Jeffrey Kingston. Japan in Transformation, 1952 – 2000. Harlow: Pearson Education Limited, 2001. 230 pp.
Over the past fifty years Japan has seen significant changes in all aspects of its society and the way it interacts with the outside world. For example, despite suffering a defeat in World War II, Japan soon became one of Asia’s greatest economic powers. In Japan in Transformation, 1952 - 2000, Jeffrey Kingston focuses on various aspects of change in Japanese society and politics in the period after World War II. These include the effect of the US occupation, analysis of postwar politics, the economic boom, changes in demographics, the treatment of women, and foreign policy and security issues. Throughout the book, the author tries and often succeeds to explain many of these changes as part of the legacy of the occupation. All in all, Jeffrey Kingston gives a thorough economic, politic and social analysis of this crucial period in Japanese history.
Kingston begins with a brief introduction of the American occupation of Japan following World War II from 1945-1952. He notes that the principal focus of the US occupying forces was to demilitarize Japan and convert it into a democracy. Japanese troops have been demobilized and “in the first two years of the Occupation purges of thousands of officers, bureaucrats and industrialists blamed for the war were a further hedge again a revanchist threat.” (9). A policy of democratization was also important. “By spreading power within the government and among all citizens, including voting rights for women, and by supporting a robust press and unions, the Supreme Command of the Allied Powers (SCAP) was attempting to inoculate Japan from the scourge of militarism,” points out Kingston (10). Yet, the author agrees that despite half a century of what may seem to have been positive changes, the Japanese themselves are still having different opinions of the US Occupation. For instance, “conservative Japanese frequently trace many of Japan’s current social problems back to the Occupation … they see women’s legal equality, the end of the patriarchal ie system, educational reforms, the new Emperor system, demilitarization, etc., and a vague process of Americanization as harmful to the Japanese social fabric.” (16)
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... flag,” (3) as symbols of Japan, he incorporates several of these same photographs as an inset to the book. Also included are several maps, documents and a timeline used to supplement the author’s arguments.
It would appear that Jeffrey Kingston is targeting a more scholarly audience with Japan in Transformation. While not necessarily difficult to read or understand, the material includes a large number of statistics and the author’s extended analysis of very narrow topics in this period of Japanese history would probably be of more interest to historians and scholars rather than the general public. Additionally, the fact that the book is not organized chronologically would make it a less than helpful resource on postwar Japanese history to a novice scholar.
All in all, Japan in Transformation, 1952 – 2000 is a broad analysis of Japan’s social, political and economic issues following the US Occupation after World War II. Kingston’s knowledge of the material, attention to detail, and thorough analysis of the subject is an invaluable resource on this selection of topics from an important period in modern Japanese history.
A Short History of Japan. Los Angeles: Berkeley, 1999. Turnbull, Stephen.
I will use Tanizaki’s story to personalize the factual history of Gordon’s book. A few aspects of Japan’s industrialization gave insight to the hectic political theater in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries: imperialism, industrial capitalism, and the growth of the national image. Imperialism molded politics in Japan due to the ability for it to convince the population to believe that the Empire was doing the will of the people, and that the Empire answered to the people and not their own interests. Industrial capitalism at the end of the nineteenth century brought important political changes. The industrialization of Japan gave birth to a larger class of laborers who gathered in cities such as Osaka and Tokyo.
Tipton, E.K 2008, Modern Japan: A Social and Political History, ed. 2, In Nissan Institution, New York
Dower, John W. Embracing defeat: Japan in the wake of World War II. New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 1999.
Modern Japan: A Historical Survey is written by author Mikiso Hane. This book was published in 1986 by Westview Press, Inc. in Colorado. Mikiso Hane was a Japanese History Scholar who was distinguished internationally for his works. He acquired his bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees in history from Yale University and became an acclaimed Emeritus of History professor who worked in Yale, University of Toledo, and Knox College. Not only did he teach Japanese history, he taught Chinese, Russian, Indian, and western history. He also went to Germany and Japan for research after he attained his doctorate. As a child, he moved to Japan from Hollister California, where he was originally born in 1922. During the war, he went back to the states and was sent to a Japanese internment camp. However, he earned money by teaching Japanese in Yale to put himself through college. Hane is the author of 14 books, educational articles, and college text books, many of which are highly respected works of his. He also gained National Council membership for his widely respected contributions to the humanities.
The militarization of Japanese society during the 1930s and 1940s was total and absolute. Military rule dominated nearly all aspects of life, from politics to education, a shift that seems incongruous with the democratic attitudes that defined the preceding Taishō era. However, this shift was in fact not so radical; rather, militarism progressed naturally out of the rapid modernization that Japan had undergone in the decades prior, and the fundamental values that formed the basis of the Meiji Revolution and Taishō democracy would continue to power Japan’s war engine through World War II.
