After more than two centuries of self-imposed peaceful isolationist policy or the sakoku under the Tokugawa Shogunate, Japan had rose into an expansionist and imperialist nation just within decades in comparison to the other western countries. No one could imagine such a small island country in Asia could rise into such a powerful nation-state. Japan began expanding and seizing colonies in Asia in the late nineteenth century later than the Western colonizers such as England, France, the Dutch, Russia and Germany that started to show interest in Asia particularly China earlier that century. This had allowed Japan to build an empire stretching from Manchuria in the North to Dutch East Indies in the south from 1868 until the end of the World War
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It is undeniably true that there were numerous factors that drove the country to colonized other nations, however this essay will emphasise on the two most significant causes, which are firstly the rise of domestic nationalism that pushed for an expansion and finally the inescapable economic pressure for …show more content…
At the end of the nineteenth century, Japan was in a period that it worries about its national security and its covet of becoming an imperial power comparable to the Western colonizers. In 1853, when Commodore Perry from the United States potently open up the Tokugawa Japan to the world, the country was forced by the Western nations to sign treaties that were seen by most Japanese as unequal. The treaties permitted legal extraterritoriality to foreigners in Japan and compel the Japanese government to accept tariff rates provided by them. After the downfall of the Tokugawa Shogunate and the rise of the Meiji Restoration, the Japanese government was keen in getting more impartial deals with the Western powers. Japanese statesman such as Iwakura Tomomi demanded the revision of the treaty due to its violation towards the freedom of Japan (Iriye, 1989). Therefore, in order to achieve that, they need to be evenly matched with the other imperial
It is undeniably true that there were numerous factors that drove the country to colonized other nations, however this essay will emphasise on the two most significant causes, which are firstly the rise of domestic nationalism that pushed for an expansion and finally the inescapable economic pressure for …show more content…
At the end of the nineteenth century, Japan was in a period that it worries about its national security and its covet of becoming an imperial power comparable to the Western colonizers. In 1853, when Commodore Perry from the United States potently open up the Tokugawa Japan to the world, the country was forced by the Western nations to sign treaties that were seen by most Japanese as unequal. The treaties permitted legal extraterritoriality to foreigners in Japan and compel the Japanese government to accept tariff rates provided by them. After the downfall of the Tokugawa Shogunate and the rise of the Meiji Restoration, the Japanese government was keen in getting more impartial deals with the Western powers. Japanese statesman such as Iwakura Tomomi demanded the revision of the treaty due to its violation towards the freedom of Japan (Iriye, 1989). Therefore, in order to achieve that, they need to be evenly matched with the other imperial