At the financial institution where I work, there is a charter of values which says that we should be international not only in our operations, but also in our values. To this end, we need to respect the communities in which we operate.
This disturbs me. It sounds nice at face value, but the real communities we operate in are often bigoted, narrow-minded, superstitious, or outright hostile to individual rights. They are communities which preach holy war against other communities, or refuse to allow basic surgery for fear of offending the gods, or communities which don’t allow their women even marry to their own desire. Respecting the community isn’t good enough to have international values. We need to spread the values we aspire to.
Three hundred years ago, my industry heped to create the middle class in Europe. It financed them- and thus financed the spread of liberal values. If we are as courageous as out charter tells us to be, we should damn well live up to our responsibility and create a liberal middle class in Asia.
