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Critical International Relations Theories in East Asia
What do we study when we study International Relations (IR)? This book interrogates the meanings of the established ontology and subjectivity embedded in the discourse of “Western” and “non-Western” IR. We are predisposed to see a nation-state as a unified entity, everlasting and moving towards a particular end. This leads us to say, for example, “Japan is threatened by the possible Chinese attack” without questioning what “Japan” and “China” mean in this context. This book tries to locate and unearth the consistent structure and system of the world, with a particular focus on subjectivity and temporality in IR that captures the way in which we conceive and misconceive the world. The contributors reveal the extent to which contemporary IR discourses are a part of the culture of linear progress and pre-given autonomous sovereign individuals. Our targets of inquiry therefore inevitably include not only “Western” IR, but also “non-Western” discourses as well. The contributors focus on the fluid identities of contemporary world affairs with special attention to temporality, and strive to develop a new approach to understanding the contemporary world and the meanings of world affairs. Kosuke Shimizu is a professor of the Department of Global Studies and director of Afrasian Research Centre at Ryukoku University, Kyoto, Japan.
IR Theory and Practice in Asia
This series will publish philosophical, theoretical, methodological and empirical work by prominent scholars, as well as that of emerging scholars, concerned with IR theory and practice in the context of Asia. It will engage with a wide range of issues and questions ranging from meta-theoretical underpinnings of existing Western-oriented IR theories to ways of theorising Asian histories and cultures. Contested Ideas of Regionalism in Asia He Baogang What Is at Stake in Building “Non-Western” International Relations Theory? Yong-Soo Eun International Relations as a Discipline in Thailand Theory and Sub-fields Edited by Chanintira na Thalang, Soravis Jayanama and Jittipat Poonkham Rethinking Middle Powers in The Asian Century New Theories, New Cases Edited by Tanguy Struye de Swielande, Dorothée Vandamme, David Walton and Thomas Wilkins Critical International Relations Theories in East Asia Relationality, Subjectivity, and Pragmatism Edited by Kosuke Shimizu
For the full list of titles in this series, please visit www.routledge.com/ IR-Theory-and-Practice-in-Asia/book-series/IRTPA
Critical International Relations Theories in East Asia
Relationality, Subjectivity, and Pragmatism Edited by Kosuke Shimizu
First published 2019 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2019 selection and editorial matter, Kosuke Shimizu; individual chapters, the contributors The right of Kosuke Shimizu to be identified as the author of the editorial material, and of the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Shimizu, Kosuke (Professor of International Relations), editor. Title: Critical international relations theories in East Asia: relationality, subjectivity, and pragmatism / edited by Kosuke Shimizu. Description: Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, 2019. | Series: IR theory and practice in Asia | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2018048807| ISBN 9780815363217 (hardback) | ISBN 9781351110235 (ebk.) Subjects: LCSH: East Asia—Foreign relations. | International relations—History. | East Asia—Politics and government. | East and West. | World politics. Classification: LCC JZ1720 .C75 2019 | DDC 327.101—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018048807 ISBN: 978-0-8153-6321-7 (hbk) ISBN: 978-1-351-11023-5 (ebk) Typeset in Galliard by codeMantra
In Memory of Lily
Contents
Preface List of Contributors Introduction
ix xi 1
Kosu k e Sh i m i zu
1 What is missing in the ongoing debate over non-Western IR theory building?
11
Yon g - S o o EUN
2 Appealing to humane capitalism as the International Relations of economics: comparing early and late globalizing Asia via Tomé Pires’ Suma Oriental (1515) and Mahathirist thought (1970–2008)
25
A l a n C hon g
3 Indigenization of International Relation theories in Korea and China: tails of two essentialisms
50
J u n g m i n S e o a n d H wa n bi L e e
4 Kōanizing IR: flipping the logic of epistemic violence
64
L .H.M. Li ng
5 International Relations concerning post-hybridity dangers and potentials in non-synthetic cycles
86
C h i h -y u S h i h a n d Jo s u k e Ik e da
6 Identity, time, and language: Nishida Kitaro’s philosophy and politics in non-Western discourse Kosu k e Sh i m i zu
103
viii Contents
7 On the necessary and disavowed subject of history in postwar “Japan”
120
H itomi K oyama
8 Pacific for whom: the ocean in Japan
138
A tsuko Watanabe
Index
157
Preface
Since its inception in 2005, the Afrasian Research Centre at Ryukoku University has been striving to find a new approach to conflict resolution and reconciliation. This volume is one of the results of the Centre’s enterprise for world peace. The Centre has published a series of working papers as well as edited pamphlets; all are available on its web page. Throughout the research in conflict and peace, we noted that more philosophical approaches are needed to investigate and analyze each concrete case we have engaged with in Asia. This volume specifically pays attention to the relationship between time and subjectivities, which was also the title of the second Afrasian International Symposium held in Kyoto in 2017. In 2015, the Centre began a new research project with funding from MEXT (the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology of Japan), specifically focusing on subjectivity in International Relations (IR). The project was established with the collaboration of IR researchers, including such prominent scholars as Takashi Inoguchi, and such Area Studies specialists as Takeshi Hamashita and Akio Tanabe, to reflect upon the unconventional subjectivities embedded in the local contexts and establish IR theories based on them. We are indebted to many people and institutions for their cooperation in composing this volume. First of all, we would like to thank MEXT and the Socio-Cultural Research Institute at Ryukoku University for providing financial support to the project. We would also like to thank the Research Assistants at the Centre, including Takumi Honda, Hitomi Koyama, Nobuyuki Matsui, and Ayana Matsuo, for their selfless support in organizing the symposiums. They were the core of the organization and the symposiums would not have been possible without their exceptional dedication. The final versions of the manuscripts were thoroughly read and edited by another assistant at the Centre, Shincha Park, whose knowledge of IR/Area Studies and writing/editing skills were exceedingly sophisticated, and his last-minute editing helped shape this volume. All the administrative work was undertaken by Akiko Takamine and Chiaki Yokoe of Ryukoku University, and we would like to appreciate their helps, which made the project run exceptionally smoothly. As the head of the project and the director of the Afrasian Research Centre, I am grateful to the participants of the first and second international symposiums,
x Preface Pinar Bilgin, Kelvin Cheung, Young Chul Cho, Alan Chong, Emilian K avalski, Hitomi Koyama, L.H.M Ling, Takeshi Hamashita, Eiichi Hoshino, Josuke Ikeda, Takashi Inoguchi, Akio Tanabe, Yasukatsu Matsushima, Jungmin Seo, Chih-yu Shih, Kohei Wakimura, and Atsuko Watanabe, for their lively and intensive discussions on the topic. Finally, we would like to specifically extend our gratitude to Lily Ling who were part of this project. Her enthusiasm for and devotion to the idea of new theories of IR have always been the basis of our research, and we would like to unmistakably and proudly acknowledge the work of the outstanding laoshi to be our intellectual foundation. Kosuke Shimizu, Ryukoku University, Kyoto
List of Contributors
Alan Chong is Associate Professor at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS) in Singapore. He has published widely on the notion of soft power and the role of ideas in constructing the international relations of Singapore and Asia. His publications have appeared in The Pacific Review, Contemporary Southeast Asia and the Review of International Studies. He has also edited the International Security in the Asia-Pacific: Transcending ASEAN towards Transitional Polycentrism (Palgrave, 2018), and served as co-editor (with Faizal bin Yahya) of State, Society and Information Technology in Asia (Ashgate/Routledge, 2014/2015). He is currently working on several projects exploring the notion of ‘Asian international theory’. Alan Chong can be contacted at [email protected]. Yong-Soo Eun, Ph.D., is Associate Professor of Political Science and International Studies at Hanyang University, South Korea, and the Editor-in-Chief of the Routledge series, IR Theory and Practice in Asia. He is broadly interested in IR theory, pluralism in social and international studies, Global IR, philosophy of social science and the international politics of the Asia-Pacific region. He is the author of Pluralism and Engagement in the Discipline of International Relations (Palgrave 2016). His work has also been published in Review of International Studies, Perspectives on Politics, PS: Political Science and Politics, and Chinese Journal of International Politics, among other venues. Josuke Ikeda is Associate Professor at the Faculty of Human Development at the University of Toyama, Japan. His latest publications include ‘The idea of the “Road” in International Relations Theory’, Perceptions (2014), and co-edited book of Eikoku Gakuha no Kokusai-Kankeiron (The English School of International Relations, in Japanese from Nihon Keizai Hyouronsha) (2013). Hitomi Koyama is Associate Professor of Politics and Law at the College of Global Liberal Arts, Ritsumeikan University, Japan. Formerly University Lecturer in the Faculty of Humanities, Leiden University Institute for Area Studies in the Netherlands, she received her PhD at Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, in 2015. She is the author of On the Persistence of the Japanese ‘History
xii List of Contributors Problem’: Historicism and the International Politics of History (Interventions Series, Routledge 2018); “On the Gesture of ‘I Prefer Not To’: Rethinking the Historical Titles and Territorial Claims Surrounding the Dokdo/Takeshima/ Liancourt Rock” in Victor Teo and Haruko Satoh eds., Japan’s Island Troubles with China and Korea: Prospects and Challenges for Resolution (Politics in Asia Series, Routledge 2018); “Rethinking Japan in mainstream international relations” (with Barry Buzan), International Relations of the Asia-Pacific, lcy013 (May 2018); and “Historicism, Coloniality, and Culture in Wartime Japan”, Contexto Internacional, Vol. 38, No. 3 (2016). Hwanbi Lee is currently an MA student in the Department of Political Science at Yonsei University. Her MA thesis focuses on how Pakistan military manipulates elections through clientelism and legal institutions. Her research interests centre on authoritarian regimes, civil-military relations and the impact of relations with India and China on domestic politics, specifically in the region of South Asia. L.H.M. Ling was Professor in the Graduate Program in International Affairs (GPIA) in Milano School of International Affairs, Management, and Urban Policy at The New School, New York City. Her research critically assessed the Westphalian approach to world politics through the notion of worldism. Prof. Ling published books and articles extensively including Postcolonial International Relations (Palgrave Macmillan, 2002), Transforming World Politics (Routledge, 2009, co-authored with Anna M. Agathangelou), The Dao of World Politics (Routledge, 2013), Imagining World Politics (Routledge, 2014) and Asia in International Relations (Routledge, 2017, co-authored with Piner Bilgin). Jungmin Seo is Professor of Political Science and International Studies at Yonsei University. He taught at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa and the University of Oregon before joining Yonsei University. His research interests include Chinese and Korean politics, nationalism, international migration and state-society relations. He has a Ph.D. in political science from the University of Chicago. Chih-yu Shih teaches international relations theory, anthropology of knowledge and China studies at the Department of Political Science at National Taiwan University. He is also co-editor of the journal Asian Ethnicity. He is currently working on intellectual history of China and Chinese studies, which is accessible at http://www.china-studies.taipei/. His recent English publications include Post-Western International Relations Reconsidered (2015), Post-Communist Sinology in Transformation (2016), From Sinology to Post-Chineseness (2017), China Studies in the Philippines (2018) and China and International Theory (2019), among others. Kosuke Shimizu is Professor of international Relations at the Department of Global Studies. He is also the Director of the Afrasian Research Centre, and the Dean of Research of the Ryukoku University, Kyoto. He has
List of Contributors xiii received his Ph.D. from the Victoria University of Wellington, and is currently working on critical theories and philosophy of the Kyoto School. His recent English publications include Multiculturalism and Conflict Reconciliation in the Asia-Pacific (Palgrave Macmillan, 2014, co-authored with W illiam S. Bradley); “Materialising the ‘Non-Western’”, Cambridge Review of International Affairs, 28 (1), 2015; “Reflection, the Public, and the Modern Machine,” Japanese Journal of Political Science, 18 (4), 2018; and “Do Time and Language Matter in IR?”, Korean Journal of International Studies, 16 (1), 2018. Atsuko Watanabe is Project Research Fellow at the Institute for Advanced Studies on Asia at the University of Tokyo. She holds an associate fellowship at the Centre for the Study of Globalization and Regionalization at the University of Warwick, UK. Her current research is related to global intellectual history, particularly on geopolitical concepts. She is the author of Japanese Geopolitics and the Western Imagination (2019), and a co-editor of Modern Japanese Political Thought and International Relations (2018). Her recent publications have appeared, among others, in the Political Geography and European Journal of International Relations.
Introduction Kosuke Shimizu
It has been said that until recently International Relations (IR) has been dominated by the “Western” theories and discourses whose main concern is to understand the world scientifically and objectively and establish a universally applicable theory of the world. Here the “Western” IR refers to such established discourses as realism, liberalism, and constructivism of IR. As is well known, the mainstream’s attitude towards IR theory (IRT) has been severely criticized in the “Third Debate,” and their alleged scientific and objective epistemology was thrown into question (Smith, Booth, & Zalewski, 1996). However, in the Third Debate, the main concern was confined to epistemology, while ontology was hardly touched upon (Neumann & Wæver, 1997). Later, post-colonialism gave another attack on the mainstream IR that these discourses were a part of the modernist project of imperialism. It has brought in different and ignored dimensions such as history, art, and novels, and this attempt was probably the first time that ontology became the target of the debate in IR. Ontology is, needless to say, an elusive term. When we discuss, for instance, the recent US involvement into North Korea, we all agree that we know what the US and North Korea mean. When we think of the Brexit, we all presume that everyone has the same understanding of what EU and Britain consist of. The original meaning of ontology is a “philosophical inquiry into what it is.” In IR, it often refers to what the target of our intellectual enterprise is. Then what is it? The world? What does “the world” mean then? Realists presume that the world consists of nation-state, and only nation-state. Their version of the world is full of conflicts in which all nation-states are supposed to unceasingly compete with each other in order to maximize their profit and to secure their sovereignty. Liberalists may add to the list international organizations and multinational corporations considering the market as one of the main targets of the academic inquiry. In the case of constructivism, ideas and norms are added to the list. In any case, nation-states remain as the core composition of IR discourses, and they presumably exist prior to our inquiry. In other words, they are pre-given. Even if we consider the newly developed non-Western IR theories, it seems to make little difference in terms of subjectivity and ontology. This is because the non-Western IR theories generally succeeded the Western philosophical foundations, particularly ontological ones, of the mainstream IR theories, which
2 Kosuke Shimizu is exclusively grounded in the pre-set ontological subjectivity of nation-state. The so-called Chinese School of IR, for example, provides the most indicative case. Generally speaking, Chinese School is said to include the “relational” turn, or “Guanxi,” of IR (Qin, 2016); application of “Tianxia,” or all-underheaven theory of Chinese philosophy (Zhao, 2006); or employing Confucian Humane Authority of hegemony (Yan, 2011). While the focus of their inquiry is diverse, what they commonly inherited from the Western positivist tradition is a pre-set subjectivity of ontology before actions. They presume that “China” unchangeably exists prior to any interactions with others. For them, the existence of “China” is a precondition of their narration, although it might be their narratives that construct “China,” if we take the relationality critique seriously. However, “China” is also an elusive term. What “China” represents is totally depending on how individuals interpret and construct the term. As Sankaran Krishna (2017) argues in criticizing David Kang’s East Asia before the West, which eagerly described that China in the ancient era enjoyed the relatively safe period, we could interpret ancient China to be a place of full of violence if we consider the violence that took place at the frontiers, particularly northern and western ones (p. 98). In other words, there are two different versions of what ancient China really represents, one as a safe nation and one as full of violence, which is largely determined by the teleological perception that a researcher has prior to the research. In this sense, the relationship between epistemology and ontology must come under the light of our investigation. We usually and uncritically presume that ontology, or target of our inquiry, is given prior to our engagement with it. However, as we have seen above, our epistemological engagement in IR in fact totally relies on the ontological agreement that supposedly exists among the researchers, and the very action of our inquiry successively confirms and even strengthens the ontological quality. The concept of relationality is categorical in the context of ontology of IR. Usually in the contemporary IR, a relation is regarded as lying between two different entities, for example, subjectivities. In this context, the two entities come prior to the relation; therefore, the quality of subjectivities is not influenced by the relationship by any means. However, relationality in Asian thought, be it Confucianism, Buddhism, or Daoism, is directly related to the ever-changing nature of subjectivity. It is relationality that constructs subjects, not the other way around. For instance, the Kyoto School philosophy, which developed existentialist ontology on the basis of Asian Ancient thought in the first half of the twentieth century at the Kyoto Imperial University, argues that “it is experiences that produce the subjects, it is not subjects which go through experiences” (Nishida, 1965, p. 4). In this sense, there are three actors in a relation in the Asian context; first those who thinks that he/she has the relationship with the other; second who is seen as the other; and the third that is the very relation itself. Here the third party, the relation, is seen as containing a certain ontological quality. The relation, typically exemplified by an experience, here refers to the unexpected encounter
Introduction 3 to the “others,” and the encounter guarantees originality and peculiarity of each individual. A series of encounters engender an individual one and only. This individual is not a standardized average individual as we usually understand the term “individual.” It is rather a peculiar “self,” not a standardized “individual,” if I borrow the term from another Kyoto School philosopher Jun Tosaka, and each “self” has a record of peculiar history, encounters, and relationalities. This perception tells us that each subject is different from one another due to its peculiar history of encounters, and should not be thought in a standardized way. When we assume the third party, thus relationality, to be temporal that takes place exclusively momentarily, subjectivities inevitably become fluid and flexible. However, when the third party becomes materialized and institutionalized, subjectivities consequently become stable and rigid. Miki Kiyoshi, who also studied in the Kyoto Imperial University, for example, argues that a typical example of the institutionalized third party is myths. He argued that, strictly speaking, the third party holds a specific character of “the form without a form” which becomes possible only by the human capacity called “imagination.” When the third party is materialized in a form disregarding its original character, such as the national myths used and abused to construct a national polity in the case of prewar Japan, the myths become a devise to control and maintain a particular type of individuals (Miki, 1967). In other words, the third party, relationality, should be deconstructed when it is institutionalized, and should be left temporal and momentary for the sake of freedom and diversity of individuals (Kado, 2007). What is interesting in this ontology of relationality is the assumed nature of the ever-changing subjectivities. As individuals are always open to new and unexpected encounters when the relationality takes place momentary, subjectivities are never fixed or presupposed since the encounters to “others” are the primary source of subjectivity making. All identities including individuals, collective identities, nation-states or even global citizens are always subject to dynamic alterations and transformations into something new and never supposed to stay the same. What intrigues us here is the fact that the subject transformations supposedly do not have a clear end, and this influences the general perception of temporality. As the subject transformation does not have a clear end in the Asian context, the construction of subject is totally contingent, and the contingency in the subjectivity construction provides a very sharp contrast to the Western linear progressive perspective of history. Unlike the latter, the former evidently shows a very strong tendency to concentrate on the present or moment, and often results in the pragmatic attitude towards problems they face. In some cases, they even decide not to solve the problems as a temporal solution and leave them aside if the parties involved explicitly or implicitly agreed with each other (Mogi, 1997; Yonaha, 2008). A typical example here is the Ryukyu Kingdom from the seventeenth to the nineteenth centuries. In 1609, the Satsuma Clan of Japan violently invaded the Ryukyu Kingdom. Before the invasion, the Ryukyu Kingdom was under the hierarchy of the Ming Dynasty, and a tribute nation to it. The Japanese
4 Kosuke Shimizu invasion of the Ryukyu was immediately reported to the Ming Dynasty, yet the Dynasty made no reaction to this unsettling incident, and practically ignored it. The Tokugawa Shōgunate became aware that the invasion came to be known by the Ming Dynasty. What followed was practically nothing, except for the Ryukyu Kingdom being under two different powers (Mogi, 1997). This pragmatic attitude to avoid conflicts is sometimes interpreted as the result of a particular time concept, namely cyclical one in contrast to linear progressive time of the “Western” civilization. Cyclicality of time here is often understood in contrast to the linearity of time (McKay, 2017; Walker, 1993). Here, linearity and cyclicality become the focus of the inquiry into temporality. When we think of time today, the linear progressive time frame is what we usually adopt. Time continuously “flows” from the past through the present to the future. According to the progression of time, our lives supposedly become more civilized and improved. We are a part of civilizational advancement, and this advancement is irreversible by any means. On the cyclical time frame, it is assumed that the time repeats similar history; thus, the society is seen as stable and unchanging. In IR, this time frame has been regarded as the representation of unremovable stagnation and violent conflict, and often spatialized into the concept of sovereignty in the form of the inside/outside (McKay, 2017, p. 5; Walker, 1993, pp. 11, 78, 177). In many cases, contemporary IR is seen as reification of linear time frame which is directed to a certain perfection, be it the democratic peace, civilization, harmonious institutional arrangement, revolution of proletariat, or the world government. They all adopt the concept of dialectical progression, and the goal of the dialectics is pre-set. As a result, our engagement in IR is always based on the perception of a linear evolution from where we are to the given future end. This is particularly so in the case of liberal institutionalism and Marxism. Liberal institutionalism sees the world peace in the international cooperation, and this can be done only through the completion of the international organizations. The classical Marxism tries to achieve communist government as the goal of their political engagement. To a certain extent, global civil society perspectives or feminism subscribe to the linearity too. Global civil society approach sees the “political emancipation” by the establishment of “global extension of democracy” through civil society organizations (Kaldor, 2003, pp. 11–12). Feminism uses the lens of women to present a radically different scenery of the world in order to promote “equality and justice for all women” as the ultimate goal (Kinsella, 2017, p. 191). One of the exceptions for linearity of time in IR is surprisingly realism. Realist assumption of confrontational and conflictual nature of nation-state as the only actor of IR does not seem to have a chance for change. It is supposed to be a given “fact” that nation-state is always eager to strengthen its power to maintain state sovereignty. In this understanding, there are no opportunities for a change in the world landscape. A nation-state may have a linear progression towards the hegemonic status, yet this will be followed by trade deficit, economic downturn, increase in unemployment, and inward-looking xenophobia. The hegemonic
Introduction 5 status of the nation will be discarded as a result, and has to face the danger of the decline. All in all, this is a repetition of the same old story. In this sense, the realist understanding of world affairs is not based on the linearity, but rather on cyclicality. The presumed fact of cyclicality of time in realism is, in fact, a reification of the inside/outside dichotomy, which Rob Walker severely criticized. In the realist reading of world affairs, the inside is characterized by order and stability, while the outside is supposed to be full of confrontations and conflict. The outside is a representation of “other” which is placed in contrast to the Western civilized “self” (Walker, 1993). Therefore, we could say that realism is describing the “other” with the cyclicality of time frame, and consequently cyclicality is equated with disorder and insecurity in the realist reading. While liberalism and Marxism, and, to a lesser extent, feminism and Global Civil Society approach are attempts to apply the domestic analogy of the linear progress to world affairs, realism is based on the clear distinction of domestic and international. But of importance is the fact that all of them regard linear time frame as something favorable and legitimate, while the cyclical to be loath and invalid. In other words, the mainstream IRTs are “othering” the cyclical time in order to legitimize the linear progressive perception of temporality. We all assume in this book that the contrast of linearity and cyclicality is rather misleading. It is rather, we assume, political in a sense the cyclical perception of time is constructed to referring to “other” time frame for the sake of legitimacy of time of the “self” in the West. In fact, it is an oversimplification to bundle up all “other” non-Western time frames with “cyclical.” Some Western understanding of time is not linear, for example, hegemonic stability theory, while some non-Western perception towards time is no cyclical, for example, Japanese Medieval linear time (Maki, 2003, Chapter 2). The forerunner of temporality and IR, Kimberly Hutchings, in fact, carefully avoids the linear/cyclical dichotomy of temporality and introduces chronos and kairos distinction instead. In her Time and World Politics (2008), Hutchings distinguishes “time as quantitatively measurable duration, associated with the inevitable birth-death life cycle of individuals (chronos), and time as transformational time of action, in which certainty of death and decay is challenged (kairos)” (p. 5). While some researchers confuse her distinction of chronos and kairos with linearity and cyclicality, Hutchings’s main concern was more about kairos’s transformationality. Kairos contains the disruptive and transformative function against the continuous character of chronos. Thus, the distinction between chronos and kairos is characterized by the relationship between continuity as normal represented by chronos and discontinuity as exceptional by kairos (Hutchings, 2008, p. 5). What is kairos then? In this context, Maki Yusuke’s distinction of four types of temporality is suggestive. In the first place, Maki adopts the traditional Western distinction between linearity and cyclicality as one of the frameworks to examine the concept of time. He also investigates the distinction between quantitative and qualitative time, the former to be abstract and the latter to be concrete. In investigating history and tradition of time in the West and East, he states that “cyclical” is
6 Kosuke Shimizu misleading in some cases particularly in some non-Western context, and introduces “repetitive” and “vibrating” instead when it comes to concrete lives of people because our concept of time is constructed on the basis of bodily experience such as day and night, or when cows go to the meadow and when cows come back to the cowshed (Maki, 2003, p.19). In other words, nonlinear concept of time can be described as “cyclical” when it stays on the abstract level, whereas “repetitive” when it is of concrete bodily experiences. Therefore, there are four types of time frames including linear-quantitative, linear-qualitative, cyclical-quantitative and repetitive-qualitative (Maki, 2003, p. 163). Maki sees linear-qualitative time frame to be “segmented linearity” instead of simple linearity of the linear-quantitative because the former has a particular set of beginning and end instead of the eternity of past and future like the latter. In other words, the qualitative time is intimately related to space, while the quantitative time is independent of a particular location (p. 193). Only after the divorce from the physical location, the contemporary understanding of the eternal linearity of time becomes possible. Similarly, nonlinear time frames have two distinctive types. The cyclical- quantitative is a time frame commonly seen in the non-Western world. Confucianism, Buddhism, and Daoism are allegedly all constructed on the basis of the cyclical-quantitative time. The repetitive-qualitative time frame is a characteristic time concept inherent in “primitive” society according to Maki. It is rarely seen in the contemporary world, but conceptually possible. What distinguishes these two is, of course, the feasibility of being used in the intercommunal relations. While major religions in the Asian region, for example, are spread out over the borders, and therefore, constructed with cyclical time frame, a community of small scale and relative autonomy tend to use repetitive time frame. What Maki tries to clarify by identifying four different styles of time is to put an emphasis on the link between time and space. Quantitative time frame shows the frequency of intercommunal relations in the contemporary world, which requires standardization of time in order for the trans-communal communication. This was in a certain sense the beginning of the globalization process. Some scholars argue that “time and globalization each have their own complex social histories, yet the two domains have always been intertwined” (Huebener et al., 2017, p. 1). When time becomes quantitative, and thus, communicative for intercommunal relations, it becomes more abstract due mainly to the separation of time and space. Time is not connected to a particular space anymore, and has its own autonomy. On the other hand, according to Maki (2003), the qualitative time is concrete, and inherently linked to particular space and events (p. 36). This means that time is intimately related to a particular space, and this perception can be understood as grounded in bodily experiences (Maki, 2003, p. 163). Our enterprise to understand world affairs is always based on the quantitative time framing. This is because our investigation of world events always adopts abstract ontologies, namely nation-state and market. Nation-state and market are regarded as universal and standardized. They are everywhere and their quality is always supposed to be the same. For example, hegemonic stability theory tells us
Introduction 7 of the cyclical time of world hegemony, but it does not tell us the differences of quality each hegemony had. Hegemonic states are supposed to show the same, or similar at best, path of rise and decline. Similarly, liberalism shows linear progressive economic development and civilization on the basis of free market economy, while the democratic peace theory ushers us to a place in which civilization and democracy are regarded as the converging goal. Traditional Marxism is not an exception. Its theory of material stages for historical dialectics is supposed to be applicable to any nations. In their articulations of the world, time is quantified and utterly separated from space. One of the evident consequences of this separation of time and space is the fixed subjectivity. A particular nation, Japan for instance, becomes timeless subjectivity lasting from the ancient time to the present with no substantial change. Japan as a nation-state is same as Japan in the ancient time, and Japan under the tribute system of China 700 years ago. In order to prove the existence of everlasting Japaneseness as a nation, traditionalist Japanese intellectuals often employ the emperor system, which has been existent for far more than a millennium (Nishida, 1965). Here, the existence of the emperor system is detached from the concrete history, and became an abstract institution on the basis of the quantified time. Time becomes the focus of our inquiry only when we investigate the timing a certain event happened. In this investigation, we may understand peoples did this, soldiers did that. However, what is missing here are the concrete experiences and qualities of the peoples, soldiers, and, of course, emperors, where time and space are intertwined. In other words, what sort of peoples, what sort of soldiers, and what sort of emperors should be the target of our inquiry. To do this, we need to be cautious and fully understand that the subjectivities we analyze are not abstract. They are placed as bodily existence in the processes of changes every moment. Each actor is/was always under the economic, social, and political pressure. Only by understanding the time-space relation and its consequence to subjectivity, our inquiry into IR becomes more plausible. This book is to reflect upon the meanings of the pre-set and abstract ontology frozen in the discourse of the “Western” AND “non-Western” IR by basing our perception on the fluid and ever-changing subjectivities. It evidently reveals that IR scholars are always set and ushered to talk about political events in terms of geopolitical divisions and the abstract linear progressive historical perspective as far as we take IR as it is. We are destined and designed to see a nation-state, like China or Japan, to be monolithic and everlasting. The assumption of the pre-given and abstract subjectivities with the idea of linear progressive time leads us to say, “Japan is threatened by the China rising” without questioning what “Japan” and “China” mean in this context. This book tries to locate and unearth the consistent structure and system of the world, with a particular focus on subjectivity and temporality in IR, that captures the way in that we conceive and misconceive the world. In this sense, this book is not another attempt to establish a “non-Western” or “Global” IR. It is far less ambitious than that, only to focus on the meanings of putting the everlasting subjectivities with pragmatic orientation of Asian
8 Kosuke Shimizu thought into the context of contemporary IR. It is to reveal the extent to which contemporary IR discourses are a part of the culture of linear progress and pre-given autonomous sovereign individuals. Our targets of inquiry therefore inevitably include not only “Western” IR, but “non-Western” and “Global” IR discourses as well. In sum, a particular methodology penetrates this volume, that is, the focus on the fluid identities of contemporary world affairs with special attention to temporality, and we strive to develop a new perception towards the contemporary world in order for better understanding of world affairs.
Chapters Each chapter in this volume is located in one of the three main foci, including problems of “non-Western” IR, alternative subjectivity in perceptions, and a lternative subjectivity in memory. The first part serves as an introductory section of the book by clarifying that the problem of subjectivity in IR is not limited to the mainstream IR, but also the recent discourse of “non-Western” IR. The second part provides an alternative perception of subjectivity by introducing such refreshing and new ideas of kōans and post-hybridity. The third part involves empirical tests of the idea of alternative subjectivity in the past in order to provide cautionary tales for the contemporary attempts for a lternative approaches. After the introduction, Chapter 1, “What is Missing in the Ongoing Debate over Non-Western IR Theory Building?” by Yong-Soo Eun, argues that both “Western” and “non-Western” theories at the outset of the debate between them have avoided an important question of pluralism in IR. Do we really need pluralism in IR in the first place? If we do, what is that for? Eun criticizes the heated debate of “Western” and “non-Western” discourses for their prefixed subjectivities in order to make it more dialogic. Chapter 2, “Appealing to Humane Capitalism as the International Relations of Economics: Comparing Early and Late Globalizing Asia via Tomé Pires’ Suma Oriental (1515) and Mahathirist Thought (1970–2008)” by Alan Chong, introduces a pluralistic capitalism of sixteenth-century Asia, and compares it with more contemporary perception of capitalism provided by Malaysia’s longest serving iconoclastic premier Mahathir bin Mohamad in order to reflect upon an Asian perspective on humane capitalism, which he calls “international relations of economics.” Chapter 3, by Jungmin Seo and Hwanbi Lee, “Indigenization of International Relation Theories in Korea and China: Tales of two Essentialisms” introduces the paradox in “non-Western” discourses in South Korea and China that such efforts to develop allegedly indigenous IRTs inevitably resulted in strengthening the basic assumptions of Anglo-American IRTs that is fundamentally based on the Westphalian concept of sovereignty. By using the concept of hegemony and culture in cultural studies, Seo and Lee suggests that so-called indigenized IRTs in China and Korea are trapped in the notion of essentialist and hegemonic notion of nation-state of Anglo-American mainstream IRTs.
Introduction 9 We shift our focus in Part II to alternative IRTs. Chapter 4, “Kōanizing IR: Flipping the Logic of Epistemic Violence” by L.M.H. Ling, introduces Zen Buddhism in order to criticize the mainstream IRTs for their unquestioned acceptance of the presumption of fixed subjectivity. By focusing on Zen Buddhism’s austerities of kōans, Ling pledges for disturbing the logical consistence of IR, which is firmly constructed on masculine Western logic. Chapter 5 is by Chih-yu Shih and Josuke Ikeda, titled “International Relations Concerning Post-Hybridity Dangers and Potentials in Non-Synthetic Cycles.” This chapter argues that although the concept of hybridity has been the site for the struggle for post-colonial justice, it has now turned into the site of violence and injustice such as terrorism. In order to transcend this state of affairs, they advocate the idea of post-hybridity, which evidently shows the contemporary subjectivity of ever-changing. Part III is more historical. Chapter 6, “Identity, Time, and Language: Nishida Kitaro’s Philosophy and Politics in Non-Western Discourse” by Kosuke Shimizu, attempts to clarify the reason for the Kyoto School’s involvement with the Imperial regime of Japan prior to and during WWII. Shimizu argues that the involvement was due to their acceptance of linear time of history in their practice of politics despite their philosophical enterprise with the concept of cyclical time. Chapter 7 by Hitomi Koyama, “On the Necessary and Disavowed Subject of History in Postwar ‘Japan’,” concentrates upon the inherent tension in the politics of history in the postwar Japan. By exploring politics of Japanese and Asian history in the post-Postwar era, Koyama argues that we need to consider that the subject of history is constantly interrupted, and the greyness or ambiguity of the subject will call forth the limitation of IR theoretical presuppositions. Chapter 8, “Pacific for Whom: The Ocean in Japan” by Atsuko Watanabe, demonstrates the ambivalent role the ocean has played in transforming the subjectivity of Japan. In order to develop her argument, Watanabe focuses on the shifts in the Japanese perception of regional geopolitical order from the nineteenth century to WWII. By prudently analyzing a large quantity of unexamined works by Japanese geopoliticians, Watanabe argues that an analysis of what the “absence” of “non-Western” theory practically means requires more careful historical investigations.
Acknowledgement This book is based upon a series of symposiums held at the Afrasian Research Centre, Ryukoku University, Kyoto, in 2015 and 2016. This volume is also based on research projects funded by JSPS 15H01855, the Afrasian Research Centre, and the Socio-Cultural Research Institute of Ryukoku University.
References Huebener, P., O’Brien, S., Porter, T., Stockdale, L., & Zhou, Y. R. (2017). Introduction. In P. Huebener, S. O’Brien, T. Porter, L. Stockdale, & Y. R. Zhou (Eds.), Time, globalization and human experience: Interdisciplinary explorations (pp. 1–25). London: Routledge.
10 Kosuke Shimizu Hutchings, K. (2008). Time and world politics: Thinking the present. Manchester: Manchester University Press. Kado, K. (2007). Nishida Kitaro to kokka eno toi [Nishida Kitaro and the question of state]. Tokyo: Ibunsha Kaldor, M. (2003). Global civil society: An answer to war. Cambridge: Polity. Kang, D. C. (2010). East Asia before the west: Five centuries of trade and tribute. New York, NY: Columbia University Press. Kinsella, H. M. (2017). Feminism. In J. Baylis, S. Smith, & P. Ownens (Eds.), The globalization of world politics: An introduction to international relations (pp. 189–203). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Krishna, S. (2017) China is China, not the Non-West: David Kang, Eurocentrism, and global politics. Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies, 77(1), 93–109. Maki, Y. (2003). Jikan no hikaku shakaigaku [Comparative sociology of time]. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten. McKay, A. (2017). Introduction. In A. Hom, C. McIntosh, A. MacKay, & L. Stockdale (Eds.), Time, temporality, and global politics (pp. 1–19). Bristol: E-International R elations Publishing. Miki, K. (1967). ‘Kōsōryoku no ronri’ [Theory of the imagination]. In K. Masuda (Ed.), Miki Kiyoshi zenshū [The collected works of Miki Kiyoshi] (Vol. 8, pp. 1–509). Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten. Mogi, T. (1997). Henyo suru kindai higashi ajia no kokusai chitsujo [The changing modern East Asian international order]. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten. Neumann, I. B., & Wæver, O. (Eds.). (1997). The future of international relations: Masters in the making? London: Routledge. Nishida, K. (1965). ‘Nihon bunka no mondai’ [The question of Japanese culture]. In Y. Abe, T. Amano, T. Watsuji, T. Yamauchi, R. Mutai, M. Kosaka, & T. Shimomura (Eds.), Nishida Kitaro zenshū [The collected works of Nishida Kitaro] (Vol. 12, pp. 275–394). Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten. (Original work published 1938) Qin, Y. (2016). A relational theory of world politics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Smith, S., Booth, K., & Zalewski, M. (1996). International theory: Positivism and beyond. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Walker, R. B. J. (1993). Inside/outside: International relations as political theory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Yan, X. (2011). Ancient Chinese thought, modern Chinese power. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Yonaha, J. (2008). ‘Saikindaika suru sekai? Higashi ajiashi kara mita kokusai syakairon’ [Re-modernizing world? International society theory from East Asia]. In T. Oga & Y. Sugita (Eds.), Kokusai shakai no igi to genkai: Riron, shisō, rekishi [The meanings and limitations of international society: Theories, thought, history] (pp. 251–272). Tokyo: Kokusai Shoin. Zhao, T. (2006). Rethinking empire from a Chinese concept “all-under-heaven” (Tian-Xia). Social Identities, 12(1), 29–41.
1 What is missing in the ongoing debate over nonWestern IR theory building? Yong-Soo EUN
Non-Western IR: endorsement and criticism1 Whether there are any substantial merits of theorizing “non-Western” International Relations (IR) and what such a theory would (or should) look like are topics of a heated debate in the study of contemporary IR. Such a remarkable interest in non-Western (or “post-Western”) IR theory is largely derived from apparent concerns about American and Western dominance of the field and the corresponding marginalization of IR studies produced outside the West (Acharya, 2010, 2014). Moreover, the growing body of literature on non-Western IR often begins with an expressed discontent with the explanatory utility of existing mainstream IR theories, namely realism, liberalism, and constructivism, all of which have Western—or more to the point, Eurocentric (Patomaki, 2007)—origins or orientations in their conceptual, theoretical, and normative foundations. West-centric or, in Johnston’s words (2012, p. 53), “transatlantic” IR theory, is often criticized for misrepresenting and therefore misunderstanding much of the rest of the world. What is more, it is often highlighted that Asia has unique cultures, institutions, norms, and worldviews that are inherently d ifferent from those derived from or advanced in Europe (Kang, 2010). Consider, for example, Kang’s critique. In his well-known piece, “Getting Asia Wrong,” Kang (2003) called for “new analytical frameworks,” noting that “most international relations theories derived from the European experience of the past four centuries… do a poor job as they are applied to Asia” (pp. 57–58). A critique of this kind has, indeed, long served as a starting premise upon which theoretical studies on Asian IR are based. Almost two decades ago, K atzenstein (1997) wrote as follows: “Theories based on Western, and especially West European, experience have been of little use in making sense of Asian regionalism” (p. 1). Similarly, Herbst (2000) commented that “International relations theory, derived from ‘an extended series of case studies of Europe’ has become notorious for falling short of accounting for the richness and particularity of Asia’s regional politics” (p. 23). More recently, a similar line of thinking was also found in Acharya and Buzan’s edited volume, Non-Western International Relations Theory (2010), in which they stated as follows:
12 Yong-Soo EUN The puzzle for us is that the sources of international relations theory conspicuously fail to correspond to the global distribution of its subjects. Our question is: “why is there no non-Western international theory?” We are as intrigued by the absence of theory in the non-West. (p. 1) Here, China’s rise has added certain momentum to the long-standing attempts to build new or indigenous theoretical frameworks, especially within the C hinese IR community. Qin (2007), of China Foreign Affairs University, asserted that Chinese IR theory “is likely and inevitable [emphasis added] to emerge along with the great economic and social transformation that China has been experiencing” (p. 313). In a later piece on a similar topic, Qin (2011) explained why the development of a Chinese IR theory is “inevitable,” saying: Although the major achievements of the last three decades in China have been made by learning [of Western IR]…the more Chinese have learned, the more they want to create, especially when they find that Western IR theory is sometimes unable to provide satisfactory explanation… If persistent efforts are made, it will be inevitable for Chinese IR theory, with local experience and universal validity, to emerge and grow. (pp. 252–253) It seems that the logic underlying this projection is associated not only with empirical observations of a rising China, but also with political commitments. The scholarly practices of building an IR theory “with Chinese characteristics” is a representative case in point (see Seo & Lee, Chapter 4 in this volume). For example, consider the arguments by Liang Shoude of Peking University. Liang is one of many Chinese scholars who argue for the need of an IR theory that reflects China’s cultural traditions and national interests. Specifically, he has suggested that Chinese scholars bring Chinese characteristics to the fore in the study of IR; going a step further, Liang (1994) emphasized that “the end purpose of IR studies in China should be to safeguard China’s national sovereignty and to serve its national interest, and to inherit and carry on the historical tradition of Chinese culture” (cited in Song, 2001, p. 68). Regardless of whether they agree on the end purpose of IR studies in China suggested by Liang, Chinese (and non-Chinese) scholars have made considerable attempts to discern Chinese characteristics in discussions of a Chinese IR theory. Confucianism, Marxism, “Tianxia” (天下, “all-under-heaven”), the Chinese tributary system (朝贡体制), and the philosophy of Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping have all been incorporated as the theoretical sources of Chinese IR (for example, Horesh, 2013; Kang, 2010; Qin, 2007, 2011; Song, 2001; Wan, 2012; Wang, 2011, 2013; Yan, 2011; Zhang, 2012; Zhao, 2009). In this sense, Kristensen and Nielsen (2013) claimed that “the innovation of a Chinese IR theory is a natural [emphasis added] product of China’s geopolitical rise, its growing political ambitions, and discontent with Western hegemony”
What is missing in the ongoing debate? 13 (p. 19). Although consensus concerning what the Chinese characteristics are has yet to be achieved, many Chinese scholars tend to hold the view that building a Chinese IR theory, whatever its characteristics and purposes would be, is desirable. As Qin (2011) explained: A general consensus among Chinese scholars was reached in the mid-1990s on the possibility and desirability of building Chinese IRT [IR theory], and the discussion since 2000 has focused more on how to build Chinese IRT than whether to develop Chinese IRT. (p. 250) On the other hand, a significant number of criticisms have been raised against the increasing number of attempts to develop a Chinese IR theory and (by extension) a non-Western IR theory. Such criticisms are based on various empirical, epistemological, and normative aspects. Empirically, first, Asian IR are not fundamentally different from those of Europe in the sense that anarchy, survival, and the balance of power have been the key operating and organizing principles when it comes to state-to-state interactions during the premodern period, as well as since the “encounter with the West” of the nineteenth century. For example, based on a detailed archive analysis of China’s foreign relations under the Song and Ming dynasties, Wang (2011) concluded that in the “anarchical” international environment at that time, “Confucian culture did not constrain the [Chinese] leaders’ decisions to use force; in making such decisions, leaders have been mainly motivated by their assessment of the balance of power between China and its adversary” (p. 181). This finding led Wang to endorse the theoretical utility of structural realism. Epistemologically as well, critics have pointed out that it is “unscientific” to emphasize and/or incorporate the culture or worldview of a specific nation or region in theorizing IR, for theory should seek universality and generality to be recognized as a “scientific” enterprise. In the case of China, criticism of this kind can be increasingly discerned in the studies conducted by younger generations of Chinese IR scholars. According to Song’s (2001) observation, “Chinese scholars, especially those younger ones who have had experiences of studying in the West, think that it is unscientific or unnecessary to emphasize the so-called Chinese characteristics” (p. 68).2 This emphasis on the universality of theory also resonates with South Korean IR scholars’ concern with “Korean-style” theory building (Cho, 2015), and the question of “How can we make a distinctively Korean IR theory while trying to be as generalizable as possible?” This is a key question frequently asked in the search for a Korean school of IR. For instance, Choi (2008) wrote: “any theorizing based on Korea’s unique historical experiences must be tested under the principle of generality… Although Korean IR should strive to explain the country’s unique historical experience, it will be judged by strict measurements of scientific universalism” (pp. 209, 215). This represents a readily acknowledged line of thinking within the Korean IR community (for example, Chun, 2007; Min, 2007).
14 Yong-Soo EUN A normative line of criticism of building non-Western IR theory highlights the power-knowledge relationship. Like the case of a West-centric IR, the criticism goes, the current scholarly practices and discourses associated with non-Western IR will also entail a hegemonic logic that serves to enhance specific national or regional interests (Callahan, 2008; Hurrell, 2016). In this regard, Chen (2011) noted: “Re-envisioning IR in Asia is not about discovering or producing as many ‘indigenous’ national schools of IR as possible” (p. 1), and “Scholars… must also recognize and resist the pitfalls of equating the mere increase of non-Western voices with the genuine democratization of the field, if they are to live up to their responsibility to jointly construct a non-hegemonic discipline” (p. 16). In a similar vein, Ikeda (2011) commented as follows: “there needs ‘post- Western’ turn rather [than] ‘non-Western,’ [sic] or more precisely, the latter should be a step move [sic] towards the former” in order to address “another kind of ‘Westfailure’ in IR theory” (pp. 12–13). In short, what critics indicate is that, although it is our responsibility to render the present status of IR more democratic and diverse, “most intellectual endeavors to construct non-Western IRT in Asia run the risk of inviting nativism” (Chen, 2011, p. 16).3 Hurrell (2016) concurred on this point, adding: Uncovering the culturally specific character of particular ways of understanding the world undoubtedly encourages greater pluralism… But it can also lead to a cultural and regional inwardness that may work to reproduce the very ethnocentricities that are being challenged. (pp. 149–150) Sharing these concerns about a hegemonic or exclusive form of knowledge production and its political ramifications involved in the quest for non-Western IR theory, a group of scholars began to pay greater attention to the “globalization” of IR, with the concept of Global IR. Acharya is probably the most passionate scholar in this academic endeavor. In his presidential address delivered at the annual convention of the International Studies Association (ISA) in 2014, Acharya explained what “Global IR” is (or should look like). His background assumption was as follows: “The discipline of International Relations does not reflect the voices, experiences, knowledge claims, and contributions of the vast majority of the societies and states in the world, and often marginalizes those outside the core countries of the West” (Acharya, 2014, p. 647). However, instead of arguing for a counter or alternative (that is, a non-Western) approach, Acharya (2016, pp. 4–15) presented the notion of a Global IR that transcends the West-non-West divide, suggesting that IR should be an inclusive discipline which embraces “pluralistic universalism.” Obviously, Acharya is not alone in this scholarly endeavor. According to Balzacq and Baele’s (2014) study on contemporary developments in IR theory, one of the key features of IR’s “third debate” is to problematize the “parochialism of American international political discourse” (p. 7; original quotation from Ashley, 1984, p. 229). The proponents of pluralism in IR point out that the field has developed in the US
What is missing in the ongoing debate? 15 in isolation from contributions made in other parts of the world. In this respect, Steve Smith (1987) noted that the opening of the discipline should involve both theoretical and geographical diversity. In his words, IR needs to “become more applicable to the concerns of scholars working in other countries… In this way, International Relations may become a non-hegemonic discipline” (Smith, 1987, p. 204). More recently, drawing upon postcolonial and feminist literature, Tickner (2011) a rgued that IR should move towards “a more international and pluralist discipline that is built on less West-centric foundations and is more respectful of multiple ways of understanding our complex world” (p. 611). In addition, Global IR was identified as one of the key issues to be addressed in the newly established book series by Routledge, IR Theory and Practice in Asia.4
What is missing in the debate? To summarize, then, the terrain of the ongoing debate over non-Western (or post-Western) IR theory is wide and constantly being reshaped from different angles with meaningful contributions. Despite this, however, several critical issues remain unclear or under-explored. The debate does not properly address more acute issues associated with non-Western IR theory building, namely theoretical pluralism and theoretical fragmentation. For example, there is a shared conviction that a pluralist approach to IR (be it non-Western, post-Western, or Global IR) is a good thing; as such, terms such as “democratization,” “globalization,” and “diversity” of IR theory frequently appear in the discussion with positive connotations. But they tend to remain either in the form of a plea—in the case of Global IR—or as an undisputed premise upon which the attempt to search for national or regional characteristics or ontologies is undertaken—in the case of non-Western or post-Western IR—without pondering the manifold implications that can be drawn from that premise. This chapter suggests that there are (at least) three questions that require more careful attention in our discussion of non-Western IR theory. First, does IR require pluralism? Second, to what extent has contemporary IR become pluralistic? Finally, should IR pursue the promotion of dialogue and engagement across theoretical and geographic divides? Each question invites several subsequent questions. For instance, the first question of whether IR requires pluralism asks us to think through the extent to which IR ought to embrace pluralism. Likewise, the normative “ought-to” question related to dialogue and engagement leads to additional questions, such as that of “how-to.” I will elaborate on this point in more detail in the ensuing pages.
