The geography of thinking

Most of the time we imagine we are unique individuals – very occasionally we have a sense that we are but a grain of sand in an endless desert.

An archetypal figure in these most modern of modern times is the character who flits between continents, universities, policy institutes, government and business consultancies and on whom it is difficult to pin any label except that of “technocrat”.

I have, these past 2 days, been absorbed by a book whose title The Dawn of Euroasia – on the trail of the new world order (2018) intrigued me sufficiently to persuade me to fork out 10 euros without too rigorously subjecting its content to the tests I recommend for non-fiction books. Its author Bruno Macaes was unknown to me but seems to be one of the slippery new breed of geographical, linguistic and functional commuters.

A self-styled “adventurer”, Maçães was a Professor 2006/07 at the University of Yonsei in the Republic of Korea, where he taught International Political Economy; then worked at the American Enterprise Institute in 2008. From 2008 to 2011, Maçães helped launch a new international university in Europe, the European College of Liberal Arts in Berlin.

Between 2011-2013 he was a policy adviser in the Portuguese PM office whose political connections allowed him, for a couple of years, to be Secretary of State for European Affairs which he left in late 2015. He has held positions at the Carnegie and right-wing Hudson Institutes; and is currently a hedge-fund adviser with Flint Global

I could see that the text covered aspects of China and the Central Asian countries in which I had spent almost a decade of my life - and that acknowledgements were duly made to the geopolitics writer par excellence  Robert Kaplan – although there was no reading list.

I am now on the final chapter and have to say that this is an extremely well-read 45 year old (with the breadth including a range of Russian novels he’s able to build seamlessly into the text)- even if this interview does reveal a certain slickness

Particularly resonant at this time was a section covering the 2015 immigration crisis which was resolved by a formula based on algorithms which weighed for population size, GNP (40% apiece), average number of asylum applicants per million inhabitants in 2010-2014; and the unemployment rate (10% apiece). As he was reading the account of the relevant meeting in his office, he suddenly had the realization that 

“the EU isn’t meant to take political decisions. What it tries to do is develop a system of rules to be applied more or less autonomously to a highly complex political and social reality” (p228)

I am surprised, however, that Macaes does not make more of the cultural insights which occur particularly in his “Chinese Dreams” chapter (pages 137-147). His spell in South Korea will have allowed him to become familiar with the literature on the culture of geography - whose principal exponents are de Hofstede, Trompenaars and Inglehart

Richard Lewis’s When Cultures Clash (1996) is my favourite go-to reference whenever the discussion turns to questions of cultural difference – as is Richard Nisbett’s Geography of Thought (2003) who argues that-

East Asians and Westerners perceive the world and think about it in very different ways. Westerners are inclined to attend to some focal object, analyzing its attributes and categorizing it in an effort to find out what rules govern its behavior. Rules used include formal logic. Causal attributions tend to focus exclusively on the object and are therefore often mistaken.

East Asians are more likely to attend to a broad perceptual and conceptual field, noticing relationships and changes and grouping objects based on family resemblance rather than category membership. Causal attributions emphasize the context. Social factors are likely to be important in directing attention. East Asians live in complex social networks with prescribed role relations. Attention to context is important to effective functioning.
More independent Westerners live in less constraining social worlds and have the luxury of attending to the object and their goals with respect to it. The physical ‘‘affordances’’ of the environment may also influence perception.

Most of the writing on the geography of thought hesitates at this stage and seems unwilling to explore the implications of such a startling discovery. The niceties of cultural behaviour on display at global interactions are a safer topic – forming an integral part of most Business School courses. 

But the reviews of The Geography of Thought clearly suggest that all of us need to be thinking much more about the way we all take decisions – whether as individuals, organisations or countries – in full recognition that there are, legitimately, various styles appropriate to particular contexts….…

Further Reading

This is a more eclectic list than usual not just because Macaes is well-read but also for the thoughts his text gives rise to….

