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May, 2008
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Incorporating Japan into the World History Curriculum: An Integrative Model


Kristine Dennehy
California State University, Fullerton

ACCORDING TO the California Department of Education's Curriculum Framework, the secondary curriculum for grades nine through twelve is geared toward students who are beginning "to develop [an] abstract understanding of historical causality—the often complex patterns of relationships between historical events, their multiple antecedents, and their consequences over time."1 Furthermore, the curriculum is based on a recognition of "the continuing need of many students for concrete illustrations and instructional approaches" if they are "to grasp the workings of political and social systems as systems and to engage in higher levels of policy analysis and decision making."2 As a way to realize these goals within the social studies curriculum, this article will introduce course content material and accompanying teaching strategies to facilitate the incorporation of modern Japanese history into the world history curriculum. Readers are encouraged to adapt these strategies for use in their own classrooms. Teachers can use selections of this course content material and modify these lesson plans for immediate implementation at a variety of educational levels. 1
      The broader aim of this article is to show how these changes in curriculum choices can serve to fill many of the gaps that exist in the teaching of world history. There is a tendency for Asia to be marginalized or even neglected, in comparison with the attention given to historical events in the United States and Western Europe, in many cases because teachers are not as familiar with the primary source material or the current historiography of Asian history.3 The material and strategies discussed here are adapted from a teacher training seminar on modern Japanese history conducted in Anaheim, California in 2004 as part of a series called Teach Asia.4 Connie DeCapite, the director of this series, and I collaborated in compiling sources and devising lesson plans that could be used right away by the seminar participants with their own students, regardless of the level of background knowledge in the area of Japanese history.5 2
      The use of the term "integrative model" refers to the format of the seminar, which differed from the conventional model where a professor who specializes in Japanese history stands behind a podium and lectures to teachers. Rather, the format of this seminar integrated historiographical issues and pedagogical strategies into a more interactive presentation of the materials. An essential component of this process was leading the participants through a specific lesson right after an overview of the key content material. This was a process that teachers then successfully adapted for use in their own classrooms after completion of the seminar. In this way, primary documents authored by nineteenth-century Japanese statesmen, for example, were integrated into the social studies curriculum, thereby reducing the tendency to focus solely on the actions and perspectives of Westerners during this time period. These are managable adjustments that can be made by individual teachers to complicate the problematic notion of "the West and the rest" that often dominates the teaching of modern world history. 3
      This seminar was geared toward the California Grade Ten History-Social Science Content Standards for World History, Culture, and Geography: The Modern World, particularly items 10.3–10.11 which include an examination and analysis of the following:
  1. the effects of the Industrial Revolution
  2. patterns of global change in the era of New Imperialism
  3. the causes and effects of World War I and II
  4. international developments in the post-WWII world
  5. contemporary nation-building and global integration6
 4
      These five areas are taken as conventional markers of the momentous shifts in global power that spurred on increasing interaction among peoples around the world in the modern era. By looking at these events and processes through the lens of the modern Japanese experience, topics of inquiry like the Industrial Revolution become more multifaceted, beyond the standard narrative of the invention of the steam engine in Britain and the origins of the machine age. Although the main points covered here coincide with these California high school-level standards, they can be adapted and used in a variety of locales and teaching environments, including college-level undergraduate surveys and seminars. These materials are particularly well-suited for undergraduates who plan to be social studies teachers and can eventually use the content material and integrated teaching strategies in their own classrooms. Suggestions will also be made as to how these lessons on Japan can be used to draw comparisons to other trends in modern world history and modified for students with various levels of English language proficiency, vocabulary, and organizational and writing abilities. The goal of this article is also to have readers adapt these lessons to suit the skills and interests of their own students. Teachers who are looking to broaden the geographic and thematic scope of their social studies lessons will find concrete examples from modern Asian history that can be used in this way. 5
      The four-hour Teach Asia seminar was divided into four parts, each of which focused on a major issue in the historiography of modern Japan, such as debates over the nature of Japanese imperialism. These four points were chosen as a way to introduce the teachers to some of the key concerns in modern Japanese historiography so they could develop an appreciation for the controversies and multiple perspectives found in the current scholarship.7 This set the tone for the seminar at each stage, by encouraging teachers to approach historical materials and issues with a mindset of critical inquiry. In this way, rather than listing the "facts" of modern Japanese history, they were presented with a set of issues that could be investigated using methods specific to the discipline of history, such as the analysis of primary source documents. The four issues and accompanying questions in each section were as follows:
  1. Catching up with the West
         How does the mindset of catching up with the West characterize Japan's agenda from the 19th century through today?
         Primary source/lesson: document analysis and poster representing key features of the Charter Oath of 1868
  2. Japanese Imperialism
         How does Japanese imperialism compare with Western imperialism in the late 19th and early 20th century?
         Primary source/lesson: think/pair/share responses to "Fukuzawa Yukichi on Empire"
  3. 1945: Break or Continuity?
         Does the year 1945 mark a significant breaking point in modern Japanese history or can the decades of the 1930s-1950s be characterized more by points of continuity?
         Primary source/lesson: T-chart listing points to support each side8
  4. U.S.-led Occupation
         Which elements had the greatest influence on the relatively quick and peaceful rebuilding of Japan after World War II: the role of Douglas MacArthur and the U.S.-led Occupation, or the actions and efforts of Japanese people themselves?
         How do American policies and the global environment in immediate postwar Japan compare and contrast to Iraq today?
         Primary source/lesson: Venn diagram comparing and contrasting the U.S. Occupation of Japan and Iraq9
 6
   

