
poverty was widely viewed in England as being caused by laziness,
indifference, and ineptitude, so that “Britain’s mission” was not seen as one
“to alleviate Irish distress but to civilize her people and to lead them to
feel and act like human beings.”12
The cultural roots of the Irish famines extend, in this sense, at least as
far back as Spenser’s Faerie Queene, published in 1590, and perhaps even
earlier. The art of blaming the victims, plentifully present in the Faerie
Queene itself, survived through the famines of the 1840s, and the Irish taste
for potato was added to the list of the calamities which the natives had, in
English view, brought on themselves. Charles Edward Trevelyan, the Head
of the Treasury during the famines, expressed his belief that Britain had
done what it could for Ireland, even as the famine—with little public
relief—killed rampantly, and even as ship after ship, laden with wheat, oats,
cattle, pigs, eggs, and butter, sailed down the Shannon, bound for England
(which had greater purchasing power than starving Ireland and could buy
what the Irish—hit by the potato blight—could not afford).Trevelyan also
pointed to some remarkable cultural explanations of the hunger, includ-
ing:“There is scarcely a woman of the peasant class in the West of Ireland
whose culinary art exceeds the boiling of a potato.”13
The connection between cultural bigotry and political tyranny can be
very close. The asymmetry of power between the ruler and ruled can be
combined with cultural prejudices in explaining failures of governance, as
is spectacularly observed through the Irish famines of the 1840s (O Grada
1989; Eagleton 1995; Mokyr 1983;Woodham-Smith 1962). Similar use of
cultural prejudice for political irresponsibility (or worse) can also be seen
in the history of European empires in Asia and [Link] Churchill’s
famous remark that the Bengal famine of 1943 was caused by the ten-
dency of people there to “breed like rabbits” belongs to this general tra-
dition of blaming the colonial victim, and it had a profound effect in cru-
cially delaying famine relief in that disastrous famine.14 Cultural critiques
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46 Sen

of the victims can be used by the rulers to justify hugely inefficient—as

well as deeply iniquitous—tyrannies.

Cultural Determinism
While the marriage of cultural prejudice and political asymmetry can
be quite lethal, the need to be cautious about jumping to cultural conclu-
sions is more pervasive. It can even influence the way experts see the
nature and challenges of economic development. Theories are often
derived from fairly scanty evidence. Half-truths or quarter-truths can
grossly mislead—sometimes even more than straightforward falsity, which
is easier to expose.
Consider, for example, the following argument from the influential and
important book jointly edited by Lawrence Harrison and Samuel
Huntington called Culture Matters (to which I referred earlier), and in par-
ticular from Huntington’s introductory essay in that volume called
“Cultures Count”:
In the early 1990s, I happened to come across economic data on Ghana and South
Korea in the early 1960s, and I was astonished to see how similar their economies
were then. . . .Thirty years later, South Korea had become an industrial giant with
the fourteenth largest economy in the world, multinational corporations, major
exports of automobiles, electronic equipment, and other sophisticated manufac-
tures, and per capital income approximately that of Greece. Moreover it was on its
way to the consolidation of democratic institutions. No such changes had
occurred in Ghana, whose per capita income was now about one-fifteenth that of
South Korea’s. How could this extraordinary difference in development be
explained? Undoubtedly, many factors played a role, but it seemed to me that cul-
ture had to be a large part of the explanation. South Koreans valued thrift, invest-
ment, hard work, education, organization, and discipline. Ghanians had different
values. In short, cultures count. (Harrison and Huntington 2000, xiii)

There may well be something of interest in this engaging comparison

(perhaps even a quarter-truth torn out of context), and the contrast does
call for probing [Link] yet, as used in the explanation just cited,
the causal story is extremely deceptive. There were many important
differences—other than their cultural predispositions—between Ghana
and Korea in the 1960s when they appeared to Huntington to be much
the same, except for culture. First, the class structures in the two countries
were quite different, with a very much bigger—and proactive—role of
business classes in South Korea. Second, the politics were very different
too, with the government in South Korea willing and eager to play a
prime-moving role in initiating a business-centered economic develop-
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How Does Culture Matter? 47

