In Search of a Faust

THE CHALLENGE OF MODERNISATION by I. R. Sinai. 256 pages. Norton. $5.50.

"Backward" is a word no longer used in polite Western circles to describe the underdeveloped nations of the world. Yet this is precisely the word that I. R. Sinai uses, plus some even blunter ones, in an angrily eloquent book on the problems and prospects of the new nations. "The international atmosphere," writes Sinai, "is absolutely clogged with slogans, speeches and books extolling the 'Great Revolution' that has supposedly been brought about in all these populous territories. What we are witnessing in reality is a colorful masquerade, a sort of superior political orgy, superficially exciting but essentially undermining and leading only to a process of dissolution."

Lithuanian-born Author Sinai, 40, is an Israeli citizen who is now lecturing at Manhattan's New School of Social Research. Along with some other realistic observers, he contends that Western imperialism was much too easygoing. Assailed by guilt feelings, sentimentalizing the alien cultures over which they ruled, the imperialists failed to overhaul the social structures of the subject nations. They gave the non-West a taste for Western-style living without supplying them with the economic base or the management training that could provide it. As a result, the former colonies, now touchily proud new nations, are worse off than they were under colonialism.

Time to Give Up Gandhi. Non-Westerners, writes Sinai, fail to understand that the West's envied economic progress is not a matter of technology alone. It rests on character traits developed over centuries of Western history: an assertive individualism; a secure, well defined ego; a Faustian drive to learn and master.

All of these traits are conspicuously lacking in the non-West; nor are non-Westerners at all sure that they want them. Believing their own propaganda about the "spiritual superiority" of their way of life, they stand with a foot in each world. A leader like Nehru urged, on the one hand, rapid industrialization, and on the other revered the Gandhian ideal of small, self-sufficient communities dedicated to hand spinning. The non-Western personality is in fact schizophrenic, writes Sinai; and in an acid aside, he suggests that psychiatrists might be more useful in the new nations than economists.

Supremacy of the West. Since the new nations must undergo a change of heart before they can progress, writes Sinai, the West is wasting its time with economic aid, which is tantamount to "pouring oil into a motor with ruined cylinders." It is also unrealistic to expect them to be democratic. They are so far behind the West that it takes a strong man to pull them up. Such a leader is likely to be an "exceedingly unattractive specimen," obsessed with the idea of modernization and oblivious to the niceties of diplomacy. And since he has to take so many unpopular steps, he cannot take a chance at the polls, where he is almost certain to be defeated. Only when a degree of modernization has been achieved can he afford to relax and allow more democracy.

Turkey's Kemal Ataturk proved to be almost the ideal strong man. While he modernized Turkey and guided it to economic "take-off," he discarded dreams of national expansion and left his neighbors alone. Though he ruled as a dictator, he prepared the country for an eventual transition to democracy. Turkey is far from perfect today, but it is in much better shape and has much better prospects than any underdeveloped nation. Strong Men Nasser, Nkrumah, Ben Bella, take note.

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