Japan: Japan and Late Twentieth-century World Essay

Submitted By beardy88
Words: 2718
Pages: 11
Open Document
Table of Contents / Sample Articles |

|

|

|
Although Japan is sometimes compared in size to a state such as California, it is probably better to think of it in national terms. In that case, Japan is two-thirds the size of France, one-quarter bigger than Italy or Great Britain, and three-quarters larger than the Korean peninsula. Geographically, the United States, Russia, and China are very big countries, while Japan is something more like "normal size." (see note 1)
But geographic size does not itself determine world power, and "small countries" such as England and the Netherlands once wielded enormous economic and military might. Today, as the second largest national economy after the United States, Japan is a "big country" in terms of economic power. | Why, then, do Japanese people almost always describe Japan as a "small island country"? Because it is small in comparison to the countries that dominated its history: China, the historical great power in East Asia, and the United States, the global superpower in the twentieth century. Japan also seems small to Japanese because it is mostly mountainous, with nearly 80 percent of its 126 million population now crammed into some sixty cities. |
And because Japan is a country of four main and many outlying islands, it is indeed surrounded by the sea, which in past times often seemed to protect and isolate Japan from the rest of the world.
But no longer, for there are no island countries in the global economy. So while one understands why Japanese feel their land to be small (and vulnerable), Japan’s size must be measured in relative terms. In natural resources, Japan is tiny compared to Brazil or Canada; in national product, Japan is large compared to Italy or France, though not to the European Union as a whole; militarily, Japan may be big in relation to most of the world’s countries, but it shrinks mightily when the referent is China or the United States; in foreign aid given to other countries, Japan is at present bigger than the United States; and so on. Take a look at The State of the World Atlas to see how the size of countries varies in relation to what is being measured. Size, it turns out, is always relative (see note 2).

|

Contemporary Japan is a modern society, an instance of the multiple patterns of modernity that characterize the late twentieth-century world. Images of samurai and sumo wrestlers, of geisha and cherry blossoms, should not mislead: Japan is no exotic Lotusland, no topsy-turvy Asian version of Western-style modernity. If modernity, broadly defined, implies industrialization, the nation-state, expanded political participation, forms of middle class or mass society, and growing integration in the world, then there is no single way to be modern, no Western way, no Asian way. Indeed, as any glance at the globe will show, modernity is notoriously uneven in its contemporary appearances. | |

| Yet there are patterns held in common, and modern Japan is a variant of a pattern of modernity, which, though it is by no means the only pattern, is one that Americans know quite well. It includes a capitalistic economy, a democratic politics based on representative parliamentary government, a large middle class as the social basis for both capitalism and democracy, and active engagement in global relations of power (see note 3). |

To know Japan today, think first of modernity held in common, first of commonality, and only then of difference. |

|
France and Germany, Canada and Korea are different, too. This is because the common patterns of modernity take various local forms. Capitalism operates differently in different places, shaped by the historical ecology of its surroundings. Compared to the United States, Japan’s "moderated capitalism" has what Americans consider an unacceptably high degree of government involvement in the private sector. Compared to France, the penetration of the political economy by the
Show More

Related Documents: Japan: Japan and Late Twentieth-century World Essay

Can the Concept of ‘Early’ and ‘Late’ Industrialization Explain the Key Institutional and Organizational Characteristics of National Business Systems, and Do They Have Any Bearing on Long-Term National Competitiveness? Essay

Can the concept of ‘early’ and ‘late’ industrialization explain the key institutional and organizational characteristics of national business systems, and do they have any bearing on long-term national competitiveness? Introduction The concept of industrialization has been used among different nations and regions, while many countries have carried out their own industrialization progress during the past several decades, which stimulates the development of organizations and better corporate…

