How did they manage an Empire?

At first, shoguns, who were hereditary commanders of the Japanese army, governed Japan since 1500 until 1867 with absolute power under the leadership of the emperor. The Japanese nation was very conservative and they encouraged trading barriers with the outside world, they refused to established any connection with Western nations, while Western nations were interested in establishing trading routes with Japan.

In 1853, the U.S. sent a fleet of ships under the command of Commodore Mathew Perry to Japan in order to end the nation’s self-imposed isolation and open it to trade. Matthew Perry convinced the shogun of Japan to signed an agreement for trading between them, one of the reasons why Japan accepted to sign this agreement was because they were afraid of having a war that could bring unequal treaties with them, like the one of the recent Opium Wars that occurred in China. Soon, the Britain, Russia, and Holland negotiated similar treaties.

The intrusion of the West would become a turning point for feudal Japan. The Tokugawa shogunate was criticized and ultimately overthrown for allowing western nations into Japan, making European nations wealthy. Nationalism in Japan was very strong. Consequently, in 1868, Emperor Mutsushito was restored to the throne, he was a member of a group of samurais, and came to be known as the first Meiji Leader.

Emperor Mutsuhito decided that in order to withstand the imperialistic might of the West, Japan would need to adopt western ways. This movement would be known as the Meiji Restoration. Japanese scholars were sent abroad to learn as much as possible about the West. Feudalism was abandoned in Japan in favor of a written constitution and the establishment of modern mechanized armed forces. Western technology was adopted which allowed the Japanese to fully industrialize in less than 50 years. By the end of the Meiji Restoration, the Japanese no longer feared that they would be imperialized. Rather, they set out to practice imperialism themselves.

Japan declared a war to China in its search for natural resources and trading rights on mainland Asia, this war was called the Sino-Japanese War and it lasted from 1894 to 1895; this also created a conflict with Russia leading Japan to the Russo-Japanese War that lasted from 1904 to 1905. Japan won both wars and surprised the world with its unexpected victory, the destruction of the Russian Navy by the Japanese marked the first time an Asian nation had defeated one from Europe.

With the “Treaty of Portsmouth”, Japan earned the following:
Chinese port city trading rights
Control of Manchuria in China
Korea became its protectorate
Annexation of the island of Sakhalin

During the 1900s, Japan did imperialism throughout Asia. Japan occupied nations once held by the French, British, and the Dutch. Native leaders were installed as part of governments that were manipulated by the Japanese.

In 1940, Japan announced that it would form a Greater East Asia Co-prosperity Sphere, that encouraged Asian nations to resist western imperialists in order to contribute to the industrial needs of the Japanese war machine. Japan was practicing its own form of imperialism by dominating almost all Asia.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KjPUbKcYPwU

Meiji Leaders

They were a remarkably able group that carried out an economic and social revolution. This revolution is sometimes called the Meiji Restoration but it is also called the Meiji Revolution. The period that followed is called the Meiji Era.

The Meiji Era leaders wanted economic development as a growth of Japan, but circumstances allowed them very little policy choice. The first problem to be solved was financing the national government financial plan. The national government also paid to the samurai, the samurai class lost its source of living in the land reforms and the creation of the conscription army of commoners. The total of the samurai salary was enormous and required one third of the income of the national government. Later the inflation benefited the farmers whose land tax was at fixed financial levels, they gained at the expense of the samurai and the city dwellers.

The national government created some programs, such as public education, by declaring that it must be done and leaving it to the villages to finance and arrange for its provision. The Meiji elite were great students.

The Meiji government was faced with unique circumstances and did not know how to make the country’s economy prosper. It had only some reformist ideas influenced by the West and the sense of crisis. The actions of the government were quick to respond to unique circumstances and led to series of mistakes and miscalculations. However, it learned from mistakes and had power and new legitimacy which could be used for mobilization of society in reform efforts.

The Meiji Restoration is the successful building of the nation-state with a new institutional framework, which changed the course of development. The Meiji Era policy of using private businesses to promote government policy objectives proved successful.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oQjCEGbgxJU

Why Imperialism In Japan?

In order to understand why imperialism started in Japan in the first place, it is necessary to talk abaout Japan`s geographycal features. Note in the picture that Japan is a very small coutry compared to it's population, it has a very montanious territory consequently it has very few natural resources, but it is strategically located because of its connection to America and several Islands of Southeast Asia through the Pacific Ocean, and its access to mainland Asia through the Sea of Japan.

Japan's expansion was the result of emulation of, which is the effort or ambition to equal or surpass another, and conflict with the Western nations.

Japanese goverment turned expansion into a systematic goal which were often intertwined, for security, national pride, resources for industrialization, settlement of overpopulation and markets for manufactured goods.

Japanese expansion was also fueled with Social Darwinism and racism. Social Darwinism states that only the strongest ones are the ones who adapt and survive, this created in Japan a need to ruthlessly protect itself and even side with the Western powers; but despite Japan's civilization, Western countries, because of racism, treated it the same way as other Asian countries. So the last chance for Japan to win Western respect and ensure security and survival as a nation, and even bringing civilization to other countries in Asia was imperial expansion.

As a conclusion, Japanese imperialism differed from European civilization because it was the first non-Western imperial power that rose to imperial status after facing colonization by the West.