“SUMMARY OF THE WEST UNIQUE, NOT UNIVERSAL”The article “The West Unique, Not Universal” is written by “Samuel P. Huntington”.The article tells about the weird attitude of the West feeling superior about their culture as theuniversal culture. This is explained in the article in two forms. The first is the “Coca-colonization thesis” which proclaims that the Western culture especially the American cultureis attracting the people of all continents throughout the world. The second is the“Modernization” which proclaims that the Western culture is a sign of modernization andothers shift from their traditional culture to the Western culture to modernize themselves. Theauthor feels that both these are false assumptions. The first thesis is made on the assumptionthat consumption of Western things makes people follow the Western culture. But the fact isthat the culture lies in the beliefs, values, language, religion, traditions, customs and norms ofthe people. The argument about the modernization is a big flaw. Modernization means changein the standards of living of the people and not changing their culture. It involves “bettereducation, industrialization, technological improvisation, wealth, social integration anddiverse occupational structures”. If all parts of the world gets modernized this alone does notsay that the world is homogenous; though modernized, there may be differences among themodernized areas. They do have much in common but not in an entirety and it is a falseassumption that all modernized cultures resemble the Western Culture. The article presentsthe different features of the Western culture that help in distinguishing it from others. Theseinclude- “the classic legacy, Western Christianity, European languages, Separation ofspiritual and temporal authority, rule of law, social pluralism and civil society, representativebodies and individualism of the West”. However, the above list does not include the perfectdistinguishing characteristics of the West. Those collectively represent the Western Culturebut individually do not support as the distinctive features of the West. The west took manyyears to get into modernization. The author feels that the Western Civilization is unique butnot universal. The author says that it is a wrong notion that modernization could only be achievedthrough Westernization. There are many nations who modernized themselves withoutshifting from their traditional culture. Improved technology made transportation,communication and trade easy with globalization and that paved way for borrowings ofcivilization and practices among different nations. The author explains this with someexamples like the Chinese adapting and practicing Buddhism from India. Thesetransformations are made by some nations to improvise their cultural identity but not tofollow or shift from their traditional culture to the Western culture. Westernization is not theonly means to achieve economic development and modernization. Many Islamic and Asiannations show reluctance to follow the Western culture as it is secular and they are not ready tofollow Christianity. Modernization helps nations to strengthen their political, economic andmilitary powers. Many parts of the globe are shifting towards modernization and away fromwesternization. The article then explains the concept of “indigenization”. The two keyelements of culture are the religion and the language. English language is supposed to be theinternational language but the author in the article says that it is not used by ninety twopercentage of the world and hence it cannot be taken as the world language. This argumentsupports that the western culture is not universal. Even the same is the case with the religion.Muslims are exceeding in numbers than the Christians and this also shows that the westernculture is not universally accepted. The article presents the appreciation for the connectionbetween “imperialism and universalism”. The author says that it is time the western cultureneed to accept that it is not the universal culture and that it should “maintain its dynamismand promote its coherence”. The article says that the conflicts regarding varying policies ofthe United States and Europe towards the third parties should be resolved and unity should beachieved to improve the influence of the West in the world affairs. The author states this as“The peoples of the West must hang together, or they will hang separately”. The political andeconomic integration of North America and Europe can help reduce the decline theirinfluence on world affairs and help them increase their power among other