Why China’s Rise Cannot Be Stopped

Summary

CONFLICTED – Episode Summary

Episode: Why China’s Rise Cannot Be Stopped
Date: February 5, 2026
Host: Thomas Small
Guest: Professor Kishore Mahbubani (Ex-Singaporean Ambassador to the UN, Scholar, Author)

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Episode Overview

This episode of CONFLICTED with Thomas Small features a powerhouse conversation with Professor Kishore Mahbubani, a renowned Singaporean diplomat and thinker. The central theme is the rise of Asia—particularly China and India—and what this irreversible shift means for world order, Western societies, and the future of global cooperation. Drawing on deep professional and personal experience, Mahbubani examines why the 21st century is inescapably the "Asian Century," explores Western and Asian philosophies, critiques Western hypocrisy, considers global governance, and spells out both opportunities and risks in the new multipolar era.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. The Unstoppable Rise of Asia – Is the Asian Century Inevitable?

• Historical Context: From year 1 to 1820, China and India were the world’s top economies. Their modern resurgence is a "return to normalcy" rather than an aberration.
• Rapid Catch-Up:
  • In 2000, the EU economy was eight times larger than China’s; by 2026, they’re equal, and by 2050 the EU will be half China’s size.
  • Similarly, the UK’s 2000 economy was 3.5 times India’s; by 2050 India will be four times bigger.
• The Demographic Revolution:
  • The Asian middle class swelled from 150 million (2000) to 2 billion (2020), projected to reach 3.5 billion by 2030 ([08:18]).
• Insight: “The return of China cannot be stopped. It is in the interest of the world, including the Western powers, to see China emerge as a responsible stakeholder on the world stage.” [57:33, Prof. Mahbubani]

2. Personal Journey: Decolonization and Intellectual Evolution

• Overcoming Colonial Inheritance:
  • Mahbubani candidly reflects on growing up as a “mentally colonized” child in Singapore, believing in Asian inferiority.
  • The Non-Aligned Movement provided psychological liberation and solidarity among postcolonial states.
• Philosophical Anchoring:
  • Early exposure to Jawaharlal Nehru’s "Discovery of India" and later to Wittgenstein’s philosophy offered intellectual tools for self-emancipation and critique of Western double standards ([10:43]–[16:08]).
• Western Analytical Tradition:
  • “Paradoxically, the reason why I could understand and expose Western hypocrisies was because of Western analytical reasoning. It’s a beautiful double-edged sword.” [16:08, Prof. Mahbubani]

3. From Idealism to Pragmatism: Lessons of Diplomacy

• Career Choices:

  • Recounted turning down a fast-track defense job due to pacifist beliefs ([17:43]), reflecting youthful idealism.

• Philosophical Influences:

  • Preferred Marx over Rawls in youth for depth but grew more pragmatic, favoring Rawls’ focus on improving the lives of the bottom 10% ([20:35]).

• On Social Justice:

  • Criticizes the US and other Western plutocracies for failing their lower classes, contrasting them with Asian state-building ([21:51]).

  “In my book Has China Won?, I have a chapter on how the United States has become a plutocracy... the bottom 50% have actually seen their incomes and standards of living stagnate for several decades. That’s tragic.” [21:51, Prof. Mahbubani]

4. Asian Governance – The "MPH" Formula

• Singapore as a Model:

  • From a $500 per capita income in 1965 to $92,000 today ([29:47]), Singapore is held up as a miracle of development.
  • MPH Formula: Meritocracy, Pragmatism, Honesty.
    • Meritocracy: Select the most capable for public service.
    • Pragmatism: Copy and adapt global best practices.
    • Honesty: Wage war on corruption—“send ministers to jail if corrupt.” ([30:32]–[32:23])

  “Singapore succeeded by becoming the most copycat country in the world.” [30:35, Prof. Mahbubani]

• Limitations:

  • Singapore’s success not always directly transferable due to its unique size/history, but core principles offer lessons even to Western nations ([28:57], [33:01]).
  • Critique of NHS (UK): Insistence on “co-payment” in Singapore reduces overconsumption, the kind of pragmatism Western systems lack ([35:02]).

5. Non-Aligned Movement, Dependency Theory, and Western Interventions

• Non-Aligned Movement:

  • Provided solidarity, but the realpolitik of the Cold War made true non-alignment rare ([37:24], [38:50]).
  • Not all participants succeeded – India and Singapore flourished, others like Iraq and Libya, especially after Western interventions, collapsed ([40:21]).

  “You didn’t send them to heaven with your liberation, you sent them to hell. And you should acknowledge responsibility for having sent them to hell.” [41:52, Prof. Mahbubani]

• On Dependency Theory:

  • Singapore rejected dependency theory, welcomed Western investment, and thrived as a result ([41:57]).

6. The UN and Multilateral Governance

• Why is the UN Weak?
  • Great powers purposely select “spineless” Secretary Generals, a consensus between the P5 ([44:00]–[46:31]).
• Potential for Stronger UN:
  • Multilateralism is increasingly in the interests of all powers, especially as multipolarity rises ([47:07]).
  • Effective global rules (UNCLOS, Montreal Protocol) exemplify success ([47:07]–[48:49]).
• Resilience of Global System:
  • Even amid protectionism, trade and cooperation have grown thanks to enduring multilateral structures ([49:01]–[50:12]).

7. Western Hypocrisy: Ideals vs. Practice

• Human Rights Double Standards:

  • The West creates noble norms (e.g. anti-torture conventions), but violates them (e.g. Guantanamo) and shields allies from accountability ([51:35]).

  “Not one European government dared to speak out on Guantanamo and waterboarding… The 88% [of humanity] now look at the 12% and say what a wonderful bunch of hypocrites they are.” [53:31, Prof. Mahbubani]

8. China in the Rules-Based Order: Good Faith Actor or Revisionist?

• Western Perceptions:

  • The Anglo-Saxon perspective paints China as a "bad faith" actor, but the global majority views China as rational and predictable ([54:49], [55:44]).

• WTO and Law:

  • On the US blocking WTO judicial appointments: “It’s not China.” ([56:26])

• US-China Relations and World Stability:

  • Current Trump administration is more pragmatic, leading to stabilization ([60:09]):

    “Of all the recent administrations, the most pragmatic American administration towards China is the current Trump administration... welcomed by the world.” [60:09, Prof. Mahbubani]

• Advice for the West:

  • Don’t wait to negotiate rules for China as #1; do so proactively to avoid an “angry dragon” ([57:33], [59:13]).

