EASTERN ENEMY OR ASIAN ALLY?
Edward Heathcoat Amory defends the
Queen's decision to honour the Emperor of Japan
Tokyo THE GRAND Master of Ceremonies for the Imperial Household Agency, Yoshio Karita, met me in his office in the grounds of the Imperial Palace in Tokyo. Dressed in an impeccable European suit, hair slicked back in a style which he had per- haps adopted during his time at Oxford University, and speaking English with an Brideshead Revisited accent, the Grand Master is typical of the Anglophiles in the upper echelons of Japan's bureaucracy.
With the Emperor Akihito making a controversial state visit to Britain this week, the Land of the Rising Sun is at pains to emphasise its admiration for the United Kingdom. Ever since Emperor Meiji decided to open Japan to the West in 1867, there have been close connections between the two countries. Japan fought on Britain's side during the first world war, Britain built much of the original Japanese imperial navy, and the former Emperor Hirohito, who first visited Britain aged 20 in 1921, was deeply influenced by George V's advice on the role of a modern consti- tutional monarch. Mr Karita emphasised that despite the 'very unfortunate interrup- tion of the war', the Japanese love affair with Britain has continued.
The current Crown Prince Naruhito, along with a number of other members of his family, was educated at Oxford. Several of them can pass as born and bred in Eng- land, coming across as more sophisticated, better-looking, better-dressed and wittier versions of our own royals. The Emperor's job description is very similar to the Queen's, with no political involvement but a symbolic role in the constitution. Ordi- nary Japanese people, according to Atsushi Tanase, royal correspondent of Yomuiri Shimbun, the world's largest-circu- lation newspaper, see him as a 'movie star', akin to the Queen's super-celebrity status. Although most of the Japanese press remain deferential, weekly magazines print royal gossip, and women regard the shop- ping, dressing and marrying habits of the imperial family as setting the social stan- dard.
To complete the parallel with Britain, there has even been some royal scandal. The Emperor's youngest son, Prince Akishino, was alleged to have been making frequent trips to Thailand, not to study the mating habits of the cuttlefish, as he had claimed, but to visit a Thai mistress. The Prince denied the story. Prior to Princess Diana's death, the democratisation of the royal family in Britain was reflected in a gradual lifting of the 'chrysanthemum cur- tain' behind which the lives of the imperial family have traditionally been concealed.
This modernisation is now on hold, as many in Japan agree with conservatives in Britain that there are pitfalls in attempting to become a People's Monarchy. Despite this concern, however, Ryuzo Sejima, an influential unofficial adviser to the imperial family, explains that 'older Japanese people regard Britain as the master and teacher behind our modernisation'. To listen to the faction in Japan that Mr Sejima represents. the British should regard this other island nation, with a history and tradition as rich as our own, as our spiritual blood brothers in the East. They point to the close indus- trial relationship between the two countries — more than half Japanese overseas investment in Europe goes to Britain — as further evidence.
Before abandoning Europe for a curren- cy union with the yen, however, we must overcome two obstacles. Firstly, outside the imperial chrysanthemum circle, Western influence on Japan comes principally from America. Younger people in Japan may lis- ten to some British music, but they take most of their cultural cues from Hollywood and Times Square, to the disgust of the older generation. There is a flourishing baseball league, complete with cheerlead- ers and team mascots dressed in Disney- land costumes. When a home run is struck, a cartoon character on the big screen in the Tokyo Dome screams, Tanzaaiii, nice hit- ting.' A foreign ministry spokesman explains that 'our most important bilateral relationship is with the US, because our national security is dependent on them'. American bases in Japan still provide an important practical and symbolic bulwark against China. Britain, says the same offi- cial, is seen as part of the European Union, and will lose much of its attraction for Japanese companies if it does not sign up for the single currency. The second obstacle is Japanese nation- alism. There is a sharp political split in Tokyo between those who believe that to survive globalisation Japan must embrace the West and discard its own traditions, and the conservatives who feel, as one told me, that 'by following such a trend the Japanese people will become rootless'. Many people in Japan, explained Professor Kashioka of Kyoto's Joshi University, `define the national identity negatively. Anything that is not Western, anything that foreigners are unable to understand, is automatically Japanese.' Until recently, the foreign office in Tokyo advised people travelling abroad to be suspicious of `gaijin' who spoke their language, on the grounds that anyone with such an unusual aptitude must be preparing to cheat them. Such views make saying sorry for the war politically explosive. 'Three successive Japanese prime ministers have apologised to Britain,' I was told by one older Japanese man. 'Isn't that enough? We're a sovereign nation, not a puppy that needs its nose rubbed in its mess.'
