Mark Richardson, over at Oz Conservative,
continues with his posts on Kok-Chor Tan, the Chinese researcher at the University of Pennsylvania. I commented on Richardson's initial entry on Tan
here, where I wrote:
I got suspicious by the title of [Tan's] book...: Toleration, Diversity and Global Justice. These are words associated with victimology and the culture of grievance. So I googled Kok-Chor Tan, and below is what I found [on Tan's profile at the University of Pennsylvania's website]:
Kok-Chor Tan
Associate Professor of Philosophy
University of Pennsylvania
My area of specialization is in political philosophy, and I am especially interested in problems of global justice, nationalism and human rights. Currently, I am thinking of a book-length project with the working title “Globalization and Culture: The Problems of Global Justice". At Penn, my teaching, which reflects these interests, includes courses on global justice, political philosophy, introductory ethics, and specialized courses on topics such multiculturalism and human rights. I have also taught courses in philosophy of law, biomedical ethics, and introduction to philosophy (freshman seminar).
Selected Publications:
1. Institutions, Luck, and Justice: the site, ground and scope of equality (Oxford University Press, forthcoming).
2. Justice Without Borders (Cambridge University Press, 2004).
3. Toleration, Diversity and Global Justice (Penn State Press, 2000)
I elaborate in my post:
"[W]ell-to-do Chinese in the West see themselves as victims rather than as successful members of a society. Many in the group behave as though they have grievances that will never go away. They behave as though they're losing. I think what's happening is that they cannot quite come up to par with the Western world and its civilization they're trying to usurp, so they whine instead. And the most effective way to whine is by latching on to the already established minority grievance systems in the U.S. and Canada, such as discrimination, human rights, social justice, etc."
I don't think (or trust) Chinese (Asians) will bring us any new Enlightenment period.