9. What Will the Asian Century Mean? What Could Derail It?

• Not “Anti-Western”:
  • Asia’s success builds directly on Western innovations (“seven pillars of Western wisdom”).
  • “The Asian century is not going to be an anti-Western century.” [61:56]
• Biggest Risk:
  • Major Asian powers (China-India, China-Japan, Japan-Korea) not managing historical disputes could endanger the project ([63:53]).

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Memorable Quotes & Moments

• On the Mental Impact of Colonialism:

  “Growing up as a young Asian child in the British colony of Singapore, I genuinely believed we Asians were intellectually and culturally inferior to the white men.”
  [10:43, Prof. Mahbubani]

• On Pragmatism and Progress:

  “Pragmatism means you don’t hesitate to learn from anybody, including those whom you considered to be your slaves for a hundred years.”
  [33:01, Prof. Mahbubani]

• On the NHS vs Singapore’s Health System:

  “The very definition of pragmatism is that you must be able to slay sacred cows. And if cannot slay a sacred cow, you cannot become pragmatic, and the NHS has become a sacred cow in the British political system.”
  [35:02, Prof. Mahbubani]

• On Western Hypocrisy:

  “When a Third World country carries out torture, they condemn it fiercely and impose sanctions. But when the United States ...reintroduced torture, not one European country dared to officially criticize.”
  [51:35, Prof. Mahbubani]

• On Asia’s Attitude to the West:

  “Most Asian countries still respect the West and want to work with the West. People in the West should not be frightened by the emergence of the Asian century.”
  [61:56, Prof. Mahbubani]

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Key Timestamps for Important Segments

| Segment | Topic | Timestamp (MM:SS) | Speaker | |---------|-------|-------------------|---------| | Main Thesis of Asian Century | China, India, historical & economic rise | 06:00–09:04 | Mahbubani & Small | | Mental colonization & emancipation | Decolonization, Nehru, personal journey | 10:43–13:12 | Mahbubani | | Wittgenstein's influence | Western philosophy & analytical reasoning | 14:06–16:08 | Mahbubani | | Rawls vs. Marx | Philosophy, pragmatism, social justice | 19:22–21:33 | Mahbubani & Small | | MPH Formula for development | Meritocracy, Pragmatism, Honesty explanation | 30:35–32:23 | Mahbubani | | Critique of NHS | Healthcare reform and sacred cows | 34:41–36:15 | Mahbubani & Small | | Non-Aligned Movement’s realism | Realpolitik & dependency theory discussion | 37:05–41:57 | Mahbubani | | UN reform & great power interests | Weakness of UN, Clinton’s Yale speech | 44:00–47:07 | Mahbubani | | Western hypocrisy—Guantanamo | Human rights, double standards | 51:35–53:31 | Mahbubani | | China’s role in global order | US, China, WTO, pragmatic Trump policy | 54:49–60:41 | Mahbubani & Small | | Meaning and risk of “Asian Century” | Not anti-West, future challenges | 61:56–63:53 | Mahbubani |

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Tone and Language

The episode balances the gravitas of history and global affairs with moments of warmth, candor, and even humor (notably in the anecdotes and British self-deprecation). Mahbubani is consistently erudite yet accessible; Small is incisive and conversational, encouraging depth and reflection without shying from tough questions.

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Conclusion

Professor Mahbubani’s argument is powerful and optimistic: the Asian century is inevitable, largely because it is a restoration of historical norms, powered by demographic and economic forces larger than any one actor. The West need not fear this shift—indeed, Asia’s rise embodies the success of Western ideas. The greatest risks come from unmanaged rivalries within Asia and a failure—on any side—to adapt, cooperate, or learn. Throughout, Mahbubani calls for the humility to learn across civilizations, the pragmatism to reform institutions, and the courage to tackle uncomfortable truths within and between societies.

Transcript

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[Thomas Small]

For much of the modern era, there has been a quiet assumption about the course of history that power may spread, but that leadership would remain Western, that other societies would grow richer but within a global order led ultimately by the United States. But what if Western dominance is becoming a thing of the past and Asia is returning to playing the central role.

[Interviewer (Host)]

It always had in world affairs?

[Thomas Small]

Professor Kishore Mahbubani has argued for decades that this is the Asian century. A former Singaporean ambassador to the United nations and president of the UN Security Council, he argues Asia's rise does not require Western decline in absolute terms, but so long as global institutions are reformed.

[Interviewer (Host)]

To reflect our genuinely multipolar world.

[Thomas Small]

Having lived through decolonization, the Cold War, and the unipolar moment, Professor Mahbubani is well placed to explain why the 21st century is the Asian century and how the west can adapt to China's return as the fulcrum of world history. I'm Thomas Small. This is my conflicted conversation with Kishore Mahbubani.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Professor Mahubani, hello sir. Thank you for coming on. Conflicted how are you today? How are things in Singapore?

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

Well, it's a beautiful rainy day in Singapore and it's ironic, you know, in the United Kingdom you wish you had sun. In Singapore we love rain, since we get sun all the time.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Professor Mahubadi, I'm so pleased to be speaking to you. During your long, storied career as a diplomat, you served at the very highest levels of Singapore's foreign service as Permanent secretary of the Ministry of Foreign affairs, as Singapore's ambassador to the United nations, and as president of the UN Security Council. There are few men today whose views on the big questions of geopolitics and statecraft are as grounded in experience. And you were one of the earliest voices decades ago, now openly to argue that the 21st century would be an Asian century. As the world settles into multipolarity and as the United States and other powers begin to adjust to this new reality, sometimes by returning to open great power competition, how do you assess that argument today? Do you still believe the 21st century will ultimately be remembered as the Asian century?

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

Well, I have absolutely no doubt that the 21st century will be the Asian century. And any skeptical listeners, please let me share two statistics about the two largest countries in Asia, China and India. And of course, it's important to emphasize at the very outset that from the year 1 to the year 1820, the two largest economies of the world were always those of China and India. So their return is a perfectly natural development. But what's amazing is the speed at which it is happening. So in the case of China, for example, in the year 2000, when the 21st century opened, the combined economy of the European Union countries was eight times bigger than China's. But today in 2026, both are about the same size. And by 2050, the European Union countries will become half the size of China. So when the 21st century opens, the European Union is eight times bigger than China. By the middle of the century, the European Union will be half the size of China.