This attitude is not surprising in a nation that was almost cut off until 130 years ago, and whose population, untouched by coin- Mal immigration, are all drawn from a sim- ilar racial pool, sharing several thousand years of documented history, ruled by 125 emperors in unbroken succession. It is vir- tually impossible for a foreigner to be nat- uralised as a Japanese national without marrying a native. Many aspects of life in Japan are alienating for Westerners. The food is different; even Japanese people are often unsure exactly which part of which sea creature they have just swallowed. The need to remove your shoes when entering houses, the incessant bowing and the ritual importance of business cards are all reminders that Japan is, in some ways, unique. Nor has feminism made much progress. Women are demanding greater freedom, and yet a Japanese men's maga- zine recently ran a feature on how to cope if your boss was a woman. The principal difficulty, it suggested, was which of you should bow lower to the other. Older peo- ple still command far more respect than in the West. Also, their children are con- cerned that, with a rapidly ageing popula- tion, looking after granny could prove an expensive commitment.
Religion in Japan is very different from the West. Buddhism and Shinto, the two principal local religious traditions, are devoted to success in this life rather than reward in the next. Recently, a burglar was arrested in the Tokyo area and charged with over 300 break-ins. Before each crime, he had visited a local Shinto shrine to pray for success. On the final occasion, the policeman following him also made an offering at the shrine, successfully request- ing help with his law enforcement activi- ties. Even the Anglophile royal family is inescapably bound up with the Shinto tra- dition. A Chief Ritualist in the Imperial Household organises the many religious ceremonies in which the Emperor partici- pates as a priest.
Other aspects of modern Japan are less strange. The distinguished writer Hidoyuki Agawa, who served in the wartime imperi- al navy, made me an extremely dry martini and laughed at my gin-sodden jokes. On a Saturday night at the Hotel New Otani in central Tokyo, the lobby was thronged with brides in fluffy white wedding dresses, their parents carrying accumulated wed- ding presents in bulging carrier bags. White weddings are very fashionable at present, and local churches are taking advantage by offering them to non-Chris- tians in exchange for three months' bible study. Tokyo is similar to many other mod- ern cities, although the buildings are uglier, there are more people in the underground, the taxi-drivers speak almost as little English as those in New York and the well- cut outfits available in the local Giorgio Armani store are in smaller sizes. Younger people, in particular, are increasingly indif- ferent to national traditions, and prone to the same outbreaks of random violence as children in America and Britain. These eastern islands are not inscrutable, merely insular.
Japan has some obstacles to overcome before Britain could regard it as a reliable ally. It is a long way from Europe, and pre- occupied by China's growing economic power, at a time when the Japanese econo- my is going through its worst period of stagnation since the war. It is constitution- ally unable to send its powerful 'self- defence force' to fight abroad and its bureaucracy is surprisingly corrupt. Ameri- ca, the world's only superpower, will remain its most important Western part- ner. Nevertheless, when the Queen pre- sents the Emperor with the Order of the Garter and receives in return the Grand Cordon of the Supreme Order of the Chrysanthemum, we should welcome the exchange. As the century draws to a close, constitutional monarchies and their rulers are an endangered species and should stick together.
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