The Nature and Characteristics of the Meiji Modernization

The first important point to note is that the Meiji modernization is a ‘defensive modernization’. Its aim is to achieve national independence and security by building up the nation’s strength and thus forcing the Occidental Powers to give up the ‘unequal treaties’ especially as the existence of ‘extra-territoriality’ and ‘fixed tariff’ in the post 1868 period constantly reminded the Japanese of the impending foreign threat. Not surprisingly, the Meiji government gave special emphasis to the development of heavy and strategic industries (ship-building, building of arsenal etc.) immediately after the Restoration since they realized that the new western force could only be overcome by technological superiority (not cultural superiority). Because of the urgent need to get rid of the western threat, the Meiji modernization is a very ‘speedy process’. The transformation of Japan from a backward and feudal society to a modern and technologically advanced one took place within a few decades whereas the political and economic transformation of Europe, for instance, took about 3 centuries (16th -19th). Moreover, because Meiji modernization is ‘defensive’ in purpose, its leaders saw to it that there should be as little reliance as possible on foreign capitals so as to prevent financial reliance and subordination to foreign powers. It is thus a ‘self-regulating’ process.

Another important point to note is that the Meiji modernization is a ‘guide’ and ‘forced’ process under the leadership of a far-sighted and yet comparatively conservative minority. The Meiji Restoration is not a ‘revolution’ resulting in class-displacement but merely ‘a shift in the balance of power within the traditional leadership’, with the power now passing into the hands of the ‘lower samurai’. These new leaders, though realistic and practical in their outlook and accepting western technological superiority, were attached to traditional values. Their slogan was ‘occidental technology and science but oriental ethics’. In other words, there was no change in the ‘belief system’ but rather a continuation of traditional values in the course of modernization. Though the new government had succeeded in building up a powerful facade based on the western model, yet, behind this facade, the spirit and mentality of the Japanese remained unchanged and uncontaminated by western culture. In a sense, the Meiji modernization is thus a ‘conservative aristocratic revolution’. The Meiji modernized only those sectors (e.g. economic, military) which they themselves thought to be most essential to the well-being of the nation. Other people did not have voice in it. It was therefore a ‘forced’ or ‘involuntary’ process directed by the upper class of the former samurai.