Asia in the New Millennium. Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky, 2013. xi, 294 pp. US$50.00, cloth. ISBN 978-0-8131-3679-0.
The “Note on Romanization” page in State Violence in East Asia offers clues as to the breadth that this volume covers: Korean, Japanese Chinese, Indonesian, Thai and Burmese. Not listed here are two additional geographic areas also included: the Philippines and Cambodia. Most readers will be familiar with the skeletal details of the events addressed here. However, the authors expand their meticulous coverage of these events to analyze the efforts by civilians and government officials to negotiate reconciliation and closure to the crimes committed during these troubling times. This latter effort I felt to be the most interesting angle of this well-conceived and tightly organized volume.
The framework for State Violence in East Asia is paved by two excellent introductory chapters, one by the editors and a second by Vince Boudreau that analyzes the “social and political role” of state violence. The chapters that follow, building their arguments on ideas and questions presented in these two discussions, focus on four fundamental aspects of state violence: the reasons behind the state’s decision to use violence; social treatment of this violence in its aftermath; the path(s) taken to push for reconciliation; and the relationship between political transition and resolution of violence (4). Boudreau’s distinction between instrumental and exemplary violence (24–29) serves as an important thread that weaves its way through many of the volume’s case studies. His discussion on “Asian Cases” (34–38) correctly warns that much variety exists within this geographically defined area due to the different historical experiences of the residents. The question then arises as to the value of limiting the discussions here to just East Asian cases.
The question of why the state chooses to commit acts of violence on its citizens is most relevant to distinctions that Boudreau draws between instrumental and exemplary violence: does the state simply act to eradicate a potential or visible threat or does it employ violence as a preemptive warning directed at potential threats to its existence? The two motivations often overlap, as suggested in Jeffrey N. Wasserstrom and Kate Merkel-Hess’s consideration of the 1989 Tiananmen Incident in China as “instrumental in the moment” but harbouring “exemplary ends” (chapter 4). The question of why the state targets its own people is closely related to a second question concerning which people it targets: ethnic minorities (Okinawans and non-Khmer Cambodians), and political minorities (politically ostracized Koreans of Chŏlla province and leftists in general). Both groups have traditionally been seen as harbouring less intrinsic interest in central state operations, and thus peoples that pose the greatest potential threat to the state. Many chapters reveal attempts by the state to link radical political movements to citizen protests by describing their acts as communist-directed attempts to overthrow democratically elected governments, a claim that has enjoyed less support since the end of the Cold War.
The diverse experiences found in the case studies regarding popular attempts to reach resolution and gain restitution underlines the difficulty of negotiating closure after the violence has subsided. Boudreau offers two necessary factors that encourage this process: a “balance of power between the regime and its critics,” and the extent to which either side “controls the narrative” (40). Rewriting state narratives is facilitated by, as seen in South Korea, significant political change that allows the victims political space to assume a degree of control over the reconciliation process. Even here, as Namhee Lee demonstrates, the results are never completely satisfactory to all (64–68). Yet, this example is exceptional in that it resulted in powerful heads of state and industry being brought to trial. An insurmountable roadblock found in many cases was the retention of either direct or indirect power and influence by officials responsible for the violence.
This leads to the rather important question raised in a number of the chapters: to what extent is regime change necessary for resolution and narrative correction? Douglas Kammen’s chapter on Indonesia’s 2004 examination of the mid-1960s revolution (chapter 6), and Rommel A. Curaming’s chapter on the mid-1980s overthrow of Ferdinand Marcos in the Philippines (chapter 8) are of particular value in addressing this question. The two authors independently attribute the lack of success of reconciliation to non-ideological factors, namely the social class and economic interests held by those who remained in positions of influence over the periods of state violence and reconciliation. Other pertinent factors include the “relative empowerment of civil society,” “the form of military engagement that accompanied the political transition, and the “proximity of justice” (15–16). An unfortunate, but perhaps inevitable, barrier is the “natural fear” element: the fear that the perpetrators of state violence will be pardoned for their crimes as a compromise toward the “utilitarian premise of achieving the greatest good for the greatest number” (16).
State Violence in East Asia offers eight generally sound case studies that follow rather closely the road map laid out by the volume’s editors. The study on World War II-era Okinawan suicides, however, appears slightly out of place for two reasons: first, the acts under discussion occurred during a wartime situation, and the victims were targeted not as state enemies but for their assumed position as imperial subjects. In other words, it was their Japanese identity that “entitled” them to die for the imperial cause. This diverse collection of case studies might have benefited from a short consideration of similar developments in Latin America or Africa. That said, the structure, cohesion and diversity among the chapters qualifies State Violence in East Asia as a steady anchor for a survey course or seminar on modern Asian issues, a welcome counter to the many publications dealing with East Asia’s miracle economies. Its overall structure demonstrates an excellence in organization that future edited volumes might consider emulating.
Mark Caprio
Rikkyo University, Tokyo, Japan
pp. 561-563