Multiple modes of wellbeing in Asia

Abstract

In this chapter I propose the typology of societies in Asia on the basis of 50 odd thousand respondents to the AsiaBarometer Surveys conducted every year between 2003 and 2008. Each respondent was asked to choose five from among 25 lifestyle aspects such as health, home, diet, job and family. I factor-analyzed responses society by society with five societal types using the two heavily loaded dimensions after varimax rotation: materialism, post-materialism and public sector dominance. Ab type (materialism dominance followed by post-materialism: Japan, Indonesia, Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan), Ac type (materialism followed by public sector dominance: China, South Korea, Taiwan, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Mongolia), B type (post-materialism followed by materialism: Hong Kong, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, Kyrgyzstan), Ca type (post-materialism followed by public sector dominance: Brunei, the Philippines, Bhutan, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Kazakhstan), Cb type (public sector dominance followed by materialism: Singapore and the Maldives. This is a thoroughly evidence-based typology of societies as seen from bottom in the daily lives of ordinary people in Asia.