 |
Travel to Japan — Unbiased reviews and great
deals from TripAdvisorJapan
|
National name: Nippon
Emperor: Akihito (1989)
Prime Minister: Yasuo Fukuda
(2007)
Current government officials
Land area: 152,411 sq mi (394,744 sq km);
total area: 145,882 sq mi (377,835 sq km)
Population (2007 est.): 127,467,972
(growth rate: 0.0%); birth rate: 9.2/1000; infant mortality rate:
3.2/1000; life expectancy: 81.4; density per sq mi: 836
Capital and largest city (2003 est.):
Tokyo, 35,327,000 (metro. area), 8,483,050
(city proper)
Other large cities: Yokohama,
3,494,900 (part of Tokyo metro. area); Osaka, 11,286,000 (metro.
area), 2,597,000 (city proper); Nagoya, 2,189,700; Sapporo,
1,848,000; Kobe, 1,529,900 (part of Osaka metro. area); Kyoto,
1,470,600 (part of Osaka metro. area); Fukuoka, 1,368,900; Kawasaki,
1,276,200 (part of Tokyo metro. area); Hiroshima, 1,132,700
Monetary unit: Yen
Language:
Japanese
Ethnicity/race:
Japanese 99%; Korean, Chinese, Brazillian,
Filipino, other 1% (2004)
Religions:
Shintoist and Buddhist 84%, other 16%
(including Christian 0.7%)
Literacy rate: 99% (2002 est.)
Economic summary: GDP/PPP (2007
est.): $4.29 trillion; per capita $33,600. Real growth rate:
2.1%. Inflation: 0%. Unemployment: 4%. Arable
land: 12%. Agriculture: rice, sugar beets, vegetables,
fruit; pork, poultry, dairy products, eggs; fish. Labor force:
66.07 million; agriculture 4.6%, industry 27.8%, services 67.7%
(2004). Industries: among world's largest and technologically
advanced producers of motor vehicles, electronic equipment, machine
tools, steel and nonferrous metals, ships, chemicals, textiles,
processed foods. Natural resources: negligible mineral
resources, fish. Exports: $665.7 billion f.o.b. (2007 est.):
transport equipment, motor vehicles, semiconductors, electrical
machinery, chemicals. Imports: $571.1billion f.o.b. (2007
est.): machinery and equipment, fuels, foodstuffs, chemicals,
textiles, raw materials. Major trading partners: U.S., China,
South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Australia, Saudi Arabia,
UAE (2006).
Communications: Telephones: main lines
in use: 55.155 million (2006); mobile cellular: 101.7 million
(2006). Radio broadcast stations: AM 215 plus 370 repeaters,
FM 89 plus 485 repeaters, shortwave 21 (2001). Television
broadcast stations: 211 plus 7,341 repeaters; note: in addition,
U.S. Forces are served by 3 TV stations and 2 TV cable services
(1999). Internet hosts: 33.333 million (2007). Internet
users: 87.54 (2006).
Transportation: Railways: total: 23,474
km (16,519 km electrified) (2006). Highways: total: 1,183
million km; paved: 925,000 km (including 6,946 km of expressways);
unpaved: 258,000 km (2003). Waterways: 1,770 km (seagoing
vessels use inland seas) (2007). Ports and harbors: Chiba,
Kawasaki, Kiire, Kisarazu, Kobe, Mizushima, Nagoya, Osaka, Tokyo,
Yohohama. Airports: 176 (2007).
International disputes: the sovereignty
dispute over the islands of Etorofu, Kunashiri, and Shikotan, and
the Habomai group, known in Japan as the "Northern Territories" and
in Russia as the "Southern Kuril Islands", occupied by the Soviet
Union in 1945, now administered by Russia and claimed by Japan,
remains the primary sticking point to signing a peace treaty
formally ending World War II hostilities; Japan and South Korea
claim Liancourt Rocks (Take-shima/Tok-do), occupied by South Korea
since 1954; China and Taiwan dispute both Japan's claims to the
uninhabited islands of the Senkaku-shoto (Diaoyu Tai) and Japan's
unilaterally declared exclusive economic zone in the East China Sea,
the site of intensive hydrocarbon prospecting.
Major sources and definitions
Recent Rulers of Japan
|
|
Geography
An archipelago in the Pacific, Japan is separated from the east coast
of Asia by the Sea of Japan. It is approximately the size of Montana.
Japan's four main islands are Honshu, Hokkaido, Kyushu, and Shikoku. The
Ryukyu chain to the southwest was U.S.-occupied from 1945 to 1972, when it
reverted to Japanese control, and the Kurils to the northeast are
Russian-occupied.
Government
Constitutional monarchy with a parliamentary government.
