Why history matters
By Jian Junbo
AsiaTimes Online 28 Nov.2006
Speaking Freely is an Asia Times Online feature that allows guest writers to have their say. Please click here if you are interested in contributing.
We should be delighted that the tense relations between China and Japan have been defused ever since Shinzo Abe, who succeeded Junichiro Koizumi as Japan's prime minister, visited Beijing last month. Apart from a small number of people, no one wants to see conflict between the two countries.
Nevertheless, both leaders continue to shelve the issue of history that in recent years has come to the surface. Therefore, the seeds of tension are still incubated in the land of mutual distrust between them, which easily can give rise to new rivalry and hostility. In other words, if the two countries don't tackle the history question successfully, they will never live in harmony.
About 20 years ago, the history question was clear-cut. At that time, the Chinese government's opinion was very clear - that Japan had invaded China and made millions of Chinese people suffer great pain from the 1930s to the 1940s. China suffered in the hands of Japanese militarists.
Meanwhile, the Chinese government maintained that Japanese common people were also victims of World War II, and therefore the Chinese people should be friendly to and sympathetic with them; in addition, learning from history, the two countries ought to face the future to develop peaceful, friendly and stable bilateral relations.
To demonstrate the Chinese government's and people's forgiveness to Japan and the Japanese people, the Chinese government decided to forgo any war indemnity. In return, Japan helped China develop its economy with foreign aid. As a result, the two states established diplomatic relations in the 1970s, and maintained good relations for almost two decades.
However, after Junichiro Koizumi came to power as prime minister, good relations gradually froze, and hostility rose both in China and in Japan. In 2003, spontaneous anti-Japan demonstrations erupted in several Chinese cities, stimulated by Japanese provocations on the history question. It was clear that Koizumi's administration had defied its previous counterparts' tacit understanding of the history question.
From 2001 to 2006, Koizumi made annual visits to the Yasukuni Shrine, which honors the collective spirit of Japan's war dead, including top-level World War II criminals convicted by the Tokyo war tribunal. His government also approved controversial historical textbooks for use in Japanese middle schools, which whitewashed the cruel invasion of China and other Asian countries.
Obviously, Koizumi's government had broken the continuity in Sino-Japanese relations based on the shared tacit understanding of Sino-Japanese modern history maintained by the two countries' previous leaders. Japan was swiftly revising the shared historical opinion in Sino-Japanese relations.
It has been said that Koizumi wanted to revitalize Japan's sense of self, because Japan's identity as a global economic power had been diminished after the economic bubble burst in the early 1990s, which happened to be in tandem with China's rise. Its international image was deeply shaped by the US-Japan alliance, in which Japan was easily recognized as a subordinate state under US military protection.
However, maybe we cannot neglect another possible reason: that Koizumi simply wanted to cater to right-wing nationalists, conservatives and even militarists in Japan to cement his power and his party's political status.
In contrast, China has not changed its position vis-a-vis Japan. As a developing country, it has focused on economic development and political stability and seeks friendly and reciprocal beneficial relations with Asian neighbors, including Japan, which explicitly shows that China will not revise its views on modern Chinese-Japanese history to provoke its neighbors.
Certainly, as a sovereign state, Japan has the right to change its historical opinion; yet it cannot push the responsibility for the tension in bilateral relations to China's side. China was a victim of the Japanese invasion, and now it is still influenced by Japanese domestic politics and societal and economic issues.
So when there doesn't exist a shared historical opinion between these two countries with Japan's official revision of Sino-Japanese modern history in recent years, the history question matters. If the history question continues to fester, there will no stable and friendly diplomatic relations.
Thus the best approach to lessen the tension in Sino-Japanese relations is to cooperate in "writing" a shared history as an important first step. For its part, the Japanese government should stop revising its historical opinion before these two countries achieve a consensus on the history question.
Perhaps Shinzo Abe's election is a good chance, but the touchstone of his administration's sincerity to improve Sino-Japanese relations is whether his government is willing to remove the history question by stopping revising historical opinion before there is a consensus about historical opinion between these two Pacific powers.
Jian Junbo is an academic visitor at Durham University, United Kingdom, and a permanent researcher at the Center for European Studies, Fudan University, Shanghai, China.
