Browse

Bones Around My Neck: The Life and Exile of a Prince Provocateur

Tamara Loos

Prince Prisdang Chumsai (1852–1935) served as Siam's first diplomat to Europe during the most dramatic moment of Siam's political history, when its independence was threatened by European ... More

Prince Prisdang Chumsai (1852–1935) served as Siam's first diplomat to Europe during the most dramatic moment of Siam's political history, when its independence was threatened by European imperialism. Despite serving with patriotic zeal, he suffered irreparable social and political ruin based on rumors about fiscal corruption, sexual immorality, and political treason. This book pursues the truth behind these rumors, which chased Prisdang out of Siam. This book recounts the personal and political adventures of an unwitting provocateur who caused a commotion in every country he inhabited. Prisdang spent his first five years in exile from Siam living in disguise as a commoner and employee of the British Empire in colonial Southeast Asia. He then resurfaced in the 1890s in British Ceylon, where he was ordained as a Buddhist monk and became a widely-respected abbot. Foreigners from around the world were drawn to this prince who had discarded wealth and royal status to lead the life of an ascetic. His fluency in English, royal blood, acute intellect, and charisma earned him importance in international diplomatic and Buddhist circles. Prisdang's life journey reminds us of the complexities of the colonial encounter and the recalibrations it caused in local political cultures. His drama offers more than a story about Siamese politics: it also casts in high relief the subjective experience of global imperialism. Telling this history from the vantage point of a remarkable individual grounds and animates the historical abstractions of imperialism, Buddhist universalism, and the transformation of Siam into a modern state.Less

A Delicate Relationship: The United States and Burma/Myanmar since 1945

Kenton Clymer

In 2012, Barack Obama became the first U.S. president ever to visit Myanmar, formerly known as Burma. This official state visit marked a new period in the diplomatic relationship between the United ... More

In 2012, Barack Obama became the first U.S. president ever to visit Myanmar, formerly known as Burma. This official state visit marked a new period in the diplomatic relationship between the United States and Burma/Myanmar, which this book examines. From the challenges of decolonization and heightened nationalist activities that emerged in the wake of World War II to the Cold War concern with domino states to the rise of human rights policy in the 1980s and beyond, the book demonstrates how Burma/Myanmar has fit into the broad patterns of U.S. foreign policy and yet has never been fully integrated into diplomatic efforts in the region of Southeast Asia. When Burma achieved independence in 1948, the United States feared that the country might be the first Southeast Asian nation to fall to the communists, and it embarked on a series of efforts to prevent this. The book explores attitudes toward Burma (later Myanmar) from anticommunism during the Cold War to interventions to stop drug trafficking to debates in Congress, the White House, and the Department of State over how to respond to the emergence of the opposition movement in the late 1980s. The book concludes with President Obama's visits in 2012 and 2014, and visits to the United States by Aung San Suu Kyi and President Thein Sein, which marked the establishment of a new, warmer relationship with a relatively open Myanmar.Less

Empire of Dogs: Canines, Japan, and the Making of the Modern Imperial World

Aaron Herald Skabelund

In 1924, Professor Ueno Eizaburo of Tokyo Imperial University adopted an Akita puppy he named Hachikō. Each evening Hachikō greeted Ueno on his return to Shibuya railway station. In May 1925 Ueno ... More

In 1924, Professor Ueno Eizaburo of Tokyo Imperial University adopted an Akita puppy he named Hachikō. Each evening Hachikō greeted Ueno on his return to Shibuya railway station. In May 1925 Ueno died while giving a lecture. Every day for over nine years the Akita waited at Shibuya Station, eventually becoming nationally and even internationally famous for his purported loyalty. A year before his death in 1935, the city of Tokyo erected a statue of Hachikō outside the station. The story of Hachikō reveals much about the place of dogs in Japan's cultural imagination. This book examines the history and cultural significance of dogs in nineteenth- and twentieth-century Japan, beginning with the arrival of Western dog breeds and new modes of dog keeping, which spread throughout the world with Western imperialism. It highlights how dogs joined with humans to create the modern imperial world and how, in turn, imperialism shaped dogs' bodies and their relationship with humans through its impact on dog-breeding and dog-keeping practices that pervade much of the world today.Less

