Singapore’s Kishore Mahbubani caught the Kookmin Ilbo’s attention with a piece in Time in which he claimed that Asian nations needed to send Japan a “big thank-you note” for its role in shattering the myth of European superiority and providing a model for Asian modernization:
Cultural confidence is a necessary but not sufficient condition for development. Centuries of European colonial rule had progressively reduced Asian self-confidence. Future generations of Indian citizens will be wondering how 300 million Indians - including my own ancestors - allowed themselves to be passively ruled by fewer than 100,000 Britons. Those as yet unborn will not understand how deeply the myth of European cultural superiority had been embedded into the Indian psyche. Jawaharlal Nehru, the first Indian Prime Minister, once said the defeat of Russia in 1905 by Japan first triggered the idea of independence for India in his mind. That was a remarkable admission; it implied that intelligent Indians could not conceive of governing themselves before Japan, an Asian power, defeated a European one.
Japan’s record in World War II was disastrous. But if Japan had not succeeded early in the 20th century, Asia’s development would have come much later. Japan inspired the rise of Asia. Even South Korea, which suffered from brutal Japanese colonial rule, could not have taken off so fast without having Japan as a role model. Asia needs to send Japan a big thank-you note. The tragedy, of course, is that such words of gratitude will not be delivered while Japan remains ambivalent about its own identity, torn between Asia and the West.
Read the rest of the piece on your own, as well as the rest of Time’s Asian Journey 2005 edition.
36 Comments
taken from a broad perspective, i tend to agree with him about the role japan has played to invigorate asia. of course, the piece is not without problems. in the first para on page two, for instance, he uses “could not” instead of “might not” in talking about whether korea could have developed as quickly as it did without the japan effect (broadly defined).
Koreans, as the kookmin ilbo did, will obviously take issue with this. they have for years. indeed, the newspaper’s lede in a sense blamed the article on the americans. Time magazine is their creation, after all. but people like the kookmin editorial writers will never get the finer points.
i personally believe that Mahbubani is correct on japan’s role. but who really knows what would have transpired? what if the korean yangban had actually organized the country effectively instead of leaching off it. perhaps korea would have been japan….
And what Japan couldn’t inspire through example as far as de-europeanization in South and Southeast Asia it sought to do with violence, especially the part where Japan made sex slaves out of Dutch women captured in Indonesia.
NOT an extention of that thought In the movie HAVANA, one character says to the the character played by Robert Redford “I want to thank you for sleeping with my wife. Really. Thinking of ways to kill you is what kept me alive.” Having a wealthy former colonial power right next door certainly has to have helped Korean economic development.
NOT an extention of that thought In the movie HAVANA, one character says to the the character played by Robert Redford ??I want to thank you for sleeping with my wife. Really. Thinking of ways to kill you is what kept me alive.??
Well, Lena Olen was kinda hot back then.
LOL, I disagree, Marmot. She was already past prime then; white women age faster–it’s been all downhill from “The Unbearable Lightness of Being” for her
Anyone check out this article?
http://kr.news.yahoo.com/servi.....wssetid=57
I think that is the most rediculous idea I have heard of so far today-thank you letters to Japan-for what? enslaving the women, sending the men off to work and in some cases fight in far away lands, raping the land and countries of as many of their resources as they can providing only enough infrastructure to support their war machine? That has absolutely nothing to do with being any sort of role model, much less a good one. In fact, Japan’s actions only show that they were able to successfully implement the European Impirialistic model of growth and expansion that accompanied the industrial revolution. Despite its self serving yet sizeable foreign aid that is given out, I would argue that the other Asian nations have benefited in spite of Japan by following its export focused economic growth strategy and by takking advantage of open American markets and providing services to the US military in times of war in Asia (Korea, Vietnam). What would have been worthy of recognition would have been if Japan had followed Confucious’ leadership model and been benevolent in helping other nations in the region develop industrially not for Japan’s direct benefit but for the benefit of it’s neighbors but we all know that did not happen.
Big thank you note… What stupid. We can’t ignore the facts.
And ??I want to thank you for sleeping with my wife. Really. Thinking of ways to kill you is what kept me alive.??
He’s a masoquist then.