AsiaTimes Online 28 Nov.2006
Speaking Freely is an Asia Times Online feature that allows guest writers to have their say. Please click here if you are interested in contributing.
We should be delighted that the tense relations between China and Japan have been defused ever since Shinzo Abe, who succeeded Junichiro Koizumi as Japan's prime minister, visited Beijing last month. Apart from a small number of people, no one wants to see conflict between the two countries.
Nevertheless, both leaders continue to shelve the issue of history that in recent years has come to the surface. Therefore, the seeds of tension are still incubated in the land of mutual distrust between them, which easily can give rise to new rivalry and hostility. In other words, if the two countries don't tackle the history question successfully, they will never live in harmony.
About 20 years ago, the history question was clear-cut. At that time, the Chinese government's opinion was very clear - that Japan had invaded China and made millions of Chinese people suffer great pain from the 1930s to the 1940s. China suffered in the hands of Japanese militarists.
Meanwhile, the Chinese government maintained that Japanese common people were also victims of World War II, and therefore the Chinese people should be friendly to and sympathetic with them; in addition, learning from history, the two countries ought to face the future to develop peaceful, friendly and stable bilateral relations.
To demonstrate the Chinese government's and people's forgiveness to Japan and the Japanese people, the Chinese government decided to forgo any war indemnity. In return, Japan helped China develop its economy with foreign aid. As a result, the two states established diplomatic relations in the 1970s, and maintained good relations for almost two decades.
However, after Junichiro Koizumi came to power as prime minister, good relations gradually froze, and hostility rose both in China and in Japan. In 2003, spontaneous anti-Japan demonstrations erupted in several Chinese cities, stimulated by Japanese provocations on the history question. It was clear that Koizumi's administration had defied its previous counterparts' tacit understanding of the history question.
From 2001 to 2006, Koizumi made annual visits to the Yasukuni Shrine, which honors the collective spirit of Japan's war dead, including top-level World War II criminals convicted by the Tokyo war tribunal. His government also approved controversial historical textbooks for use in Japanese middle schools, which whitewashed the cruel invasion of China and other Asian countries.
Obviously, Koizumi's government had broken the continuity in Sino-Japanese relations based on the shared tacit understanding of Sino-Japanese modern history maintained by the two countries' previous leaders. Japan was swiftly revising the shared historical opinion in Sino-Japanese relations.
It has been said that Koizumi wanted to revitalize Japan's sense of self, because Japan's identity as a global economic power had been diminished after the economic bubble burst in the early 1990s, which happened to be in tandem with China's rise. Its international image was deeply shaped by the US-Japan alliance, in which Japan was easily recognized as a subordinate state under US military protection.
However, maybe we cannot neglect another possible reason: that Koizumi simply wanted to cater to right-wing nationalists, conservatives and even militarists in Japan to cement his power and his party's political status.
In contrast, China has not changed its position vis-a-vis Japan. As a developing country, it has focused on economic development and political stability and seeks friendly and reciprocal beneficial relations with Asian neighbors, including Japan, which explicitly shows that China will not revise its views on modern Chinese-Japanese history to provoke its neighbors.
Certainly, as a sovereign state, Japan has the right to change its historical opinion; yet it cannot push the responsibility for the tension in bilateral relations to China's side. China was a victim of the Japanese invasion, and now it is still influenced by Japanese domestic politics and societal and economic issues.
So when there doesn't exist a shared historical opinion between these two countries with Japan's official revision of Sino-Japanese modern history in recent years, the history question matters. If the history question continues to fester, there will no stable and friendly diplomatic relations.
Thus the best approach to lessen the tension in Sino-Japanese relations is to cooperate in "writing" a shared history as an important first step. For its part, the Japanese government should stop revising its historical opinion before these two countries achieve a consensus on the history question.
Perhaps Shinzo Abe's election is a good chance, but the touchstone of his administration's sincerity to improve Sino-Japanese relations is whether his government is willing to remove the history question by stopping revising historical opinion before there is a consensus about historical opinion between these two Pacific powers.
Jian Junbo is an academic visitor at Durham University, United Kingdom, and a permanent researcher at the Center for European Studies, Fudan University, Shanghai, China.
