16. AFTER THE TSUNAMI
1.Related to author, Ofunato, June 2012.
2.David Pilling, ‘Japan: The Aftermath’, Financial Times, 25 March 2011.
3.The word for sea bream, tai, is contained in the word omedetai, which means ‘congratulations’. For that reason it is considered to bring good fortune.
4.‘“Miracle Pine” Preservation Plan Questioned Over Y150m Cost’, Japan Times, 23 July 2012.
5.When I checked in September 2012, it had 7,584 ‘Likes’.
6.In July 2013, the preserved tree, its scaffolding removed, was lit up with an LED display. The plan was to leave it illuminated for an entire year, Asahi newspaper, 29 June 2013.
AFTERWORD
1.John Dower and other scholars have long argued that this view is too simplistic. Of the classic example of stasis followed by rapid change, Dower told me, ‘The challenge was to revise the view that Japan, prior to the Meiji Restoration, had been this stagnant society, this dark feudalistic society. Then, so the story goes, you come to this Meiji miracle and they are transformed. Of course, what we see now is this terrific dynamism going on in all aspects of [Tokugawa] society and that becomes the baseline for understanding why Japan was able to move so fast after Meiji.’
2.Interview with author, Boston, May 2011.
3.Jonathan Soble, ‘Japan Warms to “Fire Ice” Potential’, Financial Times, 12 March 2013.
4.Remarks to author by Lionel Barber, editor of the Financial Times, Jakarta, March 2013.
5.Ben McLannahan, ‘Abe Takes First Step on Road to Recovery’, Financial Times, 11 January 2013.
6.Telephone interview with Peter Tasker, Arcus Investments, April 2013.
7.Shinzo Abe, address to Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), Washington DC, 22 February 2013.
8.Martin Wolf, ‘The Risky Task of Relaunching Japan’, Financial Times, 5 March 2013.
9.Bond prices fall when interest rates rise and vice versa.
10.Jonathan Soble, ‘Abe Pushes for More Women in Senior Roles’, Financial Times, 19 April 2013.
11.Telephone interview, April 2013.
12.Dealogic, ‘Global Cross-border M&A Volume by Acquirer Nationality, 2012’.
13.Mure Dickie, ‘Tokyo Warned Over Plans to Buy Islands’, Financial Times, 6 June 2012.
14.Amy Qin and Edward Wong, ‘Smashed Skull Serves as Grim Symbol of Seething Patriotism’, New York Times, 10 October 2012.
15.‘A Squall in the East China Sea’, Financial Times Editorial, 21 August 2012.
16.In fact, as prime minister, Abe went on to open negotiations with Moscow over four disputed islands.
17.John Garnaut, ‘Xi’s War Drums’, Foreign Policy, May/June 2013.
18.Jonathan Soble and Kathrin Hille, ‘Abe Blasts China over Maritime Incident’, Financial Times, 6 February 2013.
19.‘Panetta Tells China That Senkakus Under US–Japan Security Treaty’, Asahi newspaper, 21 September 2012.
20.Ben Bland, ‘Asean Chief Warns on South China Sea Spats’, Financial Times, 28 November 2012.
21.Graham Allison, Director of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard University, in ‘Thucydides’s Trap Has Been Sprung in the Pacific’, Financial Times, 21 August 2012.
22.Address to CSIS, Washington DC, 22 February 2013.
23.David Pilling, ‘The Son Also Rises’, Financial Times, 15 September 2006.
24.Toko Sekiguchi, ‘Japanese Prime Minister Stokes Wartime Passions’, Wall Street Journal, 25 April 2013.
25.Yuka Hayashi, ‘Abe Seeks to Rewrite Pacifist Charter’, Wall Street Journal, 25 April 2013.
26.Ibid.
27.Gideon Rachman, ‘A Gaffe-prone Japan is a Danger to Peace in Asia’, Financial Times, 12 August 2013.
28.Paul Kennedy, ‘The Great Powers, Then and Now’, International Herald Tribune, 13 August 2013.
29.Remarks to author, Tokyo, July 2013.
30.Remarks to author, Tokyo, July 2013.
31.Pew Research Center, ‘Global Attitudes Project’, 11 July 2013.
32.Interview with author, Tokyo, March 2012.
33.Kenneth Pyle, The Making of Modern Japan, p. 99.
34.Address to CSIS, Washington DC, 22 February 2013.
35.Keizai Koho Center (Japanese Institute for Social and Economic Affairs), ‘Japan 2013, An International Comparison’.
36.International Monetary Fund, World Outlook Economic Database, April 2013. Even on a purchasing power parity basis, which adjusts for prices across nations, the Japanese are on average four times richer than their Chinese counterparts.
37.City-states such as Singapore and Qatar, both richer than Japan in per capita terms, are too small to provide meaningful comparisons. South Korea and Taiwan have both successfully emulated Japan’s economic development, but neither has quite caught up with Japanese living standards, and both face demographic problems every bit as severe as those of Japan. Other fast-growing economies in Asia, Latin America and Africa are still leagues behind Japan’s economic and industrial prowess.
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Glossary
Aum Shinrikyo: The doomsday cult led by Shoko Asahara that organized a sarin gas attack on the Tokyo subway in March 1995. The attack killed thirteen people and injured several hundred more.
Bushido: The ‘way of the warrior’, or the code of ethics attributed to the samurai.
Choshu: One of the four domains that rebelled against the Tokugawa shogunate in what became the Meiji Restoration. Some of Meiji’s greatest intellectuals were from Choshu. Shinzo Abe, who became Japan’s prime minister for a second time in 2012, has deep political roots in Choshu, modern-day Yamaguchi prefecture.
Class-A war criminals: Those tried at the International Military Tribunal for the Far East, also known as the Tokyo trials, for their leadership role in Japan’s ‘crimes against peace’. Japan accepted the findings of the tribunal, though its parliament does not recognize those convicted as criminals.
Diet: The Japanese parliament.
Edo: The name of the city where the Tokugawa shogunate lived. It gives its name to the ‘feudalistic’ period of rule by the Tokugawa family between 1603 and 1868. After the Meiji Restoration, which ended Tokugawa rule and established the foundations of modern Japan, the city was renamed Tokyo and became the capital.
Bending Adversity: Japan and the Art of Survival Page 43
