Uma Breve Interpretação das Diferentes Reações de Japão e China, a Partir do Século XIX, ao Desafio do Ocidente[A Brief Interpretation of the Diverse Reactions of Japan and China, in the XIX Century, to the Western Challenge]

What makes a country grow and develop while another languishes in stagnation or regression? What kinds of decisions are made that lead to this divergence? This article seeks to illustrate this question through two examples of very close nations: China and Japan. It aims to compare the largely successful example of Japan with the failure of the former Chinese empire to withstand Western pressures, which became stronger following the attainment of industrial and military supremacy after the British Industrial Revolution and its imitation and subsequent surpassing by other European countries and the USA. This failure would only be reversed in the Chinese case in the 20th century, starting with the Revolution of 1949 and, more decisively, after the economic reforms initiated in 1978. The contrast between China’s ineffective response to the Western challenge and Japan’s effective and incredibly rapid response will be explained in the article, along with some of the reasons for these different reactions. It will be demonstrated how Japan undertook something entirely different by changing the Emperor and initiating the so-called Meiji Revolution, in place of the Tokugawa Era (1603-1867). This also resulted in Japan’s modern industrialization occurring nearly a century earlier than that of its Asian neighbors, including China.