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Essay on Kita Ikki's Plan For Japan
In Japan and beyond, a debate has been rolling over the last fifty years or more as to who or what, politically, Kita Ikki was. Having been seen by some scholars as being of the right and by others as of the left, in a recent article Christopher Szpilman branded Kita an enigma. Kita Ikki (1883-1937) was an ideologue and activist. He wrote the book that heavily influenced the Young Officers who staged a coup d'etat in the so-called February 26th Incident of 1936, which, if successful, according to some, would have brought about fascism in 1930s Japan.
For one distinguished left-leaning historian, Maruyama Masao, the February Incident, despite eventual failure, was the turning point that led to the development of 'fascism from above' at the hands of the military-bureaucratic establishment. Hence Kita - executed for his part in instigating the rebellion (albeit he was essentially not involved) - is an important figure in the arguments that have raged among historians about what kind of state the Imperial Japan of the 1930s was (Katou, 1996).
Some scholars conclude that Kita was a socialist. His American biographer, George Wilson, has muddle-headedly referred to him as a 'rather right-wing left extremist'. The historian and former lecturer of mine at the School of Oriental and African Studies, Dr. Richard Sims, claimed in one seminar that Kita was a left-wing radical who tried to ward off state repression via an essentially 'amuletic', and thus insincere, appeal to the figure of the Japanese Emperor. Arrested by the suggestion that any left-winger worth his or her salt might thus compromise and link their socialism to the Emperor, I remonstrated with Dr. Sims, retorting that Kita was surely a man of the right, perhaps even a fascist, as one authority alleged.
The work of Kita Ikki was considered one flag from the right extremists....