Words 2523 - Pages 11

Japan Essay

2014 Japan: Sushi Economy The story The Sushi Economy is a reading about the first international tour of sushi’s journey in the global market. It takes you through the massive street markets in Tokyo of Tsukiji market. There they sell millions of dollars of fish each day. It gives off distinctive flavors of chef’s being watched as they show the makings of sushi. It’s the way of uncovering the behind the scenes and history of sushi from how it became involved with the world and how it started in Japan…

Words 696 - Pages 3

Music In Japan Book Review

Book Review Music in Japan: Experiencing Music, Expressing Culture, Bonnie C. Wade, New York Oxford University Press 2005, 2004041486 Music in Japan is one of several case-study volumes apart of the Thinking Musically, Global Music Series. Music in Japan offers a vibrant preface to the music of modern Japan, a nation in which traditional, western, and popular music thrive side by side. Drawing on many years of experience, author Bonnie C. Wade focuses on the major periods of the…

Words 839 - Pages 4

Essay on CCOT And CC

period from 1500 – 1850, compare North American racial ideologies and their effects on society with Latin American/Caribbean racial ideologies and their effects on society. Analyze the social and economic transformations that occurred in the Atlantic World as a result of new contacts among Western Europe, Africa and the Americas from 1492 to 1750. Within the period from 1450 – 1800, compare the processes (eg political social economic) of empire building in the Spanish Empire with the empire-building…

Words 1536 - Pages 7

Week 8 English Essay

Negative effects of both world wars One might want to consider a world war as a war for the change of the entire world, however history learns that that was not the situation in the two world wars of the twentieth century. Both world wars had unfathomable worldwide impacts, which influenced just about everybody on the planet. The impacts had both positive and negative angles. The beneficial outcomes, in the zones of innovation, world peace and worldwide economy, make world wars resemble "wars for…

Words 1728 - Pages 7

Essay HIS 154 F14 Terms For Exam 2

HIS 154 F14 terms for exam #2 New imperialism- coined by the British anti-imperialist John Hobson, reflected a new understanding of the world among segments of Europe, the US, and Japan. These groups came to believe that their countries had a right and even a duty to conquer or control the affairs of societies on other sides of the globe. Not only were they willing to create new empires, they were able due to a significant military advantage over Africa and Asia. Metropole- British metropolitan…

Words 1368 - Pages 6

The Utility of the Oil Weapon Essay

have been a grave mistake and/or whether the overall effect will be the devastation of various economies that had neither culpability nor interest in disempowering Iran. Specifically, Mana Saeed al-Otaiba’s account of the oil crisis starting in late 1973, “The Arab Oil Weapon”, demonstrates the absence of equitable logic in resorting to such punitive measures. Briefly, Dr. Saeed al-Otaiba, then the 27 yr. old Minister of Oil and Mineral Resources of the United Arab Emirates, served as spokesperson…

Words 865 - Pages 4

Russo-Japanese War Essay

1905) was "the first great war of the twentieth-century”. At the turn of the century, Russia was the largest nation in Europe, both in terms of population and land area. Russia also had a powerful army and navy, which in addition to its vast territory, made it almost unthinkable for any nation to attempt to wage a war against it. Both Russia and Japan thought war would be an easy win. In that sense, it made negotiating impossible. During her negotiations with Japan, Russia did not expect the Japanese…

Words 2680 - Pages 11

Asian Americans In Politics Research Paper

In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Asian immigrants, especially those from China and Japan, experienced prejudiced and exclusionary laws. The Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 is an example, that restricted Chinese laborers from entering the country and denied them the right to become naturalized citizens…

Words 663 - Pages 3

Who Is Leonard Blusse´s Visible Cities?

They are looking at the relations as they “should be” rather than how they were. In reality, trade flourished in Asian countries when governments gave autonomy to private traders and loosened their maritime bans. Prior to the seventeenth century, China and Japan exercised much restraint over foreign trade in their regimes. These countries soon had to adjust to the global changes in trade, as the maritime prohibitions caused the economy to diminish and problems to occur. The author…

Words 1370 - Pages 6