Does IR require pluralism? Obviously, epistemic pluralism is a core premise upon which non-Western, post-Western, and Global IR projects are all founded. As discussed earlier, non-Western IR theory-building enterprises reject the long-lasting dominance of Western/American IR scholarship over the field and are dissatisfied with the
16 Yong-Soo EUN corresponding marginalization of non-Western worlds in international studies. Their advocates persistently argue for the “broadening” of IR beyond the disciplinary dominance of a particular region and call for embracing a wider range of theoretical, historical, or normative perspectives (see Acharya, 2014, 2016; Acharya & Buzan, 2010; Hutchings, 2011; Ling, 2013, 2014; Qin, 2016; Tickner, 2011). In Acharya’s words (2016), IR should “not impose any particular idea or approach on others but respects diversity,” and it should be grounded in “world history, theoretical pluralism” (pp. 4–5). Qin’s (2016) “relational theory” of IR, which emphasizes “multiple cultures” and the high degree of “intimacy” in our “pluralistic world” (p. 39), is an attempt to give theoretical substance to Acharya’s idea of “pluralistic universalism.” Yet, a pluralistic approach as a “way of knowing” is not without its critics. For example, Mearsheimer (2016) has explicitly stated that he disagrees with the growing calls for broadening the horizons of IR beyond American dominance (p. 147). Van der Ree (2014) claims that, in IR, “plurality is mostly understood as a serious problem which needs to be overcome…” (p. 218). There are a considerable number of IR scholars who favor epistemic unity or theoretical synthesis over pluralism. According to Schmidt (2008): Too much pluralism leaves us with a divided discipline that not only fails to speak with one voice, but cannot even agree on what we should be studying, focusing on, or seeking to explain. Pluralism, in other words, masks the fact that we have an incoherent [emphasis added] field. (p. 298) Brecher and Harvey (2002) are deeply concerned with the lack of progress and knowledge accumulation in the field, arguing that alternative and critical perspectives in IR “encompass an array of research programs and findings that are not easily grouped into a common set of beliefs, theories or conclusions…[and have] difficulty agreeing on what they have accomplished…” (p. 2). It is for these reasons that several scholars propose an epistemic synthesis, which has variously been referred to as a “paradigmatic synthesis” of research traditions in IR (Brecher & Harvey, 2002); the theoretical “integration” of different levels of analysis (Hudson, 2007); “analytic eclecticism” based on the mixing and matching of approaches (Cornut, 2015; Sil & Katzenstein, 2010); “multi-method” research that combines quantitative and qualitative methods and “middle ground epistemologies” that combine positivist and interpretivist epistemologies (Bennett, 2015; Collier & Elman, 2008); and an “ontological synthesis” based on “quantum consciousness theory” (Wendt, 2015, p. 192). However, this skepticism of pluralism is not representative of the majority of IR scholarship. Rather, many scholars, whether or not they are engaged in non-Western IR theorization, tend to believe that IR should become more pluralistic (Ashley & Walker, 1990; Balzacq & Baele, 2014; Campbell, 2013; Dunne, Hansen, & Wight, 2013; Ferguson, 2015; George, 1989; Jackson, 2011, 2015; Kratochwil, 2003; Lebow, 2011; Mearsheimer & Walt, 2013; Wight,
What is missing in the ongoing debate? 17 2006). Nonetheless, this does not justify the taken-for-granted acceptance of pluralism, which is strongly embedded across different forms of the non-Western IR theory-building enterprise. The point is that pluralism as such is not without controversy, although the view appears unproblematic among proponents of non-Western IR. Therefore, advocates for opening up IR ought to more fully address the epistemic implications of its underlying premise, namely diversity and pluralism. What is more, although it is generally agreed that diversity and pluralism are “desirable” for a “better future” for IR (Acharya, 2016; Dunne et al., 2013; Hellmann, 2003; Jackson, 2015; Kratochwil, 2003), we also have to address how much—in other words, to what extent—IR should embrace pluralism. This question is of great importance in the ongoing debate because the answer affects the degree to which the contour and the contents of the non-Western IR theory-building enterprise are to be either expanded (facilitated) or narrowed (constrained). Nevertheless, even in recent studies that make significant contributions to the study of Global IR, this question is either ignored entirely or treated as something that can be “put aside” (Bilgin, 2016, p. 138). I think the question of whether and to what degree IR needs to embrace pluralism can only be answered after we have a clear understanding of the current state of diversity in IR. Put otherwise, we need to first examine and comprehend where IR currently stands in terms of diversity in order to determine where it should stand.
To what extent has contemporary IR become pluralistic? Contemporary IR literature in general and arguments regarding non-Western IR theory in particular have a slim understanding of the extent to which contemporary IR has become diverse and pluralistic; this is mainly due to their partial and limited attention. The simplest way to understand the extent of diversity in IR scholarship is to look at how many knowledge claims exit. Even so, to understand diversity in this numerical sense is not simple as it may appear because knowledge claims are associated with several complex dimensions, including ontological, epistemological, theoretical, methodological, praxical, and geographical ones. Furthermore, even if we zoom in on “theoretical” dimension, we need to look at diversity in terms of not only the number of theories available in the field, but also the epistemological, methodological, and empirical aspects of diversity, for all of them relate to theory building and theory testing. Unfortunately, however, the ongoing debate tends to focus attention on only theoretical dimension; furthermore, theoretical diversity tends to be approached narrowly, in terms of the geographical origins of key IR concepts, theories, or theorists. For example, Wemheuer-Vogelaar, Bell, Morales, and Tierney’s study (2016) based on the 2014 Teaching, Research, and International Policy (TRIP) Project’s worldwide faculty survey data shows that “geography plays a central role in the Global IR Debate,” and that non-Western IR scholars “are more likely to have geographically bounded perceptions of IR communities” than their Western counterparts (p. 18).
18 Yong-Soo EUN To be clear, this is not to say that it is not true that non-Western worlds are underrepresented in international studies, or that this underrepresentation is unproblematic. The point is not that these geographically based concerns are misplaced, but that the current terrain of the non-Western or Global IR debate needs to extend to issues of epistemology and methodology in order to see the extent of the “parochialism” of IR more clearly, and thus ameliorate it. This is especially necessary, given that there are conflicting views of the extent to which IR has actually become diverse and pluralistic. A cursory survey of the IR literature on pluralism and the sociology of the field will suffice to illustrate this point. On the one hand, some scholars argue that the discipline has already become pluralistic and diverse. For example, Rengger (2015) notes that contemporary IR is “a plural, and pluralist, field…. Whether one likes it or not…, that is simply the reality” (p. 32). Likewise, Dunne et al. (2013) argue that “IR now seems to have settled into an uneasy truce on the question of pluralism” due to “the proliferation of theories” in the discipline (pp. 405, 416). On the other hand, the argument that IR is still monistic and parochial is also repeatedly made, not only in the non-Western or Global IR literature, but also in the IR literature on post-positivism and reflexivity. A recent work by Hamati-Ataya is a case in point. Calling for “strong reflexivity,” she argues that “three decades after the launch of the post-positivist critique, however, reflexive IR… remains located at the margins of the margins of the discipline” (Hamati-Ataya, 2012, p. 670; 2014, pp. 171–172). Similarly, in a discussion of the state of theoretical diversity in IR, Reus-Smit (2013) observes that “[t]raditionally, mainstream International Relations scholars (and political scientists) confined the field to empirical-t heoretic inquiry on [positivist] epistemological principle…. The tenuous nature of this position is now widely acknowledged, increasingly by mainstream scholars” (p. 604). And Lake (2013) argues that “positivists either subsumed the critiques offered by the reflectivists…or just simply ignored and marginalized them” (p. 570). It is in this respect that Jackson (2011) calls for “a broad and pluralistic definition of science” based on a variety of ontologies (p. 19). Given all of the above, the following question arises: what types of diversity are we talking about? Depending on our answer to this question, our understanding of the extent to which IR has become diverse and pluralistic will vary substantially, as will our rationales for and approaches to the non-Western and Global IR projects. For example, if projects to broaden IR consider the issue of the hierarchy of knowledge in terms of not only geography (that is, West-centric IR), but also epistemology and methodology (that is, the dominance of positivism), then their proposals can find common ground with post-positivist IR scholarship, whose epistemological underpinnings are marginalized by both the West and the non-West.
Should IR promote dialogue across theoretical and spatial divides? If so, how? Regardless of whether we achieved a consensus on the extent and types of d iversity that we (ought to) pursue, the goal would remain the same from the perspective of the “broadening IR” project, be it non-Western, post-Western, or
What is missing in the ongoing debate? 19 Global IR. To put it in the simplest terms, a shared goal means greater diversity. This, however, can raise concerns about the fragmentation of IR scholarship. The more diverse IR becomes, the more divided and fragmented the discipline is likely to become, which is a hindrance to knowledge accumulation. This, as mentioned earlier, is part of the reason that some IR scholars take issue with pluralism (Schmidt, 2008). In response, scholars working on broadening IR, particularly in the name of Global IR, often suggest that IR needs to engage in active “dialogue” across theoretical and spatial divides. The scholars are not calling for discarding or disavowing West-centric IR, but rather to render it inclusive and broad, so that voices and experiences outside the West are reflected more fully. Acharya (2011) makes this point clear: My main argument is that while one cannot and should not seek to d isplace existing (or future) theories of IR that may substantially originate from Western ideas and experiences, it is possible, through dialogue and discovery, to build alternative theories… that have their origin in the South. (p. 620) Furthermore, “encouraging debate and dialogue across perspectives… is a core [emphasis added] purpose of the Global IR project” (Acharya, 2016, p. 14). “Encouraging dialogue” is not as simple as it may appear, however. As Hutchings (2011) aptly notes, “dialogue” can be a mere exchange or encounter that is already “staged and scripted” by the mainstream (namely the West and positivists in the case of IR); as such, it could turn out to be “a piece of rhetorical bullying” (p. 645). Furthermore, a “staged and scripted” dialogue across theoretical paradigms can lead to a tug of war between rival camps over truth claims and a turning inwards. Indeed, this is one of the hallmarks of the socalled “great debates” in IR; in response, Lake (2013) suggests that IR ought to pursue “working-within-paradigms” rather than “working-across-paradigms” (pp. 567, 580). Despite these concerns, many IR scholars, including Hutchings and Lake, do not oppose dialogue per se. Indeed, “vigorous” dialogue across cultures and regions and active engagement between theoretical perspectives are frequently proposed by those who wish to broaden IR. Moreover, this is also the case in reflexive discussions regarding the prospects of IR and IR theory. The “integrative pluralism” advanced by Dunne et al. (2013) is a case in point. In “The End of International Relations Theory?,” they argue that IR should move towards “integrative pluralism” in which not only diversity, but also, and more importantly, “engagement” across competing theoretical paradigms is encouraged (Dunne et al., 2013, pp. 416–417). In a related vein, Jackson (2011) foregrounds “engaged pluralism,” which “brings unlike elements into dialogue with one another without fusing them into a specious synthesis” (p. 207). More than a decade ago, Lapid (2003) argued that if “pluralism…is the most feasible and deserving destination for the international relations theory enterprise in the foreseeable future, then dialogue must figure prominently on our agenda at the dawn of
20 Yong-Soo EUN the twenty-first century” (p. 129). In short, the importance of dialogue per se is readily acknowledged in the IR literature. The question then is how we can ensure proper dialogue and engagement across theoretical and spatial divides without subjugating marginalized perspectives or engaging in a narcissistic turf war. This question is important because the discipline is already marked by a positivist–post-positivist divide. It is also important from the perspective of the non-Western theory-building project because what this project aims to achieve could fragment the field even further. And finally, it is also important because those who make a plea for active dialogue and engagement do not generally elaborate on how we could embark on this project. To be sure, there are a few exceptions (Bilgin, 2016; Hutchings, 2011); in general, however, our call for dialogue is not well matched by a corresponding development of proposals on how we can realize it. What is lacking is an assessment of when each approach offers a better understanding of given issues; where our research interests overlap and thus complement each other; and, most importantly, how we can find and expand points of contact across theories and regions.
Concluding remarks What is missing in the ongoing debate over the non-Western IR theory-building enterprise is what cuts to the heart of the project. Without addressing the questions examined in this chapter, any attempt to advance non-Western or Global IR is likely to remain inchoate. Our understanding of where IR currently stands—and where it should stand—in terms of diversity determines whether the contour and the contents of various forms of non-Western IR theorization should be expanded (facilitated) or narrowed (constrained). Further, if epistemic unity or synthesis rather than epistemic pluralism is seen as facilitating progress in IR, then attempts to broaden IR, be they non-Western, post-Western, or Global, must be avoided. Relatedly, the types of diversity we are (or should be) pursuing will affect how we approach the “broadening IR” project. In this context, we must first clarify the extent to which contemporary IR has become pluralistic by looking at multiple dimensions of diversity. Furthermore, we need to empirically investigate the disciplinary practices associated with the IR publication system and IR pedagogy. In addition, since our constant calls for more diversity in IR could further complicate the issue of disciplinary divides and theoretical fragmentation, we must determine how we can engage in productive dialogue that does not entail subjugation by a particular community in the field, be it from the West or the non-West. As the above analysis has shown, however, the issues examined in this chapter remain largely underilluminated in the ongoing debate. Hutchings (2011) comments, rightly in my view, that “discourse helps us to expand the parameters of our disciplinary imaginations and pave the way for a new era of discovery” (p. 639). If so, the current debate over non-Western IR should become richer and wider, considering the complex issues at stake regarding theoretical pluralism and fragmentation more fully. In order to open up parochial IR, the opening up of the ongoing debate and the discourse thereof is also vital.
What is missing in the ongoing debate? 21
Notes 1 The discussions and perspectives that this chapter offers reflect my thoughts formed between early 2016 and early 2017. 2 Qin (2011), however, sees this differently, stating “more and more scholars and PhD students [are] striving to explore the Chinese indigenous resources as inspiration for theoretical breakthroughs” (p. 252). 3 This position was soon confronted by counterarguments. Sato (2011), for example, criticized Chen by saying that “the discourse of anti-‘non-Western’ IRT would strengthen not only the hegemonic status of Western IRT, but also the discipline Asian Studies” (pp. 4–5). 4 For other titles in the series, see https://www.routledge.com/series/IRTPA (accessed November 26, 2015).
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2 Appealing to humane capitalism as the International Relations of economics Comparing early and late globalizing Asia via Tomé Pires’ Suma Oriental (1515) and Mahathirist thought (1970–2008) Alan Chong Capitalism has evolved spatially into globalization; yet its social and ethical d imensions remain understudied under the discipline known as International Relations. Understandably, one needs to dissect history and the location of ideas within global and local histories in order to consider what a tentative Asian normative reading of the international relations of economics (IRE) implies. In this exploratory chapter, I pose the question of how a nascent Asian philosophical perspective on humane capitalism might form based on two streams of thought that were produced 500 years apart. I deliberately choose to employ the phrase “international relations of economics” instead of the more popular “international political economy” (IPE) to allow room for incorporating normative, social, and even tolerant perspectives towards economic diversity in international relations. Moreover, I want to leave open the possibilities of resisting the homogenizing tendencies of globalized capitalism through Asian international thought. Before I justify the resort to perspectives in and of Asia, it is useful to recall how the globalization of capitalism has been treated as a homogenizing process in mainstream international thought and reiterated as such. Economic historian David Ludden (2004) has imputed four characteristics that have defined “global/globalized capitalism” as we know it: (1) it is an economic system based on private property, individual profit, and state enforced market principles, which had emerged uniquely in Europe; (2) it defines modernity; (3) it represents universal human progress; and (4) it has rivals, not only based on socialism and communism but also grounded in non-European traditions. (p. 2)
26 Alan Chong Clearly, the last characteristic strongly suggests that capitalism’s global reach is highly contested, filtered, or has been imperialistic in imposing so-called free market discipline on unwilling territories and their very human subjects. How did capitalism assume homogenizing patterns? Three centuries ago, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels authored what they thought was a comprehensive attack on the systemic excesses of capitalism upon the social lives of its workers. Marx and Engels were associated with a theory of alienation of labor and a predictive teleology of social exploitation in the name of progress. Central to their thesis was the idea that even if European empires had not uniformly reproduced the conditions of industrial capitalism in their colonies in the “periphery,” their organizational ramifications would be painfully felt there, since non-Western populations would be disciplined to fit into an international division of labor (Lenin, 1965, pp. 270–286). Consequently, Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov, better known as Lenin, warned that territorial and economic imperialism represented the highest stage of capitalism. This was, in fact, Lenin’s primary explanation for the outbreak of the First World War: nationally based capitalism would run out of spaces to organize for production and those very nationalist motivations would compel each nationally derived empire to turn on one another. It was therefore extremely ironic that a critical ideology produced its critique within a mirrored frame of capitalist globalization. Following the “shock” of the Asian Financial Crisis of 1998, billionaire financier George Soros (1998) commented: We are all part of the global capitalist system, which is characterized not only by free trade but more specifically by the free movement of capital. The system is very favourable to financial capital, which is free to pick and choose where to go, and it has led to the rapid growth of global financial markets. It can be envisaged as a gigantic circulatory system, sucking up capital into the financial markets and institutions at the centre and then pumping it out to the periphery either directly in the form of credits and portfolio investments, or indirectly through multinational corporations… The Asian crisis reversed the direction of the flow. Capital started fleeing the periphery. At first, the reversal benefitted the financial markets at the centre. The US economy was just on the verge of overheating and the Federal Reserve was contemplating raising the discount rate…The transactions form a daisy chain with many intermediaries and each intermediary has an obligation to his counterparties without knowing who else is involved…The sophisticated system received a bad jolt when the Russian banking system collapsed. Russian banks defaulted on their obligations, but the Western banks remained on the hook to their own clients. No way was found to offset the obligations of one bank against those of another. Many hedge funds and other speculative accounts sustained large enough losses that they had to be liquidated…The pain at the periphery has become so intense that individual countries have begun to opt out of the capitalist system, or simply fall by the wayside. (pp. xii–xiv)
Appealing to humane capitalism 27 Soros (1998) proposed that globalized capitalism required “reflexivity,” whereby the deficiencies in capitalism ought to be publicly admitted to and consequently corrected in good time (pp. xxi–xxv). Soros was in fact acknowledging the accuracy of an earlier and more prescient theorist of what I have termed “IRE.” Karl Polanyi (2001) argued that markets in goods and services, and especially in finance, have never been automatically self-regulating in the mode of the fabled “invisible hands” of demand and supply. The myth of the self-regulating globalizing markets had to be invented in tandem with how ideas of commercial and industrial society remade human populations in their orientation to work, and rewards for labor and leisure. Principally, capitalist man (and woman) has to embrace the new principle of a materialistic, uniform, and modernizing society worshipping the modus operandi “for the motive of subsistence that of gain must be substituted” (Polanyi, 2001, p. 44). Is this not a clearer way of explaining why modern capitalism was a “revolution” upon preexisting traditional forms of indigenous economics worldwide? Conversely, in this day and age, when one ought to scrutinize globalized capitalism for its inhumane excesses, should we not investigate what normative visions indigenous economics offered and how these were capitalist hybrids? From another direction, the aura of the relentlessly positive trajectory of the so-called Asian “tiger economies” beginning in the late 1970s sparked an earnest effort to define Asian characteristics for a locally adapted globalized capitalism. However, much of this effort was still mired in the idea that a globalizing capitalism operated with an irreducible core value of allowing free markets to operate according to a theory, which is unfettered by the hand of government. Here is where the Asian “modifications” have reopened the question of whether capitalism does, or should, actually operate uniformly worldwide. Additionally, if capitalism has been modified in the Asian experience, for what normative purposes has it been adjusted? Works like Chalmers Johnson’s (1982) on the Japanese “developmental state” interpreted the rapid Japanese economic ascent following the American Occupation after the Second World War as a product of guided free markets. Japan’s Ministry of International Trade and Industry (MITI), other ministry bureaucrats, parliamentary factions, and the various homegrown conglomerates in cars, consumer electronics, and other high technology manufacturing both argued and colluded among themselves under the umbrella aim of producing government policies that specifically assisted private sector export promotion. Johnson termed this a “plan rational” approach to capitalism since worldwide demand and supply forces could not be allowed to thwart the attainment of domestic social goals that fostered a thriving middle class employed by nationally based multinational companies. The national market had to be regulated, so that almost full employment could be sustained, which meant that exports overseas had to be kept at a high volume to justify high employment and maximum production at home (Johnson, 1982, pp. 17–20). Johnson’s argument was replicated on a broader scale to account for the astounding economic progress of Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, and even China in the World Bank’s famous, but retrospectively controversial, 1993 report (Birdsall,
28 Alan Chong Campos, Kim, & Corden, 1993). Others, such as Alice Amsden, diagnosed the Asian capitalist success stories in terms of how “vigorously and rapidly exportables were extracted from a sequentially rising number of import substitution sectors” (Amsden, 2001, p. 161). Consequently, even twenty-first-century visions of ASEAN Economic Community were cast in terms of “intra-regional FDI, transfers of technology and skills” and the increase in “Average Labour Productivity” (Khuong, 2013; Kumar, 2004). This clinical language obscures the subtler, noneconomic factors, issues, and sociopolitical arts of economic governance that perhaps underpin why Asian states and societies have proven resilient in coping with the social and political fallout from the recurring crises in globalized capitalism. In this regard, it is worth examining where, how, or if, polities and societies in the pre- and early modernizing eras have bequeathed values to modernizing Asian economies that humanize the operation of capitalism in Asia. The Asian financial crisis of 1997–1998 has triggered some exploration into the softer, qualitative factors that have colored the operation of Asian capitalism since the commencement of decolonization at the end of the Second World War. In fact, a decade prior to the crisis, Kunio Yoshihara (1999) had already identified what he labeled as East Asia’s “ersatz capitalism,” characterized by “the desire to make money quickly and without making much effort” (p. iv). Rent-seeking and speculative behaviors were the norm and focused on the stock market and real estate. In these strategies, political connections were crucial in enhancing market opportunities, since the usual factors of production could be brought into play for physical deployment in economic growth from foreign sources invited by local agents. In contrast, following the now legendary explanations of hyperactive speculation during the Asian financial crisis, Yoshihara (1999) called for more “echt capitalism” to seed robust and tangible economic growth through skilled manpower and cultivation of local Asian talent (Yoshihara, 1999, pp. v, 83–87). Many interpreters of the Asian financial crisis have not strayed very far from this diagnosis of insufficient growth with genuine financial equity for their workers and citizens. Additionally, severe blame was placed on “bad old” Asian economic practices such as clannish networks, nepotism, and inbreeding of suppliers of capital to seed projects, albeit to differing degrees in Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, the Philippines, South Korea, Taiwan, and China (Choi, 2006; MacIntyre, Pempel, & Ravenhill, 2008, pp. 18–19; Pempel, 1999). Yet others pronounced on variations among Asian economies’ practices of sound central banking measured against a mostly neoliberal economic orthodoxy (Hamilton-Hart, 2003). In the most comprehensive attempt to define East Asian capitalism, Andrew Walter and Xiaoke Zhang (2012) opine that a fundamental diversity befuddles analysts as to why some Asian economies thrive better than others or are more resilient than others in weathering crises spawned by the requirements of participating in a truly global capitalist economy. To them: [T]here is an obvious tension between the desire to formulate parsimonious theories of institutional change or resilience and the need to be sufficiently attentive to the significant differences among Asian political economies.
Appealing to humane capitalism 29 In an attempt to overcome this problem, some authors have distinguished Asian political economies on the basis of business systems…, financial institutions…, labour markets and industrial relations…, and welfare regimes… The difficulty with such studies from our perspective is that each focuses narrowly on only one among a number of important institutional spheres. This evades the questions of institutional complementarities and of the possibility of identifying broader patterns of capitalist organization. (p. 9) This chapter goes to lengths to argue that Asian experiences with protocapitalism, and subsequently incorporation into globalized capitalism itself, privilege an economic eclecticism derived from normative visions of government, humanism, ethnic pride, piety, and even military prowess. This motley set of socially derived economic motivations will be argued as being grounded in a social foundation of what I have termed IRE. Economics should never be divorced from politics and political considerations of engendering contentment among governed populations. Hence, scholarship following the script of a globalized neoliberal economy and diagnosing Asian misdeeds according to the “orthodoxy” of free market economics is unhelpful in understanding Asia’s political economy. As I am suggesting with the following tentative and open-ended reading of two streams of Asian economic thought, Asian thinkers and politicians have always enmeshed material practices with what they understand to be their prescriptions for humane governance. Logically, humane governance is for the people, whether they live under monarchies and modern totalitarianisms or under democracies of some abridged form. Humane governance extended to economics must surely mean the practice of humane capitalism in today’s discourse. This chapter is thus intended to serve as a healthy intellectual provocation by drawing a connecting thread between the Asian IRE of the 1500s and Mahathirist c ritical thought of the 1970s and 2000s.
The value of reading the Suma Oriental and Mahathirist thought In investigating our understanding of IRE in terms of a humane capitalism, we are also tentatively offering an account of early globalizing Asia through “connected histories” whereby: [T]he notion of “discovery” thus applies as much to Zheng He’s Indian Ocean voyages in the early fifteenth century as those of Cabral or Magellan a century later. These voyages were accompanied by often momentous changes in conceptions of space and thus cartography… (Subrahmanyam, 1997, p. 737) Asia was globalizing in and of itself where travellers were trying to write for their political audiences in their societies of origin, as well as a part of a broader
30 Alan Chong Pan-Asian fraternity of like-minded travellers. One can of course cite the travel writings of Ibn Battuta (1983), which date to the 1320s and 1350s, as a fine example of this genre of documenting globalizing Asia. One scholar has even valued Battuta’s writings as transcendental of Islamic audiences, and a candidate for an Asian equivalent of a Machiavellian diplomat. According to Stewart Gordon (2008), Battuta introduced the spread of political intelligence whereby he was “able to tell one king about another, information kings eagerly sought” and, in turn, these “Kings particularly wanted to know about the successful strategies, symbols, and ceremonies in other courts” (p. 109). As an itinerant scholar, trader, and confidant of royalty, Battuta’s recollections connected what is today Northeast Asia to South and Southeast Asia, as well as to the eastern coasts of Africa. His observations of religion, trade, and custom enlarged the psychological scope of how the personalities he visited would conceive of a world beyond Asia supplying luxuries and necessities to that region. Likewise, the Chinese traveller and translator Ma Huan (1413–1431) was the official chronicler of the Zheng He voyages sanctioned by the Ming Emperor. While the purpose of these voyages was to secure trade and diplomatic space for China, Ma Huan’s patient recording of dress, custom, and religion enlightened the Ming’s perceptions of China’s environs. Although he was Muslim, Ma Huan’s writings recorded visits to the trading cities on the Malabar coast of present-day India, Hormuz (Ormuz), near Persia, and as far as Mecca. He even made observations of Buddhist rites. Gordon (2008) described Ma Huan’s contribution to early globalizing Asia in this manner: Like many travellers—Ibn Fadlan, Ibn Battuta, Xuanzang—Ma Huan searched for pattern and structure among unfamiliar beliefs and customs. He analyzed and sought to make comprehensible what he saw and experienced. There was a continuing need for such writers and interpreters across the Asian world… Compared to other travel writers of the time, Ma Huan’s writing was distinguished by his simple, unvarnished observations, his respect for those he encountered, and his awareness that at least some ways of doing things in foreign lands were not so different from back home. (pp. 134–135) Subsequently, by the 1800s, a number of well-known Malay tracts like the a nonymously authored Sejarah Melayu, Munshi Abdullah’s Hikayat Abdullah, and Abdullah al-Misri’s Hikayat Mareskalek trod equally globalizing paths in orienting their generations of Asian readers towards their ancestries and contemporary connections (Chong, 2012; Mandal, 2013; Sweeney, 2006). In the course of their narration of the new geographies of their time, they too pondered in their respective trains of thought the meanings of ideal governance and properly ordered civilization. Embedded in these lines of thought are notions of humane economics that have bearing on humanizing today’s capitalism. In this regard, we can place Tomé Pires’ Suma Oriental: An account of the East, from the Red Sea to Japan, Written in Malacca and India in 1512–1515
Appealing to humane capitalism 31 (1944a, 1944b) as a work describing and analyzing globalizing Asia with a few qualifications. First, Pires wrote in the service of Portuguese imperialism, albeit from the position of earnestly seeking enlightenment about the customs and politics of Asia. This might be construed by some as a tainted text, authored from the position of a would-be exploiter and a temporal victor in the opening chapter of the Western colonization of Asia. Second, Pires wrote as an ethnic “outsider” to Asia, hence his work is little more than depicting Asia through Western eyes. But these issues matter less intellectually, and culturally, if we revalue the critical roles played by otherness in both producing and reproducing globalization. The other can be advantageous in both interpreting and connecting the political geography of early globalizing Asia in the sense that, like Battuta and Ma Huan, he is connecting the proverbial dots into a grand thematic design that few have perceived before. Pires ranged over a wide swath of maritime Asia that few have recorded before in such extensive depth prior to 1515. Armando Cortesão’s (1944) introduction to his translation of the Suma acknowledges that, while little is known of Pires’ background, he found enough fragmentary evidence through the private letters written by Pires to his family and various officials that he trained a watchful eye over the state of Portuguese colonies in Asia stemming from his duties as a responsible apothecary both at the Indian and Malaccan stations he had occasion to visit. It was also known that he departed for Asia under the initial patronage of Jorge de Vasconcelos, the director or purveyor of the Casa de Mina e India, the Portuguese equivalent of a Ministry for Colonial Affairs; and of Dr. Diogo Lopes, “perhaps the chief royal physician, with whom Pires might have been connected after his service as apothecary to Prince Afonso,” son of the Portuguese monarch John II (1455–1495) (Cortesão, 1944). Subsequently, his painstaking reports of his travels had certainly earned him sufficient royal favor to have been appointed Portugal’s first ambassador to the kingdom of China. Pires’ effort should therefore be considered as a work of colonial intelligence gathering, covering an Asia awaiting its turn as a regional theatre for Western penetration. Moreover, the mix of moderated observation, and the occasionally normative orientation, in the tone of the Suma supports its value as a text worth its intellectual weight among many rival contributions to our understanding of early globalizing Asia that was already presenting global discourse with an unstated pattern of mercantile civilization. Likewise, Mahathir bin Mohamed, the Prime Minister of Malaysia from 1981 to 2003, began his career within the crucible of Southeast Asia’s trans-regional politics of decolonization. His views were controversial in the 1960s and remain so now. Across much of modernizing Asia, nationalism and national self- determination were inextricable from economic justice (Sukarno, 1966). In Malaysia’s context, century-long policies of exploiting local natural resources by pacifying local social and political discord through “divide and rule” policies had to be reversed. The British administered the government by implementing a socioeconomic arrangement whereby the indigenous Malays were assigned low-level administrative and policing roles on the colonially perpetuated pseudoscientific assumption that this ethnic group was indolent by nature and unsuited
32 Alan Chong for more vigorous aspects of modern capitalism. The “imported” races of Indians and Chinese were intended to develop British Malaya into the centerpiece of British rubber production, commercial attraction, and tin extraction. True political independence for Malaya, and subsequently for the Federation of Malaysia, required policies that restored racial pride to the Malays by reversing the colonial socioeconomic division of labor. To that end, the other races ought to abide by affirmative action policies that would place strategic curbs on their economic domination of the postcolonial economy. This is one aspect of Mahathirist humane capitalism—restorative economic justice. A second one that emerged from the rhetoric of Mahathir’s economic nationalism vented abroad and at home and, consequently in full bloom during the Asian financial crisis, was that of making the world safe for a developing economy. Humane capitalism meant breaking the relationships of dependency that still enchained ex-colonial territories in a subservient position to capitalist metropoles. Moreover, Mahathir believed that ex-colonial peoples in Asia should “Look East” for ways to enhance human resources through non-Western methods and values of diligence in acquiring skills. While these were powerful aspirations, the reality of Malaysian economic performance showed otherwise. Nonetheless, Mahathir’s nationalistic invective against the “new imperialism” of globe- straddling hedge funds headquartered in the Global North during the Asian financial crisis finds resonance in twenty-first-century criticisms of globalized capitalism that treat brick and mortar economic enterprises in the Global South with contempt (Chong & Balakrishnan, 2015; Scholte, 2000). Across nearly five centuries, it is remarkable that a generic vision that places human beings at the front and center of the border crossing nature of economic relationships lies at the center of both Tomé Pires’ observations and Mahathirist diatribes.
Mercantile civilization in the Suma Oriental The world of the Suma reduces maritime Asia, circa 1515, to trade and its ancillary effects as a source of sociopolitical legitimacy for the monarchies, port cities, and other proto-state entities. While the logic of this frame of analysis can be contested intellectually and politically in the twenty-first century, given the fluid polarities of “globalizing politics” in the era of the Internet, let us go along with Pires’ worldview of mercantile civilization as the primary heuristic container for interpreting Asia for the moment. Pires leaves his reader in little doubt that the progress of civilization is made possible on the basis of material exchange. One can clearly see it, for instance, in his lengthy prefacing note to the King of Portugal: …[I]n this Suma I shall speak not only of the division of the parts, provinces, kingdoms, and regions and their boundaries, but also of the dealings and trade that they have with one another, which trading in merchandise is so necessary that without it the world could not go on. It is this that ennobles kingdoms and makes their people great, that ennobles cities, that brings
Appealing to humane capitalism 33 war and peace. In this world it is customary for merchandise to be clean—I do not speak of the dealings in it, which are held in esteem—for what can be better than that which is based on truth. Pope Paul II was originally a merchant and he was not ashamed of the time he spent in trade, and the scholars of Athens used to praise trade as a wonderful thing, and nowadays it is carried on throughout the world, and particularly in these parts it is held in such high esteem that the great lords here do not do anything else but trade. It is pleasant, necessary and convenient, although it brings reverses, which make it more esteemed. (Pires, 1944a, p. 4) Such statements could easily have been authored by a late twentieth-century agent of globalization: the International Monetary Fund (IMF) or a World Bank official, the scion of an Asian tycoon armed with Protestant ethics, a proponent of China’s “One Belt One Road” initiative, or a trader in the murky borderlands of Indochina and south China, or in the Tumen River Delta economic zone straddling the Russian Far East, northern China, and various Central Asian Republics. Conversely, this excerpt could be seized upon by anti-globalization non-state civil society lobbies to condemn the naked materialist exploitation embedded in the vision of a borderless world of unlimited consumption and production chains. But mercantile civilization, as I have derived it in my interpretation of the central thrust of Tomé Pires’ writings, is more than a vision of pure capitalism. As he describes them, multiple cultures of mercantile civilization exist in as varied a range as the kingdoms that straddle coastal Asia. It is also possible that Tomé Pires was consciously projecting Portugal’s formula of neo-Malthusian political economy onto his observations. Medieval Portugal was a highly stratified society in the 1500s (Subrahmanyam, 2012, p. 55). Even within its compact territory, relative to its European neighbors, there were divisions between coast and interior, north vs south, and Lisbon against the rest of the country, as well as differences between Catholic clergy, urban bourgeoisie, and the nobility (who were themselves divided against one another). To diffuse these tensions, His Majesty Dom Duarte (1433–1438) created a system of entailed estates, whereby grants of land were made out to the eldest sons of the nobility, and treated by law as inalienable in every aspect, thereby leaving a large number of younger sons in each family as a “‘surplus’ to be exported,” in Sanjay Subrahmanyam’s (2012) turn of phrase, as entrepreneurs, explorers, and military commanders to North Africa and, subsequently, Asia (p. 55). Urban bourgeoisie tended to support overseas ventures in Asia or elsewhere only if the royal approval awarded to them did not crimp their abilities to reap profits from these distant trading networks. Moreover, the “service nobility,” mainly those who worked in banking and finance, literally saw profit in participating in royally sanctioned trade overseas. Finally, the urban laboring classes who coincided with the largest population concentrations in the northern parts of the country saw maritime activity as a safety valve for their economic and social prospects (Subrahmanyam, 2012, pp. 56–57). An Asian dimension to Portugal’s burgeoning
34 Alan Chong maritime empire thus offered tantalizing solutions to domestic sociopolitical pressures. The interplay of early civil society demands, economic interests, and elite interests intersected to embolden men like Tomé Pires to dedicate themselves to empire building either through commerce, or military occupation, or by supplying intelligence according to their agenda. Although Pires formally divided the Suma into five books, covering the political geography of “Arabia, Egypt, and Persia as far as Cambay,” “Cambay to Bhatkal (Baticalla),” “Bhatkal to Bengal,” “Bengal to China,” “all the islands,” and with a sixth book devoted to Malacca itself, we will not be examining his texts in that order. Instead, we will frame the reading of the Suma according to four categories that correspond to what I would label the characteristics of mercantile civilization.
Demographic pluralism In the Suma, demographic pluralism is portrayed in its most fundamental sense as a population comprising many creeds, races, and divergent social practices. A pluralistic population may ideally be both a symptom of trading prosperity and a source of threat against that very prosperity. In Pires’ (1944a) account of Cairo, this is starkly put across, where the very mercenaries guarding the Sultan may turn on their leader, for ambition or for treasure: The Sultan is always there. He has many slaves to guard him, Mamelukes, which in the language of the country means people bought with money. There must be as many as five thousand of these and they guard his person. Most of them are renegades who were Christians. He has a large number of wives. He never goes out, nor is he ever seen by the people of the city. He has ministers of Justice—who rarely administer it. When they are annoyed with the Sultan these Mamelukes choose someone else and kill the other. He must be a renegade and they say that this is done because the Christians apostatize in order to attain this dignity—which may be true. Neither son nor relative inherits, but successors are chosen in the said way. He must be a renegade Christian and the more times he has been sold the greater his consequence in the kingdom. The Sultans of Cairo are very poor and even more so now… The greatest revenue he had, on which he maintained himself, was from the pilgrimage to the Holy Sepulchre and the duties on spice passing through Cairo. He is now already getting very little from the [trade in] spices, and please God that he will get still less from the Holy Sepulchre. The other neighbouring regions are every day joining the [Moorish Persian leader] Sheikh Ismail against him. (pp. 10–11) No self-respecting historian or social scientist will, of course, treat this depiction as wholly accurate. What is of interest is the warning contained within it of mismanaging demographic pluralism and the need to harmonize one’s rule over a pluralistic population through piety. In contrast, Pires (1944a) writes
Appealing to humane capitalism 35 approvingly of Christian-Muslim relations in the wide province of Suez, where the Christians are themselves further differentiated by ritual: In this province and also among the Arabs there are many Christians— some of them circumcised and some of them not. The circumcised are called Jacobites and the others Melchites. They have two Lents, one at Christmas and the other the same as ours [the Portuguese].1 They do not marry one another (i.e. Jacobites do not marry Melchites) and many of them are hermits and men of holy life, and some of them are men of property and they are numerous. They are found in Jidda, in Tor, and in Mecca. They are considered by these people to be good men. The merchandise which these people take to India comes from Venice in Italy. It comes to Alexandria, and from the Alexandria warehouses it comes by river to the factors in Cairo, and from Cairo it comes in caravans with many armed people. It comes to Tor, but this is not often, because on account of the nomad robbers they need many armed people to guard the merchandise. But at the time of the Jubilee [i.e. most likely, the Islamic Haj], which is held every year in Mecca on the first day of February, when many people come, (the merchandise) is sent to Mecca with them. And from there it comes to Jidda and from Jidda it comes to the warehouses they have in Aden… (pp. 12–13) Pires implies that plural populations residing in close proximity to major trading and religious sites offer their mixed peoples the advantage of not only worshipping their god, but also availing themselves of products from faraway places brought in by those belonging to a different faith. A division of labor is effected where Christians and Muslims coexist. Consequently, this passage alerts us to the need to address the dimension of piety in trading civilizations in reading the Suma. Above all, Pires repeatedly celebrates the multiplicity of economic talents that demographic diversity brings. Each race is specialized or fitted for some form of refined economic activity. The Kingdom of Cambay, located on the northwestern coast of the Indian subcontinent is one such felicitous example that he provides: I now come to the trade in Cambay. These (people) are (like) Italians in their knowledge of and dealings in merchandise. All the trade in Cambay is in the hands of the heathen. Their general designation is Gujaratees, and then they are divided into various races—Banians, Brahmans and Pattars. There is no doubt that these people have the cream of the trade. They are men who understand merchandise; they are so properly steeped in the sound and harmony of it, that the Gujaratees say that any offence connected with merchandise is pardonable. There are Gujaratees settled everywhere. They work some for some and others for others. They are diligent, quick men in trade.
36 Alan Chong They do their accounts with figures like ours and with our very writing…. There are also some Cairo merchants settled in Cambay, and many Khorasans and Guilans from Aden and Ormuz, all of whom do a great trade in the seaport towns of Cambay; but none of these count in comparison with the heathens, especially in knowledge. Those of our people who want to be clerks and factors ought to go there and learn… (Pires, 1944a, pp. 41–42) Pires extends comparable admiration towards the kingdoms of Siam and Ternate in the Moluccas in much the same tone. His negative models are the ones who do not, on a societal level, venture beyond their shores or landed boundaries to embrace the social diversity that both fuels and manifests thriving emporia. Pires’ (1944a) description of the kingdom of Cochin China is rather disparaging when he describes them as ethnically homogeneous and “a very weak people on the sea; all their achievement is on land,” and even then his vassalage of China means that “he always has an ambassador at the king of China’s court, even though the king of Cochin China be unwilling, or though it breed discontent in him, because he is his vassal…” (pp. 114–115). As for the fabled wealth of a xenophobic China, which, Pires claims, imposed extremely restrictive practices and zones upon foreign traders, he made a correlation between their fear of trading with diverse foreigners and their national prowess: They say that the Chinese made this law about not being able to go to Canton for fear of the Javanese and Malays, for it is certain that one of these people’s junks would rout twenty Chinese junks. They say that China has more than a thousand junks, and that each of them trades where it sees fit; but the people are weak, and such is their fear of Malays and Javanese that it is quite certain that one (of our) ship(s) of four hundred tons could depopulate Canton, and this depopulation would bring great loss to China. (Pires, 1944a, pp. 122–123) On this rather ironic observation about Chinese weakness in preferring cultural homogeneity, we can next turn to the theme of military prowess as a conjoined characteristic of mercantile civilization.
