 According to Miller, democracy, to Diệm, was rooted in his dual identity as Confucian and Catholic, and was associated with communitarianism and the doctrine of Personalism.He defined democracy as "a social ethos based on certain sense of moral duty", not in the US sense of "political right" or political pluralism and in the context of an Asian country like Vietnam, Confucian values were relevant to deal with contemporary problems in politics, governance, and social change.In this sense, Diệm was not a reactionary mandarin lacking an interest in democracy as he has been portrayed by some scholars.