Author: 樹

The phrase ‘Overcoming Modernity (kindai no chōkoku 近代の超克)’ refers, in a narrow sense, to a symposium organised by a journal Bungakukai, and circulates in a broader sense as a general term describing ideological attempts to transcend modernity brought about by capitalist modernisation in Japan since the Meiji Restoration. However, contrary to their intentions, the intellectual struggle by Japanese intellectuals in the interwar period to  overcome modernity was indeed one of the products of abstraction and specialisation resulting from capitalist modernisation.

As Takeuchi Yoshimi described it as ‘one of the catchwords that took hold of the Japanese intellectuals during the war’ and ‘one of the magic words’,[1] ‘Overcoming Modernity’ was an ambiguous and comprehensive slogan with vague ideas of what modernity was and what was intended to be accomplished after modernity would have been transcended. In fact, the 13 intellectuals who participated in the symposium ‘Overcoming Modernity’ were not only philosophers, but also music, literary, and film critics, physicists, and other intellectuals from a variety of academic fields. This symposium, which brought together specialised intellectuals on the abstracted theme of ‘modernity’, is arguably the epitome of capitalist modernisation.

In Overcome by Modernity, Harry Harootunian states that the interwar Japanese history was the process of being overcome by the dynamics of modernity instead of the intellectuals overcoming modernity.[2] The intellectuals of the time sought to restrain the uneven development brought about by capitalism, which commodified everything in everyday life, and searched for something unchanging to transcend modernity. As a result, they proposed the concepts of ‘culture’ and ‘community’, but this was a form of commodification as well, labelling abstractions that had not been named before.[3] That is, what the intellectuals initially aimed to do was to overcome capitalist modernity through the pursuit of concepts with temporal invariance, but the result was a situation in which modernity was being overcome by modernity.

More precisely, however, they had been swallowed up by modernity, rather than overcome by it. They may have seriously sought to overcome modernity, but ‘modernity’, which was steadily constructed after the establishment of the new Meiji government in 1868, was already too abstract a concept at the time, and it would have been practically impossible to determine how much of the change in their circumstances resulted from modernisation and the capitalist economy.Furthermore, their perspectives on the arbitrary conception of ‘modernity’ were so varied and specialised that they ended up with different possible approaches to ‘overcoming’ it. Therefore, their intellectual endeavours were solely within the framework of capitalist modernity, and as such, no matter how much the thinkers searched for a way to overcome modernity, their methods and consequently the vision to ‘overcome modernity’ devised as a result were also products of capitalism and modernisation.

As such, the failure to formulate a systematic solution to overcome modernity lay in the fact that intellectuals in the interwar period struggled to confront the ‘modernity’ that surrounded them even though they themselves existed within the capitalised modern Japanese society. The discourse on ‘Overcoming Modernity’ demonstrates the difficulty for intellectuals to objectify the subject of their studies and propose new theses that would transcend its framework as long as they constitute the subject.

[1] Yoshimi Takeuchi, What Is Modernity?: Writings of Takeuchi Yoshimi (New York, 2005), p. 103.

[2] Harry D. Harootunian, Overcome by Modernity: History, Culture, and Community in Interwar Japan (Princeton, 2001), p. 94

[3] Ibid., p. xxiii

The theory of kokutai 国体 was a pre-war Japanese concept that envisioned an imperial family with ‘unbroken lineage (bansei ikkei 万世一系)’ to rule Japan as the spiritual, ethical, and political centre of the nation. This ideology formed the core of the Japanese political system from the Meiji Restoration to World War II. It was Aizawa Seishisai 会沢正志斎, one of the leading scholars of the Later Mito Learning (kōki mitogaku 後期水戸学), who developed the concept of kokutai in New Theses (Shinron 新論). In Aizawa’s later years, Yoshida Shōin 吉田松陰 attempted to create his own theory of kokutai after discussing with Aizawa. While both the kokutai theories of the two scholars, whose philosophies greatly influenced the nationalist ideology of ‘revering the emperor and expelling the barbarian (sonnō jōi 尊皇攘夷)’, proposed a state system centred on the emperor, differences arose in response to the changes in domestic order after the arrival of the Black Ships commanded by American Commodore Matthew C. Perry.