Military prowess While Pires does not clearly convey his opinions on the relationship between military prowess and economic strength, especially in relation to finance, hub status for trade and hospitality to foreigners, he frequently describes this constant tension between economic transactions with all partners and warring against those very partners. In writing a post facto account of the kingdom of Malacca, Pires (1944b) frowned heavily upon then King Mafamut of Malacca coveting the ships and merchandise brought by the first Portuguese trading
Appealing to humane capitalism 37 delegation to Malacca (pp. 256–257). Mafamut schemed to seize all that the Portuguese brought and desired to enlist all of his ministers and soldiers in a plot to murder the entire delegation. Mafamut imagined the Portuguese as infidels to the Islamic faith and spies sent to scout for their masters’ next conquest, which he felt secure in doing because Portugal was a faraway kingdom that may not even be in receipt of the actual news of the massacre of their delegation. Pires (1944b) records that the Malaccan king’s minister for war, or Lasemana, 2 was appalled and uttered these words of protest against his Majesty’s excessive ambition: “This business is contrary to justice, and I do not want to be in it… and all the people in Malacca together are not strong enough to capture these ships, nor is there any reason for it” (p. 257). While there is every possibility that Pires was attempting to whitewash the consequent Portuguese military conquest of Malacca in 1511 as a legitimate response to a misguided policy of aggression by the former rulers of Malacca, it also reveals the argument that the merits of trade are ideally aligned with some notion of justice towards the alien newcomers. Trade should be accommodated with all races and persons, so long as there is no initial hostile intent in either party. Additionally, any peaceful trading opportunity ought to be balanced against the temptation to pursue war as a policy option to attain other political objectives. Furthermore, embedded in the comment about the relative military strengths of the Malaccans and the Portuguese is a realism about military conquest. Trials of strength ought to offer the initiator of war a reasonable prospect of success, otherwise war ought not to be undertaken. Not surprisingly, Pires wrote ambivalently of the warlike cultures in the province of Suez. On the one hand, he admires their practiced martial qualities, while, on the other, he pronounces on their unjust behavior and misdirected energies: The people of this province are warlike. They have many caparisoned horses and they have guns. They are dexterous with the lance on horseback, holding the bridle in one hand, and they wear spurs like the Arabian warriors. They have camels with two humps. These people have many mercenaries who fight so that the others might live by their efforts, and some of them go about pillaging the country. There is little justice because of the fighting people, for they do not live in harmony together. (Pires, 1944a, p. 12) Pires praises the military preparedness of the Kingdom and port city of Aden in the southern part of the Arabian Peninsula, saying that they spent judiciously on fortification, since this insulated them against untimely demise: Aden lies at the foot of a mountain, almost flat on the plain, a little town, but very strong, both in walls, towers, and ramparts, as well as in all the paraphernalia of gun towers, loopholes, much ordnance, and many warriors—for there are always many people of the country paid to fight,
38 Alan Chong apart from the fact that at any alarm a large number (of the people) from inland rush to help. Inside the city there is a beautiful fortress, with a captain in it always prepared as he should be, because for the last ten years they have always been afraid of our [Portuguese] armadas, and all the Moors help this city so that it shall not be taken. They fear that if it were taken the end would soon come, because it is all they have left. (Pires, 1944a, pp. 15–16) Mercantile civilization is precarious and should rightly be defended commensurately with its trading hospitality; otherwise, it will not be sustainable. Such a civilization is also investing its defense against the depraved, who have turned themselves into mercenaries and who profit from endless wars. Likewise, even though Pires (1944a) singled out Siam as an important trading power, he was extremely disappointed at the constant state of war in Indochina, devoting very short paragraphs to Burma, Cambodia, Champa, and Cochin China, and frequently describing their kings as expending their treasures and energies fighting their neighbors, committing atrocities to scare one another, and pursuing minimal trade with the great trading city of Malacca (pp. 108–115). This tone of disapproval gives way occasionally to pure puzzlement, such as when Pires (1944a) writes of the “fight, plunder, yet trade” culture of the largely maritime Malay world of the islands and peninsulas stretching from Java to the Moluccas: The people of Sunda and Java are neither friends nor enemies. They keep themselves to themselves. They trade with one another, and also if they meet on the sea as pirates, whoever is better prepared attacks, and so they use here, however great the friendship or relationship between them. (p. 173) Hence, he records that: They say that the people of Sunda are more valiant than those of Java. These are good men and true, and the Javanese are diabolic, and daring in treacheries and they are proud of the boast of being Javanese [sic]. (Pires, 1944a, p. 173)
Piety and indulgence Intrinsic to the claim of being a port city or trading kingdom of good repute is the idea that the society that exists within it exhibits some markers of improvement and aspiration towards a better life, however, defined. In the world of the early sixteenth century, one cannot quite impose the framework of modernization as the ideal analytical trajectory. Instead, the world of maritime Asia
Appealing to humane capitalism 39 encountered by Pires tended to exhibit social progress through varying degrees of subjective piety at one extreme, and social and material indulgence at the other. In Pires’ representation, the world of pre-Portuguese conquest Malacca exhibited the misalignment of piety and materialism among its ruling elite. The King of Malacca overreached himself in wanting to dispossess the first Portuguese merchants of their lives while acquiring their goods. Moreover, Pires saw the King’s interpretation of Islam as being colored by deep xenophobia and a superficial puritanism. Pires’ (1944b) contrasting vision of Malacca after the Portuguese conquest predictably asserted that the new masters were now delivering “greater truth and justice” than what could be witnessed by both native Malays and the foreign trading community before Portuguese governance: “A Solomon was needed to govern Malacca, and it deserves one” (pp. 281–283). Malacca’s reputation as a trading hub could only soar as assorted foreign merchants returned to a well-ordered port. Likewise, Pires indicted the Sultan of Cairo for mismanaging interreligious and communitarian harmony in both the city and its adjacent territories, contributing steadily to the erosion of its trading reputation. The Sultan of Cairo had overindulged himself in the company of his large number of wives and the services of slaves behind the palace walls, at the expense of his subjects’ needs. Pires (1944a) juxtaposed the Sultan’s worldly extravagance against his dwindling revenue collection, derived from the taxation of spices passing through the city and pilgrims en route to worship at the Holy Sepulchre (pp. 10–11). In contrast to Malacca and Cairo, Persia simultaneously exhibited both extremes of indulgence and piety. Trade and the attendant accumulation of wealth and leisure time had, Pires (1944a) argues, “spoiled” them: The Persians are very fond of pleasure, very orderly in their dress, and use many perfumes. They anoint themselves with aloes and with costly scented unguents. They have many wives. They are served by eunuchs, and the eunuchs who have charge of the women rise to be great lords. The Moors in general are all jealous men, and thus for all their good looks most of them are sodomites, including the Persians and the people of Ormuz. And they do not consider this to be unsuitable to their condition, nor are they punished for it, and there are even public places where they practice this for money. And those who suffer this are beardless and go about dressed like women, and the Moors laugh at us when we point out to them the turpitude of that sin. (p. 23) At the other extreme, wealth, trade, and power encouraged Persian leaders to practice the cult of the Prophet, which was derived from the tussle between Prophet Mohammed’s son-in-law, Ali, and four companions in Mohammed’s company—Othman, Abu Bakr, Omar, and Hacabar—following the Prophet’s passing. According to Pires’ (1944a) account, Ali made himself out to be a true
40 Alan Chong prophet in his own right and discredited not only his father-in-law Mohammed, but also the original four companions: And he [Ali] commanded that from thenceforward they should name Ali in their prayers and not Mohammed, saying that he had won much land at the point of his lance, that the twelve signs of the heavens were with him, and that they had come together at his birth to make him a knight and a great prophet… (p. 25) From then on, Persian kings and nobles had to choose which Prophet they were devotees of, and on that basis they decided their alliances and enemies. It came to pass that Sheikh Ismail, a devotee of Prophet Ali, came to power by avenging his father’s death at the hands of the King of Shiraz (an important Persian city) who was a believer in Mohammed. Sheikh Ismail attempted to join the trading reputation of Shiraz, and the representation of a united Persia believing solely in Prophet Ali, with the projection of his diplomatic authority forged through sword and merchandise: …[T]he ambassadors sent by this Sheikh are attended by many mounted men, well dressed people of good appearance, very sumptuous, with vessels of gold and silver, which show forth the greatness of the Sheikh. To all the Moorish kings he sends gifts and presents, and learned men so that they may follow his law. He says that he will not rest until he sees all the Moors made followers of Ali in his time, and after that will come that which he knows ought to come. The Moorish people are for this new Sheikh… (Pires, 1944a, p. 29) Finally, Pires (1944a) even recognizes that heathens who are neither Muslim nor Christian sought to dignify their wealth with a large measure of constructed piety, as in the case of the landowners in the trading center of Goa, in the Indian subcontinent: There are a great many heathens in this kingdom of Goa, more than in the kingdom of the Deccan. Some of them are very honoured men with large fortunes; and almost the whole kingdom lies in their hands, because they are natives and possess the land and they pay the taxes. Some of them are noblemen with many followers and lands of their own, and are persons of great repute, and wealthy, and they live on their estates, which are very gay and fresh. The heathens of the kingdom of Goa surpass those of Cambay. They have beautiful temples of their own in this kingdom; they have priests or Brahmans of many kinds. There are some very honoured stocks among these Brahmans. Some of them will not eat anything which has contained blood or anything prepared by the hand of another. These Brahmans are greatly revered throughout the country, particularly among the heathens.
Appealing to humane capitalism 41 Like those of Cambay, the poor ones serve to take merchandise and letters safely through the land, because the rich ones rank as great lords. They are clever, prudent, learned in their religion. A Brahman would not become a Mohammedan (even) if he were made a king. (p. 59) In these myriad ways, Pires was making the point that piety and indulgence were conjoined as forms of social control exercised upon the permanent and transient populations of great trading cities, even if their degrees of success varied inevitably across the different parts of Asia.
The visibility of a junction for exchange Pires (1944a) has indirectly sketched for his readers an allusion to the geographically connected Asian global city in the course of his pronouncements upon those sites he praises as archetypes of the great trading center. Let us consider his description of the Aden’s glory: This town has a great trade with the people of Cairo as well as with those of all India, and the people of India trade with it. There are many important merchants in the city with great riches, and many from other countries live there also. This city is a meeting place for merchants. It is one of the four great trading cities in the world, and it has dealings inside the straits with Jidda, to which it trades most of the spices and drugs in exchange for the said (merchandise). It trades cloth to Dahlak and receives seed pearls in exchange; it trades coarse cloths and various trifling things to Zeila and Berbera in exchange for gold, horses, slaves, and ivory; it trades with Sokotra, sending cloth, straw of Mecca, Socotrine aloes, and dragon’s-blood; it trades with Ormuz, whence it brings horses; and out of the goods from Cairo it trades gold, foodstuffs, wheat, and rice if there is any, spices, seed pearls, musk, silk, and any other drugs; it trades with Cambay, taking there the merchandise from Cairo and opium, and returning large quantities of cloth, with which it trades in Arabia and the Islands, and seeds, glass beads, beads from Cambay, many carnelians of all colours, and chiefly spices and drugs from Malacca, cloves, nutmeg, mace, sandalwood, cubeb, seed pearls, and things of that sort… it traded the merchandise from Malacca also with Pegu in exchange for lac, benzoin, musk, and precious stones, rice also from Bengal, rice from Siam, and merchandise from China which comes through Ayuthia. And in this way it has become great, prosperous, and rich, and the king receives all his revenues from Aden alone, for all the rest is nothing. (Pires, 1944a, pp. 16–17) What we see here is the visible shape of a junction of exchange. This junction is a hub for transfers of luxuries, wealth, and practical goods to onward third and fourth destinations. There is a pluralism of tradable items concomitant
42 Alan Chong with a pluralism of merchants transiting though and residing in Aden. This hub also conflates the near and the far, “global” and “local,” and draws the produce of lesser sites into a network of transregional circulation. While the physical geography of a deep harbor and an enlightened leadership appreciative of fostering the traffic and residence of foreign traders matter in building connectivity, the availability of a climate of public safety, the ability to consume and produce unique spices, and manufactures matter in establishing greatness. Consequently, Pires is dismissive of other towns on the Arabian Peninsula such as Tor, Jidda, Fartak, Zeila, Berbera, and Sokotra as attractive trading sites. These places are mostly plagued by poor physical attributes such as shallow, rocky harbors, “bare ground and no grass” and infested by “nomad robbers” demanding a degree of military protection of merchants far in excess of what these towns are worth in terms of valuable local produce (Pires, 1944a, pp. 18–19). Other factors of decline for reigning trading hubs, as noted by Pires (1944a), include traits of treachery and slipshod handiwork by craftsmen in Bengal and a royal disinclination towards trade, discouragement of seamanship, and allowance of proximate interlopers to manage trade exclusively from the Japanese borders (pp. 93, 131). Pires has, however, distinguished the immense trading potential of Canton as a collection point of production from all of China and of foreign merchants from the rest of Asia, despite the stifling xenophobic authoritarianism of the Chinese emperor and his officials. As we have noted in the subsection on demographic pluralism, if Canton represented in Portuguese eyes the unlimited wealth that could be traded out of China, the Portuguese would ultimately dispatch Pires himself as their first ambassador to convince the Chinese to open up to said trade. As much as we can discern from Armando Cortesão’s thumbnail sketch of Pires’ life, Pires’ mission manifested ironically a clumsy combination of military prowess, piety, and indulgence to the Chinese court, ultimately resulting in the delegation’s dismal end (Cortesão, 1944, pp. xxxvi–l). If there is a lesson to be learned from Pires’ demise, it is that his articulation of mercantile civilization was not universally shared. That said, Pires leaves us a vision of what humaneness in IRE might mean – melding demographic pluralism, conjoined tolerance for both piety and indulgence, military prowess, and political promotion through serving as a commercial junction.
Mahathir bin Mohamad as a voice for economic justice Writing nearly five centuries later, Malaysian politician and longest serving premier Mahathir bin Mohamad appealed for acceptance of the Malaysian (and more broadly Asian) need to practice indigenously varied capitalism. This hybrid capitalism must address social justice and the cruel legacies of Western colonialism. From the late eighteenth century onwards, Europeans were no longer appreciative of Asian economic pluralism. Rather, empire meant the diktat of big business and centrally controlled metropolitan-periphery relations of production.
Appealing to humane capitalism 43 Mahathir’s famous diatribe in his maiden political polemic, The Malay Dilemma, first published in 1970—a time when he was construed as a “young radical” impatient with the sitting Malaysian prime minister, Tunku Abdul Rahman— begins with a sincere appreciation of the harshness of systematized colonial economics and its structural impositions upon indigenous premodern subsistence economics. Bearing in mind the well-known British pretexts for colonizing the Malay Peninsula and the ongoing fragility of the political economy of race relations in Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore, Governor Frank Swettenham’s 1906 stereotyping of the Malay race would be politically incendiary even if it were rendered in an unscientific narrative: The leading characteristic of the Malay of every class is a disinclination to work. Nature has done so much for him that he is never really cold and never starves… Land had no value in the Malay States in 1874, and it was the custom for any one to settle where he pleased on unoccupied and unclaimed land, and leave it when he felt inclined… All internal taxation was irregular, and the land was practically free. No cultivator had any title, but chiefs of districts and others with official positions—some, indeed, without— possessed written documents investing them with extraordinary powers over large and ill-defined areas. (Swettenham, 1948, pp. 136–137) The British instrumentalization of a static and purportedly “backward” Malay culture justified a civilizing mission under colonial guise. Such views have been perpetuated in Western sociology, economics, and anthropology of the region in more social scientific language. Economist J.H. Boeke (1980) of the Netherlands noted that Western capitalism did not find in Eastern society the institutions ready to take charge of propagating its principles [of capital-intensive production, labor specialization, profit orientation, managerialism, and so on] and achievements, but had to send out its own representatives for the purpose. (p. 28) Instead, there was a deep cultural clash whereby “the mass product of the new Western industries was thrown upon the Eastern market, sweeping away Native handicrafts, Native trade, and the Native system of distribution.” There, he writes, “capitalism only offered new products, and did not provide any new sources of labor. From a social point of view its effect was destructive rather than constructive” (Boeke, 1980, p. 28). In this regard, Mahathir’s discourse concerning the restoration of Malay nationalistic pride via affirmative action economics appears highly perspicacious even if it is considered by many modern economists to be a distortion of
44 Alan Chong contemporary Malaysian capitalism. In Mahathir’s own words, Malay self-respect cannot be divorced from restorative justice. Precolonial history and geography in the Malay Peninsula provided an idyll where: There was plenty of land for everyone and the hills were never necessary for cultivation or permanent settlement. The lush tropical plains with their plentiful sources of food were able to support the relatively small number of inhabitants of early Malaya. No great exertion or ingenuity was required to obtain food… Hunger and starvation, a common feature in countries like China, were unknown in Malaya…Even the weakest and the least diligent were able to live in comparative comfort, to marry and procreate. The observation that only the fittest would survive did not apply, for the abundance of food supported the existence of even the weakest. (Mahathir, 2015, pp. 34–35) In contrast, Mahathir depicted the Chinese as a people inured to hardship and inspired to be economically vigorous by virtue of the harsh weather and politically induced upheavals in China. Hence, he writes: [T]he people who left the shores of China to seek their fortune abroad were hardened and resourceful. Like emigrants everywhere they were the people who were not content with their lot and were moved by a desire for a better life, and obviously by the determination to work for this. The Chinese who flooded Malaya with the subsequent encouragement of the British were therefore adventurous and resourceful. The Malays, whose own hereditary and environmental influence had been so debilitating, could do nothing but retreat before the onslaught of the Chinese immigrants. Whatever the Malays could do, the Chinese could do better and more cheaply. Before long, the industrious and determined immigrants had displaced the Malays in petty trading and all branches of skilled work. As their wealth increased, so did their circle of contacts. Calling on their previous experience with officialdom in their own homeland, the Chinese immigrants were soon establishing the type of relationship between officials and traders which existed in China. The organized open gratification of the ruling class soon firmly e ntrenched the Chinese in the towns and helped them establish complete control of the economy. (Mahathir, 2015, p. 39) It did not help that British colonial divide and rule policies polarized ethnic resentment over who “owned” the economy. Additionally, British corporations such as the Malayan Rubber Company, Harrison and Crosfield, Boustead Buttery Estate Agency, Guthrie and Company, Barlow and Company, and Sime Darby exemplified the large-scale extractive capitalism in rubber, tin, and palm oil that neither Chinese nor Indian, let alone Malay, economic entities could compete with.
Appealing to humane capitalism 45 Upon independence, the new Malayan government trumpeted a “Malayanization” of the economy, but this hardly changed matters. In Mahathir’s (2015) reasoning: [I]n the mad scramble that followed, the Chinese won hands down. Having more business acumen, capable of improvising at short notice, and backed by newly founded Chinese banks and their own considerable personal wealth, they were soon organized to replace the established [British] firms…. More money flowed their way and helped further to consolidate their economic grip on the country. (p. 70) This criticism reeks of racism and political envy, but it is an objective observation if one adopts the view that colonialism entrenches structural violence against indigenous peoples everywhere by relegating generations to social and economic subservience. In Mahathir’s call for nationalistic restoration, special affirmative action in installing quotas for Malays in government, corporate, and educational spaces is justified as part of the economic decolonization process. Consider, for instance, Mahathir’s (2015) lament about the inadequacy of Malay scholastic training for a modern capitalist economy after independence: The deleterious effect of poverty is not fully understood by most people. In the first place, poor parents are usually not only poor, but ill-educated and ill-prepared to look after school-going children. Not understanding the value of education, apathetic, and without much faith in the potential of their children, these parents always fail to furnish even the elementary needs of children going to school… In fact, poor Malay parents would not even bother about formal schooling for their children were it not for the fact that the Government makes education compulsory… Somewhere the cycle has to be broken, and a rich country like Malaysia would stand accused of moral irresponsibility if she did not subsidize the education of the poor. The scholarships which poor Malay children are receiving are morally justifiable and socially necessary. They are the means to progress for a backward community in a progressing nation. They are a means of rectifying racial inequality, and of raising the Malays to the level of the Chinese and Indians. (pp. 98–99) Affirmative action logics therefore require redistributive capitalism interpreted as state capitalism operated by a consociational elite willing to ruthlessly enact the final trajectory of decolonization in economic terms. In this regard, Mahathir (2015) extends his affirmative action logic into what I term as IRE: Because non-discrimination between races tends to work against the interest of the Malays, the Malays have to hang on to the system which affords them some bargaining power; thus they depend on racialism to sustain
46 Alan Chong themselves. If in the process they also block the advance of others, this too is nothing unusual. The days of the survival of the fittest are over. National as well as international mores now insist that there is an inherent right of the weak to be defended. What would happen to the world if weak nations had no right to protect themselves against strong nations? The unequal strength which would follow would make strong nations stronger and the weak weaker. (p. 222) Mahathir’s affirmative action capitalism received its severest test during the Asian financial crisis of 1997–1998, prompting Mahathir to update his diatribe on remedial anti-colonialism. In his book A New Deal for Asia (1999), Mahathir opened his attack with these moral tones: Greed. An incessant greed for money and instant material gain has impoverished Asia. A whole region which took pride in its economic achievements over the last few decades, and which was praised by countries around the world as the global engine of growth and prosperity, suddenly came under the attack of currency traders and financial speculators. (p. 7) Mahathir made clear his disdain for those who would argue that free market forces would impose the normative discipline necessary for a “good capitalism.” In many ways, Mahathir was arguing in parallel with Karl Polanyi’s interpretation of the social embeddedness of capitalism and against the grain of the so-called Thatcher-Reagan “Washington Consensus.” Most economists and political scientists dismissed Mahathir at the time as an outlier and a defensive holdover from the era of firebrand anti-colonialism popular in the 1960s and 1970s (Milne & Mauzy, 1999, pp. 175–178; Wain, 2009, pp. 193–194). Yet he was trenchant about defending the moral imperative of social and political protection in an age of borderless capitalism where the Washington Consensus was imposing “one size fits all” solutions. The new colonial powers were not always the G7 governments; they could also be fronted by hedge funds and the IMF and World Bank. His prose is not intellectually elevated, but rather represents a plea to restore moral and social considerations to a global capitalism that lacks heart: [M]ost of these [Asian] countries had developed by providing some kind of protection for their businesses and industries. That is the only way they can compete with the rich advanced countries. Behind some tariff and non-tariff barriers, not only were the countries able to grow and prosper, but they could actually compete with the developed countries in the open international markets. But now the IMF insisted that the tariffs must go and the economy must be open to foreigners, that is the huge and powerful ethnic European business giants. Their banks and corporations must be allowed to
Appealing to humane capitalism 47 come in and operate freely and unrestricted and to buy up local banks and businesses. Locals may not be favoured in any way because this constitutes cronyism or nepotism. Only foreigners, particularly Europeans, are not regarded as cronies and may be favoured. The end result must be the complete takeover of the economy by the Europeans. Once they achieve this then they would be in a position to control the politics of the countries as well. (Mahathir, 1999, p. 147) Perhaps it is no coincidence that, within the capitalist heartland of the US, President Donald Trump made it a central plank of his inaugural agenda to withdraw from the Trans-Pacific Partnership, citing how lowered trade barriers facilitated the “rape” of American jobs by foreign capitalists (Cassidy, 2017). Mahathir is therefore not alone in criticizing borderless capitalism without a conscience.
Conclusion Across five centuries, two different streams of reflection upon the nature of Asia’s IRE have produced some common features centered on an appeal to humane capitalism. I dub this set of characteristics IRE, as opposed to the more mainstream term “international political economy,” which is associated with clinical free market theory and the “Washington Consensus.” IRE derived via the intellectual praxis and intellectual rhetoric in Asia collects several contradictory value propositions that anchor the practice of market relationships within social values. Some of these values may be historically contingent, but the fact that values are embedded in economic relationships means that the needs and vitality of human beings are prioritized over the theoretically faithful operation of economics. Tomé Pires admired the diversity of Asia while also identifying abject lessons from the malgovernance of economics. Cities, ports, and kingdoms thrived as trading destinations and seats of empires on the strength of market reputations and hospitality to foreigners. Moreover, foreigners ought to expediently coexist with local populations and the mores practiced by their rulers if trading centers are to flourish. The proverbial clash between godliness and materialism could also be managed and streamlined if there is positive social spinoff from market relationships. Military prowess is also not necessarily detrimental to economic prosperity if it performs a guardianship role instead of outright material aggrandizement. This early modern pluralistic mercantile civilization operated on many contradictory values, but it provided an alternative to a “one size fits all” understanding of capitalist globalization. Mahathir bin Mohamad’s late twentieth-century rhetoric about anti-colonial redistributive capitalism pushed Asian mercantile civilization even further towards the theoretical borders of political incorrectness. He essentially challenges economists to consider the nationalist pride invested in market relationships that continue to be laden with colonial baggage. To relieve this baggage of systemic inequalities, one must be prepared to call out harsh truths. Mahathir’s radical
48 Alan Chong anti-colonial diatribes may be controversial, but today they echo what some in the G7 states have termed the new populist challenge to capitalism. Borderless capitalism does impose its homogenizing tendencies upon middle classes and working classes alike. This is why we need to understand—however tentatively— that Asia may have always offered an IRE that is humane simply by tolerating many unorthodox socially embedded market relationships.
Notes 1 Fragments in square brackets indicate the author’s own notes of illumination, while those placed in normal round brackets are direct reproductions in Armando Cortesão’s translation of the Suma. 2 In modern Malay: “Laksamana” or admiral/war minister.
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3 Indigenization of International Relation theories in Korea and China Tails of two essentialisms Jungmin Seo and Hwanbi Lee Recently, academic efforts in Korea and China have focused on constructing indigenized International Relation theories (IRTs). IRT scholars in this region increasingly criticize the ethnocentrism, both geographically and historically, of existing IRTs and pursue China- or Korea-specific theories while referring to other schools that seem to have an independent status from Anglo-A merican academic hegemony. A decades-long yearning for indigenous IRT in China has resulted in the creation of several unique keywords, such as Tianxia, being inserted into existing IRT vocabularies. In Korea, where efforts have been relatively less audacious, terminology such as “middle power diplomacy” has gained significant currency among Korean academia. This chapter aims to critically review these recent academic efforts, and we argue that such efforts in China and Korea paradoxically strengthen the hegemonic status of the Western IRT’s claims for universalism by pursuing the strategy of self-orientalization, or in other words, self-essentialization.
Theory migration and formation of hegemony The act of translation cannot but participate in the performativity of a language that circumscribes and is circumscribed by the historical contingency of that act (Liu, 1995, p. xvii). Virtually all modern theories of social sciences in East Asia originated from the act of translation during the Meiji era in Japan and the late Qing period in China. However, very few scholars have investigated the complexity of the process of translation of ideas. During this process, a translator (or ethnographer) faces dual problems: deciphering the social, political, and historical contexts of specific terms and logics while contemplating the practicality and utility of those terms and logics for the situational needs of the to-be-translated language. The dilemma and paradox of a translator, ironically, is that they decide the audience and practical purpose of the information. A translator’s or theory importer’s task, therefore, is similar to that of a cunning Greek god full of tricks, such as Hermes, the messenger of the gods. Both Hermes and translators share the same challenge of delivering their message in a convincing manner. They handle “the foreign, the strange, the unfamiliar, the exotic, the unknown,” while making
Indigenization of IR theories 51 use of all the persuasive devices at one’s disposal to convince his readers of the truth of his message, but, as though these rhetorical strategies were cunning tricks, he gives them scant recognition. His texts assume a truth that speaks for itself—a whole truth that needs no rhetorical support. (Crapanzano, 1986, p. 52) In this way, an indisputable agency emerges. Theories have migrated from the West to the rest of the world through the ontology of non-Western thinkers, especially in the humanities and social sciences. Such thinkers have been intensely discussing the hegemonic theoretical framework of the West. During this process, translated modern concepts have emerged, such as “nation (minzu, minzoku, minjok),” “state (guojia, kokka, gukka),” and “democracy (minzhu, minshu, minju).” When the Western imperial societies used democracy in the contexts of emerging bourgeois and class revolutions, Chinese in the late Qing used democracy as a synonym for Western civilization and the “life-blood” of China’s wealth and power. Yan Fu, for instance, defined democracy as “subduing the self for the benefit of the public in regard to punishment and law” (Wang, 1997, p. 37). The translated concept was the result of intense interactions and the intentional choice of a translator who stood between two separate historical conditions. The translation of democracy, therefore, was circumscribed by the sociopolitical conditions of the late Qing China as much as the transplanted performativity of the vocabulary. Though this study cannot expand upon the translation of IRTs in East Asia, it is necessary to further investigate the archaeological works on the process of IRT migrations from the West to East Asia since the end of World War II. It is known that E.H. Carr’s The Twenty Years’ Crisis, 1919–1939: An Introduction to the Study of International Relations and Hans Morgenthau’s Politics among Nations: The Struggle for Power and Peace were introductory readings for the majority of young International Relations (IR) students in the 1950s and 1960s in Japan and Korea (and probably in Taiwan). Yet, few have investigated how the concepts of “national interest,” “balance of power,” or “sovereignty” were interpreted, translated, and received by those who circumscribed, and were circumscribed by, historical conditions. We presume that amid intensive ideological confrontations both inside and outside of the national border, the concepts were subjugated to numerous contestations among different groups harboring different priorities, and therefore, varied narrativization of national interest and sovereignty. Scholars rooted in non-Western cultures and engaged in IRTs have performed the role of theoretical translators in the extreme conditions of asymmetrical power relations. In 1960s Korea, many Korean students in American academic institutions were vigorously trained. For instance, the East-West Center in Honolulu actively recruited the brightest students from Korea with a special scholarship program, aiming to create pro-American elite groups through education amid the intensifying Cold War. Upon completing their studies, Korean intellectuals diligently studied, translated, and taught Hans Morgenthau, Brzezinski, and other prominent IR scholars in elite institutions in Korea. At the
52 Jungmin Seo and Hwanbi Lee same time, they were able to engage in policy-making processes as top policy advisors, and appointed high-ranking government bureaucrats. Until recently, only one retired as a professor from the Department of Political Science at Seoul National University, and others were ministers, congressmen, and top presidential advisors; the vast majority of these influential figures were beneficiaries of the East-West Center scholarship program. In various discussions on the history of Korean IRTs, virtually no consideration was given to the historical meanings presented by the first generation of Korean IR scholars, who basically served as “translators.” For instance, Hans Morgenthau’s book American Foreign Policy: A Critical Examination, was first translated into Korean in 1957; additionally, E.H. Carr’s What is History? was translated into Korean in 1966. Many political science students indicate that these books were frequently used in their college classrooms. However, the majority of political science professors in the 1960s were trained in Japanese (mostly in law), and few were directly exposed to the Western IRT. Hence, the first generation that studied in the US in the 1960s and began teaching in the 1970s can be regarded as the first importer of IRTs. Though political domination of the US in South Korea began in August 1945, academic hegemony of the Western social sciences only began in the 1970s. The Department of Political Science and Diplomacy at Yonsei University was exemplary: of the seven newly hired professors in the 1970s, five received their PhD from American institutions, one French, and one domestic. In the 1980s, all three of the newly hired professors were trained in the US. From 1970 to 2017, the department had never hired an IR professor who was not trained in the US or Europe. Of the sixteen professors who belong to the broadly defined IR subfield, twelve were trained in the US, three in France, and one in England. In this way, Anglo-American IRTs set the standard for IR curricula and syllabi at Yonsei University, as well as at the majority of Korean universities. The second generation of scholars who explored their academic careers after the liberalizing study abroad policy was enacted in 1988 engaged with American academia quite differently than their predecessors. Through democratizing processes at home, they proactively sought the applicability of American IRTs in East Asian circumstances. Furthermore, they attempted to formulate country-specific and region-specific research that obviously went beyond the simple translations performed by their predecessors. They have arduously interpreted the meanings and implications of realism, liberalism, and constructivism and tried to apply those to both the past and current international affairs of East Asia. This generation eventually became the pivotal voices that called for Korean-style IRTs, which are further discussed near the end of this section. The economic crises of 1997 and 2008 produced a new generation of Korean IR scholars. The current IR scholars in Korea and abroad have different class backgrounds than the previous scholars, with far fewer belonging to the upper class. Additionally, their research is focused within the scope of prospective jobs and research trends of Western academia, so as to ensure their survival by publishing more articles in prominent English journals. As a countermeasure against the rampant nepotism in the faculty hiring process in Korean universities, the
Indigenization of IR theories 53 sheer number of publications in the Science Citation Index (SCI) and the Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI) became the ultimate criterion for hiring, promotion, and tenure in the majority of Korean universities. This new standard imposed since the early 2000s forced Korean scholars to become an integral part of the Anglo-American academic world; the only virtual way to prove one’s research originality is publishing in English. Different generations of scholars engaged in different translations, and theories migrated accordingly. For the first generation, the primary task was to import Western IR theories that might replace the legacy of Japanese academic colonialism. Until the 1980s, IR courses in Korean universities were largely conducted through the reading and comprehension of classic IR textbooks under the guidance of America-trained professors; its applicability to Korean students’ worldview was hardly of concern. Nevertheless, student rejection of the unilateral indoctrination of Western IRTs sometimes caused classroom disruption as anti- Americanism gained strength on Korean campuses. The language of Leninist “Imperialism” circulated among student activists, and this campus atmosphere somewhat influenced the research trends of the second generation of Korean IR scholars. These scholars became increasingly concerned with “Korea-centered IR theories,” “East Asian international relations,” and “middle-power diplomacy,” and were rather uncomfortable with the basic premise of “the balance of power,” “power transition theory,” and even “democratic peace theory.” Theory migration processes can be easily identified in the history of Chinese IRTs, as illustrated by Qin Yaqing (2007, 2011) and Feng Zhang (2012). According to Qin, Chinese scholars have primarily researched the revolutionary thoughts of Marx, Lenin, and Mao, and have also viewed Western thoughts as a subject of criticism before 1979. Until then, theories were a guideline for policy-making and research reports were simply prepared for the government; even the Cultural Revolution from 1966 to 1976 intensified ideological fervor in conducting research. The “reform and opening up” policy that Deng Xiaoping initiated, though, led to the significant changes in Chinese IR studies. In the early 1980s, the first Chinese students who had studied at American universities returned to their homeland and became dedicated to teaching and performing research based on the knowledge they acquired abroad. Therefore, IRT studies in China were inevitably influenced by the American scholarly tradition (Qin, 2011, p. 190). At the same time, efforts were made to translate Western IR works into Chinese. For instance, the first translation series was completed in 1990; the series, which was mostly about realism, included Hans Morgenthau’s Politics Among Nations, Kenneth Waltz’s Theory of International Politics, and other classics. As the Cold War ended, Chinese scholars became conscious of the domination of realism in the IR discipline and aimed to import theories other than realism, thereby promoting four more series of translations (Qin, 2007, p. 29). By 2000, the majority of the important classics, most of which carried American IRTs, had been imported and translated into Chinese. Even marginal theoretical approaches such as feminism and critical theory were imported in the early 2000s.
54 Jungmin Seo and Hwanbi Lee Although the Chinese IR academic community was enriched by Western thoughts and witnessed remarkable development during this period, Chinese scholars were also concerned about Western dominance of IR studies. The earliest reflection on Chinese IRTs was provoked by the proposal that China needed “IR theory with Chinese characteristics” during China’s first major IR theory conference in Shanghai in 1987 (Zhang, 2012, p. 77). Since then, discussions on Chinese IR theories have deepened and even become complicated, forming a general consensus that building IRT from a Chinese perspective is necessary (Qin, 2011, p. 195), and local resources must be added to existing IRTs. The socalled Tsinghua approach is an example of this (see Yan, 2001). Still, those voices have failed to stop younger scholars in China from being directly exposed to and eventually dominated by Western scholarly disciplines. Likewise, the academic hegemony of Western IR has been rapidly formulated since 1979 and continues even today. From these theory migration processes in Korea and China, we can partially answer the following questions: (1) How did the hegemony of the Western IR theories emerge, and (2) What are the mechanisms for maintaining hegemony? First, a combination of open trade policy and education has facilitated the migration process of IRTs, which greatly contributed to the domination of Western IRTs in both countries. American-trained scholars have been key figures in importing and reproducing Western thoughts in their own homeland. In the 1950s, the Korean academic community explored an alternative to mitigate Japanese academic colonialism, and its study abroad policy paved the way. For China, the aforementioned opening up policy in 1979 was a watershed. An increasing number of American-trained scholars in both countries have significantly influenced the hegemony of the Western IR discipline, spreading Western knowledge and methodology to local students and creating its image as truth. Second, “an international division of intellectual labor” (Min, 2016, p. 478) has been routinized; additionally, it is related to Cox’s internationalization of the state and production (Cox, 1981, pp. 144–149). In the process of knowledge production, less developed countries are mostly immersed in empirical testing, while the developed work on theory-building. This pattern of hierarchical division of labor among countries has been reinforced over the generations. A survey of the Korean Journal of International Studies (KJIS) conducted by Byung Won Min (2016) reveals that there is a discrepancy between empirical studies and scholars’ voices calling for indigenous theories in South Korea. Analyzing articles published by KJIS during the last ten years, he argues that Korean scholars have still concentrated on the empirical research applying Western IRTs to East Asian contexts, which has no bearing on their requests for indigenous theories. Similarly, an analysis of IR-related articles published in China from 1978 to 2007 reveals that the amount of research on Western IRTs, especially constructivism, was on the rise, while there was little change in the amount pertaining to the Chinese paradigm (Qin, 2011, p. 188). In this regard, scholars in non-Western cultures seem to find it hard to overcome path dependency as long as it remains so powerful.
Indigenization of IR theories 55 For Korean and Chinese scholars, the standards for evaluating academic performance have served as one of the structural elements in maintaining hegemony. As mentioned above, Korean scholars are required to make tenacious efforts to publish articles in SCI or SSCI indexed journals for better social recognition and job prospects. Similarly, the policy and promotion criteria of Chinese university and research institutes encourage more international publications in SCI or SSCI journals not only for the social recognition and improved job positions, but also to obtain governmental funds (Liu, Hu, Tang, & Wang, 2015, pp. 557–558). Scholars have been forced to follow the standards of Western disciplines under such structures in both countries, and naturally, they tend to value publication in English for their survival in academia. In addition, it is doubtable whether some of theories and theoretical criticisms were omitted in the process of theory migration, thereby creating a bias in favor of existing universalist IRTs. This is easily seen as international journals mostly carry American or Americanized articles, but it is simply ignored or barely noticed. Thus, where are the other articles? All of these factors are feeding hegemony.
Possibility of escaping from hegemony The processes of theory migration from Anglo-American mainstream academia to Korean academia feature an extreme form of asymmetrical power relations. In the sense that the Korean scholars could not imagine indigenous IRTs without using the “modern” political categories (Chakrabarty, 2007, p. 4) such as sovereignty, international political economy, or diplomacy, Korean academia has been situated in the hegemony of Western IRT. From the 1990s to the 2000s, a number of Korean IR theorists introduced the issue of Koreanized IRT (see Cho, 2015; Min, 2016), while claiming that current IRTs in Korean academia are “failing to craft the critical tools to theorize their own unique political experience” (Kang, 2006, p. 120). This effort, many claim, should be “universally applicable” along with mainstream IRTs (Choi, A. J., 2008; Choi, J. K., 2008). In that sense, Young Chul Cho (2015) criticizes that the efforts of indigenizing IRTs in Korea fell into the colonial mentality that “relegate Korean IR to being little more than a provider of ‘unique regional independent variable’” (p. 691). In addition to Cho’s criticism, we wish to problematize another fundamental issue: the notion of the unique political experience. The majority of Korean scholars believe the historical experiences such as “divided nation,” “intensive civil war,” and “long-lasting homogeneous nation” as the very grounds for “uniqueness of political experiences.” The only way to ensure the uniqueness of certain political experiences is to accept the notion of universal experiences. In other words, as much as the notion of “international” is the outcome of “national” (Lincicome, 1999) and the notion of “chaos” is the product of the concept of “order” (Bauman, 1991), to claim uniqueness, one should take “the universal” for granted. If division, civil war, or a long history of unified dynasty are experiences, those experiences are not influencing the current political consciousness as lasting “traces,” “marks,” or “inscriptions”; rather, they are influencing the
56 Jungmin Seo and Hwanbi Lee consciousness as proactive behaviors of recollection by ever-changing political subjectivities (Ricoeur, 2004). Therefore, searching for uniqueness is the very essence of the resistance that is predetermined by hegemony that controls the concept of universality. Or, reversely, the very act of searching for uniqueness is reinforcing the notion of universality of the hegemonic theoretical frameworks. Hence, it might vitiate the domination of existing theories, but strengthen the imagined universalist experiences upon which mainstream theories have been built. Admittedly, emphasizing uniqueness strengthens the notion of universality of hegemonic IRT. However, it does so only when it is assumed that Western IRTs rest on universal experiences. In other words, if one breaks the imagined belief in universalist experience or discloses its partiality, arguing uniqueness would not reinforce the notion of universality. Rather, it would stress the particularity of experiences on which mainstream theories are based. Focusing on one’s particularity highlights the other’s particularity in the world of particularities. In fact, some have pointed to a false image of universality of hegemony. Acharya and Buzan (2007) have suggested the possibility that Western IRTs can be seen as “particular, parochial, and Eurocentric” (p. 300). Cho (2015) argues that American IR is “not the anointed guardian of universal truths but merely one player on the global academic field” (p. 694). Chun (2007) also implies the partiality of Western IRTs (p. 232). Nevertheless, it can be said that most of the research conducted in Korea thus far have failed to resist hegemony, prioritizing the systemic creation of indigenous theories over the systemic disclosure of hegemonic IRTs’ partiality. Furthermore, many point out that state-specific theories still linger within the Westphalian narrative. Apart from it, I wish to indicate that Korean scholars take an assumption of existing IR for granted in theorization. The emphasis on national experiences could be traced back to existing IR theories that treat a state primarily as a “basic” unit of analysis. Why then have states routinely been key actors in international politics, and who defined them as salient players despite there being multiple actors such as individuals and society? This assumption might be internalized in the process of the creation and reproduction of hegemony. Thus, it has been conducted without any doubt in indigenous theorization among Korean scholars. Why should a state be a principal agent in the formulation of indigenous theories? Although doubting and questioning a given order is a primary element of resistance, it seems that their theorization does not faithfully reflect their voices for resistance to hegemony.
Essentializing “culture” One of the key characteristics of Chinese IRTs is the prevalent usage of the structuralist and essentialist notion of culture. Following the fever of the Western studies in the 1980s, a China-centered approach was articulated as an alternative that often meant little more than a return to sino-centrism, with its attendant claims of particularism and Chinese uniqueness (Hart, 1999, p. 47).
Indigenization of IR theories 57 For instance, Zhao Tingyang’s concept of Tianxia, Yan Xuetong’s notion of the centrality of morality in Chinese foreign policy, or Qin Yaqing’s concept of relationality are all grounded in Chinese philosophical and cultural traditions, especially Confucianism (Qin, 2009; Yan, 2001; Zhao, 2006). Yet, Confucianism today is the result of “a particular construction of the Western construction of China with the Chinese construction of the West, with both of these components interacting and interpenetrating each other” (Chen, 1992, p. 688). Similarly, local (Chinese) knowledge or indigenous consciousness is in general the consequence of intensive interactions among the Western epistemological domination, construction of national identities, and massive destruction of nonnational culture and identities. In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, East Asian societies had already transformed into “modern” nations while fundamentally reshaping their concepts of time, space, and self (see Tanaka, 2004). This means that Confucianism, through historical interactions in the twentieth century, is not Chinese in civilizational terms, but is Chinese in national terms. Once Confucianism became “national,” (Cheung, 2012) its notion of tianxia cannot supply the necessary quality of this concept, universality. Hence, the argument for tianxia can be very easily interpreted as “Chinese tianxia” or, more simply, “Chinese hegemony.” I can very easily reject the notion of the centrality of morality in a similar vein. As to the notion of relationality or actors-in-relations, it is not easy to distinguish that concept from similar notions that appeared in Actor-Network- Theory (Latour, 2005) or Structuration Theory (Giddens, 1983). In theorizing processual constructivism with relationality at the core, Qin (2011) elaborates the following assumptions of its key concept: process is independent of results, process has its own dynamics from changing relations, and the dynamics of process cannot be reduced to a single individual. For Giddens, a continuous process is represented as action and the first two assumptions can be explained by the terms “unintended consequences of action” and “production and reproduction of social action” in structuration theory. Further, it is explicitly articulated in Giddens’ theory that society cannot be reduced to the activities of a single constituent, which is exactly the same as in the last assumption. Above all, unlike Western orthodoxy’s top-down approach, a main idea of relationality passing through core assumptions is the interaction between structure and agents, which parallels the “duality of structure,” a core concept suggested by Giddens. In a similar vein, even though Latour provides a broader definition of actor, the core of both still exists in actors-in-relations. Therefore, it cannot be said that Chinese thoughts based on relationality are original. Many of the Chinese and Korean IRT scholars’ works begin with Robert Cox’s (1981) insight that theory is always for someone and for some purpose (p. 129). Nevertheless, the burden to prove a theory’s partiality and intentionality is on theoretical challengers. I do not recall that the supporters of Chinese or Korean IRT successfully fulfilled the mission of revealing those partiality and intentionality, though we are very easily sympathetic to Cox’s notion. When resisting hegemony in the form of universality is difficult, it is tempting to utilize
58 Jungmin Seo and Hwanbi Lee the method of strategic essentialism to resist against hegemonic universalism (Spivak, 1985). The effort to use Chinese traditions to reinterpret the contemporary world order can be seen as a sort of strategic essentialism. Nevertheless, Spivak herself had to discard this concept because the deployment of this strategy in politics means internal oppression. The Chinese (as a nation, not as a civilization) academic desire to universalize its essentialistic interpretation of the past might greatly vitiate non-Western others’ moral and political sovereignty; the discussion of “hierarchical order” is a good example of this. The tributary system worked in the premodern era; nevertheless, recent influential works on East Asian nationalism and nation states agree that there was an epistemological revolution in the late nineteenth century that fundamentally altered the concepts of sovereignty, nationhood, and statehood. The emergence of nation-centered linear history in the modern national building processes of East Asia created a radical demarcation between modern and premodern political identities. Therefore, it is not empirically rigorous to use the premodern tributary system as the foundation for understanding how modern East Asian states perceive themselves and their neighborhoods. Moreover, Zhang (2009) argues that the tributary system had been changing throughout Chinese history by showing that each dynasty had their specific tributary rules. Zhang and Buzan (2012, pp. 20–23) also contend that the tributary system during the Han dynasty acted as expedient trading arrangements for strategic interaction and economic exchanges in search of peaceful relations with the Xiongnu and the Mongols, while that of the Ming and Qing was an institutional expression of Chinese civilizational superiority. For this reason, they endeavor to overcome its original usage and conceptualize it as an international society inspired from the English school. However, its newly defined significance does not seem to transcend the original idea of international society again. Likewise, evolving aspects of the tributary system reveals that Chinese scholars have not covered all of the changes of the historical institution, but have articulated specific characteristics of it enforced during a specific period. This selective use of history without consideration of its alteration is unconvincing as a theorization. Furthermore, modern nationalism tends to force these states to reinterpret ancient history through the prism of the nation state. That is how the issues of Tibet and Xinjiang are inherently confounded with a different (ethnocentric or nationalistic) understanding of the tributary system in the present. Hence, the notion of Asian hierarchical order is an extreme reification of history as an ahistorical logic to serve the goal of properly defining the country’s rising international status (Yan, 2001). Cheung (2012, 2014) demonstrates that the development of its own IRT becomes an important opportunity both to expand its discursive power as a part of its rise in world politics and to secure its domestic legitimacy as a new nationalist discourse. Hegemonic IRTs are criticized for being ahistorical; yet, the effort to extrapolate the premodern international system in East Asia to today’s world is violently ahistorical because it ignores or camouflages the fact that “local knowledge” has always been historically situated.
Indigenization of IR theories 59
Where are the West and the non-West? In returning to Cox’s definition of problem-solving theory and critical theory, we can identify where Chinese and Korean researchers searching for their own IRTs are positioned. Their new theories share some features with problem-solving and critical theories, but are usually more inclined to one approach (Cox, 1981, p. 130). Research questions represented in the majority of indigenous IR-related articles in Korea and China primarily focus on how an indigenous theory with their characteristics can be created, but not how hegemony came into being and how it can be changed. They seem to be trapped in an illusion of indigenous theorization as the only alternative to hegemonic IR (Min, 2007, p. 43). In this vein, Chinese and Korean researches focused on indigenous IRTs are closer to problem-solving theory, which concentrates on solutions within a prevailing order, rather than critical theory which stands apart from a given order. These types of theory have a different starting point in that the former begins to decolonize within the periphery of hegemony, while the latter at the core. Chen (2011) clearly articulates that building indigenous national schools is “no more than constructing a ‘derivative discourse’ of Western modernist social science” (p. 1) and the empire will be sustained if we decolonize only non-Western IR, leaving aside the Western part. Few scholars deny the dichotomy between the West and the non-West. Even scholars who argue that the current efforts to build indigenous theories regard the West as the reference point are inextricably involved in this dichotomy. Few ask why people predominantly use West and non-West dichotomy rather than East and non-East. We are not arguing that we should use East and non-East dichotomy, but wish to indicate that we cannot rule out the possibility that language itself can influence our thought. Here, three things need to be addressed. First, since Acharya and Buzan (2007) sparked the discussion of West/non-West IR theories, East Asian scholars followed it without casting doubt on its verbalism. Yet, we point out that “East” and “non-West” terms are residual concepts defined by the West, and thus, they are based on the West and its dualistic view. The very start of Acharya and Buzan’s discussion rests on the West-centrism in this regard. If we use this demarcation, the West is still a reference point because those who seek the non-Western ideas should search for what is not Western. Second, a number of Korean and Chinese scholars define the West/East relationship as opposite from a dualistic perspective. Chen (2012) criticizes that “as long as East and West are treated as oppositional entities, the competitive mood to become another English school or a superior alternative to Western theories will persist in the search for indigenous IR theory in Japan” (p. 472). In addition to Chen’s criticism, we wish to investigate the West/non-West relationship, which is not simply opposite. In terms of verbalism, the non-West exists only when the West emerges, and the West loses its significance when the non-West disappears. In other words, those two terms have significance only when they coexist. Therefore, they are interdependent and complementary, though they are seen as mutually exclusive and conflicting. In this light, simply defining their relationship as contrary should be reconsidered.
60 Jungmin Seo and Hwanbi Lee Then, what do East Asian scholars mean by the West? Against whom are they resisting? Geographically, the West is usually Anglo-America and/or Europe, but we are not struggling with Anglo-America or Europe in a strict sense. According to Inoguchi (2007), the West consists of those areas that have been characterized as modernity during the periods from the nineteenth to the first half of the twentieth century. In this sense, the West is geographically fixed and cannot be changed, as his definition is based on a given point in the past. Shih (2010) argues, however, the West is not the geographical West, but the epistemological West in Chinese, Japanese, and Western political discourse. Interestingly, unlike the geographical definition, the epistemological West is constantly changing depending on the frame (Shih, 2010, p. 554). The majority of Korean scholars still regard the West as universal instead of being a “West.” In contrast, the Chinese epistemological frame under the tianxia locates the West at the periphery while positioning China at the center. The same can be said about the Japanese Greater Asian narrative. This variability of the West reflects that the West has been constructed and empowered by interaction between the so-called West and non-West.
