Articulating the Sinosphere: Sino-Japanese relations in space and time

In: The Edwin O. Reischauer Lectures

Abstract

"The model I have drawn here attempts to accommodate both time and space. It may appear similar to the more old-fashioned 'Chinese world order, ' and indeed there are some similarities, but that older model failed to account for change over time and was, first and foremost, concerned with diplomatic relations. The model of the Sinosphere attempts to embrace intraregional relations in all their varying cultural and political complexities. The nature of Sino-Japanese ties may have been altogether different in the last third of the nineteenth century from what they were within the Sinosphere, but memory of the bond that had long linked China and Japan, I would argue, remained, if only as a lingering recollection. The Treaty of Amity, signed in 1871 ... bespeaks a time when respect worked both ways-a graded respect, to be sure, but nonetheless something tying the two states other than power and military obligations."--Jacket