Module 4 Japan And SE Asia Discussion – Summer 2022 Group 21. How does Japan take a different trajectory than China? Why? How are both places
concerned with similar things?
2. What are the similarities and differences between India and Indonesia?
3. What do find interesting and important?
Example:
While China broke apart after the Qing dynasty and had multiple leading parties, Japan had a
very different approach. They had the emperors and the Shogunate, which for some time worked
well until the lack of fighting made the position and rank of Samurai useless. This led to many
internal struggles between the Daimyo and Samurai. Also, the emperor of Japan only had
symbolic power, not political power, the political power was handed down to the shogunates.
However, it’s not surprising that eventually one Shogunate would take it too far and ignore the
wishes of the Emperor. This is why eventually it fell apart with the Meiji Restoration and the
Shogunates were removed. This is very different from the Chinese CCP and KMT. The Japanese
had a single symbolic ruling family and then the true leader. However, after the Meiji
Restoration, the Emperor had supreme authority.
The greatest similarity between Indonesia and India was the ruling class. India was ruled by the
British East India Company (BEIC) and the Indonesians were ruled by the Dutch East India
Company (DEIC), however, after the DEIC went bankrupt then it was the Netherlands that ruled
Indonesia, and with an iron fist. This is also similar to India because after the Sepoy rebellion
they lost more rights and were completely under the control of the British government. Honestly,
these Asian countries cannot catch a break in these times. There is always someone or something
disrupting the flow of the government or the economy, which leads to either a massive divide,
war or a new owner.