Comment by el_jay

While there is certainly an argument to be made that many contemporary “Western” Pseudo-Christian Superempire nations face a crisis of short-termism, there are also ancient bits of “Western” infrastructure like the Roman aqueducts still in use today - off the top of my head, the Aqua Virgo which supplies Rome’s Trevi Fountain, dated either 19BC or 19AD, I forget; Spain’s Segovia Aqueduct from the first century AD; and the Pont du Gard in Nîmes, from the same period.

Not quite as old, or at the scale of the Dujiangyan system, but still evidence that the “Western” culture did once build for long term. Less ancient, but more indicative, are the European cathedrals built by multiple generations over a century.