Japanese Studies of Post-Opium War China: 1980

47 JAPANE5E STUDIES DF POST-OPIUM WAR CHINA: 19BO Namiki Yorihisa 3£-^-^ff%, 5hiqaku zasshi 4? "^lnÌ^L> (May 19Bl), pp. 210-18. Translated by Joshua A. Fogel, Harvard University It is now several years since the great upheavals of the autumn of 1976, and China is fortifying its image as an "ordinary nation." Our understanding of China is confused because of the "realization" that in fact the People's Republic is a society that is lagging behind. There is a trend that can also be seen in the massive change in the specific field of modern Chinese history. Since 1976 historical research has taken as its slogan "seek truth through facts" ??.-^" *?-/£_ and the "liberation of thought" ^./j^ ^A)Cl jjhere has been a change] from an emphasis on the continuous upsurge of the past revolution — for example, the mass of studies (due to the tempestuous post-'49 struggles between lines) on the lack of organization and spontaneity of the Boxer Movement, which was then traced to the "ignorant" struggle of the peasantry — to an emphasis on the bourgeois development toward capitalism in China. 5hake-ups of various kinds, now stimulating China's transformation, are occurring in our method of comprehending "modern" in our own studies of modern Chinese history. Modem Chinese historical research, which has long stood at the threshold, can be said now to be undergoing a great transition . According to Banno Ryökichi if%3% fLä ("Ideas and Methods in Modern Chinese Research: A Look back at Hatano J_Yoshihiro ' s j Historiography" *§/2^?&9&ff tfj^·" &fyfy [%*C\ 5t -%O) fy\ffi^%$C)'3fL · TÖ.ySshi kenkvü hSkoku f(jfo£_&\ ^ tiL *L ' ^a9°ya University, 6), in our present state of research, we "are at a 'post-war' crossroads in relations with China and in our understanding of China." Banno argues that "it seems that modern Chinese historical studies are beginning to form one specialized area within the intellectual structure of world history." This is the result of an ongoing development in postwar scholarship beginning with a period of ten years after the 1949 Revolution when "an enthusiasm that attempted to unravel the secrets of rapid progress toward an advanced China stimulated many scholars"; during the time of the SinoSoviet conflict and the Cultural Revolution, we passed through a time when the "confidence in the supremacy of Chinese socialism gradually receded, and the extraordinary social progress of the past seemed to be stagnation, leading to a rupture in our understanding of China." We then moved into a period in which we "have fallen into a confusion of values, with doubts about Chinese socialism." As indicated by his subtitle, Banno takes as his point of departure the work of Hatano Yoshihiro, who caused a great debate in the history of postwar research by "groping for a method to confirm the impression that grim 49 reality had prescribed a distinctive nature to modern China," an impression derived from his "realization that 'compared to the modernization of Japan, China's modernization was tardy and failing,'" Banno traces in detail the history of research critical of Hatano's historical approach and holds that the critiques of HatanD "have been either incomplete or flawed in form and method, and the arguments intellectually inconsistent and slack in the investigation of [the critic'J own principles." At the same time, much productive work has been accomplished, and Banno tries to provide an outline for the future reconstruction of modern and contemporary Chinese history. Postwar research includes a number of areas of debate. My impression — shared by many people — is that they have not necessarily achieved their full purpose by leading to further studies, but have rather stimulated a dispersal of research interests. Yet, Nozawa Yutaka f? y? S ("Toward Progress in Research into Modern and Contemporary Asian History (Part 2)"ßyy^li^/\X--tßf\tj^i^O)A^U (?) , Rekishi kaqaku taikei fit JEjMr1^L* ?. *^t ^' recognizes in his postscript that Banna's point about Hatano is worth "paying heed to." In Nozawa's estimation, "it is necessary to address as a crucial question the view that postwar studies of China have reached a turning point." He notes that, in reordering the debated areas in...