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The Genealogy of Culturalist International Relations in Japan and Its Implications for Post-Western Discourse

Year 2018, Volume: 7 Issue: 1, 121 - 136, 06.07.2017
https://doi.org/10.20991/allazimuth.326972

Abstract

This paper aims to introduce a neglected methodology from Japanese
international relations (IR) – the culturalist methodology – to Anglophone
specialists in IR. This methodology is neglected not only by an Anglophone
audience but also by Japanese IR scholars. I argue here that despite this
negligence, the culturalist methodology has great potential to contribute to
contemporary post-Western international relations theory (IRT) literature by
posing radical questions about the ontology of IR, as it questions not only the
ontology of Western IR, but also the IR discourses developed in the rest of the
world. Consequently, in understanding and imagining the contemporary world,
I clarify the importance of perceptions based on what, in Japan, are commonly
called ‘international cultural relations’ (kokusai bunka) and ‘regional history’
(chiikishi). I also indicate how our perceptions of the world are limited by the
Westphalian principles of state sovereignty and non-intervention among ‘equal’
nations on the basis of state borders. While historical understanding is widely
recognised as an important approach to contemporary IR, its scope is limited
by its universalised principles.

References

  • Acharya, Amitav. “International Relations Theory and the ‘Rise of Asia’.” In Oxford Handbook of the International Relations of Asia, edited by Saadia Pekkanen, John Ravenhill, and Rosemary Foot, 120-40. New York: Oxford University Press, 2015.
  • Arrighi, Giovanni . “States, Markets, and Capitalism, East and West.” Positions 15, no. 2 (2007): 251-84.
  • Carr , E. H. The Twenty Years’ Crisis: 1919–1939. London: Macmillan, 1946.
  • Chen, Ching-Chang. “The Absence of Non-Western IR Theory in Asia Reconsidered.” International Relations of the Asia-Pacific 11, no. 1(2011): 1-23.
  • ———. “The Im/Possibility of Building Indigenous Theories in a Hegemonic Discipline: The Case of Japanese International Relations.” Asian Perspective 36, no. 3 (2012): 463-92.
  • Chen, Kuan-Hsing. “Takeuchi Yoshimi’s 1960 ‘Asia as Method’ Lecture.” Inter-Asia Cultural Studies 13, no. 2 (2012): 317-24.
  • Cox, Robert. “Social Forces, States and World Orders: beyond international relations theory.” Millennium 10, no. 2 (1981): 126-55.
  • Fairbank, John King, and Ta-tuan Ch’en, eds. The Chinese World Order: Traditional China’s Foreign Relations. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1968.
  • Frank, Andre Gunder. Re-Orient: Global Economy in the Asian Age. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998.
  • Goto-Jones, Chris. Political Philosophy in Japan: Nishida, the Kyoto School, and Co-Prosperity. London: Routledge, 2005.
  • ———, ed. Re-Politicising the Kyoto School as Philosophy. London: Routledge, 2008.
  • Hamashita, Takeshi. China, East Asia, and the Global Economy: Regional and Historical Perspectives. New York: Routledge, 2008.
  • ———. “Tribute and Emigration: Japan and the Chinese Administration of Foreign Affairs.” Senri Ethnological Studies 25 (1989): 69-86.
  • Hirano, Kenichiro. Kokusai Bunkaron [International cultural relations]. Tokyo: Tokyo University Press, 2000.
  • Hoffmann, Stanley. “An American Social Science: International Relations.” Daedalus 106, no. 3 (1977): 41-60.
  • Hook, Glenn D., Julie Gilson, Christopher W. Hughes, and Hugo Dobson. Japan’s International Relations: Politics, Economics and Security. London: Routledge, 2001.
  • Hook, Glenn D., and Richard Siddle, eds. Japan and Okinawa: Structure and Subjectivity. London: Routledge Curzon, 2001.
  • Hotta, Eri. Japan 1941: Countdown to Infamy. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2013.
