Word: reischauers
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...industry requires a measure of individual initiative, self-reliance, risk-taking. It requires a belief in progress, in the reality of the material world. Instead of a fixed order, it needs a fluid system in which people can rise through merit. It does not necessarily require democracy, although Edwin Reischauer, U.S. Ambassador to Japan, points out that it must have literacy and mass communication-which usually lead people to demand more participation in their government...
...visiting member of the International Seminar said last summer that Reischauer had practiced a kind of diplomacy Japan had never seen before. Reischauer, he explained, goes over the heads of the Japanese diplomatic hierarchy and talks to the people. According to Reischauer, there is a good deal of truth in this. As Ambassador he made extensive tours of all but seven of Japan's 46 provinces--he would have made it to all of them except that in April of 1964 he was stabbed by a fanatic protesting the lack of government funds to cure myopia in Japan. In addition...
There has been much conjecture as to why Reischauer left his post after such a successful term, but when asked bluntly he replies in kind: "The time had come to leave." Elaborating, Reischauer explains that what he had meant to do had been accomplished, and he is convinced he mght be able to make a greater contribution in academics than in diplomacy. "Five and a half years is a long, intense, tiring period, and I thought my intellect needed some refreshing," he says...
When asked whether his successor, U. Alexis Johnson, had been chosen to please the Japanese conservative business interests, Reischauer replies that he doubts Ambassador Johnson will devote any more time to trade negotiation than he did. Reischauer, however, does admit that the conservatives and businessmen in Japan were deeply concerned when he was first appointed. He attributes this anxiety to the "head-in-the-clouds image as a professor" which preceded him. The Japanese businessman's relations with the intellectuals are even more tenuous than they are in this country, Reischauer says...
Disoriented because his term as Ambassador has turned his interest from past to current events, Reischauer will not teach any of his traditional courses this semester and is still uncommitted about the Spring. "All my work used to be in the pre-modern period, and now I just don't know where I fit in," But if he is unsure as to what he will teach, his planned writing on modern Japan, diplomacy, and the Asian scene, should keep him busy. His final job during the year will be to drop by the State Department occasionally to advice...