Taoka Reiun and His Times : A Youth in Meiji

During the reaction against Europeanism (欧化主義) in the second decade of the Meiji era, Democraticism (平民主義) and Nationalism (国粋主義) became two large currents which very much influenced the youth. It is very much interesting how the intellectual young, who have received the baptism of western civilization even as they use as scholarly and ideological departure point their learning of Sinology, could have achieved self-formation while experiencing the setbacks and ideological conflicts of youth. In this paper, I focus once again on Taoka Reiun (1870-1920), who is considered to be "one of the forgotten thinkers". The objective is to cast in sharp relief one aspect of an intellectual who lived in turbulent times. This involves clarifying how he, whose works have often been declared forbidden, wrote critically of the situation at that time of domestic politics and foreign policy, or how he stood fast in his position of making political commentaries amidst the realities and tense conflict of awareness of those times, or how he felt or viewed China at that time, or what message he intended to convey. Firstly, I will consider the third trip to China of Reiun, who dreamt for a long time of going to continent. Next, I will focus on the social problem in domestic politics and investigate Reiun\u27s idea of instigating the "2nd Revolution" (overthrowing the "rich cliques") following the Meiji Revolution. Furthermore, with regards to foreign policy, I will analyze his philosophy which espouses the "boosting of the Oriental civilization" as well as the "East Asian Great Alliance"