Asians, ASD and Achievement

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Asians, ASD and Achievement
14 November 2010

Asians are defined as people from East Asian (Chinese, Japanese and Korean), South Asian (people from the Indian subcontinent), and Southeast Asian (the current ASEAN) origin. Asians have been rather successful. The Asian economies are currently seen as the bright sparks of the global economy. South Korea and Japan are currently OECD members, whereas India and China have rapidly growing economies relatively unaffected by the global credit crisis crunch. For ASEAN, we also experienced economic growth, spurred by a growth of trade with other Asian partners. Our future in Asia had never been brighter.

To examine the successes of the Asian economy, we can look into individual economies for comparisons. The growth of Asia could be attributed to the high level of emphasis towards optimizing conditions towards economic growth, throughout the country. This had been particularly in the case in some Asian economies such as Hong Kong and Singapore, as we need to find the prime examples of Asian success through its most exceptional cases. Both are ranked in the top 10 for the list of countries, in terms of GDP (PPP) by capita. Both economies are the prime cases of growth maximization. Both have free economies, both have well-developed infrastructure such as airports, seaports and excellent roads, but both are subject to a high degree of governmental intervention and guidance. Especially in the case of Singapore, the government indirectly or directly controls half of Singapore’s wealth.

As for the intangibles of the economy, it cannot be objectively examined in the Asian people, as Asia indeed works on a different system from the West. To look for objective data, I examined at the successes of Asians in other countries.

Asian Americans as a whole has the highest educational attainment and median household income than the other ethnicities in the United States, for example, including the Americans with Caucasian or European descent. More than one-fourth of Asian Americans earned incomes above US$100,000. As for Asians living in other countries, they also contributed to their host countries in their various ways. It is noted that Asian enclaves include London, Vancouver and Sydney, which happen to be the economic powers in their respective countries (United Kingdom, Canada and Australia).

Asians have achieved great success. However, such success has come at great cost. In the most extreme case of competition, we can look at the case of America, where Asians are exposed to the most competition without the benefit of mateships (Australia) or welfare systems that equalizes individuals (Scandinavian countries).

From the Wikipedia article on Asian Americans, as a member of this forum quoted from, on how Asians achieved success, and of which implicitly account for the Asians’ problems in America, other similarly competitive countries and maybe the world:

Some Asians justify and defend their overly competitive nature and emphasis on prestigious universities and professional jobs on the belief that due to the existence of white privilege, Asians (as a minority) must overcompensate in order to attain equal to or higher status than whites. East Asians also point out that due to the bamboo ceiling, Asians need to earn more impressive credentials in order to get managerial positions with higher pay and higher responsibilities. For example, a white person may need to only earn a bachelor's degree from a mediocre state university in order to get a six figure managerial position; for the Asian, he likely needs to earn a degree from an Ivy League school. The higher expectations placed on East Asians as a result of the model minority stereotype carries over from academics to the workplace.

As a result, Asians tend to do well in places where meritocracy is carried out in full form. The current knowledge-based economies tend to reward highly educated and highly competent workers. Hence, with increasing incidences of companies looking at competencies in careers to aggressively pursue new economic models, Asians tend to benefit. Now, Asia is host to most of our world’s economic growth, as well as investment and other economic opportunities.

Speaking of which, this reminds me of the plight of autistics, in Asia, the West and other places.

In the West, autistics (including those with Asperger’s Syndrome) have been known to achieve great successes in different fields. We see autistics excelling in different fields, like sports (Clay Marzo), agriculture (Temple Grandin), linguistics (Daniel Tammet), economics (Vernon Smith) and so on.

But the social conditions in Asia are unfavorable for autistics that reveal their conditions.

Asian countries, excluding Japan, have no extensive welfare systems. Asia also does not have extensive human rights for people with disabilities, as there is little need for them. Asians prefer economic growth over equality, as seen in the case of strong one-party or military-based rule that carries out economic reform and liberalization, with no reforms in the political system, as prevalent in China, Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, Thailand and Singapore.

Circumstances are hard for the autistic individual living in Asia to achieve his or her best, because of the poor level of understanding of autism throughout Asia, relative to the West. In addition, the intense competition amongst the billions of Asians will seem to be detrimental to the individual upbringing and achievement to each Asian.

Some Asian autistics might have the tendency to be overly competitive. To stand out, Asians usually not only work hard to work hard on their own side, they have to also work hard to follow the wishes of their colleagues and superiors. The Chinese term it as ‘guanxi’, India also has its extensive social system that we know as ‘caste’ that brings about adherence and extensive internal guidelines that one has to follow. Such intense competition, from the long-standing social systems, could hurt them. Those abilities these autistics could have used to work to improve on their skills are now channeled to deal with competition with other individuals. Some even work on prestige and fame, which are by themselves hollow concepts given that they are not intrinsically beneficial for the autistic individual, who is deemed to have troubles working with other individuals socially, let alone maintain such relationships at a ‘high’ level with a lot more expectations and requirements by the other individuals! What a pity, what a waste! So most of those Asian autistics fail in this social aspect, to bring out to the best of their abilities and be recognized for what they are doing.

Except for perhaps Satoshi Taijiri (the creator of Pokémon), Hikari Oe (musician) and Thristan Mendoza (Filipino percussionist), there had not been autistics in Asia who create a huge impact on society. Even that, it appears to me that Philippines and Japan are two of the most westernized nations in Asia, followed by Singapore.

I have high hopes for Singapore. As I tried to imply earlier, the West tends to celebrate individual achievements. It’s not as if autistics cannot function in the East – it just happens that the best autistic individuals in the East are ‘screwed’ by the intense competition – it’s just that as our society adapts more and more elements from the West, we have to reconsider our position. We have to try to adapt to the new situation. As we celebrate more and more individualism in our people, we will see the situation that to stand out, one just needs to be distinctive and do his best, so that he (or she) will get the most out of his life.

Actually it’s not in the case of Singapore, I feel that individualism will spread throughout Asia together with globalization. It will be eventually useful for all Asian autistics to adapt to that, and be the best they can be.

In the very end, I hope all autistics here can challenge the norms and to find their individual talents and gifts, to adapt to the new changes, new societal trends and new challenges to work towards our own individual bests.

The author is a student.

Most of this article comes from the personal viewpoints of the author. Some are adapted from Wikipedia.

Interesting read.

Regarding your last part, I've always suspected that the individualistic Western culture would be better for aspies then the collectivist Asian culture, but I'm speaking very broadly here.

I am partially Asian and partially successful....

I prefer half glass full on the success part but if I'm completely honest I'll admit my clumsy hands dropped the glass years ago.

I've heard of people having that same feeling, but I have to say when I'm around the Asian part of my family, a reserved demeanor is encouraged. I Identify more easily with the Asian side of my family than with the American side.

Fair enough. I can't say I know many Asian adults (I know a lot of Asian teenagers, but they're no different to other Australians.)

Is the only measure of the success of people and of nations based only on economic success. Perhaps if this is the primary focus there will be many compromises in society. As you mention, the lack of much needed human rights for people with disabilitys. Western cultures have led the world in human rights success and balanced this with other national prioritys as well. We still have have a long way to go, but human rights are global rights that belong to us all, regardless of race.

Indeed, I hope increased human rights for all individuals will take place throughout Asia. This will increase the quality of life in Asians. However, the pre-existing economic condition should be economic growth to reach a critical mass, where there will be enough economic resources for all people in the country to live with.

Sadly, most Asian countries are not so developed yet, save for Japan and maybe South Korea.