Tuesday 28 September 2004
The Chrysanthemum Throne
Part II - House of the Setting Sun
When people first
start learning about the IHA, one of their initial questions is usually, “How did it
become so powerful?” The simplistic answer is, Japan’s defeat in WWII. When people start to ask about the Crown Princess
Masako’s current plight, the simplistic answer is that Japan’s rules of succession require a male heir. It’s only when people
start to ask about why the IHA is so opposed to gender-blind rules of succession that the
answers become extremely complicated. I don’t pretend to know the definitive answer
but I firmly believe the explanation lies in several, interconnected issues: the
historical role of the emperor; the emperor’s status under Shintoism; Emperor
Hirohito’s actions during the WWII; the political system set up by the victorious
Allies; the nature of Japan’s current political system; and converging impact of all
these factors upon the IHA’s ideology.
The vastness of each
of these topics means that even an abbreviated explanation would be too long, not to
mention quite confusing. For the sake of clarity, I’ll be adding a subsequent Part to
this series on the Chrysanthemum Throne so that Part II can focus solely on the historical
role of the Emperor, Japan’s
political traditions, and the changes effected by Japan’s defeat in WWII. At times, it may seem as though the issue of the IHA
and the succession crisis has been lost by the wayside. The ultimate purpose of this Part,
however, is to show why the Japanese political system has turned servant into master, and
why I think the IHA’s control over the Imperial Family and Princess Masako is a
legacy of Japan’s history,
tradition and culture.
The Historical Role of the Emperor up to WWII
The Japanese call their
country Nippon, which
translates to “Origin of the Sun” or “Land or the Rising Sun.” The
Japanese flag, a simple red disk in the center, reflects this theme, one deeply rooted in
mythology, religion and politics. So does the name sometimes given to the Imperial Family:
House of the Rising Sun. The reason lies in Japanese mythology, which holds that the
goddess of the sun and the ruler of the heaven -- known as Amaterasu Omikami
– was the actual ancestor of the current Imperial Family. The first known written
documentation of that claim was made by Emperor Jimmu, Japan's legendary first emperor, in the 7th century. Before then, Japan had lacked a writing system and stories were
transmitted orally. It was only after the Chinese writing system was introduced around
that there was documentary evidence to tell the tale of monarchy’s “divine”
roots. Thus, the Japanese emperors claimed descent from the birth of time when,
theoretically, Amaterasu created the world and all known living things.
The belief in a divine
emperor is interwoven with the belief in Shinto, a polytheistic religion with roots
stretching back to 500 B.C. The religion venerates almost all forms of nature, whether
they are rocks, mountains, rivers, trees, water, or a person’s ancestors. In other
words, it is based on animism or natural phenomena. http://www.asahi-net.or.jp/~QM9T-KNDU/shintoism.htm
Almost all ancient religions --- be they Incan, Aztec or Egyptian --- considered the Sun
to be the greatest of all natural phenomena and the Japanese were no exception. Thus, the
Sun Goddess was the principle deity of Shinto and her living descendent on earth
– the emperor – a man to be revered and obeyed like no other. It seems that, at
this time and up to the early 20th century, the emperor was considered merely
as the Goddess’ descendent and not as an actual living God in his own right.
While the semi-religious aura gave the
emperor great symbolic authority, the medieval ages marked the loss of real power for both
the emperor and his Shinto religion. Shinto was supplanted by Buddhism, an
influence imported in from China,
while the emperor was controlled by various aristocratic clans who used the emperor as a
way of maintaining their power, usually by marrying into the imperial family. Over time,
these powerful families were, in turn, replaced as the real – but unofficial –
locus of power by various shoguns (or military governors). In all cases, however,
the emperor’s role was a largely ceremonial one where he possessed extreme prestige
and symbolic political authority but nothing particularly concrete. (See, G.
Cameron Hurst III, The Structure of the Heian Court: Some Thoughts on The Nature of
‘Familial Authority’ in Heian Japan, pp.55-59, in Medieval Japan: Essays in Institutional History,
(eds. Hall and Mass, Stanford University Press, 1974).) As one historian explains it,
“in political struggles, the supreme goal was to control or dominate the imperial
position rather than usurp it as in so many other societies. It was, in a sense, a human
chess game where the object was to capture the king – but the king could not be
removed from the board.” (Id. at 59.) Somehow, I don’t think much has changed over the past thousand
years but we will get to that later.