Lena Olin is still hot, if you ever watch ABC??s Alias. Anyway???
When tragedy happens, what??s important is how we could take it. Some may take it well and learn a lesson, but others may not. I knew a guy who was seriously addicted to drug and alcohol; his excuse was he lost his mom when he was very young. But not all people who lost their mom or significant others turned out to be like him. A lot of them are more mature than people in their ages. Tragedy actually helps people to grow up.
However, learning a lesson and growing up from it doesn??t necessarily mean that you have to say ??Thank you?? to someone who caused it. For example, a rape victim may grow up from her experience (i.e. helping other rape victims???). Or she could turn herself into the industry (if it??s true that some porn actress are former victims of sex related crimes) and make decent money. Choice is hers, and I don??t want to judge whose choice is better than the other. Either way, I don??t think that we are supposed to ask her to say ??Thank you?? note to the rapist.
Asian countries might learn a lesson from their colonial experiences and actually grew up from it. But asking them to ??send a big thank you?? is over-the-top. (I’ll buy his argument if he is willing to ask rape victims to send a ??thank you?? note to their attackers…)
“people like the kookmin editorial writers will never get the finer points”.
Yup, KMI rather crudely pulled out only the offending bits about Japan and failed to give the context or background of the author, a leading Asian values proponent. Pity the reader who lacks the time or the English skill to read the actual essay.
Whatever complaints we can make about the Western media (”sensationalist”, “superficial” …) few outlets are as guilty of outright malpractice as their Korean counterparts.
Again, the key is to read the whole argument carefully in the context of the broad sweep of history and take note that he doesn’t cut Japan’s atrocities any slack. Nor does he attribute to Japan benign motives — which Japanese revisionists tend to do in their retelling of the Great East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere story.
Lena Olin not hot “anymore”? Madness.
She looks fine enough to me. She was born in Sweden, no less.
slim wrote:Whatever complaints we can make about the Western media (??sensationalist???, ??superficial?? ???) few outlets are as guilty of outright malpractice as their Korean counterparts. If we’re comparing newspaper to newspaper, I’d completely agree. But with things like Newsmax.com and Fox News floating around, I’m not so hopeful about the U.S.’s news media either.
Considering that what made the Japanese powerful was their selective adoption of European culture, I’d say the cultural superiority thing is not a myth. And yes, Lena Olin still has it.
What? You look like a f* looser and say superiority? That’s funny.
I was always more of a Juliette Binoche fan in “The Unbearable Lightness of Being.” However, my college buddies heartily were in the Lena Olin camp.
I concur with James. It is frustrating to read pronouncements on world history by people as unqualified as Mahbubani. He is a cheerleader for globalization without reflection. This is very profitable in his native Singapore, where honest criticism would not be rewarded with plum government and academic positions.
Mahbubani has earned his lofty positions by carefully steering clear of any meaningful reflection on his own society, where creativity and freedom have been sacrificed at the altar of order and development. To me, Singapore is more frightening that North Korea, because its material success hides its dreadful oppression of its people. Singapore is much like the Brave New World of Aldous Huxley, which is more disturbing to me than the blatant tyranny of George Orwell’s 1984.
Mahbubani is basically a total European in his thinking. He does not draw on any “Asian” philosophy or tradition, such as Confucianism, Hinduism, Islam, etc. He takes a completely materialist view of the world, seeing the growing strength of Asian economies and militaries as signs of progress. No one can deny that Asian nations are more powerful compared to the West today. But this process has caused great damage to their very “Asian” identities, as industrialization has meant the erosion of traditional ways of life and philosophies.
I would also add that the Meiji modernization program led directly to Japan’s vicious conquests. The Japanese people were brutalized into becoming soldiers, factory workers and engineers in a very short period of time. Traditions and local customs were destroyed for the sake of centralized military and industrial power. Once the ball started rolling, it was inevitable that a brutalized society needing ever greater resources would use any means necessary to attain them.
A big shoutout to Hitler too for laying the groundwork for the European Union–that’s about how logical the Time article is.
when japan thanks korea for enculturating it, populating it, and providing it it’s royal family, i’ll consider the suggestion that i should feel thanks to the japanese for introducing things discovered in the west.
ok?
glad you understand.
