POLITICS AND CULTURE OF ASIA

AND THE MIDDLE EASTSeptember 8th, 2010

Human Development Index

Asia: the world’s largest continent

17,350,000 miles 3/5 world population Dead Sea (lowest point) Mt. Everest

(highest point) Extremely diverse in culture, customs,

beliefs, development and civilization. Center of most major world religions

(Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, Islam and Judaism)

Among the oldest civilizations in the world

Comparison of Asian Countries Japan: stable democracy since 1947 and 2nd largest economy in the World with GDP of $4.167 trillion

Bangladesh: plagued by coup d’etats since its birthin 1971 and GDP of $280 billion

Developing Countries of Southeast Asia

Cambodia Laos Myanmar

Indonesia Vietnam

Countries of Asia Continued

India Pakistan

Afghanistan

Bangladesh NepalBhutan

The Middle East

•Geographically Ambiguous area from the Eastern Mediterranean and parts of Africa (generally Arab, but also includes Israel, Persians of Iran and mixed ethnicities of Afghanistan).

Rise of the Earliest civilization (Mesopotamia) and Persia

Islamic empire at one time stretched from France, Spain and Portugal all the way to China and Indonesia.

Some of the greatest scientif and cultural contributions ever known including mathematics and medicine

Collapse of Ottomon empire in 1918 brought a change the region

Middle East Continued

After fall of Ottoman Empire many were colonized by the British and French

British (From Iraq to Egypt

French (Mediterranean areas including Syria and Lebanon)

After independence found themselves geograpically in the middle of Cold-War battle for influence between USSR and USA.

Most are rich in Natural Resources (curse and blessing?)

Most Middle Eastern countries suffer from authoritarian regimes and corruption.

While the Middle East has human development problems, many are highly developed (UAE, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar)

Misconceptions About the Middle East

Women have no rights

Backward People

All Desert

All Muslim

All Arab

Developing Countries of The Middle East

Yemen

Syria

Iraq

Roots of Failure in Afghanistan

India Held Back

Free at Last?