Modernization, Development Strategies, and Knowledge Production in the Asia Pacific Region

Abstract

Knowledge utilization has been a core element in development strategies since the dawn of modernization in the Asia Pacific Region. An American expedition under Commodore M. C. Perry shocked the Tokugawa shogunate in 1853 by entering Japan’s Edo Bay (now Tokyo Bay) with smoke-belching steam-driven warships and later by Perry’s demonstration of various other technologies, including a miniature train. Japan’s leaders realized that their closed society was vastly inferior in military capability to the Western Barbarians; and unless they caught up they were destined for colonial subjugation much like what was taking place across the Sea of Japan, in mainland China. Thus, within a few short years a new leadership emerged in Japan, which declared strong determination “to seek knowledge throughout the world” and to accept Western science—at the same time as they reaffirmed Eastern morality (Bartholomew, 1989).