The Rise of Modern Japan

I have no clue who was directing the camera angles (the professor? the Great Courses?), but this quarter profile business, with the lecturer's eyes focused away from the viewer, is a little unnerving and distracting, undermines the material, like the lecturer is indifferent or aloof to his audience, even reminding me of some telling a lie and averting his eyes.

Professor Ravina is an excellent lecturer, and I enjoyed his "Understanding Japan: A Cultural History" before purchasing this lecture series. I thought "The Rise of Modern Japan" would pick up where "Understanding Japan" left off, but I found that although there was some new material, too much of it was content repeated/repackaged from the prior lecture series. A minor point: I don't enjoy watching segments where the professor looks to the side of the camera during the lecture instead of into the camera. So, although I recommend Professor Ravina as a lecturer, I suggest people skip this one and instead purchase access to "Understanding Japan."

I am only a couple of episodes into this course and while I thoroughly enjoy the content and the clarity with which the professor presents it, I am horrified by the way these lectures were shot and edited. I have been a video editor for over forty years and rarely if ever have I seen intercutting between wide-shot and close-up so badly executed. The purpose of a close-up is not only to vary the visual perspective on the subject, but also to emphasize the spoken content and emotional presence of the speaker. So far in this series, the wide-shots all have the professor talking directly to the camera, but the close-ups have him staring camera-right at who-knows-what, disengaging the viewer and breaking the natural flow of the lecture. Ideally, the lecturer should turn his head to reconnect with the viewer when the shot is switched. Not so in this course where attention careens wildly from direct contact to disconnection with the subject. Perhaps there should be more cutaways to archival material to avoid this issue. As is, it's disconcerting and just plain weird. Alternatively, one might want to just listen to these lectures. They're certainly worth it.

As was true of his earlier series on “Understanding Japan: A Cultural History,” Dr. Mark Ravina’s present set of lectures is erudite and enlightening. The dramatically changing economic, political, and societal events experienced by the Japanese people during the years leading up to, during, and after WWII are carefully traced and explained. The relevant context of what was happening on the world stage during those years is not neglected. Neither are the fascinating responses of Japanese writers, film makers, and other artists of the era. If informational content were the sole measure, I’d consider this Great Course one of the very best of the more-than-one-hundred that I have purchased and studied. Dr. Ravina’s presentational manner is not that of a dispassionate academic. His speech is ever thoughtful and caring, whether he is reporting on admirable human accomplishments or on pathetic and tragic deeds and events. Up until a few years ago, reviewers on this website were provided with several 1–5 scales by which to rate component parts of each course. If I still had that option, I would give “The Rise of Modern Japan” a 5-out-of-5 rating for its impressive content. Unfortunately, the production values of the overall package here are not up to the kind of support that Dr. Ravina deserved. Camera angles and other aspects of the videography are mediocre. A repetitive slide show of unexplained images cycles through distractingly behind the professor much of the time. Other visual accompaniments, while often very good and helpful, suffer from some over-repetition and other strangely inappropriate use (e.g., as when a Sony product is flashed on-screen as Dr. Ravina is discussing a successful marketing effort by Panasonic). On several occasions, a delayed, ghostly echo of the lecturer’s words is audible and annoying. I wonder if the disappointing production values have some connection with the course’s having been produced during the covid-19 pandemic. Averaging in the cited flaws, I feel that an overall 4-out-of-5 rating for this product is fair. Please do not lose sight of the fact that the informational content of “The Rise of Modern Japan” is truly excellent. I recommend this course, despite its production flaws. It would be a shame for students to bypass it.

This was a surprisingly excellent course. It’s a close look at Japanese postwar social, economic, and political history, and as such is much easier to take in than a broad course on the history of Japan. Points are sharply and neatly made, and we know the general international context, so there’s none of the blur that results from trying to take in too much too quickly. Anyone with an interest in film, or even the broader concept of art history as a means of cultural insight, will enjoy the Japanese movie reviews that the professor uses to illustrate his points. This course is well worth it if you enjoy the close examination of relatively brief but transformative historical periods.

I very much enjoyed the comprehensive review and in-depth analysis of Japanese history since the end of the Pacific War (or WWII depending on how you think of it).

