Why some cultures respond violently to modernization

"The vocabulary of the rejectionist movements varies with the country and the time -- the Koran in today's Saudi Arabia, Kim Il Sung ideology in today's North Korea, and a mix of Confucianism and secular xenophobia in the Japan, China and Korea of the 17th through 19th centuries. But these religions and ideologies seem to reflect something deeper: frustration at the humiliating choice faced by once-great civilizations heartsick at the pressure to discard bits of their own cultures to catch up with the nouveaux riches in the West."
--Nicholas D. Kristof, New York Times, January 8, 2002