Conclusion I am very struck by the irony that, in the very act of criticizing Western domination, one often ends up reifying the power of denominator to a degree that the agency of non-Western cultures is reduced to a single possibility: resistance (Liu, 1995, p. xv). The history of East Asia has been blurred with imperialism since the premodern era. It experienced successive imperial orders led by different states—China, Britain, Japan, and America, in turn. Some believe that the age of imperialism is over; however, this is doubtable as its latent legacy has recently emerged in the minds of Asian scholars. As many point out, it is imperialistic to force others to accept a theory that is centered on one’s own culture and experiences, and thus might vitiate the others’ sovereignty. In this regard, current efforts to draw a border in the knowledge world and to create a nation-specific theory that is universally applicable at the same time might lead to unending imperialism in terms of intellectuality. Having gone through modernization, the concept of state has been altered. However, without considering its alteration, the past is perceived and interpreted from the contemporary perspective in Korea and China. There was no concept of sovereignty or Westphalian system in the premodern era. Thus, the traditional culture that Chinese scholars emphasize was of the “civilizational” state. When seeking to construct indigenized theories with civilizational properties, though, they use the state in national terms as its base. Despite the differences of those two concepts of state, they converge on the contemporary concept in Chinese political discourse. Although it is worth trying to construct theories among Chinese and Korean scholars, given the awareness of intellectual colonialism, it does not always weaken hegemony. As hegemony is closely related to the internalization of Western ways of thinking, it is worthwhile to ask why Chinese and Korean scholars
Indigenization of IR theories 61 are obsessed with and locked inside of an indigenous theorization box, which is also derived from Western thinking. In addition, efforts to theorize with local resources have failed to escape from hegemony as its assumptions, logics, or narratives still follow the dominant way of thinking. For these reasons, recent endeavors to utilize local resources as a strategy in Korea and China remain in West-centrism, simply disclosing its ambition for discursive power. Further, as seen in Korean and Chinese discourses, they respectively argue two different essences in explaining IR. Then, what is the true essence constructing IR, culture, or history? Is there any invariable essence in IR? The local resources they use are outcomes of the ongoing interaction between various actors, which means that they are not invariable in nature. Considering their incessant interaction, focusing on fixed property cannot reflect or keep up with changes in IR. It is hardly deniable that existing IRTs, firmly grounded in the notion of the Westphalian concept of international order, cannot solve transnational and global problems. That makes the tianxia epistemology sensible; yet, what matters is not the weakness of the existing IRTs, but the global reality of fast globalization that vitiates the existing state system. It happens first in the financial sector, followed by global production networks that greatly assisted the rise of China. The emergence of right-wing statism (in disguise of nationalism) is the reaction against the deeply globalizing world economy. Current IRTs are not able to follow the fast changing realities. Nevertheless, it does not mean that premodern epistemology such as tianxia or zhongyong dialectics suddenly became workable, no matter how attractive this may seem. Past experiences or “traditional culture” can be useful resources for building a new paradigm or perspectives. Nevertheless, all the experiences become sensible only through a certain form of epistemology. Likewise, traditional/cultural relics come to recognition only through certain sociopolitical positions that usually take the form of “narration” (White, 1973). In Korea, the foundation grounds for the necessity of Korean-style IRTs are Korean national experiences, which can be perceived only through positing the Korean nation as the hegemonic subject of history. The emphasis on Korean national experiences, therefore, might repress nonnational political experiences such as class, gender, and other groups that fiercely seek the opportunity to gain the status of political subjects. By reifying past culture and tradition in the form of epistemology and discourses as something passed down without alteration, the efforts to utilize them might only be instrumentalizing the past to justify the desire of the current regime. When the templates (historically situated forms of nation and modernity) are given by hegemony, resistance with culture and experiences against domination becomes an integral part of hegemony.
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4 Kōanizing IR Flipping the logic of epistemic violence L.H.M. Ling
Introduction International Relations (IR) effectively serve a regime of epistemic violence.1 It targets multiplicity and difference as reminders of a Hobbesian State of Nature, where anarchic fear and its consequent rejection rule. Framed in terms of a Westphalian interstate system, 2 IR sets up a “white world order”3 where the Western/Westphalian Self always lords over Others.4 Hypermasculine- Eurocentric Whiteness (HEW)5 thus colonizes not just world politics, but also our beings.6 Even those who vow to destroy it now use HEW as both excuse and rationale.7 More than an “epistemic disobedience,”8 IR needs an epistemic awakening. Kōans can help. An ancient and tested practice in Buddhism, kōans seek to “loosen” us from established icons, rituals, thoughts, or traditions—and reason itself—so that spiritual enlightenment may unfold.9 Kōans typically come in the form of an absurdity, paradox, or non sequitur. These open the heart-mind-soul to understanding and compassion. Kōans, moreover, need not come from Buddhism only or even from Asian culture.10 To require such would counter the very ethos of kōans! By the same token, kōans need not stay in the domain of religion only. They can benefit any area of life that seeks—and needs—enlightenment, defined as “awakened wisdom and selfless compassion” (Hori, 2003, p. 6). World politics is no exception. This chapter experiments with the concept of kōanizing IR. Doing so would not eliminate Westphalia or the interstate system or HEW, which would amount to another kind of epistemic violence. Rather, kōanizing IR flips its logic by opening a heterotopic (out-of-the-normal) space for questioning and reformulating, even from what may seem like absurdist angles. No lack of seriousness or respect is intended. What kōans seek, instead, is to relieve us from self-righteousness and its invariably deadly consequences; they emancipate within us an artistic moment of being so that we can see and see again, feel and feel again. From this basis, we can open our hearts, minds, and souls to greater understanding and compassion. Buddhism’s classical image of the Great Compassion serves as a conceptual guide. The bodhisattva Guanyin’s “thousand arms and eyes” dispense mercy in
Kōanizing IR 65 myriad ways yet from the totality of the same celestial body. I seek the same for IR, that is, multiplicity and difference flourishing from the same global body politic. I call it a worldly world order. This chapter proceeds accordingly. First, I examine the most prevalent form of HEW in IR today: Neorealism. Next, I present kōans as an alternative philosophy and method of inquiry. Lastly, I extend this kōanic methodology to IR. I conclude with an articulation of the kind of world politics that could emerge from this kōanizing effort.
Neorealist IR: the epistemic violence of structural logic Waltz first articulates the concept of Neorealism in his Theory of International Politics (1979). It retains classical realism’s premise that IR resembles Hobbes’ State of Nature, where life is “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short” (Hobbes, 1988, p. 65). With anarchy and competition among states, military capability and national self-interest override all other considerations, but where classical realists treat states as individual billiard balls, each bouncing against one another in a vacuum, Waltz encases them in an overarching, self-enclosed structure. Each state within this structure thus experiences the same external pressures applied equally regardless of internal differences. For this reason, strategic game-playing or power-balancing accounts for all national decision-making. Coined a “selfhelp” system, it compels each state to protect or pursue its national self-interest at the expense of all others. Success or failure depends solely on how well the state manages its resources and strategies. Waltz (1986) recognizes that the structure’s individual “units” (that is, states) are “not unitary and purposive actors” (p. 339). They pursue a variety of goals that are often vaguely and inconsistently formulated. But “[f]or the purpose of constructing a theory” (Waltz, 1986, p. 339), Waltz assumes that they function as if they were identical. Change in the interstate system, then, occurs when the structural position of individual units changes. “What really matters,” writes Waltz, “are the changes in the behavior of states and in their alignments” (Waltz, 1986, p. 342). Since military capability makes the difference, only “great powers” matter. “It would be as ridiculous to construct a theory of international politics based on Malaysia and Costa Rica,” Waltz (1979) muses, “as it would be to construct an economic theory of oligopolistic competition based on the minor firms in a sector of an economy” (p. 72). To be fair, Waltz does not disdain the “lesser” powers; he merely believes that their fate rests outside of themselves, that is, with the “great powers.” The very inconsequential nature of the “lesser” actors shields them from intervention by their more powerful counterparts. Waltz (1986) grants that systemic transformations can take place, but believes that this requires “look[ing] at a system’s dynamics and not just at the characteristics and strategies of the units” (p. 342). Yet Waltz (1979) stipulates that any systemic change would “originate not in the structure of a system but in its parts” (p. 343). This apparent
66 L.H.M. Ling contradiction notwithstanding, systemic transformation ultimately does not concern Waltz. Power, he believes, is the hallmark of the Westphalian interstate system. Power motivates states despite their inability to control the world “reliably.” He provides four main reasons for why this is the case: First, power provides the means of maintaining one’s autonomy in the face of force that others wield. Second, greater power permits wider ranges of action, while leaving the outcomes of action uncertain… Third, the more powerful enjoy wider margins of safety in dealing with the less powerful and have more to say about which games will be played and how… Fourth, great power gives its possessors a big stake in their system and the ability to act for its sake. For them management becomes both worthwhile and possible. (1979, pp. 194–195) “Weak states,” in contrast, operate on “narrow margins”: “Inopportune acts, flawed policies, and mistimed moves may have fatal results. In contrast, strong states can be inattentive; they can afford not to learn; they can do the same dumb things over again” (Waltz, 1979, p. 195). Microeconomic theory offers the best analogy for this concept, as it accounts for why “order” can prevail in world politics without an obvious “orderer,” like a global Leviathan (Waltz, 1979, p. 89). Just as firms must respond to a market dictated by the laws of supply and demand, Waltz explains, so too must states respond to an international environment dictated by the laws of power politics. Nonetheless, by fusing neoclassical economics with Westphalian power politics, Neorealism opens the theoretical possibility—and structural benefit—of having a global hegemon. Hegemonic Stability Theory provides the most prominent example of this formulation. It argues for the need of a global hegemon, given the planetary threat of our contemporary, nuclear age (Gilpin, 1981; Kindleberger, 1981). A superpower like the US can “check” and “manage” the global system, so that states do not descend into warfare as in the past. A generation later, Hardt and Negri (2000) adapt this concept to global capitalism, dubbing it “empire” to highlight capitalism’s seemingly invisible yet universal impact.
Neorealism’s HEW Here, the HEW in Neorealism becomes apparent (Figure 4.1). Its foundational notion of a chaotic, competitive State of Nature, Sampson (2002) notes, comes from what he calls “tropical anarchy,” that is, “an image of primitive society popularized by British social anthropologists during the 1930s and 1940s” (p. 429). Consequently, only HEW can take charge. Not only is HEW white but, equally importantly, it is hypermasculine. Indeed, feminists have long noted Neorealism’s inherent androcentrism. Waltz’s states-as-units echo Hobbes directly, in which the “wild” individuals in the State of Nature resemble
Kōanizing IR 67 HEW
MASSES
Figure 4.1 Hypermasculine-Eurocentric Whiteness.
“mushrooms after a rain.” No family, procreation, or gestation—no social relations at all—account for these mushroom-like individuals. Still, the “stateunit,” like Hobbes’ “wild-individual,” refers to the male/masculine possessing the female/feminine in the State of Nature and in society (Pateman, 1988; Peterson, 1992; Tickner, 1992). Waltz’s notion of “great powers” reflects the same dominance structure. The great powers have “autonomy” without considering who and what makes such privilege possible; impunity (“wider margins of safety”) for actions taken regardless of their results (“uncertain outcomes”), yet still entitled to managerial status and authority (“have more say about which games will be played and how”) no matter the havoc left behind (“inattentive,” “afford not to learn,” “do the same dumb things over again”). In contrast, “weak states” evoke the cosseted, corseted female. They are confined to “narrow margins,” where a single misstep could produce “fatal results”—despite the fact that their subaltern labor and resources are what make “great power” possible in the first place (Enloe, 2014; Escobar, 1994; Marchand & Runyan, 2000, 2011). Given this international hierarchy of “powerful” vs “powerless,” Others cannot contribute to world politics, let alone transform it. Neorealists, along with “democratic peace theorists,” push this instrumental reasoning to its logical conclusion. We should have a global hegemon and it should be the US since it exemplifies the best of the West, liberal-capitalist democracy (Ikenberry, 2008). That Pax Britannica bequeathed these values and institutions to the US not only enhances their stability, but also, implicitly, their whiteness (Ferguson, 2003). A hegemonic, Neorealist Self thus arises, representing one (“white”) race, one (“hypermasculine”) gender, and one (“Western/Westphalian”) culture. Where Others may disagree or resist, HEW makes sure to divide and rule, beguile and betray, use and abuse. Epistemic violence becomes the order of the day. In this
68 L.H.M. Ling way, Neorealism demolishes multiplicity and difference in world politics—and the negotiations needed to bridge them (Inayatullah & Blaney, 2004). Some Others now respond in kind. The result? More bombings and killings, grief and mourning, outrage and revenge.
A need for moral imagination IR needs what Lederach (2005) calls a “moral imagination.” This imagination helps to tap into the creativity needed for systemic transformations at personal, societal, and structural levels. Lederach (2005) defines a moral imagination in the following terms: [T]he capacity to imagine ourselves in a web of relationships that includes our enemies; the ability to sustain a paradoxical curiosity that embraces complexity without reliance on dualistic polarity; the fundamental belief in and pursuit of the creative act; and the acceptance of the inherent risk of stepping into the mystery of the unknown that lies beyond the far too familiar landscape of violence. (p. 5) Art or any intuitive, creative process encourages a moral imagination. We begin to think, then think again (Bleiker, 2009). New ideas or strategies emerge to transform conflicts or dilemmas, not just mend them on the side. To stimulate the creative process, Lederach (2005) inveighs, “[w]e must incite and excite the artist within us” (p. 175). Kōans offer one way to do so.
Kōans: invoking the artist within The first principle When one goes to Obaku temple in Kyoto he sees carved over the gate the words “The First Principle.” The letters are unusually large, and those who appreciate calligraphy always admire them as being a masterpiece. They were drawn by Kosen two hundred years ago. When the master drew them he did so on paper, from which the workmen made the large carving in wood. As Kosen sketched the letters a bold pupil was with him who had made several gallons of ink for the calligraphy and who never failed to criticize his master’s work. “That is not good,” he told Kosen after his first effort. “How is this one?” “Poor. Worse than before,” pronounced the pupil. Kosen patiently wrote one sheet after another until eighty-four First Principles had accumulated, still without the approval of the pupil.
Kōanizing IR 69 Then when the young man stepped outside for a few moments, Kosen thought: “Now this is my chance to escape his keen eye,” and he wrote hurriedly, with a mind free from distraction: “The First Principle.” “A masterpiece,” pronounced the pupil. (“Zen Koans”)11 This chapter cannot give a full accounting of kōans. Not only have they been in practice for fourteen centuries and across vastly different areas, but the kōanic tradition also encompasses a wide variety of rules and protocols,12 as well as types and concerns, as manifested in its more supernatural and mystical side.13 For our purposes here, I extract the basics of kōans: what they are, where they come from, how they work, and why we need them. In particular, I turn to the kōanic archives of Eihei Dōgen (1200–1253). These give us a meticulous record of how a Zen master like Dōgen could see with the “true Dharma eye” (Loori, 2005).14
What is a kōan? A kōan presents “an artificial problem” (Hori, 2003, p. 6). Typically, it consists of an “enigmatic anecdote or dialogue between two contesting parties” (Heine, 2002, p. 1). Well-known examples of the former include: “Does a dog have Buddha-nature?” and “What is the sound of one hand clapping?” A dialogical kōan usually takes this form: A monk asked, “How can I get out of the three worlds?”15 Master Tenryū said, “Where are you now?” (Yamada, 2015, p. 26) A kōan aims to shake one from certainty. Its goal: to open the heart-mindsoul to self-discovery. A “first insight” (kenshō) signals the possibility of enlightenment (satori) to follow. “Kōans exhaust the logical activity of the mind so that the mind will break out of its conventional view of the nature of reality” (Grenard, 2008, p. 153). Neither a one-time event nor a terminal process, kōans require constant study, reflection, and (seated) meditation (zazen), usually over a lifetime. Even monks who have achieved a high level of satori would often seclude themselves in remote mountains or forests to withdraw from the world, so as to pursue further insight and self-realization. A critical reader may interject: Are you not perverting kōans, then, by applying them to a domain as involved, charged, and confrontational as world politics and IR? My response: yes and no. Any innovation (for example, Neorealism) requires some departure from its original (for example, classical realism). Neither suffers consequences from this departure. Moreover, world politics and IR need kōans precisely for their ability to insert self-questioning, insight, and enlightenment into human affairs and knowledge production. Indeed, the yin/yang dialectics behind kōans (more below) rely on this kind of balance due precisely to the complications involved.
70 L.H.M. Ling Where do kōans come from? In fact, kōans have a very worldly and pragmatic beginning. Magistrates in Tang China (7–10 CE) would decide on a sentence for those on trial based on arguments made in public records (gong an). These used speech and other forms of probative reasoning to make the case. Buddhist monasteries integrated such rigorous public reasoning with traditional Chinese literary games16 to enliven monastic training. This process became known in Japan as kōans and later entered the West under this rubric. Note, for example, the tenth-century manuscript: “A Debate between Tea and Beer” (cha jiu lun) (Wang, 2009). Found in one of the Mogao Caves at Dunhuang, China’s gateway to the Silk Roads, this debate reflected a typical monastic exercise at the time. It required novices to argue two sides of an issue, usually between two inanimate objects, yet find, at the same time, an essential commonality between them. In the debate between tea and beer, each party boasts of its superiority over the other. Their exchange quickly descends into mutual slander—until Water comes along. It reminds tea and beer, instead, of their mutual reliance upon it: If tea had no water, what would its appearance be? If beer had no water, what would its complexion be?… [Everything in creation] need[s] water…Despite all this, I do not call myself capable and sagacious, so what’s the use of you two wrangling over your merits? From now on, you definitely must get along harmoniously with each other. [That way] the beer shops will prosper and the tea houses will not be ruined. You are brothers forever, as it must be from the beginning to the end (Wang, 2009, p. 261). Non-duality figures prominently in Buddhist thought, in general, and kōans, in particular. That is, “subject and object are not opposed to each other, the one excluding the other” (Hori, 2003, p. 15). Still, non-duality cannot sacrifice duality. Otherwise, nonduality itself would impose another duality. Dōgen identifies three stages of thinking to facilitate non-duality with duality: thinking (shiryō), not-thinking (fushiryō), and nonthinking (hishiryō). Transitioning from one to the other helps the mind journey from the conventional to the ineffable. Dōgen cites this kōan as an example: An ancient Buddha said: “Mountains mountain, waters water.” These words don’t say that “mountains” are mountains, they say that mountains mountain. This being the case, we should study “mountains.” When we investigate mountains in this way, mountains mountain. (Tanaka, 2013, p. 326) Dōgen exhorts us to remove the self when considering others, including that which may seem inanimate. When we think of mountains as “mountains” only, then we are prioritizing ourselves—that is, our preconceived notion of a mountain—in our understanding of it. To not think about the mountain, in
Kōanizing IR 71 turn, would erase something that obviously exists. Both cases would violate the mountain. When we perceive that “a mountain mountains,” however, we begin to relate to it on its own terms. We are entering the realm of nonthinking. We are experiencing the mountain.17 In this way, we emancipate ourselves from preconceptions or other normalized ways of thinking. We begin to realize the world (and our minuscule role in it) as it seeks and needs to be realized. Buddhism’s five-rank protocol specifies a method to this integration. The first two ranks—(1) “the relative within the absolute” and (2) “the absolute within the relative”—caution, in effect, that appearances can be deceiving. Things may seem different on the surface, but they share a common essence (for example, tea and beer are both made of water). However, the common essence in different things does not negate each entity’s unique qualities (for example, tea and beer taste differently and affect us differently as well). From these two ranks, the third one—(3) “coming from within the absolute”—becomes possible. Here, we begin to see and treat the two parts, relative and absolute, as one. Compassion arises and enlightenment begins. A fourth rank—(4) “arriving at mutual integration”—urges action based on this insight. “At this stage, the absolute and relative are integrated, but they’re still two things” (Loori, 2005, p. xxvii). For this reason, we need a fifth rank—(5) “unity attained”—to affirm “[t]here is no more duality. [The entity] is one thing—neither absolute nor relative, up nor down, profane nor holy, good nor bad, male nor female” (Loori, 2005, p. xxvii). Daoist yin/yang theory accounts for such dialectical insight (Figure 4.2).18 The Classic of the Way (Daodejing) (Ames & Hall, 2003) posits two ontologically equal opposites: yin (the female principle, represented by the black sphere) and yang (the male principle, the white). Each opposes the other (black vs white), but each also exists within the other (black-within-white, white-withinblack). An inherent simultaneity follows: conflicts and contradictions (yin vs yang) operate in tandem with complicities and connections (yin-within-yang, yang-within-yin).19 In this way, the dao accounts for continuity and change, connections and conflicts, masculinity and femininity, duality and non-duality.
Figure 4.2 Y in and Yang.
72 L.H.M. Ling For this reason, the dao teaches balance or harmony to realize the totality of yin and yang. Kōans seek to instill in daily life these Daoist abstractions.
How do kōans work? A kōan breaks into three parts: (1) a “main case” (honsoku), which prompts numerous “checking questions” (sassho) to ferret out deception or spur further understanding, (2) a “commentary” that registers one’s reflections derived from these questions, and (3) a “capping phrase” or “capping verse” (jakugo) to capture the insight attained from the exercise. The jakugo usually takes the form of a poem, composed in the style of classical Chinese. Zen master Eihei Dōgen excelled at this process. He often rewrote original kōans with iterated commentaries and sassho, through notes appended to the text, to reverse conventional understandings. Often, Dōgen would express his “checking questions” in a direct and surprisingly crude manner. Conventional niceties, he seems to have felt, would have obstructed the expression of alternative insights and feelings, rude or not. Dōgen’s method enabled him to “support several different didactic and metaphysical positions concerning the doctrines, rituals, and practices of Zen monastic life” (Heine, 2004, p. 5). One kōan, for example, involves an old woman and a monk. A monk encounters an old woman selling rice cakes by the side of a road. He asks for one, but she poses a question. On the condition that he is able to answer it, she’ll give him a rice cake. She then asks a deep, almost mystical question regarding the Buddhist concept of the “ungraspable mind.” The monk is struck speechless and the old woman leaves without selling him a rice cake. Heine (2004) notes: Dōgen’s commentary tries to reverse the conventional understanding by criticizing the woman as well as [the monk]. Dōgen points out that while [the monk] thought that he was “checking out” the old woman, it turned out that she had checked him out and found him wanting. [Dōgen] challenges [the monk] for not asking in response to her query, “I cannot answer your question, what would you say?” But Dōgen also suggests that she should have said, “Venerable priest, if you cannot answer my question, try asking me a question to see if I can answer you.” (p. 9) Dōgen’s commentary, Heine suggests, encourages both the monk and the old woman to begin a dialogue by asking questions. Thus they can engage with each other, rather than stay in their respective, socially assigned identities as “venerable monk” and “old woman who sells rice cakes.” The monk could enact Buddhist humility by ceding religious authority to the old woman, and the old woman could enact her dignity as a person who is worthy of asking and answering a question to a venerable monk.
Kōanizing IR 73 Another kōan shows Dōgen’s method in greater detail. It is from kōan 16: “Changsha’s Returning to Mountains, Rivers, and the Great Earth” (in Loori, 2005, p. 22). I cite it here in its entirety: Main case Zen master Jingcen of Changsha (Zhaoxian) was once asked by a monastic, “How do you turn the mountains, rivers, and great earth and return to the self?” [Note 1: What is he talking about? It seems he has confused the horse with the cart.] Changsha said, “How do you turn the self and return to the mountains, rivers, and great earth?” [Note 2: Back in your own backyard, there is no place this does not reach.] Commentary Responding to the myriad things from the perspective of the self is delusion. Manifesting the self from the perspective of the myriad things is enlightenment. From ancient times to the present, people have regarded the myriad things as separate from themselves, not realizing that the universe is the body of the Buddha—this very body and mind itself. What do you see when you behold the mountain? Can you see the real form of truth? What do you hear when you listen to the river sounds? Can you hear the subtle gathas [hymns] of rock and water? Or are you trapped in the superficiality of sound and form? Mountains, rivers, and the great earth are ceaselessly manifesting the teachings, yet they are not heard with the ear or seen with the eye. They can only be perceived with the whole body and mind. Be that as it may, how do you turn the self and return to the mountains, rivers, and the great earth? What is it that you are calling mountains, rivers, and the great earth? Indeed, where do you find your self? Capping verse There is no place to hide The true self. When the universe disintegrates, “it” remains indestructible. This gigantic body Ultimately has no abode. Here, we see the basics of kōanic practice at work: questioning assumptions (“the self is delusion”), investigating possibilities for action (“how do you… return to the mountains, rivers, and the great earth?”), breaking through words and letters (“There is no place to hide”), and cutting attachment to one’s own awakening (“This gigantic body/Ultimately has no abode”).
74 L.H.M. Ling Why do we need kōans? Kōans rouse those who are asleep, not just intellectually but also emotionally and spiritually. Here, awakening means realizing our essential, but dynamic non-duality (compassion) in a dualistic (passionate) world. For this reason, a kōan raises doubt—especially self-doubt. Doing so simultaneously brackets the familiar and highlights the unfamiliar. Distinctions between Self and Other, Subject and Object fall aside, no longer occupying the center of our concerns, yet they remain distinctively present in the background.20 With kōans, a heterotopic space becomes possible. It invites the novice to new sources and types of action or dynamism, including spiritual development. To facilitate this journey, kōans use language to transcend language. Metaphors, allusions, analogies, puzzles, and word games, for example, help to “brea[k] through the surface of words and letters—which may appear to be speaking of something else entirely—to the Fundamental beneath” (Hori, 2003, p. 22). To retain self-awareness—in order to avoid enlightenment as another source of hegemony—a kōan cuts off attachment to one’s own awakening; otherwise, compassion for others cannot take place. Note this kōan: An ordinary person knows it and becomes a sage; A sage knows it and becomes an ordinary person. (Hori, 2003, p. 23) Let us now see how a kōanic method can awaken IR.
Epistemic awakening: rousing IR, rousing world politics Clearly, we cannot expect kōans to do for IR and world politics what they do for Zen Buddhism. Nonetheless, kōans can help IR emancipate itself (and us) from convention’s grip. And kōans can do so nonviolently. In flipping the logic of HEW and other types of epistemic violence, kōans may rouse those who are asleep—intellectually, emotionally, and spiritually—to a world of beauty and wonder, joy, and creativity, rather than one that is “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.” To begin, I apply the four main steps of kōanic practice to Neorealism: (1) questioning assumptions, (2) investigating possibilities for action, (3) breaking through words and letters to reach the Fundamental underneath, and (4) cutting attachment to one’s own enlightenment. I draw on Dōgen’s method to supplement a “main case” with “checking questions” in the form of notes. However, I dispense with the protocol of a “capping verse” in classical Chinese poetry. Instead, I draw from popular culture where appropriate. Our “main case” comes from a quote from Waltz (1979, p. 72), cited above. Since it is neither an “enigmatic anecdote” nor a “dialogue between two contesting parties,” this quote does not technically qualify as material for a kōan.
Kōanizing IR 75 onetheless, the quote tells a story; accordingly, it warrants subjection to N Dōgen’s kōanic method. Main case “It would be as ridiculous [Note 1: How so?] to construct a theory of international politics based on Malaysia and Costa Rica [Note 2: would Malaysians and Costa Ricans agree?] as it would be to construct an economic theory of oligopolistic competition based on the minor firms [Note 3: not to them!] in a sector of an economy” [Note 4: Is this guy for real? He thinks the economy is free of politics—when both are products of each other!] Commentary 1 Questioning Assumptions. The notes above underscore a common theme: the author not only assumes much, but he also presumes his knowledge. He presumes to know what qualifies as “ridiculous,” to whom, and under what circumstances (Note 1); that Malaysia and Costa Rica, like minor firms, could not possibly have any impact on their larger environments (Notes 2, 3); and that politics and economics do not intertwine (Note 4). Do these presumptions hold? Clearly not. Malaysia, for instance, played a significant role in world politics and economics during the Asian financial crisis (1997–1998). Unlike Indonesia, Thailand, and South Korea, Malaysia under Prime Minister Mohamad Mahathir refused demands for structural adjustment, privatization, and liberalization from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) (see Chong, Chapter 2 in this volume for Mahathir’s thought on capitalism). Consequently, Malaysia—unlike its neighbors— managed to avoid the massive social, political, and economic havoc wreaked by the IMF (Ling, 2002a, 2002b). Indeed, Malaysia’s leadership during the crisis has inspired many to call for a new financial and trading architecture for the region (Muchhala, 2007). Given the region’s importance for the global political economy, this decision can be expected to reverberate throughout the interstate system. That the author cannot conceive of any importance (“ridiculous”) for small states like Malaysia and Costa Rica, like “minor firms” in an oligopolistic economy, reveals his fundamental disrespect for anything or anyone that is not HEW. 2 Investigating Possibilities for Action. What can we do about such narcissism and arrogance in IR? This question applies not only to the author and others like him, but also to others who accept such narcissism and arrogance as their price of admission into the Club of HEW.21 Furthermore, how can we transform HEW as a cultural norm in IR without imposing another version of HEW?
76 L.H.M. Ling 3
4
Breaking through Words and Letters to Reach the Fundamental Underneath. Despite writing about “world politics” and “oligopolistic competition,” the author is really writing about and for others who are just like him: white, male, privileged, and vested. How can we break through this? Cutting Attachment to One’s Own Awakening. Still, one cannot stay satisfied with critique only. After all, others have done so with Neorealism and, despite great analytical acuity, have ended up in angry, opposed camp.22 A breakdown in communication effectively resumes the status quo.23 And who benefits? HEW. Yet to eradicate HEW, as the kōans remind us, would reproduce HEW. So, the question becomes: how do we develop a world politics of duality and non-duality, Neorealist HEW and Others? Could this be where the kōanic notion of “mountains mountain” apply—as in, for instance, “Malaysia Malaysias”? What would this mean for world politics?
Capping verse You’re so vain, you probably think this [world] is about you You’re so vain, I’ll bet you think this [world] is about you Don’t you? Don’t you?24 An innovative approach to the questions above comes from Särmä (2014). To break through “words and letters,” she collects images that relate to an international concern, like nuclear weapons or North Korea, and paste them into a collage. This method conveys the subject as a whole, rather than in fragments, like treaties or states in conventional IR. Subsequent discussions provoked by the collage provide a more thorough and reflective understanding of the matter, leading to better decision-making. Indeed, Bleiker (2009) proposes, all kinds of aesthetics can achieve the same, whether they are in the form of poetry, painting, music, or stories. Ultimately, we come back to one question: how do we remove the Self from IR? Merely raising individual doubt or uncertainty, as suggested by the kōans, is not enough. The Buddhist novice, after all, seeks self-discovery, whereas HEW does not and never will. HEW has too much vested to change (Ling, 2015). It has developed a system of support, moreover, from those who comply with it even as they suffer from HEW’s hierarchical binaries (Ling, 2016b). Some recommend “provincializing” HEW (Chakrabarty, 2007); others prefer to center the marginalized Other (Acharya, 2014; Boroujerdi, 2013; Chong, 2012; Mandaville, 2003; Shimizu, 2011). This countermeasure, though much needed, risks reproducing a non-HEW version of HEW. It is equally full of hegemonic privileges defined by race, gender, class, and nationality. As the kōans instruct, emancipation from hegemony requires considerations of duality with non-duality, Self with Other, yin with yang.
Kōanizing IR 77 Here, Buddhism’s five-rank protocol can help. Substituting the “particular” for the “relative,” and the “universal” for the “absolute,” we gain the following insights: 1 Recognize “the (particular) within the (universal).” Translation: even the smallest members of a system or structure can revolutionize it. 2 Recognize “the (universal) within the (particular).” Translation: the system operates in and through its members, regardless of who or what they may be. 3 “Come from within the (universal).” Translation: individual members (“units”) still constitute a common, concrete body politic (“structure”). 4 “Arrive at mutual integration.” Translation: what kind of action could we take to honor this common body?25 5 Relish “unity attained.” Translation: once the above question receives at least one answer, then a new world of enlightened emancipation will appear. We begin to waken from Neorealism. Waltz’s interstate system, we realize, masks more complex, profound dynamics at work. Contrary to his proposition that the same systemic pressures apply equally to all states, rendering them identical “units,” the five-rank protocol reveals a variety of activities and relations in motion. Particulars and universals not only interact, but also mutually penetrate. Consequently, systemic change, if not transformation, can arise from any source at any level anywhere. At the same time, an inherent conservatism tempers members as they also carry the system within. Another vision emerges. Instead of flat, objectified, structure pressuring functionally identical units within, global relations begin to resemble raindrops in a barrel of water. Each drop stimulates a node of action that ripples outward towards other raindrops and their ripples. These expand with law-like regularity in speed and form, but eventually meet, melt, and compose new swirls, thereby making one another. Both sameness and difference thus apply to raindrops in a barrel. Furthermore, the very multiplicity of nodes, ripples, and swirls in the barrel ensures a mutual balancing that evens their flow. To keep the water fresh and moving, the barrel must stay open; indeed, it requires a constant source of systemic disturbance. Otherwise, still water can turn stagnant and attract mosquitoes that carry disease. Such constancy disappears, of course, when a sudden storm strikes or the barrel leaks or a cat jumps in. None is subject to prediction or control. In this analogy, Neorealism is the barrel. It may structure the water into which raindrops fall, but the barrel cannot account for the larger dynamics at work: the sky and other elements that produce the raindrops, the ripples that spread horizontally (across space) or evaporate vertically (over time), and the currents at the bottom of the barrel (signifying the yin of the past, heresies, the underclass) that invariably affect the surface (signifying the yang of the present, orthodoxies, the upper class). In this scenario, declarations of singularity, like Hegemonic Stability Theory, simply delude. Attempts at “structural positioning” may tilt the flow inside the barrel, but not permanently. How does one divide raindrops?
78 L.H.M. Ling Waltz simplifies the problem by focusing on “great powers.” However, as demonstrated above, this privileging of “great powers,” and who makes them into what they are, deludes as well. Even if, for example, consensus forwards liberal-capitalist democracy as the best template for governance, the raindrop analogy compels us to recognize democracy’s multiple sources of origin, development, and practice. One could argue that yin/yang dialectics present another type of democratic theory and practice. The same applies to understandings of power. Privilege and hegemony may still take place—ripples, after all, can only emanate from nodes of action—but no single hierarchy can prevail. HEW becomes one node among many. As for the many “weak” or “minor” actors in world politics, they can balance HEW through solidarity with one another. Today’s solidarity entails more than political or economic or military collaboration; it also promotes a new sense of presence epistemically. That is, a cultural self-confidence is asserting itself in various locales and in various ways (Ling & Pinheiro, in press). The “weak” ones of world politics thus redefine Waltz’s notion of “self-help.” All this underscores the mutual impact of raindrops, in calm times and bad, in harm and benefit. We return to the kōan about the old woman and the monk. As Dōgen suggests, perhaps all that is needed to bridge the two, despite their difference in gender, status, and knowledge, is to begin a dialogue by asking questions. The ontological parity that such an exchange brings forth opens that heterotopic space of moral imagination, “inciting and exciting” the artist within.
Conclusion: wandering at ease with the world “Wandering at Ease” opens the Zhuangzi (Ames, 1998), a partner text to the Daodejing. The Authentic Person (zhen ren), according to the Zhuangzi, embodies the “realness” of the world and, through this authenticity, has the capacity to transform it. Herein lies artistry of the highest order: Thus, “knowers” participate actively in the “realization” of their worlds through their own “self-disclosure” (ziran). “Knowing” for the Daoist, in addition to being cognitive, is profoundly experiential and performative—a “making real” (Ames, 1998, p. 3). This chapter seeks to “make real” a wandering at ease in the world—for all of us. Through kōans, we discover that multiplicity and difference can undermine the violence and hegemony of HEW. In this way, world order approximates the bodhisattva Guanyin, dispensing compassion to all with a “thousand arms and eyes.” Mountains thus mountain and waters water. A worldly world order beckons. One last note. In the spirit of duality with non-duality, self-disclosure (ziran) with collective-ziran, knowing with performance, and drawing on “the artist within,” I offer a humble poem. It tells of a debate between Water and Tea (Ling, 2014c). I dedicate it to the spirit of kōans, in general, and kōanizing IR, in particular.
Kōanizing IR 79 WATER & TEA
“How about a dip?” Water splashes to Tea, so cute in its jar, Perfum’d and flowery, made from fields afar. “What?” rustles Tea, turning to Water in a nearby pot. Who is this commoner, this vulgar besot? “The moon is out, the night is young,” Water flows on with style. The words and feelings aim ‘specially to beguile. “Why should I?” Tea fans and flares, “Soaked and depleted, no one would care. Whilst now, I am neat and dry and sprightly, Safe from dangers, sealed so tightly.” “Yet who but I,” Water laps smoothly, “could coax from you a joy, taste, and beauty, That the world, for all its craving, Savors and ne’er tires of raving?”
“You forget,” Water slides to Tea. “Without me, you cannot be. My ancestors rained on you often, From seedling to sprout, To nourish and soften, Pluck’d, you were sunn’d, daily and long ‘Til your fragrance grew Sweet, pungent, and strong. “Nay,” Water ripples in turn, “I, too, have much to earn. Without your tender shoots in motion, How could Sun and Wind produce a potion? So you see, my beautiful Tea,
“Even so,” Tea begins to loosen, “You and I can’t be a twosome. You are liquid, I am not; you so clear and I so dark. How could we ever create a spark?”
“Am I to pay, then, this eternal debt? Sighing a life of untold regret?”
80 L.H.M. Ling We have much in common, you and I, From the Sea to the Earth to the big, blue Sky.”
Tea is moved beyond thoughts, beyond words, beyond the head… Water’s not shallow but deep, deep, instead! A noble spirit swims within, Pulling Tea closer, wishing to begin…
“Well,” Tea sashays with a smile, “Let’s see what comes in a while.” And Water swills happ’ly in its plain, old pot, Ready for Tea, ice cold or piping hot!
Acknowledgements Many thanks to Ebby Abramson, Boyu Chen, Ching-Chang Chen, Shirin M. Rai, and Saara Särmä for their most helpful comments. I retain responsibility, of course, for any errors within.
Notes 1 Spivak (1988) first coined the term epistemic violence. It refers to an ideology as well as a process. A hegemonic order believes its attributes are the best; consequently, it rationalizes the dismissal, silencing, and overall erasure of any alternatives, especially if these come from “subalterns.” 2 Carvalho, Leira, and Hobson (2011) consider this an “origin myth,” but convention still traces our contemporary inter-state system to the Treaty of Westphalia (1648). 3 Vitalis (2015) shows how racism and imperialism account for the teaching, training, and practice of IR, especially in the US, from colonial to current times. 4 Hobson (2012) details three centuries of Eurocentric theorizing in IR. Ling (2014b) emphasizes its intersections of race with gender. 5 Nandy (1988) first coined the term hypermasculinity. The British propagated hypermasculinity, which Nandy characterized as an “undeveloped heart,” to justify their colonial conquests. It denigrated anything smacking of the feminine: for example, welfare, intellection, compassion. Eurocentrism places all things European—people, customs, languages, institutions, philosophies, even styles of dress—at the center of what constitutes “civilization.” See, Gong (1984), Anghie (2005), Aydin (2007), and Suzuki (2009). Whiteness refers to a sense of entitlement and privilege based on all of the above (Baldwin, 1984; Biss, 2015). For this reason, Whiteness is more of an ideological than biological condition, as demonstrated by the global distribution and acceptance of Westphalian IR across the globe (Tickner & Waever, 2009). 6 A sample of this literature includes: Darby (2006), Jones (2006), Ling (2002, 2014a), Seth (2013), and Shilliam (2011). 7 For example, ISIS (the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria) mirrors its Western/Westphalian nemeses by (1) seeking to establish an Islamic “state” and (2) excising any possibility for negotiation across multiplicity and difference (Lalami, 2015). Equally troubling is
Kōanizing IR 81 (3): an assertion of hypermasculine authority and privilege. It justifies using women to serve men through their bodies only—as in colonial times of old and today (Enloe, 2014; Ling, 2002; Moon, 1997; Nossiter, 2015; Shubert & Naik, 2015; Stoler, 1989; Yoshimi, 1995). Other groups like Al Shabaab (al-Qaeda’s affiliate in Somalia) and the FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia) use similar tactics. 8 Mignolo (2009) argues that emancipation from colonial-imperialist knowledge production requires “disobedience” at the epistemic level, not just critiques on the side. 9 Kōans do not discriminate between monks and nuns, men and women, since everyone is capable of enlightenment. However, I recognize that the kōanic tradition has tended to record the experiences and insights of monks/men rather than nuns/ women. Many thanks to Shirin Rai for this reminder. 10 The West enjoys a similar, longstanding tradition of absurdism: for example, the comic-caustic plays of Aristophanes (circa 446 BC–386 BC) to postwar existentialism from Sartre and Camus, among others, to contemporary programs like The Daily Show with Jon Stewart (1999–2015). A critical difference, however, lies in the West’s aim at democratizing discourse rather than the Buddhist one of self-realization or enlightenment. 11 “Zen Koans” (http://www.ashidakim.com/zenkoans/zenindex.html) (Downloaded: 19 July 2015). 12 For example, Hakuin’s kōan system has a five-fold division; the Zen monk and scholar Akizuki Ryōmin, along with the yogic Nanpō Jōmyō, have a three-fold system; others add a fourth category (Hori, 2003, p. 19). 13 “Dreams and visions, spirits and demons, fantastic symbols and icons, ascetic hermits and witches, sticks, staffs, and stones, and ghosts and apparitions, in addition to sacred or exotic mountain peaks, recesses, valleys, and caves, appear in numerous kōan cases” (Heine, 2002, p. 2). These reflect Zen Buddhism’s integration of indigenous religious traditions, martial arts interests, as well as devotional practices from Buddhism’s land of origin, India. This aspect of kōans, however, falls outside this chapter’s purview. 14 Even here, I can only extract the simplest teachings given the scope and sophistication of Dōgen’s corpus. 15 In Buddhist philosophy, the three delusive worlds are those of desire, form, and no-form. 16 These included competition, on-the-spot spontaneity, turning the tables, and mindto-mind transmission (Hori, 2003). 17 Toward this end, experience can take one or both forms: (1) Direct Experience 1, whereby the novice receives first-hand knowledge of an integrated way of being, and (2) Experience 2, whereby the novice attains pure consciousness. The latter is defined as “direct apprehension without having any intellectual or conceptual activit’” (Hori, 2003, p. 10). 18 Of course, Buddhist thought also stems from classical Indian philosophy such as “advaita monism” (Shahi & Ascione, 2015). I thank Ching-Chan Chen for this reference. Other parallels can be found, for example, between Daoism and Samkhya (Ling, 2014a). 19 This is where Daoist dialectics differ most significantly from Hegelian dialectics (Brincat & Ling, 2014). 20 I thank Ching-Chang Chen for this clarification. 21 Nandy (1988) calls this condition the “intimate enemy.” Therein lies the nature of epistemic violence. 22 For instance, Ashley (1986) quotes E.P. Thompson in calling Neorealism “an orrery of errors” (p. 256). Waltz (1986) responds in kind: “I find Richard K. Ashley difficult to deal with. Reading his essay is like entering a maze. I never know quite where I am or how to get out” (p. 337). 23 Hagmann and Biersteker (2012) note, for instance, that the discipline remains Western-centric in theorizing, English-based in language, and quantitative or formalistic in methodology.
82 L.H.M. Ling 24 My capping verse is adapted from Carly Simon’s 1988 song, “You’re So Vain,” (https://www.google.com/?gws_rd=ssl#q=you%27re+so+vain+lyrics) (Downloaded: 10 January 2016). The original lyrics had “song” where I have inserted “world.” 25 Elsewhere (Ling, 2016a), for example, I draw on traditional Chinese and Indian medicine to treat the border between India and China as a meridian in the same body politic. The border dispute between the two thus represents a blockage that needs release through cross-border trade, tourism, and other measures to enhance circulation and health for the region.
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84 L.H.M. Ling Ling, L. H. M. (2016b). What’s in a name? A critical interrogation of the Chinese school of IR.” In R. Little, Y. Zhang, & S. Chang (Eds.), Constructing a Chinese school(s) of IR: Ongoing debates and critical assessment (pp. 17–34). London: Routledge. Ling, L. H. M., & Pinheiro, C. M. (in press). South-south talk, worldism and epistemologies of the south. In L. H. M. Ling, N. Messari, & A. B. Tickner (Eds.), Theorizing international politics from the global south: A world of difference. London: Routledge. Loori, J. D. (2005). The true Dharma eye, Zen master Dōgen’s three hundared Kōans (K. Tanahashi & J. D. Loori, Trans.). Boston, MA: Shambhala. Mandaville, P. (2003). Toward a different cosmopolitanism—Or, the “I” dislocated. Global Society, 17(2), 209–221. Marchand, M. H., & Runyan, A. S. (Eds.). (2000). Gender and global restructuring: Sightings, sites and resistances. New York, NY: Routledge. Marchand, M. H., & Runyan, A. S. (Eds.). (2011). Gender and global restructuring: Sightings, sites and resistances (2nd ed.). New York, NY: Routledge. Mignolo, W. D. (2009). Epistemic disobedience, independent thought and decolonial freedom. Theory, Culture & Society, 26(7–8), 1–23. Moon, K. H. S. (1997). Sex among allies: Military prostitution in US-Korea relations. New York, NY: Columbia University Press. Muchhala, B. (Ed.). (2007). Ten years after: Revisiting the Asian financial crisis. Washington, DC: Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. Nandy, A. (1988). The intimate enemy: The psychology of colonialism. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Nossiter, A. (May 18, 2015). Boko Haram militants raped hundreds of female captives in Nigeria. New York Times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/19/ world/africa/boko-haram-militants-rapedhundreds-of-female-captives-in-nigeria.html Pateman, C. (1988). The sexual contract. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. Peterson, V. S. (Ed.). (1992). Gendered states: Feminist (re)visions of international relations theory. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner. Sampson, A. B. (2002). Tropical anarchy, Waltz, Wendt, and the way we imagine international politics. Alternatives, Global, Local, Political, 27(4), 429–457. Särmä, S. (2014). Junk feminism and nuclear wannabes: Collaging parodies of Iran and North Korea. PhD Dissertation. School of Management, University of Tampere. Seth, S. S. (Ed.). (2013). Postcolonial theory and international relations: A critical introduction. London: Routledge. Shahi, D., & Ascione, G. (2015). Rethinking the absence of post-Western International Relations theory in India: ‘Advaitic monism’ as an alternative epistemological resource. European Journal of International Relations, 22(2), 313–334. Shilliam, R. (Ed.). (2011). International relations and non-Western thought: Imperialism, colonialism and investigations of global modernity. London: Routledge. Shimizu, K. (2011). Nishida Kitaro and Japan’s interwar foreign policy: War involvement and culturalist political discourse. International Relations of the Asia Pacific, 11, 157–183. Shubert, A., & Naik, B. (2015). ISIS Soldiers told to rape women “to make them Muslim”. CNN. Retrieved from http://www.cnn.com/2015/10/08/middleeast/ isis-rapetheology-soldiers-rape-women-to-make-them-muslim/ Spivak, G. (1988). Can the subaltern speak? In C. Nelson & G. Lawrence (Eds.), Marxism and the interpretation of culture (pp. 24–28). London: Macmillan. Retrieved from http://www.maldura.unipd.it/dllags/docentianglo/materiali_ oboe_ lm/2581_001.pdf Stoler, A. L. (1989). Making empire respectable: The politics of race and sexual morality in twentieth-century colonial cultures. American Ethnologist, 16(4), 634–660.