The author reviews different credible sources and comes up with the idea that the blame is not on the Japanese alone. Looking back in history, Japan chose to be an isolated country until the westerners invaded and forced trade
In Toshie: A Story of Village Life in Twentieth-Century Japan, published in 2004, author Simon Partner offers an insight on the transformation that underwent Japan through the mid-twentieth century through the life of Sakaue Toshie, a woman born and raised on a farm in the Kosugi hamlet of Yokogoshi, Niigata—a rural region almost 250km from the capital of Japan. Toshie was born in 1925—a year before the 64-year reign of Showa Era by Emperor Hirohito. This was a time when “two out of every ten babies died in childbirth or infancy,”(1) and Toshie’s family, who were poor tenant farmers renting a mere one acre of land, “were not far above”(2) those that were “literally unable to support themselves.”(2). Kosugi was virtually isolated especially in the winter season, when “residents of Kosugi had their hands full just keeping the main paths open in the hamlet,” (5) but also experienced “frequent floods [that] caused losses that small peasant farmers were often unable to recoup.” (7). This small village of Kosugi was thus one of the many rice-growing villages, with limited productivity and western mechanization. However, during the last three quarters of the twentieth century, Japan essentially transformed from an Empire to a Nation State, changing considerably in not only its governmental structure but also its social and economic structure. This paper examines Simon Partner’s contemporary approach of welding these significant historical transformations with the life experiences of a rural villager—a voice often unheard and hidden under the urban perspectives in historical textbooks. It argues that Japan’s socioeconomic metamorphosis did not occur immediately during or after the World War in the 1940s; rather, these changes kicked in af...
Many of the world powers of the 20th century were searching for or ensuring their continued possession of power. For Japan, their power fluctuated, depending on whether they were in times of war or peace, riches or poverty, and their allegiances. After having fought with the Allies during World War I, Japan prospered but was then discriminated against leading to Japan switching sides and fighting alongside the Axis powers in World War II. Japan’s entered World War II seeking power by means of land, natural resources, and military dominance.
For the past two thousand years, the people of Japan have gone through tremendous change: from its first inhabitants of the Jomon people, to the rice production of the Yayoi era, to the change from a feudalism country into a democracy. Japan pulled together its resources and developed a culture that can be globally respected. Although it is not a first world country, its growth in a short period of time has gained a lot of momentum. It was the first Asian nation to industrialize, and to become an economic
Postwar Japan is characterized as much by its successes and booms as by its disasters and busts. Yoshimi Shunya’s article “Radioactive Rain and the American Umbrella” begins by boldly claiming that, with the triple disaster of 3/11, Japan’s “’affluent postwar’ has finally reached a decisive end…[a] closure [that] had been clearly augured since the 1990s.” Yet, a decade earlier, Douglas McGray argued that Japan is “more like a cultural superpower today than it did in the 1980s,” having become a nation on par with the United States in terms of cultural influence. Though these two drastically different characterizations may seem contradictory at first glance, they are in fact entirely compatible. Furthermore, the forces that led Japan to this
When one thinks of Japan, what is the first thing that comes to mind? Advanced technology? Video games? Weird T.V. shows and anime? Before Japan began its transition into technology and advancement, they were in an era of both military action and strong nationalism which still impacts them today. Japan's military power and control over the East Asian region was its strongest feature for several hundred years. This changes dramatically with the 20th Century. By the turn of the century, Japan's strives to modernize and stay relevant to the global economy and system was its most vital aspect.
Urinary tract infection (UTI) is one of the most common and frequent bacterial infections globally. It is a pathogenic invasion of the urothelium, resulting in inflammation, encompassing infections of the urethra, bladder, ureters and kidney (Dielubhanza & Schaeffer, 2011). UTI development depends on anatomical factors, the integrity of host defence mechanisms, and the virulence of the infecting organisms. Such infections affect all ages and both sexes but occur more often in women than men (Al-Badr & Al-Shaikh, 2013). Several risk factors predisposed to acquiring UTI, which includes multiple sexual intercourse partners (Lentz, 2009) and postmenopausal (Raz, 2001). According to Foster, Sr. (2008), there is approximately 60% of women experience
...high power status, Japan had to have a self-reliant industrial common ground and be able to move all human and material resources (S,195). Through the Shogun Revolution of 1868, the abolition of Feudalism in 1871, the activation of the national army in 1873, and the assembly of parliament in 1889, the political system of Japan became westernized (Q,3). Local Labor and commercial assistance from the United States and Europe allowed Japan’s industry to bloom into a developed, modern, industrial nation (Q,3). As a consequence production surplus, and food shortage followed (Q,3). Because of how much it relied on aid of western powers, Japan’s strategic position became especially weak. In an attempt to break off slightly from the aid of the west Japanese leaders believed that it would be essential for Japan to expand beyond its borders to obtain necessary raw materials.
Vogel, S. K. (2006). Japan remodeled :How government and industry are reforming japanese capitalism. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.