  • ———. Pan-Asianism and Japan’s War: 1931–1945. Basingstoke: Palgrave/Macmillan, 2007.
  • Inoguchi, Takashi. “Are There Any Theories of International Relations in Japan?” International Relations of the Asia-Pacific 7, no. 3 (2007): 369-90.
  • Inoguchi, Takashi, and Paul Bacon. “The Study of International Relations in Japan: Towards a More International Discipline.” International Relations of the Asia-Pacific 1, no. 1 (2001): 1-20.
  • Iriye, Akira. Cultural Internationalism and World Order. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997.
  • ———. Shin Nihon no Gaiko: Chikyuka Jidai no Nihon no Sentaku [New diplomacy of Japan: Japan’s choice in the global era]. Tokyo: Chuokoron, 1991.
  • Kang, David. East Asia before the West: Five Centuries of Trade and Tribute. New York: Columbia University Press, 2010.
  • Kawata, Tadashi, and Saburo Ninomiya. “The Development of the Study of International Relations in Japan.” The Developing Economies 2, no. 2 (1964): 190-204.
  • Keene, Edward. Beyond Anarchical Society: Grotius, Colonialism and Order in World Politics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002.
  • Lee, Seok-Won. “Empire and Social Science: Shinmei Masamichi and the East Asian Community in Interwar Japan.” Social Science Japan Journal 17, no. 1 (2013): 59-76.
  • Murata, Koji . “The Evolution of Japanese Studies of International Relations.” Japanese Journal of Political Science 11, no. 3 (2010): 355-65.
  • Nakano, Ryoko. “‘Pre-History’ of International Relations in Japan: Yanaihara Tadao’s Dual Perspective of Empire.” Millennium 35, no. 2 (2007): 301-20.
  • Yaqing, Qin. “International Society as a Process: Institutions, Identities, and China’s Peaceful Rise.” The Chinese Journal of International Politics 3, no. 2 (2010): 129-53.
  • ———. “A Relational Theory of World Politics.” International Studies Review 18, no. 1 (2016): 33-47.
  • ———. “Rule, Rules, and Relations: Towards a Synthetic Approach to Governance.” The Chinese Journal of International Politics 4, no. 2 (2011): 117-45.
  • Sakai, Tetsuya. Kindai Nihon no Kokusai Chitsujo [International order of modern Japan]. Tokyo: Iwanami, 2007.
  • Shani, Giorgio. “Towards a Post-Western IR: The Umma, Khalsa Panth, and critical international relations theory.” International Studies Review 10, no. 4 (2008): 722-34.
  • Shimizu, Kosuke. “The Ambivalent Relationship of Japan’s Soft Power Diplomacy and Princess Mononoke: Tosaka Jun’s philosophy of culture as moral reflection.” Japanese Journal of Political Science 15, no. 4 (2014): 683-98.
  • ———. “Materializing the ‘Non-Western’: Two Stories of Japanese Philosophers on Culture and Politics in the Inter-war Period.” Cambridge Review of International Affairs 28, no. 1 (2015): 3-20.
  • ———. “Nishida Kitaro and Japan’s Interwar Foreign Policy: War Involvement and Culturalist Political Discourse.” International Relations of the Asia-Pacific 11, no. 1 (2011): 157-83.
  • Smith, Steve, Ken Booth, and Marysia Zalewski. International Theory: Positivism and beyond. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998.
  • Suzuki, Shogo. Civilization and Empire: China and Japan’s Encounter with European International Society. London: Routledge, 2009.
  • Tansman, Alan, ed. The Culture of Japanese Fascism. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 2009.
  • Yamamoto, Kazuya. “International Relations Studies and Theories in Japan: A Trajectory Shaped by War, Pacifism, and Globalization.” International Relations of the Asia-Pacific 11, no. 2 (2011): 259-78.
  • Young, Louise. Japan’s Total Empire: Manchuria and the Culture of Wartime Imperialism. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998.
  • Zhao, Tingyang. “Rethinking Empire from a Chinese Concept ‘All-under-Heaven’.” Social Identities 12, no. 1 (2006): 29-41.
Year 2018, Volume: 7 Issue: 1, 121 - 136, 06.07.2017
https://doi.org/10.20991/allazimuth.326972