[Interviewer (Host)]

It's just incredible when you think, you know, God works slowly, but he but he's allowing the Asians to get their revenge in the end after that century of humiliation when Asia was for the first time ever subjected to the depredations of colonialism.

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

Yes. And then the second statistic I'd like to mention is a comparison of United Kingdom and India. And that's a good comparison because as you know, a hundred years ago in 1926, 100,000 Englishmen could effortlessly rule over 300 million Indians. That was a remarkable feat. And even as recently as the year 2000, the British economy was about 3.5 times bigger than India's.

[Interviewer (Host)]

That is incredible.

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

That's in the year 2000. But today, India's economy is bigger than that of the United kingdom. And by 2050, India will be four times bigger than UK so again, when the century opens, the United kingdom is almost four times bigger than India. But by 2050, India will be four times bigger than the UK that's an example of how the world is turning upside down.

[Interviewer (Host)]

The demographic shift is profound as well. You know, in 2020, approximately 2 billion Asians were middle class. This is projected to increase to 3.5 billion by 2030. So when you're talking about just middle class consuming Asians, that is a huge demographic increase.

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

Absolutely. But the really astounding statistic is that in the year 2000 again. When the 21st century opened, there were only 150 million Asians in the middle class. But as you indicated, the number has grown to 2 billion and could grow to 3.5 billion. Now again, this is one of the most amazing transformations that we have ever seen in human history.

[Interviewer (Host)]

So you think that the 21st century will be the Asian century is inevitable now, sir. Your autobiography is entitled Living the Asian An Undiplomatic Memoir. The book is excellent, it's informative, it's funny, and it is very thought provoking. I thoroughly recommend everyone read it. You plunge the reader into several world historic events which you experienced firsthand and yet from an Asian perspective that most Westerners will find novel and sometimes challenging. Your career as a Singaporean diplomat reached truly stellar heights, and yet your childhood was a very difficult one. And it's perhaps safe to say that when you were growing up, nobody would have foreseen your illustrious career. You were born in 1948 in Singapore, and yet you grew up very much in the shadow. The partition in India and your childhood overlaps almost perfectly the transition which much of the world underwent from subjection to European colonial powers to post colonial independence. There were several competing ideological formations back then which tried to make sense of the past while laying the groundwork for the future. Third Worldism, revolutionary socialism, developmentalism, dependency theory, and of course, liberal internationalism, just to name a few. As a young man living through that period, which of those ways of thinking most appealed to you and which did you later have to unlearn?

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

Well, I have to begin with a confession, and this is a way of describing how much Asia has changed. Because, you know, as you mentioned, I was born in 1948 in Singapore, and I lived in Singapore, which was a British colony essentially until 1963, till I was 15 years old. And I can tell you that growing up as a young Asian child in the British colony of Singapore, I genuinely believe that we Asians were intellectually and culturally inferior to the white men.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Oh, my Lord, you don't hear that confession very much.

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

I believe that absolutely, because somehow the reason why the British were so brilliant at colonizing many countries, especially India, is that they made the colonized people feel inferior and accept the British as natural superior rulers, which I did as a child.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Well, I can tell you, sir, as an American who has made his life in Britain, they still have that power. They can still effortlessly make you feel inferior. I don't know how they do it.

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

So it took me some time to come out of it. One of the books that I read as probably in my teenage years, was a book written by the first Prime Minister of India, Jawaharlal Nehru, called A Discovery of India. And that's when I first began to be aware that actually we Indians, we had a great civilization and great history and unfortunately it was lost as a result of the Western British colonial rule. So for me, the first journey was a journey of mental emancipation from British mental colonization. And of course that was helped a lot by the feeling in many countries. And at that time it was actually the Non Aligned Movement, that was the movement of countries that said, hey, we are now free and independent and we will chart our own future. So that's why when Singapore became independent, as one way of reaffirming its independence, apart from joining obviously the United nations, we also joined the Non Aligned Movement. And there we met many other fellow countries where we compared notes on what life was like to be colonized and how wonderful it was to be decolonized. That was the first big intellectual passage of my life.

[Interviewer (Host)]

This sounds to me, sir, like you did in those decades, at least we're talking the 60s and 70s, embrace something like, you know, on a kind of normal political spectrum, something like those more radical post colonial third worldist views. Or were you always more pragmatic? I asked because you studied philosophy at the University of Singapore and then you went to Canada for graduate studies, also in philosophy. You were especially influenced by the work of Ludwig Wittgenstein. And I appreciate this is a big question, but perhaps you could indicate for us how Wittgenstein's thought and philosophy more generally influenced you, but also as you emerged into your career as a diplomat, perhaps the idealism of your youth, or, you know, maybe adjacent radicalism of your youth, was it ironed out a bit by experience?

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

Well, I can tell you that Wittgenstein had a very profound impact on my mind. And one reason I believe, in my subsequent life after graduation I was able to write and publish 10 books and probably a few hundred essays, was because Wittgenstein essentially taught me how to think. He was the one who taught me how to ask fundamental questions about everything. And I remember how exciting it was to read his works, especially in Philosophical Investigations. As you know, what's unusual about Wittgenstein is that he was not responsible for creating one major school of thought. He was responsible for creating two. Two major schools of thought. The first one with his first book called, I think, Tractatus Philosophicus, and then the second one with his book Philosophical Investigations. So he was a remarkable philosopher. And I felt after studying him that I could take on any challenge. Because once I understood Wittgenstein and understood how he dissected everything, I found that I could use his analytical tools and his amazing ability to analyze everything and apply it to other areas of human endeavor. And once you are able to do that, you have a major competitive advantage in life.

[Interviewer (Host)]

So when you say that the first challenge to overcome was the challenge that your mind had been colonized by the British, you had to decolonize your mind. That wasn't a process that involved you, let's say, utterly rejecting the Western intellectual tradition. You still were inspired by that tradition. So away from a kind of colonization, colonizer, colonized relationship, you still embraced that universal dimension of the Western intellectual tradition. How do you make sense of that development in your own personal intellectual life?