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5 International Relations concerning post-hybridity dangers and potentials in non-synthetic cycles Chih-yu Shih and Josuke Ikeda
Hybridity, one of the most popular concepts in international, ethnic, migrant, cultural, and civilizational studies of the twenty-first century, is losing its critical potential, both because everyone is hybrid (Hutnyk, 2000, p. 36) and because the awareness of hybridity might induce violence (Kraidy, 2004). In terms of pedagogy and epistemology, we believe that it is necessary to acknowledge the irony of “hybrid violence,” both cosmopolitan and indigenous, in order to move ahead. Cosmopolitan hegemonic power claims to represent the highest form of hybridity, qua globalization, and vows to protect globalization by targeting both failing states and terrorist forces. In this conceptual striking back, a neoconservative form of governance in the cosmopolitan center comfortably claims hybridity. On the other hand, an indigenous, hybrid product of the Cold War’s making acquires nationalist and/or religious fundamentalism. Hybrid actors at both levels can apparently seek dominance in their own peculiar ways and abandon the option of tolerance expected of a hybrid actor, be it cosmopolitan or postcolonial. In brief, the faddish and political use of hybridity conflates the discursive postcolonial and its material conditions. To recover the ontological insecurities addressed by postcolonial hybridity, there is a need for a specific notion that can show the potential dangers of everyone being hybrid. Before hybridity became an indicator of cosmopolitanism, it used to denote the unfortunate incapacity of a postcolonial actor in escaping scrutiny of an established canon (Delanty, 2006; Neilson, 1999; Ong, 1998; Sajed, 2010). A hybrid actor recognizes, but evades, his or her own inferiority (Cabán, 1998; Fanon, 1986; Paolini, 1999). However, hybridity later turned into a subversive celebration of ineffective indoctrination of any orthodoxy or canon. It is the evidence of sited subjectivity or agency, whose unique genealogy cannot entirely be subsumed by simulating the sanctioned orthodoxy. Much later, it appeared that hybridity’s own suppressive potential emerged in its political call for such sited subjectivity that generated sited hegemony. However, it is the Bush Doctrine’s insinuated appropriation of hybridity as a feature of globalization that fully exposes the unanticipated irony of “hybrid fundamentalism,” both in terrorism and among the new conservatives.
IR concerning post-hybridity 87 The question is therefore not just about how one has been synthetic of one’s own sited cultures and the encountered or assimilated hybrid civilizations. Rather, it is about what follows afterwards (Arxer, 2008). The unpredictable conditions allude to the suppressive potential of agents of hybridity that is in need of more researches, both theoretical and empirical, in addition to its a lready lauded potential for emancipation. The political use of the term hybridity does not reduce its teachings to insignificance, though. We intend to try developing the theory of hybridity further, in order to recover its critical power registered in the teachings of Said (1993) and Bhabha (1994). To understand the cycles of hybrid dominance and tolerance and to behold the dangerous as well as emancipative potential of hybridity, we propose the perspective of post-hybridity. The aim of this chapter is threefold. First, it seeks to put forth a temporal perspective to supplement the overly spatial sensibilities registered in the quest for a synthetic kind of sitedness in post-Western International Relations (IR) theory. Second, it aims to reflect upon the dangers of hybridity that are reduced to the desires of conquest. Finally, it seeks to release hybridity’s burden of emancipation in a cyclical mode of historiography. Such historiography transcends obsession with the geo-culture of space emerging in the post-Western pursuit of sitedness, while at the same time, cautioning the use of genealogy or linearity to implicate sitedness. The Newtonian ontology that undergirds the cultures of space and linear time has been the root image of the Western worldview (McMullin, 2001), to the effect that the post-Western quest for sitedness risks reproducing Western hegemony, by relying on imagined geography to mark and illustrate hybridity.1 We believe that this is the source of confusion in rendering globalization hybridity and postcolonial hybridity indistinguishable. While each postcolonial site is “differently different,” (Bilgin, 2012) and each resists the synchronizing pressure under the circumstances of global governance, sitedness may inadvertently materialize postcoloniality to become a Newtonian process of forces colliding in demarcated spaces to create a new combination. In short, post-hybridity is emerging and shows how hybridity may pressurize national or other group actors to present itself as a synthetic identity in order to win acknowledgment in a largely capitalist, multicultural world (Jameson, 1991). Hybridity rejects the possibility of “purity,” not starting from the rigid “self” nor seeing the external “other.” Post-hybridity is not as promising in its awareness of multilayer, cultural memory, reconnection, and most importantly, non-synthetic and yet cyclical historiography. Katz (2013) calls this trans- hybridity, with a similar focus on cultural transformation not only in the spatial aspect, but also, and perhaps more, in the temporal aspect. This chapter employs post-hybridity’s ontology in the temporal and cyclical sense to remind us of the absolute space or time emerging in post-Western IR. The discussion continues with an examination of post-hybridity in the intellectual history of Hong Kong. Here, both the dialectical and the cyclical modes of existence are becoming central to self-interrogation, indicating the unpleasant possibility of post-hybridity being dangerous as well as emancipative.
88 Chih-yu Shih and Josuke Ikeda
Synthetic hybridity in IR Emergence of sited hybridity Hybridity is a term that was originally never used in the discipline of IR. After all, mainstream IR has been focused on a horizontal community of “the self” as constituting the international order, or a vertical process of “othering” as the imperial order (and its reactions) (Keene, 2002), but hardly anything “in- between” has existed until recently. The recent introduction of the postcolonial approaches has brought IR to witness what is called the “post-Western” standpoint. Unlike “non-Western” IR (for example, Acharya & Buzan, 2010), or the claims for national re-conceptualization of one’s own worldviews, it is clearly an “in-between.” The sense of “unhomeliness” (Bhabha, 1994), together with the idea of “provincialization” (Chakrabarty, 2007), became the major strategy for the postcolonial engagement (Shani 2007, 2008; Vasilaki, 2012). Here what all expertise may share is not only a critical reassessment of IR, but also its re-formulation from the point of the in-between. A continuous criticism is in tandem with the notion of “identity as iteration” (Bhabha, 1994, p. 12). One challenge with post-Western IR, however, comes from its very foundation— the question of where they are. Importantly, the idea of hybridity may e ntail “in-betweenness” both in spatial and in temporal senses. However, an error may occur while (mis)interpreting it exclusively as the first. If one sees h ybridity as a philosophical as well as empirical project against the process of a pure, fixed, and totalizing identity and theorization, and yet if one takes hybridity only in the spatial sense, we may fall into the same pitfall of “ending up reproducing the very hegemony they set out to critique” (Shani, 2008, p. 723). What can be derived from this is the irony that hegemony has to be hybrid or, at times, hybridity has to be hegemonic. It may convert attempts of non-Western or post-Western IR into a pursuit towards intellectual dominance based on sited hybridity. Another hurdle is how to re-locate the postcolonial actors’ own critical practices with less, if not without, West-centeredness. Intellectually speaking, a practice with hybridity does not go far beyond Western values. The problem with it is not that criticism is coming from the West, but that its mode of practice is considerably influenced by modern enlightenment thought (Gay, 1977). Regarded as the “struggle against the absolute state” (Eagleton, 2005, p. 9), criticism has been “the continuation of politics by other means” (Eagleton, 2004, p. 29). As a counterpart of absoluteness, the idea of plurality has been seen as another normative pillar. The critical has been linked with “the political” in an organic manner, constituting an antagonistic field (Mouffe, 1993) and aiming at bringing “the political” back (Edkins, 1999). The point is that a quite similar story can be applied to postcolonial thought, as well as post-Western IR. Especially in the latter, “democratization” of the discipline has been pursued (Chen, 2011, p. 3), and the idea of hybridity has been a major strategy. To participate in the democratization of IR, the strategic prerequisites are a materialized site and synthetic hybridity to conveniently represent it. Nevertheless, once we accept
IR concerning post-hybridity 89 the first point of challenge and see hybridity as the strategic representation of a spatial site, any activity of post-Western IR may face a fundamental deadlock in that post-Western is already somewhat Western. In such a situation, it is certainly ironic to see the emergence of hybrid f undamentalism. Indeed, what may be commonly shared among hybridity, post-hybridity, and non-Western or post-Western IR is the rejection of purity qua fundamentalism. Ontologically speaking, post-hybridity may mean, in the long run, no synthetic subjectivity to own a site or the absence of a site to synthesize subjectivity. Epistemologically, it attends to the changing times of the world, self, and the other. Finally, as a methodology, it may suggest dialectical conversion, even rupture, instead of the genealogy that is oriented towards Newtonian absolute time, as a different mode of critical engagement that may transcend sited “critics.”
Dangers of post-hybridity Globalization puts political pressure on all actors to eagerly claim hybridity. Hybridity’s opposition to purity requires either imagination of an object of purity and/or isolation from the object’s post-hybrid conditions. For example, former Taiwanese President Lee Teng-hui once justified his pro-Taiwan independence campaign by alleging that Taiwan was no longer part of feudal, that is, pure, China and imposing a curb on his countrymen from investing in China (Cheung, 1988, pp. 118–120). Pure feudalism is no longer existent but to make hybridity a foundation of non-Chinese subjectivity seems his only choice (Corcuff, 2012, pp. 56–58). Ironically, China’s adoption of the one-country-two-system formula to reunite with Hong Kong was, likewise, a deliberate exercise of hybridity made of socialism and capitalism, on the one hand, and Chinese and British policies, on the other. The last case suggests that reunification does no damage to the degree of hybridity. This innocence of always being hybrid breeds the first danger of post-hybridity as the green light to exercise conquest of any kind. The conquest of a presumably hybrid target is not for its purification, since the conquering subject is already hybrid. In fact, all the postcolonial nations owe their post-coloniality to the historical forces of colonialism that brought modernity to indigenous societies. Immigrants who chase after modern lifestyles in order to rise from subaltern identities transform hosting societies, likewise, into hybrid societies, which are prestigiously defined as cosmopolitan. The colonial scope is usually more hybrid than any particular postcolonial identity and even takes hybridity as an ideal (Andrews, 2012). Worse, victimization of a selfclaimed hybrid target in any way is the fault of the less-hybrid, whose resistance to cosmopolitan absorption wins it the notorious label of fundamentalism. This has been the fate of so-called failing states that defied American intervention arriving in the name of global governance that transcends and synthesizes hybrid conditions in the most magnificent scope. Cosmopolitanism itself, originally assumed that it could overcome, and aimed at overcoming, a member’s purity and making the members blend. Such
90 Chih-yu Shih and Josuke Ikeda “cosmopolitan culture” once became a site against parochial nationalism by proposing denationalized citizenship (Sassen, 2006). Here, cosmopolitanism was a counterpart against a particular type of sited identity, namely, nationality. Yet, it still does value another kind of space which cities may best represent. Thus, at its root, no cosmopolitan culture is without a “city culture” that lumps urbanized population, migrants, and ghettos into a sited identity. Two implications follow. One is that hybridity becomes a vital factor for cosmopolitanism, while cosmopolitanism becomes the site for hybridity. The other is that as long as globalization involves a particular process of urbanization of the world, we cannot, in principle, escape the dynamics of becoming hybrid. Everything may become hybrid because it requires cosmopolitan culture or the culture of global cities, and we are fixated with the culture of space. The other danger accordingly is internal conquest. Hybridity, which assumes differences between one another, expects each to be hybrid in their own peculiar way. Sameness, or even similarity, with another national actor could discredit a claim to hybridity. This could happen because hybridity can no longer be conveniently defined by opposition to purity, be it real or imagined. Both Confucian Vietnam and Confucian Korea breed scholarship that painstakingly pursues all the trivial variations of Chinese Confucianism in order to present an indigenously synthetic cultural legacy.2 The second danger of post-hybridity is the tendency to protect the image of hybridity among local leaders who point fingers at some others for being traitors of indigenous identity. Traitors are those who connect with presumably alien cultures and civilizations to undermine some imagined synthetic identity, and risk the loss of sited distinction. Unavailability of pure civilization or ethnicity engenders anxiety nonetheless, especially among those subscribing to the romantics of national integration. Internal conquest takes place everywhere in the world even though the spread of hybridity should have deprived any attempt at conquest of the morale to do so. After all, no conquest can be complete or even effective in setting up the future direction of the conquered population. Nevertheless, internal conquest gains momentum wherever a site, allegedly one of a kind, acquires a synthetic identity. This makes, for example, both Inner Mongolians in China not Mongolian in the eyes of contemporary Mongolian citizens, and the Han Chinese in China a race different from the Han Chinese in Taiwan in the eyes of pro-Taiwan independence activists (Brown, 2004; Bulag, 2004, p. 109). Both Mongolian and Taiwanese civilizations are celebrated as being nobly hybrid and yet, synthetic in their own ways. Theoretically, conquests do not always result in dominance or exploitation. Cosmopolitanism is supposedly a tolerant and ongoing mechanism to constantly embrace another different component via soft conquest, soft intervention, or soft governance (Brandsen, Boogers, & Tops, 2006; Koremenos, 2001; Schelkle, 2007). Practically, though, cosmopolitanism and military campaigns often arise from the same colonial leadership at different times or on different issues, while isolation and openness compose the two postcolonial modes of self-synthesizing over different times or issues. Pre-WWII Japan’s approach to Taiwan attests to
IR concerning post-hybridity 91 Hybridity A+B+C…(Time 1) → A+B+C…(Time 2) →… Post-hybridity A, b, c…(Time 1) → B, a, c…(Time 2) →…
Figure 5.1 I llustration of synthetic vs non-synthetic subjects.
the former cycles of cosmopolitan assimilation and military annihilation, and contemporary Singapore’s approach to China testifies to the latter cycles of closure and access (Klingler-Vidra, 2012). Figure 5.1 portrays two different modes of evolution. Under hybridity, all components are combined into a unique synthetic subject, which evolves from Time 1 to Time 2 in the genealogy of the same synthetic subject despite new components being added and/or old components adapting. The subject defines the way to combine civilizational identities under hybridity. In contrast, under post-hybridity, the process is dialectical, with only one particular identity taking the lead each time in accordance with contingency of the situation as well as agency of relevant actors. The identity discourse defines the non-synthetic subject under post-hybridity. As all are hybrid, sited or territorial hybridity composed of at least two purer civilizational components at the same time loses behavioral relevance to a certain extent. This happens because actors are no longer hybrid of two inconsistent sets of standards represented exclusively by place. In short, one cannot simply sit between the US and China because the values and self-understandings of the two places are not internally consistent or even expressible without serious distortion. Korea, for example, as a place, may still represent Confucianism, and yet, it can also represent Buddhism and Christianity. On the other hand, Confucianism, Buddhism, and Christianity can all use Korea (or China, Japan, and Taiwan), in turn, as models, so Korea (or any of the others) becomes temporally divided. Hybridity that is not territorially embedded is unfamiliar to literature. Rather, saying Korea is a hybrid of these religions is much more common than saying these religions are a hybrid of Korea, China, Japan, and Taiwan, so as to change sitedness into style that comes and goes. Intermingling and learning which breed inconsistent standards can take place at any selected site indeed, but these processes exist not merely in place, but also in time. A multilayered set of identities of this temporal nature moves the control away from the sited (sovereign as well as non-sovereign) subjectivity, which literature on hybridity has tried praising philosophically and demonstrating empirically. Under the conditions of post-hybridity, the territorially irrelevant call or urge of a particular mode of self-identification answered by indigenous leadership decides what reigns for the time being. The same Korean intellectuals, for example, could take pride in the recognition of their English-written scholarship by their American colleagues in one moment, but denounce liberalistic suspicion towards
92 Chih-yu Shih and Josuke Ikeda nationalism in the next moment in order to promote Korean unification as the utmost life goal of all Koreans. Multilayered values and identities do not oblige a synthetic solution to all acquired and internalized values and identities. Rather, they may surface and submerge dialectically without a scientifically discernible pattern.
Non-synthesis and reconnection Non-synthesis defines the extent to which post-hybridity may be different from hybridity. Post-hybrid identities have to be practically re-incurred, while the power of hybrid identity is mainly derived from discourse. The factors that make post-hybridity epistemologically different are threefold, namely multilayeredness, memory, and reconnection. They are all counterparts of major tenets of hybridity, which are, subjectivity, uncertainty, and difference. At the deeper level, more fundamental differences exist between the spatial and temporal ontologies. They do share one thing, which is that ontology changes. However, while hybridity may focus more on spatial change, presumably via a sited subjectivity, post-hybridity is interested in its temporal cycle that requires no synthetic subjectivity, nor forward time. Multilayeredness may describe coexisting strings in our identity. Its starting point is the recognition that no identity is a tabula rasa in the geographical and/or cultural sense. It therefore suggests that our identity can be a discontinuous construct, so that it cannot be fully understood through discourse analysis, nor is it as powerful in subverting hegemony as discursive re-interpretation is. Multilayeredness suggests that our identity and our very existence belong to more than one mode of social ontology, and in this sense, it is similar to its predecessor, plurality. What differentiates multilayeredness from plurality, nevertheless, is the rejection of synthesis premised upon a sited subjectivity. In the international context, this is sometimes connected to nationalism, which constitutes the affiliation of the self to a particular political community. The theme of plurality requests everyone to subscribe to a higher level of identity. In Taiwan, for example, this means not asking where one’s ancestor comes from (aboriginal, dynastic migrant, Japanese colonial, or Civil War refugee, etc.) in order to be treated equally as “new Taiwanese” (Fan, 2011). The problem with plurality is that, despite the very claim for plurality, it is oriented towards civic nationalism, which is reproduced to the effect of synthetic subjectivity that cannot reflect the multilayeredness and open-endedness of non-synthetic dialectics. Perhaps a similar difficulty can be identified in the current mode of cosmopolitan citizenship, not because of its cosmopolitan character, but because of its reduction to citizenship. Multilayeredness, composed of a contemporary thesis and many antitheses, is proposed here to avoid pressure for sited synthesis. It attends to the non-synthetic process that does not assume any subjectivity to represent a site in the long run. Non-synthetic multilayeredness enables one to appreciate the return of a lost antithesis, despite the fact that it may have disappeared for a long period of time. Urbanization
IR concerning post-hybridity 93 may have permanently changed the value of land at one time, for example, but post-humanist thought can appeal to the traditional value that resists commercial investment and large-scaled development. Any antithesis can be retrieved to obscure the identity of a particular site or personality. In the case of Taiwan, the aboriginal may re-identify with the Polynesians, Han heirs with the aboriginal, the postcolonial subjects with the Japanese, and the Civil War refugees with the Chinese, not to mention the range of options for those inheriting from a hybrid family. Cultural memory, rather than uncertainty, is a ground to remain cognizant of multilayeredness, so that all antitheses can potentially be reenacted. Its principle is that everyone is capable of returning to or incurring an imagined past. In the world of hybridity, social formation of the subject may take place via either the infliction, or the totalization by one character on the other. While the future is always uncertain, there is no way to return, hence “unhomely” (Bhabha, 1994). Such synthesizing pictures often stress the fact that there are always two symbiotic stories to tell (Hollis & Smith, 1990) from the same identity discourse at the same time, but what cultural memory may suggest is that the practical—as opposed to discursive—switch between a thesis and a non-symbiotic antithesis can be conscious and abrupt.3 Lee Teng-hui turning himself from a Communist to a Christian, being a follower of Chinese unification to a leader of Taiwanese independence, and his re-identification with Japanese colonialism, for example, were all more than just uncertainty. It was the incurring of a distinct past from memory. What may be the link between multilayeredness and memory is the third tenet of reconnection. While each layer may have selected a particular other to contrast the layer’s own celebrated identity, a re-emerging layer is likely to appeal to a previously silenced or politically incorrect identity. In practice, reconnection with those others who were conceived of as contrasted with the prevailing identity dramatizes the return of an old identity. Cyclical practices of different theses are the duty of the subjects to fulfill their social roles as time changes. The duty is therefore not about how different the subject is from the other. Rather, it is about how the subject copes with time and its context. Moreover, because the subject is expected to hold multilayered identities, the act to reconnect is always strategic. For another East Asian example, note that growth, nuclear weapons, national unification, regime stability, and family history inspire cycles of reconnection in Pyongyang in reference to China, the Chinese Communist Party, South Korea, and kinship (Kim, 2011, pp. 26–27). Each cycle emerges out of a discernible rationale at its time, be it socialism, nationalism, comradeship, and so on. The post-hybrid capacity for reconnection informs the non-synthetic d ialectics of a site, a person, or a history, to practically switch identities. In contrast, a successfully synthesized hybrid site relies on re-interpretation to resist domination. Genealogy is the basic method of cultural sociology to track how one h ybrid condition evolves with a traceable string (Mukerji, 2007), hence uncertain and yet, sited subjectivity. Accordingly, hybridity proceeds with the participants
94 Chih-yu Shih and Josuke Ikeda and observers providing symbiotic and yet contradictory meanings to the same practice. However, reconnection is what characterizes the post-hybrid subject exercising cycles of plausible canons one after another because the reigning one fails to achieve success. Democratic Taisho turned to imperialist Showa in the aftermath of the Washington Conference, because it was perceived to have subjected Japan to US dominance (Nish, 2002, p. 26). Genealogy between different canons is unnecessary in this particular change, as democracy and imperialism were parallels in history rather than a hybrid at the same site. Changes were not merely discursive, but they were practical under the post-hybrid condition. Together with these points, the idea of post-hybridity projects an attitude to think of ontology in a temporal manner. To be fair, hybridity is not discarding social ontology in a temporal sense (Bhabha, 1994, p. 6), but it may still be reasonable to say that, in postcolonial literature, social ontology has been interpreted in the matter of belonging, which has had a tendency to see identity in terms of “where” rather “when.”4 In this point, post-hybridity is closer to the Derridean idea of différance, which states that the present and the presence is already a mixture of temporally different existences, resulting from the past. Thus, in terms of identity, differences can only emerge as such from previous identities of the self. Genealogy is thus the proper method to explain the evolution of sited hybridity. However, multilayeredness and reconnection via strategic incurring of memory make post-hybridity a process of dialectics and rupture. This can be called “cyclical historiography,” which will be discussed more in the case study of Hong Kong.
The case of post-hybrid identity in Hong Kong The dangers of post-hybridity reside primarily in the desire for conquest. It can arise internally from imagined sitedness to gather, as a cosmopolitan center does, another exotic model to enhance the universality of the center. The US intervention in the Middle East is the archetype of cosmopolitan center seeking dominance over sites of different civilizations via an allegedly multicultural institutional frame (Cheng, 2012, p. 7). Alternatively, internally imagined sitedness can sever, as an independent subaltern does, transborder connection to protect a distinctive hybrid identity. Singapore’s pursuit of a non-Chinese identity via a national English curriculum represents a quintessential case of self-reconstruction (Stroud & Wee, 2011). The externally triggered action transcends the sited distinction and presses actors constantly in response to the call for performance against standards that are externally prepared, such as human rights, economic growth, nationalism, peace, and so on. Nations are merely agents of cycles as China’s coping with Myanmar, North Korea, Vietnam, and the Philippines dissolve the nation into different modes of relationship, each embedded in a series of bilateral historical trajectories. Subjectivity is no longer premised upon the ability to re-appropriate civilizational mingling for the use of national self-actualization. From a historical perspective, almost all national actors demonstrate the intellectual capacity for dialectical change in accordance with the demand of the time.
IR concerning post-hybridity 95 Postcolonial Hong Kong is distinctive in its combination of Chinese, British, American, and several other Asian civilizational resources. Chinese immigrants have been arriving in different generational cohorts in a historical span as long and wide as over 300 years, and nascent immigrants have started joining from Southeast Asia in the aftermath of the Cold War. Hong Kong is a typical site of non-synthetic hybridity. Canonic thoughts and beliefs that sustain differing identity strategies of Hong Kong’s intellectual and elite strata remain tenaciously within their own genealogy with their own versions of tradition and self-identity. Hong Kong, thus, exemplifies a geo-cultural path that literature on hybridity has not seriously considered. Hong Kong’s particular geo-cultural path is different from what literature refers to as hybridity, because Hong Kong’s identity encompasses non-synthetic, lingering Confucian, Christian, liberal, patriotic, and other identities that exist in parallel to each other, rather than merging into a hybrid identity. Owing to this, the allegedly hybrid identity of Hong Kong could disintegrate at any time, because of re-imagined or re-enacted traditions. In other words, the non-symbiotic parallel identities support a cyclical historiography rather than the celebrated post-coloniality that moves Hong Kong irrevocably away from any fixed past. However, Hong Kong would not be considered essentially distinct in postcolonial literature, which considers hybridity a common sense phenomenon in all postcolonial societies. In fact, metropolitan centers anywhere in the world display post-coloniality to a certain extent and are therefore accessible subjects of study on the postcolonial agenda. Accordingly, postcolonial and global cultures constitute two sides of the same coin. Hong Kong embraces both sides. This is a reason why Hong Kong has also been considered an example of cosmopolitanism (in the studies on global cities). Although the two agendas do not move in the same direction, postcolonial historiography emphasizes variety, and while historiography on globalization emphasizes synchronized practices and representations, they similarly conceive a local history moving forward on its own track that denies any possibility of reproducing existing canonic thoughts or hegemonic values. The postcolonial agenda treats this forward move either as one into or away from a global agenda, or a little of both. The contemporary history of Hong Kong seemingly illustrates this as a move away from any specific meaning of being Chinese. At this seemingly non-typical hybrid site of Hong Kong, two popular modes of historiography are readily available to approach its geo-cultural history. Both fail badly. One is the so-called “end-of-history” kind of historiography that expects a linear and progressive evolution towards an individualist, civilian culture that is able to transcend sitedness. The other is the challenging deconstructive historiography that is emerging in different schools of deconstruction, including those advocating “postcolonial modernity,” “multiple modernities,” “post-Western IR,” and so on. The deconstructionists’ endeavor to discover geo-cultural morality is presumably not shareable elsewhere. The problem is that neither of the two options can cope with the paralleling, coexisting, and yet non-confrontational cultural, religious, and political identities in Hong Kong after its return to China
96 Chih-yu Shih and Josuke Ikeda in 1997. The rise of the confrontation between pro-democratic and pro-Chinese forces brings forth an unfamiliar challenge because one can detect different strings of intellectual belief coexisting in the same identity. Despite a hybrid outlook of the agent, the two hardly synthesize. Each appears in cycles contingent upon the context and the judgment of the agent. The case of Hong Kong, thus, has wider philosophical implications to the extent that indigenous and colonial thoughts considered mixed during cultural encounters do not substitute each other. Instead, they parallel or layer. The capacity for intellectual return or appeal to a perceived past string cannot be a phenomenon just specific to Hong Kong. Therefore, postcolonial hybridity fails to appreciate many powerful intellectual foundations to which later generations can resort. Incurring an alternative origin to situate a different contemporary identity is always possible because of the longevity of human intellectual history. Hong Kong demonstrates this constant re-appealing that takes place on the basis of solid traditions in Confucianism, Christianity, and patriotism, in addition to the familiar liberalism and anti-Communism. Chineseness has become extremely difficult to define, and attempts at doing so generate bitter feelings, because neither of the above-mentioned intellectual identities has mixed well. This makes hybridity a misleading notion in the sense that there is no reference to the intellectual mechanism that brings back the past. The past in the present is always re-imagined, and such a past is always portrayed in postcolonial literature as being for some contemporary purpose. In other words, the epistemology of hybridity treats the cultural past in Hong Kong that encompasses all these different identities as sheer strategic resources that can be enlisted by contemporary people for their own purposes. In doing so, it omits the nature of culture as an internalized memory that inspires spontaneous action. For example, take a past intellectual resource, such as Confucianism. Confucianism has implanted a cultural memory that enables contemporary people to naturally and instantaneously respond to Communist symbols with a readily affective aversion that imposes barriers on certain strategic options. Since the above constitutes an intuitive response, this would not be considered a strategic choice. However, if Confucianism would ally with Christianity in order to be anti-Communist, then this would constitute a strategic choice. Postcolonial hybridity only focuses on the latter, while omitting the former. Cycles make a legitimate concept only if arriving civilizations each remain in their own momentum. In the modern history of Hong Kong, these should at least include Chinese immigrants that arrived in Hong Kong in separate waves, colonial immigrants, and missionaries. The result has been the coexistence of non-synthetic intellectual resources embedded in Confucianism, anti- Communism, Christianity, nationalism, and liberalism. These resources run in parallel, and do not merge, in a community undergirded by the geological demarcation of the colony and the Cold War camp. These values could each replace one another, contingent upon the event, political condition, individualized experience, and choice of the agent. Hong Kong’s intellectual history, thus, illustrates an entirely unfamiliar, and yet potentially ubiquitous, postcolonial condition that
IR concerning post-hybridity 97 the notion of hybridity is unable to catch. This is especially true in a migrant society, which comprises a variety of ethnic groups with each dominating in a particular occupation, residential area, social stratum, linguistic legacy, etc. To begin, Hong Kong’s Chinese immigrants have been determined to avoid sited identity. This does not mean that they gained no sitedness, but rather that they preferred a distinctive non-Hong Kong identity. The first cohort of Chinese immigrants consisted of those Chinese that had lost the political battle during the Manchurian (Qing) conquest of China. The overthrowing of the Qing Dynasty brought another generation of Confucian scholars that was still loyal to the dynasty. They despised the colonial Hong Kong population, and therefore, naturally, became the faithful ally of the cultural conservatives in China, who were opposed to those characterized as Westernizers, modernizers, or cultural revolutionaries. Lu Xun, an important leader of the May Fourth Movement, was critical of these Hongkongnese Confucians, saying that the colonial administration had found an ironic ally in them in its attempt to deprive the labor movement of its legitimacy. The Communist Revolution in 1949 brought in another c ohort of Confucian immigrants, who, this time, were anti-Communist. The most recent intellectual Chinese immigrants arrived after the suppression of the Pro- Democracy Movement in 1989, likewise anti-Communist, but hardly Confucian. Each carried with them a peculiar mission of restoration. The above-mentioned different generations of Confucian immigrants multiplied the cultural layers in Hong Kong. This was especially because their ideological enemies have varied widely over the years, going from Manchurians to Westernizers, from Communists, finally, to the Communist party-state. Hong Kong has never been a real home for them despite the fact that most of them spent the rest of their lives there. Love for certain Chinese cultural identities combined with an aversion to the current regime made them unfit for both the colonial life in Hong Kong and a possible new life in China. The wished temporality of their stay in Hong Kong kept them from attending to issues that seriously affected them. Nevertheless, they always stood firm, while facing colonialism. Despite the brief alliance between the British colonial government and Confucian scholars during the Republican period, which witnessed the establishment of the Chinese Department in the University of Hong Kong, synthesis or mutual conversion has not occurred, apparently. The colonial government did not intend to reproduce a particular kind of Chineseness for Hong Kong. As a result, pedagogy under colonialism had no patriotic goal. Rather, it prepared the population for capitalist competition. Nevertheless, Chineseness remained strong via the practice of Chinese cultural life and through receiving the exodus of Chinese refugees and the ubiquitous appropriation of Chinese cultural symbols. However, not only did indigenous Chinese and colonial British components not synthesize, different cohorts of Chinese immigrants did not, either. Both are more than just cultural resources for use in accordance with context and judgment. They additionally make a hybrid repertoire of cultural memory that can be triggered into action for achievement, often of opposite ends, most noticeably, Chinese patriotism and colonial modernity. By cultural memory, the
98 Chih-yu Shih and Josuke Ikeda concept refers to the evaluative intuition that generates agency for action. A non-synthetic kind of cultural memory in Hong Kong is destined to cause cycles in identity strategy in the population at large, as well as in each individual. Owing to the aforementioned situation, it becomes possible for people like, for example, Seto Wah, to be a leader of the pro-democracy movement after 1989, and a determined patriot at the same time. His simultaneous critical perspective on Chinese Communist Party rule and his unreserved leadership in campaigning for the recovery of sovereign control of the Diaoyu Islands from Japan, at times, embarrassed his followers, who could often only agree with one of his two positions. Also, university professors specialized in China studies, for example, have to rely on different layers of Chineseness in order to study their Chinese subjects empathically, practice activism in Hong Kong, engage Western colleagues professionally in academic conferences, and re-appropriate their network in Singapore, Taipei, or among Chinese Diaspora elsewhere. Their intellectual capacity of adaptation and shifting brings to light the non-synthetic hybrid condition they are in. In this condition, all the cultural resources have the opportunity to prevail on their own and make the dialectics of cultural memories an ongoing process. Non-synthetic hybridity can be illustrated by the mutually estranging relationship between different generations of Chinese immigrants to Hong Kong, too. In favor of liberal democracy, the latest anti-Communist generation of the 1990s does not possess the same anti-Communism embedded in Confucianism of the earlier days. Nor was it similar to the one brought forth separately by the Church tradition, which included Sinology, but no Confucianism. The cohort that arrived after the Communist takeover largely experienced the war with Japan during childhood. Their strong patriotism alienated them from the cultural nationalism that arrived one generation earlier or the China watchers who came to Hong Kong for the purpose of solidifying American containment. Chinese scholars that have been coming to Hong Kong since the beginning of the new century with a Western academic degree are lukewarm to anti- Communism, which makes them block communication with the earlier nationalist cohort. Furthermore, there have been intellectuals growing up in Hong Kong who can represent yet another indigenous layer with acquaintances to liberal and nationalist discourses at the same time. In brief, the values, identities, and cultural memories in the culturally hybrid Hong Kong have not synthesized. Since all can emerge and submerge separately, strategic adaptation has become an inevitable process of life that depends on pragmatic concerns of the actor as well as his or her evaluative intuition. Hong Kong’s case makes Singapore, or, for that matter, differing Chinese Diasporic communities, cases of comparison. Singapore, similarly, has Chinese immigrants who arrived in different cohorts. The first generation arrived amidst the transformation of dynastic China into a republic, while the second generation grew up during the anti-Japanese War. Even though the latter has preserved major intellectual resources that sustained Chinese humanities and identities, it nonetheless watched the third
IR concerning post-hybridity 99 generation drift away from Chineseness. The leadership under Lee Kuan Yew initially suppressed Chineseness in order to cope with an unfriendly attitude of the neighborhood towards it, the multiracial and religious politics in the nation, and potential Communist infiltration via Chinese patriots overseas. Granted that the third generation was bred according to English pedagogy, Lee was able to revitalize Chineseness first under the disguise of Asian values and then, upon the fast-rising Chinese economy. New Chinese immigrants have begun to arrive from the Chinese mainland before the start of the new century to make a non-synthetic parallel to those that had come from Hong Kong a decade earlier. Non-synthetic hybridity causes integrative problems to some extent, but also enriches the hybrid identity for a potentially quicker and more drastic adaptation in the face of a fast-changing global geo-culture.
Conclusion Post-hybridity warns against the loss of critical and analytical usefulness of hybridity. One function of post-hybridity is to show how, in a world of all being hybrid, conquest nevertheless proceeds upon the quest for sited subjectivity. Second, post-hybridity adds a temporal dimension to the analysis of hybrid conditions to enable an understanding of how and why a wholeheartedly claimed sited subjectivity can merely be a temporary phenomenon. Third, post-hybridity points to the methodology of genealogy as a reason for preoccupation with sited subjectivity, and suggests adding dialectics to the study of hybridity as a remedy. Finally, post-hybridity deconstructs hybridity’s obsession with difference and subjectivity by analyzing how subjects can be sheer media between contexts and acquired civilizational resources, instead of self-actualizing agents. Another observation from the case of Hong Kong may also be added in its relation to (post-) Western IR. In the first place, IR theory has been the theories of and among sited identities, while what Hong Kong shows is a fact that, in the study of global relations or globalization, such a framework is too narrow in its scope and analysis. Second, even Hong Kong’s case may make post-Western modes of IR inquiry insufficient as the latter does see the uncertainty of a particular identity, but only considers the spatial aspect. As mentioned, the newest addition to the inquiry is the possibility of a temporal reconnection out of strategic choice, while in the post-Western IR, it has still been the matter of reinterpreting the sited identity. It is true that some works have already attempted to do this (Ling, 2013; Sassen, 2006), but it is still necessary to bring time or history back to IR theory, albeit in a very different sense. Cyclical historiography may, thus, become a gentle reminder to reflect on how one may situate the self, the other, and the world in theories of globalization.
Notes 1 These possible sites that can reproduce existent and generate new borders include, for example, India, the Caribbean, Eurasia, the Andes, China, Japan, and Southeast Asia. (Tickner & Blaney, 2013).
100 Chih-yu Shih and Josuke Ikeda 2 For a comparison between these, especially separate Confucianisms, see Richey (2013). 3 A case for such a practical use of memory through “the balance of relationship” or “the balance of role” has already been presented through the example of urban Chinese. See Shih (2013, p. 88). 4 Post-colonial literature usually enlists words that indicate our existence in any spatial sense such as “site,” “displace,” “home (and the world),” “unhome,” and “space.”
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6 Identity, time, and language Nishida Kitaro’s philosophy and politics in non-Western discourse Kosuke Shimizu Recently, identity has been given substantial attention in the study of contemporary world affairs. As an academic discipline, International Relations (IR) has not paid sufficient attention to the concept of experience as a basis of identity making and its relation to the concept of time. However, once we thoroughly look into the concept of experience, it becomes clear that such concepts as language, time (and inevitably, space), and identity are intertwined with the concept of experience; the way they relate to each other profoundly influences how we see and construct the world. There was a school of thought that tried to connect experiences and identity to politics in Japan before World War II. The philosophers of the school attempted to intervene in the foreign policies of imperial Japan to promote policies for co-existence of different nations by utilizing their concepts of experience and identity. However, the attempt ended up in a devastating failure and resulted in providing justification for the aggressive expansion of Japanese imperialism. This story tells us how difficult it is to convey non-hegemonic experience and identity into a discourse constructed on hegemonic language without transforming it into an identity, which is fixed and spatialized. In this chapter, I will argue that non-hegemonic IR theories must take seriously the power of hegemonic language and the concept of time for further development in an age of dynamic change and transformation. This is particularly so in the case of a radical alternative based on particular non-hegemonic identities, such as the recently emerging “non-Western IR.” I will argue here that non-hegemonic IR discourses may run the risk of reiterating the hegemonic IR by focusing only on, and consequently may unintentionally resulting in promoting, the confrontational world image. I will take up Nishida K itaro’s involvement in the wartime regime in Japan with a particular focus on the contradictory relationship of experience, time, and identity in this chapter to illustrate a cautionary tale for alternative, non-hegemonic IR theories. I will do so by critically investigating Nishida’s experience of involvement in the wartime regime by utilizing his very concept of the “eternal present” [eien no ima]. In other words, I will critique Nishida’s politics by employing his philosophy. This attempt is indispensable for understanding the risk non-hegemonic IR involves because it illuminates the difficulty that even scholars with full consciousness of
104 Kosuke Shimizu the tension between time/space and non-hegemonic/hegemonic identities may easily fall into the pitfalls created by the temptation to spatialize the world on the basis of essentializing hegemonic language.
Pure experience and language The Kyoto School’s philosophy has recently come to be seen as one of the sources that inspire contemporary IR literature. Chris Goto-Jones’s prominent work on Nishida Kitaro’s philosophy (Goto-Jones, 2009), and Graham Gerald Ong’s application of “emptiness” to IR theories (Ong, 2004) are good examples. Chih-Yu Shih’s examination of Nishida’s ideas is also worth noting here, insofar as it attempts to put Nishida’s “place of nothingness” into the context of contemporary IR (Shih, 2012, 2017). Both the concepts of “emptiness” and “place of nothingness” here refer to a place or field in which what Nishida calls “pure experience” [junsui keiken] takes place. Scholars interested in the Kyoto School philosophy in IR as well as other fields tend to focus on “pure experience,” which Nishida regarded as the core of being. What is being? This is the question Nishida tried to answer. There have been many philosophers in the past who tackled the same question regardless of where they come from. Kant’s noumenon, which “must be cogitated not as an object of sense, but as a thing in itself” provides a typical example (Kant, 2003, p. 164), and other influential philosophers include Plato, Husserl, Heidegger, Arendt, and most recently, Agamben (Agamben, 1999; Arendt, 1978; Heidegger, 2010; Husserl, 2008; Plato, 2008). Nishida Kitaro, the leading figure of the Kyoto School, developed a philosophy of being on the basis of pure experience. Nishida argues that what is essential in existence is experience. However, the concept of experience Nishida developed is not an experience we usually assume in everyday life. Rather it is “pure,” which means before any existence. He contends that it is not a human being that goes through experiences. Rather, it is experiences, which construct a human being (Nishida, 1965c). There are no human beings prior to an experience, and the subject and the object are before the division in the “pure experience.” The pure experience does not have context or meanings. Instead, it is purely an experience without meanings. The experience is given meaning through the interpretative process in which language has importance. The process in which the pure experience is given meaning comes after, thus interpretation becomes possible only retrospectively. While he presumed the existence of this essential element of the world, Nishida was skeptical of language’s function to describe it, thus any explanation of it becomes inaccurate because that practice takes language. In fact, Nishida admits that the pure experience is rather indescribable. Whatever it is, a direct fact cannot be explained to us. Even if it is about reason, chokkakuteki genri [the principle of direct sense], as its foundation, cannot be explained. Explanation is a unified system to encompass everything within it. The center of the system cannot be explained and we are blind to it (Nishida, 1965c, p. 40). For Nishida, this unexplainable and indescribable experience is the most
Identity, time, and language 105 foundational truth of the world, and this unexplainable and indescribable truth occurs prior to any attempt to articulate it and vanishes when it is articulated. Thus, it is inherently temporal in its character. Nishida argues that any scientific inquiry’s “truth” claim is not the truth. He maintains that the “truth is personal and real,” thus individual and concrete. Therefore, “the perfect truth cannot be described in language” (Nishida, 1965c, p. 37). In this sense, Nishida’s desperate attempt to articulate the unspeakable and unexplainable with philosophical language was destined to fail from the beginning, and he was well aware of it (Kobayashi, 2013, p. 28). In fact, speaking of an indescribable in the present tense was not an easy task, and this can be seen in the terms in Nishida’s philosophical writings, such as koiteki chokkan [action tuition], mu no basho [place of nothingness], eien no ima [eternal present], and zettai mujunteki jiko doitsu [self-identity of absolute contradiction], all of which Nishida invented in explaining the pure experience. Nishida’s entire works were characterized by the repetition of similar explanations, slightly different from one another, but eventually failing to provide a precise representation. Kobayashi (2013) explains that Nishida was searching for a word to capture the essence of being in the very process of philosophical writing, in contrast to an organized way of writing. In other words, his writings vividly illustrate his philosophical engagement, in which he was facing the problem of writing the pure experience in language in the very moment of writing.