Catching up with the West

 
      By starting with an issue like Japanese efforts to catch up with Western nations, the seminar brought attention to the following major trends of the mid-late nineteenth century: changes in technology, transportation, and trade as a result of the industrial revolution, and the effects of imperialist expansion in the age of gunboat diplomacy. As stated above, these coincide with the California Standards which call for students to "Discuss the locations of colonial rule of such nations as England, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Russia, Spain, Portugal, and the United States." In addition, students should be able to "explain imperialism from the perspective of the colonizers and the colonized and the varied immediate and long-term responses by the people under colonial rule."10 This particular wording brings to light the importance of looking at Japan in comparative perspective, so that the actions of the Japanese government in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century are examined and evaluated in light of the larger global context of industrialization and expansionism.11 One way to do this, as we explained in the accompanying lesson plan for this section, is to work with students in understanding a key document crafted by the statemen of the Meiji era (1868–1912), the Charter Oath of 1868, which was a clear reflection of the Japanese priorities to engage with world powers in a new way from the mid-nineteenth century on. 7
      Japan was in a unique position as the only Asian country to emerge from these imperial contacts a major global empire by the early twentieth century. So, how did a mindset of "catching up with the West" play a role in this trajectory of modern Japanese history? In the historiographical overview of this section, we started with a consideration of the legacies of the Tokugawa period (1603–1868), particularly the process of protoindustrialization and the use of the term "early modern" to describe this era which preceded Japan's industrial age.12 It was this foundation of protocapitalist industries like silk cloth production that enabled Japan to industrialize as rapidly and efficiently as it did. In contrast to the stereotype of Japan as a sleepy backwater, the Tokugawa period was in fact an era of much economic vibrancy and development. By reviewing the economic, social, and intellectual trends that had been developing in the seventeenth through mid-nineteenth centuries, the emphasis was placed on indigenous factors that played a part in Japan's modernization and industrialization.13 This brought attention to the problems of constructing a historical timeline solely based on developments in the West, and encouraged teachers to be aware of the Eurocentric nature of starting the story of modern Japanese history with the arrival of Commodore Perry in 1853. 8
      However, as a matter of practicality in dealing with this specific curriculum, we moved quickly to a discussion of the particular challenges the Tokugawa shogunate faced as it gave way to the leadership of the Meiji period in 1868. We reviewed three particular issues in this section: the nature and effects of the unequal treaties, the goals and accomplishments of the Iwakura Mission, and the role of foreign advisors in the Meiji era. For each issue, the teachers were encouraged to see the significance of these events and historical processes from the perspective of a newly emerging Japanese state that was confronted by the economic and political power of Western imperialist nations. Although Japan was never colonized by a Western power, the term "semi-colonized" has been used to describe the limitations on Japanese sovereignty as a result of the unequal Ansei treaties of the 1850s, or as it was known specifically in the case of the treaty with America, the U.S.-Japan Treaty of Amity and Commerce of 1858. 9
      In discussing the unequal treaties, we covered the basic issues of economic and legal inequality, and key terms like extraterritoriality. In this section, stress was also placed on the significance of the psychological effect that these treaties had on Japanese leaders, smacking as they did of Social Darwinism and a Western disdain for the "uncivilized" nature of Japanese laws and institutions. This led to a review of the Iwakura Mission (1871–73), whose delegates had the task of revising the unequal treaties. While the delegates failed in this regard, the members of this elite group did succeed in making the most of their time abroad by studying and meticulously recording information that served as the basis for many of the political, economic, and social reforms carried out in Japan over the next several decades. Given this background, we then looked at the Meiji government's policy of hiring foreign advisers and the role this played in aiding Japan's rapid modernization.14 In this case as well, particular attention was given to the mindset of the Japanese government at that time, which was to carry out these reforms as much as possible on Japan's own terms. In the hiring of foreign advisers, for example, the priority was on training the next generation of Japanese specialists in various fields (Western medicine, railroad engineering, etc.) as quickly as possible, so that the Japanese themselves would be highly trained and thus, not dependent on Westerners any longer than necessary. Such an approach fosters an appreciation for the historical agency of the Japanese themselves, rather than focusing solely on the actions and records of Western governments and private citizens from this time period. 10