History
Legend attributes the creation of Japan to the sun goddess, from whom
the emperors were descended. The first of them was Jimmu, supposed to have
ascended the throne in 660 B.C., a tradition
that constituted official doctrine until 1945.
Recorded Japanese history begins in approximately A.D. 400, when the Yamato clan, eventually based in
Kyoto, managed to gain control of other family groups in central and
western Japan. Contact with Korea introduced Buddhism to Japan at about
this time. Through the 700s Japan was much influenced by China, and the
Yamato clan set up an imperial court similar to that of China. In the
ensuing centuries, the authority of the imperial court was undermined as
powerful gentry families vied for control.
At the same time, warrior clans were rising to prominence as a distinct
class known as samurai. In 1192, the Minamoto clan set up a military
government under their leader, Yoritomo. He was designated shogun
(military dictator). For the following 700 years, shoguns from a
succession of clans ruled in Japan, while the imperial court existed in
relative obscurity.
First contact with the West came in about 1542, when a Portuguese ship
off course arrived in Japanese waters. Portuguese traders, Jesuit
missionaries, and Spanish, Dutch, and English traders followed. Suspicious
of Christianity and of Portuguese support of a local Japanese revolt, the
shoguns of the Tokugawa period (1603–1867) prohibited all trade with
foreign countries; only a Dutch trading post at Nagasaki was permitted.
Western attempts to renew trading relations failed until 1853, when
Commodore Matthew Perry sailed an American fleet into Tokyo Bay. Trade
with the West was forced upon Japan under terms less than favorable to the
Japanese. Strife caused by these actions brought down the feudal world of
the shoguns. In 1868, the emperor Meiji came to the throne, and the shogun
system was abolished.
Japan quickly made the transition from a medieval to a modern power. An
imperial army was established with conscription, and parliamentary
government was formed in 1889. The Japanese began to take steps to extend
their empire. After a brief war with China in 1894–1895, Japan acquired
Formosa (Taiwan), the Pescadores Islands, and part of southern Manchuria.
China also recognized the independence of Korea (Chosen), which Japan
later annexed (1910).
In 1904–1905, Japan defeated Russia in the Russo-Japanese War, gaining
the territory of southern Sakhalin (Karafuto) and Russia's port and rail
rights in Manchuria. In World War I, Japan seized Germany's Pacific
islands and leased areas in China. The Treaty of Versailles then awarded
Japan a mandate over the islands.
At the Washington Conference of 1921–1922, Japan agreed to respect
Chinese national integrity, but, in 1931, it invaded Manchuria. The
following year, Japan set up this area as a puppet state, “Manchukuo,”
under Emperor Henry Pu-Yi, the last of China's Manchu dynasty. On Nov. 25,
1936, Japan joined the Axis. The invasion of China came the next year,
followed by the Pearl Harbor attack on the U.S. on Dec. 7, 1941. Japan won
its first military engagements during the war, extending its power over a
vast area of the Pacific. Yet, after 1942, the Japanese were forced to
retreat, island by island, to their own country. The dropping of atomic
bombs on the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945 by the United States
finally brought the government to admit defeat. Japan surrendered formally
on Sept. 2, 1945, aboard the battleship Missouri in Tokyo Bay.
Southern Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands reverted to the USSR, and Formosa
(Taiwan) and Manchuria to China. The Pacific islands remained under U.S.
occupation.
Gen. Douglas MacArthur was appointed supreme commander of the U.S.
occupation of postwar Japan (1945–1952). In 1947, a new constitution took
effect. The emperor became largely a symbolic head of state. The U.S. and
Japan signed a security treaty in 1951, allowing for U.S. troops to be
stationed in Japan. In 1952, Japan regained full sovereignty, and, in
1972, the U.S. returned to Japan the Ryuku Islands, including Okinawa.
Japan's postwar economic recovery was nothing short of remarkable. New
technologies and manufacturing were undertaken with great success. A
shrewd trade policy gave Japan larger shares in many Western markets, an
imbalance that caused some tensions with the U.S. The close involvement of
Japanese government in the country's banking and industry produced
accusations of protectionism. Yet economic growth continued through the
1970s and 1980s, eventually making Japan the world's second-largest
economy (after the U.S.).
During the 1990s, Japan suffered an economic downturn prompted by
scandals involving government officials, bankers, and leaders of industry.
Japan succumbed to the Asian economic crisis in 1998, experiencing its
worst recession since World War II. These setbacks led to the resignation
of Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto in July 1998. He was replaced by Keizo
Obuchi. In 1999, Japan seemed to make slight progress in an economic
recovery. Prime Minister Obuchi died of a stroke in May 2000 and was
succeeded by Yoshiro Mori, whose administration was dogged by scandal and
blunders from the outset.