Pure experience, the eternal present, and power politics Despite the high regard with which this philosophy is held, there is a dark side to Nishida’s life: its incorporation into Japanese wartime imperialism. This fact is especially important in terms of critically engaging with IR as an academic discipline because it supposedly provides a cautionary tale to the contemporary literature of alternative IR theories of non-hegemonic identity, which have been constructed on the basis of peculiar experiences on the margins. For a detailed discussion of Nishida’s incorporation into the wartime regime (Shimizu, 2011), we need to comprehend his philosophy of time, the concept of the eternal present in particular, and its relation to the pure experience. Nishida called the moment in which the pure experience takes place the “present” [ima]. By definition, the present would intervene via context or language because it only becomes possible in retrospect. The present in its purist form is independent of the past or future and is never controlled or influenced by them. Nishida’s concept of the present comes close to Bakhtin’s concept of the “chronotope.” Bakhtin gives the name of the concept “to the intrinsic connectedness of temporal and spatial relationships.” It shows “the inseparability of space and time,” which he defines as “the fourth dimension of space” (Bakhtin, 1981, p. 84). Like Bakhtin, Nishida sees the present as one where time and space are inseparable. However, while Bakhtin developed the “chronotope” for the purpose of literal criticism, his concept was deployed to describe actuality in a particular space and time in order to explain its indescribability (Bakhtin, 1981),
106 Kosuke Shimizu Nishida’s ima was to inquire into the meanings of the actuality through which identity is constructed. The question of identity is precisely the reason why he developed his idea of the eternity of ima, the present. If human beings are constructed in every single moment of pure experience, how could one have an identity, which is presumably continuous? He or she would be a different person from one moment to another if there was no continuity. However, this continuity, which guarantees a durable existence of the container-like existence of experiences must not be pre-given, otherwise the identity becomes fixed and the logic of pure experience would be denied. The pure experience is characterized by unexpectedness. If the container of the experience is preset, the experience is not “pure” any longer. Nishida initially responded to this question with his idea of mu no basho [place or field of nothingness]. He argued that the place of nothingness encompasses everything within it, but does not exist in a fixed form (Nishida, 1965a). It is not a thing but rather a place or field. It is not a container but a place “on” [oite] where pure experiences take place. While the place of nothingness is a spatial expression, the eternal present is a temporal one. Nishida saw a logical limitation in the spatial expression of “place” for the concept of pure experience. He tried to add a temporal dimension to it and devised the concept of the “eternal present.” By adding the temporal dimension to the “place of nothingness,” he emphasized the changing character of identity. For Nishida, identity will never be the same, but is always changing in nature. This is because while the pure experience takes place “on” what he formerly called the “place,” the experience constructs and changes the form and character of the place. Therefore, the place cannot be the same as the one a moment ago. This changing character of identity “on” which a series of experiences takes place is the reason Nishida put the “eternal” before the “present.” It is not a mere present distanced from the past and future, but is always continuous. This changing nature of identity is the key to understanding Nishida’s political writings. To Nishida, the problem of the world constructed based on hegemonic language at that time is the fixity of and institutionalization of identities. The desire for accumulation of power and capital, which are obviously based on the simple assumption of continuity of the abstract concept of the time, constituted imperialism and resulted in the First World War. However, history is not just about continuity, but also discontinuity. Although each identity looks the same for a certain period of time, it is subject to change every moment because of unexpected, pure experiences. Nishida contends that imperialism ignores this fact and presumes that its identity never changes; it thus forces other nations to be fixed as well. As a result, “every nation under colonialist domination has been deprived of its world historical mission” [sekaishiteki shimei] to eventually form a peaceful region and world by transcending itself (Nishida, 1965b, p. 429). Here, Nishida expected each nation to have a flexible identity and meaning in itself through a self-realization that reflects upon its own experiences. While Nishida’s critique of the world of imperialism on the basis of his concept of time was clear and straightforward, his depiction of Japan as a political subject
Identity, time, and language 107 was rather ambiguous. In fact, Nishida’s alleged efforts to change the Japanese government’s political direction from one of imperialist expansionism to a more harmonious world, together with his idea of the identity of ever-changing character, failed disastrously, as did attempts by his disciples. An article that Nishida wrote upon request for Prime Minister Tojo’s speech on the Great East Asian Co-Prosperity Declaration was used solely to justify the Japanese army’s aggression towards the Asian continent despite being substantially edited without Nishida’s permission. Nishida was extremely disappointed to hear Tojo’s speech (Nishida, 1966a) and later died in sorrow. The draft he wrote for Tojo’s speech was entitled “The Principle of the New World Order,” and it is well known that there were three versions of it: the first, which was submitted to the government; the second, the one substantially revised by officers and used in the speech; and the third, which Nishida wrote after the speech, to clarify his political position. Currently, the second and third versions are available, while the first version has been lost and cannot be located (Arisaka, 1996, p. 86). Among those, the third version is naturally philosophical. There were many words he had invented in the process of philosophical engagement, such as “absolute present” or zettai genzai (another expression of the eternal present), and “self-identity of absolute contradiction” in referring to kokutai [national polity] and the Emperor system (Nishida, 1965b). On the other hand, the second version is overtly colored with aggressive imperialist language. It states, for example, that the Great East Asian War (against Britain and the US) is a holy war to accomplish our duty in world history (Kawanishi, 2005). However, there are no such words as “Great East Asian War” or “holy war” in the third version. The only word he used in the third version, which is found in this sentence of the second version, is “world history” (Nakamura, 1988, pp. 42–43). As mentioned above, Nishida did not simply intend to applaud the imperialist policies of the hawkish government; rather, it is said that he wrote the draft “in the hope that the government officials might learn something” from him (Arisaka, 1996, p. 86) and hoping that they might change the course of action. However, the result was completely the opposite. His writing was abused by the imperial regime and substantially changed to justify Japan’s aggressive foreign policies. This is certainly a tragic story. He felt that he was deceived and betrayed by the government. However, our analysis does not end here. Probably even more intriguing than abuse by the imperial government is the fact that, even in the third version, he had to use words such as “state” and “nation” to describe “ Japan” and its relationship to the prevailing international order. With these words, he plainly states that the only actors of the world are “states” (Nishida, 1965b, p. 427). When he refers to the world, it is always described as an aggregation of states, whether conflictual or cooperative. For instance, in referring to the mission of humanity in an increasingly globalized world Nishida writes, “I believe that today’s world is in the era of global self-realization. Each state must realize its own world historical mission, and they must constitute the world historical
108 Kosuke Shimizu world or global world” (Nishida, 1965b, p. 427).1 Nishida was arguing that the world was becoming one, and was no longer fragmented. It was the beginning of a new era, and imperialist thought, together with communist thought as the countermovement to it should be overcome (Nishida, 1965b, p. 427). What is striking here is, however, not his utopian or romantic hope for the world to literally become global, but the fact that he saw kokka [states] as the only actors to constitute the world, even in the case of this new era. Interestingly, Nishida criticized the League of Nations for its unquestioned acceptance of the concept of state as the only constituent unit of the organization (Nishida, 1965b). Nishida claimed that the Wilsonian League of Nations was destined to fail from the beginning because of its assumption that world peace would be brought about by simply recognizing independence and equality of nations [minzoku]. He maintained that each nation had a distinctive way of materializing its historical mission. In his view, the application of an abstract idea of equality among independent states to all nations which presupposes that all states are the same does not contribute to solving historical problems in any sense, and “this has been proven by today’s [Second] World War” (Nishida, 1965b, pp. 427–428). While Nishida was critical of the League of Nation’s presumption of peace— which assumed the standardized and timeless concept of nation-states—and their easy application to all nations in constructing the League, he never questioned whether the state should be the exclusive unit constituting the world. In other words, Nishida was well aware of the problems of standardizing the concept of state; he was not part of the problem of presuming states to be the only actors, which inherently results in conceptualizing the world only in terms of geographical divisions. Reflecting his state-centric and geographical understanding of the world, Nishida sees the division of “West” and “East” in an essentialized manner as well. This is particularly salient when it comes to the issue of “culture.” Nishida equalizes the expressions of the world “becoming one” with the “integration of the East and West” (Nishida, 1966b, pp. 280–281). The “cultures” of East and West are then connected to a series of dichotomies of “Buddhist”/“Christian,” “science” [gaku]/“discipline” [kyo], and “material” [mono]/ “spiritual” [kokoro], while he continuously contends that we have to go beyond these divisions (Nishida, 1966b, pp. 281–289). The repeated use of the geographical dichotomies of the world related to the “East and West” division evidently confirms Nishida’s spatialized perception of the world. Nishida was in some ways forced to use the language of Westphalia, the language which exists with preset presumptions of geographical division, state sovereignty, the nation-state as the main actor, autonomy and coherence within each state, and the legitimate use of violence. In fact, those who take part in analyzing world affairs even today are forced to adopt the presumptions and dichotomies embedded in the state-centric language of Westphalia even if they are critical of the current state of world affairs.
Identity, time, and language 109 This is the similar problem that Mustapha Pasha (2013) explains in a moment of the subaltern’s speech on IR: The subaltern climbs to the surface as protest, yet is often articulated only in the language of modernity. Marginality acquires speech, but only by adopting the rituals and syntax of hegemony. The subaltern does speak, but speaks in the idiom of hegemony. (pp. 153–154) To be heard, anyone who tries to explicate or develop normative arguments on the basis of his/her identity protesting IR must adopt the hegemonic language of IR. Nishida also had no choice but to accept the state-centric wording. He showed his resistance to hegemonic discourse slightly by turning upside down the concept of nation-state “state-nations” [kokka minzoku] in which he used the concept of “state” as an adjective in the third, and probably the first draft of the principle article. However, his attempt had never been recognized or understood by the government officials and, consequently, it appeared in such words as kaku kokka kaku minzoku [each state and each nation] in the second version (Shimizu, 2011, pp. 169–170).
Spatialization of the temporal experience for fixed identities What is wrong with using state as a constituting unit of the world? According to Nishida’s philosophy of the eternal present, it limits our imagination of the world by spatializing its existence. By using any language, we are destined to spatialize everything. In general, the language belongs to the past; this also means that the world is only seen in the form of what is already materially established. Therefore, using the Westphalian language, or any languages, in describing the world forces us to think of the world in terms of space. Henri Bergson (2001) makes the case for this position: We necessarily express ourselves by means of words and we usually think in terms of space. That is to say, language requires us to establish between our ideas the same sharp and precise distinctions, the same discontinuity, as between material objects. This assimilation of thought to things is useful in practical life and necessary in most of the sciences. (p. xix) Words fortify the spatialized identities, and language provides a platform for the fixation of relationships among them. With a spatialized perception on the basis of hegemonic language, we tend to see everything in a static manner and the relationship among the objects is fixed. Spatiality is overwhelming in many disciplines, of which IR is a typical case. The subjectivity of the language of Westphalia, a spatializing language which
110 Kosuke Shimizu presumes that the state is the only unit constituting the world, is ontologically characterized by strict and fixed geographical boundaries. In turn, this becomes the basis of dichotomies such as “inside” and “outside,” “self” and “other,” “civilized” and “barbarian,” the “West” and the “Rest,” “order” and “chaos,” and “friends” and “foe.” The word “Japan” as a state also tends to fix its identity, and draws it into a relationship with other identities such as “China” and the “U.S.” This relationship forces us not to see “Japan” as constituted by continually changing content and meaning, which are supposedly changing in every moment according to the philosophy of eternal present, but in its relationship with other states. The fixed identity of “Japan” and its relationship with other states become timeless, and “Japan” or “China” becomes a spatialized concept in terms of the “same sharp and precise distinctions, the same discontinuity” as those that exist between material and geographical objects, as Bergson maintains. Except for a few examples, the state-centric language of spatiality is widely regarded as pre-given in the IR community, and is rarely questioned for its biased view of global affairs (Darian and Shapiro, 1989). Hutchings (2008) wrote, for instance, that the “[p]redominant academic modes of analysis and judgment of international politics in the period between 1945 and 1989 were overtly preoccupied with spatial rather than temporal relations” (p. 11). This is because IR scholarship has focused only on the “spatial distribution of different power capabilities” (Hutchings, 2008, p. 11). This spatial distribution of power was institutionalized, and thus became static and timeless. As a result, the space of international politics was “thought of as frozen in time” (Hutchings, 2008, p. 11). In other words, contemporary IR scholars are destined to socialize themselves in the language of spatiality in order to be heard and recognized by others. Nishida’s political narrative was an example of the mistaken belief that the world can be understood in spatial terms instead of temporal ones, notwithstanding his philosophical engagement with temporality. Nishida’s political writings were concentrated too much on the “West/East” spatial division based on geopolitics, and never devoted enough time to investigating the undecidability of subject and identity. In other words, his perception of the world in his political writings lacked the concept of time on the basis of the eternal present. Had he chosen to stick to the idea of the eternal present instead, he might have realized that geographical dichotomies, such as “West/East” and “U.S./Japan,” are themselves modern constructs of the language of spatiality, and are far from essential and pre-given entities. However, these dichotomies had already been unquestionably institutionalized in the society before Nishida’s political discourse was developed, and thus closed off the contingencies that might have changed his political views.
“Non-Western” IR, the national schools, and structural changes in world affairs What sort of lessons for contemporary IR can we draw from Nishida’s experience? In order to link the Nishida’s tragic experience with “non-Western” IR discourse,
Identity, time, and language 111 non-Western IR should first be clarified. Broadly speaking, there are four possible categories in the discourse of recent developments in “non-/post-Western” IR: (1) empiricist, (2) standpoint, (3) nationalist, and (4) “post-Western” (Shimizu, 2014). The empiricist outlook only highlights worldviews that are not traditionally “Western.” This approach is the most basic form of “non-Western” IR and obviously takes the language of Westphalian spatiality as pre-given. The second perspective—standpoint—aims to add a new dimension to contemporary IR. It aims to “enrich” the discipline by including voices that Western mainstream discourses have long disregarded (Acharya, 2014; Acharya & Buzan, 2010). Again, this approach indisputably adopts space-centered language. Third, the nationalist point of view is explicitly against Western domination over IR theory, and strives to replace it with a new vision of world order. National schools, such as the Chinese and Korean Schools, can be categorized here (Yan, 2013; Zhao, 2006; see also Seo & Lee, Chapter 3 in this volume). However, in terms of an analysis on the basis of language, this supposedly radical approach against mainstream IR theories also seems to be conservative in the sense that it takes the language grounded in the spatializing perception of the world as pre-given. Last, “post-Western” IR transcends contemporary IR by surpassing the spatial binary opposition of “Western” vs “non-Western.” This approach problematizes “the basic formulation and idiom of our query,” and expresses a deep awareness of the problem of the language of Westphalia (Behera, 2007, p. 342). The post-Western approach is not merely meant to provide “different” perceptions of the world, but also to focus on the intimate links between knowledge and power in the Foucauldian sense (Foucault, 1972). Tickner and Wæver (2009) are, for example, very much aware of the power relations embedded in the practice of introducing “other” views of the world to the audience in the center. Accordingly, they try to avoid developing another way of “speaking from the center.” They do so by claiming that it is imperative: [to] actually know about the ways in which IR is practiced around the world, and to identify the concrete mechanisms shaping the field in distinct geo-cultural sites, a knowledge effort which must use theories drawn from sociology (and history) of science, post-colonialism, and several other fields [to comprehend] how the world is understood around the world. (Tickner & Wæver, 2009, pp. 1–2)2 Similarly, Hamashita Takeshi develops his understanding of the world by focusing on the “margins.” He argues that the world can be described differently when we see it from the margins where continuous changes in governance, domination, subjectivity, connections with others, and social configurations are the norm (Hamashita, 1994). Among the newly developed discourses of “non-/post-Western” IR, the third perspective—sometime referred to as “national schools”—is most similar to the experience of Nishida. In fact, it seems that Nishida shares some of its features with the nationalist approaches. First, Nishida and nationalist “non-Western”
112 Kosuke Shimizu IR share the constructivist attitude of idealism in that the ideal state of affairs could and should be applied to the international context; this will lead to a stable, enduring, and new global order. Underlying this assertion is the assumption that at the time of Nishida, the world was becoming unstable, largely due to the rapid restructuring of the prevailing order; meanwhile, Western hegemony was gradually losing its power. In a similar vein, it is said of the contemporary world that the relative decline of the US hegemony is gradually becoming visible (Alagappa, 2011, p. 217). Second, Nishida and the national schools of IR explicitly maintain an “anti-Western” stance. Nishida contends that the world is dominated and harshly exploited by the Western imperial powers. He also argues that instability of the world can be explained by the limitations of Western modernity and rationalism, which should be challenged by non-hegemonic political thought. Similarly, there is a perception in the discourse of national schools that Western IR, mainly North American, dominates local knowledge of IR and world politics. For instance, there have been numerous conferences and symposiums held to develop distinctive Chinese IR since the 1990s, and “Chinese scholars who have participated in the conferences in China seem to occupy the same nationalist context as their predecessors, who addressed the intrusion of Western influences” (Wang, 2013, p. 521). It is also important to mention that Korean scholars have long wished to liberate themselves from Western intellectual domination (Cho, 2014). The underlying perception that penetrates these arguments is that the limits of Western modernity and rationalism emanate, at least partially, from inherent violent tendencies embedded in the predominant order, as well as a total lack of morality. Scholars in this camp share the view that imperialism supports the prevailing world order, and that excessive competition and conflicts are inevitable. Third, both Nishida and the national schools are supposedly history- and/ or culture-centered in the sense that Nishida and the contemporary national schools develop discourses of the world according to a nation-based identity with a distinctive “history” and “culture.” Like the philosophy of world history formed by Nishida and his disciples in the Kyoto School, the national schools frequently refer to the identity with the “historical [rekishiteki] and cultural [bunkateki] uniqueness” of their own countries. For Nishida, “history” [rekishi] and “culture” [bunka] are constructed on the basis of experience and transcendent truth, and together they construct a distinctive Japaneseness. “History” and “culture” as products of a series of pure experiences form a methodology with which to closely approach the truth. We can only come to understand our identity and to create our perceptions towards the world by comparing our history and culture with others (Nishida, 1966b). However, Nishida sees the history and culture of Japan in his political writings to be fixed and pre-given. Similarly, David Kang (2007) contends “identity is more than merely the sum of domestic politics; it is a set of unifying ideas that focus primarily [on] how a nation perceives the world around it and its place with[in] it” (p. 9). As noted above, Chinese IR scholars often look at the sources of China’s identity in “China’s cultural traditions, foreign policy practices, New China’s diplomatic
Identity, time, and language 113 experiences, and Marxist doctrine” (Wang, 2013, p. 21). In a similar vein, Korean scholars have strived to establish a national school based on their allegedly “distinctive” historical experiences. Young Chul Cho (2014) contends that there has been a persistent call to establish a distinctive Korean School of IR since the 1950s (see Seo & Lee, Chapter 3 in this volume). Korean scholars are relying on historical ontology, by which they supposedly provide an important contribution to the existing knowledge of IR. The Korean School’s underlying motivation can be found in the enduring desire for independence from Western dominance in Korea’s intellectual sphere. The Korean School of IR must be established in order to academically improve South Korean knowledge production for global scholarship, to raise the dignity of IR scholars in South Korea while preventing their intellectual Western dependency (colonialism), and to protect the country’s national interest in regional and global politics (Cho, 2014). That the national school scholars adhere to the difference and distance in spatiality between Western civilization and non-Western states and regions is closely related to how they use language to understand the world. As non- Western nations, and Asian countries in particular, purportedly have different cultures and histories from those of the West, they presumably have a unique ontological quality. However, national schools’ identities are solely characterized by a materialistic and spatialized perception, and lack a sufficient attention to the concept of time. The dynamic nature of culture and history on the basis of temporality were missing in the discourses of national schools of IR like Nishida’s discourse of political philosophy. As a result, national schools’ political contentions are exclusively static and spatial. Their perceptions of the world are set in a frozen time, thus what they provide us are only snapshots of the world from their standpoints. Consequently, their view of the world contains only a materialized form of culture and history rather than its dynamic and ever-changing nature. The Chinese School is typical in that it places a special emphasis on such unconventional ontological components as the tributary system (Kang, 2007, 2010), a system of ancient Chinese governance (Zhao, 2006), or the Chinese concept of relationality, guanxi (Qin, 2010, 2011), but never questions their static perception towards identity and ontology. As a result, all of the possible ontological components are frozen in time. In other words, they see the world consisting only of unchangeable nation-states. The scholars of national schools uncritically accept the nation-state as the exclusive agency of IR; this evidently illustrates that the language they use is based on the Westphalia language of spatiality, and is thus no different from the mainstream IR theories in terms of a static ontology. The national schools spatialize their unique and peculiar experiences into the world of the nation-state by focusing on the supposedly appropriate geographical division, and drawing a map in which the divided subjectivities maintain strict boundaries. As the language of Westphalia presupposes the existence of the nation-state prior to investigating the present, perceptions of national schools’ scholars are profoundly influenced by the past.
114 Kosuke Shimizu In his political writings, Nishida saw “Japan” as having a pre-international existence in its political thinking, while the Chinese or Korean Schools viewed the identities of “China” or “Korea” as being pre-given and essential. All these ontological types of existence supposedly capture the firm ontological status of the countries involved, which enjoy the privilege of that status. As a result, there is a persistent contradiction in non-Western IR discourses’ arguments between the purpose of transcending the Westphalian system and their own ontological presumptions. The Chinese School’s insistence on a Sinocentric formulation of future IR is a typical example. They are understandably enthusiastic in criticizing the violent character of Western modernity (which appears to be a rational international order, but is in fact supported by a violent imperialist system), while they articulate an allegedly new global structure based on tianxia, in which they view the China-centered international system of hierarchy as superior to the Westphalian structure. In fact, they give the reader the impression that they implicitly presuppose China rising as pre-given, replacing US hegemony sometime in the near future. Here we find the intimate relationship between knowledge and power. In any sense, their version of IR is not very different from the Kyoto School’s view of the world (Chen, 2012, p. 477). In fact, the concept of tianxia is similar to Nishida’s theory of world history, which was, after all, deployed by Japan’s imperialist government to justify its invasion of the Asian continent (Nishida, 1965b; Shimizu, 2011).
Bringing time back in Of course, the problem of a pre-given and fixed identity and ontology is not limited to the national schools. Alexander Wendt’s Social Theory of International Politics (1999), for example, has the same problem; Wendt states: I want to show that states are ontologically prior to the states system. The state is pre-social relative to other states in the same way that the human body is pre-social. Both are constituted by self-organizing internal structures, the one social, the other biological. (p. 198) Wendt’s explication of the pre-given existence of human “body” prior to society is precisely the case in point. Body is a fixed existence, but it does not necessarily mean that identity is unchangeable. However, when we analyze a nation-state, such as Japan in the IR discourse, we are not dealing with Japan as a bodily existence; there is no such thing as Japan’s physical body as it is, in any sense, a social construct. When we say “Japan,” we usually refer to its abstract meaning and identity. The concept of the eternal present tells us that identity and meaning are constructed in every moment through pure experience. Extracting the abstract meaning of a particular identity out of a fixed bodily existence would close off two different but related possibilities. One is the possibility of seeing diversity and change within the identity of a conventional actor.
Identity, time, and language 115 “Japan,” “the U.S.,” or “China” are not unchangeable in their contents, but are always in the process of construction, which may be affected by unexpected encounters with pure experience domestically and internationally. Thus, Japan in this moment is not Japan with an abstract identity and meaning, but a bodily existence in which experience is full of unexpected encounters. Nishida’s failure in conveying his idea of pure experience into political discourse lies precisely here. Nishida took “Japan” with an abstract meaning and identity as pre-given. However, his philosophy suggests that any identities are open to pure experience, and an identity only exists in the form of “continuity of discontinuity,” thus it is always subject to change. This is not limited to nation-states. Even if we are to focus on marginalized identities and try to explicate the world from that perspective, the problem of spatialization stays the same. In fact, Japan before the Russo-Japanese War in 1904–1905 regarded itself as a marginalized and non-hegemonic nation, and the Japanese of the time felt that they were on the margins of the world. It is only after the “victory” over Russia, that Japan started to consciously consider itself a part of the international community, and later turned to an aggressive imperialist phase (Hirama, 2010). The danger of spatializing experience and fixing identity is thus ubiquitous, and could take place whether it is one of hegemonic or non-hegemonic identity. What is considered to be important in taking into account temporality is the unceasing practice of reflecting upon pure experience at every moment. Second, it also closes off the possibility of IR discourse looking at unconventional actors and elements that possibly affect the process of constructing the state as well as the world. If we only look at the world in terms of space that is constituted only of nation-states as Nishida’s political writings did, we eliminate the possibility of taking into account the meaning of the present, or the experiences of nonconventional actors altogether. Again, this is also a reason Nishida’s political writings were colored by Westphalian expressions of geographical division. While Nishida’s philosophical enterprise was explained with religious, artistic, literary, and poetic expressions, his political works are filled with such words as nation, state, national polity, and the imperial household. If we are to transcend the hegemonic “Western” IR, alternative theories should be based on a concept of inclusiveness, an open system for all countries and cultures, and therefore one open to the “others.” For the sake of inclusiveness, we must continuously question the language of the Westphalian system we are using. However, this inclusiveness cannot be materialized only by criticizing Western theories of exclusiveness, or emphasizing the “non-Western” nations’ different identities from the “Western.” Rather it should be done by directly approaching the present and pure experience. As noted above, pure experience is indescribable in Nishida’s philosophy of being; therefore, we cannot grasp pure experience, as it is, in words. However, we can search for expressions that approximate it. What are these in IR? As a philosophical investigation into pure experience is well beyond the scope of this article, it is possible to provide a concrete research program here. However, there are some suggestions with which we can develop our analysis of time in IR.
116 Kosuke Shimizu First, and interestingly, Nishida (1965c) sees poetry as the closest expression of a pure experience (p. 86). A similar understanding of poetry approaching reality can also be found in Aristotle, Heidegger, and Arendt (Arendt, 1978, p. 8). It seems that poetry has some potentialities in reformulating the study. This is because poetry is supposedly connected directly to the senses. Nishida (1965c) states that poet “directly recognize[s]” [chokkaku] the “source of phenomena” [hongenteki gensho] (p. 86), thus comes close to a thing in itself. This is also the case in IR. We have often disregarded the experiences of non-IR scholars, which are expressed in the form of arts, poetry, novels, songs, and the like, despite their approximations of pure experience. Therefore, an analysis to take into account the unconventional dimensions of the world, such as the arts, should be welcomed. Second, as Nishida’s philosophy is substantially influenced by Buddhism, we can learn something from it. In fact, some interesting attempts started in the IR community have recently thought to bring Buddhist thought into IR theorization (Ling, 2017; see also Ling, Chapter 4 in this volume). Among those interesting and suggestive ideas in Buddhism, kōan would be most relevant in our investigation of identity and time. Kōan is a Zen-Buddhist practice of dialog. It sometimes appears in the form of “an absurdity, paradox, or non sequitur” (Ling, 2017, p. 2). This unconventional style of dialog disturbs the conventional use of language, and reminds practitioners of the fragility and fluidity of identity. Thus, kōan seems to have some potentiality in approaching pure experience. In IR, this means not disregarding discourses, which appear to be irrational, but genuinely taking them into our analysis of the world, as they may show the most approximate expressions of the eternal present. In any case, if we were to transcend the hegemonic theories of IR, we should start our enterprise by seriously considering spatiality and temporality, and looking into unconventional discourses and narratives even if they do not look rational. In doing so, the concept of the eternal present would become a substantial help.
Conclusion What can we say about non-Western IR literature on the basis of our understanding of the Nishida’s experience and the Kyoto School? First, inclusiveness and openness are definitely goals worth pursuing. However, it is certainly too naïve to say that simply introducing different non-hegemonic identities and ideas at the abstract level into the IR discourse will automatically solve the problems, which emanate from a hegemonic perception of the world. As Nishida’s experience and that of his disciples suggests, knowledge and intellect are always in danger of being abused by the prevailing power structures and the spatializing power of language. This especially seems to be the case when dynamic ideas of peace and inclusiveness on the basis of the concept of time are forced to be articulated in the state-centric language of Westphalia. Nevertheless, we are obliged to articulate what we see and what it should be even if our perception is based
Identity, time, and language 117 on a non-hegemonic identity. We need to consciously and critically engage with IR with regard to such inherently spatializing geopolitical concepts as Japan, China, and the West. Second, the concepts of time, language, and identity should be taken seriously in understanding the contemporary world. Integrating the concept of time into our analysis makes our perceptions of the world more dynamic and fluid, and the new generation of IR theories based on time would benefit those who have been regarded as residing outside of IR or simply as irrational “others” to the IR “self.” This is because the introduction of the concept of time would allow us to reconfigure the world by breaking away from the past institutions and establishments. In turn, this leads us to question the pre-given identity of the privileged “self,” and contribute to critical engagement with IR. However, again we must remain conscious that even the identities of the current “others” may easily turn into another future “self” if they lack the concept of the eternal present. In any case, an engagement with IR without a thorough understanding of time would run the risk of being abused by hegemonic discourse.
Acknowledgments An earlier version of this manuscript appeared in the Korean Journal of International Studies, 16(1).
Notes 1 Arisaka translates this sentence “each nation [must] realize its world-historical mission; each nation must develop itself, yet at the same time it must negate itself and reach beyond itself to participate in building a global world.” Arisaka translates “jiko ni sokushite” as “develop itself.” However, as sokushite in Japanese implies getting back to itself, I employed “confirming” in this translation instead (Arisaka, 1996, p. 101). 2 A similar approach was also taken by Robbie Shilliam (2011).
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7 On the necessary and disavowed subject of history in postwar “Japan” Hitomi Koyama
Introduction While more than seventy years has passed since 1945, the politics of history between Japan and its neighbors remain rife with tension.1 The internationalization 2 of the contention over history-writing became pronounced only towards the end of the 1970s with the addition of Class A war criminals to the Yasukuni Shrine by the new head of the shrine, which, in turn, posed questions about whether Japan has accepted the verdict given in the Tokyo War Crimes Trial among Japan’s neighbors.3 By the end of the 1980s, the rise of feminist discourse in South Korea, the alteration of Cold War geopolitical hold on the region, and the broader international community’s shift in economy of attention to violence perpetrated against women under war further cemented the tension over how, and for some, whether, to discuss and explain what had happened under Japanese colonial rule, imperial expansion, and World War II.4 Domestically the battles over how history is used can be identified earlier. Taking the notion of politics broadly, the contention over how to rethink the relation between the writing of history, the state, and its subjects, can be identified in the educators and socialists’ struggle over utilizing history education towards the end of creating a revolutionary subject in the immediate aftermath of 1945. This was gutted under the newly forged alliance between the pro-US Japanese elites and the US Occupation.5 Even with such attempts at depoliticizing the matter over history, historians such as Saburo Ienaga waged a three decades long trial where he sought to delink the relation between the state and education. In the political front, while official statements have been issued, the sense of coherence has remained wanting. Several Japanese Prime Ministers have offered words of apology from time to time, only to have the weight of his words written over by remarks made by politically appointed ministers stating that the Rape of Nanjing is a hoax and resigning abruptly, and as a consequence, leading many to question the sincerity of “the Japanese people.”6 Yet this nonetheless raises a question: What might it mean to speak of “the Japanese people” in an age after History with a capital H? As Wendy Brown (1995) writes, this
History in postwar “Japan” 121 [r]efusal to self-define or write a single origins story also reflects a late modern or postmodern consciousness of the exclusions and violations accomplished by master narratives, the oppressiveness of closure on identity, and the vulnerability to colonization and regulation presented by definitive meaning. (p. 30) If we were to re-envision the persistence of Japan’s history problem as a question of de-imperialization in addition to dewar and de-Cold War (Chen, 2010), how does the late modern consciousness of the violence committed in the name of history result in the impasse over the uttering of the word, “we”? Various political and geopolitical factors intertwine to constitute this imperial debris. In this chapter, I emphasize the dimension of an ontological dilemma that haunts the contention over history-writing. Epistemology is of import, but so is question of ontology, which in everyday language translates to a simple question: “what is a state in history?” Said another way, what does it mean to speak of the sovereign subject of history in an age where imperialism, colonialism, and grand narratives are to be refused and disavowed? This question must be posed with an awareness of how periodization and naming have also obfuscated the decolonial stake of the history problem. The method of periodization as well as the question of how to call the war in it of itself imply different orientations about one’s understanding of the meaning of the past. For example, the phrase Pacific War—a term often used in the immediate aftermath of 1945—locates emphasis on Japan’s relation to the US. As an alternative, the term Fifteen Years War in the Asia-Pacific brings focus to the presence and implication for Asia in addition to the Pacific theater. Despite the nlargement of the geographical scope under question, as the ubiquity of the term “postwar” attests, the emphasis on war as that between the good and bad continues to occlude the imperial and colonial question (Fujitani, 2015). The presupposition of comparability all too often smuggles in a standard, which, despite its particularity, claims universality. The claims to universality, in turn, render that which does not fit as irrational or enigmatic. Therefore, I leave the comparative studies which contrast Japan with Germany out of discussion in this chapter towards the end of reflecting on the history problem as a question of how to speak of the state of history and decolonization while also attending to the historical specificity of this geographical region called Asia.7 In the first part, I briefly discuss the specific geopolitical factors that contour the imperial debris of the present. In the second part, I shift focus on the continuing impasse over how to speak of the military sexual slavery or “comfort women” between Japan and the Republic of Korea and the meaning of the concreteness of bronze statues of innocent girls, and how this ineluctably recenters the state which many in postwar Japan have sought to decenter and disavow. In part three, I revisit how the notion of collective responsibility presupposes an autonomous agent-actor in history, which renders the term “we, the Japanese people” both necessary and inadequate, thereby resulting in an impasse.
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East Asia, Cold War, and history There are various factors that have contributed to the occlusion of the colonial question in postwar Japan that is specific to the case of Asia. First, the decolonization of the region was implemented by what Lori Watt (2010) refers to as thirdparty decolonization. This indicates that, in contrast to the French empire, whose relation to Algeria in terms of the size of the settler population is comparable to that of the Japanese settler in Korea, the scope for debate on the meaning of decolonization was small. Furthermore, in the case of the returnees from Korea according to Jun Uchida (2011), in comparison to the narratives of those who returned from Manchuria, it has almost entirely disappeared. Second, the framing of the war as that which occurred between “good America” and “bad Japan” instead of what Takashi Fujitani (2015) calls the “global complicity of empires” has resulted in limited and hypocritical bastardization of the sense of justice. Third is the extent to which Cold War geopolitics continues to refract the ways in which the history of Japanese colonial rule is deployed both within and outside of “Japan” (Chen, 2010). While these factors are by no means to be taken as an exemption from pursuing reflective dialogue over the meaning of the past and issues of collective responsibility within Japan, they are nonetheless important to note if we are to avoid what Seraphim (2008) calls the new form of Orientalism, where Germany is cast as the civilized Enlightened Western self and non-Western Japan is cast as the “backward” Other. In this chapter, I will briefly discuss these factors and then add to the critical intervention into this matter by bringing into fold the discussion on the state of history as a matter of politics of ontology.
Third-party decolonization and postwar instead of post-empire The fact that those in charge of decolonization were themselves mostly imperial powers has created lasting impacts. Deimperialization and decolonization of Japan’s former empire was conducted by what Lori Watt (2010; also Kato, 2017) calls a third-party decolonization—where those who had the most leverage over postwar order were the Allied Powers, and most, except for Chiang Kai-shek’s China and the US which had just granted independence to the Philippines, were imperial powers (Great Britain, the Netherlands, and France). As historian Takashi Fujitani (2015) reveals, the focus on the war crimes emphasizes the tension between the Allies and Axis, between “good empires” and “bad empires”…[occlude] how the advanced capitalist nations that included Japan, the US, and the European empires conspired together to exploit and disregard the sovereign rights of all those people they considered “savage,” uncivilized, or not ready for self-government. (p. 167) Indeed, at the Tokyo War Crimes Trial, it was Indian Judge Radhabinod Pal in his dissent opinion that aptly pointed out the hypocrisy of the British and
History in postwar “Japan” 123 American powers for casting the war as that between the good and the bad, while saying nothing of their respective committing of crimes (Nandy, 1995). Although Judge Pal was by no means claiming that Japan did not do any wrong in his “not guilty” verdict, today there is a statue of Judge Pal within the premise of the Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo, where his dissent opinion is deployed towards the end of characterizing the war as a war of liberating Asia from the West. Postcolonial critique has found a peculiar life in postwar Japan.
Refraction of Asia under Cold War As Shin Kawashima (2017) notes, quite often, the study of Japan’s former colonies has been heavily implicated by the respective scholars’ ideological framework—for those who saw hope in socialism attended more to the potential for the People’s Republic of China and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea while neglecting Japan’s relations with the Republic of China and the Republic of Korea; those who conceived of these states allied with the US as bulwark against the spread of communism had a reverse relation to the study on Japan’s Others in postwar years. Furthermore, in the postcolonial Republic of China, delineation and differentiation of Taiwanese identity vis-à-vis the People’s Republic of China have often taken the form of strategic identification with Japan. Yet such identification cannot be interpreted flatly as an absence of the history problem between Japan and Taiwan. It is in this sense that Taiwanese literary critic Kuan-Hsing Chen (2010) insists on the need to rethink the inter-“national” relations of Asia’s task as being not limited to deimperialization and decolonization, but also de-Cold War. It should also be underscored how patriarchy and racism have rendered some victims visible while rendering others invisible. With regard to the “comfort women” issue, Fujitani (2015) notes how racism among the Allied Powers played out in the war crimes trial because while the Japanese use of Dutch woman was promptly punished in the Class B & C War Crimes Trials, nonwhite women, which were the majority of the “comfort women,” and their existence was merely pointed out during the Tokyo War Crimes trial as evidence of Japanese evilness; however, these women were given no opportunity to testify or be heard (p. 152). Within Korea, where the majority of the “comfort women” came from, domestic patriarchy rendered it difficult to raise the issue, resulting in self-silencing.8 It was the push by Korean civil society and the public appearance of Hak-sun Kim in 1991 that vividly reminded those in Japan that the colonial question is far from over. Against these imprints of Cold War geopolitical thinking which all too often reduce the politics of history to questions of national self-interest and zero-sum game, of balancing, civil society in these respective states has sought to figure an alternative form of solidarity to work against effacement and silencing. The Tokyo Women’s Trial, held in 2000 and planned by transnational feminist network, is of one example, and so are the recent erection of bronze statues by civil society groups in various parts of the world, not limited to Asia but also in countries which have accommodated Asian diasporas and migrants.
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Bronze statues and reification of positionality In recent years, the “comfort women” issue became caught in impasse where each state’s positionality in relation to the past have become reified; politics of truth and strategic essentialism have intertwined to cast Japan under oppositional currents. I argue that to rethink the persistence of Japan’s history problem with its neighbors demands that we envision the dilemma as being caught amidst two historical tendencies: between the disavowal of grand narratives, on the one hand, and on the other, the tendency of politics based on claims of injury ineluctably recentering the very state of history which activists and critics seek to deconstruct. We must reconsider the ways in which the ontological status of the state in history is presupposed since this is an implicit factor that belies the politics of history not only in Japan, but also in the world in general. I submit that, in addition to the disagreement over epistemology, there is a strident disagreement over how one is to relate the ambiguity of the status of the state as the subject-agent to responsibility, because it evokes the necessity and inadequacy of the coherent, self-sufficient, autonomous liberal subject as the starting point of theorization. This has implication for reconsidering the presupposed relation between the historical subject, agency, and responsibility. The number of bronze statues symbolizing the women and girls, known as “comfort women” by some and military sex slaves by others, have incrementally increased in the world—an additional statue erected in Pusan in South Korea, and the first one for the Philippines in 2017 (although this was taken out subsequently) and many others exist beyond Asia where citizens of states formerly victimized by imperial Japan migrated to, such as the US and Canada. The mayor of Osaka recently took issue with the city of San Francisco’s permitting of a statue, and at the end of 2015, the negotiation between South Korea and Japan centered on another statue being placed in front of the Japanese embassy in Seoul. While the protests by survivors ineluctably cannot continue permanently, the statues have no such biological limit to their presence. The agreement announced by then South Korean President Park and Japanese Prime Minister Abe in December 2015 sought to settle the issue “finally” and “irreversibly” without any consultation with the remaining survivors, and at the beginning of 2018, the new South Korean President Moon contested the agreement. There is a sense of fatigue in the air, a sense of endlessness, and now a guaranteed endlessness given the material concreteness and durability of bronze metal statues. Today, the Japanese Embassy in Seoul looks more akin to a permanent construction site, since the building is covered by high walls, and the building itself is no longer visible from the street. Across the building is the statue, with at least two people camping out next to the statue all the time to prevent any attempts by the embassy guard to come near the statue. In addition to the use of bronze metal as the material of choice, another symbolic aspect of the statues is the reification of particular positionalities. The statue in front of the Japanese embassy is situated across from the building, casting her gaze relentlessly. The figure of the girl is associated with youth and
History in postwar “Japan” 125 innocence, poignantly indicting the cruelty of what has happened. While one could rightly argue that this would implicitly privilege the virgin from the nonvirgin, “good women” from prostitutes, youth from the aged, which are problems in their own rights, here, the bronze statue casts an image of a defenseless young girl, quietly posing the question of “why” to the embassy of Japan. As Lisa Yoneyama (1999) observes in her study on the Hiroshima Peace Park, the use of women and children in commemorating the tragedy of the past amplifies and reifies a particular narrative of the past while occluding others. In the case of Hiroshima, the statue of Sadako who died young due to nuclear radiation serves to focus the international economy of attention towards the inhumane use of such weapons of destruction and away from the fact that Hiroshima has been a center of military ports and industry that supported Japan’s war. The choice of the figure of the victim has an affective dimension. Indeed, the phrasing of the Nanjing Massacre as the Rape of Nanjing also is gendered in its approach—it posits a place as feminine (in fact, the earth is usually associated with mother), and therefore implies that the aggressors are hypermasculine Japanese violators of the female body in a dual sense. In the case of the “comfort women,” the Japanese NGO’s deployment of the term “military sex slave” in place of “comfort women” have further cemented a very specific image of what has happened: the enslavement of innocent girls and women. Anthropologists such as Sarah Soh (2009) have studied how the condition of the “system” has gradually escalated, and what has become widely circulated as a replacement for the term “comfort women”—which has been criticized for being euphemistic—is that of military sexual slavery. As the choice of whether or not to place quotations around the term “comfort women” implies, critics of the Japanese state’s position towards the issue point to the state’s whitewashing of its past and the evasive phrasing of words as a sign of stubborn unwillingness to come to terms with the past (Field, 1997). The term comfort was deployed widely at the time in wartime Japan, as in comfort bags that were sent to soldiers in the war front from mainland Japan and often included hand-stitched items for soldiers to use. The use of the term in relation to women therefore implies that women’s bodies—the majority of whom came from Japan’s colonies—were considered to be an extension of an object for use by the soldiers in times of duress. According to Yuki Tanaka (2001), this, along with the racialized ranking of whose bodies’ dignity counts more, has contributed to the formation of racially hierarchical modes of objectification of women. For Tanaka, the issue of “comfort women” must be rethought not only as a specifically Japanese issue, but also as an issue of phallocentric military culture that also permeates in the US, Australia, the Netherlands, and Great Britain. His critique of military culture implies a call for transnational solidarity against such misogynistic culture in addition to accounting for the specific Japanese military involvement in the deployment of the system. Nonetheless, what is notable is how critics of the study point to how Tanaka verges on equating the gravity of crimes committed by other states to what Japan did, therefore making light of the specificity of the Japanese state’s role in setting up of the “comfort” stations
126 Hitomi Koyama (Morris, 2003). The logical end of such push is to once again redefine the war as that between the good and the bad, and away from an inquiry into the interconnection between colonialism, military culture, and violence against women. The tension here is that between identifying specificity, on the one hand, and that of general broader issue, on the other, it appears that the two are often framed as incompatible with one another. By extension, deflection from the critique of military culture and colonial rules implemented by the Dutch and the British, in turn, feed into the sense within Japan that only Japan is singled out and is placed in a reified characterization. And it is against this insistence for specificity that the domestic constituency, which supports politicians willing to take a revisionist view of history, is responding to. In terms of domestic political arrangements and the postwar power dynamics, one could point to the strong presence of the War Bereaved Family’s Association (Izokukai) and its connection to major political figures such as Shinzo Abe, the current Prime Minister of Japan. It is well known that the sheer number of those families affected in a total war rendered the War Bereaved Family’s Association as fertile soil for shoring up votes. In identifying the resilience of this voting bloc’s influence, Masaru Tamamoto (2000) indicates that as a family member, one does not want to see their father or brother’s character defined by high politics, thereby appealing to the universal human response to essentialism. One could also point to how the victim mentality engrained by the centrality of the US dropping of atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki recast postwar Japanese stance towards the past significantly inward, rather than outward, and in the process effaced the presence of the victims without (Orr, 2001). In this sense, Battleship Island (2017), a South Korean film’s depiction of Korean forced laborers and “comfort women” escaping enslavement from Japanese industrial coal mine’s ending with the US dropping of the atomic bomb and the protagonists’ daughter uttering “but there are many Koreans living there” also point to the ways in which Hiroshima and Nagasaki serve to occlude Japan’s colonial question. The film intervenes in the postwar narrative that focuses on the war and the bombs for their respective effacing of the presence of the forcibly recruited Korean laborers. What this brief sketch of diverse contentions over reification of identity shows is the extent to which efforts are placed in dislodging a reified image of the Japanese people solely as an aggressor: at times, by pointing to the diversity of wartime and colonial experiences, and, at other times, by selectively remembering the past from the perspective of a victim. While it is commonsensical to argue that not all acted the same during the colonial period or under wartime, and thereafter, there is reluctance towards posing a uniform, coherent stance. Nonetheless, this raises the consistency issue, what is Japan? This question of state ontology within the discipline of International Relations (IR) has been left without much consensus, as evident in the occasional identification of the state as an agent-actor in history, on the one hand, and as a unit subject to behavioral analysis, on the other (Schroeder, 2004). Furthermore, the shape of the territory has shifted as Japan sought to definitively demarcate its border and
History in postwar “Japan” 127 expand, following the expansion of European international society into Asia.9 As sociologist Eiji Oguma (2002) shows, the meaning of “Japanese” has fluctuated widely throughout history. With the integration of a constructivist approach to IR, the notion that the nation is a socially constructed product has become predominant; yet, as Roxanne Doty (1996) writes, the likening of states to people with identity nonetheless is buttressed with a desire for coherence and order. While IR theorists remain split over the implication of attributing coherent state identity, sociologist Shunya Yoshimi (2009) notes that with globalization, particularly in the 1990s, the notion of “Japan” could no longer be held as a given; rather, it has become a question. What is notable is how, since 1945, the meaning of “being Japanese” has been exposed to centrifugal forces that detest a singular meaning and positionality, and by extension, to the past as an imperial power. Indeed, according to the transcript of the negotiation that took place between South Korea and Japan that prepared the joint announcement at the end of 2015, the Japanese negotiators were specifically asking their counterparts to promise to abandon the term “military sex slaves” when referring to the “comfort women” in government documents (Takeda, 2015). The Japanese side also insisted that the South Korean government remove the bronze statue from the embassy front, and to withhold support for transnational feminist movements abroad in the future. In terms of statue removals, the South Korean counterpart informed the Japanese that they would try, but cannot guarantee anything, as this is a matter of civil society and the state cannot coerce the removal of the statue. The term “final” was inserted by the South Korean negotiators to prevent the Japanese negotiators from backing off from their concessions; although, in the present context, the term is now used against South Korea because President Moon’s investigation into the matter signals a departure from the term “final.” Taken together, the negotiation that took place prior to the December 2015 joint announcement has more to do with the Japanese negotiators’ attempt at dislodging a specific positionality in the characterization of what had happened in exchange for payment of monetary compensation. There is an obsession over the ways in which the past is characterized and reified in the form of bronze statues. As Michel-Rolph Trouillot (1995) succinctly puts it, there is a difference between “what has happened” and “what is said to have happened” (p. 13). Within the dissonance between the two lies the politics of history and the contestation over the power to authorize particular depiction and explanation of the past. In general, the use of history towards the end of the construction of national consciousness has become the essential hyphen that connects the nation to the state. Yet the use of history is not limited to the province of the nation-state, as empires also deploy history towards their respective ends, as was the case in the discourse on Pan-Asianism. The casting of Pan-Asianist discourse as a clash between the East and the West and the fashioning of Japan as the leader of Asia and the only successful modernizer has, in historian Eri Hotta’s (2007) view, provided an anchor to the war aim by providing a rationale to the meaning of war. In the case of the Japanese empire, this is the grand narrative of history, a
128 Hitomi Koyama history alternative to the Eurocentric History, that of the war having liberated Asia from the West. As Hotta notes, while the discourse on Pan-Asianism embodied various strands of thought, the latent sense that, in World History, the region of “Asia” is more “backward” and “stagnant” than the “West” and that a collective action must be taken to address this endowed a sense of mission to the war. The use of history therefore had been partly complicit in prolonging Japan’s war and legitimating what Japan was doing in Asia. Therefore, this was the grand narrative of the empire-state which had to be shed, as Japan had to transform itself into a nation-state with war defeat. To treat the history problem as an issue of IR occludes this dimension of the problem of also being that of decolonization and deimperialization, as an issue of empire and its aftermaths. To be sure, these uses of history by the empire were not limited to Japan. Since 1945, there is a broader movement among European nation-states and former empires to move away from stirring nationalism by depicting the state as a rational institution (Schissler & Soysal, 2005). Though, what significantly differentiates the case of dissolution of the Japanese empire from the rest is the speed in which it took place and the fact that it took the form of what Lori Watt (2010) characterize as “third party decolonization” (p. 12). The postwar order was debated among the Allied Powers with little concern for those inhabiting the region, and Chiang Kai-shek who represented China, the only Asian power to sit at the table, had to navigate through shifting relations among the Great Powers and secret deals cut behind his back over the fate of Manchuria (Kato, 2017). Thus, unlike the French empire whose slower dissolution offered space for renarrating the meaning of Algerian independence, and thereby, the dissolution of the French empire as an inevitable part of the progress of history, in the case of Japan, there was little space for grappling with what to do with Japan’s grand narrative.10 As symbolized in the national language textbooks used by school children in 1945 following the Japanese surrender, the subject of history—the empire—in Japan’s case was “deleted” in various ways; passages were painted over with calligraphy ink, entire pages and sections were cut out, and scraps of paper were pasted over any statements that might support Japan’s grand narrative.11 Likewise, for the formerly colonized, the ways in which independence came about posits a peculiar dilemma for narrating the past. While this is not to discount the role of anticolonial underground resistance movements, the predominant sense that the primary factor that resulted in decolonization of Asia came exogenously and suddenly with the US dropping of the atomic bombs, and how the democratization of Japan also was imposed from above, rather than below, continues to cast questions over what one might mean by the state as the sovereign subject of history.
