Hello Richard from Paris!

You ask an excellent question. My nearest answer/guess is that the Meiji Restoration is too associated with the ending in disaster of the Meiji/Taisho/Showa era in 1945 to be very "celebrated" in Japan. I think a very interesting comparison would be how/whether Germans think of Bismark and the unification of Germany in the same era as the Meiji Restoration to "celebrate" it. Or do the Germans make a clear distinction between everything before WWI and everything after until 1945? Or like the Japanese everything before is tainted by the WWII disaster?


Best regards,
Ellis
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Ellis S. Krauss
Professor Emeritus,
School of Global Policy and Strategy
University of California, San Diego
La Jolla, CA 92093-0519
Tel: please contact me first via email
Fax (home): +1 (760) 943-8881
2018 Recipient of the Order of the Rising Sun,
3rd Class, with Gold Leaves and Neck Ribbon from
the Emperor of Japan