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Attracted by Tanxu’s work in Yingkou and other Manchurian cities, government leaders in Harbin invited Tanxu there to construct a Buddhist temple. The motivations were, as elsewhere, both religious and political, aiming to bring Buddhism to a city that lacked a major temple, but also to use the architecture and location of the temple to promote Chinese nationalism in a city that had until recently been a Russian semi-colony, and retained a Russian identity in much of its population and infrastructure. Tanxu continued his work in Harbin, while also travelling throughout the region and even Japan as part of the East Asian Buddhist Conference, until 1932, when Japanese armies invaded Harbin and established the state of Manchukuo as a Japanese protectorate. Although insistent that he was not a guerrilla in the Japanese resistance, Tanxu’s patron, General Zhu Qinglan, attracted the attention of Japanese spies and police, and Tanxu soon fled to Xi’an.

This chapter examines the meanings of Japanese immigrant nationalism. The origin of modern Issei nationalism can be traced to the rise of Japanese militarism in Manchuria in the early 1930s, which drastically transformed the hitherto estranged relationship between the empire and the immigrant community after 1924. For policy makers in Japan, Japanese residents in the United States became politically relevant at this time in the context of the growing tension with Anglo-American powers. The rise of Japanese immigrant patriotism and Japan's attempt to exploit it for geopolitical purposes, did not result in the metamorphosis of the Issei into a replica of the Japanese militarist or the ultranationalist extremist, as anti-Japanese agitators often claimed. Instead, Issei patriotism inaugurated another phase of the immigrant-state partnership where immigrant dreams and Japan's state mandate converged in complex ways.

The apparent implosion of all central authority in China in the aftermath of the Boxer Uprising led to a renewed Russian expansionist drive in the northern provinces of the Chinese Empire. The resulting Manchurian crisis, triggered by Russian attempts to establish a protectorate there under the guise of the Ts'êng–Alekse'ev agreement, marked the nadir of Anglo–Russian relations. It threatened to escalate into a regional war. That a conflict was averted owed much to Lord Lansdowne's brinkmanship. But the full significance of the crisis went beyond the region. It threw into sharper relief the nature of Britain's relations with Germany and Japan, and so highlighted the ongoing problems of isolation. This chapter concludes with a re-interpretation of the failed Anglo–German alliance talks in the spring of 1901.

To assess trends in the standard of living in Liaoning province in north-east China during the nineteenth century, the secular change in demographic rates and their sensitivity to economic conditions are examined. The findings show that marital fertility rose, child mortality fell and some men were able to marry much earlier. Fertility became less sensitive to grain prices, suggesting a decline in the vulnerability of rural populations to economic shocks. Based on these trends, the conclusion can be drawn that the standard of living in Liaoning rose during the nineteenth century. While these results may not be generalized to China as a whole, they do raise the possibility of variation between and within regions of China in trends in living standards during the nineteenth century.

This chapter explores how missionaries, starting in the mid-nineteenth century, developed a method for assessing the degree of faith of Christians in communities in Manchuria. Far from being a passing experiment, missionaries’ use of statistical methods and quantitative language to measure the religiosity of local converts became a central concern of the Church, as important as translating texts to and from Latin, French, and Chinese. In creating this method, missionaries calculated the impact of their efforts and defined what it meant to be a “good” Christian.

This chapter demonstrates that Japan's foreign policy from 1931 to 1941 was rooted in a logic going back many decades. It starts by briefly discussing US–Japanese relations from the end of the Russo-Japanese War up to 1921. The chapter then turns to an exploration of Japanese behavior during the period of Shidehara diplomacy and late Taisho democracy. It shows that Japanese leaders of all stripes, including Foreign Minister Shidehara Kijuro, were hardheaded realists who sought to maintain Japan's economic position in Manchuria and northern China even as they acted to reduce the risk of economic or military conflict with the great powers. The rest of the chapter takes up a more detailed analysis of the tragic decade from 1931 to 1940.

The 20th century began with hopes and anxieties for Japan, a modern nation-state in the making. In 1901, the beginning of the new century brought events which, in retrospect, seem equally pregnant with foreboding. The state of army and the navy at the turn of the century are examined. The chapter also outlines the Anglo-Japanese Alliance, armament expansion, Russians in Manchuria, and the rise of Japanese ‘Jingoism’. It concentrates on the Russo-Japanese war. On 10 February 1905, Japan formally declared war against Russia. The Anglo-Japanese Alliance had contributed to the strengthening of the Japanese navy. The chapter examines the 1905 riots. In addition, the international realignment after the war and the road to Korean annexation are covered.

At 10:20 a.m. on 18 September 1931, in the suburb of Mukden, a bomb exploded on the Southern Manchurian railway. The damage was minimal but a Japanese patrol claimed they had been fired upon by Chinese soldiers and were forced to retaliate. By the following morning the Japanese had breached the walls of Mukden and occupied the city. Japan's successful action in Manchuria has come to be seen as part of a nationalist upsurge against a western-created form of internationalism. The origins of the crisis can be traced to post-war nationalist movements in China and Japan, intent on change at home and the assertion of the full independence of their respective countries. Japan was condemned at Geneva for its actions in Manchuria but was not subjected to sanctions. It was far from clear in 1933 how far she would retreat into isolation. These events, nonetheless, marked a change in Japan's policy and in western perceptions of her intentions. They revealed, too, weaknesses in the international structure that had been created during the 1920s that called into question some of the fundamental principles on which it was based.

The peace movement experienced a dramatic revival from the beginning of 1919 to the eve of the Manchuria crisis and also benefited from the public's growing disappointment with the post-war world. In the early 1920s, the Labour party's success gave a boost to the Union of Democratic Control, but doubts over League of Nations gave way to the unprecedented success of the League of Nations Union (LNU) that developed as a substantial peace association. The failure of World War I in delivering international improvements as promised has only provided confidence in peace activism over the duration of this period. Another significant contribution was the development of LNU into a respectable yet vigorous peace association aiming to gain public support for the league's ideals.

On September 19, 1931, Japan began the process of converting the Chinese province of Manchuria into its own puppet state of Manchukuo, thus calling into question an earlier pronouncement about the prospects of peace just nine days before, However, peace movements fare best when optimism is seasoned with a dash of pessimism: although the former gives their ideas plausibility, the latter is needed to give them urgency. In the early 1930s, the mixture was therefore ideal: the optimism carried over from the post-Locarno period ignited with the pessimism generated by Japanese, German, and Italian behaviour to stimulate the most intense phase of peace activism ever, of which unquestionably the highlight was the extraordinary Peace Ballot of 1934–5.

This chapter presents a set of case studies to examine the cycle theory of international norm change with respect to rules on conquest. Each case represents a key cycle of norm change. The cases include Germany's 1870 annexation of Alsace-Lorraine; World War I; Japan's transformation of Manchuria into puppet state “Manchukuo” during the early years of the League of Nations; the Nazi invasions of Czechoslovakia and Poland leading up to World War II; North Korea's 1950 invasion of South Korea at the beginning of the Cold War; and the 1990 Iraqi invasion of Kuwait at the Cold War's end.