On the constitution of the collective: collective responsibility and collective identity Equally problematic is the ways in which the transition from empire to nation-state took place. Recent studies in Japanese history attest to the continuity, rather
History in postwar “Japan” 129 than discontinuity, of politics before and after 1945 that see the resilience of the national socialist movement during the wartime period as having contributed to democratization in postwar years; even still, critics who identify the persistence of Japan’s history problem with the influence of the US, such as literary critic Norihiro Kato (2015), problematize the exogenous source of Japan’s constitution. How is the constitution tied to the idea of collectivity? For Sheldon Wolin (1989), this is “an entanglement of historical and mythical elements,” for the constitution is an event where a society will “try to express what they are about as political collectivities by appealing to or constructing their pasts and connecting that past with present arrangements of power…and [t]he myth thus [supply] and ontological basis for the historical experience” (p. 2). Wolin is speaking of the American constitution, yet turning our attention back to Japan, the event that took place during the US Occupation in relation to the constitution, as an ontological basis for a community that came about exogenously. If the new constitution, written in a matter of a few days by a handful of Americans, was imposed by the threat of another nuclear attack, and if this was the beginning of Japan’s postwar identity, would this not have an implication on the politics of history that deal with the ontological status of the state? Thus far, the constitution has not been amended, in part because any discussion of amendment is bound to be split; there are those who want to retain the constitution as is without acknowledging how it came into being, and those who wish to amend it precisely because of the ways in which it came into being, and therefore advocate for the closing of the disjuncture between the source of the supreme law of the land and its people who are to live under the law. Kato (2015) posited in 1995 that in order for Japan to apologize coherently to Asia, there must be an effort to constitute a weak kind of subject because he sees the underlying link between the constitution and its source, and the politics of history. What Kato highlights, then, is the question: How might we theorize the relationship between responsibility, subject, and the notion of Japan? His thesis was criticized by figures such as Takahashi Tetsuya (2005) for implicitly echoing neo-nationalist tendencies by bringing in the need to discuss identification with the state, and therefore, resulted in a stalemate. At its core, the two oppositional presuppositions over state ontology might be characterized in the following way: Can the demand for past injury be given recognition without the state’s ontological coherence? Kato emphasizes the incoherence as a consequence of the original twist of the ways in which the beginning of postwar Japan embodied a paradox: the constitution, which is to be for the people and by the people, was exogenously “given” by the US. Some have attempted to deal with this exogeneity by characterizing the day the war ended, August 15, as a day of revolution by the Japanese people; yet, such an acrobatic gesture cannot hold its ground empirically speaking. Takahashi, on the other hand, is wary of the representational violence that is bound to accompany any claims of unity, and suggests that it must be through the gesture of perpetual atonement towards Japan’s victims that any acts of reconciliation must be tethered to. To Takahashi’s morally righteous standpoint, Kato finds an
130 Hitomi Koyama instinctive disagreeability. In the afterword contribution to Kato’s subsequently published work, Haisengoron (After defeat), reflecting on the deadlock, philosopher Tatsuru Uchida (2015) sums up the question as follows: whether being too right is right. This is to say that any claims to a unitary “we” is suspect, and rightly so, yet to what extent do we nonetheless need this “we”? Therefore, the exogenous nature of postwar Japan’s constitution, which in theory is to constitute the people, is rightly to haunt the postwar discourse on history. To be sure, and if we were to follow Immanuel Kant, morality presupposes the ability of the subject to exercise agency (the Kantian “as if” condition that depends on the possibility in the futurity of the condition’s fulfillment in order for morality to become an imperative). If one’s action was dictated by external factors, then the attribution of responsibility seems to suffer. In this sense, the narration of history in modernity has oscillated between the declaration that “we are making history,” the proclamation of one’s historical agency, and that of fatalism, of history as a tragedy that offers the salves of consolation, but in the process diffuses the loci of agency and thereby responsibility for what has transpired. Asked another way, is theorizing responsibility possible under the condition of an ambiguous state of history, or is there an inherent built-in intolerance towards such ambiguity in the politics of history that seeks concrete resolutions and solutions? The politics of history and its handling therefore bring forth the questions of identity politics and identification with the state in the aftermath of decolonization and deimperialization, when grand narratives are to be disavowed; yet nonetheless, it requires that one responds “as a Japanese” to give coherence to the statement of who did what, when, and where. This attests to the need to address the ways in which the ontological status of the state is both contested and recentered by various movements since decolonization. Attention to the politics of history in domestic terms are abound, yet there remains less attention to the ways in which contentions over history plays out in the realm of IR with an eye to the connection between the empire-state’s transformation into a nation-state, and the former colonies’ transition into a nation-state. Much of the recent studies on the international politics of history focus on the role of apology or deploy a comparative study of Germany and Japan. While these approaches are important, I attend to how the ambivalent state of history is caught in a cycle of deconstruction and reconstruction, of decentering and recentering, thereby reinforcing the impasse over history-writing in postcolonial Asia. I have thus far addressed the implication of the postwar Japanese constitution being exogenously derived, thereby rendering the ontological state of history on ambiguous ground. While we live in an age where grand narratives are perceived with wariness and suspicion, there is nonetheless a perceivable need for a more agentic beginning for narrating postwar Japan; this is why Norihiro Kato (2015) advocates for a national referendum to actively choose the constitution, rather than have it imposed. This also implies a need for identifying with a state, whether heroic or not.12 In this sense, his intervention attests to the need for a state of history that is not schizophrenic, but rather, cohesive. Therefore,
History in postwar “Japan” 131 divergent accounts of what has happened must be overcome. Taken together with Chen’s observation on the need to de-Cold War East Asia, this would dovetail with the need to come to terms with the hegemonic influence of the US on postwar Japan in coming to terms with its former colonies. This would mean that Japan would have to grapple simultaneously with its self-portrayal as a victim of the so-called West as well as its past self as an empire that victimized Asia. Therefore, there is a need to shift away from arguments based on positionality constituted solely in binary terms, either that of Japan-Asia or that of Japan West towards a less split identity that occludes one binary relation at the expense of the other. Nonetheless, this need for coherence also goes against the fragmentary tendency of history-writing which has come to focus ever more on the microhistories of previously neglected subjects rather than macrohistory.13 A single origin story ineluctably defines the meaning of the past, and reifies a particular positionality in relation to the Other. The ambiguity of postwar Japan’s collective identity tethered to the US-imposed constitution and the need to agentically affirm one’s origin therefore is in a frictional relationship with the disavowal of grand narrative. The state of history after grand narratives therefore poses a peculiar dilemma. The impasse over the history problem is not only defined by Japan’s peculiar relations with the US. Those who seek to indict the former empire’s past are also bound to recenter the state of history in specific positionality as an aggressor, permitting of no other positionality and thereby causing backlash among those who revolt against the essentialist approach towards the politics of history. I ask if the very act of demanding the response from the state itself also recenters the state, thereby ineluctably reinforcing the very notion of the state’s ontological status despite itself. In the following, I elaborate on the ways in which this mechanism replicates itself, thereby making the history problem into a problem without a foreseeable exit. Earlier, I touched on the tension among historians on how to account for the “comfort women”—as that between emphasizing on specificity on the one hand, and general tendency, on the other. The dilemma of forming solidarity across national boundaries against a specific hegemony called patriarchy is also vividly portrayed in the disagreement among Korean and Japanese feminists in the Beijing Women’s Conference in 1990s. When Japanese feminist Chizuko Ueno advocated for an alliance and solidarity across the border, she was promptly criticized for effacing concrete historical difference between Korean and Japanese feminists (Seo, 2005). Patriarchy is a common enemy, yet such singular focus serves to whitewash the different historical experiences of Korean and Japanese women. Phrased another way, it is implied that the response to the “comfort women” issue cannot come from a standpoint of general world citizen or post-national feminist. It cannot be “we, the people, are sorry,” but “we, the Japanese people, are sorry.” Here again, the motion to constitute solidarity against one of the many modes of hegemonic structure contradicts another, which seeks to critique the violence of colonial domination. Any transnational feminist movement that seeks to
132 Hitomi Koyama form intersectional solidarity is facing what Grewal and Kaplan (1994) calls scattered hegemonies—where women in the postcolony are often forced to choose between siding with domestic patriarchy and international (mostly white First World feminist) sisterhood that neglects the concrete historical difference between the First and the Third World. The impasse identified here brings us to a strategic issue: What role should nationalism, or national particularity, play in the question of the history problem? In considering this in relation to the “comfort women” issue and the Korean feminists’ relation to Korean nationalism, Ranjoo Seodu Herr (2015) rejects the so-called incompatibility thesis. By the incompatibility thesis, she refers to the tension between domestic nationalism and transnational feminism. She refers to the debate on whether the ways in which the Korean Council’s insistence on deploying a nationalistic narrative promotes or undermines a transnational feminist alliance. The gesture to generalize risks the whitewashing of differences. Thus, away from epistemic colonialism and its attendant whitewashing, Herr turns to epistemic privileging of the colonized. She argues, “to minimize the miscommunication across difference…That feminists from advantaged groups acknowledge that women/feminists of oppressed/marginalized group have an ‘epistemic advantage’” (Herr, 2015, p. 50). This is a call for figures like Ueno to acknowledge her limits of imagination and to undertake methodological humility as a Japanese, whom in relation to the Korean feminists, are in the advantaged category. In such a move, awareness of historical difference folds into the feminist discourse under such measures, yet in the process it also reinforces the idea of a national boundary. Herr (2015) elaborates on her conception of “polycentric” nationalism as “a political movement among members of a nation for the attainment and maintenance of self- government and independence in order to protect and promote unique national culture shared by national members”; in such a gesture, the postcolonial state’s transition from a colony to a nation-state becomes consistent with the Korean feminists’ transition that “seek[s] redress from the aggressor nation” (p. 44). While Herr’s acrobatic move appears to reconcile the tension noted above, such a gesture nonetheless is anchored in the awareness of privilege, advantage, or humility, which logically must always be preceded by the clear demarcation of the categories in question. Know yourself before you speak, it implies, yet such knowledge of the self is predicated on the knowability of who and what we are. This brings us back to the reinforcement of the idea of the nation-state, and this goes against the postmodern awareness of the socially constructed nature of the very category of the nation-state. If one were to characterize modernity as certainty of reason, rationality, and control, postmodernity is a nod to the very untenability of such aspirations towards clarity. Returning to the tension between Japanese feminists and Korean feminists, here one can discern the tension that Brown identifies as the feminist hesitation towards the idea of the post. As Brown (1995) writes, postmodern sensibility at once denaturalizes preexisting social order and simultaneously prohibits one from making a subject-centered claim, thereby dissolving “a relatively
History in postwar “Japan” 133 bounded formulation of the political and disintegrates the coherence of women as a collective subject” (pp. 38–39). Furthermore, Brown (1995) suggests that the feminist insistence on the concrete and specific identity of the subject recurs because it has many of the attributes of what Nietzsche named the politics of ressentiment: developing a righteous critique of power from the perspective of the injured, it delimits a specific site of blame for suffering by constituting sovereign subjects and events as responsible for the ‘injury’ of social subordination. (p. 27) The discourse on injury while seeking to right past wrongs nonetheless fixes and therefore reifies specific positionality in relation to the interpretation of the past. Here she builds on the dual meaning of the term subject, following Judith Butler. On the one hand, the subject is understood as subjection where the political institution impresses upon the subject. On the other hand, as Butler (2005) observes, when one speaks of the “subject of history,” the “of” connotes both “‘belonging to’ and ‘wielding’” (p. 14). Here, Butler is speaking of the Foucauldian identification of the paradoxical duality of the ways in which power both impresses upon, presupposes, and is formulated by and through the subject. Through this engagement with Butler and Foucault, Brown (1995) thus asks whether the “constitutive material of the opposition itself” (p. xi) is not dependent on the concreteness of the injurer’s identity as the injurer, or aggressor— here, the state. Phrased differently, efforts to seek redress on historical injury are therefore caught amidst the disavowal of a grand narrative after empire, on the one hand, and that of the postcolonial feminists’ demand for a coherent identification of postwar Japanese people to identify as an injurer, on the other. Yet in postwar Japan, the meaning of war remains split among Cold War and Asia-West binaries that continue to tug towards a need to come to terms with such schizophrenic tendency, which also appears problematic in its resemblance to recent revisionist impulses to shore up a sense of Japanese national unity, as headed by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. This is problematic because the notion of the subject is located between two opposing views. On the one hand is the subject deemed as “a necessary precondition of agency,” where agency is presumed to be required for the theorization of the responsible agentic subject, and, on the other hand, is the well-founded wariness that the notion of the subject is a “sign of ‘mastery’ to be refused” (Butler, 2005, p. 10). Depending on one’s presupposition about the subject of history and its relation to the Other—the proposition to constitute a subject therefore becomes either a necessary yet inadequate imperative, or an unacceptable proposition altogether. Therefore, in my reading, the critique of the role of the Japanese state alone cannot suffice to see why the history problem persists to this day. Here the notion, “we, the Japanese people,” is both necessary and disavowed in an age after grand narratives, rendering it both desired and inadequate.
134 Hitomi Koyama
Conclusion As Louiza Odyessos (2007), following Jean-Luc Nancy, notes, our basic socalled units of analysis in IR presupposes an atom that is already demarcated. Yet, the imagery of atomic self-sufficient subjects betrays the duality of our predicament. For we are born into webs of relationality, and while we might exercise some agency in navigating amidst these webs after birth, the presupposition of self-sufficiency inevitably polarizes the image of the subject into either powerlessness or powerfulness, responsible or irresponsible. What one might call the greyness of this subject or its ambiguity calls forth the limitation of such theoretical presupposition, and hence the limits of a liberal approach to the politics of history.14 The ontological coherence of the subject of history is constantly interrupted by death and birth, movements and flows, yet the politicization of the given and seeking of responsibility, if Brown is right, pushes towards a concrete and specific positionality and identity of the subject. It is in this sense that the liberal subject is set up for failure, and therefore, resentment. This is not to discount the Japanese state’s need to account for the fact that history of an empire cannot by definition be viewed as off-limits by the postwar category of the nation-state and its right for self-determination; this tension between the wariness of grand narratives and the need for a coherent subject of history must be reckoned with. If one presumes that the politics of history has a technical solution that only awaits to be implemented, this occludes the structural tension over grand narratives after empires that manifest in the recurrence of the problem of the subject of history.
Notes 1 On this, see Dudden (2014), Jager & Mitter (2007), Hasegawa & Togo (2008), and Yoneyama (2016). 2 Within mainland Japan in the immediate aftermath of the war, there have been efforts made by socialists to re-envision the role of history education towards the creation of a revolutionary subject, and historian Saburo Ienaga’s indictment of the Ministry of Education (present day Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology [MEXT]) to dissociate state control over education has lasted for over three decades. On the initial trajectory of “domestic” contention over history-writing, see Koschmann (1996). 3 The emperor of Japan has stopped going to the Yasukuni Shrine after this addition. However, high-ranking Japanese politicians and Prime Ministers continue to do so. 4 The periodization, as well as the question of how to call the war in it of itself, implies different orientations about one’s understanding of the meaning of war. For example, the phrase, Pacific War would overemphasize US-Japan competition, while the term Fifteen Years War in the Asia-Pacific brings focus to the presence and implication for Asia. 5 On this, see Koschmann (1996). 6 While this chapter focuses on the relation between Japan and its former colonies and countries invaded during Japan’s expansion, there are issues of how to speak about the past between Japan and the West, too. On the Pacific dimension of historical memories, see Fujitani, White, and Yoneyama (2001).
History in postwar “Japan” 135 7 There are numerous studies that compare Japan with Germany, including Lind (2008), Berger (2012), and Buruma (2015). The author will leave this literature out in part for the economy of space, and also because this comparison all too often have amounted to what F. Seraphim (2008) calls the new form of Orientalism. 8 On the “comfort women” discourse, see Barlow (1997), Tanaka (2001), and Soh (2008). 9 On international law and demarcation of “Japan” and the politics of translation, see Yonaha (2009). 10 On the dissolution of the French empire and its narration of its meaning, see Shepard (2006). 11 On this, see Koyama (2018). 12 One must note that there is a significant difference between the revisionist movements, which seek to glorify Japan’s past and Kato’s argument for identifying with a not-that-glorious Japan. This is why he focuses on the meaning of defeat in his subsequent works. 13 On postwar Japanese historiography’s turn to microhistory, see Narita (2012). 14 On a succinct comparative account that contrasts such a liberal account of the subject with a Confucian relational notion of the subject, see Sakai (2016).
References Barlow, T. (1997). Positions: East Asia culture critique: Special issue—The comfort women: Colonialism, war, and sex. Durham, NC: Duke University Press Berger, T. (2012). War, guilt, and world politics after World War II. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Brown, W. (1995). States of injury: Power and freedom in late modernity. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Buruma, I. (2015). The wages of guilt: Memories of war in Germany and Japan (Reprint edition). New York, NY: New York Review Books. Butler, J. (2005). Giving an account of oneself. New York, NY: Fordham University Press. Chen, K. (2010). Asia as method: Toward deimperialization. Durham, NC and London: Duke University Press. Cho, S. (Producer), & Ryoo, S. (Director). (2017). Battleship island. South Korea: Filmmaker R&K [CJ Entertainment]. Doty, R. (1996). Sovereignty and the nation: Constructing the boundaries of national identity. In T. Biersteker & C. Weber (Eds.), State sovereignty as a social construct (pp. 121–147). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Dudden, A. (2014). Troubled apologies among Japan, Korea, and the United States. Columbia, CA: Columbia University Press. Field, N. (1997). War and apology: Japan, Asia, the fiftieth, and after. Positions, 5(1), 1–50. Fujitani, T. (2015). Post-imperial Japan in transnational perspective. In D. Rothermund (Ed.), Memories of post-imperial nations: The aftermath of decolonization, 1945–2013 (pp. 150–170). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Fujitani, T., White, G., & Yoneyama, L. (Eds.). (2001). Perilous memories: The Asia- Pacific War(s). Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Grewal, I., & Kaplan, C. (Eds.). (1994). Scattered hegemonies: Postmodernity and transnational feminist practices. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press. Hasegawa, T., & Togo, K. (Eds.). (2008). East Asia’s haunted present: Historical memories and the resurgence of nationalism. Westport, CT: Praeger Security International.
136 Hitomi Koyama Herr, R. (2015). Can transnational feminist solidarity accommodate nationalism? Reflections from the case study of Korean ‘comfort women’. Hypatia, 31(1), 41–57. Hotta, E. (2007). Pan-Asianism and Japan’s war: 1931–1945. New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan. Jager, S. M., & Mitter, R. (Eds.). (2007). Ruptured histories: War, memory, and the postCold War in Asia. Boston, MA: Harvard University Press. Kato, K. (2017). The decline of the Japanese empire and the transformation of the regional order in East Asia. In B. Kushner & S. Muminov (Eds.), The dismantling of Japan’s empire in East Asia: Deimperialization, postwar legitimation and imperial afterlife (pp. 15–29). London and New York, NY: Routledge. Kato, N. (2015). Haisengoron [After defeat]. Tokyo: Chikuma Bunko (Original work published 1997). Kawashima, S. (2017). “Deimperialization” in early postwar Japan: Adjusting and t ransforming the institutions of empire. In B. Kushner & S. Muminov (Eds.), The dismantling of Japan’s empire in East Asia: Deimperialization, postwar legitimation and imperial afterlife (pp. 48–65). London and New York: Routledge. Koschmann, V. (1996). Revolution and subjectivity in postwar Japan. London and Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Koyama, H. (2018). On the persistence of the Japanese ‘history problem’: Historicism and the international politics of history. London and New York: Routledge. Lind, J. (2008). Sorry states: Apologies in international politics. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. Morris, N. (2003). Japan’s comfort women: Sexual slavery and prostitution during World War II and the US occupation. Gender, History and Culture in the Asian Context, 9. Retrieved from http://intersections.anu.edu.au/issue9/morris_review.html. Nandy, A. (1995). The savage freud and other essays on possible and retrievable selves. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Narita, R. (2012). Kingendai nihonshi to rekishigaku: kakikaeraretekita kako [The modern Japanese history and historical science: The rewritten past]. Tokyo: Chuko Shinsho. Odysseos, L. (2007). The subject of coexistence: Otherness in international relations. M inneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press. Oguma, E. (2002). A genealogy of ‘Japanese’ self-images. D. Askew (Trans.). Melbourne: Trans Pacific Press. Orr, J. (2001). Victim as hero: Ideologies of peace and national identity in postwar Japan. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press. Sakai, N. (2016). Equality, hierarchy, and identity in modern Japan: Reflections on the nationalist ethics of Fukuzawa Yukichi. In S. Y. Chien & J. Fitzgerald (Eds.), The dignity of nations: Equality, competition, and honor in East Asian nationalism (pp. 23–32). Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press. Schissler, H., & Soysal, Y. (Eds.). (2005). The nation, Europe, and the world: Textbooks and curricula in transition. New York, NY: Berghahn Books. Schroeder, P. (2004). Systems, stability, and statecraft: Essays on the international history of modern Europe. New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan. Seo, J. (2005). Nationalism and the problem of political legitimacy in China. In L. White (Ed.), Legitimacy: Ambiguities of political success or failure in East and Southeast Asia (pp. 141–182). Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Seraphim, F. (2008). War memory and social politics in Japan, 1945–2005. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
History in postwar “Japan” 137 Shepard, T. (2006). The invention of decolonization: The Algerian War and the remaking of France. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. Soh, C. (2008). The comfort women: Sexual violence and postcolonial memory in Korea and Japan. Chicago, IL and London: University of Chicago Press. Stoler, A. (2016). Duress: Imperial durabilities in our times. Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Takahashi, T. (2005). Japanese neo-nationalism: A critique of Kato Norihiro’s ‘after the defeat’ discourse. In R. Calichman (Ed.), Contemporary Japanese thought (pp. 193–210). New York, NY: Columbia University Press. Takeda, H. (2015, December 28). S. Korean task force criticizes ‘comfort women’ deal set in 2015. The Asahi Shimbun. Retrieved from http://www.asahi.com/ajw/articles/ AJ201712280043.html. Tamamoto, M. (2001). A land without patriots: The Yasukuni controversy and Japanese nationalism. World Policy Journal 18(3), 33–40. Tanaka, Y. (2001). Japan’s comfort women: Sexual slavery and prostitution during World War II. New York, NY: Routledge. Trouillot, M. (1995). Silencing the past: Power and the production of history. New York, NY: Beacon Press. Uchida, J. (2011). Brokers of empire: Japanese settler colonialism in Korea, 1876–1945. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Uchida, T. (2015). Kaisetsu [Commentary]. In N. Kato, Haisengoron [After defeat] (pp. 361–371). Tokyo: Chikuma Bunko. Watt, L. (2010). When empire comes home: Repatriation and reintegration in postwar Japan. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Wolin, S. (1989). The presence of the past: Essays on the state and the constitution. Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins University Press. Yonaha, J. (2009). Hon’yaku no seijigaku [The politics of translation]. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten. Yoneyama, L. (1999). Hiroshima traces: Time, space, and the dialectics of memory. Berkeley: University of California Press. Yoneyama, L. (2016). Cold War ruins: Transpacific critique of American justice and Japanese war crimes. Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Yoshimi, S. (2009). Posuto sengo shakai [Post-postwar society]. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten.
8 Pacific for whom The ocean in Japan Atsuko Watanabe
Doesn’t it turn your stomach to think that America is east and Japan west [of the Pacific]? This doesn’t make sense. For me Japan must be regarded as the Land of the Rising Sun and as Tōa [East Asia]. Dazai Osamu, ‘8th December’ (1942 [1964])
Introduction In contrast to land-based regions, the role of an ocean-based region in identity politics is a relatively underappreciated topic in International Relations (IR). This negligence is partly due to the conventional view of contemporary world politics in which states are considered to be given. In the field of political geography, the discipline is based on “a theory of the states” (Steinberg, 2009, p. 472, emphasis original; Taylor, 1994, p. 2), and the importance of areas outside the state has been emphasized. Critical geographers maintain that geopolitical discourse of the state is constructed by “the inscription of boundaries that serve to demarcate an ‘inside’ from an ‘outside,’ a ‘self’ from the ‘other,’ a ‘domestic’ from a ‘foreign’” (Campbell, 1998, p. 9; see also Dalby, 1990; Ó Tuathail, 1996; Ó Tuathail & Dalby, 1998). Philip Steinberg directs our attention to another outside: the ocean as a non-territory (Steinberg, 2001, 2009). Inspired by these contributions, this chapter demonstrates the ambivalent role that the ocean has played in transforming the subjectivity of Japan, a modern state surrounded by the sea. The investigation focuses on the shifts in the Japanese perception of regional geopolitical order from the nineteenth century to the Second World War. The ocean’s indeterminacy that “resists ‘filling’” (Steinberg, 2001, p. 34) has provided an ambivalent and even contradictory source for its self-identification in world politics. Discourses around Japan’s self-identification as a maritime nation are considered to originate in their modern form in kaikoku, the time when Japan opened the country and signed unequal treaties after Commodore Perry’s black ships berthed at Edo Bay. Despite the apparent simplicity of this narrative, Japan’s geographical location vis-à-vis the sea and land is complex and multifaceted. In 1894, the Christian thinker Kanzō Uchimura famously stated in his Chirigakukō (On Geography) that Japan had acted as a maritime nation that opened up its arms towards the Pacific and the US. In this imagination, Japan
Pacific for whom 139 was an island country located at the Western rim of the ocean, where the West meets the East (Uchimura, 1894). This formulation of Uchimura was related to a growing expectation that the rise of the Pacific and the decline of the Atlantic were imminent. From a late nineteenth-century Western point of view, Japan’s location signified not only the “post-Columbian ‘end of geography’ but also the end of the American Wild West, making a ‘worldwide view’ to see the globe as a whole became possible” (Ó Tuathail, 1996, p. 28). However, this does not mean that Japan’s identity as a maritime nation was a result of the expansion of this Eurocentric view. On the contrary, as I have argued elsewhere (Watanabe, 2018), for the Japanese, this was the period when they fully acknowledged that the world was not one but divided. They understood Japan’s establishment of the European-style modern nation-state as a transition from one (Asian) world to another, and not just an entry into European international society (Suzuki, 2009). In the course of this transition, the ocean presented them with two different regions: the old world of Asia and the new world of the Pacific. Borrowing Steinberg’s (2009) terms, it signaled a transition from one “ordering of space” (p. 472) to another. In this respect, it was a natural corollary for the people to turn away from the old world of the Asian continent to build a new identity towards the ocean. By contrast, when Japan is seen as a continental nation, it becomes a country of the “Far East.” This self-identification emphasizes its differences from the West. The first half of the twentieth century, when Japan intensified its imperial ambitions in China, was a period when this identification process was fully engaged. In a roundtable discussion held in 1940, the Marxist Kyoto School scholar Kiyoshi Miki, one of the original advocators of East Asian regional cooperation, which later came to be called as the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere (GEACPS), insisted that Japan had to become a continental nation by abandoning the identity of a maritime nation, which, according to him, it had developed since the Meiji Restoration (Tachibana et al., 1940; see also Shimizu, Chapter 7 in this volume for Kyoto School’s war involvement). However, this conversion did not result in a drastic foreign policy change. Rather, during this period, the two contradictory geopolitical denominators— maritime and continental—converged into the Southern Expansion Doctrine (Nanshinron). This debate eventually directed Japan’s policy throughout the Asia-Pacific War. In this debate, the modern European representations that distinguish sea and land were disrupted to enable Japanese elites to justify the nation’s expansionist policy (Steinberg, 2009). In this policy, the geopolitical idea of the South (Nan’yō), which originally indicated islands in the Southern Pacific and the Southern Pacific Ocean, came to denote the southern part of the Continent of Asia and even beyond. By revisiting these ambivalent discourses between ocean and land, this chapter highlights the importance of incorporating the ocean into analyses of foreign policy in order to better understand the contested and obscure nature of Japan’s geopolitical identification.
140 Atsuko Watanabe
Sea and land: distinctive, or not? The Pacific, and indeed the Asia-Pacific, connotes one of the most elusive identities in world politics. Disagreeing with its usage as an adjective, Arif Dirlik (1998) argues that the Pacific as a regional construct is full of contradictions and that it is difficult to decide where its periphery and center are. In order to understand this region, “it is necessary to define our terms by specifying whose Pacific—and when” (p. 15, emphasis original). He maintains that the Pacific is an invented concept whose material basis is “defined best not by physical geography, but by relationships (economic, social, milita and cultural) that are concretely historical.” It is “a geographical construction ‘through human interactions’” and “a Euro-American invention” whose inhabitants’ contributions are seemingly limited to those through resistance (Dirlik, 1998, pp. 4–5). Dirlik understands the invention of the Pacific in another sense too: as a concept. Endowing the concept to the region, the West “reconstructed the area in accordance with the logic of European capitalism and politics” and “projected on the area their myths, fantasies, and visions,” which nevertheless ended up being deconstructed “to create new visions” (Dirlik, 1998, p. 5). He writes: The Pacific in this regard has served an ambiguous purpose, reflecting the contradictions of capitalism itself—at once a “paradise” that offered relief from the harshness of life under capitalism and a frontier of capitalism that awaited the transfer of native power of European dynamism. The beachcomber and the entrepreneur are two sides of the same coin. (p. 5) Dirlik insists that the Pacific as a concept is Asian in content, making it the source of contradiction. What then is its Japanese content? The Japanese t hemselves represent a contradiction because, on the one hand, they exploited the Pacific and saw it as their paradise, while, at the same time, they lived in the area as natives. My interest lies in this contradiction in the concept of the Pacific as it has been deconstructed and developed in Japan. By analyzing it, I want to demonstrate how geography can affect people’s expression of their collective identification. This does not mean that my focus is the state, but I want to redirect attention to geography as something understood through examinations of the relations between place and power. Here, the state is understood as an outcome of these relations (Elden, 2013). As mentioned above, Steinberg argues that we can better understand the interior construction of the state as a space when we take the ocean as the construction of “outside” space and not one limited to other states as “the other” of the state that is “the self.” The ocean is a “non-territory,” even though it is essential to our understanding of territory (Steinberg, 2009). Stuart Elden (2013) has also demonstrated that territory can only be grasped through detailed historical investigations. These claims are insightful; however, their studies suffer from geographical limitation.
Pacific for whom 141 As Elden (2013) candidly writes, his work examines territory as a concept developed within Western political thought and practice, and thus reflects power relations and outcomes only within the West. In order to extricate the Asian content in the Pacific as a European concept, the differences and similarities between power in modern Western states of Judeo-Christian tradition and that in Japan in Confucian-Buddhist tradition have to be carefully examined, as Michel Foucault suggested in his lecture in Japan in 1978. Foucault (1978) indicated that this difference, and the Japanese experience of having been influenced by the West are important to consider when examining the establishment of the modern self and worldwide state power (pp. 161–167). This distinction has to be attained not by redrawing the line between the West and the East, but by reconsidering the contradiction in the concept as a co-construction of numerous relations. In addition, interactions between different power relations have to be taken into consideration. I do not intend to provide a comprehensive genealogy of the concept of territory and the ocean in Japan, as I have already done so in part (Rösch & Watanabe, 2017; Watanabe, 2017, 2018; Watanabe & Shangguan, 2018). Instead, my aspiration is, bearing the potential geographical difference in the concept of territory in mind, to revisit discourses on ocean and sea in Japan. In doing so, I hope to shed light on an element of the semantic contradiction in the Pacific. In particular, my focus is on the position of the ocean in modern Western geographical imaginations, as elaborated by Steinberg (2009): “the ocean as an external void that could serve as a counterpoint to the territorial state” (p. 485). In what follows, I will demonstrate that, in modern Japan, the ocean and sea have been perceived in two oppositional contexts: connection and blocking. In this view, the state is not necessarily bounded as a territorial state surrounded by the ocean, but is sometimes conveniently open to the outside through it. In doing so, I will show that this oscillation is a product of the historical interactions between differently developed relations of place and power, rather than an exclusively Japanese creation.
Japan and the ocean In European eyes It is well known that Magellan, who first circumnavigated the world, gave the Pacific Ocean its name after having it found calmer than the Atlantic. Europeans extended this impression of tranquility to Japan itself, imagining Japan as an isolated and peaceful country surrounded by the ocean, unlike the European states that were in constant communication and combat. This impression was disseminated to Europeans through The History of Japan, originally published in 1727 by Engelbert Kaempfer (1651–1716), a German naturalist who lived in Japan in the late seventeenth century. Kaempfer (1906) described the Japanese as being
142 Atsuko Watanabe confined within the limits of their Empire, enjoying the blessings of peace and contentedness, and not caring for any commerce, or communication with foreign nations, because such is the happy state of their Country, that can be subsist without it. (p. 304) More than one and a half centuries later, European geopoliticians such as Friedrich Ratzel, Rudolf Kjellén, and most notably Karl Haushofer were in a similar way attracted to Japan. Although Haushofer’s geopolitics is certainly too dense and fanciful to take seriously, some of his claims are worth noting. In his book Geopolitik des Pazifischen Ozeans, which was translated into Japanese in the early 1940s, he insisted that there was a unique theory of “spatial developments” in the Pacific, which was different from those in the Atlantic. He claimed that he studied Japan and the Pacific in order to understand whether the ocean, as an “apolitical” space, would be occupied by humans as they expand their territory (Haushofer, 1942, Introduction). For him, whereas the Atlantic was a space that separated people, the Pacific was not. Haushofer argued that the Pacific was, despite being larger than other oceans, smaller in its “separating force” (Scheidekraft). In the Pacific, the power structure was “centripetal,” in contrast to the “centrifugal” Atlantic, which for him must be represented by Japanese history as its spiritual center (Haushofer, 1942, Chapter 1). According to Steinberg, European maps in the beginning of the sixteenth century did not make a clear distinction between land and sea. Although the ocean as a void was already an emergent idea, the ocean was a social and natural space that “could be bounded, controlled, and organized.” In the seventeenth century, then, the dominant representation became “a space of routes.” Finally, in the eighteenth century, “the ocean’s status as a space beyond society coincided with the rise of territorial state boundaries on world maps” (Steinberg, 2009, pp. 482–490). Haushofer, who came from this intellectual tradition, certainly found that the ocean in Japan played a different role than the one in Europe did; a theorization similar to Kaempfer’s. Here, it is important to note that European perspectives that viewed Japanese IR as unique were in part reflections of their own geopolitical situations and never an objective result of their analyses of Japan (Arano, 2010).
Premodern periods Surprisingly, given that Japan is surrounded by the sea, the role of the ocean in the history of Japan’s IR has received relatively little attention. This is because conventional historical studies of modern and premodern Japan have argued for a long time that, since the first unification of the country by Hideyoshi Toyotomi in the midst of the sixteenth century, Japan began to close the country (sakoku), and was then forced to open it by the American black ships (kaikoku), who, by allowing Japan to join the international society, turned it into a modern state in the Western sense of the term. This conventional understanding, apparently
Pacific for whom 143 affirming Steinberg’s argument, received little critical scrutiny, and historical investigations of the region were periodized into “modern” and “premodern” (Arano, Ishii, & Murai, 2012). It was not until the 1980s that some historians started to reinvestigate this historical narrative and to claim that there was another type of state system in Asia (see Arano et al., 2012), although the nature of the region of “Asia” was a subject they believed should be addressed separately. The ongoing debate around this subject provides the basis of my discussion. It alludes to the fact that, in Japan, the ocean and the sea were not really perceived in the way Steinberg explicates, but that the perception transformed in a more kaleidoscopic way. This is because, as these studies claim, Japan as the state was not newly established after kaikoku, but the alleged establishment was better understood as a transition from one type (Asian) of state to another type (European). Japan did not become a modern state overnight; the process took decades, lasting even until today, and perhaps will never be completed. Through this process, the perception of ocean has shifted, and it is still shifting through continuous interactions with the outside world. Although the idea of the Pacific as a whole might have been brought into Japanese consciousness by Europeans, the “indigenous” root of the regional identification that evolved around the sea can be traced back to the premodern period. The name for Japan in Japanese is Nippon, which means “where the Sun rises.” This moniker developed in the seventh century and implies Japan’s geographical position vis-à-vis China as the middle kingdom. In this imagination, the sea bridged these two countries. Until the sixteenth century, the sea was a space for Wakō (pirates) that included people from different areas in the region, including present-day Japan, Korea, and China. In this context, the South China Sea did not separate the regions, but rather linked people to each other. However, once Toyotomi unified Japan, trade and movement of people started to be controlled.
At the dawn of modernity When the Japanese started to develop a sense of nation is a source of controversy, as some argue that, before the Meiji Restoration, Japan was not a state but a region composed of many han (daimyo domain) (Ringmar, 2012; Watanabe, 2010). Setting this debate aside, the importance of the ocean in Japan’s development is uncontestable, given its geography. Masao Maruyama (1952) argued that for a human collective to develop a sense of community, there must have been long periods during which a group of people naturally lived together in a space, thereby nurturing a feeling of attachment to the space. In the Japanese archipelago, such a sense was relatively easy to develop because of the sea that surrounds it. In addition to this traditional and historical dependency on their environment, Maruyama (1952) argues, for the people in such a natural community to get together in the name of a state, “external stimuli” (gaikan) are needed (pp. 321–323). It was at the end of eighteenth century, when Adam Laxman, a Finn-Swede serving as a lieutenant in the Imperial Russian military, landed
144 Atsuko Watanabe in Hakodate in Hokkaidō, that people began to feel this gaikan. This made Japanese people pay renewed attention to the ocean, although in a somewhat curious way. They saw it as a source of insecurity, rather than as something that protected them from danger. Edo-period scholar Shihei Hayashi, for example, in his book Kaikoku Heidan (Defense Strategy of Maritime Nation), asserted that the river running beneath the Japan Bridge (Nihonbashi) in the center of Edo led to China, and then to the Netherlands simply because the sea linked all the lands. It cannot be divided (Hayashi, 1791/1939). This description of water running from Japan to reach first China and then Europe reflected the rapidly changing representation of the world map in Japan. The transformation was mainly for two reasons. First, China declined in the Japanese perception. Since the seventh century, for Japan, “the other,” or more strictly, the center of their universe from which they imported knowledge, was China. However, from around the sixteenth century when the Japanese started to trade with Europeans, this view began to transform, as evidenced in the rise of kokugaku in the latter half of the eighteenth century. This was an academic movement searching for Japanese-ness by eliminating the Chinese influence in Japan’s classical texts from the eighth century. This move was related to the change of Chinese dynasty from Ming to Qin, a non-Han dynasty, which gave Japanese intellectuals, whose cultural basis was Chinese knowledge, a reason to disdain it. Second, in the eighteenth century, the Pacific had begun to turn to be perceived as an “interior sea” as Americans and Europeans, including Russians, started whale fishing and fur trade with China (Arano, 2010; Kimura, 2010). As visitors from overseas increased, world maps, based on sophisticated survey techniques, were produced domestically. However, according to Miyoshi (2010), from the seventeenth century to the beginning of the nineteenth century in Japan, three different images of the world existed concomitantly, each of which was represented by different types of maps that had different origins—domestic, European, and Chinese. As Hiroshi Mitani (2003) points out, it was from this period onwards, rather than the earlier periods after Toyotomi, that the Shōgunate government started to tighten trade and immigration regulations. The term sakoku began to appear during this period in Japan, introduced by Tadao Shizuki (1760–1806), a scholar who studied Western knowledge through Dutch sources, in his translation of parts of Kaempfer’s work into Japanese in 1801 (Arano, 2010). It was the era of kaibō, which can be translated as “maritime security.” What is notable here is that it was the awareness of the connected-ness to another part of the world, as seen in Hayashi’s book, which closed Japan off from other countries. That is, Japan insisted that it had to close the country because its openness had created insecurity. It was not until Japan began to fully realize that its space was not only connected to other known spaces (Asia), but also to unknown spaces (Europe) when communications with the outside were regulated. In addition, as already discussed, this idea of sakoku was never purely Japanese, but already had incorporated the European idea of IR when it began to be used by the Japanese.
Pacific for whom 145 The consequence of this perceptional change was not only the move to breakdown (sakoku and kaibō), but emerging ideas to open towards the outside. This is because the threat simultaneously implied new possibility, which was particularly crystallized in terms of domestic economic crisis. Japan in the late eighteenth century experienced the Great Ten’mei Famine, the deadliest in the early modern period, caused by a series of volcanic eruptions. Despite the Tokugawa Shōgunate’s repeated reforms, the nation’s financial situation did not improve significantly. Maruyama (1952) points out that because the government as well as han did not have sufficient financial resources, thinkers such as Nobuhiro Saito maintained that, through maintaining a state-controlled economy and overseas trade, Japan would become the world’s richest and strongest state. This “state” did not signify each han, but was composed of all people integrated under the name of the emperor. According to Maruyama (1952), such views already took on an “extraordinarily utopianistic” tendency (pp. 342–346), which, as the following sections demonstrate, continued to characterize the political ideas that Japan developed around the concept of the ocean and the sea, until the Asia-Pacific War and possibly beyond.
The ocean in modern Japan Perhaps it is not an exaggeration to say that it was the imagination around the ocean that turned Japan into a modern nation-state. Eventually, this imagination enabled Japanese intellectuals to justify modern wars, allowing them to glorify even atrocious acts. Affirming the well-known claim of Charles Tilly (1985), Japan became a modern state by fighting four modern international wars: the First Sino-Japanese War, the Russo-Japanese War, the First World War, and finally, the Asia-Pacific War. Needless to say, since Japan is an island country, all these wars, with the exception of the last one, evolved around the ocean. As a consequence, geography became a fashionable topic in Japan, as it stirred imaginations of Japan’s position in the world. I have already mentioned Uchimura’s fanciful depiction of Japan. In his book, he compared the shape of the archipelago to a heavenly maiden (ten’nyo). Yukichi Fukuzawa, a well-known Meiji intellectual, published a best-selling book titled Sekai Kunizukushi (Countries of the World) in 1869, writing to introduce world geography to the general public. Shigetaka Shiga’s Nihon Fūkeiron (On Japanese Landscape) was one of the most widely read books in the 1890s, and inspired the Japanese to visualize their islands’ uniqueness in the world. In these books, perhaps because the ocean is something that, as Steinberg insists, in practice cannot be filled, it worked as an essential background of imagination. Paradoxically, however, it was simultaneously this ocean that enabled the Japanese to envisage their state’s limitless expansion as “peaceful,” as the designation “Pacific” suggests. When the Asia-Pacific War broke out in 1931, this view came to be crystalized in Nan’shin (southing), a powerful discourse that affected Japan’s policy during the war. However, what “the South” (Nan’yo) meant remained muddled.
146 Atsuko Watanabe Iwao Kōyama’s geographicity of history Prior to discussing Nan’shin in depth, the Japanese theorization of the role of geography in history as elaborated by Iwao Kōyama, a Kyoto School h istorian, has to be provided. Whereas the thought of Kyoto School has been intensively discussed among IR theorists, particularly in relation to the question of non-Western IR theory (Inoguchi, 2007; Jones, 2002; Ong, 2004; Shimizu, 2015), few studies discuss their theoretical contributions to geography, despite the Kyoto School’s emphasis on space. Kōyama’s theory is not an exception, as it exemplifies not only the enigmatic role of the ocean, but also the relation of power and space in Japanese political thought in general in the first half of the twentieth century. In his 1940 essay titled “The Historicity of Geography and Geographicity of History,” he claims “the essence of historicity is found in voluntary action” and the “power of history is on the basis of idealistic spirit.” This highlights his emphasis on the importance of body, and therefore, spatiality. According to Kōyama, history needs spatiality in addition to temporality, and this temporality and spatiality has to be integrated through the human body. Whereas the human spirit expresses ideal, the body implies reality. History is how the spirit realizes its ideal through the body that inhabits a particular geography. Thus, he goes on to state, a history of a state cannot be understood if its geographic features are ignored, because those features are the basis of the “national spirit” (Kōyama, 2001, pp. 98–103). Kōyama states that his theory has to be distinguished from the geographical determinism proposed by Ratzel. Unlike him, Kōyama does not think of geography as science. According to Kōyama, Ratzel’s theory, due to his ambition to make geography as a science, captures only the geographicity of history, and not historicity of geography, which inevitably led this German ethnographer and geographer to an ignorance of humans’ “spiritual spontaneity.” Kōyama states that history and geography are not a simple objectively arising phenomenon, but an ongoing truth with which humans are actively engaging. Geographical determinism insists that humans’ spirits are particularized by a specific environment. Meanwhile, there are different types of cultures developed in the same region. According to him, this is because there is a relation between a specific geographical environment and a spiritual subjectivity that can be called the “harmonious concert” (ko’ōteki gacchi) among them. Humans, with their spontaneous spirits and needs, approach “the system of possibilities” that nature provides them, and create reality through their actions. Borrowing from a classic Chinese notion of the “integration of human and haven” (tenjin gōitsu), he idealizes this “harmonious concert” of geography and people. For Kōyama, Western humanism ignores the importance of this harmony. Integration is thus not only a theory for understanding the past, but a practical premise upon which to construct a new history. For him, “the unshakable standard of truth, goodness, and beauty only comes into being on the interface” where human and heaven are integrated (Kōyama, 2001, pp. 116–143). For Kōyama, the state and its history are a product of such a harmonious concert. The state requires a piece of land for its endurance, which inevitably causes
Pacific for whom 147 struggles against other states. In order to maintain its independence, the state requires both closedness and openness. For continental nations, national borders are “political,” “artificial,” and “historical.” By contrast, for maritime nations like Japan, the sea functions as a border. This border has, however, “no room for politics,” and is governed instead by nature (Kōyama, 2001, pp. 159–160). Kōyama (2001) writes: The fact that our nation-state is an island country means that two opposing actions work simultaneously: it is blocked from the continent by the ocean on the one hand, and it is connected through the ocean on the other. The sea has these opposite actions… simultaneously and naturally. These f unctions cannot be observed in continents. (p. 104) For this reason, maritime nations such as Japan and the United Kingdom tend to be isolated. At the same time, this geographical feature enables such states to actively engage abroad, as most remarkably seen in the history of the British Empire (Kōyama, 2001, p. 160). Japan’s distance from the Asian continent is not too wide to have no traffics, but not too narrow to have frequent traffics. Kōyama argues that these opposing functions of the sea have led Japan to three unique developments. First, they have allowed the Japanese community to keep their blood “relatively pure.” Second, as the distance makes armed invasions almost impossible, it has promoted peaceful cultural interactions with other states. Lastly, the interactions have given birth to a “unique Japanese national culture,” one that is nevertheless loosely connected to other Asian cultures. These developments, he argues, have nurtured a “Japanese specific cultural spirit,” a spirit that allows the Japanese to accept foreign cultures, “whereas [before] they had been valuing and conserving their own unique culture” (Kōyama, 2001, pp. 104–107). Therefore, for Kōyama, the Japanese are fundamentally a peaceful and friendly nation. In this way, Kōyama, analyzing the role of the ocean in Japan’s state construction, elucidates a Japanese self-portrait in which they present the ocean as the origin source of their national spirit. In doing so, he effectively justifies the expansion of the Empire of Japan to the continent. The Japanese, he states, have successfully developed their peaceful characters according to the nation’s integration of human and heaven. This is made possible by the nation’s geographical location, which is surrounded by the sea. They have assimilated the wisdom of the world nonetheless without being overwhelmed by it, and developed a potential to lead the new world history. In other words, by deliberately refuting German determinism, he elaborated another determinism, which I have described as “ecological fatalism” (Watanabe, 2017). Thus, Kōyama has successfully achieved a rationalization of Japanese nationalism. The integral condition for this achievement is the sea as an imaginative space. On the surface, Kōyama’s discussion affirms Steinberg’s claim of the ocean as essential to the construction of the state. However, at the same time, the
148 Atsuko Watanabe difference between the two must be carefully discerned. Kōyama’s elaboration of the function of the ocean as connection and blocking does not necessarily imagine the ocean as a void, but rather as something that contains possibility. For him, it does not really matter if the space is to be filled or not; it is the ocean itself that contains the possibility; this possibility is however not only exploited by humans; it has to be the “harmonious concert” between humans and nature that turns (some of) the possibility into reality. In this respect, it is this harmony, a gift from Mother Nature, and not human actions, that fills the space.
