Regionalismus und historische Identität –: Transnationale Dialoge zur Geschichte Nord-/ Ost­-/ Asiens seit den 1990er Jahren

Since the Asian financial crisis of 1997 initiatives of regional cooperation and integration have proliferated in Asia. However, these initiatives are usually based on government agreements and business networks only. They are rarely substantiated by what scholars of regionalism call a “cognitive” or “imagined” region. This article explores contemporary transnational dialogues of (mainly Northeast) Asian intellectuals on the history of Asia as an important dimension of a “cognitive” region. Three forms of dialogue are discussed and compared: textbook dialogue, academic dialogue and the dialogue of critical intellectuals on the nature of Asian modernity. The analysis shows that the persistence of nationalist perspectives is a major obstacle to constructing a shared view of Asian history. The transcendence of nationalist points of view, on the other hand, requires a level of reflexivity and epistemological awareness that also reveals the constructed nature of any definition of “Asia”. Asia as a category remains contested and unstable

Einleitung: Asianismen seit dem 19. Jahrhundert.: „Asien“ als Gegenstand nationaler und transnationaler Diskurse und Praktiken

Over the last two decades, “Asia” has gained an important place in Western public discourse. Ideas of “Asia” as an entity, however, have a long tradition in Western discourse and were subject to significant changes over time. Within the region, concepts of a shared Asian identity and projects of integration and collaboration can be traced back to the late nineteenth century when Japan proposed to lead Asia in its struggle against Western colonialism and imperialism. Due to its own bid for power in the region, Japanese Pan-Asianism was not uncontested. Throughout the twentieth century, various actors at different levels of society developed a variety of definitions of “Asia” and alternative projects of intraregional collaboration. The term “Asianisms” is used to refer to both discursive constructs of Asia as a region as well as to political, economic, social and cultural practices related to them. The article gives an overview of the evolution of Asianisms since the late nineteenth century and introduces the individual contributions to this volume

Multiple Futures? Comparing Approaches to the Future in Africa, China, and Europe: An Introduction

Die Zukunft ist ungewiss, und sie ist nicht für alle dieselbe. Das Heft untersucht in vergleichender Perspektive zeitgenössische Zukunftserwartungen, Formen des Zukunftswissens und Strategien des Zukunftsmanagements in Afrika, China und Europa. Während je eigene soziale, politische und ökonomische Gegebenheiten Unterschiede im individuellen und kollektiven Zugang zu Zukunft bedingen, bringt die Verflechtung der Welt gleichzeitig Parallelen und Konvergenzen hervor