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

Well, I've spent a large part of my life trying to figure out my own relationship with the West. And as you know, one of my books is called has the West Lost It? And my attitude towards the west is that, number one, it was Western analytical reasoning that enabled me to understand both the massive double standards of Western intellectuals and also how the west in many ways was betraying its own principles when it carried out various activities around the world. So for me, paradoxically, the reason why I could understand and expose Western hypocrisies was because of Western analytical reasons reasoning. So it was what they call a beautiful double edged sword.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Well, I'm going to ask you about Western hypocrisy later because you have some very bracing views on that, very illuminating views. But I would like to return to pressing you a bit about how the experience of real life, especially in the trenches of diplomacy, how it influenced your intellectual development. Young men are idealists, often radical idealists as they grow up. They are mugged by reality, as the expression has it, and they tend to moderate. How did your experience in the trenches of diplomacy change your intellectual trajectory?

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

Well, I would say certainly you're right. I was very idealistic as a young man. As soon as I graduated with a first class honours in philosophy, the then Deputy Prime Minister of Singapore, who was also then the Minister of Defence, invited me to his office and said, kishore, please come and join the Ministry of Defense and I guarantee you that you will have a great career. I'll ensure that you get promoted very fast and you will do very well working in the Ministry of Defense, which is a remarkably generous offer on his part. So I then did one of the stupidest things in my life. I said Dr. Go, I wish I could join you, but I'm afraid I cannot. So he said, why not? I said, I cannot join you because I'm a pacifist. And he immediately threw me out of the office with a look of contempt. So just imagine that if I hadn't been idealistic, I could have had a great career and probably risen much faster in the civil service. But at the end of the day, I still had a very good career in the civil service. And as you know, two years after working, I went to Canada to study philosophy again because I was still interested in becoming a professional philosopher when I was younger. So I went on to write a thesis which tried to compare the concepts of freedom and equality in the writings of Karl Marx and John Rawls. And John Rawls, as you know, was the greatest American philosopher of the 20th century. And I must confess here that I found the ideas of Karl Marx much more appealing than the ideas of John Rawls.

[Interviewer (Host)]

There's your youthful radicalism there, right?

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

That's right, yeah. And I found. Found Karl Marx, in many ways, a deeper thinker than John Rawls. And actually that's why I was then invited once again by Dr. Go King Si, the man who threw me out of his office, to go back to the Ministry of Defense. And this was in the year 1976, after South Vietnam had collapsed.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Oh, please don't tell me you told him, but now I'm a communist, sir.

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

No, he wanted me to explain the origins of Marxist thought. And since I had spent a year studying Karl Marx and John Rawls, I was able to give six lectures, a set of six lectures, three times, to various senior people in the Ministry of Defense of Singapore so they could understand what were the sources of Marxist thought.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Well, I mean, if I reading your autobiography, though. Yes. You say you found Marx to be the deeper thinker. You ultimately decided that Rawls was the more useful thinker in understanding how states interact in the real world, perhaps understanding how people interact in the real world. So. So already, you know, at that time, though, you found Marx the more appealing thinker. Your more pragmatic mind was inclining towards Rawls.

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

And that was one of the transitions I made in my life as I got older. And I realized that you got to be practical and pragmatic if you want to reform society. And John Rawls, in that sense, was much more pragmatic. So, for example, he said, don't just focus on inequality, because all societies, at the end of the day, there will be inequality because of the difference. Different capabilities of human beings. But what you should focus on is ensuring that even if inequality increases, you create a society in which the bottom 10% also find that their lives are improving. So if you can ensure you're not just improving the lives of the people at the top, but also focusing attention on and improving the lives of the people at the very bottom, that's the most just society to have. And it's such a tragedy that today most west societies have ignored his advice.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Yes, it's funny because this is, you know, understood to be a classic of liberal ideology that you ensure that all the boats are rising and for so long the west did do so, but it has stalled. Maybe, you know, forever, maybe not. I don't know.

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

I think it's more than stalled, it has gone into reverse.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Yes.

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

In the case of the United States, for example, in my book Has China Won? I have a chapter on how the United States has become a plutocracy. I cite Angus Dieter from his book Debts of Despair. It shows that the bottom 50% have actually seen their incomes and standards of living stagnate for several decades. Now that's tragic because it doesn't take very much resources to try to improve the lives of people at the bottom. But the plutocrats in the United States, the billionaires, have become very greedy and they've gone out of the way to make sure that they don't pay their taxes. And as a result of that, the public coffers diminish and the people at the bottom are not receiving the kind of support and assistance that they should be given.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Well, one lesson you've learned from your life is the importance of the state in cultivating the conditions for talented public spirited individuals to rise up. And that such people have a real role to play in the cultivation of the common good in the west, especially a West dominated by more libertarian strains of thinking, more individualistic strains of thinking, thinking this has tended to be completely eclipsed. Now the idea that well educated, civic minded bureaucrats have a very important role to play in cultivating the common good. I mean, because you, you come from poverty and yet because of the enlightened governance of Singapore, you were given a great education, you were marked out for success, given opportunities, and you were able to serve your country. I suppose the west has perhaps forgotten this as well.

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

Yes. And the fundamental problem here in the west is that philosophers or political thinkers or politicians have grown up in a culture which has only encouraged a focus on rights and not responsibilities. And I can tell you that on the 50th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1998. I was a Singapore Ambassador to the UN then. And when we had a celebration of the 50th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, I said at the United nations that a group of actually Western and Asian statesmen, led by a former German Chancellor, had come out with a draft Universal Declaration of Human Responsibilities. So I say, why don't we discuss this Universal Declaration of Human Responsibilities to balance the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. And paradoxically, all the Western delegates who believe in the principle that there should be no censorship, decided to censor the discussion of a Universal Declaration of Human Responsibilities. And I think that's been one of the fundamental reasons why so many Western societies are now so, so deeply internally troubled societies is because they have become gripped by the wrong ideas. And that's why focusing on making sure what is the grounding of your ideas is the first thing you need to do if you want to fix your society.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Well, this is where the Asian contribution to the global conversation can often seem to a Westerner to be quite paradoxical. Often the non Western world in political terms is understood as more radical, sometimes more revolutionary, especially if you take the longer view with figures like Mao and Third Worldism more generally and all of the revolutionary socialism that animated it. So on the one hand, the west can be seen as the torchbearer for something like conservatism in international politics. But at the same time, the Asian voice invokes duty, responsibility, honor, these older categories of social, cultural, even spiritual thought which the west recoils against. And in those ways, the west seems more radical or progressive or modern and more inclined to reject the wisdom of the past. There's an interesting contradiction or, I don't know, tension there, would you say?