Imperial Eclipse: Japan's Strategic Thinking about Continental Asia before August 1945

Yukiko Koshiro

The “Pacific War” narrative of Japan's defeat that was established after 1945 started with the attack on Pearl Harbor, detailed the U.S. island-hopping campaigns across the Western Pacific, and ... More

The “Pacific War” narrative of Japan's defeat that was established after 1945 started with the attack on Pearl Harbor, detailed the U.S. island-hopping campaigns across the Western Pacific, and culminated in the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan's capitulation, and its recasting as the western shore of an American ocean. But in the decades leading up to World War II and over the course of the conflict, Japan's leaders and citizens were as deeply concerned about continental Asia—and the Soviet Union, in particular—as they were about the Pacific theater and the United States. This book reassesses the role that Eurasia played in Japan's diplomatic and military thinking from the turn of the twentieth century to the end of the war. Through unprecedented archival research, locating documents and reports expunged from the files of the Japanese Cabinet, ministries of Foreign Affairs and War, and Imperial Headquarters, the book reconstructs Japan's official thinking about its plans for continental Asia. It brings to light new information on the assumptions and resulting plans that Japan's leaders made as military defeat became increasingly certain and the Soviet Union slowly moved to declare war on Japan (which it finally did on August 8, two days after Hiroshima). The book also describes Japanese attitudes toward Russia in the prewar years, highlighting the attractions of communism and the treatment of Russians in the Japanese empire; and it traces imperial attitudes toward Korea and China throughout this period.Less

My Nuclear Nightmare: Leading Japan Through the Fukushima Disaster to a Nuclear-Free Future

Naoto Kan

Jeffrey S. Irish (ed.)

On March 11, 2011, a massive undersea earthquake off Japan's coast triggered devastating tsunami waves that in turn caused meltdowns at three reactors in the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant. ... More

On March 11, 2011, a massive undersea earthquake off Japan's coast triggered devastating tsunami waves that in turn caused meltdowns at three reactors in the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant. Ranked with Chernobyl as the worst nuclear disaster in history, Fukushima will have lasting consequences for generations. Until 3.11, Japan's Prime Minister, Naoto Kan, had supported the use of nuclear power. His position would undergo a radical change, however, as Kan watched the nuclear disaster at the Fukushima No. 1 Power Plant unfold and came to understand the potential for the physical, economic, and political destruction of Japan. This book offers a fascinating day-by-day account of the Prime Minister's actions in the harrowing week after the earthquake struck. He records the anguished decisions he had to make as the scale of destruction became clear and the threat of nuclear catastrophe loomed ever larger—decisions made on the basis of information that was often unreliable. For example, frustrated by the lack of clarity from the executives at Tepco, the company that owned the power plant, Kan decided to visit Fukushima himself, despite the risks, so he could talk to the plant's manager and find out what was really happening on the ground. As the text details, a combination of extremely good fortune and hard work just barely prevented a total meltdown of all of Fukushima's reactor units, which would have necessitated the evacuation of the thirty million residents of the greater Tokyo metropolitan area.Less

Planning for Empire: Reform Bureaucrats and the Japanese Wartime State

Janis Mimura

Japan's invasion of Manchuria in September of 1931 initiated a new phase of brutal occupation and warfare in Asia and the Pacific. It forwarded the project of remaking the Japanese state along ... More

Japan's invasion of Manchuria in September of 1931 initiated a new phase of brutal occupation and warfare in Asia and the Pacific. It forwarded the project of remaking the Japanese state along technocratic and fascistic lines and creating a self-sufficient Asian bloc centered on Japan and its puppet state of Manchukuo. This book traces the origins and evolution of this new order and the ideas and policies of its chief architects, the reform bureaucrats. The reform bureaucrats pursued a radical, authoritarian vision of modern Japan in which public and private spheres were fused, ownership and control of capital were separated, and society was ruled by technocrats. The book shifts our attention away from reactionary young officers to state planners—reform bureaucrats, total war officers, new zaibatsu leaders, economists, political scientists, engineers, and labor party leaders. It shows how empire building and war mobilization raised the stature and influence of these middle-class professionals by calling forth new government planning agencies, research bureaus, and think tanks to draft Five Year industrial plans, rationalize industry, mobilize the masses, streamline the bureaucracy, and manage big business. Examining the political battles and compromises of Japanese technocrats in their bid for political power and Asian hegemony, the book offers a new perspective on Japanese fascism by revealing its modern roots in the close interaction of technology and right-wing ideology.Less

