The State, Identity, and the National Question in China and Japan

The State, Identity, and the National Question in China and Japan

Author: Germaine A. Hoston

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2021-02-09

Total Pages: 643

ISBN-13: 0691225419

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The first decades of the twentieth century witnessed an explosion of nationalist sentiment in East Asia, as in Europe. This comprehensive work explores how radical Chinese and Japanese thinkers committed to social change in this turbulent era addressed issues concerning national identity, social revolution, and the role of the national state in achieving socio-economic development. Focusing on the adaptation of anarchism and then Marxism-Leninism to non-European contexts, Germaine Hoston shows how Chinese and Japanese theorists attempted to reconcile a relatively new appreciation for the nation-state with their allegiance to a vision of internationalist socialist revolution culminating in stateless socialism. Given the influence of Western experience on Marxism, Chinese and Japanese theorists found the Marxian national question to be not merely one of whether the "working man has no country," but rather the much more fundamental issue of the relative value of Eastern and Western cultures. Marxism, argues Hoston, thus placed native Marxists in tension with their own heritage and national identity. The author traces efforts to resolve this tension throughout the first half of the twentieth century, and concludes by examining how the tension persists, as Chinese and Japanese dissidents seek identity-affirming modernity in accordance with the Western democratic model.


National Identity and Great-Power Status in Russia and Japan

National Identity and Great-Power Status in Russia and Japan

Author: Tadashi Anno

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2018-09-03

Total Pages: 262

ISBN-13: 1351969358

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Having suffered military defeat at the hands of advanced Western powers in the 1850s, Russia and Japan embarked upon a program of catch-up and modernization in the late-19th Century. While the two states sought in the main to replicate the successes of the advanced great powers of the West, the discourse on national identity among Russian and Japanese elite in this period evinced a considerable degree of ambivalence about Western dominance. With the onset of the crisis of power and legitimacy in the international order ushered in by the First World War, this ambivalence shifted towards more open revolt against Western dominance. The rise of communism in Russia and militarism in Japan were significantly shaped by their search for national distinctiveness and international status. This book is a comparative historical study of how the two "non-Western" great powers emerged as challengers to the prevailing international order in the interwar period, each seeking to establish an alternative order. Specifically, Anno examines the parallels and contrasts in the ways in which the Russian and Japanese elites sought to define the two countries’ national identities, and how those definitions influenced the two countries’ attitudes toward the prevailing order. At the intersection of international relations theory, comparative politics, and of historical sociology, this book offers an integrated perspective on the rise of challengers to the liberal international order in the early-twentieth century.


Embracing 'Asia' in China and Japan

Embracing 'Asia' in China and Japan

Author: Torsten Weber

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2017-12-13

Total Pages: 421

ISBN-13: 3319651544

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This book examines how Asianism became a key concept in mainstream political discourse between China and Japan and how it was used both domestically and internationally in the contest for political hegemony. It argues that, from the early 1910s to the early 1930s, this contest changed Chinese and Japanese perceptions of ‘Asia’, from a concept that was foreign-referential, foreign-imposed, peripheral, and mostly negative and denied (in Japan) or largely ignored (in China) to one that was self-referential, self-defined, central, and widely affirmed and embraced. As an ism, Asianism elevated ‘Asia’ as a geographical concept with culturalist-racialist implications to the status of a full-blown political principle and encouraged its proposal and discussion vis-à-vis other political doctrines of the time, such as nationalism, internationalism, and imperialism. By the mid-1920s, a great variety of conceptions of Asianism had emerged in the transnational discourse between Japan and China. Terminologically and conceptually, they not only paved the way for the appropriation of ‘Asia’ discourse by Japanese imperialism from the early 1930s onwards but also facilitated the embrace of Sino-centric conceptions of Asianism by Chinese politicians and collaborators.


A Nation-State by Construction

A Nation-State by Construction

Author: Suisheng Zhao

Publisher: Stanford University Press

Published: 2004

Total Pages: 380

ISBN-13: 9780804750011

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This is the first historically comprehensive, up-to-date analysis of the causes, content, and consequences of nationalism in China, an ancient empire that has struggled to construct a nation-state and find its place in the modern world. It shows how Chinese political elites have competed to promote different types of nationalism linked to their political values and interests and imposed them on the nation while trying to repress other types of nationalism. In particular, the book reveals how leaders of the PRC have adopted a pragmatic strategy to use nationalism while struggling to prevent it from turning into a menace rather than a prop.


