In contrast to China, where a centralized political system was viewed as crucial to protect the vast country from foreign conquest or internal fractionalization, a decentralized political system reminiscent of the feudal system in medieval Europe held sway in Japan under the hegemony of a powerful military leader, or shogun, who ruled with varying degrees of effectiveness in the name of the hereditary emperor. This system lasted until the early seventeenth century, when a strong shogunate called the Tokugawa rose to power after a protracted civil war. The Tokugawa managed to revitalize the traditional system in a somewhat more centralized form that enabled it to survive for another 250 years.
The Tokugawa era, then, can be defined as stretching from 1603 to 1868, until Japan loosened its isolationism and entered into more regular international trade. Japan's first contact with the modern West was with Portuguese sailors in the mid 1500's; Japan at first became even more isolationist in response to these foreign contacts. In 1853, however, Japan negotiated a treaty with the United States, providing for expanded merchant contact. Not only was Japan changing its foreign policy; it was also changing internally. The Tokugawa rule came to an end, replaced by the Meiji government. Under Meiji rule, the empire worked to modernize itself: semi-democratic deliberative bodies were formed, all social classes were to have a voice in government, all social classes were to have a degree of economic freedom, laws were to be rationalized, and a deliberate examination of other nations was undertaken to find ways to improve Japanese industry and the Japanese economy. Okuma Shigenobu, who was prime minister in Japan when the Meiji era began, and for a number of years in the Meiji era, wrote:
By comparing the Japan of fifty years ago with the Japan of today, it will be seen that she has gained considerably in the extent of her territory, as well as in her population, which now numbers nearly fifty million. Her government has become constitutional not only in name, but in fact, and her national education has attained to a high degree of excellence. In commerce and industry, the emblems of peace, she has also made rapid strides, until her import and export trades together amounted in 1907 to the enormous sum of 926,000,000 yen. Her general progress, during the short space of half a century, has been so sudden and swift that it presents a rare spectacle in the history of the world. This leap forward is the result of the stimulus which the country received on coming into contact with the civilization of Europe and America.
In addition to realizing that Japan's contact with Europe and the U.S. was responsible for its transformation into a modern industrial power, as foreseen by the deliberate Meiji policy of examining systems in foreign nations, Prime Minister Okuma also was active in Japanese politics during the war between Japan and Russia. The outcome of the Russo-Japanese War in 1905 altered the thinking of Western governments about East Asia - it raised concerns that Japan's expansionist ambitions and modern weaponry were a serious threat to European claims in the area. Russia's defeat in this was one of many factors which led to the fall of the Czarist government in 1917.
As Japan grew stronger, it established "spheres on influence" in eastern Asia, including the southern end of the Korean peninsula, the island of Taiwan (also called 'Formosa'), and the Chinese coastal city of Amoy (also called 'Xiamen'). This established Japan as a significant regional power, emergent from its isolationist phase. In fact, Japan's participation in World War II grew out of its effort to create an empire in the Pacific.
Recovering from its defeat in 1945 in World War II, aided by the United States, Japan recovered its industrial and economic power. Between the war's end and 1953, the United States gave Japan $2.44 billion dollars in reconstruction aid, even more money in the form of soldiers spending their wages in Japan as they were stationed there, and help in the form of expertise in the rebuilding process and in the form of actual construction as the American military built infrastructure. Japan once again took its place as a significant modern economy.
But Japan faces another problem. Given the carrying capacity of eastern Asia and the Pacific rim, Japan is significantly underpopulated. Despite serious worries in the 1960's and 1970's that there could be a overpopulation problem, the opposite is now true. Sustainable clean air and clean water can be provided for millions more than currently occupy the region, and responsible agriculture and renewable food sources can feed them. But despite this capacity, the population remains dangerously low, causing a number of economic, social, and political problems. Patrick Buchanan writes that Japan is
on the path to national suicide. Japan, its population peaking at 128 million in 2010, will lose 25 million people by 2050. A fifth of her population will disappear and one in six Japanese will be over 80. Japan's median age will rise from 45 to 55. And these projections assume a rise in the fertility of Japanese women that is nowhere in sight.
Japan - or any other nation - needs a large proportion of young people in its society. It is not sustainable to have a large elderly population with relatively few young workers.
In March 2010 came more grim news. Marketwatch reported the birth rate in Tokyo had fallen to 1.09 children per woman and if "current trends continued, Japan's population will fall to 95 million by 2050, from about 127 million now," a loss of 32 million people. At this rate, a fourth of the nation will vanish in four decades. "With as much as 40 percent of its population over 65 years of age," wrote Joel Kotkin," of Forbes, "no matter how innovative the workforce, Dai Nippon will simply be too old to compete."
If the population problems described above actually happen - if Japan is really going to lose a great percentage of its population, and if Japanese don't start having lots of children soon - the social, political, and economic problems caused will not only ruin Japan, but would be large enough to affect other nations: this degree of instability can cause wars. Further, the environmental impact would be disastrous: any hope for sustainable clean air and clean water is predicated upon a population which is growing steadily. The common notion that large populations are bad for the environment is simply wrong: the ideal population grows at a steady and slow pace. This allows for "green" planning, and provides the economic energy to put that planning into practice. The population crisis facing Japan would trigger a total abandonment of any "green" practices because of economic necessities.
Noting that births in Japan in 2008 were 40 percent below what they were in 1948, Nicholas Eberstadt writes, in Foreign Affairs, that "fertility, migration and mortality trends are propelling Japan into ... a degree of aging thus far contemplated only in science fiction."
The Japanese government has recognized the problem, and is attempting to deal with it. As in many other developed nations, cash bonuses and other incentives are offered to parents who have more children. It is not clear, however, that this will be enough to change the trend.
In December 2010, Agence France-Press, citing the National Institute of Population and Social Security Research, reported: "On current trends, Japan's population of 127 million will by 2055 shrivel to 90 million." Recognizing the gravity of the demographic crisis, the Democratic Party of Japan, which was swept into power in 2009, planned $3,000 allowances per child and assistance with child care for families with grade-school children. The need seems desperate. In a 2010 Washington Post story on the decline in Japanese students attending U.S. universities, Blaine Harden wrote, "The number of children [in Japan] under the age of 15 has fallen for 28 consecutive years. The size of the nation's high school graduating class has shrunk by 35 percent in two decades."
It is clear that Japan's most pressing need is to have more children. The alternative is that Japan will simply cease to exist.
