The Search for a New Order: Intellectuals and Fascism in Prewar Japan

Fletcher explains how three writers — Ryu Shintaro, Royama Masamichi, and Miki Kiyoshi — who were supporters of democratic socialism became ideologues for the East Asian bloc ideal that rationalized Japan’s dominance of Asia after 1937, and he demonstrates how and why they designed the New Order movement of 1940. He concludes that the advocacy of fascism was a reasoned effort to respond to the ills of industrialization and the challenges of mobilization for war.

Originally published in 1982.

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