Carroll Quigley - Tragedy and Hope - A History of the World in Our Time

The social impact of economic changes such as these is far-reaching. The cities are growing rapidly, while many rural areas are losing population as their peoples flock to urban areas. By 1961, 44 percent of the total population was clustered in 1 percent of the country’s total area. Tokyo, with 7 million people in 1940, was down to 3 million in 1945, and passed 10 million in 1961. Other cities grew steadily but at a slower rate, and by the present day are agglomerating into four megalo-politan areas. Tens of millions of commuters swarm into these to work each day, and the traffic problem, especially in Tokyo, has become almost insoluble.

As might be expected, such rapid material advance and profound social change has given rise to all kinds of social problems. Family discipline has weakened, and the older Japanese morality and outlooks are now widely rejected. Marxism and existentialism vie for the allegiance of the educated, while the less esoterically informed are, satisfied with the pursuit of material success and personal pleasures. The gap between these two groups is considerable, and much of the stability, both political and social, in Japanese society today seems to rise from the self-satisfaction of the new middle class and the eagerness of many peasants and workers to get into that class and enjoy its benefits. These benefits increasingly provide a life like that in American suburbia, with television, baseball, bulldozers, picture windows, neon-lighted department stores, mass advertising, instant foods, and weekly slick magazines. The speed with which this has come about is almost beyond belief. Commercial television began in Japan in 1953; five years later, 16 percent of urban houses had a set, but by 1961, 72 percent had sets; electric washing machines increased from 29 percent of urban houses in 1958 to 55 percent three years later. This salaried middle class is the key to the rapid achievement and political stability of Japan. Ambitious, hard-working, loyal, reliable, very adaptable to bureaucratic organization, scientific training, and rationalizing processes, they ire suspicious of ideologies or extremist doctrines of any kind, and form one of the world’s most amazing peoples.

These general attitudes have given Japan the appearance of successful adaptation to democratic political life as determined by the SCAP-imposed constitution of 1947. As a matter of fact, the Japanese are basically uneasy about individualism, democracy, mass society, and the speed of their economic change, but few have much of an urge to rock the boat, and those old enough to remember the years of tension and war from 1931 to 1944 have-no preference for them. There are discontented groups, including the ultranationalists on the extreme Right and the various Socialist, Communist, and student groups on the Left. Both of these extremes, especially the former, operate in an atmosphere of considerable unreality. The really notable feature of Japanese political ideology is the way in which SCAP’s agrarian reform has driven Communism out of the rural areas and restricted it to the cities, chiefly to student groups.

The foundations of the present political system in Japan were established by SCAP in the early years of the Occupation. In the early months of peace, 5,000,000 Japanese military were demobilized and 3,000,000 civilians were repatriated from overseas areas. When Japanese prisoners of war were eventually returned, about 375,000 in the hands of the Russians were never accounted for. More than 4,200 Japanese were convicted of war crimes, over 700 were executed, and about 2,500 were sentenced to life imprisonment. An additional 220,000 persons were permanently excluded from public life, and about 1,300 nationalist and extremist organizations were banned. The Shinto religion was separated from the state, forbidden to propagate militaristic or ultranationalist doctrines, and Emperor Hirohito was forced to issue a public statement denying that he was divine.

A Japanese “Bill of Rights” protecting the rights of individuals and political freedoms, on a much more extensive basis than we have in the United States, was issued in 1945. The centralized police control in the Home Ministry was abolished, and police powers were curbed. A new civil code established freedom from family domination for all and equality for females.

The Constitution itself, issued by SCAP in 1946, provided that a prime minister be chosen by the 467 members of the House of Representatives, who themselves were chosen by universal adult suffrage. These were elected from 118 electoral constituencies, each represented by from three to five members, although the voter could cast his ballot for only one candidate. This ensured representation for minority views and made it difficult to obtain a majority in the House without coalitions of parties. However, the parties have tended to coalesce into two wings around the conservative Liberal Democrats and the Socialist Party. Except for the period April 1947-October 1948, when the Socialists controlled the government during a period of extreme labor unrest and violence, control has been in the hands of the Liberal Democratic Party and its allied groups. These have generally won almost two-thirds of the seats in elections over the last ten years (since 1955), while the Socialists have had difficulty in obtaining one-third of the seats.

The chief differences between the two parliamentary groups revolve around foreign affairs, with the Liberal Democrats committed to a pro-Western policy in strong alliance with the United States and rather isolated from Asia. The Socialist group wishes to weaken the American connection and resume Japan’s traditional position as a leading Asiatic Power. The economic orientation of Japan and its booming prosperity have made the task of the Socialists a difficult one.

The different views of the two parties in domestic politics are reflected in a controversy over the Constitution. This document, in Article Nine, renounces war and forbids maintaining an army, navy, or air force. Despite this, in July 1950, General MacArthur ordered formation of a defense force, and the United States insisted on this at the time of the Peace Treaty with Japan, the following year. The Mutual Defense Alliance with the United States, signed in March 1954, bound Japan to maintain a defense force of 275,000 men. Since this force is unconstitutional, the Socialists have sought vigorously to keep their parliamentary representation at over one-third of the seats, to prevent an amendment removing Article Nine. All amendments require a two-thirds vote of the Parliament plus a majority in a national referendum. However, even in 1963, when the Socialists made a desperate effort to obtain one-third of the seats (156), they fell 12 seats short of the necessary number. They have received little help from the Communists, whose parliamentary representatives rose to a peak of 35 seats in the disturbed period of 1949, but they alienated the Japanese by their addiction to violence and have elected only a handful of members since 1950 (none in October 1952, following the May Day riots of that year and only 3 in 1960, increased to 5 in 1963).

On the whole, Japan in the twentieth century has been an extraordinary country, and this characterization does not decrease with the passing years. It is a bulwark of strength to the Western bloc, not because of its military power, which is insignificant, or even as an American military base in the Far East, but because it, like West Germany, is an example of the freedom and prosperity associated with being an American “satellite,” in sharp contrast with the unhappy plight of the Soviet satellite states. Above all, Japan, for the neutrals and the backward areas of the world, is a living proof that it is possible to advance from backwardness and slavery to prosperity and freedom.