Why does Japan need nationalism?
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Of course, Japan doesn't need nationalism but she certainly has it.
My sense of things, gathered from the Japanese folk I know, is that most people have little or no interest in the old dream of Dai Nippon and related delusions.
Until quite recently (the 1997 “meltdown”) the international face of post-war Japan has been of a super-efficient corporation, “Japan Inc”, a post nation-state model of technocratic perfection, the land of ever more finely tuned autos, super cute imagery, uniquely fashionable Harajuku girls and heroic bloodshed anime.
Up to a point (yes, up to a point) this has been enough for many, perhaps most, Japanese. But not for those of a nationalist bent who persist in celebrating and nurturing ideas from the militarist era – among other things.
But really, this is an extraordinarily large topic and this brief post doesn't even scratch the surface. It begins, I think, with the concept of nihonjinron and ends, well, I'm not precisely sure about that.
Some useful references:
Nihonjinron at Wikipedia
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nihonjinron>
Cultural Nationalism in Contemporary Japan by Kosaku Yoshino (a work I've found to be quite helpful)
(Google book search link with some excerpts)
.d.
I never liked you Rusty...you were always a smart alec, a sass mouth and a bit of a giggle puss.
Dr. Impossible
...................... http://monroelab.net/blog/