Yamakawa/Fukumoto JCP split

[Psy]

Why did the Comintern denounce both Yamakawa/Fukumoto in JCP split of 1927 where Fukumoto called for a revolution to establish a revolutionary workers state of Japan while Yamakawa called for a revolution to simply overthrow the Japanese monarchy?

So you have one side saying Japan is too primitive and has to have a capitalism revolution first and the other saying that is BS as Japan already is modern enough to jump right into communism. Then the comintern jumps in and says they are both wrong and just have a two-stage revolution without even addressing the divide. Since if Fukumoto if was right a two-state revolution would have been pointless as how can you have a capitalist revolution in a capitalist nation, which was Fukumoto argument, why should Japanese workers rise up to establish what they already have? Fukumoto pointed that the capitalist class was the ruling class of Japan and the old feudal order was nothing more then a bunch of yes men for the capitalists of Japan.

[Homo Songun]

I am not familiar with the specifics of this case, nor with the history of the Japanese movement. Perhaps the Comintern was wrong. That said, it is quite obvious to me that most urgent task in a place like 1927 Japan would be building the broadest possible front against the fascist regime. Neither of the expelled lines seemed to be agreeing with that.

Do you have some links to documents on MIA or something?

[Psy]

I am not familiar with the specifics of this case, nor with the history of the Japanese movement. Perhaps the Comintern was wrong. That said, it is quite obvious to me that most urgent task in a place like 1927 Japan would be building the broadest possible front against the fascist regime. Neither of the expelled lines seemed to be agreeing with that.

Do you have some links to documents on MIA or something?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialist_thought_in_Imperial_Japan

We are talking 1927, at the time the only fascist regime was Italy. From the position of Japan the problem was not that fascism not even during World War II as Japan entered World War II as a purely capitalist state under purely capitalist logic and basically just following in the footsteps of Britain and the USA in empire building in the name of Japanese capitalist class hidden behind monarchical nationalism. Japan occupied foreign lands not because Japan thought they were the master race, or to snuff out communism but because those lands had capital Japanese capitalists wanted.

[Homo Songun]

While I'd be willing to label 1927 Japan as "ultra-nationalistic militarist" rather than fascist as such, it is ultimately an academic distinction, as history has proven.

I do think your criteria for fascism is eccentric though. Fascism cannot be separated from "capitalist logic" in the way you seem to imply that it can.

Anyhow, if you find out more post it here.

[North Star]

Stop the presses! The Comintern was wrong!:laugh: Japan was more advanced in 1927 than Russia was in 1917. The Emperor was a figurehead. Overthrowing the Imperial Family would involve overthrowing the Generals and other Rightists which would probably require a full blown socialist revolution to achieve anyway. I would consider Japan fascist. By the end of the 1920's it had experimented with liberalism and it didn't work out so well. The Zaibatsu (industrial conglomerates) were perfectly happy with fascist rule as it would open up new markets in Asia and keep the working class at bay. The middle bourgeoisie was very weak. The big bourgeoisie was integrated into the Imperial system and any attempt to overthrow the Emperor would have to take on a socialist character to succeed. There was no real room for a bourgeois-democratic revolution in Japan. Japan like Germany relied on state directed industrialization which was unable to produced a middle and petty bourgeois stratum that would promote liberal democracy. Given the huge size of the zaibatsu, it's not surprising that liberal democracy did not naturally evolve. The middle and petty bourgeois elements were too weak to co-opt the workers and the big bourgeoisie would not budge on modest reforms and the military and Imperial bureaucracy class were of course quite reactionary.

[Die Neue Zeit]

Why would Japan be fascist if economically it's more similar to Bismarck's Germany than either Hitler's Germany or Mussolini's Italy?

[citizen of industry]

See "Taisho democracy." It was distinct from the previous Meiji era and latter Showa period and undoubtedly influenced party program. I don't know much about the pre-war labor movement, but that probably had something to do with it.

[Psy]

Why would Japan be fascist if economically it's more similar to Bismarck's Germany than either Hitler's Germany or Mussolini's Italy?
Right, Japan even cubically disagreed with Nazi's treatment of Jews and stated Japan wouldn't issue any similar policies and that Japan's alliance with Nazi Germany was only out of economic and military reasons and that Japan didn't support the politics of Nazi Germany.

Japanese propaganda at the time also didn't mix well with fascist propaganda, Japanese propaganda at the time revolved around fighting imperialism (that wasn't Japanese imperialism). Japanese propaganda portrayed the Japanese military forces as liberating Asia from the imperialism of the French, British and US for altruistic reasons. Thus Japanese WWII propaganda is similar to modern US war propaganda with Japan ruling class refusing to admit Japan was going to war out of self-interest of even the nation and that they are only going to war to help the less fortunate.

Meanwhile Nazi Propaganda didn't dance around German imperialism, it was up front that Germany was going to war to expand the German empire to restore Germany's power and honor that was stolen from them in WWI and that Nazi Germany didn't give a shit about the weaker nations it occupied.

In occupation policy differences Japan brutality was a means to industrialize its colonies through primitive accumulation. The Japanese ruling class pretty much saw the victims of Japanese imperialism as a source of cheap labor, while the Nazis made it clear they wanted to exterminate the victims of its imperialism.

[Die Neue Zeit]

What I meant was that the Imperial Japanese domestic economy wasn't organized on a corporatist basis, as opposed to the fascist examples, which were. Bismarck's Germany wasn't corporatist in its economic development.

[Psy]

What I meant was that the Imperial Japanese domestic economy wasn't organized on a corporatist basis, as opposed to the fascist examples, which were. Bismarck's Germany wasn't corporatist in its economic development.
Well yhea but I think more important is that Japan's logic to go to war was that foreign imperial powers stunted Japan's economic growth thus like Germany in World War I went to war to establish its own economic zone.

[Psy]

Okay getting back to the point, how should the JCP split have been dealt with? All the way up to 1937 Japan was rocked with militancy from farmers and workers yet no revolution and the socialists only won 3% of the seats in the 1936 election.

[Psy]

Anyhow, if you find out more post it here.
Well I did some digging on the Internet and found a Marxist by the name of Frank Glass A.K.A Li Fu-jen that wrote a three part article Japan Faces the Abyss back in 1944

http://www.marxists.org/archive/glass/1944/02/japan1.htm

http://www.marxists.org/archive/glass/1944/03/japan2.htm

http://www.marxists.org/archive/glass/1944/04/japan3.htm