Jackson School Publications in International Studies. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2014. ix, 330 pp. (Tables.) US$30.00, paper. ISBN 978-0-295-99346-1.
In this volume, ten experts of Europe and East Asia discuss how countries in both regions have dealt with the legacies of their problematic pasts. Half of the essays are dedicated exclusively to European experiences. But the essays’ focus on the process and not just the result of national memory making generates insights that are directly relevant to Asia as well. In this way the book manages to link the two regions without falling into the common trap of obsessively comparing the current situation in both areas, which only results in superficial moralizing of the history issue. Secondly, the contributions in this volume are refreshingly evenhanded. Even the possibly provocative thesis by Gilbert Rozman that not Japanese but Chinese historical revisionism has been driving the history gap in the past decade is very well argued.
There are several themes in this book. The main one in my view is succinctly summarized by Gi-Wook Shin when he writes: “No nation is immune from the charge that it has formed a less than complete view of the past” (158). Indeed, reading the ten essays will inevitably lead to the realization that every country—European or Asian, victim or perpetrator—has engaged in national myth-making and the reinterpretation of its past history. The authors discuss the various factors that account for this in each state. But the volume also succeeds in calling attention to the greater link that exists between memory politics, national identity and nation-state building. Julian Jackson makes this connection explicit when he quotes “forgetting, even historical error, are a necessary factor in the creation of a nation” (150)and argues that “finding a balance between history and myth, denigration and celebration, is very difficult” (151). This has been indeed the case for Japan, China and South Korea as Sneider and Rozman demonstrate in their essays. But we find similar problems in Europe. For decades many European nations harped on their legacies of resistance and victimhood while ignoring the often more salient histories of collaboration and cooperation in the murder of European Jewry (see the chapters by Julian Jackson, Thomas Berger, Frances Gouda, Roger Peterson and Daniel Chirot). Some of this was probably necessary. As Fania Oz-Salzberger’s essay suggests, raw facts of history have the capacity to tear apart the fabric of its societies, especially after an intense period of conflict. The argument implied in Oz-Salzberger’s essay, however, also puts the Korean and Chinese unwillingness to investigate their history of collaboration into a more sympathetic light. After all, their communities were as damaged by the past as those of postwar Europe. That being said, one also needs to distinguish between the necessity to boost one’s national identity after an intense collective trauma and an outright nationalist revisionism that prevents reconciliation 70 years later. Rozman argues that the current history politics of China errs on the side of the latter.
Another major theme of this book is Japan. Specifically, several authors set out to provide a more proper contextualization of the country’s role in East Asia’s memory politics. Chirot makes the compelling case that Japan’s less than sanguine approach to its past legacies is common amongst nation-states. Germany is the real exception. Yet Berger speculates that even the Federal Republic might have taken a similar path had it not been subject to a much larger pressure from the international community. Berger also informs us that on the level of collective memory, the Japanese were more pertinent than Germans in early postwar decades. This finding falls in line with Sneider’s article, which disavows the myth of Japanese memory having been monolithic and dominated by right-wing conservatism. The larger point of these essays is a simple one. Vilifying Japan and subjecting it to over-simplistic comparisons with Germany will not provide any solutions for the history problem in East Asia.
The authors, however, do recognize Japan’s central role in this issue and the shortcomings of its politics. Rozman rightly points out that Japan’s own haughtiness caused it to miss the opportunity to seek deeper reconciliation when it could have in the 1980s. He is also correct in asserting that Japan’s obsession with its neighbours’ use of the “history card” has prevented it from recognizing its own offensive historical revisionism. And one cannot find much fault with Gi-Wook Shin’s argument that Japan has apologized plenty, but that these apologies have sounded hollow to Asians because of its domestic political conduct. In short, the message of these authors is that there is nothing wrong with pushing Japan to assume greater responsibilities for its past transgressions and contrasting it to Germany for that reason. But one needs to do so sensibly and in a historically defensible manner. Naturally, this conclusion is commonsensical. Except that in this work we find plenty of examples of how to do so properly.
Last but not least, the book offers an interesting proposition on how to move forward in East Asia. Gi-Wook Shin argues that this can be done only with the more active involvement of the United States—a country that has apparently been co-responsible for the creation of Asia’s history problem from the start. Shin suggests that were the United States to fully acknowledge and apologize for the atrocities committed on Japan during World War Two, Japan might do the same in regards to its neighbours. This is certainly an idea worth pondering. But one should also add that China and Korea will have to be ready to compromise themselves—something Shin seems to take for granted.
There are many other interesting arguments as well as criticisms that deserve mention but cannot be treated here. In closing it suffices to say that despite any quibbles one might have with one or another essay, the overall quality of the contributions is very high. Reading them will make one rethink what we know about memory politics in East Asia, Europe and the comparison thereof. Even those who have studied these issues extensively will find new ideas in this publication.
Ivo Plsek
University of California, Berkeley, USA
pp. 270-272