[sixhobbits]

"Nigeria is beating the West at its own board game"

I know that the definition of "the West" is pretty vague, but this journalism seems a decade or two behind its time with its "us and them" style. Scrabble doesn't belong to Europe/USA and Nigeria fits geographically, politically, economically, and religiously into common definitions of "the West".

[corin_]

Wikipedia's "Cultural Definition":

"From a cultural and sociological approach the Western world is defined as including all cultures that are directly derived from and influenced by European cultures, i.e. Europe (at least the European Union member states, EFTA countries, European microstates);[31][32] in the Americas (e.g. Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Mexico, United States of America, Uruguay, Venezuela), and in Oceania (Australia and New Zealand). Together these countries constitute Western society."

I don't think I've ever heard any definition include any African country.

[794CD01]

Not even South Africa?

[corin_]

I can't think of any time I've thought of or heard someone speaking of South Africa as a western country. Influenced by the West, sure.

[varjag]

Honestly I hardly heard anyone referring Venezuela or Cuba as the West either. In practice it's really down to Anglo-Saxon + European first world countries.

[semi-extrinsic]

Same goes for North vs South. There is a funny quote by a US president (that I can't seem to find right now) listing some countries in the southern hemisphere, and they're all actually on the northern hemisphere.

[lifeisstillgood]

I disagree. Japan is frequently referred to as part of "the West" (despite obvious geographical issues). They don't fit this "derived from" idea (which itself seems a suspect concept)

I would rather see "western" culture as lead by democracy, freedom, justice and fairness for all under rule of law. It seems better to have a culture where we have a shared destination to strive towards rather than a common ancestry

[corin_]

Japan is also frequently considered not to be part of "the West", I don't what proportion of people think which way though. I'd never consider them included, and in discussing either marketing or sales in business I've never heard them included as part of the West.

[arcticfox]

Scrabble quite literally was invented by and belongs to an American company.

And you're basically just asking for the definition of "the West" to be rewritten for some reason:

- culturally, I think it's a disservice to Nigeria to call it "Western", which usually means descended from the European tradition. Nigerians have their own ancient history, whereas direct descendants of European immigrants (e.g. most Americans) do not.

- religiously, Nigeria is >50% Muslim.

- economically, Nigeria's per-capita GDP is 10% or less of most "Western" countries

As you said, it's vague, but it remains a pretty useful adjective (what else do you call Europe + the Americas + Australia etc. without a long-winded explanation?) as long as it's not being redefined for who knows what reason...

[hammock]

Was actually invented by an American man who sold it to an American company.

[YeGoblynQueenne]

- religiously, Nigeria is >50% Muslim.

You know, I might be misreading this but I think you mean Western society is, by contrast, Christian.

The West has made a big todo about being secular on a national level, regardless of what the population believes or does not believe. In some countries, the people are also largely a-religious. There's culture war, check, but to say that a nation's religion plays any role in whether it belongs to the West or not is, dunno. Dangerous?

I don't disagree that in the past cultural lines were drawn along religion, but, surely we 've come a bit of way since? Maybe not if you look at current wars, but still: is that really, really what we think the West means? An alliance of Christian nations?

'Cause that, like, sucks.

[dalke]

You are misreading. Do you say that Japan and S. Korea are part of the West? Certainly "Westernized", but not "West", given the different history and cultural traditions. One example is religious differences like Shintoism, but there are many others.

I believe the argument is that Nigeria should be seen the same way. While Westernized, to place it under the category "West" also serves to minimize its own long historical and cultural history which is independent of the European tradition.

If you say that Japan is part of the West, then I can agree that Nigeria could also be part of the West, but disagree that it's a useful categorization. We have other terms, like "industrialized", which are less culturally burdened.

Otherwise, Nigeria is not part of the West in the same way that Japan is not part of the West.

[s_m_t]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_world

>The concept of the Western part of the earth has its roots in Greco-Roman civilization in Europe, and the advent of Christianity.[2][3][4][5][6] In the modern era, Western culture has been heavily influenced by the traditions of the Renaissance, Protestant Reformation, Age of Enlightenment—and shaped by the expansive colonialism of the 15th-20th centuries. Before the Cold War era, the traditional Western viewpoint identified Western Civilization with the Western Christian (Catholic-Protestant) countries and culture.

>Christianity remains the dominant religion in the Western world, where 70% are Christians.[38]

[Lordarminius]

I fail to see why YeGoblynQueene is being downvoted. I was under the impression that the downvote button was to be used for posts that do not contribute to the discussion or are inflammatory etc. His contribution is relevant despite being wrong.

