Word: reischauer
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Politically, Reischauer found a strong and healthy belief in democracy. "Ever since the last war," he maintains, "the Japanese have never doubted that the ballot box would decide the major issues." A higher percentage of people vote in the Japanese elections than do here, and the elected governments now have eleven years of successful rule under their belts...
Perhaps the most profound change has been sociological. "The younger people differ from their elders in the way they act and the way they think," Reischauer comments. "They are more western, more modernized, in their outlook." One example of this has been the virtual disappearance from the cities of the kimono in favor of more western-like dress...
...these impressions tended to make Reischauer optimistic about the future of Japan and of Japanese-American relations. It is quite possible, however, to look at certain aspects of Japan and come away feeling rather pessimistic. Some people, for example, feel that Japan's slow and steady economic rise should have been faster, though Reischauer has anticipated the slower, safer kind of expansion. Moreover, the Japanese intellectual classes tend to be very critical of the United States, and if one reads only their writings, one can get the impression that the Japanese as a whole are hostile. "But the less vociferous...
...despite Reischauer's optimism, he feels there are certain areas in which both the United States and Japan have fallen down. On Japan's part, he notes a tendency to divorce herself from Asia and to shirk her rightful share in world affairs...
Moreover, the Japanese do not seem eager to assume any sort of leadership in the Far Eastern sphere. They have not yet recovered their self-confidence, Reischauer says, and they tend to leave the problems for others to solve. They tend to talk, he said, in terms of huge, outside forces--the U. S. and Russia, for example--over which they have no control...