Abstract

References

  • Acharya, Amitav. “International Relations Theory and the ‘Rise of Asia’.” In Oxford Handbook of the International Relations of Asia, edited by Saadia Pekkanen, John Ravenhill, and Rosemary Foot, 120-40. New York: Oxford University Press, 2015.
  • Arrighi, Giovanni . “States, Markets, and Capitalism, East and West.” Positions 15, no. 2 (2007): 251-84.
  • Carr , E. H. The Twenty Years’ Crisis: 1919–1939. London: Macmillan, 1946.
  • Chen, Ching-Chang. “The Absence of Non-Western IR Theory in Asia Reconsidered.” International Relations of the Asia-Pacific 11, no. 1(2011): 1-23.
  • ———. “The Im/Possibility of Building Indigenous Theories in a Hegemonic Discipline: The Case of Japanese International Relations.” Asian Perspective 36, no. 3 (2012): 463-92.
  • Chen, Kuan-Hsing. “Takeuchi Yoshimi’s 1960 ‘Asia as Method’ Lecture.” Inter-Asia Cultural Studies 13, no. 2 (2012): 317-24.
  • Cox, Robert. “Social Forces, States and World Orders: beyond international relations theory.” Millennium 10, no. 2 (1981): 126-55.
  • Fairbank, John King, and Ta-tuan Ch’en, eds. The Chinese World Order: Traditional China’s Foreign Relations. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1968.
  • Frank, Andre Gunder. Re-Orient: Global Economy in the Asian Age. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998.
  • Goto-Jones, Chris. Political Philosophy in Japan: Nishida, the Kyoto School, and Co-Prosperity. London: Routledge, 2005.
  • ———, ed. Re-Politicising the Kyoto School as Philosophy. London: Routledge, 2008.
  • Hamashita, Takeshi. China, East Asia, and the Global Economy: Regional and Historical Perspectives. New York: Routledge, 2008.
  • ———. “Tribute and Emigration: Japan and the Chinese Administration of Foreign Affairs.” Senri Ethnological Studies 25 (1989): 69-86.
  • Hirano, Kenichiro. Kokusai Bunkaron [International cultural relations]. Tokyo: Tokyo University Press, 2000.
  • Hoffmann, Stanley. “An American Social Science: International Relations.” Daedalus 106, no. 3 (1977): 41-60.
  • Hook, Glenn D., Julie Gilson, Christopher W. Hughes, and Hugo Dobson. Japan’s International Relations: Politics, Economics and Security. London: Routledge, 2001.
  • Hook, Glenn D., and Richard Siddle, eds. Japan and Okinawa: Structure and Subjectivity. London: Routledge Curzon, 2001.
  • Hotta, Eri. Japan 1941: Countdown to Infamy. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2013.
  • ———. Pan-Asianism and Japan’s War: 1931–1945. Basingstoke: Palgrave/Macmillan, 2007.
  • Inoguchi, Takashi. “Are There Any Theories of International Relations in Japan?” International Relations of the Asia-Pacific 7, no. 3 (2007): 369-90.
  • Inoguchi, Takashi, and Paul Bacon. “The Study of International Relations in Japan: Towards a More International Discipline.” International Relations of the Asia-Pacific 1, no. 1 (2001): 1-20.
  • Iriye, Akira. Cultural Internationalism and World Order. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997.
  • ———. Shin Nihon no Gaiko: Chikyuka Jidai no Nihon no Sentaku [New diplomacy of Japan: Japan’s choice in the global era]. Tokyo: Chuokoron, 1991.
  • Kang, David. East Asia before the West: Five Centuries of Trade and Tribute. New York: Columbia University Press, 2010.
  • Kawata, Tadashi, and Saburo Ninomiya. “The Development of the Study of International Relations in Japan.” The Developing Economies 2, no. 2 (1964): 190-204.
