Rice is nice: East vs. West

Asian Rice  (Image by Franz Eugen Kohler)

Michaeleen Ducleff of NPR explains that Eastern cultures are thought to be more cooperative than Western ones

because of agricultural differences.

According to some psychologists, the seeds of these cultural distinctions were sown centuries ago when Western

farmers favored wheat and Eastern ones favored rice.

Whereas growing wheat doesn’t require all that much collaboration among farmers, growing rice does.  Rice paddies require elaborate irrigation systems that depend upon cooperative ventures.  If one farmer floods or drains the fields at a particular time, the adjacent farmers need to be in sync with this.  Rugged individualism could easily lead to crop failure.

Thomas Talhelm of the University of Virginia therefore theorizes (aka “the rice theory”) that rice-based societies

tend to be “more cooperative and interconnected” than wheat-based ones.

Talhelm surveyed farmers in the north of China who grow wheat versus farmers in the south of China

who grow rice. Survey results indicated that the Chinese wheat-growers tend to be more individualistic

and analytical than the southern rice-growers.

Resources

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2014/05/08/310477497/rice-theory-why-eastern-cultures-are-more-cooperative

Copyright May 10, 2014 by Linda Van Slyke   All Rights Reserved