Remembering well Japan's incredible rise that "threatened" the US in the 80's, I was excited to see this course. It delivered. At Thanksgiving, I reviewed my impressions of it with a niece who is an international engineer/supply chain executive at a major corporation. She supported Prof. Ravina's views. Some topics of the course include: 1.] FINANCIAL MARKETS: Lecture 4 (L4): By 1990 the Japanese stock market return was 23% (based on 1950-1970 economic growth of 13% a year). BUT history "...suggests that mature economies...sustain only single-digit growth (L9). Continued 23% stock market return based on single digit real growth was nonsense. Next, the government's Ministry of International Trade (MITI) crossed the line from helping companies find raw materials to heavy-handed guidance on market decisions (L5). Companies that rebelled (but were not extinguished by MITI) such as Mazda and Honda, did well. Other businesses "fell into line", and became politically oriented. The school system was adequate though unexceptional. Then came the Japanese real estate bubble (L9). The government vacillated before providing stimulus with a goal of 2% inflation yet achieved only got to 1% inflation and later deflation. "Zombie" corporations propped up by such stimulus collapsed. Unfortunately, stimulus also leads to inflation. Central banks, whose job is to fight inflation, waited too long to raise interest rates. Thus, rather than slowly deflate the markets, the financial and housing bubbles burst uncontrollably. L10: "...there was an upsurge in single-parent households". Men (particularly the elderly) "were pushed out of work" and jobs became part-time or contract. Young men lost their self-worth and future (see "Tokyo Sonata", L10). Tent cities of homeless began to appear. In 2012 Child poverty was 16% (US: 21%). SOUND FAMILIAR? Take the course. 2.] POLITICAL BALANCE: L4 and L11 provide a very important POV for those who roll their eyes at what is happening in the US today. L4 describes Prime Minister Kishi's 1960 moves to revise the US-Japanese 1951 outdated security treaty. Though his treaty proposals were vindicated and he held out until they were ratified, his heavy-handed methods (rather than respectfully courting public opinion) led to terrible optics, protests, and the political wisdom "don't be Kishi". This led to the Japanese "...political paradox of a vibrant communist party in one of the world's most successful capitalist economies..." Yet much is nominal communism. For example, L11 showed how the conservative LDP party united with the communist party briefly. L11 also showed how Kishi's grandson Abe Shinzo venerated his grandfather by trying to expand Japan's army during his time as the longest serving prime minister. He did this by courting public opinion in ways that included supporting a populist (though misleading) revisionist history. As a leader, one must not only be far seeing: one must not "be Kishi". 3.] COMMERCE: (L5, L8) provide insight into solutions for Japan’s resource poverty. These innovations included government-banking collusion to avoid idle factories, time-management, sponsored cartels, punitive quality control failure assessments to workers. This produced enormous output but eventually led to excessive MITI direction including their electronics debacle with Sony. Later, after the US ended artificial support for the yen, Japan went for higher end goods and sent factories to the US. By the mid-80s, Prime Minister Yasuhiro felt the coming era would be Japan's - but his slow, deliberate Quality improvement tactic missed the upcoming Silicon Valley "minimal viable product" tidal wave. 4.] HISTORY: The first 3 lectures describe detail the complexities involved with the Japanese ore-WW II "Strike North" vs "Strike South" decisions, including strongly disagreeing powerful leaders and the American Great Depression. Ravina shows how our view of Japan" having a desire for world domination stopped by two atomic bombs" is wrong on so many levels...including the real reason for the second atomic bomb. The frustrations of Yoshida (the peace loving ambassador to the UK) and his eventual exoneration and long career are remarkable. Tragically, L11 showed that Japanese elite universities morally failed the country thus keeping it bound to the LDP. These chapters also sorely test US schools that portray America as evil. FINAL THOUGHTS: There are many other insights. For example, (L7, L10) Japanese cinema was surprisingly helpful in understanding paradoxes presented to the Japanese people. SUMMARY: The course is compact, orderly, and readily understandable. Those who take this course may better understand not only the Japanese, but also today's U.S. headlines. The professor's effortless Japanese made the language sound beautiful (to someone who previously had no interest). The audio version is quite adequate though the video is worth watching if you have time and the Guide is excellent.

I will make this short. Not only is this course informative and comprehensive but Professor Ravina has that unique talent of keeping one's attention while keeping the topic interesting. So thank you Professor Ravina, I ordered another of the course you teach.

Dr. Ravina provides clear explanations and detailed examples of how Japan rose from the devastation of World War II to an economic empire in one generation

Professor Ravina presented the first course we ever bought from The Great Courses on Understanding Japan. We have travelled, studied and read of Japan as amateur enthusiasts. The content of this course provided many "ah ha" moments and we particularly enjoyed the content outlining chain of events and inter-relationships of policy. Our only comment would be in relation to the episode re movies and film makers - it was of interest but seemed out of step with the other content - easy to pass over if you wished to but the movies in question we did follow up and have watched at least one so far!