Firstly, Aizawa and Yoshida disagree on the perception of kokutai and other countries. According to Aizawa, kokutaiconsists of the principle of loyalty and filial piety (chūkō no genri 忠孝の原理) through ancestral rituals.[1] This means that the subjects are loyal to the emperor as he shows filial piety to the preceding emperors and ancestral gods through rituals, and at the same time, the history of the ancestors’ loyalty to the preceding emperors confirms the present meaning of filial piety. Furthermore, Aizawa regards Japan as a divine country (shinshū 神国) and assumed the rule of all nations by the emperor was eternal and unchanging. While praising Japan as a divine country, he also called it the ‘Land of the Center (chūgoku 中国)’,[2] based on the idea of ‘Little China (shōchūka 小中華)’ and regards the ‘barbarians of the West (seikō no ban’i 西荒の蛮夷)’ who were advancing into the world as a particular threat to kokutai.[3]

On the other hand, Yoshida initially recognises that kokutai is the emperor military subjugation of others and argues that it was the duty of the shogun to assist the emperor to govern by defeating foreign enemies. In addition, based on the national consciousness, he criticises the situation that shoguns and feudal lords were only defending their strongholds and argued that the people should cooperate to protect the nation. However, when Japan was overwhelmed by the dominant military power of the United States, which made it difficult for Japan to maintain its isolationist system, Yoshida shifted his theory of kokutai. He acknowledges that each country has an individual kokutai (national polity) and advocates that superior ‘righteousness of imperial ruler and ruled (皇朝君臣の義)’ to all nations was Japanese unique fundamental principle, kokutai.[4]

Secondly, the difference between the two theories of kokutai can also be traced in their attitudes toward the shogunate. Aizawa’s theory of kokutai was an ideology built on the premise of the Tokugawa feudal system in order for the regime to reorganise its order in response to internal and external crises. In contrast, Yoshida sees the emperor as the permanent sovereign and prioritises the role of all people in Japan as imperial subjects. He argues that people are to devote themselves to the emperor while also serving their feudal lord, and their loyalty to the feudal lord means to promote him to be faithful to the emperor.[5]

The difference between the two theories of statehood can be attributed to the threat of foreign powers, which became increasingly realistic at the end of the Edo period. Aizawa formulates kokutai theory based on the ‘theory of social hierarchy (taigi meibum ron 大義名分論)’, which derives from Neo-Confucianism, with the assumption of governance by the shogunate. However, Yoshida’s theory of kokutai, which he advocated after witnessing the powerful military power of the United States and experiencing a shake in the legitimacy of the shogunate, contained a stronger element of ‘theory of delegation of power (taisei inin ron 大政委任論)’ of National Learning (kokugaku 国学), which assumes that the authority of the shogunate originates from itself but is merely delegated by the emperor. Thus, in comparison to Aizawa, his vision of the national body proved to be an advantageous theory for building a political system with the emperor at the centre, as it undermined the legitimacy of the shogunate’s rule of Japan.

In conclusion, while both the national state proposed by Aizawa and Yoshida are built on the premise of loyalty to the emperor and share some elements of Neo-Confucianist ‘theory of social hierarchy’, they differ in their interpretation of kokutai and other countries, as well as in their attitudes towards the Tokugawa regime. The worsening of Tokugawa Japan’s domestic and foreign situation and the destabilisation of the political order resulted in the transition in the theory of kokutai from Aizawa to Yoshida.

Bibliography

Anderson, Emily (ed.), Belief and Practice in Imperial Japan and Colonial Korea (London, 2017).

Yoshida, Toshizumi 吉田俊純, Mitogaku No Kenkyū: Meiji-ishin-shi No Saikentō 水戸学の研究—明治維新史の再検討 (Tokyo, 2016).

Yamaguchi-ken Kyōikukai 山口県教育会 (ed.), Yoshida Shōin Zenshū Dai 2 Kan 吉田松陰全集第2巻 (Tokyo, 1934).