      In this way, participants were now prepared to address several key issues related to modern Japanese history in a way that would encourage their students to "consider multiple accounts of events in order to understand international relations from a variety of perspectives."15 In studies of mid-nineteenth-century encounters between strong Western powers and other parts of the world, there is a tendency to emphasize, if not glorify, the developments of the industrial age and the spread of technology that we have come to take for granted in our contemporary age. We cannot imagine our lives without these revolutionary scientific inventions, and in the search for the origins of these developments, Western Europe becomes the focal point from which all other aspects of modern world history emanate. This approach, however, can perpetuate a certain style of world history instruction that can be summed up as "the West and the rest." In the case of Japan, of course we cannot ignore the tremendous impact that Western European inventions and institutions had on its modern trajectory. However, we can shift the focal point away from privileging the accomplishments of Western thinkers and government leaders, and instead also include the indigenous trends of Japanese protoindustrialization and the motivating factors, as seen through the eyes of Japanese politicians and intellectuals, that prompted them to take the path they did in the late nineteenth century. 11
      After covering these points, the teachers were asked to review the text of the Charter Oath of 1868 and respond to specific questions about this primary document. Prior to coming to the seminar, teachers were given a binder with other examples of primary and secondary source material, so we used those materials to link them to the points we had just discussed regarding the unequal treaties, the Iwakura Mission, and foreign advisers. As a hands-on activity, teachers formed small groups and collectively came up with posters that represented various features of Japan's process of "catching up with the West." For instance, they drew the ships of the Iwakura Mission on the shores of England, with depictions of things like trains and schools that represented the kinds of technology and institutions the Japanese wanted to learn about while they were abroad. Each group member explained at least one feature of the poster which required them to identify and describe a particular feature of Japan's encounters with expanding empires in the nineteenth century. These kinds of lessons can be replicated and tailored to the strengths and interests of students at a particular grade level. This kind of activity gives students a means to express their understanding of the material in creative, artistic ways that can supplement other means of assessment, such as essay composition. 12
      Depending on the level of the students, the poster exercise could be conducted in a variety of ways to link elements of Japan's encounters with the West to other trends in world history at this time. For example, students could be asked to compare and contrast the mindset and actions of the Meiji government to those of China's Qing dynasty in the mid-nineteenth century. In this case, a review of major events like the Opium Wars of 1839–1841 is instructive for two reasons. First, it was an important precedent that Japanese leaders learned from in assessing the intentions and potential threat of Western powers at this time. It helped to foster a mindset in Japan that made military reforms and funding a priority. Second, it serves to illustrate the changing structure of international relations at this time, from the ceremonial exchanges and trade which accompanied the Sinocentric tributary system, to a treaty system based on the idea of sovereign nation-states.16 It is also noteworthy that Japan, which signed these unequal treaties under the threat of violent Western retaliation in the 1850s, made a decision to join this new world order and impose the same kinds of inequalities on neighboring Korea under the terms of the 1876 Treaty of Kanghwa.17 This assessment of the actions and historical agency of leaders in Japan, China, and Korea also shifts attention away from a primary focus on the dominant influences and legacies of the Western presence in Asia in the mid-nineteenth century, to an appreciation of the various historical continuities and breaks that characterize the region of East Asia during this period of dynamic change. 13
   

