Japan entered the 20th century as a nation much different than it was 100 years prior. Modernization in society, politics and culture rushed in; Western influence seen in the previous period -Meiji- continued at a rapid pace. Immense investments that were placed during Meiji on defense, industry, the military, and sectors of the economy that brought forward a modern, strong and evolving power, continued and largely paid off, as the Japanese Empire entered the Taisho era in 1912, as a power ready for the new age.
Russo-Japanese War, 1915, Kobayashi Kiyochika. This conflict was a bright example of Japan’s rising status as a world power.
Unprecedented prosperity, a mighty industry, a strong and modern military gifted Japan with a seat at the table of the Big Five and a permanent place in the Council of the League of Nations. Having grown considerably so, its political system, which by then had reached a party-led status, baptized the state “Taisho Democracy.” The weakness of the Emperor to really influence this system, due to his illness and meakness added strength to this democratic mandate as it weakened imperial rule.
Glittering Sea, 1926, Hiroshi Yoshida. A masterpiece of the shin-hanga style.
Socialism also grew in this time of modernized political life, and although it was heavily repressed it kept growing in the shadows until eventually the Japanese Communist Party was founded in 1922. Western influence also appeared in the economy; mass production of clothing cheapened the quality and prices of traditionally unattainable items like the kimono. Western architecture also grew in prominence, art forms like shin hanga flourished. The Japanese woman, much like the Neue Frau in Germany or America’s flappers, was also an item of revolution in the new figure of the moga. Meanwhile, the great and beautiful Oiran still walked the streets, which shook under their koma-geta by the mighty new railways that slit through the pristine Japanese lands, and the cars that roamed the streets of the metropoles. Generally a time of great contrast emerged within Taisho, due to the incredibly modern character of the newly electrified, Western-style buzzing cities and a still very traditional rural Japan. Old Japan still lived and breathed in the customs of a world that struggled to see eye to eye with a New Japan that radiated like a Rising Sun.
Taisho was full of promise and modernity, but it was also like winter mist; easy to vanish at the coming of the spring wind. As the 1920s brought with them Emperor Showa to the throne a rising class of militarists, traditionalists, modernizers, officers and policy makers crashed the glass palaces of the Taisho days for an Iron Japan. Why did this happen?
The exciting but frail nature of Taisho was simple. Meiji investments and the rise of a Japan that saw prosperity due to rapid economic renewal and modernization was coming to a point of exhaustion. Lacking the resources to keep going, Japan was faced with a problem that democracy could not solve but that a militarist expansion could. The acquisition of colonies rich in rubber, oil and various other resources as well as the establishment of Japan as the defacto power in Asia seemed to many, including the young Emperor Showa, as the natural solution. The army and navy cliques prone to war traditionallly, influenced the young Emperor who grew ever more fond to the idea of armed conflict. A series of incidents and victories abroad, including but not limited to Mukden emboldened both him and the officers of the rivaling military wings. It was only natural that the legacy of a colorful Taisho flower, could not but wither under the necessities imposed by Showa.
The growing military might of the Empire too required colonies and resources that Japan did not have. Simply put, Japan was faced with an option to scale down towards sustainability, or scale up towards expansion. It was a harsh gambit that Japan took entering Showa, and this it paid dearly when faced with the might of the Western powers who hammered down on an Axis struggling to make a new world for itself. In the end, the gambit ended without glory; Taisho’s promises died and Showa’s flexing withered. A new Japan was being born anew.