We hear the “West” or “Westerners” used all the timein this sense - “Westerners are currently evacuating Iraq” or “The West is divided over (some issue)”.
Just what is the West. Is it just Western Europe, North America, and Australia/New Zealand. Is Latin America in the West? (It is mostly Western European in language and religion) or is it not (as it is mostly economically “developing”)? Maybe Chile would be Western but not Bolivia. Russia seems to be always excluded - yet Greece isn’t, and but how about Poland, Hungary, or Bulgaria. Would Islamic people in Europe such as Albanians or Bosnians be Western? Japan seems to be far closer to the “West” than not in economic and social terms, then again it is decidedly eastern geographically.
Is there some widely accepted list of what constitutes the Western world? Or is it just anyone’s random definition…
I don’t think that you can define the “west” in geographic terms. It is much more of a cultural definition. Western Civilization grew out of the same Tigris-Euphrates river valley that Iraq is now sitatued in. Flowing Westward, it took roots in the Levant, then N. Africa, Greece, and Italy(Roman Republic/Empire). From there it grew into Europe and was spread from there. Some areas remained “westernized” and others became the “East.” The rise of Islam and the dichotomy that grew between that and Christianity created a large schism in the Middle East, and the difference in European and Oriental values in Asia defined the split between east and west. It is from this view of the world (excluding, for the most part, Africa nad the Americas) that the differences took on the nomenclature of East/West.
Now the definition is pretty much up for grabs, and is adaptable to different situations.
I would place India in with SE Asia, but, as has been noted, it depends on what you want the West to mean at the time, and how you’re drawing your cultural/geographic boundaries.
Generally, when I refer to the west, I mean North America above Mexico and the EU. Australia is actually a little out there on its own, or gets bunched in with Japan in The Far East. I know that’s a little strange, but in terms of trade and economic links, Australia is closer to Indonesia and Japan than it is to, say, Belgium. Of course, culturally it’s like a hot and happy England/America mishmash…
And now we see why we can’t really define it very well, so I’ll stop trying
Is “The West” like porn? You know it when you see it?
I would define the West as the First World democracies. They are countries that are boadly capitalist (i.e. not command economies) where if you don’t like the government you can vote for a different one, protest in the streets without being tortured, or leave without the government arresting and imprisoning you for trying.
The distinction between east and west comes from very ancient times. If I am not wrong one of Emperor Augustus first decrees was that official documents should be written in Latin in the west and greek in the east. Then even durig the first years of the empire it was known that there was a difference between east and west.
Teodosio The Great was the last emperor who ruled in the entire empire, his sons Honorius and Arcadius only made permanent a situation that happened many times before (example Diocletian Tetrarchy).
In 476 the western empire was overrun by the barbarian hordes, the east agonized for the next 1000 years (Mehmet II took Constantinople in 1453)
1066 was the year of the great schism, so now we add another difference between east and west.
Then from the ashes of the Roman Empire two civilazations who have a lot in common were born, the eastern christian civilazation and the western christian civilazation. That is why IMHO it is sometimes difficult to decide wether Russia, Greece or Serbia, etc belong to our civilazation or not, in the opinions of the auhtors I read, they don’t (Check Arnold Toynbee).
Notice that I said our civilazation, Argentina (and all Latin America) belongs to west how could it not with such a name?
I disagree with you go alien then, Japan is not a western country nor is India. Westerners share something of a common language (all are heavily influenced by Latin), something of a common culture and specially a system of belief (the Judeo- Christian one). Of course that means that IMHO Israel is a western country who happens to be in the wrong neighbourghood.
When talking modern geo-politics and culture the ‘West’ is Europe, the UK and the US (the US essentially being England jr.) Australia too. Since the end of WWII Japan is now most definately ‘Western’. South Korea as well.
The ‘East’ is Russia, China (all of Asia really), and the Middle East (minus Israel). Turkey being right on the ‘border’ between East & West is kind of both (depending on who you ask). Or rather it started out Eastern but has become more and more Western.
Africa and South America are more the third world than western or eastern.
Although its hardly 100% accurate concepts like Christianity, democracy and capitalism are all considered the hallmarks of ‘Western Civilization’. Islam, Buddhism, Hindu are all ‘eastern’ religions.
