Northeast Asia and the Weight of History

All states and societies are products of their particular historical circumstances. Even where countries or regions have been profoundly influenced by external forces, such forces are mediated by local institutions, actors and contingent factors that give a distinctive character to seemingly ubiquitous influences. The impact of contingent factors can be seen in the different responses to the impact of European imperialism in Latin America and East Asia, for example. Equally important and revealing, such forces can be seen in the very different impacts that apparently similar influences had on countries within various regions. Japan and China not only responded very differently to the challenge of European economic and political expansion, but their subsequent historical development has been distinctive as a consequence. If we want to understand the contemporary economic, political and strategic positions of the various countries of East Asia, and why there are important differences between both the developmental experiences of individual countries, as well as between Northeast and Southeast Asia, then we need to place recent developments in their historical context.