ment in a way that did not apply to Ghana. Third, the close relationship
between the Korean economy and the Japanese economy, on the one
hand, and the United States, on the other, made a big difference, at least
in the early stages of Korean development. Fourth—and perhaps most
important—by the 1960s South Korea had acquired a much higher liter-
acy rate and much more expanded school system than Ghana had. The
Korean changes had been brought about in the post–World War II period,
largely through resolute public policy, and it could not be seen just as a
reflection of age-old Korean culture (McGinn et al. 1980).
On the basis of the slender scrutiny offered, it is hard to justify either
the cultural triumphalism in favor of Korean culture, or the radical pes-
simism about Ghana’s future that the reliance on cultural determinism
would tend to suggest. Neither can be derived from the overrapid and
underanalyzed comparison that accompanies the heroic diagnostics. As it
happens, South Korea did not rely just on its traditional culture. From the
1940s onward, it deliberately followed lessons from abroad to use public
policy to advance its backward school education.
And it has continued to learn from global experience even today.
Sometimes the lessons have come from experience of failure rather than
[Link] East Asian crisis that overwhelmed South Korea among other
countries in the region brought out some of the penalties of not having a
fully functioning democratic political [Link] things moved up and
up together, the voice that democracy gives to the underdog may not have
been immediately missed, but when the economic crisis came, and
divided they fell (as they typically do in such a crisis), the newly impov-
erished missed the voice that democracy would have given them to use
for protest and to demand economic redress. Along with the recognition
of the need to pay attention to downside risks and to economic security,
the bigger issue of democracy itself became a predominant focus of atten-
tion in the politics of economic [Link] happened in the countries hit
by the crisis, such as South Korea, Indonesia, Thailand, and others, but
there was also a global lesson here about the special contribution of
democracy in helping the victims of disaster, and the need to think not
only about “growth with equity” (the old Korean slogan), but also about
“downturn with security” (Sen 1999).
Similarly, the cultural damning of the prospects of development in
Ghana and other countries in Africa is simply overhasty pessimism with
little empirical foundation. For one thing, it does not take into account
how rapidly many countries—South Korea included—have changed,
rather than remaining anchored to some fixed cultural parameters.
Misidentified quarter-truths can be dreadfully misleading.
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48 Sen

There have, of course, been various earlier attempts at cultural deter-

minism in explaining economic development. Indeed, a century ago, Max
Weber (1930), the great sociologist, had presented a major thesis on the
decisive role of Protestant ethics (in particular, of Calvinist ethics) in the
successful development of a capitalist industrial [Link] analy-
sis of the role of culture in the emergence of capitalism drew on the world
as he had observed it in the late 19th century.15 It is of particular dialecti-
cal interest in the contemporary world in light especially of the recent
success of market economies in non-Protestant and even non-Christian
societies.
Max Weber was particularly clear that Confucianism was quite unsuited
for a dynamic industrial economy.“The Calvinist ethic,”Anthony Giddens
summarizes Weber,“introduced an activism into the believer’s approach to
worldly affairs, a drive to mastery in a quest for virtue in the eyes of God,
that are altogether lacking in Confucianism,” adding: “Confucian values
do not promote such rational instrumentalism.”16 In sharp contrast with
this view, many writers in present-day Asia make the opposite claim that
Confucian ethics is particularly suited for success of industrial and eco-
nomic progress, as illustrated by the performance of East [Link] have,
in fact, been several different theories seeking explanation of the high
performance of East Asian economies in terms of local culture. Michio
Morishima (a great economist) has traced the roots of “the Japanese
ethos” to the special history of its feudal system; Ronald Dore (a great
sociologist) has emphasized the contribution of “Confucian ethics”; Eiko
Ikegami (a brilliant young Japanese historian) has focused on the influence
of the “Samurai code of honour.”17
There is much to learn from these theories, and the empirical connec-
tions they have brought out have been [Link] yet it is also remark-
able how the specific aspects of cultural explanations, based on observing
the past, have often foundered in the light of later experience. Indeed, the-
ories of cultural determinism have often been one step behind the actual
world. By the time Max Weber’s privileging of “Protestant ethics” (based
on 19th-century experience) was getting widely recognized, many of the
Catholic countries, including France and Italy, were beginning to grow
faster than Protestant Britain or Germany. The thesis had to be, then,
altered, and the privileged culture was taken more generally to be
Christian and western, rather than specifically Protestant.
However, by the time that Eurocentric view of the culture of develop-
ment got established, Japan was growing much faster than the West. So
Japan had to be included in the privileged category, and there was useful
work on the role of Japanese ethos, Samurai culture, etc. But, by the time
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How Does Culture Matter? 49

