Embracing "Asia" in China and Japan: Asianism Discourse and the Contest for Hegemony, 1912–1933 by Torsten Weber (review)

Embracing "Asia" in China and Japan is the latest addition to the growing body of literature on Asianism. The author, Torsten Weber, concentrates not on Asia as a whole but almost exclusively on Japan and China, because of "the prominence and relevance of … Japanese and Chinese contributions to Asianism discourse" (p. 6).

Weber is a practitioner of conceptual history (Begriffsgeschichte), pioneered by the German intellectual historian Reinhart Koselleck. The book's theoretical framework is impressive, informed as it is by scholars including the philosopher Michel Foucault, the literary critic Edward Said, the historian of China Arif Dirlik, the japanologist Wolfgang Seifert, and the Kenyan literary critic Richard Wafula. The "microscopic focus" Weber adopts, he hopes, should "provide a comprehensive analysis of the negotiation of a concept within its politico-intellectual context" (pp. 6–7) and "extend the conventional framework within which most scholarship has engaged with Asianism" (p. 6).

Weber correctly identifies the First World War as a cathartic event that "changed Chinese and Japanese perceptions of 'Asia,'" transforming it into a "full-blown principle," or "ism" (p. 1). The war, he argues, was an "Asianist moment" that in the immediate term brought about a sharp (albeit temporary) decline of Western power in East Asia and made it possible for Japan to expand in China; the loss of prestige proved more enduring. These developments both fueled Asianist hopes and anxieties concerning the nature of Asianism and led to a vivid debate, recounted in some detail by Weber, on Asianism and its relation to nationalism, internationalism, and imperialism.

Weber divides the book into eight chapters. Following an introduction that outlines his theoretical approach, a second chapter with a primarily theoretical focus assesses the achievements and legacy of the sinologist and pioneer in the study of Asianism Takeuchi Yoshimi. Weber is not an uncritical worshipper of the great scholar, whose distinction between "self-acclaimed" and "real" Asianism he finds too vague for comfort. Instead, Weber chooses to focus "on the definition and functions of different conceptions of Asianism in the conceptual contest for authority, authenticity, and hegemony" (p. 53). Much of the remainder of the volume is arranged chronologically, taking up Asianism in the period prior to 1913 (chapter 3), the years of the First World War and its immediate aftermath (chapters 4–5), and the 1920s and early 1930s (chapters 6 and 7). The concluding chapter reiterates Weber's arguments about the evolution of Asianism as a concept and stresses its continuing relevance in the twenty-first century, when it has become, once again, an instrument of foreign policy. "The rhetorical potential of Asianism," he notes, "has been rediscovered for inter-state diplomacy, mainly as a tool for promoting either China-centric or Japan-centric positions" (p. 323).

The chapters covering the 1920s and early 1930s address developments that are of great importance in the history of Japanese Asianism. Chapter 6 focuses on the 1920s. That decade witnessed a resurgence of Asianism partly in reaction to the 1919 failure to insert a racial equality clause into the Covenant of the League of Nations and partly in reaction to the 1924 Johnson-Reed Act, which effectively banned Japanese immigration to the United States. If the Asianist activities of the 1920s exemplified Asianism "from below," the Manchurian Incident of September 1931 followed by the creation of the puppet state of Manchuria represented, according to Weber, Asianism "from above," that is, Asianism imposed by state authorities. This latter strand is addressed in chapter 7, which focuses on the "hijacking" of Asianism by Japanese militarists, who used it as window-dressing to justify their aggression. This use of the ideology for political purposes had its equivalent in China, where Nationalist factions drew upon Sun Yat-sen's "Greater Pan-Asianism" either to proclaim resistance to Japanese aggression or to justify collaboration with the Japanese occupier. [End Page 123...