Sarah Paine: recommendation

Transcript context

…I'm going to talk to you today about one of the two great generations in modern Japanese history. They are the Meiji generation, named after the Meiji Emperor here. That generation transformed Japan into the first and only non-Western modern power in that period. The second great generation of the modern Japanese is of course the post-war generation that transformed their country into a global powerhouse. I'm going to ask a question, or try to both ask and answer. What caused the reversal of the balance of power in Asia in the period that I'm going to talk to you about? It's a really consequential question about why these tectonic changes take place in the international system. Historically China had always been the dominant civilization in Asia from time immemorial. Then upstart Japan winds up doing things, or China winds up doing things, and it reverses and has profound effects. It's a very relevant question in our own day when there's an ongoing reversal of the reversal, when China's on the comeback and threatening to put Japan back in its box. So it's really interesting to ask why? How do these things happen? So that's the background of what I'm talking about. But if you think about China back in the day before Japan trounced China in the First Sino-Japanese War, the Chinese believed that there was only one civilization, theirs naturally. They believed that of course it's the best. Because there's only one that makes it easier to be the best. But in addition, if you think about all levels of human endeavor, Chinese institutions were imitated throughout the East. It was the richest country on the planet for many, many years. Incredible achievements in science, philosophy, you name it. Also there was another assumption that people didn't make a U-turn on the path to civilization. It's always forward towards Chinese civilization. Well, Japan by Westernizing is taking a U-turn on the road to civilization. It's dumping Chinese civilization. Already we have at least two civilizations out there. Then when it trounces China in a war, it suggests to the Chinese that they can't be better than the Japanese, at the military things at least. This effect on China was far more devastating than the Opium Wars. The Chinese could write those off, the losses there to “a bunch of crazy Europeans, they're irrelevant to us.” But when Japan did this, it basically detonated the Confucian underpinnings of Chinese civilization. The Chinese have been trying to find a suitable replacement ever since. For a while they thought it was communism. Maybe they still do. So I'm going to ask a question, why did the Asian balance of power change? Now, spoiler alert, I'll give the answer. I'm going to say, clever decisions in Tokyo. But I'm going to use a particular framework to answer this that I have found really useful. I learned it from teaching at the Naval War College where students are required to have a counterargument in papers. This is what I learned from doing this. nswer this that I have found really useful. I learned it from teaching at the Naval War College where students are required to have a counterargument in papers. This is what I learned from doing this. So I'm going to have an argument, which is a thesis, and then I'll have some data supporting it. But I'm not going to quit there. I'm going to find the second best argument, the counterargument. The absolutely best alternate explanation, but not one that I think is the best one. I'm going to give you the best one. That's my thesis and I'm going to go into that. It's incredibly valuable, particularly in our own fraught political times where we need to hear each other out. You need to hear out the counterargument of what the other side is saying. What you'll often find out in a counterargument is that there are actually some very valid points in it. It leads you to think, “Oh well, maybe I need to adjust my own argument.” So changing your mind's a good idea if the data comes in. Also, it gets you away from monocausal explanations where you come up with one cause you think “that's it, time to quit.” If you're thinking about the counterargument, you might get other causes as well. Also, if you're going to do something like on a job and you have to recommend a course of action, your thesis, you had better anticipate what the counterargument's going to be. Then the third part of this is the rebuttal. Because you had better come into that meeting with your boss with the rebuttal in your back pocket so that you can deal with people who are saying you're wrong. The rebuttal cannot be a repetition of the original argument because you know what? That's annoying. Don't do that. It’s really annoying. The most effective ones are coming at the problem from a completely different direction from either argument or counterargument that then shores up your argument. My other direction is, I've got a Sino-Japanese problem and I'm going to come around with a Russia angle. So this is my game plan of what I'm planning to do and the analytical reasons for doing it. Okay, so I have a thesis which I'm going to give to you in emails and written work and lectures like this one. You really help people if you explain exactly what you're up to and you do it succinctly at the very beginning. So here it is. The Japanese leaders Westernized their institutions. They integrated multiple instruments of national power into a coherent strategy. Then in the Russo-Japanese War, they quit that one exactly at the culminating point of victory for maximum gains. Together, these three things overturned the balance of power in their favor. That's my thesis. Short, sweet, you've got it. Whether you agree with it or not, we will get there. Okay, so now I'm going to go to the first point. You should start with a topic sentence. I'm going to start one. Why am I doing this? These are all sign posts to orient you to my argument so that you can absorb it. Also, if you don't like it, you can see very clearly the parts that you don't like and we can get into a fun conversation. se are all sign posts to orient you to my argument so that you can absorb it. Also, if you don't like it, you can see very clearly the parts that you don't like and we can get into a fun conversation. My topic sentence for the Westernization part is that Japanese leaders concluded that in order to parry the threat of the Industrial Revolution, and of all these imperial powers coming at them, they needed to Westernize their institutions in order to protect their national interests. That was step one. So that's my topic sentence. Okay, so what's going on? The Industrial Revolution started in England, or Britain more generally in the late 18th century. It spread to the continent after the Napoleonic Wars died down at the beginning of the 19th century. By the mid-19th century, it had reached Asia. It's profoundly disruptive to traditional societies whose traditional security paradigms no longer work when they're facing the weaponry of the industrialized age coming at them. What the Industrial Revolution does and why it's so revolutionary is it produces compounded economic growth. Traditional societies are pretty much pretty stable. But when you compound economic growth, the difference in power and wealth becomes stark between those who do and those who don't. It's also based, not only on technological changes—where you've got all these fancy armaments and railways and telegraphs—but it's also based on institutions. What are institutions? They're how we organize each other. When you think of institutions, you think of the buildings where people are. But that's not it. It's the people in there who are working on a shared project together, a shared area of activity. This is one of the hallmarks of Western civilization. This is what the Romans figured out about institutions and laws, that this is a way of really harnessing people, and it's profoundly powerful. I'll go into all of that. Japan's looking at the world with this incoming industrial revolution, or the powers that have benefited from it. It's watching its neighbor China being defeated twice in war. They're horrified, not just appalled. They’re looking at it and going, “maybe we’ll be next?” And they're right. The United States does unto Japan what Britain and France did unto China. What's that? The treaty port system. What it meant is that trade in Japan and China would take place in designated treaty ports, that the West would set tariffs on this trade, and that Western citizens in China or Japan in these treaty ports would not be subjected to Chinese or Japanese law, but home country law. When Chinese and Japanese citizens were in Europe and the United States, they most certainly were not dealing with home country law, they were dealing with US or Western law. So it was not reciprocal in any way. In addition, each one of these treaties had a most favored nation clause in it which said, the one who's negotiating this treaty, the most favored one, whatever they negotiate will be given to everybody else. So it meant whatever one could negotiate accrued to them all. It meant that China lost sovereignty and Japan lost their sovereignty when these treaties went in.…

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