National identity, collective memory and history wars in East Asia

Abstract

The article addresses the phenomenon of “history wars” between China and the Republic of Korea, on the one side, and Japan, on the other, which broke out after the cold war around the historical interpretation of Japan’s expansionist policy on the mainland, especially in the period of WWII. The aim of the article is to examine the origin, the ethical and the political underpinnings of “history wars”, specifically in the context of collective memories of WWII and the national identities in the three countries. The authors tried to trace the prehistory of the formation of national identities in East Asia in the twentieth century. While South Korea and China perceive the period of Japan’s imperialist expansion in the XX century through the dualistic prism of the relationship between the victim and the criminal, in Japan the policy on the mainland, although considered to be "erroneous", is not subject to unconditional condemnation on the grounds that at that time all the imperialist states acted the same way. Besides, the discourse of victimhood based on war sufferings of the Japanese people is in conflict with the wounded feelings of the East Asian nations. The article articulates the role of patriotic education and, specifically, the policy of creating museums and historical memorials in the three countries in conducting “history wars”. The authors insist that the interplay of domestic discourse and international memory politics has become a durable source of paramount tension in the international relations of the region.