Many of the purported traditions of countries relate to something called the “Village Mentality”. Families in rural villages have lived there for generations and consider their village to be the center of the universe. This framework totally influences their views of the outside world; their ways of earning a living; and their methods of problem solving.
In order for a 21st century urbanite to understand the Village Mentality, it is good to have a sound familiarity with Maslow’s Hierarchy of Human Needs and a full appreciation of the chronic poverty that has danced through and often engulfed rural communities of the third world for centuries. With this, one can hold a sensible perspective when examining many of the social traditions that preserve the “male chauvinist” mentality of developing countries.

Third world people have had an ingrained fear of poverty for centuries. Third world families believe an able bodied male child is their only true insurance against starvation, for the future, when the parents become elderly and the father can no longer work. The son can take on the duties of farming the crops and traveling to nearby villages to sell them.

Having an understanding of the abject fear of destitution these rural people hold in the back of their mind can go a long way in making sense of the male preference mindset held by countryside parents. Think about it. The heavy responsibility related to the mother’s obligation to bear a son; the princeling role of boys, particularly first sons in the family; the preferential education and benefits given to these princelings; the responsibilities of the eldest son to care for elderly parents; the prevalence of arranged marriages and dowries; the concern placed upon the premarital purity of the daughters. All of these are part of the village mentality of shared by peasants throughout the third world.

Now, Urbanization is a Constant due to new factors that have entered the equation.
Enter: Urban factories that offer young men and women from the countryside more money than they could earn at home. Enter: Television that allows the village youth the opportunity to see the world from other perspectives; that makes them realize their hometown is not the center of the earth and that informs them there are opportunities and a better lifestyle elsewhere. Enter: Buses and trains that can transport rural youth to the big city factories. Now, place this whole scenario in a context of a global environment that seeks cheap, labor-intensive goods. This global environment has a growing middle class that seeks advanced education and knowledge based positions rather than factory work and farm work for their offsprings. One more thing, the total population of this global environment continues to grow so fast that despite its all ready large size, it has doubled in the last 40 years.

What does all this mean to the country bumpkins? Well, goodbye Hicksville, Hello City Lights! And Hello 7-11’s, Disco Darlings and Big Macs. A few years ago, Mom & Dad controlled the purse and the kids had to beg for money. Now, it’s the folks hinting to the kids to send more money home. Before the folks were angry if their daughter came home after 12. Now they are happy if she comes home once after 12 months. And what about those old cultural taboos about daughters staying out late and “What will the neighbors say?” Now, do you really think they know where their children are sleeping . . . and with whom? Also, Daddy’s friends don’t help them get jobs anymore. The kids must knock on the doors by themselves and depend on themselves, not the prior generation’s network of uncles, sister-in-laws and village bosses.

Some claim the youths of the third world are becoming westernized. I disagree and state this is not true. The kids are being urbanized and creating a new society. They are developing their own cultural mores; their own priorities; and their own value systems. Sometimes the developing pattern is similar to the west. It is not an intentional mimic. It is a homegrown creation that for evolutionary reasons often follows a similar metamorphosis.

And what about the kids who go away to college? Not to many return home when they graduate. The sights and sounds and opportunities of the big cities are too tempting. Many contemplate advanced studies overseas and some even consider emigration. The old Chinese Hukou concept, in which a person is a resident of a village forever, is quickly becoming irrelevant.