Encounters and Engagement in the Civilizational Analysis of Japan

Jeremy C A Smith

doi:10.14712/23363525.2021.16

Abstract

As a field of significant activity for historical sociologists in recent decades, civilizational analysis has produced extensive and incisive works examining Japan as a historical formation of Eurasia. However, the same cannot be said of Japan’s Pacific relationship with the United States, which is neglected in the major historical sociologies of Japanese modernity. This essay seeks to address that unnecessary oversight by putting that relationship into focus as an international dimension of the institution of both states. It would be tempting to elucidate the entanglement of the two as an encounter of civilizations, but the author instead casts it as intercivilizational engagement, that is a deeper set of connections generated by routine contacts and migratory movements, trade in commerce and culture, and selective appropriation of models of statehood. Delineating the lines of exchange in all four domains of connectivity between Japan and the US, the essay profiles the international and imperial extensions of both states. In altering the perspective on Japan’s relations with the world, the author outlines a larger potential historical sociology of intercivilizational engagement between two Pacific-edge civilizational constellations.

Highlights

Civilizational analysis and historical sociology have rightly regarded Japan as a sui generis modernity, a case study in divergence from Western statehood, and a civilization with deep roots in East Asia
This essay addresses a gap in historical sociology and largescale studies of civilizations, when it comes to Japan’s relations with the Pacific world and the United States
In the remainder of the essay, I sketch the contours of intercivilizational engagement by, first, demarcating modern migration as a single dimension of the trans-Pacific relationship and, second, briefly exploring aspects of the other three dimensions across three phases, namely the economic, cultural, and political

Summary

Introduction

Civilizational analysis and historical sociology have rightly regarded Japan as a sui generis modernity, a case study in divergence from Western statehood, and a civilization with deep roots in East Asia. I track inter-state relations between the US and Japan before the Pacific War. With a focus on economic engagement, I highlight the competition of two interconnected models of capitalism in the postwar period. SMITH Encounters and Engagement in the Civilizational Analysis of Japan of modernization processes added complexity and several twists to Japan’s twentieth century fate.

Results

Conclusion