Yamaguchi-ken Kyōikukai 山口県教育会 (ed.), Yoshida Shōin Zenshū Dai 3 Kan 吉田松陰全集第3巻 (Tokyo, 1939).

Imai, Usaburo 今井宇三郎, Seya, Yoshihiko 瀬谷義彦, Bitō, Masahide 尾藤正英 (eds.), Nihon Shisō Shi Taikei 53: Mitogaku 日本思想史体系53 水戸学 (Tokyo, 1973).

Yoshida, Tsunekichi 吉田常吉 et al. (eds.), Nihon Shisō Shi Taikei 54: Yoshida Shōin 日本思想史体系54 吉田松陰(Tokyo, 1978).

[1] Usaburo Imai, Yoshihiko Seya and Masahide Bitō (eds.), Nihon Shisō Shi Taikei 53: Mitogaku (Tokyo, 1973), pp. 51–53.

[2] Ibid., p. 65.

[3] Ibid., p. 50.

[4] Yamaguchi-ken Kyōikukai (ed.), Yoshida Shōin Zenshū Dai 2 Kan (Tokyo, 1934), p.479–480.

[5] Yamaguchi-ken Kyōikukai (ed.), Yoshida Shōin Zenshū Dai 2 Kan (Tokyo, 1939), p. 566.

From the viewpoint of people after World War II, it is easy to disapprove of imperialism that swept the world in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. However, at a time when this idea was considered standard, a Japanese socialist Kōtoku Shūsui developed a logical criticism of the problem in his first work, Monster of the Twentieth Century: Imperialism(Nijusseiki No Kaibutsu Teikokushugi 廿世紀之怪物帝国主義). In this book, Shūsui describes the Chinese, Japanese,and European history and the trend in Japan and Europe at the time and argues that imperialism is an ideology woven with patriotism and militarism.

One of the most notable features of Monster of the Twentieth Century: Imperialism is its foresight. Prior to the British economist John A. Hobson’s Imperialism: A Study (1902) and Vladimir Lenin’s Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism (1917), Shūsui identified the complex structure of imperialism and raised the alarm. However, this work by Shūsui presently tends to be appreciated for its lack of economic analysis and its strong moral and ethical aspects through comparison with Hobson’s and Lenin’s analysis of economic factors of imperialist behaviour[1]. However, this work can also be regarded as an intellectual attempt to integrate literature and social science. This is well illustrated by the fact that Shūsui refers to the Chinese classics such as Mengzi and Shiji, as well as multiple Japanese literary works as the basis of his logic. For example, Shūsui cites Mengzi: Gong Sun Chou I. Accepting Mengzi’s teaching on the innate benevolence of all people, that anyone who sees an infant about to fall into a well will run to save him, he argued that patriotism is highly egoistic and is distinguished from the innate, pure benevolence. He also attempts to construct a more comprehensive argument fusing the West and the East by combining those works with the European counterparts.

What provides a distinctive philosophical depth to Shūsui’s Monster of the Twentieth Century is that he unravels the unique characteristics of Japanese imperialism while grounding it in the historical events and ideas of Japan and China. Shūsui’s approach to developing the logic can be traced to his teacher, Nakae Chōmin 中江兆民. Chōmin, about whom Shūsui wrote a biography called Chōmin Sensei 兆民先生, had re-evaluated the Confucian tradition in the face of concepts such as ‘civil rights (minken 民権)’ and ‘equality and freedom (byōdō jiyū 平等自由)’. In Ichinen Yūhan, he regards civil rights as the principle (shiri 至理) and equality and freedom as the righteousness (taigi 大義) and argues that these ideas are not idiosyncratic to the West, as they have existed in the Confucian tradition of East Asia since they were detected by Mencius and Liu Zongyuan[2]. Accordingly, he seeks ways to develop the idea of democracy (minpon shugi 民本主義) as well as freedom and equality based on the Confucian tradition. In Mengzi: King Hui of Liang II, ‘the theory of the expulsions of disqualified monarchs by King Tang and King Wu (tōbu hōbatsu ron 湯武放伐論)’ is developed, which discusses whether subjects and people ought to remain submissive even when the monarch is a tyrant in accord with Confucianism, which emphasizes the importance of the relationship between sovereign and subject as one of the five relationships. Chōmin sheds light on the potential for ultimate democracy, which has been inherent in this Confucian philosophy.