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

Yes, certainly. And here the tragedy is that, I mean, basically we've been living in a mono civilizational world or Western domination of world history for over 200 years now. But we are now moving to a multi civilizational world where there'll be many successful civilizations living side by side. And so the logical thing, the rational thing to do for the west is to step back and say, hey, why are the Chinese doing so well? Are there elements in their society or elements in their philosophy that we can learn from? But unfortunately, many of the leaders in the west, both in the United States and in Europe, have become very ideological. And they say, well, if China is run by the Chinese Communist Party, we have nothing to learn from the them because we are opposed to Communism. But I keep emphasizing to my Western friends that what you're seeing in China is not a rebirth of communism. What you're seeing is the revival of the world's oldest, most continuous civilization in human history, which is Chinese civilization, Mandarinism, Confucianism, and also. Also the Chinese believe that you shouldn't just focus on individual rights. You should also look at the state of the society and what you need to do to ensure that the social environment is also healthy and responsible. And that's the balance in every society. There's a certain tension within how much attention you give to individual rights and how much attention you give to societal responsibilities.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Well, speaking of Western Malays, you are a Singaporean, and Singapore is often invoked, at least in the west, as a near perfect model of state building, economic development and governance. And across a wide range of issues, Singapore is said to provide a kind of blueprint for Western societies struggling with economic and political malaise. What do you make of this?

[Rocket Money Advertiser]

This.

[Interviewer (Host)]

I've always rejected this degree of valorization of Singapore as overblown. Given Singapore's size, its unique demographics, and its very specific historical circumstances, you've lived through Singapore's transformation from an impoverished colonial backwater into a thriving 21st century powerhouse. So how do you see it? To what extent is Singapore genuinely a model other states can learn from? And where do the lim of that analogy lie?

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

Well, I just imagine how much better off the world will be if every country in the world could match what Singapore has accomplished. So when Singapore became independent in 1965, when I was 17 years old, 60 years ago, our per capita income was $500. And in my childhood, I grew up in real poverty. I was put in a special feeding program when I was six years old because I was technically undernourished, lived in a house without a flush toilet. I had debt collectors coming to our house. So I had a perfect third world childhood. And what's amazing is that this country, Singapore has seen its per capita income go from $500 to US$92,000.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Just incredible.

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

So it is now higher than that of United Kingdom and the United States, which is is amazing. In one lifetime now, no other country has done what Singapore has done. So it is quite natural, therefore, for every country in the world to say, hey, where can I go and learn from if I want to improve my society? Which is why when I was dean of the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, I gave a lecture to ensure that every student in the school would hear it before graduation. And I said, I'm going to give you the secret of Singapore's success free of charge. And I also gave a hundred percent guarantee that if they implemented a secret formula, the countries would succeed.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Oh good. Or can you give us a. Can you give us a precis of that secret formula?

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

Sure. It's a very simple formula which I capture with an acronym, mph. Now, MPH does not stand for miles per hour. MPH stands for. For Meritocracy, Pragmatism and honesty. To understand meritocracy, you know, when a country selects players for his football team, the captain never looks for his own relatives. He picks the best players to ensure that they score the goals. But when you come to the captain of the finance team in the country, instead of picking the best financial people, suddenly the uncle and cousins and nephews appear in the finance ministry. That's the opposite of meritocracy. So pick the best people and not your relatives. Secondly is pragmatism. And here Dr. Go King Sweet again. The gentleman who threw me out of his office said to me once, Kishore, no matter what problem Singapore encounters, somebody somewhere must have encountered that problem before. Why don't we go and study how other countries have dealt with the same problem and adapted to our own circumstances. So Singapore succeeded by becoming the most copycat country in the world. And finally the H is the hardest part. Honesty. And this means zero corruption. In fact, I once wrote an essay, very short one page essay called the Ten Commandments of Development. And the first commandment was Tao should acknowledge that the single biggest reason why societies fail is corruption. So if you can remove corruption in the way Singapore did by sending ministers to jail, if they were corrupt, then your country will succeed.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Well sir, I can see how MPH would be very valuable advice to future leaders of developing countries. Especially countries maybe in the grip of more ideological or radically ideological formations. But what about modern Western countries? I mean they're fully developed. They have, at least in theory, bureaucracies that are meritocratic, systems that are meritocratic. They at least in theory have laws against corruption and try to prevent it. Etc. So do you think Singapore is a model for countries like Britain or the United States even that are struggling at the moment with various problems?

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

Absolutely. I mean, I know for the British, the idea that the United Kingdom, which used to rule over Singapore right from 1819 to 1959, 140 years. The very idea that the United Kingdom could learn lessons from a country that once colonized is absolutely unthinkable to the British mind. And this is exactly the opposite of pragmatism. Pragmatism means you don't Hesitate to learn from anybody, including from people whom you considered to be your slaves for 100 years.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Well, to be fair to a lot of my British friends, especially those on the kind of Anglo futurist side, people who wish to see London become, as they call it, Singapore on Thames, a lot of British people are open to learning from the Singapore. The question is what lessons specifically does Singapore have to give them?

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[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

Let me give you a specific example. One of the things the British are proudest of is the National Health Service.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Oh dear, okay, well you went straight for the jugular, sir.

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

And everybody loves it, but it is collapsing.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Everybody, the British have a love hate relationship with it.

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

I think at this stage, yes, but it is collapsing. The queues are crazy. If you wait months quite often for, you know, relatively basic operations that you can get in Singapore in 24 hours. And the one basic difference between Singapore's health system and the British health system is that we insist on coping payment. You never get anything for free because if you get something for free it leads to over consumption. And the co payment by the way, depends a lot on your income and what kind of housing you live in. The way we have structured our health system leads to much better health results. You know, the very definition of pragmatism is that you must be able to slay sacred cows. And if cannot slay a sacred cow, you cannot become pragmatic and the NHS has become a sacred cow in the British political system. And no British politician has the courage to say, hey, let's admit it, the system is breaking down, let's have a fresh start.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Well, I don't disagree, sir. Now, while reading your book, I was most struck by the extent to which Singapore engaged seriously with the Non Aligned movement. It isn't often, often that a Westerner like me encounters a perspective on that movement like Singapore's, which adopted a more nuanced, less ideological approach, or so it seems to me. On the questions that underlay the non aligned movement, certainly compared to the big ideological state projects of Egypt, India and others, was non alignment ultimately a moral project. A strategic one or simply a survival strategy for small and medium sized states. And a lot of our listeners will hardly know the role that the Non Aligned Movement played in creating our world. How do you assess its influence today?

