IS the title of this column a fair question? Many would argue that one is better than the other, based on their mindsets and ideals.

But is not even the International Date Line, as well as other matters related to logic and rationality, from the then dominant Western world? It is not too late to choose the East over the West, right?

Did not the order of the British Empire define us so? Was it not England – the now not-so-United Kingdom – that called the shots? Doesn’t the Empire-based definition appear somewhat out of fashion today? Even Donald Trump seems to believe so.

Is the UK also not leaving the European Union, which it chose over its Commonwealth allies as its preferred group of trading partners? Why the rethink now, then? Or was it all simply business first? But was that not always so? A kind of gunboat diplomacy.

Did not that choice demonstrate well to the Commonwealth that the British, with their noses in the air and their tea-sipping culture, were not really about to change? The sun, as they say, will never set on the British Empire. Or so they believe. Really?

Was that not the very same reason for the Boston Tea Party, with the Native Americans and all? And is that not why the US today has more coffee drinkers per capita than tea drinkers? Maybe Sri Lanka should promote its tea to the Americans, post-Boston Tea Party.

Culture and values

Since our backdoor government was formed, its cabinet of clowns has become globally infamous, being the butt of jokes about our culture and values. Mind you, this is all without the tourism funds promoting “Malaysia truly Asia”.

Maybe it would be great for tourism, but what, then, would we really be promoting? A country of clowns and jokers? But who is travelling today? Maybe Zunar can host a global exhibition of clowns and jokers.

Maybe our former ministers, who were deemed inexperienced when they made mistakes – and learnt from them – on the job, don’t seem so bad after all now. Let’s give credit where it is due.

In light of the new reality, it is my view that we have to move beyond our half-baked system of governance of the past 60 years and move towards a new, good one.

What do I mean? Governments come and go, as we’ve learnt over six decades of a culture of corruption. But what can the coronavirus pandemic teach us? If anything, it is showing the world that we all need a serious science-based leadership for any hope of improved governance.

Why such a paradigm shift?

Thomas Kuhn popularised the concept of a paradigm shift, meaning a fundamental and radical change made requisite. Does not Covid-19 make requisite the search for a new and improved form of governance for the world?

Have not the traditional leadership hierarchy, where power resides in political office, and real cause of human problems been wrongly defined?

Does not the virus crisis necessitate that all systems of authority based on hierarchy be revamped and redefined?

Why this need for a conceptual paradigm shift in all aspects of world geography, history, and modern science and medicine? Is not the world moving its centre of gravity away from any hierarchy towards knowledge over ignorance?

What is a paradigm?

Kuhn identifies a paradigm shift as a fundamental change in the basic concepts and experimental practices of any scientific discipline. This notion is presented in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (1962).

A paradigm theory helps scientists in a particular field, within their broad theoretical framework, with what Kuhn calls a “conceptual scheme”. It provides them with basic assumptions, key concepts and methodologies.

Kuhn defines paradigms as universally recognised scientific achievements that, for a time, provide model problems and solutions for a community of researchers. A paradigm prescribes the following:

* What is to be observed and scrutinised?

* The kind of questions that are supposed to be asked and explored.

* How these questions are to be structured.

* How the results of scientific investigations should be interpreted.

In short, a paradigm is a comprehensive model of understanding that provides new and different viewpoints to problems, and how to resolve them.

Learning how to begin to find a treatment to the coronavirus is truly a paradigm shift for most ordinary citizens of the world.

Kuhn writes: “Paradigms gain their new status because they are more successful than their competitors in solving problems that the group of practitioners has come to recognise as acute.”

Medical scientists

In the face of Covid-19, experts who know and understand the phenomenon have emerged, providing knowledge leadership to help us comprehend the crisis. In the US, they include Dr Anthony Fauci and Dr Sanjay Gupta.

One has hands-on experience, and the other is a media communicator. Both are equally important in addressing our paradigmatic challenges. The global community, or McLuhan’s Global Village, needs to fully understand these new problems.

Global way forward

This pandemic is not one of a China or Wuhan virus. Scientifically, it is under the coronavirus family, and has been named Covid-19.

It appears similar to the Spanish flu, H1N1 and a number of other diseases, but appears to have taken on mutated forms and is very contagious.

Labelling and assigning blame is not the way to deal with the pandemic. What is needed is a paradigm change in leadership, to tackle it and treat it as a common, global problem.

In Malaysia, it is good to see that the leadership of even a backdoor government has allowed the director-general of health to take the lead in this. Like its American counterpart, our team is doing well enough.

What the world needs now are not more idiocratic leaders, but pragmatic and realistic ones who know the limits of their knowledge and make way for science-based leaders.

The globe will ride out this storm with what the late Peter B. Vaill, who was my good friend, adviser and professor, had called “whitewater leadership”.

This column is dedicated to the memory of Vaill, who died two weeks ago in Minneapolis. Farewell my friend, and maybe, we’ll see you on the other side. – April 12, 2020.

* KJ John worked in public service for 32 years, retired, and started a civil group for which he is chairman of the board. He writes to inform and educate, arguing for integration with integrity in Malaysia. He believes such a transformation has to start with the mind before it sinks into the heart!

* This is the opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insight. Article may be edited for brevity and clarity.