I’m sure that the Japanese contributions (if it really did) don’t justify for its crimes as socially.
This is a propos of nothing, but I once heard that Lee Kwan Yew modelled much of what he did after Park Chung Heeboth the good and the bad. I have no way of verifying this, or if it’s just something people say.
In Andrew Nahm’s extensive history of Korea (the title escapes me, but it contains the word “transformation”) there’s a fairly detailed chapter on the Japanese occupation period, both negatives and positives. It makes for a good read, and is reasonably objective.
Yeah, I have read that and thought it was reasonably objective and at the same time, found it to be a little short on citing some of the benefits that Korea recieved and a little long on the negative. If we assume that he was fairly representative, then wouldn’t it be safe to conclude that any beneficial Japanese contributions were outweighed by the negative effects Japanese occupation brought about?
James wrote:If we assume that he was fairly representative, then wouldn??t it be safe to conclude that any beneficial Japanese contributions were outweighed by the negative effects Japanese occupation brought about?I think that, if we are considering things in the aggregate, that would be the case.
But approaching this from a social scientist perspective, are the benefits of Japanese occupation true to begin with? The fact that benefits (e.g., educational expansion and longevity increases) occurred during the forty-year domination of Korea by Japan does not mean that the benefits should be credited to Japanese occupation.
It was the missionaries (mostly but not only American) prior to annexation that started introducing modern hospitals and schools to Korea. Not only is there no reason to believe that this would not have continued without Japanese occupation, the Japanese military authorities stifled such missionary activities when they contradicted Japanese government-general aims. (The Japanese military authorities also stifled economic and social freedoms in favor of squeezing activities into Japanese imperial aims, something that would run counter to freer economic development.)
Also, the Korean government began public works projects like railways, light rail, electricity, etc., prior to annexation (many of them done by Japanese corporations under Korean imperial contract). Japanese military occupation did not lead to these things happening.
The notion of Korea developing without Japanese occupation is supported by two facts of history: it had a model of development in Japan, which had modernized just decades earlier; and Korea showed in its post-war period that it was capable of using social norms to mobilize resources and personnel to go from one of the poorest countries in the world to one of the dozen richest. Thus, the idea that Korea could have modernized without Japanese occupation is not mere speculation or wishful thinking.
But make no mistake, a successful modernization would likely have required significant Japanese participation: the Japanese corporations setting up projects prior to annexation for example, and the influx of Japanese capital and know-how after 1965.
But that is precisely the point here: none of these required military occupation by Japan. Had Korea had a Canada-US-type relationship with Japan, the same benefit and more may have resulted, but without the brutal occupation (or the resulting division of the country and the war that followed). Thus, unequivocally, Japanese military occupation provided NO benefit for Korea, even if some benefit occurred during this time, because military occupation provided nothing that an economic and political partnership could not have. (The much reviled Ito Hirobumi, in fact, was supposedly against annexation of Korea, but his political opponents used his assassination as a pretext for taking over the country.)
Of course, this would lead to other questions. Had Korea developed close economic and political ties to Japan, would it have been a willing participant in Japan’s imperial expansionism? Or would Japan have felt content that its islands were protected by the buffer provided by their Korean ally? Or would Japanese imperial expansionism been squelched by a stronger Korea of the 1930s that didn’t want the Japanese imperial army using the peninsula as a base for making inroads into China?
But let’s say that Japan can take credit, as some right-wing Japanese politicians and Japanese apologists say, for positives that occurred during their occupation of Korea. Wouldn’t it stand to reason that Japan should take the blame for negatives that occurred and resulted as well? The division of Korea by the Allies was necessitated by Japanese imperial aggression, and the horrific Korean War came as a direct result of that division. Do the Japanese apologists then think that these two things should be on Japan’s shoulders? Either of these things would certainly outweigh any aggregate benefit Korea received.
How about the rise of communism as a military force against Japanese expansionism that eventually became strong enough to take over China and North Korea? If Japan is to take credit based on a broad view, then it deserves condemnation for leading to so much of the world falling under communism’s sway (something Nazi Germany is responsible for in Eastern Europe).