Whereas Chōmin reexamines the Confucian tradition of East Asia for its possibility of modernity, Shūsui revisits that tradition and criticises Japanese imperialism for deviating from it, assuming that prosperity and happiness, which are national honours, lie in a high degree of morality and nobility of ideals. In other words, while following Chōmin’s methodology of using the Confucian tradition as the basis for the realization of his ideals, Shūsui used it to criticize the actual situation in Japan.

Although Shūsui criticises the spread of imperialism as a global phenomenon, the significance of Monster of the Twentieth Century is that it highlights the peculiarity of Japanese imperialism on an East Asian intellectual basis and develops an analysis that focuses on its ideological aspects. His progressive argument, which is underpinned by his literary flair, has a continuity with the lengthy intellectual history of East Asia, as a result of overlooking imperialism from an ideological point of view and succeeding his teacher’s method of rethinking Confucianism, and hence gained profundity.

Bibliography

Dirlik, Arif, Anarchism in the Chinese Revolution (California, 1991).

Nakae, Chōmin 中江兆民, Sansuijin Keirin Mondō 三酔人経綸問答, trans. and ed. Kuwahara, Takeo 桑原武夫, Shimada, Kenji 島田虔次 (Tokyo, 1983).

Nakae, Chōmin 中江兆民, Ichinen Yūhan, Zoku Ichinen Yūhan 一年有半・続一年有半, trans. and ed. Ida, Shinya 井田進也 (Tokyo, 1995).

Tierney, Robert T., Monster of the Twentieth Century: Kōtoku Shūsui and Japan’s First Anti-Imperialist Movement(California, 2015).

[1] Robert T. Tierney, Monster of the Twentieth Century: Kōtoku Shūsui and Japan’s First Anti-Imperialist Movement (California, 2015), p. 7

[2] Chōmin Nakae, Ichinen Yūhan, Zoku Ichinen Yūhan, trans. and ed. Shinya Ida (Tokyo, 1995), p. 56.

In contrast to China and Korea, neither Confucianism nor Neo-Confucianism was fully established as the official ideological foundations of government in Tokugawa Japan. Living in a country where shoguns governed based on his military authority (bui 武威), a Confucian scholar Ogyū Sorai 荻生徂徠 (1666–1728) reconsidered the essence of Confucianism after being dedicated to Confucianism and Jinsaigaku 仁斎学 and formed the linguistic methodologies, namely Kobunjigaku 古文辞学, and the new theory of Confucianism, which is called Soraigaku 徂徠学. Consequently, he restructured Confucianism, which was considered merely one of the accomplishments in the early days of the Tokugawa era, into a governance theory that deals with the specific domain of politics. His innovative interpretation of Confucianism derived from his conservative approach had a significant impact on the thought at the end of the Edo period and beyond.

The significance of the rise of Soraigaku in Japan during the Tokugawa period appears to be that Sorai criticised the interpretation of Confucianism by Neo-Confucianism and Jinsaigaku from the perspective of the interpretation of the Way and between righteousness (gi 義) and profit (ri 利).

Firstly, he saw the concept of the Way in Confucianism as the method of governing a country by sages in ancient China, and he regarded the study of the sage’s ideal rule as the essence of Confucianism. In Distinguishing the Way (Bendō 弁道), Sorai developed his interpretation of the Way as the rites, music, punishments, and ordinances (reigakukeisei 礼楽刑政) established by preceding kings, not the natural way of Heaven and earth as explained by the Zhu Xi and Jinsai.[1] On the basis of his interpretation, in Plan for an Age of Great Peace (Taiheisaku 太平策), he envisioned a plan of the sage’s technique of the grand Way (daidō-jutsu 大道術) to establish a political and social system for radically changing the customs in Tokugawa Japan.[2] The idea of applying Confucianism to the politics of Tokugawa Japan as an academic discipline to investigate the specific domain of politics may have contributed to the necessity of Confucianism in Japan.

