BOOK REVIEW Asians one and all Pan-Asianism in modern Japanese history, edited by Sven Saaler
and J Victor Koschmann
Reviewed by Dmitry Shlapentokh
This book is a collection of essays, and its very composition creates a
problem. The point is that "Pan-Asianism" is an idea that had existed in the
minds of the Japanese elite from the late 19th century to the end of World War
II and beyond.
One could assume that Pan-Asianism changed throughout this period. It also
played a different role in the context of global European thought, which was
either directly or indirectly the inspirational model for the proponents of
Pan-Asianism.
Finally, Pan-Asianism existed not as an abstract intellectual construction but
was interwoven with Japanese foreign policy; and
this important aspect is practically missed from the articles. Still, with all
of its shortcomings, the edited volume comprises a wealth of information that
makes it possible to reconstruct the development of Pan-Asianism as one of the
most important trends in modern Japanese history.
Pan-Asianism - the assumption that Asians (the term taken broadly) should be
united - belongs to an intellectual construction placed between two opposite
extremes. One represents the great religions with a global span, Christianity,
Islam, Buddhism or similar religious-type doctrines, such as Marxism. The
other, opposite, pole, represents the ideology of narrow nationalism.
Pan-Asianism emerged in the late 19th century during the so-called Meiji
Restoration, the goal of which was to modernize and Westernize Japan.
Nationalism, including its Social-Darwinist form, was exported from Europe,
together with other intellectual products.
Introduced to the Japanese elite, nationalism, with its Social-Darwinist ideas
of the survival of the fittest and the competitiveness of the geopolitical
environment, seemed to fail to induce any significant numbers of the Japanese
elite with its rigid racist philosophy, which played a considerable role in the
late 19th to early 20th century Europe in alienating Europeans of different
nations from each other, at least on an intellectual level. The stress on
superiority was found not so much in biological aspects, but rather in
spiritual/cultural characteristics.
The diary of a Japanese officer from the time of the Russo-Japanese War
(1904-1905) expressed hatred of Russians not because of their ethnic or racial
characteristics, but because neither soldiers nor officers behaved as warriors.
At the same time, the Russian sailors of "Variag" - the Russian
battleship that alone faced a Japanese armada - were quite respected by the
victorious Japanese. The superiority of the Japanese implied not so much inborn
biological qualities, but the societal values of courage, spirituality and a
certain magnanimity toward those who deserved it.
It is interesting that some proponents of late 19th to early 20th century
Pan-Asianism regarded it a duty of the Japanese to protect Korea from the
encroachment of the Russians, who were seen as the embodiment of Western
imperialism.
The broadness of the approach - the absence of strict, rigid, racist
stereotypes - also influenced the late 19th to early 20th century
Pan-Asianists' approach to China.
On the one hand, Pan Asianists tried to convince Europeans that a Japan/China
alliance was impossible and that Europeans should not be worried about the
"Yellow Peril". On the other hand, the same proponents of Pan-Asianism, or at
least some of them, thought about the possibility of such an alliance.
In fact, some proponents of Pan-Asianism assumed that Japan could lead even the
people of Indo-European origin, such as most Indians. The absence of rigid
racism also explains a lot about Japanese pre-World War II policy, which,
surprisingly, was practically avoided by the authors of the essays.
And, here, the Japanese-Nazi Germany relationship could be much more
illuminating. It is true that the Nazis struck an alliance with Japan. Still,
the ideological justification of the alliance - the proclamation that the
Japanese were the "Aryans of Asia" - was clearly the fallout of the context of
Nazi racism, which saw Aryans as a people of Anglo-Saxon, Germanic origin.
In fact, Adolf Hitler, in his private conversations, recorded in his Table Talks
(available in English translation) clearly that he did not much trust the
Japanese and did not exclude a conflict with these Asiatics in the future.
At the same time, the Japanese alliance with the Nazis was natural for the
Japanese elite which believed superior moral and spiritual qualities made
particular nations natural friends of the Japanese.
From this perspective, Japanese Pan-Asianists seem to be closer to Karl
Haushofer, the influential German geopolitican who advocated alliances based on
spiritual, cultural and geopolitical characteristics, not on race.
For example, he advocated the alliance of Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, Japan
and the Soviet Union. He viewed them as nations of different race and ethnicity
but similar in their social and political organizations and culture.
One of the most important points in the study of Pan-Asianism, as well as of
other ideologies, is its application and relation to real life. This is an
important subject, entirely ignored by the authors, and could provide an
interesting insight into theoretical problems.
In the case of Japanese-Pan-Asianism, one could state that the influence of
ideology on political life did exist, but should not be exaggerated. One of the
essential aspects of Japanese Pan-Asianism, of imperial ideology in general,
was the absence of strict racial rigidity. How did this ideological specificity
influence Japanese imperial policy?
It looks like this ideology played little role in Japanese political reality:
Koreans were discriminated against and Chinese were killed en masse during the
Sino-Japanese War in the 1930s. Still, one could state that Japanese conquest
was not an exact copy of Nazi conquest. The Japanese, for example, never
advocated the extermination of entire ethnic or racial groups just because of
their biological and racial profiles.
In short, one might state that most of the essays in the book, written by
experts in the field, are interesting reading, despite the above-mentioned
shortcomings.
Pan-Asianism in Modern Japanese History: Colonialism, Regionalism and Borders
(Asia's Transformations) edited by Sven Saaler and J Victor Koschmann.
Routledge 2007. ISBN-10: 041537216X. Price US$43.96, 304 pages.
Dmitry Shlapentokh, PhD, is associate professor of history, College of
Liberal Arts and Sciences, Indiana University South Bend. He is author of
East Against West: The First Encounter - The Life of Themistocles, 2005.
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Pan-Asianism - the assumption that Asians (the term taken broadly) should be
united - belongs to an intellectual construction placed between two opposite
extremes. One represents the great religions with a global span, Christianity,
Islam, Buddhism or similar religious-type doctrines, such as Marxism. The
other, opposite, pole, represents the ideology of narrow nationalism.
