More than five years have passed since we started East Asian STS activity. It is growing more rapidly than we expected. The number of STS'ers joining in is increasing rapidly. East Asian conferences provide important meeting places for exchanging our regional experiences from and with each community. At last, the East Asian STS journal is coming into being, thanks to the enthusiastic commitment of the Taiwan STS community.
Though the future of East Asian STS seems to be bright, we have, of course, our difficulties. The biggest seem to me to be the differences in the orientation of research interests, which could lead to deep antagonism. It is true that differences are a stimulus to productivity. However, to make use of them, we need to know what are the real differences among us. The purpose of this presentation is to identify them. First, I will describe a short history of Japanese STS. And at the end of the paper, I will briefly compare it with STS in East Asia.
In my presentation, I will divide the history of Japanese STS into four stages. But first, I would ask East Asian colleagues to consider my comments below on a characteristic of the Japanese modernization process since the Meiji Restoration (1868): modernization under the strong influence of the European countries. For example, Japanese engineering infrastructure including railway & road transport system was designed, or even constructed, by British engineers. The Navy also learned much from Britain, and we bought battleships from there.
