Two scientific events were devoted to this topic: The second international seminar held at the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, and the International Symposium in Tokyo.
The seminar" Light and Shadows of Japanese Colonial Policy: New Materials and Research " (October 3, 2014) was attended by employees of the Institute of Information Technology of the Russian Academy of Sciences and Takuseku University (Japan). The first such seminar (2013) was devoted to the analysis of Russian and Western sources of Taiwanese history of the Japanese period (Golovachev, 2014).
An important milestone in the development of cooperation between the Institute of International Relations of the Russian Academy of Sciences and Takuseku University was the publication of the monograph "Taiwan in the Era of Japanese Rule" by V. Ts Golovachev (Institute of International Relations of the Russian Academy of Sciences) and V. E. Molodyakov (Takuseku University). Sources and Research in Russian" (2014). Deputy Directors of the Institute of Information Technology of the Russian Academy of Sciences E. V. Molodyakova and Yu.V. Chudodeev (Institute of Information Technology of the Russian Academy of Sciences) briefly described this book. The monograph provides a historiographical review of publications in Russian describing Taiwan from the 1870s and during the Japanese occupation (1895-1945). The authors presented an analysis of pre-revolutionary studies (before 1917), considered the issue of studying Taiwan in the framework of political analysis in the 1920s-1930s, and also compiled an overview of Soviet and post-Soviet historiography.
The book covers a wide range of publications of different origin, content and genres written by Russian, Western and Japanese citizens in Russian. Among the sources used: news collections, special press reviews, travel notes, official and scientific reports, scientific reports, articles, essays, monographs, analytical reviews of experts, translations of works from foreign popular and academic periodicals.
In the period from the 1870s to 1945, there were no official representatives of the Russian Empire and the USSR in Taiwan, so information about the island came mainly from China and Japan. Although information about Taiwan published in Russian was irregular and often borrowed from other sources, there are some unique primary sources that researchers should pay attention to. Prior to 1917, Russian officials were interested in the economic development and trade potential of Taiwan; during the Soviet era, they were interested in the development of agriculture, the struggle of the peasantry against colonialists, and the prospects for organizing a liberation movement on the island. The political bias of Soviet-era publications reduces their value to some extent, but behind the propaganda you can often find an expert analysis of the situation that demonstrates the conscientious and high-quality work of domestic scientists. A significant role in the study of colonial Taiwan was played by the personal initiative of scientists who studied the ethnography, language, culture and traditions of the island.
The authors of the analytical review not only collected and described extensive material, some of which is being introduced into scientific use for the first time, but also analyzed its source base.
An analysis of one of the most valuable sources mentioned in the book " Taiwan in the era of Japanese rule. Sources and research in Russian", was devoted to the report of V. TS Golovachev (Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences) "S. G. Eliseev and his" Report on Formosa to the Society of Oriental Studies" in St. Petersburg (1915) as a historical and biographical source". The manuscript of the report is kept in the collections of the Archive of Orientalists of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, and its text with comments was first published in 2014. [Golovachev and Perminova, 2014(1)].
The problem of opium smoking in Taiwan and the perception of Japanese colonial policy by some Russian scientists was discussed in the report "Japan solves the opium problem better than all Europeans" by V. A. Perminova, a graduate student of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences.
Russian journalist and ethnographer I. S. Levitov visited Taiwan in 1903 and stayed on the island for three weeks, during which he studied the opium policy pursued by the colony's administration. Certain successes in the regulation of opium smoking, coupled with the active promotion of these successes in colonial Japan, gave the author the impression of high efficiency, even flawlessness of Japanese policy. This impression gave rise to the desire to study the "exemplary" Japanese experience in order to apply it in Russia. I. S. Levitov considered the main reason for the widespread use of opioid smoking in the Far East to be the unwise policy of the authorities, because of which there were no real measures aimed at eradicating this habit among the population. Japan, faced with a similar problem in Taiwan, was able not only to control the sale and consumption of drugs, but also to significantly reduce opioid smoking on the island. Although the article is from. Levitova is influenced by official propaganda, and it contains a number of objective data on the socio-economic aspects of the policy pursued by the colonial authorities in Taiwan.
