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Chang Kyung-Sup
Abstract
Compressed modernity is a civilizational condition in which economic, political,
social and/or cultural changes occur in an extremely condensed manner in respect
to both time and space, and in which the dynamic coexistence of mutually dispar-
ate historical and social elements leads to the construction and reconstruction of a
highly complex and fluid social system. During what Beck considers the second
modern stage of humanity, every society reflexively internalizes cosmopolitanized
risks. Societies (or their civilizational conditions) are thereby being internalized
into each other, making compressed modernity a universal feature of contempo-
rary societies. This paper theoretically discusses compressed modernity as nation-
ally ramified from reflexive cosmopolitization, and, then, comparatively illustrates
varying instances of compressed modernity in advanced capitalist societies,
un(der)developed capitalist societies, and system transition societies. In lieu of a
conclusion, I point out the declining status of national societies as the dominant
unit of (compressed) modernity and the interactive acceleration of compressed
modernity among different levels of human life ranging from individuals to the
global community.
Keywords: Compressed modernity; globalization; reflexive cosmopolitization; unit
of modernity
1. Introduction
Most of the main impetuses for social and economic transformations in the
new century do not differentially or exclusively apply to certain limited
groups of nations. Consider the following: global free trade and financializa-
tion, corporate deterritorialization and transnationalized production, global-
ized labour use and class struggle, globalized (or globally coerced by the
IMF, etc.) policy consultation and formulation, informatization and
Chang Kyung-Sup (Department of Sociology, Seoul National University) (Corresponding author email: changks@snu.ac.kr)
© London School of Economics and Political Science 2010 ISSN 0007-1315 print/1468-4446 online.
Published by Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford OX4 2DQ, UK and 350 Main Street, Malden,
MA 02148, USA on behalf of the LSE. DOI: 10.1111/j.1468-4446.2010.01321.x
The second modern condition? 445
To the extent that risk is experienced as omnipresent, there are only three
possible reactions: denial, apathy or transformation. The first is largely
inscribed in modern culture, the second resembles post-modern nihilism,
and the third is the ‘cosmopolitan moment’ of world risk society (Beck 2006:
331).
At the level of each national society, the forces of reflexive cosmopolitiza-
tion described above have been and need to be incorporated head-on in order
to maintain civilizational integrity as well as material and physical stability.
Through this process, societies (or their civilizational conditions) are being
internalized into each other, thereby making compressed modernity – a form of
modernity I have to date been analysing in respect to externally oriented and
rapidly overtaking modernizers in (pre-crisis) East Asia – become a univer-
sal feature of national societies in the second modern world (Chang 1999,
2010a). In the current paper, this thesis will be systematically discussed in the
concrete historical contexts of nations at varying levels of development and
modernization.
I will begin by briefly introducing the concept/theory of compressed moder-
nity, and then proceed to theoretically discuss the new stage of compressed
British Journal of Sociology 61(3) © London School of Economics and Political Science 2010
446 Chang Kyung-Sup
Condensation/Abridgement [I] [ II ]
[V]
Compression/Complication [ III ] [ IV ]
Under reflexive cosmopolitization (of the world risk society), second moder-
nity becomes ubiquitous, albeit with very diverse motives, processes, extents,
and consequences. Relatively speaking, advanced capitalist societies may be
characterized by ‘autonomous second modernity’ in that most of the driving
forces of scientific-technical-cultural inputs and political-economic interests
for radicalized reflexivity originate from their own intent and power. By com-
parison, late developing and underdeveloped capitalist societies and (formerly
socialist) transition societies may be characterized more often by ‘second
modernity by dependency’. Such societies become subjected to risks of radi-
calized reflexivity largely due to their political and/or economic subordination
to advanced nations and global actors (such as transnational business) or as a
result of their own efforts at learning or seeking assistance and cooperation
from them.