In the climate of political correctness many truths get swept under the table. The west IS Christian in outlook and structure. Its laws, mores,history are all derived from a Greco-Roman tradition filtered through a sieve of Christianity. It may be that some people wish to change the outlook to a philosophy of secularism but note that even this opposition bases its attack against a religous 'enemy'.

Bertrand Russells book -A History of Western Civilization should make very clear to anyone where certain ideas are derived from.

And yes. It may suck to you but the fact is that the perception of westerners is as an alliance of (lapsed!) Christian Nations.

[huac]

You're also about 20-30 years behind if you're considering an East-West dichotomy. If you want to create a (Manichean) divide, consider Global North vs Global South.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North%E2%80%93South_divide

[nl]

Nigeria fits geographically, politically, economically, and religiously into common definitions of "the West"

Not really. I can't see a single definition of "the West" on the Wikipedia page[1] that would fit Nigeria. I'll concede it it part of West Africa, though!

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_world

[lordnacho]

I think there's a couple of memes being mixed here:

- There's North/South, meaning Rich/Poor. Australia and New Zealand are in the North, though of course most rich countries are in the Northern hemisphere.

- There's West/Rest (or East, if you like), and this one is a bit harder to define. You can go way back and say it's to do with having intellectual roots in Greek/Latin parts of Europe. That's certainly what many people who studied Classics would say. You could also argue that the liberal democratic tradition is what defines it. That would make Germany, Italy and a number of other countries temporarily non-western. Or you could go with religion and say it's to do with Christianity. That would make Russia a western country.

So, where's Nigeria? Well, it's not rich. Politically it's inherited a colonial system from the British, though corruption perceptions are not close to what people normally expect of western democratic countries (IMO part of western political tradition is to act scornful of corruption). On religion, it's a mix of Christian and Islamic.

I wouldn't say Nigeria fits into the common ideas of what the west is.

[thaumasiotes]

> Nigeria fits geographically, politically, economically, and religiously into common definitions of "the West".

The common definition of "the West" would be western Europe (we could take this as the parts of Europe which did not affiliate with an Eastern Orthodox church, or as the parts of Europe which did not affiliate with the Soviet Union), the United States, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand.

Geographically, Nigeria is not located in any of those places, or related to any of those places. It is located in the part of the world referred to as "sub-Saharan Africa".

Politically:

> Kin-selective altruism has made its way into Nigerian politics, resulting in tribalist efforts to concentrate Federal power to a particular region of their interests. Nationalism has also led to active secessionist movements such as MASSOB, Nationalist movements such as Oodua Peoples Congress, Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta and a civil war. Nigeria's three largest ethnic groups (Hausa, Igbo and Yoruba) have maintained historical preeminence in Nigerian politics; competition amongst these three groups has fuelled corruption and graft.

> president Olusegun Obasanjo, acknowledged fraud and other electoral "lapses" but said the result reflected opinion polls. In a national television address in 2007, he added that if Nigerians did not like the victory of his handpicked successor, they would have an opportunity to vote again in four years.

> As in many other African societies, prebendalism and high rates of corruption continue to constitute major challenges to Nigeria. All major parties have practised vote rigging and other means of coercion to remain competitive.

(from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nigeria#Government_and_politic... -- this is the lowest of low-hanging fruit)

Economically, Nigeria is nothing like "the West".

Religiously,

> According to a 2009 Pew survey, 75% of Nigeria's population were Muslims. A later Pew study in 2011 estimated that Christians now formed the majority of the nation, comprising 50.8% of the population, while Muslims comprised 47.9%.

( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Nigeria#Religi... )

All four of your claims appear to be nonsense.

[iopq]

economically?

GDP - per capita $1091.64

[DanBC]

Are you talking about Niger, not Nigeria? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_%28PP...

Nigeria has a GDP per capita of about $6100. Have I misunderstood that page?

Not that far off some EU countries.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_in_Eu...

    Country                CIA[4] 2010 Estimation
    Moldova                1,433
    Kosovo                 1,813
    Bosnia and Herzegovina 3,500
    Albania                4,000
    Ukraine                4,350
    Republic of Macedonia  4,669
    Belarus                5,500

[jpatokal]

Yes, you have misunderstood: it's GDP per capita at purchasing power parity (PPP), not actual dollars. Roughly speaking, the hypothetical average Nigerian has an actual dollar income of $1000, but the spending power of somebody earning $6100 in the US.

[tboughen]

While some of those countries may be European, none are EU member states. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Member_state_of_the_European...

[thaumasiotes]

I'll reproduce the URLs you're giving in full, so that the invalid comparison becomes obvious:

wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(PPP)_per_capita

wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_in_Europe_by_GDP_(nominal)_per_capita

[spraak]

Thank you I came into this thread either wanting to find someone pointing this out or to post it myself