The shoguns’
centuries-old domination over political power abruptly ended in 1868 when Emperor Meiji
overthrew the faltering Tokugawa Shogunate and returned to power in what is now
called the Meiji Restoration. One of the triggers leading to this unofficial revolution
was renewed contact with the West, something which the Shogunate had managed to avoid for
almost 200 years. http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ei/bgn/4142.htm
This Western influence proved to be significant in many other ways as well. Emperor Meiji initiated instituted wide sweeping
political, civil and social reforms which transformed Japan
into a significant world power. The first of these reforms was
to abolish the feudal system which had given his ancestors such grief. Then, in 1890, he
established a Western-style constitutional monarchy with a quasi-parliamentary body, the
Imperial Diet.
Unfortunately,
real democracy – just like a powerful Emperor -- was just an illusion. The man who
drafted most of the documents underlying the Meiji political system was Ito Hirobumi, one
of the most powerful oligarchs and a passionate admirer of Bismarck, the expansionistic,
authoritarian Prussian chancellor who unified the German state. According to one analysis,
Bismarck’s model “was a
government in which neither the parliament nor the king actually exercises real authority
over the Imperial bureaucracy.” http://www.willamette.edu/~rloftus/meijirest.html.
Ito was particularly receptive to the fact that “Bismarck's Wilhelmine constitution restricted political rights to the benefit of the
state, plus in its Article II it subordinated individuals' freedom to their
responsibilities to the emperor and, in addition, it upheld imperial absolutism.”
(M.R. Mulford, “A Brief Study of the Two Constitutions of Japan”,
hereinafter referred to as “Mulford”, available at http://www.frontiernet.net/~mmulford/2consts.htm
.)
In
accordance with that approach, Ito drafted a new Constitution which declared that the
Emperor was simultaneously the sovereign, the source of the State’s legitimacy and
supreme commander of the military. It also declared, however, that the Constitution was
bestowed by the emperor on the people. The importance of this is not that it gave power to
the emperor; rather, it was that the Emperor and, by association therefore, his advisors
were essentially beyond the law. Id. Ito’s political artfulness
did not stop there:
The government also had one further item at its disposal … [which]
significantly curtailed the power of the emperor. All issuances from the emperor had to
have the countersignature of the minister responsible for the area affected. Thus, even
though the emperor seemed to have been given immense amounts of power, the administration
of the government was in the hands of the cabinet, supreme command of the armed forces,
the privy council and imperial household ministry. All of these organs were controlled by
the oligarches and this small group of supremely powerful men came to be known as the Genro
(not to be confused with the genro-in, which was the name given to the Senate
established in the early stages of the restoration). The effect of this was to confirm the
oligarchy in power. A quote from Ito at this time is most revealing. He stated,
"...joint rule by the king and the people must, in Japan, be set aside." The
effect was that after the restoration had imbued the emperor with power once again, this
action re-relegated him to figurehead status.
Id
Ito
continued to give lip service to liberal ideals when it came to the parliamentary system.
He and his fellow oligarchs ensured that the Imperial Diet was a mockery of the
representative system by permitting only the wealthiest 1% of the population eligible to
vote in elections. In addition, the upper house, or House of Peers, was arranged so that
members were comprised of the old aristocratic clans or supporters of the oligarchs, both
of which who could be counted upon to block any liberal policies. Id. See also, http://afe.easia.columbia.edu/japan/japanworkbook/modernhist/meiji.html.
Thus,
one of the ironies of the Meiji “Restoration” is that the emperor was never
actually restored and traditional political elites were never actually removed. In fact,
the latter were alive and flourishing in the shadows. They controlled the bureaucracy,
compromised the main membership source of military leadership, were at the heart of the
Emperor’s Privy Council, and filled various other government bodies as well. In this
way, their official role in the upper house of the Diet was only the tip of the iceberg;
their unofficial, shadow roles let them run the country in perfect accordance with Bismarck’s ideal of a government where only
the imperial bureaucracy ruled. Since the Emperor did not actually dictate policies, even
if they were political, the unofficial power of the conservative elite would prove to be
significant in events as they later unfolded.
Equally significant to
that future drama was the role of Shinto which reasserted its head during this
time. Liberal though he may have been in some respects, Emperor Meiji’s
"controlled revolution" did not extend to Shinto or the old religious
ways. In fact, he made every effort to revive the ancient myths and Shinto beliefs. For example, the ancient department of Shinto
rites was reestablished, giving Shinto much of its structure and identity as a
religion. The Emperor, and the oligarchs advising him, went so far as to create “State
Shinto,” a national religion that was a counterpart of the State itself and
aggressively promoted by the State. The glorification of Shinto was -- necessarily
and philosophically – an inherent glorification of the emperor; the power of one fed
off the power of the other in the most symbiotic relationship of all. For a man whose
historical function had long been all symbol with little substance, the Shinto
religion simultaneously provided a legitimization, a source of power independent from
power-hungry groups, and a PR boost.