Societies of relatively autonomous second modernity may, in turn, be dif-
ferentiated in terms of earlier systemic characteristics of first modernity – i.e.,
© London School of Economics and Political Science 2010 British Journal of Sociology 61(3)
The second modern condition? 449
even African subsistence farming has been sacrificed seriously (for export
agriculture). Local processes of ‘learn-and-practice’ industrialization have
been replaced by direct industrial and financial investment by advanced
capitalist economies. At the same time, in order to reduce the risk of such
financial operations to themselves, advanced capitalist countries have, through
the so-called ‘Washington consensus’, disciplined un(der)developed nations
into becoming responsible debtors.20 Moreover, new economic initiatives
linked to various monopolistic/oligopolistic commodities based upon not-yet-
vindicated scientific, technological, and financial experiments have been
imposed upon un(der)developed nations under the terms of global free trade
(i.e., the WTO system).21 Interestingly, albeit tragically, the neoliberal propen-
sity to subordinate all political, social, cultural, and ecological concerns to
economic interests has intensified the existing chronic imbalances between
economic and non-economic concerns in un(der)developed nations. Through
this economically skewed and politically ungoverned process of globalization,
each un(der)developed country has become a cosmopolitan arena for late
modern political economic interests and commercialized social and cultural
relations – another ostensible instance of compressed (second) modernity as
reflexive cosmopolitization.
It appears quite instructive that the sudden change of heart by the USA and
its allies concerning the modernization project of (capitalist) un(der)devel-
oped countries happened at a critical juncture of Cold War politics. By the
early 1980s, the economic and social sustainability of the socialist systems
across the world became highly questionable, even to many socialist political
leaders themselves, including Mikhail Gorbachev and Deng Xiaoping. The
internal systemic failure of socialist modernity induced the leader states of
the capitalist bloc to seriously reconsider the political utility of subsidizing the
capitalist modernization process of numerous client nations.22 In retrospect,
the Cold War was another global regime of modernity, in which political and
ideological space for an autonomously reflective (not reflexive!) pursuit of
modernity was flatly denied to most Third World countries. The capitalist
modernity recommended by the West was a ready-made civilizational system,
and its local realization – in an extremely condensed fashion – was strategically
supervised and supported by the West as an effort to curb the international
political expansion of socialist influences. In this way, the American influence
on local politics exacerbated the already acute rigidity of the Third World’s
illiberal capitalism and thereby incurred endemic anti-American sentiment.
As the global Cold War drew to a close, such paternalistic political support for
the (condensed) modernization project of many Third World countries was
instantly terminated, giving way instead to an aggressively new but underre-
flective paradigm of global neoliberal economic restructuring. In this sense,
the neoliberal restructuring of Third World political economies is a post-Cold
War regime of cosmopolitanized reflexivity in economic (mis)management.
British Journal of Sociology 61(3) © London School of Economics and Political Science 2010
456 Chang Kyung-Sup
Interestingly, most of the former Cold War foes of the USA have ended up
volunteering to engage in such cosmopolitanized reflexivity in their post-
socialist transitions.
desirable goal for what were former ideological adversaries. Such systemic
changes have, however, been plagued by the following three types of inherent
risks: risks intrinsic to any capitalist or market economic system; risks ensuing
from the gross unfamiliarity with and/or ideological–emotional antipathy
towards a capitalist or market economic system on the part of (former) social-
ist citizens; and risks associated with the poor resource endowment of citizens
and enterprises due to chronic economic depression.23 If, in addition, these
risks are exacerbated by political instabilities or corruption (as has been the
case in numerous transition societies), the human suffering and social costs
involved would be devastating for the basic social fabric of the nations
concerned. Some liberal – and thus radical in the context of transition political
economies – Western advisors paradoxically considered these complex risks as
the primary justification for recommending a ‘big bang’ approach which
would, as a form of shock therapy, hopefully minimize the duration of institu-
tional uncertainty and human suffering.24 Unfortunately, in Russia (and many
other neighbouring transition societies), the big bang approach has only ampli-
fied the above risks, whereas in China (and, more recently, Vietnam), the
gradualist approach has allowed a much more stable progress toward material
affluence and ideological–institutional rebirth. The Chinese case, therefore,
arguably warrants more detailed attention.
