Japan in the World:
Or, Why Global History is Empty Without Japan
Morgan Pitelka
Associate Professor of Asian Studies, UNC
Director, Carolina Asia Center
moment #1
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Japan’s premodern internationalism
European-Japanese exchange, 1543-1641
Christianity
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1549: Francis Xavier arrives in Japan
1569: first church opened in Nagasaki
1570: 20 missionaries active in Japan;
estimated number of converts - 30,000
1578: Otomo Yoshishige, a powerful
warlord, converts
1585: four Japanese envoys received
by Pope Gregory XIII
1587: edict forbidding Christianity
issued but not enforced
1597: 28 Christians martyred
1603: new Tokugawa government
established
moment #2
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Japanese isolationism and urbanization
Towards isolationism
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1604: Tokugawa government begins to control trade with China
1612: government begins systematic persecution of Christians
1614: many churches destroyed, missionaries imprisoned
1616: all foreign trade restricted to Nagasaki and Hirado
1622: 55 Christian missionaries and converts executed
1624: all contact with Spain cut off
1630: Christian books, including those in Chinese, banned
1633: ships prohibited from sailing overseas
1636: all Japanese travel abroad is banned
1641: only Dutch and Chinese allowed to trade
Dutch trade was limited to Deshima in Nagasaki harbor
Chinese trade was limited to the city of Nagasaki
The System of Alternate Attendance
Demography
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Population believed to have doubled
from 12 million in 1600 to 27.7 million
in 1700
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then drifted between 32 million in 1730
and 30.6 million in 1800
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urban growth: by 1700, 5-6 percent of
population lived in cities with
populations of greater than 100,000
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by 1800, 10 percent of pop. lived in
cities
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Hiroshige, 100 views of Edo
population of Edo in 1720 was around
1 million people; Osaka had 380,000
and Kyoto had 340,000
Foreign Intrusion
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1808: British threatened to attack the Dutch at Deshima
1818: British sailed into Uruga bay at Edo
1825, Shogunate ordered foreign ships to be expelled by
force
1837, American ship was fired upon
1844: Dutch asked shogunate to open up
1853
American Commodore
William Perry sailed
gunboats into Edo bay
moment #3
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Japan’s unprecedented modernization
Meiji Restoration of 1868
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3/14/1868 = "The Charter Oath"
6/11/1868 = Provisional Constitution of
1868
Grand Council of State = Dajokan
1868, Edo renamed "the Eastern Capital"
or Tokyo
1869-1871 = domains converted to
prefectures
1871, Iwakura Mission
Towards a Modern Infrastructure
-slogan: fukoku kyohei ("enrich the country,
strengthen the military")
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-foreign experts brought in
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-1870, 1871: telegraph and postal systems
-1871: Yen established
-1872: railroad connects Tokyo and
Yokohama
-1872: Gregorian calendar adopted
"Prosperous Nation, Strong Military" (fukoku kyohei)
promotion of industry, development of banking, finance,
western-style factories
moment #4
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Japan as a world power
Sino-Japanese War, 1894-5
Russo-Japanese War, 1904-5
Growth of the
Japanese
Empire
The Road to Pearl Harbor
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1938, President Franklin D. Roosevelt asks Congress
for $500 million to build up military
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1939, US imposes economic sanctions on Japan
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1940, spring: American Pacific Fleet moves from
California to Hawaii
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September 22, 1940, Japan invades French Indochina
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September 27, 1940, Tripartite Pact
1941: US increases military forces in Philippines
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1941, July 28: US puts an embargo on oil sales,
freezes assets, and closes ports to Japanese vessels
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November 26, 1941, "Hull Note" sent to Tokyo
December 7, 1941, Attack on Pearl Harbor
August 6, atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima
moment #5
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Japan’s postwar growth and post-growth malaise
3 stages of the Allied Occupation of Japan
Japan’s “Economic Miracle”
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GNP from 1950 to 1973 rose at average annual rate of 10%;
(unprecedented in world economic history, though since reproduced by
China)
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GNP in 1950 = $11 billion (7% of American GNP)
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GNP in 1973 = $320 billion (1/3 of American GNP, third largest after US,
USSR)
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second largest borrower from the World Bank in the 1950s
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classified as a “less-developed nation” in early 1960s
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by 1964, this categorization had been changed to “advanced industrial
nation”
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by 1968, Japan had surpassed West Germany to become the world’s
second largest market economy (until China took this spot in 2010)
Environmental costs of rapid growth
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1956, Minamata Disease
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1965, Niigata Minamata Disease
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1970, Smog in Tokyo (image to left)
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1971, Environment Agency founded
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1973, Oil Crisis
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1985-1991, Gradual collapse of the bubble economy
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1991-2001, the “Lost Decade”
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2002-2011, “Cool Japan” and national “Soft Power”
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3/11/2011, Tohoku earthquake, tsunami, nuclear crisis
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