the specialness of Japan was well understood, the East Asian economies
were growing very fast, and there was a need to broaden the theory of
Japan’s specialness to include the wider coverage of “Confucian” ethics
and a wider and a more spacious regional tradition, fuzzily described as
“Asian values.” However, by the time that “Confucian” theory had
become well established, the fastest growing economy in the world was
Thailand, which is a Buddhist country. Indeed, Japan, Korea, China, and
Taiwan too have much Buddhist influence in their [Link] grand cul-
tural theories have a propensity to trail one step behind the world of prac-
tice, rather than serving as a grand predictive device.
This record need not, however, be seen as one of embarrassment, since
we have learned many things from a closer understanding of the cultural
linkages emerging from these specialized studies. But attempts to view
culture as a singular, stationary and independent source of development
have not—and could not have—worked.
Just to illustrate, consider Korea again, which is often seen as a quintes-
sential exemplification of the power of “Asian values” and of the reach of
Confucian ethics in industrial development. Confucianism has indeed
been a major cultural influence in this country, but there have been many
different interpretations of Confucianism. For example, in the 15th cen-
tury onward, the “Neo-Confucian literati” (Sarim) challenged the earlier
readings of Confucianism, and interpretational disputes were powerfully
pursued by the different sides. Neo-Confucians themselves divide into
different schools, according to different lines of division, including the
classic Chinese distinction between li and ch’i (called, I understand, i and
ki in Korea). In the 17th and early 18th century, the contest between the
“Old Doctrine” (Noron), led by Song Si-yol, and the “Young Doctrine”
(Soron), led by Yun Chung, related in part to different views of good
behavior and of good social arrangements. Confucianism does not speak
in one voice, and the particular emphasis on li (or i, in Korean) in the
authoritarian interpretations of Confucius is by no means the only claim
that obtains loyalty.
There are also influences other than Confucianism. Buddhism, as was
mentioned before, has been a major force in Korea, as it has been in China
and Japan. From the seventh century when Buddhism became the state
religion, it has had political ups and downs, but a constant cultural pres-
ence in this country. Christianity too has had a major presence in Korea,
and from the 18th century, regular intellectual confrontations can be seen
between the creed of so-called western learning, which disputed
Confucian orthodoxy, along with other challengers, such as the individu-
alist doctrines of the Wang Yang-ming school of Neo-Confucianism, and
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50 Sen

of course various theorists of Buddhism. The richness and diversity in

Korea’s cultural past cannot be reduced into a simple story of cultural
determinism, woven around an allegedly homogeneous Confucian ethics,
or the overarching role of an ill-defined “Asian values” (Han 1971;
Henthorn 1971; Lee 1984).

Interdependence and Learning

While culture does not work in isolation from other social influences,
once we place culture in adequate company, it can greatly help to illumi-
nate our understanding of the world, including the process of develop-
ment and the nature of our identity. Let me refer again to South Korea,
which was a much more literate and more educated society than Ghana
in the 1960s (when the two economies appeared rather similar to
Huntington). The contrast, as was already mentioned, was very substan-
tially the result of public policies pursued in South Korea in the post–
World War II period.
To be sure, the postwar public policies on education were also influ-
enced by antecedent cultural features. It would be surprising had there
been no such connection. In a two-way relation, just as education
influences culture, so does antecedent culture have an effect on educa-
tional policies. It is, for example, remarkable that nearly every country in
the world with a powerful presence of Buddhist tradition has tended to
embrace widespread schooling and literacy with some eagerness. This
applies not only to Japan and Korea, but also to China, and Thailand, and
Sri Lanka. Indeed, even miserable Burma, with a dreadful record of polit-
ical oppression and social neglect, still has a higher rate of literacy than its
neighbors in the subcontinent. Seen in a broader framework, there is
probably something here to investigate and learn from.18
It is, however, important to see the interactive nature of the process in
which contact with other countries and the knowledge of their experi-
ences can make a big difference in practice. There is every evidence that
when Korea decided to move briskly forward with school education at
the end of the second world war, it was influenced not just by its cultural
interest in education, but also by a new understanding of the role and
significance of education, based on the experiences of Japan and the West,
including the United States (Lee 1984; McGinn et al. 1980).
There is a similar story, earlier on, of interaction and response in Japan’s
own history of educational development. When Japan emerged from its
self-imposed isolation from the world from the beginning of the 17th cen-
tury, under the Tokugawa regime, it already had a relatively well-developed
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How Does Culture Matter? 51