Japanese Imperialism

 
      In the section on Japanese imperialism, we examined both the particular geographic context of the Japanese empire as well as the causal factors of Japanese expansionism, especially as they compare with the motivations of Western empires such as England and France.18 Whereas Western colonies were separated by large gaps of both geography and culture, Japan's colonies were in much closer geographic proximity, and tended to share cultural traditions such as Confucian ideology and Buddhism. While it was important to review some of these key features of Asian history, a distinction was made between these elements of cultural similarity and the ways in which the Japanese state exploited these connections in the early twentieth century as a way to further their political aims. 14
      The discussion of motivating factors behind Japanese expansionism was combined with a review of the historiographical debates over the nature of Japanese imperialism in Asia. For example, we started by looking at Marxist-inspired evaluations of Japanese imperialism, based on concepts like historical materialism, class struggle, and a critical view of capitalism's exploitative effects on the masses. Due to the combined influence of Marxism and strong empirical traditions in Japanese historiography, many studies rely on voluminous quantitative data to argue that economic forces were the primary factors driving Japanese expansionism in Asia.19 Among works by historians who invoked Lenin's theory of imperialism as the next stage of capitalism, a great number focused on historical events like peasant uprisings and processes like the trade of Japanese manufactured goods to the colonies in exchange for the import of natural resources like foodstuffs and minerals. While these economic histories are useful in many ways, historians must also take into account other factors, such as Japan's strategic considerations, to appreciate the complexity of this historical process. 15
      We then shifted gears to consider the theory that Japanese expansionism was fundamentally defensive in nature. That is to say, Japanese leaders felt sufficiently threatened by the possibility of Western nations colonizing Japan (or nearby areas that might then lead to Japan's eventual capitulation to Western control) that they had to protect their own borders by expanding toward the Asian mainland. The notion of inevitability is an important part of this argument, which has become extremely popular in recent years in Japan thanks to best-selling writers like Fujioka Nobukatsu and Nishio Kanji who celebrate the glories of the Japanese empire.20 The material in this section then became a vehicle to explore contemporary debates about Japanese nationalism and the popularity of such theories in the context of current controversies like the visits to Yasukuni Shrine by conservative Japanese politicians. 16
      Looking at Japan's strategic considerations can also open up this part of the curriculum to a review of global geography and other momentous events that coincided with key dates on the timeline of Japanese expansionism, such as the October Revolution of 1905 and the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–05, as seen from the Russian perspective. A consideration of Russia's domestic concerns complicates the argument that the waning Russian monarchy had the resources and inclination to assert control over areas like Korea and Manchuria, and that the Meiji oligarchy had no choice but to take on this empire as a result. In the case of Korea, Meiji leaders relied on the logic expressed by the phrase which characterized the neighboring peninsula as "a dagger pointed at the heart of Japan."21 In 1905, Korea became a protectorate of Japan, and with this new-found prestige on the world stage with its victory over Russia, the Japanese military only became stronger and more far-reaching in the subsequent decades. 17
      And yet, while 1905 marked a turning point in this militaristic expansion, it was also a time when Japan was celebrated by leaders like India's Jawaharlal Nehru for being the first Asian country to beat a Western nation as a player in the international arena of power politics. Tokyo in particular became a magnet for Asian reformers like Sun Yat-sen who sought to replicate Japan's success in terms of creating and carrying out a national plan to modernize, maintain its independence, and even compete on an equal footing with Western military powers. At this time, as the Japanese were emerging as a model in many ways for other Asian countries, elder statesmen like Ito Hirobumi were simultaneously engaged in negotiations with Western nations on an ongoing basis in efforts to garner a certain amount of prestige in international circles. When Japan defeated China in 1895, the acquisition of Taiwan as a colony served most importantly as a marker of Japan's prestige and status as an imperial power, despite other setbacks to Japan at this time, such as the Triple Intervention. In this early phase of Japanese expansionism, leaders like Ito decided that it was in their best interest in the long term to capitulate to demands by the French, Russians, and Germans to cede territory on the Liaotung peninsula. Thus, it can be argued that the prestige accorded to Japan by gaining Taiwan and the prospect of slowly and steadily establishing itself as an imperial power on this island in the Pacific outweighed the potential gains offered by a Japanese presence in an area on the Chinese mainland that was still contested among stronger European empires. 18
      For the lesson plan on imperialism, the teachers had read primary documents by a leading Meiji intellectual, Fukuzawa Yukichi, the author of best-sellers like Conditions in the West in the mid-nineteenth century. In his perceptive observations about the West, he urged his Japanese audience to realize the inevitability of the changes brought about by Western military powers. In the same way that Meiji statesmen like Ito Hirobumi worked to secure a new place for Japan in the diplomatic realm, Fukuzawa spent much of his energy preparing ordinary Japanese citizens for a world where "[n]ations gained advantage on the basis of power and strength and the axiom 'survival of the fittest' applied to nations as well as species."22 In the excerpts from Fukuzawa's writings, there were numerous quotes that encapsulated the distinctions he saw between the historical trajectory of Western nation-states, and that of Japan, a latecomer in the quest for overseas colonies. For example, in 1876, he wrote the following:

Wherever the Europeans come, the land ceases to be productive, and trees and plants cease to grow. Worse still, the human race sometimes dies out. If people understand these things clearly, and at the same time realize that Japan is an Eastern country, they must inevitably fear for the future, even though up till now Japan has suffered no great harm from foreign intercourse.23
 19
      In the "think, pair, share" activity, the teachers came up with their own list of comparisons with Western imperialism based on the points we had reviewed, such as causal factors, and the excerpts they could cite from Fukuzawa's texts to serve as historical evidence. When considering how to adapt this kind of activity, readers can build upon lessons they have had success with in examinations of European imperialism. During the Teach Asia seminar, participants shared their responses in pairs before opening up the discussion to the entire group. This gave them a chance to exchange information and examples from other areas of world history, such as comparisons with Great Britain and India, to expand their scope of analysis. As in a classroom setting, Connie and I circulated among the pairs of teachers during this second phase of the activity so that we could address any misunderstandings or clarify particular details about the Japanese context, and then raise some of those issues in the general discussion with all the participants. Teachers in a high school classroom can adapt this lesson by pairing up students with different ranges of verbal and writing skills, so that students can also learn from each other in the process of sharing these ideas. 20
   

1945: Break or Continuity?

