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Concordia Association of Manchukuo 滿洲國協和會 (Japanese, Chinese) Mǎnzhōuguó Xiéhehuì Manshū-koku Kyōwakai ᠮᠠᠨᠵᡠ ᡤᡠᡵᡠᠨ ᠰᡳᡝᡥᠣᡥᡠᡳ
Leader	Puyi
Founded	July 1932
Dissolved	August 1945
Headquarters	Xinjing, Manchukuo
Ideology	Fascism Monarchism Manchurian nationalism Pan-Asianism
Political position	Far-right
Party flag
Politics of Manchukuo Political parties

The Concordia Association of Manchukuo (Chinese: 滿洲國協和會; pinyin: Mǎnzhōuguó Xiéhehuì; Wade–Giles: Man-chou-kuo Hsieh-ho-hui Japanese Shinjitai: 満州国協和会, Hepburn: Manshū-koku Kyōwakai) was a political party in Manchukuo. Established to promote the ideals of Pan-Asianism and the creation of a multi-ethnic nation-state and to create a structure which would gradually replace military rule over Manchukuo with civilian control, the party was unable to fulfill its promise, and was eventually subverted into an instrument of totalitarian state-control by the Japanese Kwantung Army.

Background

The name "Concordia Association" came from the concept of the "concord of nationalities" (民族協和 mínzú xiéhe) promoted by the Pan-Asian movement. By granting different peoples or nationalities their communal rights and limited self-determination under a centralized state structure, Manchukuo attempted to present itself as a nation-state in the mode of the Soviet "union of nationalities". Political theorist Tominaga Tadashi, author of Manshū no Minzoku ("Nationalities of Manchuria"), wrote extensively about Soviet policies towards national self-determination. The Concord of Nationalities policy was promoted as a policy that fulfilled the goals of federalism and protected minority rights, while at the same time it strengthened central state control to avoid the separatism that had weakened the old Russian Empire.

Development

After its establishment, Manchukuo was effectively run by the Japanese Kwantung Army along totalitarian lines. The Legislative Council existed primarily as a formality to rubber-stamp decrees issued by the General Affairs State Council with Puyi officially vested with great powers but serving de facto as a Japanese puppet.

Although not officially a one-party state, political dissent was severely punished, and the only officially sanctioned political party was the Concordia Association. However, émigré nationalities were permitted to form political associations, primarily to promote their various agendas towards their home countries. These included a variety of White Russian parties supporting either fascism or a restoration of the Romanov dynasty and a number of Zionist movements for Jewish refugees.

The structure of the Concordia Association was reorganized to mimic the Japanese Taisei Yokusankai which was founded in 1940. All government officials and bureaucrats, including teachers, as well as important figures in society were members. All youth between the ages of sixteen and nineteen were automatically enrolled beginning in 1937; and by 1943, Association membership included about 10% of the population of Manchukuo.

In theory, the Concordia Association would ultimately replace the Kwantung Army as the political power in Manchukuo: however, by the mid-1930s, the Kwantung Army ordered the Association "purged" of its original leadership for alleged leftist tendencies. The Association was thus subverted into means of extending mobilization and surveillance rather than providing national ethnic, cultural, and occupational representation in government.

After the purge, Concordia Association came to closely resemble contemporary “totalitarian parties” in Europe. Like its fascist counterparts, it was corporatist, anti-communist, anticapitalist, and sought to overcome class divisions by organizing people through both occupational and ethnic communities, while promoting a dirigiste economy. The Association was distinctive in representing Asian communities—Mongols, Manchus, Hui Muslims, Koreans, Japanese and White Russian émigrés, as well as the majority Han—and their traditions. This commitment often meant supporting the religious leadership among these peoples: Mongol lamas, Manchu shamans, Muslim ahongs, Buddhist monks, and Confucian moralists. The regime's control of local society was enhanced by the work of association units established within Manchu villages, Hui mosques, and the Chinese community self-surveillance system (baojia).

Japanese ideologists like Tachibana Shiraki saw no contradiction between the goals of republicanism, equality, and modernization, on the one hand, and the "Eastern" values of community, solidarity, and the moral state, on the other. In practice, however, the very different programs and interests pursued by the military and the pan-Asianists led to many tensions and resulted in a polarized rather than harmonious society. Mongol youth demanded modern education and the elimination of the power of the lamas; Chinese supporters were divided between monarchists who favored the restoration of the emperor and republicans who opposed it. Before these tensions could be overcome and a truly independent state created, the Japanese military derailed the process by plunging Manchukuo into the Second Sino-Japanese War.

