Another important aspect of Boasian anthropology was its perspective of cultural relativism which assumes that a culture can only be understood by first understanding its own standards and values, rather than assuming that the values and standards of the anthropologist's society, can be used to judge other cultures. In this way Boasian anthropologists did not assume as a given that non-Western societies are necessarily inferior to Western ones, but rather attempt to understand them on their own terms. From this approach also stemmed an investment in understanding and protecting cultural minorities, and in critiquing and relativizing American and Western society through contrasting its values and norms with those of other societies. Boasian anthropology in this way tended to consider political activism, through scientific education about society, a significant part of the scientific project.