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NOTE
DE L'ÉDITEUR
: Between 1609 and 1879, the geographical, political, and
ideological
status of the kingdom of Ryukyu (modern Okinawa) was characterized by
its ambiguity. It was subordinate to its larger neighbors, China and
Japan, yet an integral part of neither. A Japanese invasion force from
Satsuma had conquered the kingdom in 1609, resulting in its partial
incorporation into Tokugawa Japan's bakuhan state. Given Ryukyu's
long-standing ties with China and East Asian foreign relations
following the rise of the Qing dynasty, however, the bakufu maintained
only an indirect link with Ryukyu from the mid-seventeenth century
onward. Thus Ryukyu was able to exist as a quasi-independent kingdom
for more than two centuries — albeit amidst a complex web of
trade and diplomatic agreements involving the bakufu, Satsuma, Fujian,
and Beijing. During this time, Ryukyu's ambiguous position relative to
China and Japan prompted its elites to fashion their own visions of
Ryukyuan identity. Created in a dialogic relationship to both a Chinese
and Japanese Other, these visions informed political programs intended
to remake Ryukyu. In this innovative and provocative study, Gregory
Smits explores early-modern perceptions of Ryukyu and their effect on
its political culture and institutions. He describes the major
historical circumstances that informed early-modern discourses of
Ryukyuan identity and examines the strategies used by leading
intellectual and political figures to fashion, promote, and implement
their visions of Ryukyu.
Early-modern
visions of Ryukyu were based on Confucianism, Buddhism,
and other ideologies of the time. Eventually one vision prevailed,
becoming the theoretical basis of the early-modern state by the middle
of the eighteenth century. Employing elements of Confucianism, the
scholar and government official Sai On (1682-1761) argued that the
kingdom's destiny lay primarily with Ryukyuans themselves and that
moral parity with Japan and China was within its grasp. Despite
Satsuma's control over its diplomatic and economic affairs, Sai
envisioned Ryukyu as an ideal Confucian state with government and state
rituals based on the Chinese model. In examining Sai's thought and
political program, this volume sheds new light on Confucian praxis and,
conversely, uncovers one variety of an East Asian
« prenational » imagined
political/cultural
community.
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Gregory Smits is associate professor of East Asian
history at Pennsylvania State University. |
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