Japanese Colonial Policy: The Process of its Determination and the People's Response

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

The primary purpose of this research project was to examine Japanese assimilation policy on the Korean peninsula from 1910 to 1930. The project sought to abstract the voices of a wide variety of participants including intellectuals. journalists, and politicians regarding this policy. It also examined opinions of Japanese and Koreans, as well as those from Western perspectives. This study specifically examined the following questions : 1) Where did Korean colonial history fit in the greater global colonial picture of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century? 2) What were the similarities/differences between this history and that of other Japanese colonial activities (such as in Hokkaido, Okinawa, and Taiwan? 3) What issues were debated in the decision to make similation the colonial policy in Korean? 4) In determining this policy appropriate, what image did the Japanese have of the person to be assimilated? 5) How did the Japanese aim to convince the Korean of the merits of their assimilation into the Japanese "race"? And 6) What was the Korean reaction to this policy?This project concluded that Japanese colonial activity in Korea was peripheral and showed resemblance to that of the English in Ireland, Scotland, and Wales ; the French in Algeria ; as well as the Germans in Alsace and Lorraine. In all cases the colonial rhetoric preached by the colonizer was assimilation ; their colonial behavior demonstrated separation. In the case of the Japanese, the rhetoric tried to demonstrate ancient connections existing with the Korean people. Cnnections severed from the beginning of the Choson period. Here, the colonizer saw their role as guiding the colonized to allow them to "catch up" with their Japanese cousins. The Korean reaction to this policy varied with many writing on this topic acknowledging the need for Japanese help, albeit with less Japanese arroganceand on more equal terms.