The Asiatic mode of marketing

抄録

This article was developed especially for the inaugural issue of the new journal ‘Japan Marketing History Review’. The senior author of this article, Nikhilesh Dholakia (Nik) , was invited in 1992 to teach at Chuo Daigaku - indeed, the first foreign professor that Chuo invited to teach a course in English language. In addition to an undergraduate course, Nik also offered a postgraduate seminar. Professor Kazuo Usui (Kaz) - even though a faculty member at Saitama University with a part-time faculty affiliation at Chuo University - joined Nik's postgraduate seminar as a participant. The rest, as they say, is history - a deep friendship between Nik and Kaz, extending to the families, has evolved; and this article is a tribute to this relationship.

In this paper, the authors use the phraseology of the ‘Asiatic Mode’, of Karl Marx, in a playful mode to reflect on the Asiatic Mode of Marketing. The article offers a very brief review of the ‘Asiatic Mode of Production’ ideas of Marx, including a summary of the critique of these ideas. What becomes apparent is that, with the passage of time, Marx was willing to evolve and adapt his ideas - moving from a somewhat admiring view of colonial influence on Asian nations to a more balanced view of the predations of colonial rule.

In the discipline of marketing, with some occasional exceptions, the scholars remain mired in an ‘Asiatic Mode’ of thinking: The West is Best; and the Rest better learn from the West. Practitioners also remain in this mode, though they sometimes venture forth with oft-innovative non-western practices; and even occasionally back-influence the marketing practices of the West.

In this paper, the authors offer their views of marketing histories of the two Asian countries of origin of the authors - India and Korea. Then they turn to a general critique of the way marketing history is studied - or, in many cases, neglected - in Asian settings. A critical scholarly project for the future, the authors believe, is to break out of the ‘gauze of Otherness’ that characterizes western and even Asian views of Asia. It is time to move to (to create) a world where the West is just a region, in the same way Asia or Africa or Latin America are regions; the West becoming co-equal to them.