THE VIETNAMESE CULTURE AND ITS INFLUENCE ON ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT - EMPLOYING NATIONAL CULTURE IN ECONOMIC MANAGEMENT

PHAN THANH NHON

Speech on 1st Vietnamese Studies 

International Conference,

Hanoi  1998

The course of culture and the course of economy share the same subject : Man. Evolution in this two domains, either inter-supportingly or inter-conflictingly, have been through out the time bound for man’s living. It’s the relation between nature and society, between material and spirit, between pragmatism and romanticism, between the past and future, between a relatively static position (culture) and an absolutely changing course at a point of time. Culture may sometimes be an engine and other times an obstacle to economic development. From the standpoint of Southern philosophy (in contrary to China being the North), that’s the relation between the two basic elements, Yin and Yang, and from the standpoint of materialism, the two sides of a topic that you cannot ignore one while studying the other.

Vietnam has been enjoying a national culture regconized worldwide, which is represented by several shining civilizations, from the grand copper drum civilization to the Daiviet era. The continuity of said civilizations constitutes a distinguished Vietnamese culture the strong vitality of which helps the people of Vietnam, the nation of Vietnam to survive so many turmoils.

As for economy, we haven’t been up to such a level. In the past, Vietnam primarily applied a model of self-sufficiency and the economy was never stably strong. For the time ahead, given economic development  as the main target as stated by Party Chief Le Kha Phieu in a press interview on May 5, 1998 : “In Vietnam there is only one will : To makeVietnam rich”, and so rapid economic development is put on top, then what will be the role of national culture  in said course, and how will it evolve ? That’s the topic of this paper.

1. What are the characteristics of the Vietnamese culture ?

Culture, as defined by Mr Feredica Mayor, Unesco’s General Secretary, is “the organic aggregation of individual and collective creations in the past and present. Over centuries, those activities have formed a system of values, customs and tastes - which specify the characteristics of a people”.

The Vietnamese culture goes hand in hand with the characters of the Vietnamese people, one represents the other, one depicts the other, one serves the development of the other in their interactive relationship, so close that sometimes become one. A nation with several peoples, in Vietnam there are certainly different cultural characteristics. On the whole, the culture of Viet (Kinh) - which makes up the 85% population majority - prevails. Viet culture has been studied by a number of Vietnamese and foreign researchers and has become a widely known topic. This conference can serve as an example.

As a man primarily engaged in business, with little background in culture study, I have no intention to repeat it but will, instead, employ the findings of other culture and Vietnam professionals.

Indisputably, the Vietnamese culture is based on an old-time water paddy agricultural civilization, and bears all the attributes of an agriculture-based society, in which villages play a major role. Thanks to the vitality of traditional villages, this country, this nation, this spirit have survived over centuries of separation and foreign domination. That features both strengths and weaknesses of Vietnamese : Easygoing, neutral thinking, diligent, locally chauvinist, equilizationist, discipline lacking, vulnerable, subjective, uncautious, sometimes selfish... This opinion has been thoroughly covered in many works (see The Noble Vietnamese by Vu Hanh, History of Vietnamese Culture by Dao Duy Anh, In search of Vietnamese Cultural Characteristics by Tran Ngoc Them...). These characters inevitably have their impacts on the people’s evolution in the past, in the present and in the future.

History has so far evidenced the importance of Vietnamese peasants to the fate of the nation. They’re the source of manpower and necessities for historic patriotic wars, the source of culture and art, the source of past and present interlectuals, the source of Vietnamese ideology. Even contemporary Vietnam’s revolutiona leaders have their roots as peasants prior to going to urban environment. Nowadays, the countryside remains the the social’s major labor supply for both agriculture and industry.

This fact should be regconized. Even though we set industrialization as our target, we shouldn’t deny our agricultural root and nature. It’s impossible to have a proper strategy without correct self-identification.

2. Culture and economic development in the context of contemporary Vietnam

UNESCO General Secretary once said in his speech :”Culture and development are interconnected. When a country sets its track of economic development away from the track of culture, imbalances will occur both in the economy and in culture... Culture should be regarded an immediate engine to development and, vice versa, development should have culture as its hub, one that fine-tunes social activities”.

Vietnam is always highly conscious of the role of culture. Our papers often read the phrase “developing the economy but not forgetting to conserve national traditional cultural values”. Such saying raises 2 points :

One, it again regconizes a constantly potential conflict between economic development and cultural conservation.

Second, it shows that we are only paying attention to one side of the issue : Developing the economy without prejudice to cultural conservation rather than deploying the second side (though sometimes referred to) : Employing cultural environment as an engine to economic development.

Vietnam’s economic development process should be placed in the context of the integration and globalization of world economy, where all relations become highly complex and sensitive. Economic relation is combined with political, ideologic, cultural relations. Cultural exchange between different regions and people is easier than ever with less difficulties over time and distance.

In that context, the reception and action of man- as the subject of culture - may go well beyond their control in a world that good and bad information are nested. Even developed countries encounter the adverse effects on morals and culture that bring about by scientific progress and economic development, let alone to say the Vietnamese society, one that started from a closed and isolated ground.

Demand on economic development sometimes switches us different value orientation, to different cultural orientation. According to Mr Le Quang Thiem, “the dialogues over social and human development have concluded three common value orientation : Truth - Good - Beauty : Learn the Truth, do the Good in order to obtain the Beauty”. Such orientation is put under certain pressure in the market economy. Market rules are clear and fair : “buying and selling are to be mutually beneficial”, everything has got to be paid for, nobody can relies on external subsidy.