China’s gradualist (and thus less condensed) system transition, dubbed
‘reform’ (gaige), has meant the protracted coexistence of socialist, capitalist,
and even (neo)traditionalist components of political economy, thereby impos-
ing an ultra-complex (compressed) modernity on Chinese life.25 Interestingly,
some socialist institutions, practices, and legacies have turned out to be quite
useful for market-based development. These include, for instance, a highly
educated and disciplined labour force being fully utilized for labour-intensive
industrialization, powerful local states orchestrating aggressive yet flexible
programmes of local economic development, the public ownership of scarce
resources (such as land) preventing speculative rent-seeking activities (and
thereby facilitating the rational and fair allocation of economic inputs), the
rigid residential controls between urban and rural areas helping to dampen the
exodus of poor peasants into already job-insufficient cities, etc.26 In spite of
these seemingly accidental advantages of socialist legacies, various negative
impacts and impediments arising from these and other socialist legacies need
to be considered as well. It must also be recognized that, from the very
beginning of reform, China has tried to accommodate the full spectrum of
modern and late modern industries led by Western capital in what they
have designated as ‘special economic zones’ (SEZs or jingjitequ). This could
be called an institutional framework of compartmentalized compressed
modernity. With dreams of possible gold rush-type economic opportunities in
the world’s would-be largest market, capitalist enterprises from the advanced
industrial economies began to flock into offshore Chinese SEZs and, in
British Journal of Sociology 61(3) © London School of Economics and Political Science 2010
458 Chang Kyung-Sup
response to desperate pleas from other local state units, into various interior
regions. This trend has made China an internally cosmopolitanized economic
entity, directly exposed to both the benefits and risks of the radical new world
economy. Conversely, China’s internationally oriented developmental success
in the post-socialist era, combined with a diverse set of institutional and
sociocultural factors, has exposed the world to both the benefits and risks of
China’s complex modern political economy. It can be argued that the entire
world has become, on the one hand, a perplexed consumer of cheap, functional
but hazardous Chinese products and, on the other hand, an anxious seller
to voracious Chinese buyers of natural resources, technologies, and even
enterprises.
Eastern European countries constitute still another group of post-socialist
(second) modernity societies. Their individual post-socialist transitions, by
and large closer to the Russian big bang approach than to the Chinese gradu-
alist approach, initially required their populations to experience profound
uncertainty and trauma. Their geographic proximity and historical/cultural
connection to Western Europe have instigated a sort of ‘jumpstart’ effect of
(first and second) modernization or development. East Germany, of course,
provides the most direct example of this phenomenon due to its wholesale
economic and social incorporation into West Germany (see Sinn and Sinn
1992). The recent completion of political and economic unionization in
Europe will, no doubt, radically amplify such a jumpstart effect, so that com-
pressed modernity as reflexive cosmopolitization will effectively encompass
another critical world region. Arguably, East Germans’ highly ambivalent
feelings in the post-unification era, as an unfailing index of compressed
modernity, will increasingly become a broader East European phenomenon
in this second modern era.
many statist political economists, (second) modern states are entrusted with
ever expanding and challenging functional duties as are individuals, families,
localities, regional blocs, and the world community. Under reflexive cosmo-
politization, the functional relationship between national societies (and
states) and other human existential domains or levels does not remain in a
zero-sum structure, but rather, assumes a dynamic of mutual escalation. Like-
wise, compressed modernities of different existential domains or levels tend
to intensify reciprocally.
These developments are far from difficult to empirically discern. In addi-
tion to the innumerable world conventions held by the United Nations and
UN-affiliated global organizations, back-to-back global summits and govern-
mental conferences are also being held in order to tackle a never ending
series of international economic crises, borderless epidemics, global ecologi-
cal disasters, etc. Through the WTO framework, the political and economic
elites of advanced capitalist countries envision the world as a fully integrated
unit of economic modernity. While world-system thinking, led by Immanuel
Wallerstein, has already taught us that self-contained modernity can only be
meaningfully conceived at the global level, the recent velocity of reflexive
cosmopolitization certainly supports the necessity of probing ‘global moder-
nity’ much more directly, above all, with regard to its increasingly com-
pressed nature.27 Similarly, continents or world regions are intensifying their
status as the basic unit of political economy, culture, and even formal gov-
ernance. The historic launch of the European Union as a formally legalized
unit of political sovereignty, as well as social and economic collaboration, is
certain to accelerate similarly targeted international efforts in other world
regions. This European experience clearly demonstrates that the formal
elevation of world regions as human existential units is not necessarily predi-
cated upon the civilizational homogenization of involved societies. The
extreme economic, sociopolitical, cultural, and even religious diversities
within the European Union will be further complicated through officially
sanctioned reflective and reflexive interactions, engendering new units of
compressed modernity. As emphatically emphasized in the so-called glocal-
ization literature, subnational entities – in particular, traditional localities –
have also been activated as social units of (compressed) modernity. Realizing
that national societies and states are now increasingly ineffective in protect-
ing or promoting the civilizational integrity and material stability of
localities, many of them have reflectively and reflexively embarked upon
self-helping projects with cosmopolitan contents.28 Not coincidentally, many
activist postmodernists have been integral to such local civilizational
initiatives.
