XXX Международный конгресс ИИСАА. 19–21 июня 2019 г. Т. 2

Источниковедение и историография Кореи к 150-летию академика В. В. Бартольда (1869–1930). Ч. 2 191 Japanese elements’to sneak into the judiciary” 1 . Japanese engineers detained in North Korea “made such a significant contribution in rebuilding North Korea that some of them were even awarded the ‘work hero’medal by the communist government” 2 . It is no accident that the hydro-electricity generating station featured on North Korea’s state emblem is the Sup’ung Dam [ 水豊発電所 ] on the Yalu River, construction of which began in 1937 and operation begun in 1941 3 . 2. From Overcoming Modernity to Juche Ideology Juche Ideology [ 主体思想 ] has been the official ideology of North Korea since Marxism-Leninism was removed from its constitution in 1972. Its main themes revolve around the Korean nation being the subject of its own history, being in control of its future direction, and maintaining self-reliance in foreign relations rather than siding with either China or the Soviet Union, which were then in conflict with each other, splitting the Socialist Camp. Although Juche has been phrased in Marxist terminology, and there have been repeated attempts at Marxian-ising Juche, its main themes obviously have less to do with orthodox Marxism and more to do with typically post-colonial nationalistic sentiments. Yet Juche is more than a curious deviation fromMarxism. What has always been overlooked is the context of ultranationalist intellectual thought in 1940s Japan, which, just like North Korea, was locked in a long confrontation with the United States. The main event was the July 1942 Kyoto Conference on “Overcoming Modernity”, [ 近代の超克 ] organised by a group of left-wing thinkers centred around Kamei Katsuichirō. [ 亀井勝一郎 ] They perceived of Japan’s national crisis as a crisis of the self, that “Japan as it existed had become foreign to itself” 4 —practically having become semi-colonised—and that the country has “lost its properly Japanese character due to the excessive incorporation of Western methods and ideas” 5 . The conference lacked any real conclusions, but they agreed that the “Great East Asian War” against the United States, the European powers and their “puppet” Chiang Kai-shek regime, would allow Japan and East Asia to purge these contaminants, to rediscover its true self, and to overcome the humiliation and alienation of 1 RG 242 SA2008, 9/100. Puk Chosŏn Nodongdang che ich’a chŏndang taehoe hoeŭirok (Minutes of the Second Congress of the North Korean Worker’s Party), 144–148. Quoted in Armstrong, North Korean Revolution, 200. 2 Kimura, “From Fascism to Communism”, 82–83. Japanese engineering staff likewise strongly contributed to post-1949 China, with some 1000 staff from the former SouthManchuria Railway and their familymembers retained by the Communist government to work on designing and building the Tianshui-Lanzhou section of the mainline to Xinjiang, which was completed in October 1952. For a thorough account of their experiences, see Horii, ‘Manshu’ kara . 3 Moore, Constructing East Asia, 172–180. 4 Calichman, Overcoming Modernity, x, 2. 5 Calichman, Overcoming Modernity, 7, 17.