Modernization of Meiji in the Context of Foreign Political Relations (1868-1912)

The study is devoted to Japanese modernization Meiji - radical, comprehensive transformations without analog in world history in terms of scale, pace and results. Faced with the real alternative of losing sovereignty in the middle of the 19th century, the country competes with the Great Powers. At the beginning of the 20th century it was already recognized as one of them.

The Meiji era coincided with the age of world capitalist system formation in which the developed countries forcibly involved the other countries - the emergence of Japan itself is the result of this process. The external political context of the period allows some historical analogies to be made with modernity. The key phrase here is "state sovereignty." Before reaching a sufficient degree of economic and military power, Tokyo, from the very beginning of the Meiji era, relied on diplomacy, which perfectly aligns the puzzle of opposition between the imperialist states.

What preserves the importance of the Japanese modernization model today is the possibility of borrowing the Japanese know-how of turning limitations into an advantage in the context of an unfavorable, sometimes aggressive, international environment. The Japanese model can serve as an example of achieving an internal political consensus when it comes to protecting national interests, especially in times of trials and difficulties.