ABSTRACT

This book examines the role of the cultural factor, and patterns of its interaction with social, economic and political developments, in fostering identity-based new populisms and various forms of political authoritarianism across the globe.

Comparing authoritarianism in the Asian and Western context, this book attempts to shed light on the different ways in which new political actors make use of cultural traditions or constructs in order to justify their claims to power and challenge the culture of modernity as understood in the Western world. Lastly, the book focuses on the consequence of these new challenges for multilateral cooperation at regional and global levels, asking the question: is the world going towards fragmentation and anarchy or a pluralist and innovative form of multilateral cooperation?

This book will be of key interest to scholars and students of populism and authoritarianism studies, democracy, global governance and more broadly to international relations.

chapter |12 pages

Introduction

part I|2 pages

Competing modernities and models of modernization

chapter 2|15 pages

Nation-building in the era of populism and the Muslim intelligentsia

The Indonesian experience

chapter 3|16 pages

Can we explain multiple modernities?

Suggested insights and their test in a South American context

part II|2 pages

The EU and China: Diverse identities and political prospects

part III|2 pages

Challenges for a common agenda of a new multilateral convergence

chapter 10|17 pages

The triumph of external freedom

Conflicting liberties and modernities in comparative perspective

chapter |4 pages

Conclusion