V. E. Molodyakov, a professor at Takusyoku University and a leading researcher at the Institute of International Relations of the Russian Academy of Sciences, presented a report entitled "Japan's colonial policy through the eyes of French intellectuals: Jean Ray and Claude Farrer". V. E. Molodyakov considered the views of two" right-wing " French intellectuals who in the 1930s belonged to the Soviet Union. one of the most active and influential Japanophiles in this country. They held nationalist, imperialist, and anti-communist views and were concerned about the spread of socialist ideas and movements both in France and in Europe as a whole, as well as in East Asia, which could directly threaten the French colonies. Most of the bearers of these ideas advocated the strengthening and development of the French colonial empire, emphasizing the" civilizing mission " of colonialism.
The lawyer and sociologist Jean Ray (1884-1943), one of the leading experts on civil law, claimed that Manchuria was not historically and legally part of "China proper" and that Japan had more rights in Manchuria than other powers. Claude Farrer (Frédéric-Charles Bargon, 1876-1957) (many of his works were translated into Russian in the 1910s and 1920s) was an apologist for French colonial politics and its "civilizing mission", as well as one of the most prominent representatives of the fashionable genre of "colonial romance". Farrer considered it necessary to recognize Manchuria as an independent state, as well as Chinese Tibet, Turkestan and Mongolia. After his trips to Korea, Manchuria, and Japan, in his book The Great Drama of Asia, he praised the success of the Japanese colonial policy and called on France to ally with Japan. Works by K. Farrer and J. Reis are interesting because they represent an alternative approach to the official position of developed countries in assessing Japan's expansion in Asia.
At the end of the seminar, V. TS Golovachev made a report "On the March expedition of the Chelyabinsk people following the traces of the "excursion to Formosa", undertaken in the winter of 1875 by the Russian naval officer P. Ibis*". P. Ibis 'travel notes were published in 1896 in the article "Excursion to Formosa" in the journal "Marine Collection" (Ibis, 1876). Guided by these records, the expedition members-traveler F. Labutin and photographer S. Malkov-made a route and almost completely repeated this historical hike in Taiwan. They visited the places visited by P. Ibis: in the building of the former British consulate, the Presbyterian church, in Pingdong county, where they met with representatives of the Paiwan people (P. Ibis communicated with the natives of this nation and even went hunting with them), walked along the Alangi trail on the east coast of the island, got acquainted with representatives of the ethnic groups rukai and bunun. Following the results of the expedition, the participants of the campaign held a press conference on the territory of the historical monument-the former fort Province, built by the Dutch in the XVII century. The report on the trip was published in the magazine " Taiwanese Panorama "(Moscow, 2014, N 3).
* Pavel Ivanovich Ibis (1852-1877) in the winter of 1875, alone, took a hike across the island from Kaohsiung to the south, then north to Keelung. He set out to determine the racial and ethnic type of the natives of Taiwan and their origin. As a result of the expedition, P. Ibis managed to collect unique material on the ethnography of the island, in addition, he compiled a small dictionary of local languages and expressed a hypothesis about the Malay-Filipino roots of some Taiwanese.
The seminar on Taiwan studies was useful for all participants of the meeting who are interested not only in the history of Taiwan during the Japanese rule, but also in the problems of colonialism, the history of international relations of the late XIX-mid XX centuries, as well as domestic historiography of this period.
list of literature
Golovachev V. TS. Colonial Taiwan: results and prospects of studying in Russia / / Vostok (Oriens). N 2. 2014. N 2.
Golovachev V. TS., Perminova V. A. S. G. Eliseev's report on Formosa to the Society of Oriental Studies in St. Petersburg (1915) as a historical and biographical source. 2014(1). N 6.
Golovachev V. Ts., Perminova V. A. Zhurnalistist I. S. Levitov ob opiumnoy politike na Taiwane [Journalist I. S. Levitov on opium policy in Taiwan]. Vladivostok, 2014(2). N 4.
Ibis P. Excursion to Formosa// Marine collection. N 152-1. Unofficial department. 1876; N 152-11. Unofficial department. 1876.
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