Nan’yō: the ocean for Japan In order to understand the true significance of the sea as in Japan’s modern history, the notions of the South (Nan’yō, 南洋), and the Southern Expansion Doctrine (Nanshinron) have to be examined. Nan’yō was an extremely versatile notion in early twentieth-century Japan, providing people even mystical imaginations. “Yō,” expressed in kanji as 洋, is certainly a shaky term. It means “wide ocean,” or the condition of wideness (Shinmura, 1998). The terms of “the West” and “the East” use this kanji as 西洋 (Seiyō) and 東洋 (Tōyō), respectively. Despite the fact that Nanshinron was an official policy of Imperial Japan, Nanshinron and Nan’yō have existed as marginal topics in the social sciences, except in some notable works mainly by specialists on Southeast Asia. The term Nan’yō itself is nowadays almost an obsolete term, and only provokes rustic and warmhearted images among the Japanese, while Tōyō and Seiyō are still widely used today. This negligence is probably, as Yano (1975) points out, due to the fact that the memory of Nan’yō was an anathema in postwar Japan. Nan’yō had an amazing discursive power in the first half of the last century, especially as a place in which the youth were seen as heading for their dreams. Tōru Yano (1975) defines Nanshinron as an ideology that “necessitates the tie between Japan and Nan’yō” (p. 48). It was presented as an antithesis of Westernization and modernization. In adventure novels for children, travel writings for adults, and advertisements for jobs in southern islands, Nan’yō provided the Japanese collective imagination a romanticized heaven-like place that waited for the youth to explore it. Although its genealogy can be traced back at least to the first half of the nineteenth century, the modern Nanshinron appears after the Meiji Restoration. Though it is a surprisingly malleable notion, according to Yano, seven commonalities are identified in the related books published in the Meiji Period. First, they delineate Nan’yō as the most appropriate place for Japan’s overseas expansion. Second, they oppose the Doctrine for Northing (Hokushinron), which originally indicated the expansion into the northern regions of China. Third, they argue that it is a specifically Japanese mission to develop the South, emphasizing the backwardness of the people in the region. Fourth, they do not admit the influence of the West on the region. Fifth, they are based metaphorically on the ocean and not on land. Sixth, they lament the Japanese indifference to the sea. Finally, they believe that Nanshinron offers a perfect solution for Japanese economic and social problems (Yano, 1975, pp. 53–55).
Pacific for whom 149 With these functions, Nan’yō was a surprisingly malleable space. Since the Meiji period up to the War, there are three periods when Nanshinron was widely supported: at the end of the 1880s; at the beginning of the Taishō period (1912–1926) when Japan occupied those islands under the cloud of the German defeat in the First World War, and around 1940 when Japan attacked Pearl Harbor (Shimizu, 1983; Yano, 1975). It was already during the Taishō period when the insistence of Nanshinron began to develop as a cliché. This move was, as Shimizu (1983) states, further buttressed by the inferiority complex among Japanese people to the West, which deepened as the country’s economic situation deteriorated, despite its victory in the Russo-Japanese War. Nan’yō Kyōkai (The Institute for the South) in 1915, a half-governmental organization to promote Nanshin Seisaku (policy of Southing), stated: The extensive Southern islands… with inexhaustible resources, are waiting for development by peoples from the world. Our country Japan and the South have particularly intimate relations in terms of geography and history. Such relations will become economically closer in future…. Our institution, by researching the South widely, shall pursue its development, promote the wellbeing of the both peoples, and contribute to the development of world civilization in some small ways. (Yano, 1975, p. 76) Here, in line with Kōyama’s assertion, Japanese people were expressed as peaceful, which was nurtured through their connection with the South (that is, the ocean). It was a Japanese manifest (albeit “modest”) destiny to expand into the region, and to help its (poor) inhabitants develop, which had to be different from any Western means of domination. At the same time, the framing of Nanshinron as an economic expansion led by the emperor’s power reminds us of the aforementioned discourse of the ocean in the late Edo period. During the Showa period, the traits of cliché evidenced in Nanshinron, became much clearer. First, it stressed the geographical, historical, racial, and cultural proximity between the Japanese and the indigenous peoples in the South. Second, it was envisaged as an economic, rather than political, expansion, which was insisted to be peaceful and mutually beneficial for the indigenous peoples. Third, it was a “negative choice” (Shimizu, 1983)—although Japan’s expansion abroad was necessary in order to resolve Japan’s population issue, all the other spaces on the globe except the South had already filled. Needless to say, it was the West that filled all of the spaces. Shimizu (1983) points out that, in this way, the advocates of Nanshinron insisted that Nan’yō was a paradise (rakudo) left exclusively for the Japanese, however, where specifically this imaginative p aradise remained fairly indefinite. What was made clear is that the West had created this dire situation from which indigenous people were suffering and that the Japanese could change their circumstances. The Japanese could occupy the ocean because it was a right endowed by Nature. This was then only one step away from war propaganda against the West.
150 Atsuko Watanabe The ocean, or the continent? Nanshinron gradually came to be included in Japan’s political doctrine between the late 1930s and the beginning of the 1940s. In this process, it made a significant and contradictory transformation: its geographical reach broadened. The area indicated by the term Nan’yō began to include spaces that were not on the south side of Japan. It was expanded to the continent, making the notion of “Nan’yō” completely muddled. This incongruous development was partly due to the transforming location of the US in Japan’s political world map. This was not simply because the US became increasingly powerful after the First World War, but also because people began to question how to best frame the postwar map. As Taichiro Mitani (1974) argues, the dominant image of the US in Japan in the Taisho period (1912–1926) was as a “non-Europe,” “an independent state from Europe,” and “a model of pacifist state by contrast to Germany,” which was for the Japanese people analogous to their own state. In addition, it was considered to be the leading maritime nation (Mitani, 1974, pp. 125–126). In this map, America had to be located rather on the other side of the Pacific. That is, they had to be to the east of Japan, rather than part of the West as the Atlantic community. In this framing of the world, Japan and the US shared the same regional identity as the Pacific, which represented a new world in contrast to the old world of Europe. In this way, the two countries together confronted Europe. A practical reason behind this imagination was that, as Mitani points out, the Imperial Army traditionally led the security policy of “Expanding to North, Protecting the South,” for the Japanese government, and so avoiding conflict with the US was still possible at that moment. However, this situation gradually changed. Kōshin Murofuse, in his best- selling book Nanshinron (1936), for example, while naming the US as a potential enemy, stated that the collision between the US had to be avoided. In a similar vein, The Standard of National Policy in 1936 published by the Japanese government maintained: The economic expansion shall be promoted in the Southern sea region especially in the Outer South, though with every effort in order to avoid innervate other states. The plans of the penetration shall be promoted by gradual and peaceful means. By doing this, we, together with the establishment of Manchuko, shall enhance the national power. (Yano, 1975, p. 147) In Nan’yō discourse, the ocean was rarely called Taiheiyō (the Pacific Ocean) (see Yano, 1975). This was because, for Japan, the South had to be a different space from the Pacific Ocean, which inevitably connoted the US. However, this view began to transform as conflicts in China began to deepen. Increasingly, Nanshinron and Hokushinron came to fuse into one, in which the geographical confinement of Nan’yo expanded towards the continent almost limitlessly. A critic wrote in 1941 that the “issue of the South” arose “all of a sudden” as Japan “has
Pacific for whom 151 been deeply engaged with the situation in China.” However, the links between the two issues were “not necessarily clear.” He warned that, though the advocators of Nanshinron stressed the importance of resources in the southern islands, this issue had to be handled with care and the Japanese must not follow the footsteps of Europeans’ imperial expansion (Kaneuchi, 1941). Shimizu (1983) points out that this policy shift towards the South from China was promoted partly because the conflict between economic expansion and political expansion had dissolved under the banner of Asianism. He states that the Asianistic thesis of the mission of Japan as the hegemon in Asia, which was the liberation of Asian peoples, who were under the same culture and the same race, subsumed both Nanshinron and Hokushinron (Shimizu, 1983). This discourse stated that the sea was the cradle of all Asians. Hence, all lands, both southern and northern, were connected by the sea. “Blood and soil,” the famous slogan of German expansion policy, would not suffice as a medium to connect peoples, given that Japan was an island nation. As the war escalated, especially after the invasion into French Indochina in 1940, Nan’yō came to occupy the center of the Japanese imaginative map. As Tetsurō Watsuji in his best-selling book Fūdo (1931) and Haushofer (1942) both asserted, “monsoon” was a keyword in this discourse, and its meaning as a sea breeze that developed over the ocean played a metaphorical role that stressed the shared destiny between the Japanese and the Asians. A geographer insisted that, in the South, and likewise in Japan, Manchuria, and China, the monsoon rain was a “basis of living” of the people living in the regions (Satō, 1942, p. 132; see also Kawanishi, 1942; Yonekura, 1941). The ocean in such discourse came to express the routes the ancestors of the Japanese had followed through both the islands in the South Pacific Ocean and the Asiatic continent via the Sea of Japan, thus vindicating the Japanese archipelago’s role as a repository of people in Asia (Iwata, 1942). Therefore, it was the Pacific Ocean that gave the Japanese race a superior disposition as a maritime nation that could “know the world, redress inequality, mediate peoples, and improve each other’s form of living in order to attain peace and co-prosperity” (Nishimura, 1942, p. 56; see also Iwata, 1942). For them, the ocean was a living space (Komaki, 1943a, p. 52) and the mediator that drew the country into the modern world (Hirano & Kiyono, 1942). In an extreme example, it was even argued that “the ocean, as a person that holds personality,” had to be “objectified to organize a Lebensraum” (Kamakura, 1940, pp. 34–35). In German geopolitics, this concept justified empire’s territorial expansion. In contrast, Japanese geopolitics equated water with earth by drawing upon the same concept. Therefore, the sea between the Pacific Ocean and the Indian Ocean had to be called the “Asia-Australia Mediterranean Sea” because it was mare nostrum of the GEACPS (Ezawa, 1943, Chapter 2). Some even asserted that, as the natives in the American continents were originally from Asia, the whole Pacific Ocean belonged to Asians (Komaki, 1943b). Thus, the last fad of Nanshinron caused a literal sea change in the Japanese world map. Murofuse (1936) already declared in 1936 that Nanshinron was not just a national strategy but “about the course of Japan on the international
152 Atsuko Watanabe stage,” which is the issues of all the Japanese people. It implied “the end of modernity” and “the extinction of European-ness” (Murofuse, 1936, pp. 18–19), which was the most crucial domestic and simultaneously international issue. Soon, Russia, America, and Japan would fight for supremacy. For him, it was the period of the confrontation between “continent versus continent” (Murofuse, 1936, p. 251). Hence, Nan’yō was not the ocean any more. This perceptual inversion of the land and sea was clearly evidenced in the Basic Policy Guideline in 1940, in which the term “the Great East Asia” (Daitōa) was officially used for the first time. According to Yano (1975), until then, the two different terms for East Asia (Tōa) and the South (Nanpō) co-existed in Japanese political discourse. However, following the Guideline, the “Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere,” which covered both areas, started to be used as an official expression. At the same time, the term Thaiheiyō began to be used in various ways, as the US increasingly came to be perceived as an enemy. In 1938, the Taiheiyō Kyōkai (Pacific Institute) was established. Yōsuke Matsuoka, who became Foreign Minister after two years, made a speech at the opening ceremony: “Japan is eccentrically located in the northwest of the Pacific Ocean, and the location could allow us maximize the utilization of the ocean” (Taiheiyō Kyōkai, 1938). It did not take long time until Japan experienced the ultimate inversion of the world map. The geographer Saneshige Komaki at Kyoto University, who proposed a fanatic “imperial geopolitics” urged his fellow Japanese in his 1943 essay that they should think that the US was located “at the other side of Africa, the west of Japan” and not the other side of the Pacific Ocean (Komaki, 1943b, p. 49). He asserted moreover that the Indian Ocean was an Anglo-American ocean. Now, then, the war front had moved to the West of Japan, where the Pacific met the Indian Ocean (Komaki, 1943b). In this way, the Pacific Ocean was eventually marginalized. In December 1941, the government had a cabinet decision on changing the name of the ongoing war from the “Against Anglo- American War” to the “Greater East Asia War.” The official record explained that the aim of the war was the construction of the GEACPS. An interesting fact was that the Imperial Navy, who had successfully executed the Pearl Harbor Attack only four days before, opposed the change and insisted on the name the “Pacific War” (Shōji, 2011). The Navy’s wish was ultimately realized only after the war. On December 15, 1945, as the Shinto Directive was issued, and use of the term “Great East Asia” was banned. A week earlier, on the fourth anniversary of the Attack on Pearl Harbor, the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers started a series of news stories whose title was “History of the Pacific War: The Collapse of the Japanese Military with no Truth”; the stories were published in all major papers in Japan (Nakaya, 1946). Since then, the “Pacific War” has been the most widely used designation for the war. The Japanese government has not given any alternative names for the war, but euphemistically refers to it as the “previous war” in official documents even now (Shōji, 2011). Until now, some have argued that the name was “imposed” by the US and that the Japanese should have their own label. Some others have insisted that this designation does not reflect the
Pacific for whom 153 regional war that was fought, and could blind the Japanese from the fact that the war killed a number of other Asians. Different designations, such as the “Fifteen Years War,” the “Asia-Pacific War,” and “Shōwa War,” have been proposed. Even from the vanquishers’ perspective, a few names have been proposed. For example, Christopher Thorne (1986) calls the war the “Far Eastern War,” using this designation in his book’s title. Ironically, this title was translated as the “Pacific War” in Japan. The map imagined here must have the Pacific Ocean at its center, marginalizing the continent.
Conclusion The regional cooperation that evolved around the Pacific Ocean has been one of the dearest wishes of Japan as a state, not just in the postwar period but perhaps since the dawn of modernity. The desire has been always accompanied by the dream of a single world, though the ways to frame that world must have been different in each period. The most recent development in this is the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which was signed in 2016 but was not enforced, as the US withdrew from the treaty. The most significant initiative that can be compared to this effort was the one lead by Prime Minister Masayoshi Ōhira, who formed the Pacific Cooperation Study Group in 1979; however, this did not bear substantial fruit as Ōhira passed away abruptly. In these repeated attempts, including the wartime Nanshinron discussed in this chapter, apparently, the ocean has been depicted as a space that can be filled to connect Japan to others. However, so far, no such attempts have been successful. Watsuji, in his study on sakoku, which he published immediately after the Asia-Pacific War, insisted that the cause of Japan’s defeat was that Japan “lacked the spirit of Henry the Navigator” (Watsuji, 1982, p. 304). For Watsuji, this “spirit” denoted the science that made the adventures he supported possible, which, for him, was nurtured in Europe. Meanwhile, because Japan was an outsider to the “international society” and stayed inside of the state as it “closed” the state by the policy of sakoku, Watsuji (1982) stated, they failed to develop their science and were eventually defeated in the war. I do not mean to fully affirm this assertion. However, if the spirit of Henry the Navigator represents the modern European relation of power and space in which the ocean was seen as “‘outside’ space, an arena of mobility that is deemed unsuitable for territorial control” (Steinberg, 2009, p. 467), Japan before 1945 probably did not share the means to frame that relation. For the Japanese people, the ocean was something that was usefully exploited in an ambivalent way. It was not considered to be outside of the state; rather, inside and outside are used somewhat interchangeably. In other words, the ocean and land, and inside and outside were not really perceived as binary. Most importantly, in this mental world map, there were seemingly no other states, but only Japan as the self, making the Japanese concept of the ocean eventually monolithic. However, it was not just this Japanese way of envisaging the ocean that has composed the concept of the ocean. On the contrary, numerous discussions on the ocean as a concept have been taking
154 Atsuko Watanabe place. In this context, as this chapter has demonstrated, even the concept envisaged in Japan is not a solely Japanese creation, but rather a co-construction developed in concert with the global community. The trajectories of such complex interactions are easy to dismiss because they are in many cases already covertly contained in the concept per se. Hence, the Pacific, and arguably Asia as its contrastive concept as well, has been a space of numerous contradictions and never a place of unity.
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Index
Note: Page numbers with “n” indicate footnotes. Abdullah, M. 30 absoluteness 88 absurdism 81n10 Acharya, A. 11–12, 14, 16, 17, 19, 56, 59, 76, 88, 111 actor-network-theory 57 actors-in-relations 57 advaita monism 81n18 Africa 30, 33, 152 Against Anglo-American War 152 Agamben, G. 104 Alagappa, M. 112 all-under-heaven theory (Tainxia) 2, 12, 50, 57, 60, 114 Al Shabaab 81n7 Ames, R. T. 71, 78 Amsden, A. 28 analytic eclecticism 16 Andrews, N. 89 Anghie, A. 80n5 anti-colonialism 46 anti-Communism 96, 98 anti-Japanese War 98 Arano, Y. 142, 143, 144 Arendt, H. 104, 116 Arisaka, Y. 107, 117n1 Aristophanes 81n10 Aristotle 116 Arxer, S. L. 87 Ascione, G. 81n18 Ashley, R. K. 14, 16, 81n22 Asia-Australia Mediterranean Sea 151 Asian financial crisis of 1997–1998 2, 26, 28, 46, 75 Asian regionalism 11 Asia-Pacific War 121, 134n4, 139, 145, 153
“as if” condition, Kantian 130 Average Labour Productivity 28 Aydin, C. 80n5 Baele, S. J. 14, 16 Bakhtin, M. M. 105–6 Balakrishnan, K. S. 32 balance: of power 13, 51, 53; of relationship 100n3; of role 100n3 Baldwin, J. 80n5 Balzacq, T. 14, 16 Banians 35 Barlow, T. 135n8 Basic Policy Guideline 152 Battuta, I. 28, 30, 31 Bauman, Z. 55 beer and tea debate 70–1 Behera, N. C. 111 Bell, N. J. 17 Bennett, A. 16 Berger, T. 135n7 Bergson, H. 109–10 Bhabha, H. 87, 88, 93, 94 Biersteker, T. J 81n23 Bilgin, P. 17, 20, 87 Birdsall, N. 27–8 Biss, E. 80n5 Blaney, D. L. 68, 99n1 Bleiker, R. 68, 76 Boeke, J. H. 43 Boogers, M. 90 Booth, K. 1 Boroujerdi, M. 76 Brahmans 35, 40–1 Brandsen, T. 90 Brecher, M. 16 Brincat, S. 81n19
158 Index British Malaya 32 bronze statues and reification of positionality 124–8 Brown, M. J. 90 Brown, W. 120–1, 132–3, 134 Buddhism 2, 6, 30, 81n10, 81n15, 81n18, 91, 108, 116, 141; First Principle 68–9; five-rank protocol 77; kōanic method 72–3, 74–8; kōanizing IR 64–82; kōans 8, 9, 64–5, 68–78, 81n9, 81n13; yin/ yang theory 69, 71–2, 76, 77–8 Bulag, U. E. 90 Buruma, I. 135n7 Butler, J. 133 Buzan, B. 11–12, 16, 56, 58, 59, 88, 111 Cabán, P. 86 Cabral 29 Cairo 34–6, 39, 41 Callahan, W. A. 14 Cambay 35–6 Campbell, D. 16, 138 Campos, J. E. L. 27–8 Camus, J. 81n10 capitalsim 25–48 capping verse 72, 73, 76 Carvalho, B. D. 80n2 Cassidy, C. 47 Chakrabarty, D. 55, 76, 88 “Changsha’s Returning to Mountains, Rivers, and the Great Earth” (Loori) 73 Chen, C. C. 14, 21n3, 59, 79, 81n20, 88, 114 Chen, G. 94 Chen, K. 121, 122, 123, 131 Chen, X. 57 Cheng, G. 94 Cheung, G. C. K. 89 Cheung, K. C. K. 57, 58 China, indigenized IRTs in 50–61; escaping from hegemony 55–6; essentializing culture 56–8; theory migration and formation of hegemony 50–5; West and non-West, location of 59–60 Chinese School of IR 2, 113, 114 Chirigakukō (On Geography) (Uchimura) 138–9 Cho, Y. C. 13, 55, 56, 112, 113 Choi, A. J. 55 Choi, J. K. 13, 28, 55 Chong, A. 8, 30, 32, 75, 76 Christianity 34–5, 40, 91, 93, 95, 96, 108, 138, 141
chronotope 105–6 Chun, C. S. 13, 56 Civil War 92–3, 95, 96 Class B & C War Crimes Trials 123 Classic of the Way (Daodejing) (Ames and Hall) 71 Cold War 51, 53, 120, 121, 122–3, 131, 133 collective responsibility and collective identity 128–33 colonialism 42, 45, 46, 53, 54, 60, 89, 93, 97, 113, 121, 126, 132 comfort women 125–6, 135n8 commentary 72, 73, 75–6 Communism 25, 96, 98, 123 Confucianism 2, 6, 12–13, 57, 90–1, 95–8, 100n2, 141 constructivism 1, 11, 52, 54, 57 Corcuff, S. 89 Corden, W. M. 27–8 Cornut, J. 16 Cortesão, A. 31, 42 cosmopolitanism 86, 98–5 Costa Rica 65, 75 Cox, R. W. 54, 57, 59 Crapanzano, V. 50–1 critical theory 53, 59 cross-border trade 82n25 cultural memory 87, 93, 96, 97–8 culture, essentializing 56–8 cyclical historiography 87, 94–6, 99, 135n13 Daily Show with Jon Stewart, The (TV program) 81n10 Dalby, S. 138 Daodejing 71, 78 Daoism 2, 6, 71–2, 78 Darby, P. 80n6 Darian, J. D. 110 “Debate between Tea and Beer, A” (cha jiu lun) (Wang) 70 deimperialization 122, 123, 128, 130 Delanty, G. 86 delusive worlds 81n15 demarcation 58, 59, 96, 132, 135n9 demographic pluralism 34–6 dialectical progression 4 dialectics, goal of 4 dialogue and discovery, to build alternative theories 19 dichotomies 108, 110 Direct Experience 1 81n17 Dirlik, A. 140
Index 159 discourse analysis 92 diversity in IR 3, 15–20, 25, 28, 35–6, 47, 114, 126 Doctrine for Northing (Hokushinron) 148, 150–1 Dōgen, E. 69–75, 78, 81n14 Doty, R. 127 duality of structure 57 Dudden, A. 134n1 Dunne, T. 16, 17, 18, 19 Eagleton, T. 88 East Asia: Cold War and 122–3; refraction 123; third-party decolonization and postwar instead of post-empire 122–3 East Asia before the West (Kang) 2 East Asian capitalism, defined 28 eclecticism 16, 29 economic growth 28, 94 Edkins, J. 88 eien no ima (eternal present) 103, 105–7, 109–10, 114, 116–17 Elden, S. 140–1 empire 26, 33–4, 42, 59, 66, 122–3, 127–33, 134, 142, 147, 151 emptiness 104 end-of-history historiography 95 Engels, F. 26 English curriculum 94 enlightenment 31, 64, 69, 71, 73, 74, 81n9, 81n10, 88 Enloe, C. 67, 81n7 epistemic awakening 74–8 epistemic disobedience 64 epistemic synthesis 16, 20 epistemic violence 64–82 equality 4, 45, 108, 151 Escobar, A. 67 eternal present (eien no ima) 103, 105–7, 109–10, 114, 116–17 Eurocentrism 80n5 existentialism 2, 7, 81n10, 89, 99n1 experience, forms of 81n17 Experience 2 81n17 Ezawa, J. 151 failing states 86, 89 Fan, J. 92 Fanon, F. 86 FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia) 81n7 Far Eastern War 153 feminism 4–5, 53, 132 Ferguson, N. 67
Ferguson, Y. 16 Field, N. 125 Fifteen Years War 121, 134n4, 153 financial crisis of 1997–1998, Asian 2, 26, 28, 46, 75 First Principle 68–9 First Sino-Japanese War 145 fixed identities, spatialization of temporal experience for 109–10 Foucault, M. 111, 133, 141 free market economy 7, 26, 29, 46, 47 Fūdo (Watsuji) 151 Fujitani, T. 121, 122, 123, 134n6 Gay, P. 88 GEACPS (Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere) 151 gender 61, 67, 76, 78, 80n4, 125 genealogy 86, 87, 89, 91, 93–5, 99, 141, 148 geographicity of history, Kōyama’s 146–8 geopolitics 110, 122, 142, 151–2 Geopolitik des Pazifischen Ozeans (Haushofer) 142 George, J. 16 George, S. 26 Germany 121, 122, 130, 135n7, 150 “Getting Asia Wrong” (Kang) 11 Giddens, A. 57 Gilpin, R. 66 global capitalism 46–7, 66 global civil society perspectives 4–5 global IR 14–20 globalization 6, 14, 25–6, 31, 33, 47, 61, 86–90, 95, 99, 127 Goa 40 Gong, G. W. 80n5 Gordon, S. 30 Goto-Jones, C. 104 Great East Asian War 107, 152 Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere (GEACPS) 151 “great powers,” Waltz’ notion of 65, 67, 78 Grenard, J. L. 69 Grewal, I. 132 Guanxi (relationality) 2, 113 Gujaratees 35–6 Hagmann, J. 81n23 Haisengoron (Kato) 130 Hakuin 81n12 Hall, D. L. 71 Hamashita, T. 111
160 Index Hamati-Ataya, I. 18 Hamilton-Hart, N. 28 han 143, 145 Han Chinese 90 Hansen, L. 16 Hardt, M. 66 harmonious concert 146–8 Hart, R. 56 Harvey, F. 16 Hasegawa, T. 134n1 Haushofer, K. 142, 151 Hayashi, S. 144 Hegelian dialectics 81n19 hegemony: concept of 8; escaping from 55–6; Humane Authority of 2; logic of 14; patriarchy 123, 131, 132; theory migration and formation of 50–5 Heidegger, M. 104, 116 Heine, S. 69, 72, 81n13 Hellmann, G. 17 Henry the Navigator 153 Herbst, J. 11 Hermes’ dilemma 50–1 Herr, R. 132 hierarchy 3, 18, 67, 78, 114 Hikayat Abdullah (Abdullah) 30 Hikayat Mareskalek (al-Misri) 30 Hirama, Y. 115 Hirano, Y. 151 “Historicity of Geography and Geographicity of History, The” (Kōyama) 146 history education 120, 134n2 History of Japan, The (Kaempfer) 141–2, 144 “History of the Pacific War: The Collapse of the Japanese Military with no Truth” 152 history-writing 120, 121, 130, 131, 134n2; internationalization of 120 Hobson, J. M. 80n2, 80n3 Hokushinron (Doctrine for Northing) 148, 150–1 Hollis, M. 93 Hong Kong 27, 87, 89; post-hybridity in 94–9 Horesh, N. 12 Hori, V. S. 64, 69, 70, 74, 81n12, 81n16, 81n17 Hormuz (Ormuz) 30, 36, 39, 41 Hotta, E. 127, 128 Hu, G. 55 Hudson, V. M. 16 Huebener, P. 6 Humane Authority of hegemony 2
human rights 94 Hurrell, A. 14 Husserl, E. 104 Hutchings, K. 5, 16, 19, 20, 110 Hutnyk, J. 86 hybrid fundamentalism 86, 89 hybridity 86–100; concept of 9; nonsynthesis and reconnection 92–4; sited 88–9; synthetic, in IR 88–92 Hypermasculine-Eurocentric Whiteness (HEW) 64–8, 74–9 hypermasculinity 80n5 identity 103–17; fixed 110, 114; as iteration 88; making, experience as basis of 103 Ienaga, S. 120, 134n2 Ikeda, J. 9, 14 Ikenberry, G. J. 67 imperial geopolitics 152 imperialism 1, 26, 31, 32, 53, 60, 80n3, 94, 103, 105, 106–7, 112, 121 Inayatullah, N. 68 in-betweenness 88 incompatibility thesis 132 Indian Ocean 29, 151, 152 indigenized IRTs, in Korea and China 50–61; escaping from hegemony 55–6; essentializing culture 56–8; theory migration and formation of hegemony 50–5; West and non-West, location of 59–60 Indonesia 28, 43, 75 inequality 45, 151 Inner Mongolians 90 Inoguchi, T. 60, 146 inquiry 1–2, 4, 7–8, 18, 65, 99, 105, 126 internationalization 54, 120 international law 135n9 international politics, theory of 65, 75 international relations (IR): Chinese School of 2, 113, 114; contemporary 17–18; diversity in 3, 15–20, 25, 28, 35–6, 47, 114, 126; global 14–20; kōanizing 64–82; neorealist 65–8, 69, 74, 76, 77, 81n22; pluralism as requirement of 15–17; synthetic hybridity in 88–92; Westphalian 8, 56, 60, 61, 64, 66, 67, 80–1n7, 80n5, 109, 111, 114–15 international relations of economics (IRE) 25–48 international relations theory (IRT): building with Chinese characteristics
Index 161 12–13; indigenized IRTs in Korea and China 50–61; non-Western 8, 11–21, 146; philosophy and politics in 103–17; transatlantic 11; units of analysis in 134 international studies 16, 18 International Studies Association (ISA) 14 intimate enemy 81n21 Ishii, M. 143 ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria) 80n7 Islamism 30, 35, 37, 39, 80–1n7 Iwata, K. 151 Jackson, P. 16, 17, 18, 19 Jager, S. M. 134n1 Jameson, F. 87 Japan: bronze statues and reification of positionality 124–8; collective responsibility and collective identity 128–33; East Asia, Cold War and 122–3; history in postwar 120–35; Pacific Ocean and 141–53; refraction 123; third-party decolonization and postwar instead of post-empire 122–3 jiko ni sokushite (develop itself) 117n1 Johnson, C. 27 Johnston, A. I. 11 Jōmyō, N. 81n12 Jones, B. G. 80n6 Jones, C. S. 146 junction for exchange 41–2 Kado, K. 3 Kaempfer, E. 141–2, 144 kaibō (maritime security) 144–5 kaikoku 138, 142, 143 Kaikoku Heidan (Hayashi) 144 Kaldor, M. 4 Kamakura, I. 151 Kaneuchi, R. 151 Kang, D. C. 2, 11, 12, 112, 113 Kang, J. I. 55 Kant, I. 104, 130 Kaplan, C. 132 Kato, K. 122, 128 Kato, N. 129–30, 135n12 Katz, P. 87 Katzenstein, P. J. 11, 16 Kawanishi, M. 151 Kawanishi, Y. 107 Keene, E. 88 Khuong, V. M. 28 Kim, C. S. 27–8 Kim, Y. H. 93
Kimura, N. 144 Kindleberger, C. P. 66 Kinsella, H. M. 4 Kiyono, K. 151 Kjellén, R. 142 Klingler-Vidra, R. 91 kōanic method 72–3, 74–8; capping verse 72, 73, 76; commentary 72, 73, 75–6; main case 72, 73, 75 kōanizing IR 64–82; epistemic awakening 74–8; four main steps of kōanic practice 74; neorealist IR, epistemic violence of structural logic and 65–8; Wandering at ease in the Zhuangzi 78 kōans 8, 9, 64–5, 68–78, 81n9, 81n13; artists within, invoking 68–74; defined 69; First Principle 68–9; need for 74; origin of 70–2; yin/yang theory 69, 71–2, 76, 77–8; Zen Koans 69, 81n11 Kobayashi, T. 105 Komaki, S. 151–2 Korea, indigenized IRTs in 50–61; escaping from hegemony 55–6; essentializing culture 56–8; theory migration and formation of hegemony 50–5; West and non-West, location of 59–60 Korean Journal of International Studies (KJIS) 54 Koremenos, B. 90 Koschmann, V. 134n2, 134n5 Koyama, H. 9, 135n11 Kōyama, I. 146–8, 149 Kraidy, M. M. 86 Kratochwil, F. 16, 17 Krishna, S. 2 Kristensen, P. M. 12 Kumar, N. 28 Kyoto School 2–3, 9, 104, 112, 114, 115, 139, 146 Lake, D. 18, 19 Lalami, L. 80n7 language 103–17; non-Western IR, national schools, and structural changes in world affairs 110–14; pure experience and 104–5; spatialization of temporal experience for fixed identities 109–10; time and 114–16 Lapid, Y. 19–20 Latour, B. 57 Lebensraum 151 Lebow, R. N. 16 Lederach, J. P. 68
162 Index Lee Kuan Yew 99 Leira, H. 80n2 Lenin, V. I. 26 Liang, S. 12 liberalism 1, 5, 7, 11, 52, 96 Lincicome, M. E. 55 Lind, J. 135n7 Ling, L. H. M. 9, 16, 75, 76, 78, 80n4, 80n6, 81n7, 81n18–19, 82n25, 99, 116 Lionel, W. 94 Liu, L. H. 50, 60 Liu, W. 55 Loori, J. D. 69, 71, 73 MacIntyre, A. 28 McKay, A. 4 McMullin, E. 87 Magellan 29, 141 Mahathir, Mohamad 29–32, 42–8, 75; value of Mahathirist thought 29–32; as voice for economic justice 42–7 Ma Huan 30, 31 main case 72, 73, 75 Maki, Y. 5–6 Malay Dilemma, The (Mahathir) 43 Malaysia 2, 8, 31–2, 42–7, 65, 75, 76 Manchuria 97, 122, 128, 151 Mandal, S. K. 30 Mandaville, P. 76 Marchand, M. H. 67 maritime security (kaibō) 144–5 Maruyama, M. 143, 145 Marx, K. 26, 53 Marxism 4–5, 7, 12, 139 materializing 3, 87, 88, 108, 113, 115 Mauzy, D. K. 46 Mearsheimer, J. J. 16 Meiji Period 148–9 Meiji Restoration 139, 143, 148 mercantile civilization 32–42; demographic pluralism 34–6; junction for exchange 41–2; military prowess 36–8; piety and indulgence 38–41 MEXT (Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology of Japan) 134n2 Middle East 94 Mignolo, W. D. 81n8 Miki, K. 3, 139 military prowess 36–8 Milne, R. S. 46 Min, B. W. 13, 54, 55, 59 Ming Dynasty 3–4, 13
Ministry of International Trade and Industry (MITI) 27 al-Misri, A. 30 Mitani, H. 144 Mitani, T. 150 MITI (Ministry of International Trade and Industry) 27 Mitter, R. 134n1 Miyoshi, T. 144 modernity 25, 60, 61, 89, 95, 97–8, 109, 112, 114, 130, 132, 143–5, 152, 153 Mogi, T. 3, 4 Moon, K. H. S. 81n7 Moon Jae-in 124, 127 Moors 34, 38, 39–40 Morales, M. N. 17 moral imagination 68, 78 Morris, N. 126 Mouffe, C. 88 Muchhala, B. 75 Mukerji, C. 93 multilayeredness 92–4 multi-method research 16 mu no basho (place of nothingness) 105 Murai, S. 143 Murofuse, K. 150, 151–2 Muslims 30, 35, 40 Myanmar 94 Naik, B. 81n7 Nakamura, Y. 107 Nancy, J. 134 Nandy, A. 80n5, 81n21, 123 Nanshinron (Southern Expansion Doctrine) 139, 148–53 Nanshin Seisaku (policy of Southing) 149 Nan’yō (South) 139, 145, 148–52, 149 Nan’yō Kyōkai (Institute for the South) 149 Narita, R. 135n13 national interest 12, 51, 113 nationalism 31–2, 58, 61, 90, 91–4, 96, 98, 128, 132, 147 national schools and structural changes in world affairs 110–14 nation-states 1, 3, 108, 113, 115, 128 Negri, A. 66 Neilson, B. 86 neorealist IR 65–8, 69, 74, 76, 77, 81n22; concept of 65; epistemic violence of structural logic and 65–8; HEW 64–8, 74–9; moral imagination 68 Neumann, I. B. 1 new analytical frameworks 11 New Deal for Asia, A. (Mahathir) 46
Index 163 new form of Orientalism 122, 135n7 new Taiwanese 92 Newtonian ontology 87, 89 Nielsen, R. T. 12 Nihon Fūkeiron (Shigetaka) 145 Nish, I. H. 94 Nishida, K. 2, 7, 9, 103–17; bringing time back in 114–16; non-Western IR, national schools, and structural changes in world affairs 110–14; philosophy and politics of, in non-Western discourse 103–17; pure experience, eternal present, and power politics 105–9; pure experience and language 104–5; spatialization of temporal experience for fixed identities 109–10 Nishimura, S. 151 non-synthesis, hybridity and 92–4 non-West, location of 59–60 Non-Western International Relations Theory (Acharya and Buzan) 11–12 non-Western IR theory 8, 11–21, 146; bringing time back in 114–16; dialogue across theoretical and spatial divides 18–20; endorsement and criticism 11–15; missing elements in debate 15–20; national schools and structural changes in world affairs 110–14; philosophy and politics in 103–17; pluralism and 15–18; pure experience, eternal present, and power politics 105– 9; pure experience and language 104–5; spatialization of temporal experience for fixed identities 109–10 North Korea 1, 76, 94 Nossiter, A. 81n7 nothingness, place of 104–6 noumenon, Kant’s 104 Odyessos, L. 134 Oguma, E. 127 Ong, A. 86 Ong, G. G. 104, 146 ontological synthesis 16 order: concept of 55; imperialism in support of 112; international, concept of 61; new vision of 111; “Principle of the New World Order, The” (Tojo’s speech) 107; white 64; world 58, 78; worldly world 65, 78 origin myth 80n2 Ormuz (Hormuz) 30, 36, 39, 41 Orr, J. 126
Osamu, D. 138 Ó Tuathail, G. 138, 139 Pacific Institute (Taiheiyō Kyōkai) 152 Pacific Ocean 138–54; at dawn of modernity 143–5; in European eyes 141–2; geographicity of history, Kōyama’s 146–8; Japan and 141–53; in modern Japan 145–53; Nanshinron (Southern Expansion Doctrine) and 139, 148–53; Nan’yō and 148–9; premodern periods 142–3; as regional construct 140–1 Pacific War 121, 134n4, 152–3 Pal, R. 122–3 Pan-Asianism 127–8 Paolini, A. J. 86 paradigmatic synthesis 16 paradigms 19 Pasha, M. K. 109 Pateman, C. 67 Patomaki, H. 11 patriarchy 123, 131, 132 Pattar 35 Pempel, T. J. 28 periodization 121, 134n4 Persia 30, 34, 39–40 Peterson, V. S. 67 Philippines 28, 94, 122, 124 philosophy and politics in non-Western discourse 103–17; bringing time back in 114–16; national schools and structural changes in world affairs 110–14; pure experience, eternal present, and power politics 105–9; pure experience and language 104–5; spatialization of temporal experience for fixed identities 109–10 piety and indulgence 38–41 Pinheiro, C. M. 78 Pires, T. 29–42 place of nothingness 104–6 plan rational approach 27 Plato 104 pluralism: contemporary IR and 17–18; as counterpart of absoluteness 88; demographic 34–6, 42; dialogue across theoretical and spatial divides and 18–20; junction of exchange and 41–2; multilayeredness differentiated from 92; problem of 16; as requirement of IR 15–17 Polanyi, K. 27, 46 policy of Southing (Nanshin Seisaku) 149
164 Index political science 52 politics of translation 135n9 polycentric nationalism 132 Portugal 31–9, 42 positivism 18 post-colonialism 1, 9, 89, 95, 100n4, 111 post-hybridity 86–100; dangers of 89–92; in Hong Kong 94–9 post-positivism 18 power: balance of 13, 51, 53; “great powers,” Waltz’ notion of 65, 67, 78; politics 105–9 “Principle of the New World Order, The” (Tojo’s speech) 107 problem-solving theory 59 production, internationalization of 54 provincialization 88 pure experience: eternal present and power politics 105–9; language and 104–5 Pyongyang 93 Qin, Y. 2, 12–13, 16, 53, 54, 57, 113 Qing Dynasty 97 quantum consciousness theory 16 racism 45, 80n3, 123 Rai, S. 81n9 Ratzel, F. 142 Ravenhill, J. 28 realism 1, 4–5, 11, 13, 37, 52, 53, 69 reconnection 87, 92–94 reflexivity 18, 27 refraction 123 regionalism 11 reification of positionality, bronze statues and 124–128 relationality (Guanxi) 2, 3, 57, 113, 134 Rengger, N. 18 Reus-Smit, C. 18 revisionists 126, 133, 135n12 Richey, J. L. 100n2 Ricoeur, P. 56 Rösch, F. 141 Runyan, A. S. 67 Russo-Japanese War 115, 145, 149 Ryōmin, A. 81n12 Ryukyu Kingdom 3–4 Said, E. 87 Sajed, A. 86 Sakai, N. 135n14 sakoku 142, 144–145, 153 Sampson, A. B. 66
Särmä, S. 76, 79 Sartre, A. 81n10 Sassen, S. 90, 99 Satō, H. 151 Sato, S. 21n3 Schelkle, W. 90 Schissler, H. 128 Schmidt, B. 16, 19 Scholte, J. A. 32 Schroeder, P. 127 Science Citation Index (SCI) 53, 55 Sejarah Melayu 30 Sekai Kunizukushi (Yukichi) 145 self-realization 69, 81n10, 106–8 self-reconstruction 94 Seo, J. 8, 12, 111, 113, 131 Seoul 124 Seraphim, F. 122, 135n7 Seth, S. S. 80n6 sexual slavery 121, 125 Shahi, D. 81n18 Shangguan, A. 141 Shani, G. 88 Shapiro, M. 110 Shepard, T. 135n10 Shigetaka, S. 145 Shih, C. 60, 100n3, 104 Shilliam, R. 80n6, 117n2 Shimizu, H. 149, 151 Shimizu, K. 9, 76, 105, 109, 111, 114, 139, 146 Shinmura, I. 148 Shiraz 40 Shōwa War 153 Shubert, A. 81n7 Siam 36, 38, 41 Sil, R. 16 Silk Roads 70 Simon, C. 82n24 Singapore 27, 43, 91, 94, 98 sited hybridity 88–89 Smith, S. 1, 15, 93 social sciences 50–53, 59, 148 Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI) 53, 55 Social Theory of International Politics (Wendt) 114 soft conquest 90 soft governance 90 soft intervention 90 Soh, C. 135n8 Soh, S. 125 sokushite 117n1 Song, X. 12
Index 165 Song Dynasty 13 Soros, G. 26–27 South (Nan’yō) 139, 145, 148–152, 149 Southern Expansion Doctrine (Nanshinron) 139, 148–153 South Korea 8, 13, 27–28, 52, 54, 75, 93, 113, 120, 124, 126, 127 sovereignty 1, 4, 8, 51, 55, 58, 60, 108 Soysal, Y. 128 spatial developments, theory of 142 spatiality 109–111, 113, 116, 146 spatialization of temporal experience for fixed identities 109–110 Spivak, G. C. 58, 80n1 Standard of National Policy, The 150 State of Nature, Hobbesian 64, 65, 66–67 states: absolute, struggle against 88; concept of 60; failing 86, 89; internationalization of 54 Steinberg, P. E. 138–143, 145, 147–148, 153 Stoler, A. L. 81n7 strong reflexivity 18 Stroud, C. 94 structuration theory 57 structure, duality of 57 struggle against absolute state 88 subalterns 67, 80n1, 89, 94, 109 subjectivity 1–3, 7, 8–9, 86, 89, 91, 92–94, 99, 109, 111, 138, 146 Subrahmanyam, S. 29, 33 Sukarno 31 Suma Oriental (Pires) 29–42; demographic pluralism 34–36; junction for exchange 41–42; mercantile civilization in 32–42; military prowess 36–38; piety and indulgence 38–41; value of reading 29–32 Suzuki, S. 80n5, 139 Sweeney, A. 30 Swettenham, F. 43 synthesis 16, 20, 92–94, 97 synthetic hybridity in IR 88–92 Tachibana, B. 139 Taiheiyō Kyōkai (Pacific Institute) 152 Tainxia (all-under-heaven theory) 2, 12, 50, 57, 60, 114 Taiwan 27, 28, 51, 89–93, 123 Takahashi, T. 129–130 Takeda, H. 127 Tamamoto, M. 126 Tanaka, K. 70 Tanaka, S. 57
Tanaka, Y. 125–126, 135n8 Tang, L. 55 Taylor, P. J. 138 tea and beer debate 70–71 Teaching, Research, and International Policy (TRIP) survey 17 Ternate 36 Thaiheiyō 152 Thailand 28, 75 theoretical fragmentation 15, 19, 20 theoretical pluralism 15, 16, 20 theoretical synthesis 16 theory migration and formation of hegemony 50–55 Theory of International Politics (Waltz) 53, 65 Third Debate 1, 14 third party decolonization 122, 128 third-party decolonization and postwar instead of post-empire 122–123 Thompson, E.P. 81n22 Thorne, C. 153 Tickner, A. B. 80n5, 99n1, 111 Tickner, J. A. 15, 16, 67 Tierney, M. J. 17 Tilly, C. 145 time, concept of 5–6, 9, 103–117 Togo, K. 134n1 Tojo, Hideki 107 Tokyo War Crimes Trial 120, 122–123 Tops, P. 90 tourism 82n25 transatlantic IR theory 11 Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) 47, 153 Treaty of Westphalia 80n2 tribute system 7 TRIP survey 17 tropical anarchy 66 Trouillot, M. 127 true Dharma eye 69 Trump, Donald 47 Tsinghua approach 54 Uchida, J. 122, 130 Uchimura, K. 138–139, 145 Ulyanov, V. I. 26 ungraspable mind 72 unhomeliness 88 universality, concept of 56 Van der Ree, G. 16 Vasilaki, R. 88 Vietnam 90, 94 Vitalis, R. 80n3
166 Index Wæver, O. 1, 80n5, 111 Wain, B. 46 Walker, R. B. J. 4, 5, 16 Walt, S. M. 16 Walter, A. 28 Waltz, K. 53, 65–67, 74, 77, 78, 81n22 Wan, M. 12 Wandering at ease in the Zhuangzi (Ames) 78 Wang, F. 70 Wang, H. 51, 112–113 Wang, Y. 12–13, 55 War Bereaved Family’s Association 126 Watanabe, A. 9, 139, 141, 143, 147 Watsuji, T. 153 Watt, L. 122, 128 Wemheuer-Vogelaar, W. 17 Wendt, A. 16, 114 West and non-West, location of 59–60 Westfailure 14 Westphalian IR 8, 56, 60, 61, 64, 66, 67, 80–81n7, 80n5, 109, 111, 114–115 White, G. 134n6 White, H. 61 Whiteness 80n5 white world order 64 Wight, C. 16 wild-individual, Hobbesian 66–67 Wolin, S. 129 world affairs, national schools and structural changes in 110–114 World Bank 27–28, 33, 46 world history 16, 107, 112, 114, 128, 147 worldly world order 65, 78
world order 58, 78; imperialism in support of 112; new vision of 111; “Principle of the New World Order, The” (Tojo’s speech) 107; white 64; worldly 65, 78 World War I 26, 106, 145, 149, 150 World War II 27, 28, 51, 103, 108, 120, 138 Yamada, K. 69 Yan, F. 51 Yan, X. 2, 12, 54, 57, 58, 111 Yano, T. 148–149, 150, 152 Yasukuni Shrine 120, 123, 134n3 yin/yang theory 69, 71–72, 76, 77–78 Yonaha, J. 3, 135n9 Yonekura, J. 151 Yoneyama, L. 125, 134n1, 134n6 Yoshihara, K. 28 Yoshimi, S. 127 Yoshimi, Y. 81n7 “You’re So Vain” (Simon) 82n24 Yukichi, F. 145 Zalewski, M. 1 Zen Koans 69, 81n11 zettai mujunteki jiko doitsu (self-identity of absolute contradiction) 105 Zhang, F. 12, 53, 54, 58 Zhang, X. 28 Zhang, Y. 58 Zhao, T. 2, 12, 57, 111, 113 Zheng He 29, 30 Zhuangzi 78