Despite attempts to revive the economy, fears that Japan would slide
back into recession increased in early 2001. The embattled Mori resigned
in April 2001 and was replaced by Liberal Democrat Junichiro Koizumi—the
country's 11th prime minister in 13 years. Koizumi enjoyed fleeting
popularity; after two years in office the economy remained in a slump and
his attempts at reform were thwarted.
At an unprecedented summit meeting in North Korea in Sept. 2002,
President Kim Jong Il apologized to Koizumi for North Korea's kidnapping
of Japanese citizens during the 1970s and 1980s, and Koizumi pledged a
generous aid package—both significant steps toward normalizing
relations.
Koizumi was overwhelmingly reelected in Sept. 2003 and promised to push
ahead with tough economic reforms.
In April 2005, China protested the publication of Japanese textbooks
that whitewashed the atrocities committed by Japan during World War II.
Prime Minister Koizumi apologized for Japan's abuses, admitting that
“Japan, through its colonial rule and aggression, caused tremendous damage
and suffering.”
In Aug. 2005, Koizumi called for early elections, when the upper house
of parliament rejected his proposal to privatize the postal service—a
reform he has long advocated. In addition to delivering mail, Japan's
postal service also functions as a savings bank and has about $3 trillion
in assets. Koizumi won a landslide victory in September, with his Liberal
Democrat Party securing its biggest majority since 1986.
Princesss Kiko gave birth to a boy in September. The child's birth
spares Japan a controversial debate over whether women should be allowed
to ascend to the throne. The child is third in line to become emperor,
behind Crown Prince Naruhito, who has one daughter, and the baby's father,
Prince Akishino, who has two daughters.
In September, a week after becoming leader of the ruling Liberal
Democratic Party, Shinzo Abe succeeded Junichiro Koizumi as prime
minister. He promptly assembled a conservative cabinet and said he hoped
to increase Japan's influence on global issues. Early into his term, Abe
focused on nationalist issues, giving the military a more prominent role
and paving the way to amend the country's pacifist constitution. He
suffered a stunning blow in July 2007 parliamentary elections, however,
when his Liberal Democratic Party lost control of the upper house to the
opposition Democratic Party.
Abe faced international criticism in early 2007 for refusing to
acknowledge the military role in forcing as many as 200,000 Japanese
women, known as comfort women, to provide sex to soldiers during World War
II. In March, Abe did apologize to the women, but maintained his denial
that the military was involved. "I express my sympathy for the hardships
they suffered and offer my apology for the situation they found themselves
in," he said.
A 6.8 magnitude earthquake struck in northwest Japan in July 2007,
killing 10 people and injuring more than 900. The tremor caused
skyscrapers in Tokyo to sway for almost a minute, buckled roads and
bridges, and damaged a nuclear power plant. About 315 gallons of
radioactive water leaked into the Sea of Japan.
Prime Minister Abe abruptly announced his resignation in September just
days into the parliamentary session, during which he stated his
controversial plan to extend Japan's participation in a U.S.-led naval
mission in Afghanistan. The move followed a string of scandals and the
stunning defeat of his Liberal Democratic Party in July's parliamentary
elections. The Libeal Democratic Party elected Yasuo Fukuda to succeed
Abe. Fukuda, a veteran lawmaker, was elected to Parliament in 1990 and
held the post as chief cabinet secretary under Prime Minister Junichiro
Koizumi. His father, Takeo Fukuda, served as prime minister from 1976 to
1978.
In June 2008, the upper house of Parliament, which is controlled by the
opposition, censured Fukuda, citing his management of domestic issues. The
lower house, however, supported him in a vote of confidence.
See also Encyclopedia: Japan.
U.S. State Dept. Country Notes:
Japan
Japanese Statistics Bureau www.stat.go.jp .
Information Please® Database, © 2007 Pearson Education,
Inc. All rights reserved.
More on Japan from Infoplease:
- Japan: Rulers - Japan: Rulers See this list of the Recent Rulers of Japan. Information Please® Database, © ...
- japanning - japanning japanning , method of varnishing a surface, such as wood, metal, or glass, to obtain a ...
- Japan - Japan Japan , Jap. Nihon or Nippon, country (2005 est. pop. 127,417,000), 145,833 sq mi (377,835 sq ...
- Japan - Japan Profile: Geography, People, Government and Political Conditions, Economy, Foreign Relations, U.S.-Japan Relations
- Recent Rulers of Japan - Recent Rulers of Japan Name Date rule began Date rule ended Born Died Yamato dynasty Mutsuhito ...
|
|