No, the “benefit” is a false argument. It is nothing more than a justification for murderous expansionism. It is like a chronically physically abusive guardian whining that, “Hey, what abuse are those kids complaining about? I gave them three squares a day.”
Kushibo has constructed quite a strawman, more emotively charged than most given the status Kushibo accords him as a child abuser.
The problem is that I do not believe Mahbubani implied, nor certainly did I ever say or suggest, nor in fact do I know of anyone who makes the claim, that the Japanese occupation and colonization of Korea was a necessary precondition to Korean development - let alone indicate that there is anything remotely resembling a “social science” [sic] “theory” [sic] that would establish or justify any such preposterous notion.
But the neither the absence of such theory, the insusceptibility of the truth of any such a theory to proof if one were propounded, nor the invalidity of such a theory if one were forwarded and falsified would change the fact that beginning at least in the 1880s and continuing through the 1905 demarche, the actual annexation in 1910 and the subsequent occupation, Japanese traders and businessmen and, yes, the Japanese government, the Japanese military and the other imperial instruments of occupation and oppression indeed bestowed many benefits on Korea. Of course, these were not gifts, and there was a terrible price paid. But particularly when considered frrom the perspective of Korea’s subsequent successful economic development, the Japanese contributions to the physical infrastructure of Korea, basic, practical education, vocational experience, commercial practice, finance, etc., etc., in fact were and indeed contimue to have been very important. Kushibo implicitly admits this by recognizing the role of the Japanese in the very fledgling steps toward economic modernization undertaken by the Joseon dynasty prior to 1905, and by his acknowledgement of the necessity of Japanese support to the success of self-directed Korean nmodernization in his “what if” fantasizing.
Whether Korea coulda, woulda modernized under self-management, as Kushibo suggests, is very much a matter of theological speculation. There were very powerful vested interests aligned against the forces of modernization, which to take Kushibo’s own example in the educational sphere included only a total of exactly 29 modern schools in the entire country founded between 1883 and 1909 by foreign missionaries and/or their local followers.
In any event, the fact is that Japan’s contributions to Korea’s material culture did play an essential role to its actual historical modernization, whatever coulda, woulda, shoulda have happened.
All that being said, it also needs saying that Mahbubani’s notion of anyone in Asia saying thank you to Japan for the benefits obtained during its fit of imperial madness is, to say the least, rhetorically maladroit.
Sperwer wrote:Kushibo has constructed quite a strawman, more emotively charged than most given the status Kushibo accords him as a child abuser.
The problem is that I do not believe Mahbubani implied, nor certainly did I ever say or suggest, nor in fact do I know of anyone who makes the claim, that the Japanese occupation and colonization of Korea was a necessary precondition to Korean development - let alone indicate that there is anything remotely resembling a ??social science?? [sic] ??theory?? [sic] that would establish or justify any such preposterous notion.I was making a general point about Japan apologism and claims that Korea actually benefited from Japanese occupation. While Mahbubani may not be claiming that, some Japanese politicians have done so, and this is certainly a right-wing claim today, which is why I chose to address it.
Kushibo:
Korea DID benefit from the Japanese occupation, albeit it probably suffered more than it benefitted. I think these are just facts.
They do not prove one way or another that the occupation was necessary for Korean development in any “social scientific” “thoeretical” sense - the affirmative case for which is what your comment purported to contest.
Similarly, the fact of such benefits does not (necessarily) justify the occupation and, if there are indeed any Japanese who assert otherwise, they are both wrong and very stupid for saying so.
At the risk of being accused of blaming the victim, the real issue as I see it revolves around the pressures and constraints on Japan’s policy choices resulting from the direct Chinese, Russian and Japanese rivalry in East Asia, the indirect rivalry of each of those three with the other Western powers that also had dogs in the race; the perceived risk to Japan’s security if it permitted one of the others to control Korea; and the fact that because of centuries of ostrich like behaviour Korea was utterly incapable of taking and holding up its its own part in the game.
