A short history on Japan
“From Feudalism to Military dominance to Constitutional Democracy”, Japan’s history is an insightful roadmap of how she developed into the Japanese modern state that is apparent today. Examining Japan’s past experiences as a nation, five of the most crucial events of history are the Tokugawa Shogunate of 1603, the Meiji Restoration of 1868, Japanese victory in the Russo-Japanese War in 1905, Japanese defeat in WWII, and MacArthur’s drafting of the new Japanese Constitution in 1946. These could be argued to be the major turning points in Japan’s history, completely altering the country’s values, attitudes, and orientation. The first turning point for Japan is seen in the Tokugawa Shogunate Period. I see it as the calm before the storm. It was a period of time of relative peace and stability, characterized by its strong centralized rule. This was a feudalistic era living in an isolated world. The Tokugawa Ieyasu establishes 14 generations of Tokugawa Shoguns. One of the largest landmark alterations is found in the moving of the capital to Edo, otherwise known as Tokyo. This period is not as popular as the other listed turning points, but it too is very important because it illustrates Japan’s paradigm of society and what . . .
From clothing to baseball, language to cuisine, US’s influence over Japan is still present and growing today. Overall, the US has completely enveloped Japan into their sphere of influence. This began US occupation of Japan, thus ending Japan’s joyride of imperialism. The Emphasis of this new mandate was to build a strong military and strengthen industries. The central impulse behind Japanese imperialism was to secure hegemony in East Asian international politics. Because of the Shogun’s luxurious lifestyles, the deficit rose thus causing inflation. ” In fact, the people were not involved in the process and the role of their elected representatives was only minimal. By 1910, the Japanese were sufficiently confident of their position to annex Korea formally as a colony. The question is, “is Japan loosing their culture?” Finally, MacArthur’s drafting of the new Japanese Constitution in 1946 is very significant because it transformed Japan’s political life, making it a truly parliamentary state. Japan had given up their nation’s sovereignty as well as their army. This was created to prevent invasion by Western powers. Emperor Hirohito surrendered to the US, a first and only “unconditional surrender” in history. The preamble to the Constitution states: “We the Japanese people…do proclaim that sovereign power resides with the people. This lead to the attempted rectification through heavy taxation, but it instead created a revolt, lead by the lower samurai and merchants. This war reiterated Japanese imperialism and colonialism.
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