Base Built in the Middle of ‘Rice Fields’: A Politics of Ignorance in Okinawa

Abstract

This paper explores the role of ignorance in contemporary imperial geopolitics and the political geography of islands. Ignorance and imperialism have gone hand in hand since as early as the European age of ‘discovery’. The idea of empty spaces empowered earlier European colonial expansion by ignoring the existence of non-white indigenous people and communities. A few centuries later, the cartographic discourse of empty spaces still appears to be at work today in islands such as Okinawa where US bases have been stationed since the mid-twentieth century. The paper conducts a study of ignorance, or an agnotological study, of Okinawa. There has been a growing interest in studies of ignorance in the past few years, notably in sociology, science and technology studies, and studies of race and racism. Yet, ignorance as a focal point of analysis seems to be underdeveloped in studies of geopolitics and islands despite that the production of ignorance contributes to the maintaining of existing imperial spatial orders. The paper particularly examines the dominant discourses of US officials around the history of Marine Corps Air Station Futenma, which often ignore, or disguise at best, the colonial foundation of military bases in Okinawa.