Unfortunately, the plan didn’t quite turn out as
the Emperor had hoped. The largest problem in the Meiji system was the absence of any
checks or balances on the military. A bastion of the old aristocratic clans, the military
was responsible solely to the Emperor if, and only if, he should step in. The absence of any real systemic controls was bad
enough but it was multiplied a thousand fold when combined with the military’s
expansionist agenda and with State Shinto.
As a result, the ancient mythology became more than just
a means used by the emperor to glorify his power and the state; it also became a powerful
instrument in the hands of early 19th century militarists, who used it to
glorify their policy of aggression. For centuries, Japan had reveled in its alleged racial purity, as compared
to such Asian neighbors as Korea; it also had been fiercely xenophobic. The
ruling elite took advantage of these feelings and hijacked State Shinto with its
emphasis on Amaterasu and divine purity to fuel nationalistic aspirations
against foreign “enemies.”
Although Emperor Meiji frowned on attempts to discourage
foreigners when they brought financial investment or the expertise necessary to transform Japan into an international power, he had few objections when
it involved expansion at the expense of Japan’s neighbors. What followed were military confrontations against
China (1894-95) and Russia (1904-05), victories that shocked the West,
as well as territorial gains in Korea
and Manchuria. http://www.japan-guide.com/e/e2130.html
It wasn’t enough for the conservative elites who
bided their time until 1928, when the young Emperor Hirohito ascended the throne. Hirohito
is sometimes called the Showa Emperor
because of the name – Showa – which he chose for his reign. It is unclear
if Hirohito was considered, like his ancestors before him, to be just a living descendant
of Amaterasu or if he was elevated into an actual God in his own right by the Imperial
Army and/or the political elite. The latter claim has been made but, if true, it would be
a radical departure from
ancient Shinto tenets which holds that the emperor was a divine, sacred being as a
result of his descent, not necessarily an actual, living God. The point may appear to be
mere semantics but, if true, it just added to Hirohito’s importance and increased his
usefulness to those around him. After all, if you want to mobilize a nation in support of
your militaristic plans, what’s more useful than controlling an actual, living God
who: symbolizes ethnic purity and nationalism; whose worship demands complete and total
submission by his people; and veneration is only properly shown through geographic
expansion? It doesn’t hurt that State Shinto conveniently prohibited all
criticism of the Emperor or his policies. It’s even more convenient if that
prohibition extends, indirectly, to the elites around him since, clearly, a God is
infallible in his choice of advisors.... We all know how the story ends from there.
Or do we really? Was Hirohito (and the monarchy) really
the puppet of militaristic zealots? Was the Emperor just a quiet, nerdish figurehead who
stood helplessly on the sidelines as powerful cliques drove Japan to war in his name? Was this emperor really the same as
all the figurehead emperors who preceded him and who were uninvolved in the running of the
government? According to a new book, the answers to all these questions is ‘no.’
In 2000, historian Herbert Bix’s Pulitzer Prize winning book, Hirohito and the
Making of Modern Japan, broke away from almost 50 years worth of traditionally
accepted historical interpretation to present a very different picture of this one emperor
and the power he exercised. (Herbert P. Bix, Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan, Harper Collins 2000.) Relying on newly
released documents, exhaustive research, and contacts within Japan, Bix’s controversial book argues that Emperor
Hirohito was hardly a submissive slave to the military and political oligarchy around him.
To the contrary, Bix argues that he was deeply and actively involved in every phase of the
war. Furthermore, after the war, Hirohito’s skillful but “gross
misrepresentation” of his role was intentionally designed
to lead to the conclusion that he had always been a British-style
constitutional monarch and a pacifist. Hirohito omitted mention of how he and his aides
had helped the military to become an enormously powerful political force pushing for arms
expansion. He ignored the many times he and his entourage had made use of the Meiji
system… to stifle a more democratic, less militarized political process… He was
silent too about how he had encouraged the belligerency of his people by serving as an
active ideological focus of a new emperor-centered nationalism that had grown up around
him.
Id., at p.4.