“Had Korea had a Canada-US-type relationship with Japan, the same benefit and more may have resulted,”
Hey! Yes, we Canucks were a bunch of backwoods fur traders and pioneer farmers way back when, but then so were most Americans at one time. Anyhow, most of the capital and technological input during Canada’s industrialization in the 19th century came from the mother countryi.e., the UKand happened simultaneouslyalbeit to a less pronounced degree, given the smaller populationwith similar developments in the US.
Correction: the technological input came equally from the UK and the US. But most of the capital was definitely British. The decidely pre-industrial Hudson’s Bay Company’s HQ was in London until the 1970s; and a fair chunk of residential, industrial, and commercial property in the Vancouver area was developed by British interests (including the Guiness family, of undrinkable beer fame).
Apologies for the off-topic rambling, but the analogy stuck in my craw.
Sperwer: of course, Koreans did attempt to leverage themselves at the last moment in the Sino-Russo-Japanese rivalry, with different factions siding with each of those three powers, but of course, it was too little, too late, and highly counterproductive.
Sperwer wrote:Korea DID benefit from the Japanese occupation, albeit it probably suffered more than it benefitted. I think these are just facts.No, they are not facts. As I laid out, but you either did not grasp or I did not explain properly, benefiting from Japanese occupation would mean that said benefits would not have occurred without Japanese occupation.
Given that there were clear signs of modernization prior to Japanese annexation, this would seem not be the case. One very clear option for Korea would have been for the Taehan Empire to have close economic ties with Japan while maintaining its independence, something that some in Japan’s political circles desired. (Ito Hirobumi, the very reviled Resident-General whose assasination by An Chungg?n was used as a pretext for annexation, was reputedly against annexation of Korea, though his political rival Katsura Taro was in favor of it.)
Even if one argues that Korea would not have developed without Japanese influence, none of these benefits required Japan’s brutal occupation. Ergo, Korea did NOT benefit from the Japanese occupation. (In fact, many more benefits would likely have come to Korea — even with heavy Japanese involvement — if the heavy-handed restrictions of the Japanese government-general were not there.)They do not prove one way or another that the occupation was necessary for Korean development in any ??social scientific?? ??thoeretical?? sense - the affirmative case for which is what your comment purported to contest.Maybe I was using too much shorthand from my grad school lectures. I was referring to the idea of a control situation and an experimental situation. The +JO situation (with Japanese occupation) would be the experimental situation, while the -JO (without Japanese occupation) would be the control. We have two relevant -JO periods, right before Japanese occupation and afterward. Except for the twenty years immediately after liberation, a period which found Korea reeling from an outwardly imposed national division that magnified pre-existing social divisions and then a devastating war, the period was one of great progress. The other -JO period, between the devasting Sino-Japanese War until immediately before occupation, had Korea making significant strides toward modernization.Similarly, the fact of such benefits does not (necessarily) justify the occupation and, if there are indeed any Japanese who assert otherwise, they are both wrong and very stupid for saying so.There indeed are Japanese who think so. I believe they are in the minority, but they do raise a stink sometimes.At the risk of being accused of blaming the victim, the real issue as I see it revolves around the pressures and constraints on Japan??s policy choices resulting from the direct Chinese, Russian and Japanese rivalry in East Asia, the indirect rivalry of each of those three with the other Western powers that also had dogs in the race; the perceived risk to Japan??s security if it permitted one of the others to control Korea; and the fact that because of centuries of ostrich like behaviour Korea was utterly incapable of taking and holding up its its own part in the game.I think you are right about those things. But ultimately, in the Japanese debate about whether to take over Korea or merely take them on as a junior partner, the former won out. And this happened, arguably, because this was the beginning of designs on the rest of East Asia, which came to fruition in the 1930s. Thus, supporting Japan’s take-over of Korea (and I’m not saying that you were doing this), or Taiwan or Okinawa, is tantamount to supporting their war of aggression in the rest of Asia in the 1930s and 1940s.
Kushibo:
You say:
Even if one argues that Korea would not have developed without Japanese influence, none of these benefits required Japan??s brutal occupation. Ergo, Korea did NOT benefit from the Japanese occupation. (In fact, many more benefits would likely have come to Korea ?? even with heavy Japanese involvement ?? if the heavy-handed restrictions of the Japanese government-general were not there.)”
