The Gaslight

This episode continues to highlight Yamamoto Akihiro's 2021 book Postwar Democracy: The Thought and Culture that Made Modern Japan, looking at the second half of the book. Branching out from the book, I discuss especially the meanings and fate of "democracy," the role of the New Left, and the Left/Right political dichotomy in general. What is the future of democracy in Japan?

In this episode we look at the first half of a 2021 book by Yamamoto Akihiro called Postwar Democracy: The Ideas and Culture that Made Modern Japan (Japanese). Yamamoto looks at Japan's entire postwar history through the lens of "democracy," discussing how it was debated among academics, politicians, and the general public. It's an amazing book, untranslated as of yet in English, and covered here first on the Gaslight.

In Episode 3, we delve into postwar democracy in Japan, looking especially at the writing of the 1946 Constitution of Japan. Was this "democracy from above" or a truly popular effort? As our main guide, we'll consult a few chapters of John Dower's classic text, Embracing Defeat.

In part 2 of our lecture series on the "public sphere" in Japan, we look at the Meiji Era Freedom and Popular Rights Movement, the popular embrace of democracy, and the grassroots push for a liberal constitution. Our study is guided by Japanese historian Irokawa Daikichi -- the E.P. Thompson of Japan -- and his pioneering study of popular consciousness in Meiji.

This is part 1 of a university lecture series called "Postwar Japan and the Public Sphere." To introduce the topic, Episode 1 examines Jürgen Habermas' idea of the "public sphere" and discusses how we might apply it to modern and postwar Japan in later episodes.