Non-Western political thought

Abstract

Four points of clarification are needed about the theme of this chapter and the title itself. First, from a non-Western perspective the twentieth century could be said to begin in 1905 when Japan defeated Russia, an event that destroyed the widespread myth of European invincibility and was celebrated by millions from China to Peru, or in 1918 when the savagery of the First World War, or what non-Europeans call a European civil war, shook their lingering belief in the cultural superiority of Europe. From a non-Western perspective, the twentieth century has not yet ended and would only do so when their agenda of cultural and economic decolonisation is completed and full equality with the West is attained. Since the beginning and the end of the twentieth century are matters of historical judgement and hence contestable, I have taken the safer route of defining it in strictly chronological terms.