 
      In 1993, Andrew Gordon, a leading historian of modern Japan in the United States, edited a volume called Postwar Japan as History.24 One of the central questions addressed by the authors can be summed up as follows: "Was 1945 a clear breaking point in Japanese history, or are there more points of historical continuity across this supposed divide?" This question can be examined by looking at two areas, the economy and policies toward women, both of which underwent drastic change after 1945, yet also experienced elements of continuity. Since the activity at the end was based on a T-chart worksheet, teachers were encouraged to take notes using that chart to list which aspects of postwar life were more connected to the prewar and wartime years, and which aspects constituted more of a break with the past. 21
      In the economic realm, there were strong continuities in postwar Japan in terms of the influence of state-led directives, priorities, and incentives that emanated from the central government. In studies of Japan's post-World War II economic success, the triad of conservative political parties (most notably, the Liberal Democratic Party, formed in 1955), the bureaucracy (especially the Ministry of International Trade and Industry, MITI), and big business (as represented by the zaibatsu conglomerates and the Federation of Economic Organizations, or Keidanren) are often cited as the leaders of this postwar "miracle," but the roots of all these organizations and institutions can clearly be traced back to the decades before 1945. 22
      On the other hand, there are also a number of factors after 1945 that stand in stark contrast to Japan's economic position before World War II. Though Japan had the economy of an expanding empire before 1945, the postwar years were dominated by high-growth strategies which brought about significant improvements in incomes and material living conditions for the average Japanese citizen by the early 1970s. An example of this postwar shift in economic strategies is the 1960 Income Doubling Plan carried out by Prime Minister Ikeda Hayato.25 This plan "reaffirmed government responsibility for social welfare, vocational training, and education and increased spending considerably in these areas. It also sought to eliminate low-wage jobs and regional income disparities."26 Attention to these kinds of quality of life issues indicates a clear break from the state-directed economic policies of the prewar and wartime years. 23
      We then touched on the breaks and continuities regarding policies directed specifically toward women after 1945. In this sphere, the changes brought about by constitutional reforms were quite significant. These included suffrage for women and a gender equality clause.27 However, it is also important to note that Japanese feminists and others had been lobbying for greater political rights before they were "bestowed" by the Occupation authorities. So, while these postwar legal and political reforms do constitute a break with the past in the sense of actual legislation, coverage of these issues in the classroom should also include some discussion of the historical precedents in the struggle for women's rights by the Japanese themselves. Once women did have the right to vote, they did so at higher rates compared to Japan's male citizenry. 24
      Among state policies towards women, a number of distinctions can be drawn between the goals of Japan's wartime government and those of the postwar authorities. One area that can be compared globally to policies in other wartime nations such as Germany is imperial Japan's pronatalist agenda which mobilized women as the bearers of children for the sake of the nation. This contrasts greatly with the postwar emphasis on family planning, a policy which coincided with Japan's larger economic goals of stability and high-speed growth. By drawing such global comparisons, teachers can introduce material to supplement other components of the Content Standards in a new way. For example, point number five of Standard 10.8, regarding the causes and consequences of World War II, requires an analysis of "the Nazi policy of pursuing racial purity, especially against the European Jews; its transformation into the Final Solution; and the Holocaust that resulted in the murder of six million Jewish civilians."28 Understandably, most teachers' lessons on World War II in Europe tend to focus on the Holocaust and the death and destruction that resulted. Yet, another aspect of the Nazi agenda of racial purity was the simultaneous promotion of increasing the population with people who fit a particular mold. In this sense, there are clear historical parallels in Nazi and Japanese wartime pronatalist policies of fostering the birth of certain kinds of people at the expense of millions of others who lost their lives in World War II. 25
      All of the factors mentioned above can be listed on the T-charts containing the various issues related to the historical breaks and continuities after 1945. This information can also serve as the basis for an essay assignment which requires students to compare and contrast Japan's economy, politics, and society before and after 1945. In response to the question, "does 1945 mark a break, or were there more elements of continuity?" students often hesitate to take a definitive side, so a review of the T-chart also conveys that the reality was indeed more nuanced and complex, depending on which realm and policies the historian chooses to study and document. Readers are urged to try this kind of T-chart review by highlighting a certain realm, such as economic growth, that may stand out in students' minds as particularly relevant to the study of Japanese history. 26
   