Populist Collaborators: The Ilchinhoe and the Japanese Colonization of Korea, 1896-1910

Yumi Moon

An empire invites local collaborators in the making and sustenance of its colonies. Between 1896 and 1910, Japan's project to colonize Korea was deeply intertwined with the movements of reform-minded ... More

An empire invites local collaborators in the making and sustenance of its colonies. Between 1896 and 1910, Japan's project to colonize Korea was deeply intertwined with the movements of reform-minded Koreans to solve the crisis of the Chosŏn dynasty (1392–1910). Among those reformers, it was the Ilchinhoe (Advance in Unity Society)—a unique group of reformers from various social origins—that most ardently embraced Japan's discourse of “civilizing Korea” and saw Japan's colonization as an opportunity to advance its own “populist agendas.” The Ilchinhoe members called themselves “representatives of the people” and mobilized vibrant popular movements that claimed to protect the people's freedom, property, and lives. Neither modernist nor traditionalist, they were willing to sacrifice the sovereignty of the Korean monarchy if that would ensure the rights and equality of the people. Both the Japanese colonizers and the Korean elites disliked the Ilchinhoe for its aggressive activism, which sought to control local tax administration and reverse the existing power relations between the people and government officials. Ultimately, the Ilchinhoe members faced visceral moral condemnation from their fellow Koreans when their language and actions resulted in nothing but assist the emergence of the Japanese colonial empire in Korea. This book examines the vexed position of these Korean reformers in the final years of the Chosŏn dynasty, and highlights the global significance of their case for revisiting the politics of local collaboration in the history of a colonial empire.Less

Redemption and Revolution: American and Chinese New Women in the Early Twentieth Century

Motoe Sasaki

In the early twentieth century, a good number of college-educated Protestant American women went abroad by taking up missionary careers in teaching, nursing, and medicine. Most often, their ... More

In the early twentieth century, a good number of college-educated Protestant American women went abroad by taking up missionary careers in teaching, nursing, and medicine. Most often, their destination was China, which became a major mission field for the U.S. Protestant missionary movement as the United States emerged to become an imperial power. These missionary women formed a cohort of new women who sought to be liberated from traditional gender roles. As educators and benevolent emancipators, they attempted to transform Chinese women into self-sufficient middle-class professional women just like themselves. As this book shows these aspirations ran parallel to and were in conflict with those of the Chinese xin nüxing (New Women) they encountered. The subjectivity of the New Woman was an element of global modernity expressing gendered visions of progress. At the same time, it was closely intertwined with the view of historical progress in the nation. Though American and Chinese New Women emphasized individual autonomy in that each sought to act as historical agents for modern progress, their notions of subjectivity were in different ways linked to the ideologies of historical progress of their nations. This book's transnational history of these New Women explores the intersections of gender, modernity, and national identity within the politics of world history, where the nation-state increased its presence as a universal unit in an ever-interconnecting global context.Less

Samurai to Soldier: Remaking Military Service in Nineteenth-Century Japan

D. Colin Jaundrill

This book rewrites the military history of nineteenth-century Japan. In fifty years spanning the collapse of the Tokugawa shogunate and the rise of the Meiji nation-state, conscripts supplanted ... More

This book rewrites the military history of nineteenth-century Japan. In fifty years spanning the collapse of the Tokugawa shogunate and the rise of the Meiji nation-state, conscripts supplanted warriors as Japan's principal arms-bearers. The most common version of this story suggests that the Meiji institution of compulsory military service was the foundation of Japan's efforts to save itself from the imperial ambitions of the West and set the country on the path to great power status. The book argues, to the contrary, that the conscript army of the Meiji period was the culmination—and not the beginning—of a long process of experimentation with military organization and technology. It traces the radical changes to Japanese military institutions, as well as the on-field consequences of military reforms in accounts of the Boshin War (1868–1869) and the Satsuma Rebellions of 1877. The book shows how pre-1868 developments laid the foundations for the army that would secure Japan's Asian empire.Less