ROBERT S. SCHWANTES. Japanese and Americans, A Century of Cultural Relations. Pp. x, 380. New York: Harper and Brothers for the Council on Foreign Relations, 1955. $4.00

• Author: Allan B. Cole
• Published date: 01 March 1956
• Date: 01 March 1956
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/000271625630400186
• Subject Matter: Articles

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myself &dquo;what is good about this book,&dquo;
civilian control of the Board of War made
and then asking &dquo;what are its shortcom-
it possible to have &dquo;more competent mili-
ings ?&dquo; Applying this test to Mr. Powell’s
tary administrators&dquo;; and he indicates it
volume, I shall say immediately that most
as a mark of progress that the &dquo;people were
of my opinions about it are favorable, and
finally being shown that the military pro-
I welcome it as a worthy and scholarly
fession could be respectable&dquo; (p. 208).
addition to our growing literature on mod-
This seems to me true only within a
ern China.
This is not to say that Mr.
military-power politics frame of reference.
Powell has exhausted the subject or pro-
The Confucianist instinct against militar-
duced a definitive volume, but he has
ism is truer for purposes of progress.
opened up a new approach to modern Chi-
However, in his conclusion Mr. Powell
nese history, given us some interesting new
tones down this implication when he says,
angles on such events as the 100 Days Re-
&dquo;Military developments in China during
form, the Boxer Movement, the revolution
the last half century of the monarchy have
of 1911 and the compromise aftermath, and
had a marked and detrimental effect on
on the career of Yuan Shih-k’ai.
more recent Chinese history&dquo; (p. 338).
He has used mainly Western sources,
With an emphasis on this correction of the
many of them obscure and rich, but he has
tendency I have noted above, I would un-
also made use of the Veritable Records of
reservedly recommend the book to scholars
the Ch’ing dynasty, certain collections of
in the Far Eastern studies field.
memorials, and a number of secondary
HILARY CONROY
books and articles by Chinese authors which
University of Pennsylvania
prevent his assuming a purely Western point
of view. He has not,
ROBERT S. SCHWANTES.
as far as I can tell,
Japanese and
gone into Chinese provincial gazeteers and
Americans, A...