African American Perspectives on Political Science

African American Perspectives on Political Science

Author: Wilbur Rich

Publisher: Temple University Press

Published: 2007-01-15

Total Pages: 457

ISBN-13: 1592131093

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Race matters in both national and international politics. Starting from this perspective, African American Perspectives on Political Science presents original essays from leading African American political scientists. Collectively, they evaluate the discipline, its subfields, the quality of race-related research, and omissions in the literature. They argue that because Americans do not fully understand the many-faceted issues of race in politics in their own country, they find it difficult to comprehend ethnic and racial disputes in other countries as well. In addition, partly because there are so few African Americans in the field, political science faces a danger of unconscious insularity in methodology and outlook. Contributors argue that the discipline needs multiple perspectives to prevent it from developing blind spots. Taken as a whole, these essays argue with great urgency that African American political scientists have a unique opportunity and a special responsibility to rethink the canon, the norms, and the directions of the discipline.


Asian Forms of the Nation

Asian Forms of the Nation

Author: Stein Tønnesson

Publisher: Psychology Press

Published: 1996

Total Pages: 372

ISBN-13: 9780700704422

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Asian forms of the nation have rarely been seen as independent, alternative models. Among today's leading theoreticians, there is a growing tendency to take Asia seriously, and to include Asian examples in the general discussion. The aim of the present collection is to build on and reinforce this tendency and demonstrates that in Asia, as well as in Europe, each nation forms a unique amalgam which can be compared fruitfully with others.


Global Convulsions

Global Convulsions

Author: Winston A. Van Horne

Publisher: State University of New York Press

Published: 1997-01-30

Total Pages: 388

ISBN-13: 1438422687

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Global Convulsions affords the reader an array of observations, data, and insights pertaining to both local and global events around the issues of race, ethnicity and nationalism at the end of the twentieth century. It scrutinizes closely the phenomenon of race in both historical and scientific contexts, and calls out a range of sociohistorical forces that have engendered ethnicity and nationalism. Through case studies, the contributors bring into sharp focus an array of ethnic cleavages, the difficulty of the struggle for national rights where language and religion draw a hard ethnic divide, and the actual corrosiveness of ethnicity and nationalism on the state. The enduring value of Global Convulsions lies in its global reach and the patterns that it calls out. It makes plain that the state is no salvation in relation to national chauvinism, ethnic exclusivism, and/or racial paranoia. Indeed, the state, if not the cause, is often a consummative force perpetuating these phenomena. Still, according to the contributors to this volume, the state has much potential to transcend the divides of race, ethnicity, and nationalism. And so, in Global Convulsions does one discern the possibility of "us/them" becoming "us together."


Marxist Historiographies

Marxist Historiographies

Author: Q. Edward Wang

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2015-07-16

Total Pages: 329

ISBN-13: 1317413830

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Marxist Historiographies is the first book to examine the ebb and flow of Marxist historiography from a global and cross-cultural perspective. Since the eighteenth century, few schools of historical thought have exerted a more lasting impact than Marxism, and this impact extends far beyond the Western world within which it is most commonly analysed. Edited by two highly respected authors in the field, this book deals with the effect of Marxism on historical writings not only in parts of Europe, where it originated, but also in countries and regions in Africa, Asia, North and South America and the Middle East. Rather than presenting the chapters geographically, it is structured with respect to how Marxist influence was shown in the works of historians in a particular area. This title takes a dual approach to the subject; some chapters are national in scope, addressing the Marxist impact on historical practices within a country, whereas others deal with the varied expressions of Marxist historiography throughout a wider region. Taking a truly global perspective on this topic, Marxist Historiographies demonstrates clearly the breadth and depth of Marxism’s influence in historical writing throughout the world and is essential reading for all students of historiography.


Constructing Nationhood in Modern East Asia

Constructing Nationhood in Modern East Asia

Author: Kai-wing Chow

Publisher: University of Michigan Press

Published: 2001

Total Pages: 418

ISBN-13: 9780472067350

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A cutting-edge collection exploring identity-making in East Asia This is an interdisciplinary study of the cultural politics of nationalism and national identities in modern East Asia. Combining theoretical insights with empirical research, it explores the cultural dimensions of nationhood and identity-making in China, Japan, Korea, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. The essays address issues ranging from the complex relations between popular culture and national consciousness to the representation of ethnic/racial identity and gendered discourse on nationalism. The cutting-edge research on the diverse forms of cultural preacceptance and the various ways in which this participates in the construction and projection of national and ethnic identities in East Asia illuminates several understudied issues in Asian studies, including the ambiguity of Hong Kong identity during World War II and the intricate politics of the post-war Taiwanese trial of collaboration. Addressing a wide range of theoretical and historical issues regarding cultural dimensions of nationalism and national identities all over East Asia, these essays draw insights from such recent theories as cultural studies, postcolonial theories, and archival-researched cultural anthropology. The book will be important reading for students of Asian studies as well as for serious readers interested in issues of nationalism and culture. Kai-wing Chow is Associate Professor of East Asian Languages and Cultures. Kevin Doak is Associate Professor of History. Poshek Fu is Associate Professor of History and Cinema Studies. All three teach at University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.