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

I attended many, many non aligned meetings, including in places like Cuba, Angola, New Delhi, Sri Lanka.

[Interviewer (Host)]

You describe a meeting that you attended in Cuba. Fidel Castro's there. They're all there.

[Thomas Small]

You know, you have a ringside seat.

[Interviewer (Host)]

To some serious 20th century big wigs.

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

Absolutely. I was in the same room as Fidel Castro and Saddam Hussein and Assad and Yasser Arafat and all the big names in the third world at that time. You know, it's important to remember that in the 60s and 70s when the non Aligned Movement was born, the countries were newly independent and there was a certain degree of uncertainty about whether or not they would be able to succeed. They were new, they were just, they're just newly independent. Independent. So they needed to find solidarity with other countries which also were struggling with the same issues. So by coming together in the Non Aligned Movement, we were able to come together and say, hey, we have some common interests. So for example, in the Cold War when countries did not want to take sides in the contest within United States and Soviet Union, they said we are non aligned. And so we were will choose our own policies and won't align ourselves with either United States or Soviet Union. But just to balance that, and this is an example of the reality of the world, I'll never forget a speech that the President of Sri Lanka gave in Havana, Cuba. He said, let's be honest and admit that the only two genuinely non aligned countries in the world in 1979 were the United States and the Soviet Union. Union and everyone else was in one way or another aligned one way or another, one of them.

[Interviewer (Host)]

That was a cold shower of realism, wasn't it?

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

That's right. And I thought that wasn't unfair, it was true. Because in the reality of geopolitics, great powers have a much bigger say on global affairs than smaller countries do.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Well, I mean sir, if you thought that the Non Aligned Movement brought together newly independent states so that they could find solidarity to ensure that the they wouldn't fail. And then you listed off a lot of names there who oversaw a lot of state building projects which I think it's fair to say failed. You know, Saddam Hussein, the Assads, Yasser Arafat, even Fidel Castro. So within that movement, how can you assess the roads that various participants took? One road leading to failure, another road leading to success.

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

You're absolutely right because in the non line movement you have both success stories and you had failures. So for example, today the fastest growing major economy in the world is not a Western society, not an advanced society. But India, one of the founders of the Non Aligned Movement and India will continue to grow faster than any other major western developed country for a long while. Clearly there are both success stories and failures. And Singapore for example, is an amazing success story. And so to, to some of our neighbors, Malaysia has done very well as a country.

[Interviewer (Host)]

But what about the failures, sir? What's your diagnosis of the causes of the real, sometimes quite catastrophic failures?

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

Well, I mean if you look at the failures and if you look for example at Iraq and Libya, for example, right. The United States and Europe intervened in Iraq, removed Saddam Hussein and broke the society. The United States intervened and removed Gaddafi from Libya and broke the society. And I'm not saying that Saddam Hussein and Gaddafi were good rulers. No. But as the former Secretary of State Colin Powell said, if you break it, you own it. And so the United States and Europe after breaking Iraq and Libya, walked away from their responsibility of refixing their societies.

[Interviewer (Host)]

So it sounds that you would in that case at least subscribe to depend theory, which I've often thought is a little bit suspect. Basically, if you're a developing country and you succeed, it's because it's because of your own wisdom. If you fail, it's because the United States undermined you. It's a kind of win win way of thinking of the world. But surely a lot of these states, I mean, come on, Iraq under the Ba'ath Party, Libya under Gaddafi, I mean they contributed to their own failure.

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

You're right and as I said, they were not in any way perfect societies. But what you did was that you actually the living conditions of the ordinary human beings, especially people at the bottom, much, much worse as a result of the interventions. You didn't send them to heaven with your liberation, you send them to hell.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Yes.

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

And you should acknowledge responsibility for having sent them to hell.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Oh yes. Oh yes.

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

Now on dependency theory, a very important qualification because when I was ambassador to the un, Singapore publicly disagreed with the dependency theory and Singapore said, said we should not reject Western investment and say that Western investment is exploiting our people and our society. We said that Western investment is good for your society because it creates jobs, it trains people, it brings technology and it also brings export markets. So Singapore succeeded and flourished by rejecting the dependency theory theory and saying we welcome foreign investment, especially Western foreign investment.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Well, you served twice as Singapore's Ambassador to the un, including as Permanent Representative. And you campaigned successfully for Singapore's first seat on the UN Security Council and then served as President of the security council in 2001 and 2002. Very important year. You participated in Council deliberations before and after 9 11. You witnessed the debates over the Iraq war, and you were disappointed as attempts to reform the Council failed. There's so much I could ask you about the Security Council and the UN more generally, especially in those important years. One thing that jumps out at me, especially as an American who grew up in a Republican voting home, I was always being told that the UN was corrupt, weak, even malevolent. Yet from where you stood, the United States often seemed to work actively to undermine the UN's power and then blame it for being ineffective. How does the United States regard the un? How do other great powers use it? And so how does the reality of the unity, the UN differ from the way idealists imagine it should work?

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

Well, it is true that the United nations is weak, absolutely true. But you know, when George Schulz told the then Singapore Foreign Minister, Mr. S. Dana Balan, and I was in the room, this was in the 1980s, Mr. George Shultz, the Secretary of State, was complaining about how weak the UN was. Mr. Dhanabalan, our then foreign minister, said, Mr. Schulz, you're absolutely correct. The UN is very weak. But why is the UN weak? Because we choose very weak secretary generals. Now, Mr. Secretary of State, don't you agree that for the next Secretary General of the un, why don't we pick the strongest possible person instead of the most spineless person? And you know what? George Schulz is such an honest man, he almost blushed when Mr. Dana Balan told him that. Because he realized that it was the United States that had been picking spineless Secretary generals ever since Dach Hamaskol was a Secretary General of the un? But it wasn't the United States alone. It was the United States, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, Kingdom, the French and China. All the P5, the five permanent members wanted a weak, pliable Secretary General like the one the UN has today. So, you know, if you want to reform the un, you have to persuade the United States and other great powers that it is in their interest to do so. Which is why I often cite a speech given by Bill Clinton at Yale in 2003 where he said, if United States is going to be number one forever, then fine, the United States can keep on doing what it is doing. But Bill Clinton added a But. And in the but he said, but if we can conceive of a world where the United States is no longer the number one power, then surely it is in the United States national interest to strengthen multilateral rules, multilateral norms, multilateral possessors, multilateral institutions, institutions. So I am arguing that it is now in the interests of the United States to strengthen multilateralism rather than undermine it. But unfortunately, there has been a consensus in the body politic of the US Government that a weak United nations is better for American interests rather than a strong one.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Well, how could a strong United nations serve the interests not just of the United States, but of the rest of the members of the P5? And what reforms do you think are required if bodies like the UN are to regain a measure of effectiveness? Because as the world settles into multipolarity, it's not entirely clear that the multilateral institutions founded in the mid 20th century are still fit for purpose. So what reforms are necessary? And how, in an age of multipolarity, could a struggle, strong UN serve the interests of America, China and the others?

