Hello, the episode you're about to listen to is part of a multi-part series introducing an overview

of Japanese history.

This is a repeat of one of the original projects the History of Japan podcast was built on,

and is intended to serve as an update and supplement to these original works.

After 10 years, my hope is to return to this approach and to do it a little bit better,

given the skills that I have improved in the intervening years.

If you haven't been doing so already, you should listen to these episodes sequentially,

starting with episode 501.

Without any further ado, enjoy the table, or on the table.

The last two episodes have been about Japan after the end of feudalism and the country's struggle with modernity,

with figuring out what strengthening Japan meant in terms of balancing the demands of tradition and change in the fields of politics, economics, and society.

But there's one thing we haven't talked about yet, which in the 1800s was viewed as an integral part of modernity itself.

All of the great powers of the West, and many of the minor ones, too, had empires, and the pursuit of

empire was considered part and parcel of what made modernity, well, modern.

Empire, of course, has a long history in Europe, America, and everywhere else.

And the conversation around what made the empires of the 19th century West different from those of the past,

or even how different they really were, is an interesting academic

conversation that we don't really have time for here.

One thing that was distinct about most 19th century Western empires, though, was their

focus on economics. Western Empire during the Victorian era was driven primarily by economic rationales.

For example, this is why France, Germany and the UK carved out exclaves from China at gunpoint

so those territories could be a base to push into the China market.

...