Maybe more benefits would have come to Korea without the restrictions. Maybe even more would have come if, instead of colonizing Korea, Japan had worked out some scheme to assist Korea, while leaving the fractious Koreans in charge. (Or maybe there would have been an IMF crisi in 1910). Who knows? These are counterfactual suppositions about which one could speculate indefinitely without ever reaching a conclusion. Since political action would require me to change my ethnicity and invent time travel, I’d rather go fishing.
But your opening statement just doesn’t stand up, logically. The conclusion that “Korea did not benefit from the Japanese occupation” simply does not follow from the premise that “none of these benefits required the Japanese occupation”. Of course they didn’t. The US could have fulfilled King/Emperor Kojong’s wishful thinking and given Korea a security umbrella in the form of Dewey’s Great White Fleet and billions in foreign aid. Tangun and the other ancestors could have reappeared. Or the Salmunori band could have restored the celestial harmony. Any number of counterfactuals can be imagined. My point is not that the benefits necessitated the occupation - that they could not have happened without it — just that a lot of them in fact did happen during and as a direct result of japanese actions during the occupation. I really don’t see why (or how you can think) this is anything but a question of fact and objectionable or problematic (except as a source of embarrasment and shame for Koreans). The Japanese built railroads, telegraphs and mines. They improved agriculture. They conducted the first comprehensive cadastral survey. These were all real benefits, and very significant in terms of Korea’s modernization. The possibility that the Koreans might have gotten around to doing them themselves if left alone doesn’t mean they didn’t happen and weren’t beneficial in and of themselves - notwithstanding the motives of the Japanese or the fact that they also were stealing a the agricultural production, the ore extracted from the mines and the surveyed land or that the railroads and telegraphs were built to assist in the work of expropriation and to create the logistical base for the invasion of Manchuria.
It’s also irrelevant that on balance these benefits were outweighed by the costs. I don’t happen to think that the costs (on balance) necessarily retarded Korean modernization - although they were often as high as it gets in human terms and obviously have had long-lasting detrimental effects on the Korean polity. Considered discretely and in terms of Korea’s modernization, they were still benefits.
Furthermore, in the interests of clarity, I am not suggesting that it would necessarily be unreasonable to conclude that the benefits weren’t worth the costs and that Korea would have been better off without ‘em, even it delayed of frustrated its development.
Back to your faulty attempted syllogism, if I’ve just sunk the eight ball with a combination shot off the six, your argument is tantamount to saying that because I could have done it with a combination off the 2 or with a straight hit, no combination, I didn’t sink it at all.
In other words, I am not making any theoretical claim about any sort of necessary connection between the occpuation and Korean development as a sort of scientific law. I don’t much believe in “social science”; it’s an oxymoron - at least nearly so. I think Sgt. Friday’s approach has more to recommend it.
Sperwer, I think you’re giving the Japanese occupation far too much credit, especially since you’re attributing to them such things as telegraphs that were put in place in the 1880s.
Modern train service began in 1899, between Seoul and Inchon. It was expanded to Pusan and Shinuiju (on the Chinese border) by 1906. I doubt whether Japanese occupation should be given credit for something clearly started before the occupation occurred.
Through royal initiative, electric lighting was brought to Korea in the 1880s by direct contact with the United States. Seoul even had an electric tram line in 1899.
i don’t see why this is anything but a question of fact except as a source of shame for koreans.’
and a source of ammunition for those who don’t like koreans. it isn’t the statement but the motive behind it. yeah, so what the japanese laid the foundation of korea’s modern economy? yes, and?
Kushibo:
I??ve consulted with Dr. House, and he concurs; given your obsessive penchant for playing variations on the same argumentative theme, it??s time for a booster injection of Stockholm Syndrome vaccine. ;))
Seriously, I??m under no misimpression that the first instance of all modernizations in Korea came from Japan during the occupation - although many of them did come from Japan earlier, including e.g., the Busan-Nagasaki undersea cable, and the Busan-Inchon telegraph, and the Busan-Seoul rail line (which predated the Seoul-Inchon line, which you cite, the concession for which was granted to American interests, but which the Japanese actually operated after acquiring the Anerican concession upon completion. Japan also was earlier instrumental in developing trade in Korean agricultural and fisheries commodities and in developing an industry to transport them; Korea was larmed enough by these developments that they tried and failed to create a state run shipping operation. They similarly tried and failed to create trade finance institutions to compete with the Japanese; the enterprise was effectively doomed because as late as the turn of the century Korea??s still was not a monetized economy.
