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Феномен японского колониального империализма в оптике конструктивистского направления теории международных отношений
This paper examines the problem of Japanese foreign expansion through the lens of constructivist international relations theory. The Oriental studies tradition to describe and explain such phenomenon frequently lacks the question why it was Japan that managed to overcome its subalternity and start its own colonial policies, but other Asian nations failed to perform it. A similar remark applies to so-called problem-solving theories of international relations — structural realism and liberal institutionalism, which emphasize on the determinism of international system over its elements (states-actors).
Our point is to use the methodology of constructivism as a critical theory on international relation and to reveal the implicit mechanisms of the Japanese Empire’s identity formation and, consequently, its internal grounds for imperialist policies. We argue that being forcefully «opened» and then viewed as a potential colony in the international political agenda of the second half of the XIX — early XX centuries made Japan to actively seek for national identity.
On the one hand, this resulted in the habitualization of ideas about the necessity of modernization, industrialization, and expansion as means of struggle and survival. On the other hand, this «new» identity, representing the Japanese Empire as the patron of the Eastern peoples, rests on the ancient institutional foundations of Japanese culture as main recipient of foreign cultures (Chinese, in particular). These two elements of Japan’s imperial identity together caused its successful participation in colonial race of the turn of the XIX—XX centuries as a full-fledged «great power».