Japanese Modernity: The Past in the Creation of a Non-Western Modernity - Essay Example

Japanese Modernity: The Past in the Creation of a Non-Western Modernity Introduction The Meiji Period, which emerged in the years between 1868 and 1912, is widely acknowledged as fundamental to Japan modernity. This is the reason why in 1941, whilst Japan as part of the Axis Powers was battling the Allied forces at the height of World War II, Japanese scholars convened in Tokyo to deliberate and make sense of cultural, intellectual, and technological changes brought about and initiated in the Meiji Period. They felt that the bunmei-kaika – the policy of civilization and enlightenment – widely enforced in the Period resulted in the dilution of true Japanese culture.1 Japan modernity has been praised as unique – a modernization that although was patterned after the West achieved its goal without having to completely Westernize.2 However, various writers have suggested that the Meiji Period invented most cultural, social and historical values associated to modern Japan in a desperate attempt to hold off too much Western influences from permeating Japanese society. The Meiji Period and the Beginning of Modernity The Meiji Period began with the reign of Prince Mitsuhito in 1868. Prior to this, the feudal military Tokugawa Shogunate, which dominated Japan from 1603 until its fall in 1867, was characterised by chaos and violence due to its failure to deal with domestic problems. People who were loyal to the Emperor wanted to end the rule of the military, thus, clashing with the samurais, who did not want a return to imperial rule. In addition, the isolationist stance of Japan was under threat with the arrival of foreigners in Japanese ports under an agreement signed by Tokugawa Iseda, the shogun in 1853, with Commodore Matthew Perry. The locals saw the foreigners as barbarians whose culture and literature were inferior to Japan. Their presence in Japan also drove up the prices of commodities, such as rice, causing the locals to suffer. Samurais periodically assassinated foreigners, who retaliated by bombarding Japanese towns when they failed to get justice through the bakufu – or the Shogunate system.3 With the fall of the Shogunate in 1867, imperial rule regained control of Japan. The Meiji Restoration – the revolution in political, economic and social changes – massively reorganised the Japanese system, including political, military and fiscal systems. One of the notable features of modernization was more openness to the West, its fashion, the Gregorian calendar, and even engineering and architecture styles.4 The Iwakura Mission that was sent to the United States in 1871 to propose the revision of treaties between the two countries to make them more equitable and to find out more about the US strongly recommended the urgent modernization of Japan. During their sojourn, the group realised that there was a need for Japan to keep up with the US politically, technologically, socially and judicially to successfully negotiate on equal terms.5 Tensions in Japanese Modernity The encroachment of Western culture in 19th century Japan worried the Meiji Restoration Era for fear that the alien culture would subsume the Japanese identity. The population was divided: on one hand, were those who embraced Westernization, and on the other, those who rejected everything foreign.6 Modernization – the Japanese way - was a must, according to the Iwakura mission,7 but the process did not take place smoothly. The rapid modernization of urban areas provided a striking contrast to the poverty-ridden features of the countryside. To ease the tension, the Meiji leaders justified the present by crafting its own version of the past and projecting it into the future. 8 Modernity, according to Gluck, was often thought to be a Western invention.9 In its decision to adopt modernity, Meiji distinguished the Western and the Japanese, and often this meant extreme polarities in various issues. The object was to craft a modernity that was distinctively Japanese and this was done by integrating Japanese elements to Western modernity, essaying a modernity that followed a unique path - a non-Western path. Thus, “Meiji Japan, like Victorian Britain, early Republican China, and other modern-minded places were simultaneously engaged in almost wholesale ‘invention of tradition.’”10 Often, these traditions were revival of old practices or practices that originated only in the Meiji Period. Gluck cited the concepts of the traditional Japanese woman and man as illustrations. A Japanese woman was pictured as a domesticated, middle class woman who dedicated herself to child-rearing and home-making. Japanese women, however, worked in the fields as peasants during the Tokugawa Period, and samurai women served their samurai husbands, but not for child-bearing functions. The idea of conceptualising a traditional Japanese woman, according to Gluck, was engendered by the need to locate them in an important role to maintain the family – a decision bred by modernity, rather than custom. Similarly, the Japanese traditional man had to be rearticulated as one who was both a patriarch and a disciplined imperial subject to project a strong, masculine image of Japan.11 The Japanese modern invention of tradition extended as well to religion, according to Chamberlain in a work written in 1912. To prevent the decimation of national individualism by European and American ideas that were starting to penetrate the masses during the Meiji Era the old religion of Shinto, which had earlier became discredited, was revived and reinforced as the national religion.12 In the Journal of the Iwakura Embassy, the group that was sent on a mission to the US to observe Western modernization noted that religion was, in so many ways, a catalyst to progress. The journal stated “In the administration of political affairs, in the stimulation of military preparations, in the encouragement of commercial enterprises, in the development of agriculture and husbandry, the influence of religion is significant.”13 This entry proved that the Meiji Restoration was convinced that religion is an important component of the modernization process and a catalyst of Japanese growth. The choice of Shinto as the new national religion was not surprising. Shinto was founded on the idea that “Mikado descends in direct succession from the native Goddess of the Sun, and that He himself is a living God on earth who justly claims the absolute fealty of his subjects.”14 Mikado is a term used to refer to the Emperor. However, many aspects of the religion were not original, but were inventions of modern Japan. Chamberlain cited the marriage ceremony and burial rites. So too, were the requirements for officials to attend services and for children in schools to bow before the picture of the Emperor several times in a day. All victories of the country – be it in military or economic areas – were attributed to the Emperor. Shrines were built and festivals were held to celebrate the Imperial rulers to enforce a new emperor-centric legend.15 The acceptance of Shinto by the Japanese people as the national religion was underpinned by the Emperor-centred nationalism that converged in the Meiji Period.16 Prior to the Meiji Period, the Japanese did not have a strong sense of national identity or a clear idea of the emperorship. The success of the Japanese leadership in inventing a national religion was because of the capitalisation by the modern Imperial elites on the hazy national identity and vague understanding of the emperorship by the Japanese. The Tokugawa Era emphasised individual differences in social and political beliefs underlying a sharply defined stratification of society constituted by samurais, peasants, artisans and merchants. All these classes had their respective role in society. This compartmentalisation discouraged nationalism and the development of a national identity. The Meiji Restoration exploited these weaknesses to bring about a modern state with a dictated national identity and configured traditional values. The figure of the emperor as the venerated leader of the country was drummed up by Imperial propagandists. Through the vigorous embedding of rituals in public life and the imposition of national holidays to commemorate events that were largely invented, the people began to accept and believe in the authenticity of the Emperor as the country’s central figure.17 Thus, modern Japan began to be associated with dazzling imperial pageants where the Emperor and his family, as well as close members of his regime, periodically appear before the public. These spectacular pageants that usually took place in Tokyo or Kyoto had, however, elements of Western pageantry. All these so called mnemonic sites, which did not exist before early 20th century, helped embed a ‘culture of nationalism’ in the Japanese mind.18 Conclusion Japanese modernity has been described as unique – a modernization that succeeded without adopting and wholly embracing the Western model. Thus, despite advances in technology and the catapulting of its economy to one of the top in the world, Japanese society has an identity that is distinct and separate from those of other modern societies, particularly those in the West. Several authors have suggested that the Japanese uniqueness of national identity was deliberately created separate from the Western model because of the perception of the Japanese elite of the weaknesses and inferiority of Western culture. Thus, in the process of modernizing, the Japanese ruling elite during the Meiji Restoration had to distinguish and emphasised customs, traditions and values that were antithetical of those of the West. It has been submitted, however, that in their desire to be non-Western whilst undergoing modernization patterned after the West, the Japanese ruling elite of the Meiji Restoration era had to uncover old practices already buried and forgotten and even radically invent aspects of Japanese culture and traditions for the purpose of not succumbing totally to Western influences. Examples given earlier cited the Shinto religion, and the concepts of traditional Japanese man and woman. References Buntrock, Dana. “Without modernity: Japan's challenging modernization.” Architronic, vol. 5, no. 3, 1996. corbu2.caed.kent.edu/architronic/PDF/v5n3/v5n3_02.pdf Calichman, Richard. Overcoming modernity: Cultural identity in wartime Japan. NY: Columbia University Press, 2008. Chamberlain, Basil. The invention of a new religion. The Gutenberg Project, 2008. http://www.gutenberg.org/files/2510/2510-h/2510-h.htm. Fujitani, Takashi. “Inventing, Forgetting, Remembering: Towards a Historical Ethnography of the Nation-State. In Cultural nationalism in East Asia: Representation and identity, edited by Harumi Befu, 77-106. CA: Institute of East Asian Studies, University of Berkeley, 1993. Gluck, Carol. “Japan’s Modernities, 1850s-1990s.” In Asia in Western and World History, A Guide for Teaching Embree, edited by Ainslee and Carol Gluck, 561-593. New York: ME Sharpe, 1997. Heisig James. “Nishitani Keiji and the Overcoming of Modernity (1940–1945).” In Frontiers of Japanese Philosophy 6: Confluences and Cross-Currents, edited by Bouso, Racquel and Heisig, James: 297-329. Nagoya: Nanzan Institute for Religion and Culture, 2009. Schirokauer, Conrad, Miranda Brown, David Lurie, Suzanne Gay. A brief history of Chinese and Japanese civilizations. Cengage Learning, 2012. Soviak, Eugene. “On the Nature of Western Progress: The Journal of the Iwakura Embassy.” Tradition and Modernization in Japanese Culture, edited by Donald Shively, 7-34. Princeton University Press, 1971. Read More