Serita Kentaro. The Territory of Japan. Its History and Legal Basis

2nd ed. — Springer, 2023. — 199 p. — ISBN 978-981-99-3012-8Japan fi rst became widely known among Europeans through The Travels of Marco Polo, in which thirteenth century Venetian merchant Marco Polo referred to Japan as “Zipangu, the Land of Gold.” Though Polo himself never travelled to Japan, he is thought to have been expressing the views held by the residents of southern China, after he had spent time in Hangzhou, which at the time was a trade hub between Japan and China.
Meanwhile, modern Japan makes an appearance in American author Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick, as a country closed to the outside world and a refueling station for the American whaling crew that ventures out into the North Pacif i c, as far as the Ogasawara (Bonin) Islands. This depiction demonstrates how, as the newly modernized Japan was being pressed by the nations of Western Europe to open its doors to trade, many wanted the attribution of the islands around Japan to be clarif i ed—not only China, but also Russia to Japan’s north, various countries that had been looking East since the Age of Sail, and America to the east. Thus, efforts were made to def i ne Japan’s territories from the end of the Edo period through to the Meiji period, resulting in their present def i nition. This work describes the changes and current state of Japan’s territories while also touching upon developments in the international community relating to maritime resources from the latter half of the twentieth century onwards.
It is well known how Japan emerged as a modern nation and vied alongside other countries to expand its territory at a time when the world was ruled by the law of survival of the fi ttest, before fi nally signing the San Francisco Peace Treaty in 1952.
Consequently, a series of unresolved territorial issues continue to burden Japan. In this work, I attempted to examine the claims of the relevant countries with an open mind and strived to lay the foundation for calmly addressing the issues involved, so as to fi nd a peaceful solution.
As was mentioned in the Epilogue of the original Japanese edition, this text was primarily an analysis of the situation up to 2002. Therefore, I would like to write a summary of the facts regarding the situation since that time as they relate to Russia, China, and the Republic of Korea (ROK).