ASIA REBORN

Asia Reborn unveils the story
of Asia?s resurgence over the past century. In the first single chronicle of
the modern economic and political history of the whole continent, Prasenjit
K. Basu weaves together a compelling account of how Asia?s nations overcame
European domination in the twentieth century?and its legacies of war and
famine?to begin the long climb to economic dynamism.Asia Reborn shows
British, Dutch and French colonies to have had scant infrastructure or modern
industry and to have consequently been far behind Taiwan, Manchuria and Korea
in social indicators such as literacy and life expectancy by mid-century. In
West Asia and Burma, the brief European imprint created the ethnic conflicts
that still plague these regions. The British Indian Army held the edifice of
empire together. Ultimately, it was the undermining of its legitimacy by the
armies of Subhas Bose, Sukarno, Ho Chi Minh and Aung San that helped end the
ravaging of Asia during the first half of the twentieth century. By the end
of the century, the eastern part of the liberated continent, had emulated
Japan and Singapore in transforming itself into an industrious, dynamic and
increasingly creative force finally capable of taking its people to new
heights in an Asian twenty-first century.