  • Keene, Edward. Beyond Anarchical Society: Grotius, Colonialism and Order in World Politics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002.
  • Lee, Seok-Won. “Empire and Social Science: Shinmei Masamichi and the East Asian Community in Interwar Japan.” Social Science Japan Journal 17, no. 1 (2013): 59-76.
  • Murata, Koji . “The Evolution of Japanese Studies of International Relations.” Japanese Journal of Political Science 11, no. 3 (2010): 355-65.
  • Nakano, Ryoko. “‘Pre-History’ of International Relations in Japan: Yanaihara Tadao’s Dual Perspective of Empire.” Millennium 35, no. 2 (2007): 301-20.
  • Yaqing, Qin. “International Society as a Process: Institutions, Identities, and China’s Peaceful Rise.” The Chinese Journal of International Politics 3, no. 2 (2010): 129-53.
  • ———. “A Relational Theory of World Politics.” International Studies Review 18, no. 1 (2016): 33-47.
  • ———. “Rule, Rules, and Relations: Towards a Synthetic Approach to Governance.” The Chinese Journal of International Politics 4, no. 2 (2011): 117-45.
  • Sakai, Tetsuya. Kindai Nihon no Kokusai Chitsujo [International order of modern Japan]. Tokyo: Iwanami, 2007.
  • Shani, Giorgio. “Towards a Post-Western IR: The Umma, Khalsa Panth, and critical international relations theory.” International Studies Review 10, no. 4 (2008): 722-34.
  • Shimizu, Kosuke. “The Ambivalent Relationship of Japan’s Soft Power Diplomacy and Princess Mononoke: Tosaka Jun’s philosophy of culture as moral reflection.” Japanese Journal of Political Science 15, no. 4 (2014): 683-98.
  • ———. “Materializing the ‘Non-Western’: Two Stories of Japanese Philosophers on Culture and Politics in the Inter-war Period.” Cambridge Review of International Affairs 28, no. 1 (2015): 3-20.
  • ———. “Nishida Kitaro and Japan’s Interwar Foreign Policy: War Involvement and Culturalist Political Discourse.” International Relations of the Asia-Pacific 11, no. 1 (2011): 157-83.
  • Smith, Steve, Ken Booth, and Marysia Zalewski. International Theory: Positivism and beyond. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998.
  • Suzuki, Shogo. Civilization and Empire: China and Japan’s Encounter with European International Society. London: Routledge, 2009.
  • Tansman, Alan, ed. The Culture of Japanese Fascism. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 2009.
  • Yamamoto, Kazuya. “International Relations Studies and Theories in Japan: A Trajectory Shaped by War, Pacifism, and Globalization.” International Relations of the Asia-Pacific 11, no. 2 (2011): 259-78.
  • Young, Louise. Japan’s Total Empire: Manchuria and the Culture of Wartime Imperialism. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998.
  • Zhao, Tingyang. “Rethinking Empire from a Chinese Concept ‘All-under-Heaven’.” Social Identities 12, no. 1 (2006): 29-41.
There are 43 citations in total.

Details

Journal Section Articles
Authors

Kosuke Shimizu This is me

Publication Date July 6, 2017
Published in Issue Year 2018 Volume: 7 Issue: 1

Cite

Chicago Shimizu, Kosuke. “The Genealogy of Culturalist International Relations in Japan and Its Implications for Post-Western Discourse”. All Azimuth: A Journal of Foreign Policy and Peace 7, no. 1 (December 2017): 121-36. https://doi.org/10.20991/allazimuth.326972.

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