What about traditionally private units of human existence, such as individual
and family? Is individualization tantamount to an escape from the (second)
compressed modernity which is ever intensifying at other human existential
British Journal of Sociology 61(3) © London School of Economics and Political Science 2010
460 Chang Kyung-Sup
units? The answer is to the contrary. The second modern individuality, even
without indulging in the time/space-annihilated cyberspace, is directly exposed
to reflexive cosmopolitization and thus filled with compressed modernity.
People are individually, as well as socially, much busier than before. Individu-
alization, in a contemporarily generic sense, should mean people’s active man-
agement of such individual-level compressed modernity, regardless of their
attitude and performance at other units of life.29 In the same vein, the supposed
family crisis, widely deplored in various parts of the world, is largely an epis-
temological obfuscation, if not a neoliberal conspiracy for arbitrarily blaming
private families (rather than public offices) for the difficulties of children,
elderly, etc.30 Families may be smaller and more flexible than before, but these
attributes are usually the outcome of people’s adaptation efforts in a socio-
historical context which demands that families fulfill ever increasing and inten-
sifying functions. The compact and adaptable nature of family forms and
relations is a requirement for compressed modern family life generalized
under reflexive cosmopolitization. It is no coincidence that East Asians, still
unrivalled familists, have most drastically adjusted family schedules (i.e., mar-
riage age, etc.), sizes, and living arrangements (see Chang 2009b). A pertinent
and poignant example can be seen in the way affluent East Asian fathers have,
in rapidly increasing numbers, become ‘wild geese’, in order to ensure their
children attend the best Western schools without losing maternal care. In order
to cope with the wild tide of globalization, they are aggressively globalizing
their familial living (and studying) arrangements.
8. Conclusion
Notes
Australia’s neoliberal globalization, see 22. See Cumings (1998; 1999) on the shift-
Weiss, Thurbon, and Mathews (2007). ing Asia/South Korea–USA relations in this
13. Not unrelatedly – that is, due to context.
deindustrialization, financialization, etc. – 23. See Chang (2008) for the Chinese case.
domestic inequalities have also expanded in 24. Some of these Western liberals were
many advanced capitalist countries. formally appointed as key policy advisors by
14. One of the worst scandals in this the governments of transition countries.
regard involves China’s toxic and/or bogus 25. Vietnam is a very similar case (see
commodities. See Chang (2008). Masina, 2006). See Chang (2008) for his
15. Vietnamese brides in South Korean analysis of China as a complex risk society
villages constitute a highly interesting yet which manifests risk tendencies of highly
difficult instance. See ‘Baby Boom of Mixed diverse time–space dimensions.
Children Tests South Korea’ (New York 26. See Chang (1993) for an analysis of
Times, 28 Nov 2009). Chinese rural industrialization focusing on
16. Postcolonialism literature has been a these unintended consequences of socialism.
most successful case in this regard (see, 27. See Dirlik (2003; 2004) on ‘global
for instance, Ashcroft, Griffiths, and Tiffin modernity’, and Pieterse (1994) on ‘global-
2002). ization as hybridization’.
17. China’s aggressive hunt for techno- 28. See Stiglitz (2006) for an economist’s
logically competitive overseas enterprises sympathetic view on such local initiatives
(including IBM) is a particularly noteworthy against neoliberal globalization. In many
example. Third World countries, democratization has
18. In successful cases, this may be called also facilitated this process by nurturing
developmental modernity. local political autonomy.
19. See Ha-Joon Chang’s (2002) ‘kicking 29. See another article by Chang Kyung-
away the ladder’ argument for a forceful Sup and Song Min-Young in this special
criticism of this trend. issue of the journal, entitled ‘The Stranded
20. The IMF-led structural readjustment Individualizer under Compressed Moder-
programs have been the most disturbing nity: South Korean Women in Individualiza-
example. tion without Individualism’.
21. American GMO produces are a most 30. See Chapter 4 in South Korea under
telling case in point. Compressed Modernity (Chang, 2010a).
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