school system, and in this Japan’s traditional interest in education would

have played a significant part. Indeed, at the time of Meiji restoration in
1868, Japan had a higher rate of literacy than Europe, despite being eco-
nomically quite underdeveloped. And yet the rate of literacy in Japan was
still low (as indeed it was in Europe too), and no less importantly the
Japanese education system was quite out of touch with knowledge and
learning in the industrializing West.19 When, in 1852, Commodore Mathew
Perry chugged into the Edo Bay, puffing black smoke from the newly
designed steamship, the Japanese were not only impressed—and somewhat
terrified—and were driven to accept diplomatic and trade relations with
the United States, they also had to reexamine and reassess their intellectual
isolation from the [Link] contributed to the political process that led
to the Meiji restoration, and along with that came a determination to
change the face of Japanese education. In the so-called Charter Oath, pro-
claimed also in 1868, there is a firm declaration on the need to “seek
knowledge widely throughout the world” (Cummings 1980, 17).
The Fundamental Code of Education issued three years later, in 1872,
put the new educational determination in unequivocal terms: “There
shall, in the future, be no community with an illiterate family, nor a fam-
ily with an illiterate person.”20 Kido Takayoshi, one of the most influential
leaders of that period, put the basic issue with great clarity:
Our people are no different from the Americans or Europeans of today; it is all a
matter of education or lack of education.21

That was the challenge that Japan took on with determination, and things
moved rapidly forward.
Between 1906 and 1911, education consumed as much as 43% of the
budgets of the towns and villages, for Japan as a whole (Gluck 1985). By
1906, the recruiting army officers found that, in contrast with late 19th
century, there was hardly any new recruit who was not literate. By 1910,
it is generally acknowledged that Japan had universal attendance in pri-
mary schools. By 1913, even though Japan was still economically very
poor and underdeveloped, it had become one of the largest producers of
books in the world—publishing more books than Britain and indeed more
than twice as many as the United States. Indeed, Japan’s entire experience
of economic development was, to a great extent, driven by human capa-
bility formation, which included the role of education and training, and
this was promoted both by public policy and by a supportive cultural cli-
mate (interacting with each other). The dynamics of associative relations
are extraordinarily important in understanding how Japan laid the foun-
dations of its spectacular economic and social development.
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52 Sen

To carry the story further, Japan was not only a learner but also a great
teacher. Development efforts of countries in East and Southeast Asia were
profoundly influenced by Japan’s experience in expanding education and
its manifest success in transforming society and the economy.22 There is a
fund of cultural and economic wisdom there from which the world can
draw lessons in development. India today may be immensely more
advanced technologically and even economically than Japan in the Meiji
period, and yet India is paying a very heavy price for ignoring the cultural
lessons on the critical role of basic education that emerged so profoundly
in the economically poor and politically primitive Meiji Japan (Drèze and
Sen 1995, 2002).
Cultural interrelations within a broad framework does indeed provide
a useful focus for our understanding. It contrasts both with neglecting cul-
ture altogether (as some economic models do), and also with the privi-
leging of culture in stationary and isolated terms (as is done in some social
models of cultural determinism). We have to go well beyond both and
integrate the role of culture with other aspects of our life.

Cultural Globalization
I turn now to what may appear to be a contrary consideration. It might
be asked, in praising intercountry interactions and the positive influence
of learning from elsewhere, am I not overlooking the threat that global
interrelations pose to integrity and survival of local culture? In a world
that is so dominated by the “imperialism” of the culture of the western
metropolis, surely the basic need is, it can be argued, to strengthen resist-
ance, rather than to welcome global influence.
Let me first say that there is no contradiction here. Learning from else-
where involves freedom and judgment, not being overwhelmed and dom-
inated by outside influence without choice, without scope for one’s voli-
tional agency. The threat of being overwhelmed by the superior market
power of an affluent West, which has asymmetric influence over nearly all
the media, raises a different type of issue altogether. In particular, it does
not contradict in any way the importance of learning from elsewhere.
But how should we think about global cultural invasion itself as a threat
to local cultures? There are two issues of particular concern [Link] first
relates to the nature of market culture in general, since that is part and
parcel of economic globalization. Those who find the values and priori-
ties of a market-related culture vulgar and impoverishing (many who take
this view belong to the West itself) tend to find economic globalization to
be objectionable at a very basic level.23 The second issue concerns the
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How Does Culture Matter? 53

