RISE OF MODERN JAPAN

• The Tokugawa shogunate had driven out all foreign traders and missionaries, isolating the nation from almost all contact with the outside world–Maintain relations with Korea and informal

trading with the Dutch at Nagasaki– Foreign ships are driven away and shipwrecked

sailors are caged• The Western powers see Japanese isolation as a

challenge–Want to open up Japan for trade

Opening of Japan• The first to succeed is the United States• 1853 an American fleet of four warships under the

leadership of Commodore Matthew Perry arrives in Tokyo Bay– Sent by President Fillmore “to bring a singular and

isolated people into the family of civilized nations”– Perry brings a letter from President Fillmore• Asks for better treatment of sailors shipwrecked

on the Japanese islands• Wants to open foreign relations

• Perry returns a few months later with a larger fleet for Japan’s answer

– Shogunate officials were undecided, but the gun power of Commodore Perry’s ships finally decides the answer

• Japan agrees to sign the Treaty of Kanagawa under military pressure– Provides the return of shipwrecked sailors– Opens ports to Western traders and establishes a

U.S. consulate in Japan– Also establishes extraterritoriality for Westerners in

Japan• Similar treaties signed with other European nations

Meiji Restoration• The decision to open relations is highly unpopular and

many Japanese found the treaties deeply humiliating– Angry over Westerners committing crimes and

receiving mild to no punishments– Gave rise to Japanese nationalism

• Young emperor Mutsuhito takes back power of the gov’t in 1868, ending the shogunate system– He takes the name Emperor Meiji, which means

“enlightened rule”– The emperor’s return to power is called the Meiji

Restoration and his reign from 1868 to 1912 is called the Meiji period

• The emperor realizes that Japan must change to survive – Embarks on a policy of reform to turn Japan into a

modern industrial nation

• Wanted to create a modern political system based on the Western model

• Supported rapid industrialization • Required all children to attend school and allowed

some students to study abroad

• Need modern forces to compete with the Western powers– Compulsory military service – all men serve for

three years– Gain modern weapons and hire American and

European experts to train the new modernized army

– Adopt Western military practices

Japan as an Imperial Power• Copied the imperialist Western approach to foreign

affairs– Japan lacks resources and is densely populated – no

room for expansion– Colonies = wealth, need them to compete on the

world stage• Japan’s navy forces the Koreans to open their ports to

Japanese trade– The Koreans had pledged allegiance to China

• War with China – the Sino-Japanese War (1894)– Go to war over rivalry over Korea– China is defeated in only a few months – European powers gain respect for Japan and agree to

end extraterritoriality in Japan

• Russo-Japanese War (1904) – War with Russia caused by competition over

influence in Manchuria and Korea– This victory stuns the world – a European nation just

lost to a non-Western power• Annexes Korea in 1910• Japan is now seen as a modern nation and a great

power

CHINA JAPAN How trade est.Gov’t collapseRelations w/ U.S.

Reform

Resistance toChangeBecome moreModernImperialized orImperializer

Imperialized Imperializer

NO YES

YES - government NO only the Samurai

NONE all fails MEIJI REFORMS become like the West

British force opium through war

US forces Japan to trade under military threat

Fall of the Qing dynasty Emperor retakes power

Open Door Policy Forces trade