Takeshi Takeuchi's Paradox

Author: Sun Ge
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2005-02-01
Features: changed the way I perceived the world and my habit of seeking prophets in history. I began to re-examine the meaning of eternity, re-think reality and history, the relationship between later generations and predecessors, and re-evaluate the narrowness and exclusivity of the progressivist historical view in determining direction. I even began to re-examine the meaning and possibilities of political correctness. As an important left-wing thinker in post-war Japan, Takeuchi Yoshimi was a figure filled with paradoxes. Unlike Maruyama Masao's critique of the pre-modern characteristics of Japanese society, Takeuchi Yoshimi's critique of modern Japan targeted Japan's docile modernization. When Maruyama Masao, out of his ignorance of China, used China's "nationalist" movement as a source of ideas to criticize Japan's emperor-centered nationalism, Takeuchi Yoshimi, with his deep understanding of China, analyzed the complexity of China's problems through his study of Lu Xun. When reflecting on Japan's war responsibility, Takeuchi Yoshimi distinguished between the war of aggression against China and the Pacific War. He believed that regarding the former, Japan must take full responsibility for the war, but regarding the latter, as a war between imperialisms, Japan could not bear sole responsibility. In fact, the Tokyo Trial presided over by the U.S. military had a clear "the victors write history" characteristic. After a period of preparation, Japanese right-wing nationalists then reversed this dominant fact of the trial and, in opposition to it, simplified the war history and glorified Japan's aggression. So, how should Japan's war responsibility be confronted while resisting the hegemonic order of Western civilization? Takeuchi Yoshimi's approach was: the impact of modernization, as a political, economic, and military invasion, indeed came from the outside of East Asia; while the impact of modernity, in principle, must arise from within East Asia.