Iran Confronted the West. Japan Absorbed It.

Iran and the Rejection of Western Modernity

A history commentary channel I often watch on YouTube recently explained why Iran has been in conflict with the West.

Religion is certainly part of the issue. But it is not as simple as saying Islam and Christianity are fighting each other.

In Islam, Jesus is recognized as a prophet. Of course, this is Jesus as understood from an Islamic perspective, so it is completely different from the Western Christian view.

The deeper logic of the conflict is not simply religion itself. It is the idea that modern politics, which ignores the word of God and elevates human values, is the real problem. From that perspective, democracy can look like mob rule.

In other words, modern ideas such as democracy, freedom and equality, secularism, and individualism are themselves difficult for Iran to accept.

The Changing Image of Northern Europe

Let me change the subject a little.

Recently in Japan, the image of Northern Europe, especially the Nordic countries often praised for welfare and social trust, seems to have changed completely, especially in online discourse.

For a while, Northern Europe was treated almost like an ideal society in Japan.

High welfare, high taxes, and the highest happiness levels in the world.

Bookstores were full of books praising Northern Europe, and television programs often seemed to say that Japan should learn from it.

Of course, there are probably many things worth learning.

But recently, issues such as immigration, economic stagnation, and social division have also started to be reported more openly.

One decisive moment was when videos involving a Finnish Miss Universe representative and politicians appearing to affirm discrimination against East Asians spread on social media, causing controversy in Japan as well.

The original insult may have been directed at Chinese people, but many Japanese people also felt insulted.

Even if people speak beautifully, they can still be racists.

In a way, the structure is a little ridiculous. People projected their own ideal country onto a place they barely knew, and then became angry when that country failed to live up to the fantasy.

There is probably no heaven on earth in the first place.

Every system has side effects, and every country has its own problems.

Japan Has Always Looked for Teachers

Some people worry that this shift is a sign of Japan becoming more conservative.

But when I think about it, Japan has repeated this pattern for a very long time.

In ancient times, the teacher was China, which was then the major center of civilization in East Asia.

Japan studied China’s legal and administrative systems, along with Buddhism, and worked hard to adopt them.

But in the end, they became part of something uniquely Japanese, such as Heian culture, the aristocratic court culture that developed in Japan from the late eighth century onward.

The Edo period, the long age of Tokugawa rule from the seventeenth to nineteenth centuries, followed a similar pattern.

Just before it came the Warring States period, a long era of civil wars before Japan was unified, when people became interested in foreign cultures.

From China came crafts and Neo-Confucian thought. From Spain and Portugal came Christianity.

But eventually Japan settled into the Edo system, including a policy of strictly limiting foreign contact.

Christianity was banned. Yet Neo-Confucianism and rangaku, meaning practical European learning imported mainly through Dutch books and traders, continued to remain even under those restrictions.

From Europe to America

In the modern era, Japan’s teacher became the West.

After the Meiji Restoration, the nineteenth-century political transformation that ended samurai rule and launched rapid modernization, Japan looked to Europe. After World War II, it looked to America.

But once the internet made it possible to see foreign realities directly, idealization began to fade rapidly.

Japanese people have always been good at finding teachers.

When they find something useful, they learn from it honestly.

Then, after learning enough, they begin to notice its limits.

Only after that do they start asking, “What should we do for ourselves?”

Looking at history, this seems to be a repeated pattern.

That is why the recent conservative swing in Japan does not seem to me like simple nostalgia.

Western systems are not perfect.

The Nordic model is not perfect either.

After understanding that, Japan seems to be starting to ask, “Then what should Japan be?”

This may be a healthy correction.

Take in what is good.

But do not believe blindly.

That is probably about the right balance.

The myth of Northern Europe is ending, and admiration for America also seems to be fading.

Perhaps we are finally beginning to stop living inside other people’s stories.

Iran Confronted. Japan Absorbed.

This brings me back to Iran.

Iran is probably a country that looked at Western modernity quite directly and said, “No, that is not right.”

Japan does not say it so directly.

Japan accepts things first.

It says, “That is impressive. We have much to learn,” and starts adopting them.

Then, several decades later, it begins to wonder:

“Wait, does this really fit us?”

Japan does not reject Western modernity as strongly as Iran does.

But Japan does not completely worship Western modernity either.

It pretends to accept things, then slowly reshapes them into its own form.

For better or worse, that may be the Japanese way.