Review: Asia: China's Global Role
| Author | Victor C. Falkenheim |
| Published date | 01 December 1981 |
| Date | 01 December 1981 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/002070208103600420 |
| Subject Matter | Review |
928
INTERNATIONAL
JOURNAL
monarchy
under
British
rule
in
1885,
Buddhism
lost
its
royal
'sacraliz-
ing'
function.
The
religion
reasserted
itself
as
a
political
force,
how-
ever,
by
being
the
only
cultural
institution
that
was
still
permitted
to
express
itself openly
and
critically.
Ling
also
emphasizes
the
very
severe
(and
often
underestimated)
physical
losses
sustained
by
Burma
during
the
last world
war.
The
trauma
of
these
appalling
years
was
never
adequately
made
up
in terms
of
reparations, with
the
result
that
Burma
entered
independence
with
little
of
the
material
stability
or
moral
fibre
which
it
needed.
The
consequences
of
this
were
in
part
expressed
in
a
collective
wistfulness
for
the
grand
old
days
of
pre-
colonial
state Buddhism,
something
U
Nu
mistakenly
tried
to
reintro-
duce
in
1961,
only to
usher
in the
military
regime
of
Ne
Win
which
patently
ignores
Buddhism
as
an
expression
of
national
unity.
In
Thailand,
however,
decades
of
relatively
stable
rule
have
depended
largely
on
the
support
of
a
vast
ecclesiastical
organization
(sangha).
Traditionally, Thai
loyalty has
been
to
king,
sangha,
and
state,
but
Ling
adds
a
fourth
factor,
the
army,
as
indicative
of
the changing
na-
ture
of
the
Thai
polity.
The
dangers
of
such
a close
involvement
of
institutional
religion with the
state
in
so
volatile
a
part
of
the
world
are
hinted
at,
but
regrettably
not
expanded
on.
Ling
does,
however,
give
an interesting appendix
on Buddhism
in
Laos
today, which
shows
how
even
a
Marxist
rule
can
use
religion
to
further
state
aims.
This
is
a
first-class
text,
short, manageable,
and
accurate.
It
also
has
an
ex-
cellent
bibliography,
with
some
intriguing
sources
that
one
rarely
sees
elsewhere.
Bruce
Matthews/Acadia
University
CHINA'S
GLOBAL
ROLE
An
analysis
of
Peking's
national
power
capabilities
in
the context
of
an
evolving
international
system
John
Franklin
Copper
Stanford:
Hoover
Institution
Press,
198o,
xvi,
18ipp,
us$7.9
5
China's
recent
emergence
in
an
active
global
role
has
prompted
wide-
spread
efforts
to
forecast
its
prospective
pattern
of
behaviour.
These
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