Is Japan Totalitarian?

Japan had a constitutional monarchy and allowed males to vote. They also had the military dominate and take over during the times of the Depression. Then they began making people follow the emperor and they changed education and society became very nationalistic. They tried not to be totalitarian but they ended up turning into a totalitarian society in the end. They tried to give the people a voice and they passed male suffrage or the right to vote for males in 1925 and they had leaders of the groups of people and they expanded education. They westernized and that influenced their government and made them less focussed on complete control coming from the government or one major power. Then the Great Depression highly impacted society. The people lost their jobs and their lives became worse and worse. They decided to blame their dissatisfaction on the new rulers and the west because of their influence. Organizations were formed and they were small parties or groups of people with strong nationalism and they wanted change in their lives. They wanted to return to their old ways where they were all ruled under the emperor and the emperor was the leader and only main power source. They ended up going back but military authorities also had some control. I think that they were not totalitarianism but they tried to go back and make it like that but they were not completely totalitarianism.

Information from...

Strayer, Robert. Ways of the World. p. 642-644

Ms. Xia (in class discussion March 09, 2010)