the marvels and mysteries of Japanese 'kokusaika' (1)

I have been re-reading a couple of books on Japan in the context of one of my current research projects – including Ivan P. Hall’s razor-sharp Cartels of the Mind: Japan's Intellectual Closed Shop.

While I generally agree, on the basis of my own experience in Japanese academia, with the line of his argument, there are certain passages which resonate more deeply with me, perhaps because I was raised in a Christian culture where a sense of humanist universalism and solidarity with the plight of others are (were?) still widely upheld moral values.

And perhaps that is why too the conspicuous absence of these values from Japanese society makes it so difficult, if not virtually impossible, for people with ‘our’ cultural roots to suppress a sense of outrage at the appalling discrepancies, aberrations, inequalities and injustices that such absence constantly breeds.

This also makes the Japanese shoddy attempts at 国際化 (internationalization) sound utterly ludicrous and insincere. Most of them seem absolutely incapable of understanding the reciprocity and openness to others that a genuine cosmopolitanism demands.

And how on earth can one take such people seriously and show any goodwill towards them?

Ivan P. Hall, spot on:

The truth of the matter is that the Japanese do not want non-Japanese physically present among them for any length of time, embedded as individuals in the working institutions of their society. As short-term feted guests or curiosities, yes; but not as fixed human furniture. Permanent intrusions are viewed by the Japanese as intolerable threats to their value system, their social relations, their way of life. . . .

What has been missing from Japan’s historical conceptualization of itself in respect to both the West and Asia is a capacity to think in terms of “horizontal” relationships among equals – a greater sensitivity to universal human traits and needs and interests, overriding the rigid verticalities of superior-inferior power relationships and the precipitous intercultural chasms that still dominate the Japanese view of the outside world. Having climbed to the top of the pile [my comment: it now seems to be slipping down towards the bottom, though!], Japan has difficulty deciding where to go next, since it cannot imagine simply going sideways – toward a relaxed collegiality.

In short, what prevents Japan’s assumption of an enlightened world leadership role is, more than anything else, its overblown particularism. Great powers in human history have all predicated their mandate (however presumptuous or self-serving) on some sort of universalism. That goes for the great imperial purveyors of political pax – be it America, Britain, ancient Rome, or even the perverted communist universalism of the old Soviet bloc – as well as for the major cultural players like France, with its self-appointed mission civilisatrice, and the Chinese with their superb self-confidence over the ages that the barbarians at the gates would eventually succumb to the overpowering charm of Chinese culture.

Indeed, one of the most striking features of contemporary, hitech Japan is the persistent Japanese fear of the adoption of their own culture by others, an attitude that contrasts most starkly with that of the French. A foreigner in France who does not know the language, or handles it poorly, has traditionally been persona non grata – precisely the reverse of Japan, where the fluent foreigner seems threatening and intrusive, and the complete linguistic and cultural ingénue is welcomed with open arms and sighs of relief. In France a reasonable mastery of the French language and culture by a resident foreign artist, scholar or journalist usually leads to professional and personal treatment no worse than that which Frenchmen accord one another. In Japan anxiety over the acculturation of others to their culture – together with the conviction that it cannot be done – leads most Japanese to view the effort less as a compliment or first step toward bonding than as an unwanted prying into their national psyche.

Unfortunately, the evidence to date suggests the difficulty of convincing the Japanese that their great influence in the world today makes reciprocal access to their society all but mandatory. Most, instead, when pressed, will elevate their exclusionism to a cultural principle requiring tolerance and acceptance by others on the basis of cultural relativism. True respect, in other words, means Japanese respect for American openness, and American respect for Japanese exclusivity. The demands for intellectual access represent Western absolutes, a new form of cultural imperialism. Heads I win, tails you lose. The economical and political implications of this insular rubric are mind-boggling, but that is the bottom line of Japan’s pledges of “internationalization.” (pp. 178-79; added emphases mine)

An intellectual -- and cultural -- closed shop, no doubt.