A very few modernizations did come from elsewhere: France built the Seoul-Uiju telegraph; the US, Germany and Russia pioneered mining of gold and other ores; the Russians established the first real bank; the Chinese built and operated the rail line from Seoul to Uiju (and also operated the Seoul-Uiju telegraph after acquiring it from the French).
Electrification is an interesting case for two reasons. First, as you say, the Koreans actually iniatiated something for a change, but what they undertook was quite limited, and very characteristic of the disregard of the Joseon elite for national as opposed to narrowly dynastic interests; they electrified Gyongbogung Palace and later Deoksogung. An American company initiated, implented and managed the electrification of Seoul, which was limited to the operation of streetlights in Jongno and later a couple of other major roads. An American company also built the Seoul streetcar line. With the exception of a small investment in the streetcar line made by King Gojong (purely for profiteering, prefiguring later and persisten patterns of Korean govt. corruption) all of these projects were capitalized, built, maintained and operated by foreigners.
Back to the matter at hand, though, none of these facts diminish the fact that after annexing Korea Japan dramatically increased the stock of all these elements of modernization, as well as introducing others - notably in the ??software?? realm of systems, methods and practices of education, business, government administration, military organization.
These were all benefits and, while they MIGHT have been spontaneously generated in Korea by the genius of the ancestors inherent in the land or obtained elsewhere in a much less traumatic fashion (not likely given the nature of internatioanl competition at the time), the inescapable facts are: (i) they were NOT so sourced, and (ii) the sheer magnitude of the stock of such forms of capital that was built up during the occupation by the Japanese, and which survived WWII because there was no fighting in Korea, was among the critical elements of the foundation for Korea??s later economic development - (which was further facilitated by the wholesale importation of both post-war Japanese development paradigms and Japanese capital, know-how, technology and goods). In fact, in the case of North Korea, where the bulk of the physical plant built by the Japanese was located, it was clearly dispositive in explaining the relatively robust economic performance and growth it experienced immediately after WWII and its ability to bounce back and still dramatically outpace S. Korea in the first couple of decades after the Korean War, notwithstanding the immenseve devastation inflicted on the North by UN bombing during the war.
Again, finally, just so there is no misunderstanding, as I have clearly indicated before, the economic price extracted by Japan for these benefits was high; the cost in human terms was appalling; and the collateral impact on the character of Korea??s political and economic institutions and its ??mentalite?? were and have been deplorable.
Curious:
I agree that Korea belatedly tried playing off each of the international powers or wannabees against the others.
Perhaps it would be more accurate to say “various Koreans”, since what seemed to be happening was that various factions of the elite were auctioning off bits and pieces of the national patrimony in an effort to gain foreign backing to displace their political opponents and protect them from any backlash from those opponents, and just as importantly, in all cases, to protect them once in power from the wrath of the Korean people.
Given Korea’s situation, though, I think “leverage” implies a degree of power that Korea lacked. Through centuries of wilful Confusionist ingornace, arrogance, complacency, obscurantist scholasticism, and self-serving factionalism Korea effectively had deprived itself of any method of influence over its foreign intercourse other than to open its legs. Any way they went, they were just going to get fucked.
BTW, when you say this guy (who I’m not familiar with) is an “Asian values” proponent, does this mean the whole Lee Kuan Yew/Mahathir Mohammed we don’t like the decadent West so let’s be more like the Japanese idea that was popular when they were around?
“Asian values” is IMO a pretty bogus fig leaf for the various forms of repression that abound in Singapore and Malaysia.
This doesn’t really make Mahbubhani’s argument any more or less valid, but I think you can argue that “Asian Values” as puveyed by Lee and Mahathir Mohammed was more of a Confucian/Islamic uptight and prudish slap at the West than any real embrace of Japan, so he may be aiming more at implicit criticism of the West than any sincere attempt to praise Japan.