A civilized nation: Japan and the Red Cross 1877–1900

Abstract

The history of both the Red Cross and the Japanese Red Cross is based on a teleological and eurocentric narrative which is strongly shaped by national histories and focused on persons. To assume 1863 as the founding date of the Red Cross is highly debatable, considering that most national relief organisations were renamed ‘Red Cross Societies’ only in the 1880s. In this Japan is no exception, since first a Haku-Ai-Sha (Philanthropic Society) was founded in 1877 and then turned into the Japanese Red Cross Society in 1887. Japanese actors must be regarded as intrinsically motivated and active participants in the Red Cross movement who saw an ideal and a model in the Euro-American ‘way of civilisation’ and humanity. It has taken about 30 years to turn the Haku-Ai-Sha in Japan into a humanitarian society which is accepted both at home and abroad and, with its 728,507 members in 1900, which constituted the largest Red Cross Society in the world.