asymmetry of power between the West and the other countries, and the
possibility that this asymmetry may translate into destruction of local cul-
tures—a loss that may culturally impoverish nonwestern societies. Given
the constant cultural bombardment that tends to come from the western
metropolis (through MTV to Kentucky Fried Chicken), there are genuine
fears that native traditions may get drowned in that loud din.
Threats to older native cultures in the globalizing world of today are,
to a considerable extent, inescapable. It is not easy to solve the problem by
stopping globalization of trade and commerce, since the forces of eco-
nomic exchange and division of labour are hard to resist in an interacting
world. Globalization does, of course, raise other problems as well, and its
distributional consequences have received much criticism recently. On the
other hand, it is hard to deny that global trade and commerce can bring
with it—as Adam Smith foresaw—greater economic prosperity for each
nation. The challenging task is to get the benefits of globalization on a
more shared basis. While that primarily economic question need not
detain us here (which I have tried to discuss elsewhere, particularly in Sen
1999), there is a related question in the field of culture, to wit, how to
increase the real options—the substantive freedoms—that people have, by
providing support for cultural traditions that they may want to preserve.
This cannot but be an important concern in any development effort that
brings about radical changes in the ways of living of people.
Indeed, a natural response to the problem of asymmetry must take the
form of strengthening the opportunities that local culture can have, to be
able to hold its own against an overpowered invasion. If foreign imports
dominate because of greater control over the media, surely one counter-
acting policy must involve expanding the facilities that local culture gets,
to present its own ware, both locally and beyond it. This is a positive
response, rather than the temptation—a very negative temptation—to ban
foreign influence.
Ultimately, for both the concerns, the deciding issue must be one of
[Link] overarching value must be the need for participatory deci-
sion making on the kind of society people want to live in, based on open
discussion, with adequate opportunity for the expression of minority
[Link] cannot both want democracy, on the one hand, and yet, on
the other, rule out certain choices, on traditionalist grounds, because of
their “foreignness” (irrespective of what people decide to choose, in an
informed and reflected way). Democracy is not consistent with options of
citizens being banished by political authorities, or by religious establish-
ments, or by grand guardians of taste, no matter how unbecoming they
find the new predilection to be. Local culture may indeed need positive
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54 Sen

assistance to compete in even terms, and support for minority tastes

against foreign onslaught may also be a part of the enabling role of a dem-
ocratic society, but the prohibition of cultural influences from abroad is
not consistent with a commitment to democracy and liberty.
Related to this question there is also a more subtle issue that takes us
beyond the immediate worry about bombardment of mass western cul-
[Link] concerns the way we see ourselves in the world—a world that is
asymmetrically dominated by western preeminence and power. Through
a dialectic process, this can, in fact, lead to a powerful inclination to be
aggressively “local” in culture, as a kind of “brave” resistance to western
dominance. In an important article, called “What Is a Muslim?,” Akeel
Bilgrami (1995) has argued that the confrontational relations often lead
people to see themselves as “the other”—defining their identity as being
emphatically different from that of western people. Something of this “oth-
erness” can be seen in the emergence of various self-definitions that char-
acterize cultural or political nationalism and religious assertiveness or even
[Link] belligerently antiwestern, these developments are,
in fact, deeply foreign-dependent—in a negative and contrary form.
Indeed, seeing oneself as “the other” does less than justice to one’s free and
deliberative agency.24 This problem too has to be dealt with in a way that
is consistent with democratic values and practice, if that is taken to be a
priority. Indeed, the “solution” to the problem that Bilgrami diagnoses
cannot lie in “prohibiting” any particular outlook, but in public discussion
that clarifies and illuminates the possibility of being alienated from one’s
own independent agency.
Finally, I should mention that one particular concern I have not yet dis-
cussed arises from the belief—often implicit—that each country or col-
lectivity must stick to its “own culture,” no matter how attracted people
are to “foreign cultures.” This fundamentalist position not only involves
the need to reject importing McDonald’s and beauty contests to the non-
western world, but also the enjoyment there of Shakespeare or ballets or
even cricket matches. Obviously enough, this highly conservative position
must be in some tension with the role and acceptability of democratic
decisions, and I need not repeat what I have already said about the conflict
between democracy and the arbitrary privileging of any practice. But it
also involves an additional philosophical issue about the labeling of cul-
tures on which Rabindranath Tagore, the poet, had warned.
This concerns the issue whether one’s culture is to be defined by the
geographical origin of a practice, rather than by its manifest use and
[Link] (1928) put his argument against regional labeling with
great force:
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How Does Culture Matter? 55

