百年维新：日本

A Century of Reform: Japan

百年维新：日本

One hundred and fifty years ago, forced by four American ships, the long self-fettered island country Japan chose to open to the outside world. This Oriental island country suffered from huge survival crisis and also ushered in opportunity for rejecting the old for the new.

150多年前，在四艘美国黑船的胁迫下，长期闭关锁国的岛国日本选择了不战而开国。这个东方岛国遭遇了巨大的生存危机，也迎来了弃旧图新的机遇。

Since then the outside pressure became the driving force of its internal reform. Fifteen years after that accident, on April 15, 1868, Meiji issued the” Charter Oath” which was a general guiding principle for promoting national reform and opening the political reform. Since then Japan stepped into a new age called Meiji Restoration.

外部压力成为国家内部变革的动力，黑船来航15年后的1868年4月15日，明治天皇颁布了《五条誓文》，这是一个推动国家变革，开启变法图强大幕的总纲领。从此，日本进入了一个被称为明治维新的时代。

The Japanese government sent the Iwakura Mission composed by top officials to Europe and America. Since then Japan has started industrialization of the country: Okubo Toshimichi promoted breeding industry and civilization through way of copinism and opened many state-run factories and supported the private enterprise greatly. Ito Hirobumi, Okubo Toshimichi’s successor, followed the outcry for free civil rights movement and made Japan’s first constitution which consolidated the outcome of the Meiji Reform. Yet the system of Japanese emperor which was written in the “Japanese Empire Constitution” brought some hidden trouble of the Japanese militarism. The explosion of atomic bomb ended Japan’s pipe dream for militarism.

日本派出由政府高官组成的岩仓使节团到欧美各国考察。此后，日本开始了国家工业化：大久保利通以拿来主义的方式推进殖产兴业、文明开化，开办大量官营工厂，并大力扶持民营企业。大久保的继任者伊藤博文则顺应国内自由民权运动的呼声，制定了巩固维新成果的日本第一部宪法。但是，同时写进《大日本帝国宪法》的天皇制埋下了日本军国主义抬头的隐患。原子弹爆炸的蘑菇云结束了日本军国主义的迷梦。

After World War II, based on “Peaceful Constitution” and under the support of America, Japan’s economy quickly developed and by the year 1968, a hundred years after Meiji Reform, Japan became the third powerful economy in the world, only second to America and the form Soviet Union. Now Japan has surpassed Russia to become the second powerful economy in the world.

二战后的日本，以《和平宪法》为基础，在美国扶持下，经济迅速发展。在1968年，即明治维新百年之际，成为当时仅次于美国和苏联的世界经济强国。现在，日本已经超过俄罗斯，成为了世界上经济第二强的国家。

Once Japan sought to dominate its own destiny, then it sought to be the leading actor of the world stage. During this modernization process when this island country goes up and down like tides, there is one definite truth: faced with the Western world, you have to learn to surpass. This is also what we should learn from our neighbor Japan.

从渴望主宰自身命运到渴望成为世界的主角，在这个岛国如同海潮般激荡起落的现代化过程中，一个不曾改变的命题就是：面对西方世界，进行一场为超越而进行的最彻底的学习。也许这也是我们应该向邻国日本学习的地方。
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