KENICHI MISHIMA Japan: Locked in the Discourse of National Uniqueness? Die Bevölkerung ist besser als ihre Politik und ihre Wortführer. Jürgen Habermas I n 1987 , a Japanese politician said the following at a private meeting of his party:»The position of the Tenno(Emperor) is like that of the sun shining at the zenith of the heavens.... We can therefore confidently follow our worldly pursuits, sometimes do things which are not so nice and quarrel with one another; the luminous sun rests above every­thing. The earthly world is our party. The LDP [Liberal Democratic Party] takes on the worldly business. We have a dual-world system.« 1 This unguarded comment, unsurprising given the cir­cumstances under which it was made, comes from the mouth of former prime minister Nakasone who in many respects defined Japan’s neo-con­servative cultural strategy. In what follows, I wish to spend some time dis­cussing a Japanese tradition of discourse into which the above quote can be seamlessly inte­grated. This relates to a specifically Japanese ver­sion of ethnocentricity. Then I will touch on two important problems which will accompany us into the 21 st century. The first problem is the difficulty which many Japanese have in coming to terms with the past. The second I would like to describe as»the missing dialogue between the organs of power and the public«. For although a large sec­tion of the public is in favor of an open and fair acknowledgement of the shameful actions of the past, such voices find almost no echo among poli­ticians. After all, the Japanese are not monolithic island inhabitants who have closed ranks against pressure from outside and who have closed their eyes to the past. Self-assertion Discourses Some readers may have been shocked by the quote at the beginning. The world’s press also reported that Nakasone visited the Yasukuni shrine in his official capacity as prime minister on 15 August 1985 , the anniversary of Japan’s surrender, to honor the fallen soldiers of the Greater Japanese Empire. But those sentenced by the Tokyo mili­tary tribunal as war criminals are also honored in this shrine. Nakasone has repeatedly tried to relativize what he calls the»philosophy and view of history of the Tokyo military tribunal«. 2 Such adventures also make clear that his policy was conceived in accordance with the well-known patterns which he shared at the time with Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher. Economic moder­nization cum down-scaling of the social safety net. In other words, less state presence in the economic and social sector and more of it on the level of political symbolism and in the military field. Internally a reduction of the state, externally greater splendor and power of the state. It is relatively easy to see the ideological inter­pretation which underlay this policy: by mobilizing tradition and culture he wanted to counter the danger of drifting apart of a society which dynami­cally developed in an economic boom. Here he referred back very selectively to the subtle aesthetic tradition of such arts as the tea ceremony, flower arranging or Zen Buddhist gardens but also to samurai virtues such as self-discipline, steadfast­ness, sense of harmony, and above all loyalty and devotion. They also include mutual consideration and empathy, which the Japanese allegedly practice in their every day lives. From the perspective of this experienced poli­tician, all these things characterize the uniqueness 1 . A summary of this speech, which quotes the above sentences among others, can be found in the newspaper Asahi of 30 August 1987 . 2. Nakasone had to give up the idea of a second visit to the Yasukuni shrine on the day of surrender because of the massive protests from neighboring countries. Since that time no other prime minister has dared to make such a visit although many of them, with the exception of the Socialist Murayama, would have liked to do so. 74 Mishima, Japan: Locked in the Discourse of National Uniqueness? IPG 1/2000