Whatever we understand and enjoy in human products instantly becomes ours,

wherever they might have their origin. I am proud of my humanity when I can
acknowledge the poets and artists of other countries as my own. Let me feel with
unalloyed gladness that all the great glories of man are mine.

The criteria of understanding and assessment are important, but—as Tagore

rightly noted—the inert place of origin has no right to alienate us from what
we enjoy and have reason to cherish. Culture, after all, is more than mere
geography.

Concluding Remarks
To conclude, I have tried to discuss, first of all, how—in many different
ways—culture interacts with development. There are complex epistemic,
ethical, and political issues involved in identifying the ways in which cul-
ture may or may not influence development. Some specific lines of con-
nection have been identified, particularly related to the demands of assess-
ment and policy.
Second, the acknowledgment of the importance of culture cannot be
instantly translated into ready-made theories of cultural causation. It is
evidently too easy to jump from the frying pan of neglecting culture into
the fire of crude cultural determinism. The latter has caused much harm
in the past (and has even encouraged political tyranny and social discrim-
ination), and it continues to be a source of confusion which can seriously
mislead assessment and policy in the contemporary world.
Third, what is needed is not the privileging of culture as something
that works on its own, but the integration of culture in a wider picture, in
which culture, seen in a dynamic and interactive way, is one important
influence among many others. Attempts at integration have to pay partic-
ular attention to heterogeneity of each broadly defined culture, the inter-
dependence between different cultures, and the vibrant nature of cultural
evolutions.
Fourth, there has been much focus, in this essay, on the positive contri-
butions that cultural influences across borders can make. But I have also
discussed the cultural provocation that global asymmetry of power gener-
[Link] are good arguments for not being overwhelmed by this asym-
metry—neither in the form of submissive supplication, nor in the dialec-
tical and negative form of redefining oneself as “the other” (in contrast
with “the West”), which makes one lose one’s independent identity. Both
these reactions can be contrasted with reliance on free and informed
choice, aided by public discussion, critical scrutiny, and a participatory
political environment.
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56 Sen

There is no particular “compulsion” either to preserve departing life

styles, or alternatively, to adopt the newest fashion from abroad, but there
is a need for people to be able to take part in these social decisions. This
gives further reason for attaching importance to such elementary capabil-
ities as reading and writing (through basic education), being well informed
and well briefed (through a free media), and having realistic chances of par-
ticipating freely (through elections, referendums and the general use of
civil rights).There are institutional demands for cultural democracy.
A democratic commitment is consistent with assisting local cultures to
compete in comparable terms, but does not encourage the arbitrary elim-
ination of options on grounds of their foreign origin or a priori unac-
[Link] ultimate test is the freedom of the citizens to exercise their
free agency and choose in an informed and participatory way. If that foun-
dational value has priority, then other concerns have to be integrated with
its preeminence.

Notes
I draw, in this essay, on three earlier presentations on related themes, respec-
tively, at a World Bank meeting on development in Tokyo on December 13, 2000,
at the Pardee Center of Boston University on February 4, 2002, and at the Uni-
versity of Mumbai on February 26, 2002.
1. Douglas (1987), North (1990), and Blau (1993) provide interesting insights
on how institutions think.
2. Douglas (1973/1982, 1992); Eliot (1948); Appadurai (1986); Inglehart
(1990); Adorno (1991); Mosseto (1993); Greif (1994b); Appiah and Gates (1995);
Jessor, Colby, and Shweder 1996); Klamer (1996); Landes (1998); Throsby (1999);
Eagleton (2000); Platteau (2000); and the United Nations Educational Scientific
and Cultural Organization [UNESCO] 1998, 2000) contain important illustra-
tions of different aspects of these pervasive connections.
3. Cultural capabilities are among the major components of substantial free-
doms; on the nature and use of the perspective of capabilities, see Alkire (2002a,c);
Sen (1982, 1985a,b, 1999); Griffin and Knight (1990); Nussbaum (1993, 2000);
Nussbaum and Sen (1993); Nussbaum and Glover (1995); Pattanaik (1998); Ap-
padurai (2004); Arizpe (this volume); and Osmani (2001), among others.
4. There is a vast literature on the connections between economic rewards and
cultural pursuits (Baumol and Bowen 1966; Peacock and Weir 1975; Blaug 1976;
Towse 1993, 1997; Peacock and Rizzo 1994; Throsby 1994, 2001; Klamer 1996;
Hutter and Rizzo 1997; Bowles 1998; Cowen 1998;Avrami, Mason, and de la Torre
2000; Caves 2000; Frey 2000).
5. See Boniface (1995); Herbert (1995); Hutter and Rizzo (1997); Avrami,
Mason, and de la Torre (2000); and Throsby (2001) on the interconnection be-
tween the cultural and economic aspects of tourism, among other contributions.
6. My article (“On Corruption and Organized Crime”) in the Anti-Mafia
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How Does Culture Matter? 57

