PYQ Vault · Paper 2 · Contemporary Global Concerns — II
Critically evaluate the notion of “Asian Values” in the context of the ongoing debates on human rights.
How the answer moves
The flow snapshot — the routes in, the body, the counter-view and the routes out.
Flow snapshot — how the answer moves
Intro routes
R1 Asian Values = sharpest cultural-relativist challenge to universal rights → tiger economies + Bangkok Declaration (1993) R1 not a rejection but a qualification of universality → resistance to humanitarian interference in sovereign affairs
Body flow
Lee Kuan Yew + Mahathir (community /order over individual) Tu Weiming (Confucian grounding) → Freeman (“weapon of cultural hegemony”) → Sen (diverse, not monolithic; constructed narrative for authoritarian rule) → Ruthven (culture over women’s rights = control of women) → relativist caution not baseless (duties precede rights in Confucian/Vedic traditions) → Donnelly (rights inherent/inalienable; Western double standards; relativism as guise for abuse)
Counter-view
relativism has genuine force: culture shapes the ordering of rights, universalism can be hegemony (Freeman) — set against rights as inherent and
Conclusion routes
universal (Sen, Donnelly) R1 reconcile, not choose → Coomaraswamy (non-Western values reconciled with rights) 3 adopt and adapt (Panikkar) → fails as authoritarian defence, but caution against imposed rights holds
Model answer
Handwritten, in the form it would be written in the examination hall.
