著者

犬塚 孝明

出版者

JAPAN ASSOCIATION OF INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS

雑誌

国際政治 (ISSN:04542215)

巻号頁・発行日

no.102, pp.22-38,L6, 1993

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During the course of forming the Meiji state, there occurred several examples of senior government officials whose views on foreign affairs and understanding of international relations directly reflected the considerations of internal politics and diplomacy. This feature is, needless to say, deeply related to the question of Japanese nationalism. Such men were constantly preoccupied with the dilemma of how to protect Japan's political independence by matching the strength of the Western powers on the international stage of Eastern Asia. The objective of this paper, therefore, is to accurately reassess Japan's diplomatic stance in the early Meiji period by investigating the international outlooks of two representative diplomatic leaders and ministers of Foreign Affairs, Soejima Taneomi and Terashima Munenori. This is presented through a comparative analysis of their respective perceptions and interpretations of international law and diplomatic relations in addition to the policies they actually implemented while in office.<br>The Confucian ethics particular to a scholar of Chinese classics were central to Soejima's international perspective, generating his argument for discipline through moral influence and inspiring recourse to the diplomatic guidelines of the chronicles of Lu in his approach towards Russia and Asian states, especially Formosa and Korea. This should be recognized as a significant element in effecting the Ministry of Foreign Affairs' departure from its hitherto essentially moderate diplomatic policy and the adoption instead of a hard line approach.<br>On the other hand, Terashima was a strong advocate of moderation and attached much importance to ideas of equality and negotiation between sovereign states. His subsequent appointment to the post of Minister of Foreign Affairs, therefore, should have presented an opportunity for revising Soejima's hard line diplomacy in favour of the more temperate model of the past. This was prohibited, however, by the lateral pressure that the powers of Europe and America were exerting in Asia.<br>In order to ride crises of internal disorder and foreign pressure, the leading voices in government ventured instead on a scheme of sustaining Soejima's uncompromising line while at the same time replacing his rationale with a Western-style logic of power politics. It is perhaps reasonable to accept the view that the double-edged character of Meiji diplomacy, with its aggressive stance in Asia and simultaneously subordinate attitude to the powers of Europe and America, first took shape when this strategy was actually in place and operating in Japanese foreign policy.