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

I believe as we move towards. You're right, a multipolar world with many contending powers, you actually need to have more acceptance of rules that will guide the engagement of these many great powers with each other. To avoid chaos, to avoid misunderstanding, they need to come together and agree on a common set of rules. So, for example, reason why global trade has increased dramatically over the last 50 years. For many reasons. But one reason is that ships can travel freely across any ocean, any waterway, on the basis of a common set of rules that was worked out in the United Nations Convention of the Law of the Sea. Sea. And what's interesting is that even though the United States hasn't ratified UNCLOS United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, the United States respects the rules because it is in United States interest to respect the rules of unclos. So UNCLOS is one example. Another example, you know, we had the Montreal Protocol. We were about to have a hole in the ozone layer, and it was finally fixed. And it was fixed because of a UN Agreed agreement. So when there are common challenges that many societies face, like, for example, climate change, the only way to deal with climate change is for all countries to come together and acknowledge common responsibility for this global problem. So I assure you there'll be lots of common global problems emerging and growing in the 21st century, because we are living in a small, interdependent global village at the end of the.

[Interviewer (Host)]

You must fear that a return to Great power competition will mean that global cooperation as an ideal is, is eclipsed entirely.

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

I, I'm not that pessimistic.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Oh, good.

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

I mean, I, I, you know, the advantage of being very old, I'm 77 years old now, is that I've seen lots of ups and downs in, in world history. So it is always better when you analyze international affairs never to be too optimistic or too pessimistic. At the end of the day, we stumble through and we still end up keeping the world going in a positive direction. And it's important to emphasize, remember the opening statistics we had about the middle class population in asia growing from 150 million in the year 2000 to now over 2 billion and then soon hitting 3.5 billion. All this could have only happened happen if the world order was fundamentally functioning rather than being dysfunctional. And I'm astonished that even the year 2025, which we must acknowledge was a tumultuous year with a massive increase in tariffs. Despite all that, the global economy grew and global trade grew. So it shows you the resilience of our global system. And this resilience is seen seriously underestimated.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Well, that's very good to hear. You know, I said, sir, that I would return to the question of Western hypocrisy. Your career gave you ample opportunity to observe Western diplomacy, and especially American diplomacy during postings not only to Washington and New York, but also to say, Cambodia in the 1970s, a country almost nobody thinks about today, but which played an outside role in international diplomacy back then. You also participated in debates over Iraq, as we said, in debates over America's immunity from the International Criminal Court, Guantanamo Bay and other issues during the war on terror. You have been forthright in your accusation that the west trades in double standards when it comes to human rights, democracy and international cooperation. And you've also alleged that post Cold War triumphal blinded the United States, preventing it from understanding what was really going on in our rapidly changing world. So what would you want to tell, let's say a young American today about these questions to help him or her better understand Western hypocrisy, the gap between ideals and practice in international politics, and really how those ideals can just be language games masking naked power projection?

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

Well, I think the important thing for a young American, but not just a young American, a young European, to understand is that many of the rules that they have advocated for the world are good rules. So for example, it was the United States and Europe that led the campaign to create a convention against torture. There was a wonderful positive development. And I must have tell you, I would prefer to live in a society where I didn't have to worry about my nails being pulled up when I went to jail, right? That I wouldn't be subject to waterboarding. But guess what? The first modern developed country to reintroduce torture was the United States of America in Guantanamo in 2001, 2002. Now, when that happened, I at least expected the European countries which had made equally passionate statements in the United nations about the need to protect human rights. And I thought the principal European governments would be the first to protest against the United States introducing torture. Guess what? Not one European government dared to speak out on Guantanamo and waterboarding. Not one. So the rest of the world looked at this and said, these Europeans are hypocrites. When a third world country carries out torture, they condemn, damn it, fiercely and impose sanctions. But when the United States government under George W. Bush administration reintroduced torture, not one European country dared to officially criticize the United States. And there's one important statistic that every listener of this program should know, that only 12% of the world's population lives in the West. 88% of the world's population lives outside the West. And the 88% now look at the 12% and say what a wonderful bunch of hypocrites they are.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Well, someone might say, and possibly members of the Trump administration would say that, look, the problem was all those ideals in the first place. They were all either impracticable or their ultimate, you know, force was to weaken the West. Because for the sake of balance, I'd like to ask you to assess a common, common charge made against China, especially in the West. The argument goes that in the international system built after the Second World War and then expanded during the unipolar moment, China has been a bad faith participant, formally embracing international rules and institutions while primarily using them to advance its own national interests, even to the point of weakening the liberal international international order from within. Their membership of the World Trade Organization is seen as particularly illustrative in this regard. How persuasive do you find that argument and how should we think about China's behavior in the system? As exceptional, as hypocritical as well, or as normal great power conduct? Because the Trump administration would say that its moves against the liberal international order as it is constituted is a necessary responsibility response to China's bad faith activity within that system?

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

Well, I'm glad that you described China in the way that you did, because I think you very accurately captured the I would say Western predominantly Anglo Saxon perception of China. You described it very well. And I want to tell you first of all that that perspective is not shared by the rest of the world. So the China you describe, the lenses you use are not the lenses that are used by the majority of the world's population. For the majority of the world's population, what they see is that China is a rational and predictable actor on the world stage. Nowadays, as you know, it's very difficult to predict what the United States will do. Right? I mean, for example, can you tell me that Greenland will remain Denmark's territory theory?

[Interviewer (Host)]

No, no, it's not, it's not easy to know that for sure.

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

Yeah. So by contrast China would like to be a rational and predictable actor primarily because China has actually now become the number one beneficiary of the liberal international rules based order that you mentioned. So China is today the number one trading power in the world. Now you say that China may have violated some WTO rules. Then I would say yes, let's take China to the WTO court and guess who's blocking the appointment of judges to the WTO court. See, it's not China.

