Hakko ichiu
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Hakkō ichiu (八紘一宇 literally "eight cords, one roof" i.e. "all the world under one roof"?) was a Japanese political slogan that became popular during the first part of the Showa era, and was popularized in a speech by Prime Minister of Japan Fumimaro Konoe on 1940-08-01. [1]
The term was coined early in the twentieth century by Nichiren sect religious activist and ultranationalist Tanaka Chigaku, who cobbled it from parts of a statement attributed in the chronicle Nihon shoki to legendary first emperor Jimmu at the time of his ascension. [2] Ambiguous in its original context, Tanaka interpreted the statement by Jimmu, mythically descended from the sun goddess Amaterasu, as meaning that imperial rule had been divinely ordained to expand until it united the entire world. While Tanaka saw this outcome as resulting from the emperor's moral leadership, many of his followers were less pacifist in their outlook.
Radical nationalist Ikki Kita was quick to adopt the term, and to interpret it as meaning that the Japanese were a divine race destined to pacify the world, by force if necessary [3] Army officer Ishiwara Kanji, who masterminded the Manchurian Incident, joined Tanaka's ultranationalist organization in 1920, and by 1928 was using hakkō ichiu as a slogan to justify the seizure of Manchuria's resources in preparation for a war leading to Japanese dominance over all Asia.
The term hakkō ichiu did not enter general circulation until 1940-08-01, when the second Konoe administration issued a white paper titled “Fundamental National Policy”, which opened with these words, and in which Prime Minister Konoe proclaimed that the basic aim of Japan's national policy was "the establishment of world peace in conformity with the very spirit in which our nation was founded"[4] and that the first step was the proclamation of a "new order in East Asia" (later known as the "Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere").
As the Second Sino-Japanese War dragged on without conclusion, the Japanese government turned increasingly to the nation's spiritual capital to maintain fighting spirit. Characterization of the fighting as a "holy war" (seisen), similarly grounding the current conflict in the nation's sacred beginnings, became increasingly evident in the Japanese press at this time. The general spread of the term hakkō ichiu, neatly encapsulating this view of expansion as mandated in Japan's divine origin, was further propelled by preparations for celebrating the 2600th anniversary of Jimmu's ascension, which fell in the year 1940 according to the traditional chronology.
[edit] References
- Beasley, W.G. (1991). Japanese Imperialism 1894-1945. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0198221681.
- Brendon, Piers (2002). The Dark Valley: A Panorama of the 1930s. Vintage; Reprint edition. ISBN 0-375-70808-1.
- Walter Edwards. "Forging Tradition for a Holy War: The Hakkō Ichiu Tower in Miyazaki and Japanese Wartime Ideology." Journal of Japanese Studies 29:2 (2003).
[edit] Note
- ^ Beasley, Japanese Imperialism 1894-1945, page 226-227
- ^ As early as 1928, the Japanese editorials were already preaching the theme of the hakko ichiu without using the specific term. Michio Nakajima, Tennō no daigawari to kokumin, Aoki Shoten 1990, p.129-130.
- ^ Brendan, The Dark Valley, A Panorama of the 1930s, page 43
- ^ Edwards, p. 309.
