ceed more as expatriates than as citizens of a repressive China. Once they were placed in an environment that was favorable to business development, Confucianism may have contributed to their achievement. It is not as clear that democratization is any natural outgrowth of that achievement in any of these countries.
Not too surprisingly, because much modern development theory has been written by the Western industrialized countries, it tends to favor models that have worked in the West. Thus, the focus of development theory in the West has been the development of Western style capitalism with Western style institutions, including a democratic government and a citizenry supported by certain civil rights, such as free speech and a free press. For the most part, however, governmental stability has been favored even more than democratization. In turn, this has led to the West's support of authoritarian regimes on the right, while they waged both hot and cold war against authoritarian regimes on the left and rebellions of the left.
According to Chan (1993), regional stability in East Asia is supported by increased democratization in the area. He contended that there has actually been an unmistakable and strong trend toward democratization in certain East Asian countries, such as South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, and the Philippines. For him, this has created conditions in which a regional compact, such as that of NATO, could create ongoing stability and security in which economic interdependen
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