U.S.-led Occupation

 
      The final section focused on the Occupation period (1945–1952), where we assessed the role of the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers (SCAP) and the Japanese people in rebuilding the country in such a relatively quick and peaceful manner.29 The contemporary situation regarding the U.S. role in Iraq made our discussion of these issues particularly relevant, as we also linked this lesson to a comparison of these two cases of American foreign policy and international relations. In looking at the U.S.-led Occupation of Japan, we started by examining the overall mindset of the authorities who declared that this was not to be a punitive occupation. Vindictive policies that could potentially alienate the Japanese populace were avoided in favor of an occupation structure that fostered not only their cooperation, but their active, willing leadership in carrying out its aims of political stability and economic growth. 27
      This decision can also be looked at in the context of the aftermath of World War I which, as is noted in the Content Standards, created a "widespread disillusionment with prewar institutions, authorities, and values that resulted in a void that was later filled by totalitarians."30 SCAP's decision not to impose punitive measures in occupied Japan stemmed in large part from an acknowledgement that the settlement at Versailles was a significant factor in the creation of conditions that led to totalitarian rule after 1919. By linking World War I and II in this way, teachers can broaden the scope of their descriptions and analyses of these key turning points in twentieth-century world history to include examples from the historical context of modern Asia as well. 28
      The more positive interpretations of the Occupation era tend to emphasize the liberating nature of the early postwar period, compared to what would be deemed Japan's fascist wartime past. In addition, such views stress how these reforms allowed indigenous aspirations for peace and democracy to flourish once the ultra-nationalistic, militaristic government was defeated. Drawing a progressive historical timeline ties the democratic reforms of the postwar period to earlier struggles for greater political participation, such as the efforts of the Freedom and People's Rights Movement leaders in the 1880s and the twentieth-century achievements of the "Taisho Democracy" era, including universal male suffrage.31 29
      A more critical approach can be found in the extraordinarily dense, empirically rich study, Inside GHQ by Takamae Eiji, a leading authority on the Occupation period.32 Takemae does not shy away from examining the less pleasant aspects of this period, including such things as the proliferation of prostitution due to the extreme poverty of the times. He writes, "By 1949, there were an estimated 59,000 prostitutes, many of them clustered around US military bases."33 Furthermore, Takemae argues that, for the Japanese people, "Prostitution, state-sponsored and voluntary, epitomized the ignominy of defeat and occupation by a foreign power."34 Incorporating these statistics and evaluations into his study reveals Takemae's perspective that necessarily includes a thorough treatment of both the successes and problems of this period. 30
      In the case of postwar Japanese history, a familiarity with the current state of scholarship among Japanese historians and others will again serve to foster a consideration of "multiple accounts of events in order to understand international relations from a variety of perspectives."35 Multiple perspectives can also be found in debates over the so-called "reverse course,"a term that refers to SCAP's policy of shifting its initial reformist goals of demilitarization and democratization to a new emphasis on economic recovery and political stability. When looking at this phenomenon of the reverse course it is helpful to put the events of Occupied Japan into the wider global context of the Cold War. 31
      Turning points like the Truman Doctrine of 1947 coincided with American decisions to place a priority on economic and political stability in Japan at the expense of a wider scope of democratic freedoms of expression and assembly. These points fit in well with the aims of Content Standards 10.9, which cover "international developments in the post-World War II world." Point one compares "the economic and military power shifts caused by the war, including the Yalta Pact, the development of nuclear weapons, Soviet control over Eastern European nations, and the economic recoveries of Germany and Japan." While there were dramatic shifts in Japan's economy and military immediately after its surrender, an examination of the reverse course also illuminates the ongoing reassessment of changes in direction and priorities as the Cold War heated up in Europe and Asia, particularly along the 38th parallel on the Korean peninsula in 1950. 32
      One of the most dramatic shifts in Occupation policy as a result of the reverse course was the introduction of Japanese institutions that could be tied to its militaristic past. Although Article Nine of the 1947 Constitution placed limits on Japan's offensive capabilities, the tensions of the Cold War and the outbreak of the Korean War across the Japan Sea allowed for the build-up of a stronger military alliance between Japan and the U.S. For instance, as James Auer revealed in his study of Japan's postwar maritime forces, in a secret agreement between American and Japanese officials, "Between October 2 and December 12, 1950, 46 Japanese minesweepers, one large 'guinea pig' vessel used for activating pressure mines, and 1,200 former naval personnel were employed in operations at Korean ports... One Japanese sailor was killed and eight were injured."36 The Korean War precipitated the organization of a National Police Reserve Force, followed by the 1954 formation of the Self-Defense Forces (SDF). In Michael Green's study of Japan's postwar defense production, he examines Japan-U.S. relations and argues that "With each new degree of bilateral defense cooperation, the pro-defense constituency has grown stronger and entered further into the mainstream."37 Throughout the postwar period, Japan has remained one of the United States' strongest allies in the region. 33
      As a final exercise, we reviewed the aims and outcomes of the Occupation period by examining State-directed policies, such as the initial goals of democratization and demilitarization, as well as the events and actions spearheaded by the Japanese populace. Because in the previous section, we had clearly identified pre-1945 points of continuity, participants had a better understanding of the indigenous precedents to the sweeping reforms directed by SCAP. We then used a Venn diagram to compare and contrast the American presence in Occupied Japan to that of American troops in Iraq in 2004. This provided an opportunity for participants to bring in their own store of information and interpretations of contemporary political events, and then put them in a wider global historical perspective through this comparison. 34
      In the center section of the Venn diagram, we listed elements of comparison such as the dominant role of the U.S. in world politics and the global economy, as well as the similarities in rhetoric that identify America as having a unique role in spreading democracy and liberating people in other nations from their own oppressive governments. In the case of Iraq, some of the obvious differences are elements such as Islamic fundamentalism, natural resources like oil, and the unstable geopolitical situation of the wider Middle East region surrounding Iraq's borders. In the case of Japan, the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki made for a unique situation of defeat and utter exhaustion on the part of the Japanese people. Yet, at the same time, Emperor Hirohito (in no danger of being condemned as a war criminal, thanks to MacArthur) served as a powerful symbol of unity and continuity in Occupied Japan. Iraq had no comparable unifying monarch. In postwar Japan, there was certainly far less violent resistance to the American military, although that is not to say that all Japanese blindly accepted and embraced all the changes. For instance, as trains loaded with war materials made their way to the Japan Sea coast at the time of the Korean war, there were cases of ethnic Koreans in Japan laying themselves down on the tracks as a way of protesting against America's regional military strategies and Japan's postwar "collaboration" with these aims. As we saw in the section on the reverse course, such threats of opposition to the dominant aims of the Occupation authorities were dealt with swiftly. 35
   

