Professor Carol Gluck’s February 6 lecture at Portland State University, “Postwar Japan: A Pre-postmortem” was covered in a recent article in the university newspaper, the Portland State Vanguard. The article, titled “Postwar Japan: past or present,” lays out Professor Gluck’s analysis of Japan’s relationship to World War II, noting that Japan is the only country that still considers itself in the “postwar period,” or sengo in Japanese.
“Sengo started with the massive economic growth in Japan caused by the Korean and Cold Wars. This led to not only economic transformation, but social and political changes for the country.
This time of growth and change slowed by the 1970s. According to Gluck, some economists believe this is where the sengo period ends.
In everyday society, however, the ideas of sengo continue.
‘My favorite example was from the 50th anniversary in 1995 when polls asked the interviewees their opinion of postwar and the newspaper had this big ad that said “Postwar Japan: 84% affirm,”‘ Gluck said.”
Click here to read the article.