References

1. Prasenjit Duara (2004). Sovereignty and Authenticity:Manchukuo and the East Asian Modern. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc. ISBN 9780742530911.
2. Annika A. Culver (2013). Glorify the Empire: Japanese Avant-Garde Propaganda in Manchukuo. UBC Press. ISBN 9780774824361.

• Beasley, W.G. (1991). Japanese Imperialism 1894-1945. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-822168-1.
• Dower, John (1987). War Without Mercy, Race and Power in the Pacific War. Pantheon. ISBN 0-394-75172-8.
• Li, Lincoln (1996). The China Factor in Modern Japanese Thought: The Case of Tachibana Shiraki, 1881-1945. SUNY Press. ISBN 0-7914-3039-1.
• Stoler, Ann (2007). Imperial Formations. School for Advanced Research Press. ISBN 978-1-930618-73-2.
• Young, Louise (1999). Japan's Total Empire: Manchuria and the Culture of Wartime Imperialism. University of California Press. ISBN 0-520-21934-1.
• Young, Morgan (1999). Imperial Japan 1926-1938. Borah Press. ISBN 1-4067-1127-6.

External links

• The New Imperialism

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Themes	Anti-communism Bushido Corporatism Emperor system Fascism Gekokujō Hakkō ichiu Japanese militarism Kokutai Pan-Asianism State Shinto Statism Capitalism Totalitarianism Ultranationalism Yamato-damashii
Movements	Reform bureaucratism Shōwa Restoration
People	Before 1945 Hirohito Sadao Araki Inejirō Asanuma Tanaka Chigaku Kingoro Hashimoto Kiichirō Hiranuma Koki Hirota Nisshō Inoue Kanji Ishiwara Nobusuke Kishi Ikki Kita Kuniaki Koiso Fumimaro Konoe Jinzaburō Masaki Seigō Nakano Shūmei Ōkawa Uesugi Shinkichi Hideki Tojo Masanobu Tsuji Post-war Japan Bin Akao Yukio Mishima Otoya Yamaguchi Other Subhas Chandra Bose Park Chung Hee
Organizations and factions	Before 1945 Black Ocean Society Fleet faction Gakutotai Great Japan Youth Party Imperial Rule Assistance Association Imperial Rule Assistance Political Association Japanese Committee on Trade and Information Kōdōha League of Diet Members Supporting the Prosecution of the Holy War National Defense Brotherhood National Foundation Society National Spiritual Mobilization Movement Sakurakai Shōwa Kenkyūkai Tōhōkai Tōseiha Yokusan Sonendan Young Officers Movement Yūzonsha Post-war Japan Nippon Kaigi Tatenokai Other Concordia Association Makapili
History	1930s February 26 Incident League of Blood Incident Marco Polo Bridge incident March incident May 15 incident Military Academy incident Mukden incident October incident State General Mobilization Law Withdrawal from the Washington Naval Treaty 1940–1945 Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere Kyūjō incident Pacific War Tripartite Pact 1945–1949 Matsue incident Purge Reverse Course Sanmu incident After the 1950s Mishima incident
Works	An Investigation of Global Policy with the Yamato Race as Nucleus How Japan Plans to Win Kokutairon and Pure Socialism Momotaro: Sacred Sailors Momotarō no Umiwashi Moyuru ōzora Patriotism Ode of Showa Restoration Shinmin no Michi Sun and Steel The Most Beautiful
Related topics	American cover-up of Japanese war crimes The Cleanest Race Collaboration with Imperial Japan Korean Greater East Asia Conference International Military Tribunal for the Far East Japanese war crimes Japanese history textbook controversies List of World War II puppet states of Japan Propaganda in Japan during the Second Sino-Japanese War and World War II Uyoku dantai
Category

• Anti-communist parties
• Fascism in China
• Fascist parties
• Manchurian nationalism
• Monarchist parties
• Nationalist parties in China
• Pan-Asianism
• Parties of one-party systems
• Political parties disestablished in 1945
• Political parties established in 1931
• Political parties in Manchukuo
• Shōwa Statism
• Political parties of minorities in China