[Interviewer (Host)]

I mean, I agree with you sir, to the extent that the China as bad actor theory overlooks the fact that the role that China has played played in the international economy since its admission to the WTO in December 2000 and even before. And maybe that role has been destabilizing. Maybe that role has involved some chicanery behind the scenes. But that always happened in concert with American, I mean, let's call a spade a spade here. American plutocrats who were very happy to get extremely rich off of working with a Chinese communist Communist party national interest oriented economic model, even if it meant weakening for example the industrial base of their own country in America. So it's not just a China as bad actor situation. The Americans played a very important role.

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

In that, you know. As you know, I've written a book on U. S China relations called Has China one? In fact, it's been one of my more successful books in which in the last chapter I explained how US and China can work together to create a better future for their own people. People and also a better future for the world because at the end of the day the return of China cannot be stopped. And it is in the interest of the world, including the Western powers, to see China emerge as what they call a responsible stakeholder on the world stage. Now I always tell my Western friends that this is the time when we should be talking to China on what kind of role it will play when it becomes number, number one. Don't wait till it becomes number one. Do it now before it becomes number one. Talk to China and work on a common set of rules. Because if you don't talk to China and instead you provoke China in the way that many Western countries are doing, what you're going to see when China becomes number one is not a peaceful dragon, but an angry dragon. And that's why you notice that most countries in the third world world do not emulate the west in their dealings with China. They have many concerns about the rise of China. They are worried about this great new power that is emerging. But at the same time, they realize they have to work with China, talk to China, and not try to, you know, either lecture China or humiliate China or sanction China. So the west should look at its own behavior vis a vis China and ask whether it is wise for people like Elizabeth von der Leyen and Kaya Kallas to talk of two senior officials. The tone that they adopt when they speak about China, which is dismissive and condescending.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Oh, well, that's the Europeans for you.

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

Is so uncalled for. No third world country speaks dismissive and condescendingly to China.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Well, the Trump administration is not happy to concede that China will inevitably be number one. And also I, from where I sit and I sort of take a ringside seat to these questions and I just watch the game being played in front of me. I don't think a good versus evil framing is particularly helpful. The west, led by America, has certainly engaged in all sorts of bad faith or, you know, bad policy. China, you know, not unprovocative itself in many, many important respects. So there's a kind of struggle going on overtly, covertly. It's there. Now.

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

Can I say something very surprising to you?

[Interviewer (Host)]

Oh, yes, please.

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

Of all the recent administrations that you've had, possibly the most pragmatic American administration towards China is the current Trump administration.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Absolutely, 100%.

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

And the U.S. china relationship has stabilized to an extent that we haven't seen in a long time. And all this is due to the pragmatism and the non ideological approach of the Trump administration towards China. And that is, by the way, welcomed by the world. Because when the two elephants in the global order find ways of dealing and talking to each other relative harmoniously, then frankly, it's better for the world.

[Interviewer (Host)]

I agree. I have a lot of criticisms of Donald Trump the man and the Trump administration, but I do think it Is true that it has been helpful that from a period where Western liberal internationalism sat self contented and self righteously so, thinking that it just effortlessly governed everything. For that mask to have been torn off by Donald Trump, to have woken everyone up to the reality of competition and you know, reminded people that competition doesn't need to be conflict, but it could be. And, and one way it's going to become conflict is if we don't recognize what it is. It's competition. It's not just some kind of happy technocratic fairyland that's emerging. There's real competition going on. I think that has been sobering, but helpful and as you say, pragmatic. Now, we began by talking about the idea of the 21st century as an Asian century. Sir, having lived through the long Western or American century and now well into this period of transition and uncertainty, what would you most want listeners to understand about what an Asian century would actually mean? And based on everything you've seen, what would have to go wrong for the Asian century not to materialize?

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

Well, I think the most important thing every Western listener should know about the Asian cent century is that the Asian countries need to send a thank you note to the west for having brought our world into the modern world. Right? I mean, all the amazing transformations of human society, the initial successes, the scientific revolution, the industrial revolution were all gifts of the West. And as I said in one of my books, the New Asian Hemisphere, I wrote a whole book explaining how Asia has succeeded because it borrowed and used seven pillars of Western wisdom. So the Asian century is not going to be an anti Western century. In fact, in the ancient century, many of the Western ideas will remain dominant. For example, the theory of free markets that Adam Smith taught us, that will remain with us. It won't disappear in the Asian century. So therefore, the people in the west should not be frightened by the emergence of the Asian century because most Asian countries still respect the west and want to work with the West. You also asked the question about what could go wrong. And the answer again is very simple. In the Asian century, it's very important for the Asian countries to get a along with each other and not go to war with one another. And here, if you want to be very honest, you have to admit that among the major Asian powers, like between China and India, between China and Japan, and say even between Japan and Korea, there are unresolved bilateral problems and tensions. So if these bilateral problems and tensions are, are not managed well, then we can say goodbye to the Asian century.

[Interviewer (Host)]

Well, sir, I would have liked to ask you how you think the island of Taiwan factors into the prospect of Asian war, but we've run out of time. I can't thank you enough, Professor Ambassador Mahubani for coming on Conflicted. I have enjoyed this conversation immensely. I really enjoyed the reading I did to prepare for it. Your books are extremely readable, always thought provoking, very informative. How often do you get to speak to a gentleman and a scholar of your standing? So, sir, I really appreciate it. I'm very grateful to you. Thank you.

[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

Thank you very much for having me on your show. It's been a real pleasure and an honor.

[Thomas Small]

That was Professor Kishore Mahbubani. His books include Living the Asian Century, Has China Won? And Can Asians Think. If you'd like to follow him, you'll find his links in the show notes. And remember, for deeper dives into the ideas we explore on this show, including extended conversations and Q. And as with my co host Eamon Dean, check the show notes for details on how to join the conflicted community. I'm Thomas Small. Conflicted is a Message Heard Production Our executive producer producers are Jake Warren and Max Warren. This episode was produced and edited by Thomas Small.

[Mint Mobile Advertiser]

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[Professor Kishore Mahbubani]

What do you have to lose?

[Mint Mobile Advertiser]

Give it a try at Mintmobile.

[Blinds.com Advertiser]

Com Switch limited time, 50% off regular price for new customers. Upfront payment required $45 for three months, $90 for six months or $180 for 12 month plan taxes and fees. Extra speeds may slow after 50 gigabytes per month when network is bus.