Conclusion

 
      As stated in the California Department of Education's Curriculum Framework for grades nine through twelve, students at this age are developing abstract analytical thinking skills that can be applied in many ways to the historical issues raised in this article.38 For instance, an understanding of the causes and effects of the two world wars are essential if we are to make sense of the larger economic, political, and social systems within which we operate every day. When we challenge our students to consider the historical legacy of policies like those of SCAP in 1945 not to impose a punitive occupation on Japan, given the lessons learned after Versailles, we can come to truly appreciate the complexity of the task to "deepen and extend their understanding of the more demanding civic learnings: understanding, for example, political conflict in a free society and its resolution under law."39 36
      Based on the content material and lesson plans outlined above, teachers should be able to integrate elements of modern Japanese history into their world history curriculum, with a renewed attention to the following three points:
  1. the historical agency of the Japanese people
  2. the range of opinions and pluralism that exists in Japan
  3. ways to link modern Japanese history to other global trends
 37
      An awareness of the motivations and outlooks of the Japanese people since the mid-nineteenth century is essential if we are to move away from a purely Eurocentric model of studying modern world history. Concrete illustrations, such as the Japanese views regarding the unequal treaties of the 1850s, have been given here as a way to incorporate such perspectives. Contentious topics like evaluations of Japanese aggression in Asia must include an acknowledgement that these problems have also engendered controversy within Japan among historians as well as ordinary citizens. By approaching such topics through the lessons presented above, students can engage with debates of historical interpretation based on the relevant primary source documentation. The examples of linking these points to other historical contexts can be used now with an understanding of the recent historiography. Teachers and students will themselves become integrated into the network of those engaged in ongoing research related to Japan's past, present, and future place in the world. 38


Notes

1.  California Department of Education, History-Social Science Framework for California Public Schools, http://www.cde.ca.gov/re/pn/fd/documents/hist-social-sci-frame.pdf.

2.  Ibid.

3.  A useful text that addresses this problem is Ainslie T. Embree and Carol Gluck, ed., Asia in Western and World History: A Guide for Teaching (Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe, 1997).

4.  Teach Asia is a National Consortium for Teaching About Asia program presented by Fullerton International Resources for Students and Teachers (FIRST) with funding from the Freeman Foundation. Before each session, teachers received a binder to review ahead of time, with background reading from the Social Science Education Consortium (Boulder, CO, 1995), including materials from Lynn S. Parisi, Sara Thompson, and Anne Stevens, Meiji Japan: The Dynamics of National Change and Jonathan N. Lipman, Kathleen Woods Masalski, and Alan Chalk, Imperial Japan: Expansion and War.

5.  The impetus to publish and share the results of this seminar came from the positive feedback given to Connie DeCapite after teachers successfully replicated these lessons with their students.

6.  These main points are culled from the California History-Social Science Content Standards, hereafter cited as Content Standards, http://www.cde.ca.gov/be/st/ss/hstgrade10.asp.

7.  See, for example, Andre Schmid, "Colonialism and the 'Korea Problem' in the Historiography of Modern Japan: A Review Article," Journal of Asian Studies 59:4 (November 2000): 951–976.