Notwithstanding the above, Bix doesn’t
believe one should go to the other extreme and assume that Hirohito was a master
conspirator. As he explained in an interview, “it is commonplace to think of emperors as helpless
figureheads manipulated by people behind the scenes. But throughout Japan's history, there have been
times when power and authority have converged on the person of the emperor. The Meiji
emperor was one such figure. Hirohito was another.” http://cgi.cnn.com/ASIANOW/asiaweek/foc/
The truth or falsity of Bix’s conclusions regarding
Hirohito is beyond the purview of this discussion but one thing seems indisputable: Japan has a longstanding political tradition and history of
sidelining the emperor, while others control power from behind the throne. Emperors Meiji
and Hirohito may or may not have been exceptions to this rule but the point remains the
same nonetheless: Japan’s political system and culture has
made it the historic norm for unofficial or seemingly subordinate groups to control the
monarchy, not the exception as it would be the West. In that sense, the IHA is merely the
latest in a long line of political cadres that has controlled the Imperial House.
The Monarchy at the end of WWII
Japan’s defeat in WWII cemented, institutionalized and
actually increased the monarchy’s traditional impotence. After
Japan's surrender to the Allies, there
were some thoughts of completely eradicating the monarchy but MacArthur entered into a
secret alliance with Hirohito where he and the throne were saved in exchange for the loss
of all power, the Emperor’s explicit renunciation of his divinity, and more. According to Bix, MacArthur agreed to
whitewash the Hirohito’s wartime role because he feared that Japan would disintegrate if the unifying symbol of the
Emperor were put on trial as a war criminal. MacArthur also felt that he needed Hirohito
to legitimize the Allies’ occupational reforms, ensure Japan’s peaceful rehabilitation and ward off Communism.
(Bix, at 547, 567-68, 581-618.)
The
new Constitution of 1947 departed dramatically from the Meiji Constitution of 1889. The
very first Article makes it clear that the Emperor was no sacred God but rather a human
who is merely "the symbol of the State and of the unity of the people, deriving his
position from the will of the people with whom resides sovereign power." (See,
translated version of the 1947 Constitution, available at http://www.geocities.com/jtaliaferro.geo/1947con.html.)
Under the old Constitution, the emperor’s authority as sovereign was broad and
undefined; under the new Constitution, his functions are spelled out in detail, are
deliberately narrow and specific, and almost entirely ceremonial. The emperor is limited
to such trivialities as opening parliament, bestowing decorations on deserving citizens,
and receiving foreign ambassadors. (Article 7). Even then, he first has to get
approval from the Cabinet. (Id.)
Just
to make sure that there is no doubt whatsoever about the emperor’s new role, Article
4 explicitly states that the emperor has no "powers related to government." The
Constitution goes on thereafter to give every conceivable power to the Diet. And, in case
anyone was suffering from reading comprehension and missed the point of the intervening 37
sections, Article 41 makes it clear one more time for good measure — the Diet is the
"highest organ of state power” and is not accountable to the monarch but to the
people who elected its members. The explicitness of these provisions and the drastic
changes they effected were intentionally designed to preclude the possibility of military
or bureaucratic cliques exercising broad and irresponsible powers in the emperor's name.
In other words, to ensure that the events leading up to WWII didn’t happen again.
These
provisions make the emperor’s role very different from that of any other
constitutional monarch, even those who also seem to be figureheads. Britain’s Queen Elizabeth, for example, has
the power to make certain decisions; political officials must consult her before taking
certain actions; and she has the right to advise or warn the Prime Minister. http://www.britishrepublic.org.uk/institution.htm
While some of her powers are more theoretical than actual, the fact remains that she does
have those rights and is not a purely ceremonial figure. The emperor, in contrast, has
absolutely no power, theoretical or otherwise. He is not entitled to any privileges, is
not permitted to give any advice, and may not make any political declarations, not even
symbolic ones. He is not even supposed to be
consulted on politics and he certainly doesn’t have the right to give his symbolic
assent to bills before they may become law. All
he is politically permitted to do is receive foreign ambassadors, diplomats and heads of
state, host ceremonial events and give awards.
Clearly, the vestiges of even symbolic power had been stripped away.
The fact that these changes harshly punished Emperor Hirohito, as an individual, was just
an added bonus. Although they were not as harsh as the justice which would have been meted
out at a war crimes trial, they served as a form of retribution in their own way. The
sanctions didn’t stop there. As shown in Part I of this article, the Emperor lost all
private income and the IHA essentially became a watchdog over every vestige of his daily
activity.
But old habits die hard. In this case, those “habits” would be institutional
perspectives, ideologies and systemic cultures. For all the changes generated by the
Constitution, Japan still bears a great political resemblance to how it was before the
war: a country run by an entrenched elite and a powerful bureaucracy which share a
traditional and conservative ideology, although no longer a militaristic one, while the
emperor is a token figurehead. We’ll explore that issue and how it relates to
the IHA next week. See you then…
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