In some optimists’ opinion :”The constant of Vietnamese culture is to open to other cultures worldwide. It acquires those that are good, those that are proper and denies those that are bad, those that are improper”. It’s not so simple in practise, sometimes the evil is much easier to acquire than the good.

Culture is nothing invariable. It’s an evolution, in which the control of a national policy is essential to keep it on the right track. In history there are several lessons about the extinction of peoples and nations when they were not adequately cautious about “foreign cultural invasion”. That’s the constantly potential conflict that we have referred to.

Vietnamese culture itself has both positive and negative effects on economic development. There are many analyzes pointing out which is positive and which is negative to economic development. I have no intention to mention the positives and the negatives, since one may well be positive in this context, in this method but then become negative in another context, another method. That’s the no-principle principle of economic course that become effective in culture.

So what are the rules that can be used to control these positive-negative effects ? May I propose 3 instructions :

1. Regconize the truth

2. Do not go against social-economic rules

3. Be human. Human-based culture will be everlasting, or, spiritually speaking : “having a happy end”.

The first and second instructions are for the sake of economic development while the third is for the sake of cultural conservation. Correct implementation of above-mentioned instructions will create a healthy balance of material benefit and spiritual benefit.

3. Employing national culture in economic management

As previously said, we have so far touched only one side of the issue : Developing the economy without prejudice to cultural conservation, rather than the second side: Employing culture as an engine to economic development.

Vietnamese culture is in the East - SouthEast Asia family, where strong and rapid economic development have been evidenced in Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, Hong Kong, Singapore. Is there any link between the regional culture and economic success ?

This is a region where cultures are relatively identical with the  widespread influence of three philosophies : Bhudism, Laoism and Confucianism; of eastern view of the world and life. On such a ground the model for economic development has its own properties different from the clasical western model : Stress on nationalism, directly or indirectly consider culture an engine to economic development, stress on business philosophy, prefer management by process (MBP) to management by objective (MBO), long-term employment, team-made decision, team responsibility, stress on human relation, minimize the gap between leader and worker...

It should be regconized that the East Asia, in comparison to the West,has archieved their economic success with less social pains, better cultural conservation and more stable society.

Let’s establish a table showing the influence of culture on economic development.

	Japan	S.Korea	Taiwan	HK	Sing	VN
Political stability	Pretty good	Average	Average	High	High	High
Agricultural base	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	Yes
Human relation stress	Good	Good	Yes	Yes	Good	Not yet
Education	High	Pretty good	Average	Average	High	Average
Discipline	High	High	Pretty good	Pretty good	High	Average
Ethnic-combination	No	No	No	No	Yes	Yes
Nationalism	High	High	Yes	No	Yes	Average

In the table, we can see Vietnam in a less favorable economic-cultural situation. In term of economic culture, every nation has its own characteristics. For example, Chaebol is a symbol of South Korea’s economic culture, mochav is a symbol of Israel’s economic culture. So what is the symbol of Vietnam’s economic culture at present ? We have to admit that there hasn’t been any. So Vietnam’s problem is how to employ national culture in economic development as a common cause, on both macro- and micro- levels. In this paper I would like to make suggestions in repects of nationalism build-up, educational, agricultural and industrial development, human issue, collective issue and business unit issue.

One of Vietnamese’s weakness is being uncautious, only react when pushed to the corner. In the economic struggle, there’s no visible enemy ahead, no emergency. We therefore donot pay adequate attention. It should be understood that the economic battle is as fierce, as deadly as the gun-and-bullet battle, be constantly on alert for fight. Let’s look at Japan in the time of post-world war II : Only with such a strong determination of the whole people that the economic miracle can be made.

To have such a determination, Japan itself sustains nationalism at a high level. We don’t have that in the peace. So nationalism should be promoted repeatedly. We are not afraid of becoming chauvinist, because it is away from Vietnamese’s neutral thinking. A nationalist cultural environment should be structured.

Then, a “people struggle” in economic battlefield should be triggered and employ all national human resources. The inferiority, the dependence of an economically weak nation should be regconized.

Let’s invest more in agriculture and rural areas. The industrialization and modernization should be carried out on the basis of a strong agriculture, upgrading the rural areas to same standards with urban areas, appreciating the role of peasant as the one that feeds the nation.

Let’s seriously consider national culture education as a national policy, teaching Vietnamese culture from the low levels. Employ the elites, limit the eldership-favoured human policy, expediting the development of a skillful and discipline labour force. Respect and appreciate individual success.

Highly value individual interests, combine individual and collective interest, so that everyone can value the role of nation and individuals. Look for long-term interest, social welfare and equality, respect human needs. Promote individual moral perfection in line with eastern philosophy.

Promote team spirit on the basis of village community relationship. Let’s make the worker feel responsible to and economically connected with his team as his own village. Apply economic theories in harmony with national culture. Take for example the behavior theory, the quantum theory and the system theory. (Behavior theory : Society is the engine to productivity gain, stimulate demand, create a democratic atmosphere like that in the village. System theory: The integrated system should be bigger than the sum of components. In Vietnam : The integrated system is sometimes smaller than the sum of components...)

Conclusion

This is an open topic that calls for more opinion from other theorists and pragmatists. May I limit the target of this paper at raising the topic for everybody’s discussion in order to find out a common strategy for one purpose : Conservation and development of national culture in the context of economic development for one goal : Developing the society.