Commission of the Italian Parliament collection (1993) analyses the interden-

dences between culture, values and institutions, in influencing the prevalence of
corruption. See also Zamagni (1993, 1995).
7. The concept of social capital and its uses receive attention in UNESCO
(1998, 2000); Dasgupta and Serageldin (2000); Blau (2001b); and Throsby (2001).
8. Often many different arguments can point in the same direction, in terms
of needed action. For example, there has been only partial excavation of the ruins
of the ancient Buddhist university of Nalanda in India, which had come to its end
in the 12th century about the time when Oxford University was being founded
(after having flourished for many hundreds of years, and having attracted scholars
from abroad as well as within India—Hsuan Tsang from China in the seventh cen-
tury was one of the most prominent alumni of Nalanda). Further investment in
Nalanda’s excavation, accessibility, and facilities will not only encourage tourism,
and generate income in one of the poorest parts of India, but can also help to gen-
erate a fuller understanding of the diversity of India’s historical traditions.
9. There are, as a consequence, considerable difficulties in finding suitable in-
dicators of “cultural development” (Pattanaik 1998; Alkire 2002c).
10. Since I don’t like chili, I have much practical experience of how hard it is
to escape this foreign import in many parts of India. I also frequently encounter
the comment that my culinary taste must have become corrupted by my spend-
ing a lot of time in the [Link] this I have to reply, “No, it is pre-colonial—what
we Indians ate prior to western imperialism messed up our eating habits.” There
seems to be little memory left in India of its pre-Portuguese, prechili taste.
11. In Why Ireland Starved, Joel Mokyr (1983, 291) argues that “Ireland was
considered by Britain as an alien and even hostile nation.”
12. See Mokyr (1983, 291 – 92) for a balanced assessment of this line of
diagnosis.
13. See Woodham-Smith (1962, 76).
14. Churchill also explained that his job in governing India was made difficult
by the fact that Indians were “the beastliest people in the world, next to the Ger-
mans” (Roberts 1994, 213).
15. See, however, Goody’s (1996) powerful critique of this reading of history.
16. Anthony Giddens, introduction to Weber (1930, xvi). See also Weber
(1951).
17. See Morishima (1982); Dore (1987); and Ikegami (1995), among other in-
vestigations of the cultural aspects of Japanese economic success.
18. Given the importance that is attached in Buddhism to the ability of peo-
ple to read religious and philosophical discourses, there is even a prima facie mo-
tivational connection here that can be cogently examined and critically scruti-
nized. Indeed, one of Buddha’s criticisms of Hinduism in his time was that the
scriptures were in Sanskrit, which made them inaccessible to the common peo-
ple of India.
19. See, for example, Cummings (1980), chapter 2.
20. See Passin (1965, 209–11); also Cummings (1980, 17).
21. Quoted in Kumon and Rosovsky (1992, 330).
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58 Sen

22. The role of education in the economic development of East and Southeast
Asia is extensively discussed in World Bank (1993).
23. See Hirschman (1977, 1982); Brittan and Hamlin (1995); Griffin (1996);
Klamer (1996); Appadurai (1996); Bowles (1998); Cowen (1998, 2002); Landes
(1998); UNESCO (1998, 2000);Arizpe (2000); Blau (2001); and Throsby (2001) for
various assessments of market-oriented cultures, arguing in different directions.
24. On a related issue, in the context of Indian identity, see Sen (1997).