Secondly, Sorai offered a governance theoretical interpretation of the Confucian ‘distinction between righteousness and profit’ (giri no ben 義利の弁) and argued that they are not in conflict. Zhu Xi discussed righteousness and profit in the scheme of overcoming human greed according to the heavenly principle (tianli 天理) and claimed from the viewpoint of individual morals that only righteousness is to be pursued. On the contrary, Sorai positively acknowledged the pursuit of profit and suggested that righteousness, as a political virtue, was to govern the people in a way that would benefit them. Furthermore, in Discourse on Government (Seidan 政談), he developed the theory of samurai settlement on their land (bushi dochaku-ron 武士土着論) in light of the status quo in Edo and advocated ideal governance rooted in righteousness to alleviate the budget deficit. It can be said that he established the significance of Confucianism as political studies by proposing a concrete policy based on Confucianism reflecting the reality.

Thus, Sorai can be credited with developing a very new interpretation of Confucious’ teachings, while promoting the understanding of Confucianism by directly approaching the Four Books and Five Classics in his conservative Kobunjigaku. In the face of his duality—the methodology he introduced as a conservative Confucianist and the innovative interpretation of Confucianism presented as a result—the question arises of which side of him indeed would receive more emphasis. One of the scholars who attached great importance to the groundbreaking aspects of his interpretation of Confucianism was Kaiho Seiryō 海保青陵 (1755–1817), a disciple of Sorai.

Seiryō was influenced by Sorai’s perspective to capture the actual situation in Tokugawa Japan, and he advocated the theory to govern the society and ease the people (Keisei Saimin-ron 経世済民論), which extended the positive view of the pursuit of profit from Soraigaku. Furthermore, he advanced Sorai’s concept, which affirmed the pursuit of profit, and developed a utilitarian logic that viewed profit (i.e., economic rationality) as tianli. However, while Sorai, as a Confucian, pursued the Way of prior kings, which he considered the essence of Confucianism, Seiryō deviated from Confucianism and prioritised the practicality of political analysis by focusing on theories that were compatible with the current world, thereby reducing the authority of Confucius’ argument and the Way of sages. In other words, Soraigaku became the ideological foundation of Seiryō’s thought, setting aside the objective of Sorai to grasp more faithfully the teachings of Confucius.

The ideological influence of Soraigaku on Seiryō’s thought reveals its methodological significance as well. Criticising the Neo-Confucianist approach and understandings of Confucianism, Sorai developed his interpretation, which he believed was truer to the teachings of Confucius. In other words, the rise of Soraigaku has significant implications for subsequent diverse critical debates on the interpretation of Confucianism and provided the solid foundation of unfettered and rigorous discussions that led to the development of academic fields in Japan. Moreover, it is important to note that the government system of the Tokugawa shogunate, in which Confucianism and Neo-Confucianism were not officially adopted as its governing ideology, played a role in the development of free and varied academic disciplines including Soraigaku based on a critical review of Neo-Confucianism.

Bibliography

De Bary, Wm. Theodore, Gluck, Carol and Tiedemann, Arthur, Sources of Japanese Tradition: 1600–2000 (New York, 2005).

Lidin, Olof G., ‘Ogyū Sorai: Confucian Conservative Reformer: From Journey to Kai to Discourse on Government’, in Chun-chieh Huang and John A. Tucker (eds.), Dao Companion to Japanese Confucian Philosophy (Heidelberg, 2014), pp. 165–182.

Maruyama, Masao 丸山眞男, Nihon Seiji Shisō Shi Kenkyū 日本政治思想史研究 (Tokyo, 1952).

Kuranami, Seiji 蔵並省自 (ed.), Kaiho Seiryō Zenshū 海保青陵全集 (Tokyo, 1976).

Yoshikawa, Kōjirō 吉川幸次郎 (ed.), Nihon Shisō Taikei 36: Ogyū Sorai 日本思想体系36　荻生徂徠 (Tokyo, 1973).

[1] Kōjirō Yoshikawa (ed.), Nihon Shisō Taikei 36: Ogyū Sorai (Tokyo, 1973), pp. 13–14.

[2] Ibid., p. 473.