Beyond Liberal Democracy – political thinking in an east Asian context; Daniel Bell (2006) is a powerful early apologia for the system of party control in China written by a Canadian political scientist who has chosen since 2000 or so to live in China

The Art of Thinking; Allen Harrison and Robert Bramson (1984) The book which introduced me to the idea that there are, legitimately, different styles of thinking

Decisive – how to make better choices in life and work; C and D Heath (2013). An example of the huge literature now available on decision-making…

Cultures and organization – software of the mind; G de Hofstede (1991) One of the first to explore the cultural aspects of organisations and societies

When Cultures Collide – Richard Lewis (1996) – the full text of the easiest book on the subject

Riding the Waves of Culture; Frans Trompenaars (1996). Another Dutchman rides the waves…

The geography of thought; Richard Nesbitt (2003) – which pushed the ideas further
The Spirit of Russia; Thomas Masyrk (1913 German; 1919 English). An amazing book written before the First World War by the guy who subsequently became President of Czechoslovakia

Romanian's National Day

This blog has celebrated Romania’s National Day before - but today is special since it is exactly 100 years ago today that various groups came together in Alba Iulia (which was previously the heart of Hungarian Transylvania) to celebrate the unification of that significant part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire (and part of Banat) not only with what was (since 1877) already an independent Romania but also with Bessarabia, Moldova and North Dobrodjea. In one fell swoop the landmass of the country – which opted for the Western Allies only in 1916 - was tripled.

It’s therefore a suitable day to celebrate good writing about Romania. Let me start with an author, Robert Kaplan, who has established a nice little niche for himself as a traveller with a strong line in geo-politics – with The Revenge of History (2013) being its epitome.

I have just finished rereading his “In Europe’s Shadow” (2016) which is most decidedly not a travelogue but that rare and worthwhile endeavour – an attempt to penetrate a country’s soul borne of his forays over a period of 30 years after his first (and unusual) first port of call in 1981– selected simply because, for someone wanting to be a foreign journalist, it offered the distinction of having no competitors…

It’s a very individual if not poetic book which in which the country’s past casts the main shadow (despite the title) but one which is dealt with deftly – often through conversations with characters many of whom are long dead. Americans are not well known for their linguistic skills and I sense that Kaplan relied on translated texts for his early grasp of Romanian history – so Mircea Eliade’s little history of the country (written when he was an attache in Portugal with the Iron Guard regime) was an early companion for Kaplan. But also English writers such as Stephen Runciman and Lord Kinross (on the influence of the Ottoman empire), Macartney (Austro-Hungarian empire) and particularly John Julius Norwich (Byzantium) Since 1990 he has been able to access the histories of Vlad Georgescu, Lucian Boia, Keith Hitchens even Neagu Djuvara although his failure to mention Tom Gallagher's 2 books on the country proves the point I make below about his lack of interest in the contemporary scene.... 

Although he’s able to get access to Presidents (Iliescu and Basescu) and Prime Ministers (Ponta), it’s the long-term geopolitical threats represented by the borders, plains, armies and pipelines which interest him – and he is happiest when in the company of those who talk this language.

The comments of even a dilettante like Patapievici are preferable to any conversation about ordinary life – all we get on that score is a statement that “thanks to the influence of the EU, institutions are slowly becoming more transparent” (!!) 
For future editions of the book, I would recommend that he seeks out people such as Alina Mungiu-Pippidi and Sorin Ionitsa

Then there’s my own Mapping Romania - notes on an unfinished journey (2014). This is my own tribute to the country whose summers I have enjoyed since 2007 and which I have known intermittently since winter 1991. It's actually more of a resource book for English-language visitors who want to know something of the country's history and culture. Its 120 pages contain various a couple of thousand hyperlinks and annexes which give further detail on its history, literature (or rather English texts focusing on the country), art....even cinema...

And, in Bucharest’s French bookshop, I have just come across a nice set of little stories - “Chroniques de Roumanie”; Richard Edwards (2017)

travelling curiously

Yesterday I mentioned Wilkinson and Picket book on Equality. It’s called The Spirit Level and has caused such a stir that, when I saw it on offer on Amazon for 5 pounds, I decided it was time to buy it. The authors have also set up an Equality Trust website to promote its ideas. From which I take the following snippet. A couple of young guys have been so inspired by the book that they have organised a bike ride to Sweden to explore at a human level what it means to be living in a more equal society. They will chat with people they meet – recording and blogging about the interviews. Their journey has just begun and their blog can be followed at exploring equality
In this idea of combining travel and talk with treatise, they follow an honourable tradition – for example, William Cobbett’s Rural Rides in the 1820s; George Orwell’s 1937 Road to Wigan Pier and, in 1996, Robert Kaplan’s The Ends of the Earth: A Journey to the Frontiers of Anarchy

I have been stuck too long in the laptop and books. The weather has been steadily improving in the last few days here in the mountains and I must now get out, exercise the muscles and breathe the marvellous air into my lungs. But one last snippet – this time a reading list which one of the UK’s new Foreign Ministers apparently has for the summer!