8.  For the T-chart activity, simply draw an enlarged capital "T" on a worksheet and add headings to the left and right side of the T's vertical line which goes down the middle of the page; points indicating a break are listed on the left, and points of continuity are listed on the right.

9.  A Venn diagram consists of two intersecting circles, thus creating three spaces to fill in with factors of comparison and contrast. The overlapping space in the middle is filled in with points of comparison (factors related to the Occupations of Japan and Iraq that are similar), while the non-overlapping areas of each circle are filled in with factors unique to Japan (the post-1945 Asian context) and Iraq (twenty-first-century Middle East context), respectively.

10.  Content Standards.

11.  This approach is emphasized in the preface to Andrew Gordon's A Modern History of Japan: From Tokugawa Times to the Present (New York: Oxford University Press, 2003), xii.

12.  James W. White. Ikki: Social Conflict and Political Protests in Early Modern Japan (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1995), 66. For a critique of misconceptions about this period, see Henry D. Smith, II, "Five Myths About Early Modern Japan," in Embree and Gluck, ed., op. cit., 514–522.

13.  In this teaching seminar, we focused primarily on the economic aspects of early modern Japan, so as to illuminate the variety of contexts around the world that met the challenges of the Industrial Revolution, our first topic of inquiry. For a discussion of other elements of the early modern politics and society, see James L. McClain, Japan: A Modern History (New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 2002), 98–103.

14.  Hazel J. Jones, "The Formulation of the Meiji Government Policy Toward the Employment of Foreigners," Monumenta Nipponica 23: 1/2 (1968): 9–30.

15.  This is from the introduction to the Content Standards cited above.

16.  For a useful analysis of this time of transition, see Key-Hiuk Kim, The Last Phase of the East Asian World Order: Korea, Japan, and the Chinese Empire (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980).

17.  Peter Duus. The Abacus and the Sword: The Japanese Penetration of Korea, 1895–1910 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995), 46–49.

18.  For a good overview of some key comparisons by a specialist on European colonialism in Africa, see Lewis H. Gann, "Western and Japanese Colonialism: Some Preliminary Comparisons" in Ramon H. Myers and Mark R. Peattie, ed., The Japanese Colonial Empire, 1895–1945 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1984), 497–525.

19.  Peter Duus discusses the "influence of Marxist-Leninist theories of imperialism" in his essay, "Economic Dimensions of Meiji Imperialism: The Case of Korea, 1895–1910," in Myers and Peattie, ed., ibid., p. 128.

20.  Laura Hein and Mark Selden, "The Lessons of War, Global Power, and Social Change," in Hein and Selden, ed., Censoring History: Citizenship and Memory in Japan, Germany, and the United States (Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe, 2000), 25–29.

21.  In my Japan survey lectures on this topic to undergraduates at California State University Fullerton, I am always sure to include the contrasting Korean perspective, which characterizes itself as "a shrimp among the whales" of the Pacific, i.e., Japan, China, Russia, and the U.S.

22.  Helen M. Hopper, Fukuzawa Yukichi: From Samurai to Capitalist (New York: Pearson Longman, 2005), 120.

23.  This translation is found in Carmen Blacker's The Japanese Enlightenment: A Study of the Writings of Fukuzawa Yukichi (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1964), 129–136.

24.  Andrew Gordon, ed., Postwar Japan as History (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993).

25.  David J. Lu, ed., Japan: A Documentary History, The Late Tokugawa Period to the Present (Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe, 1997), 527–531.

26.  Laura E. Hein, "Growth Versus Success: Japan's Economic Policy in Historical Perspective," in Gordon, ed., op. cit., 114.

27.  Lu, ed., op. cit., 472–473.

28.  Content Standards.

29.  While the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers refers to General Douglas MacArthur, the acronym SCAP is also used to refer to the Occupation forces and governing apparatus more generally.

30.  Content Standards.

31.  For a critique of the term "Taisho Democracy," see Andrew Gordon, Labor and Imperial Democracy in Prewar Japan (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991), 5–10.

32.  Takemae Eiji, Inside GHQ: The Allied Occupation of Japan and Its Legacy, trans. Robert Ricketts and Sebastian Swann (New York: Continuum, 2002).

33.  Ibid., 71.

34.  Ibid., 70. He states this in a caption underneath a photo of the shadows of prostitutes reflected off a building in Ginza in the autumn of 1945.

35.  Content Standards.

36.  James E. Auer, The Postwar Rearmament of Japanese Maritime Forces, 1945–71 (New York: Praeger Publishers, 1973), 66.

37.  Michael J. Green, Arming Japan: Defense Production, Alliance Politics, and the Postwar Search for Autonomy (New York: Columbia University Press, 1995), 25.

38. History-Social Science Framework for California Public Schools.

39.  Ibid.

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