Thesis (Ph.D.)--Indiana University, Dept. of History, 2006. / Adviser: Alexander Rabinowitch.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Syracuse University, 2008. / "Publication number: AAT 3323067."

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Indiana University, 2006. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 66-11, Section: A, page: 3852. Adviser: Herbert A. Terry. Title from dissertation home page (viewed Oct. 10, 2006).

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2006. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 67-11, Section: A, page: 4307. Adviser: Peter Fritzsche. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 241-255) Available on microfilm from Pro Quest Information and Learning.

Imperial Japanese soldiers were notorious for following their superiors to certain death. Their enemies in the Pacific War perceived their obedience as blind, and derided them as “cattle”. Yet the Japanese Army was arguably one of the most disobedient armies in the world. Officers repeatedly staged coups d’états, violent insurrections and political assassinations, while their associates defied orders given by both the government and high command, launched independent military operations against other countries, and in two notorious cases conspired to assassinate foreign leaders. The purpose of this dissertation is to explain the culture of disobedience in the Japanese armed forces. It was a culture created by a series of seemingly innocent decisions, each reasonable in its own right, which led to a gradual weakening of the Japanese government’s control over its army and navy. The consequences were dire, as the armed forces dragged the government into more and more of China in the 1930s, and finally into the Pacific War. This dissertation sheds light on the underground culture of disobedience that became increasingly dominant in the Japanese armed forces, until it made the Pacific War possible. Using primary sources in five languages, it follows the Army’s culture of disobedience from its inception. By analyzing more than ten important incidents from 1860 to 1931, it shows how some basic “bugs” programmed into the Japanese system in the 1870s, born out of genuine attempts to cope with a chaotic and shifting reality, contributed to the development of military disobedience. The culture of disobedience became increasingly entrenched, making it difficult for the Japanese civilian and military leadership to cope with disobedient officers without paying a significant political price. However, every time the government failed to address the problem, it became more acute. Finally, disobedient military officers were able to significantly influence foreign policy, pushing Japan further towards international aggression, limitless expansion, and conflict with China, Britain and the United States. / History

My dissertation examines the post-1949 transformation of religious and organizational culture in rural Ruian County of the Wenzhou region, Zhejiang. It explores the diversified adaptation patterns adopted by rural religious organizations in order to preserve, reinvent and even expand themselves in the volatile sociopolitical environment of post-1949 China. Based on hitherto unexploited government documents collected from local state archives, memoirs, historical accounts of religious organizations, as well as extensive oral interviews with Ruian residents, I demonstrate that, rather than following a linear and uniform decline that conventional wisdom suggests, religious organizations took divergent paths in Ruian during the Maoist era. The level of religious activities in Ruian and many regions of Zhejiang exhibited fluctuations over time rather than a linear downward movement. The Maoist period, I argue, was both destructive and constructive for religion. By stripping religious organizations of their traditional leadership and economic foundation, Maoist campaigns inadvertently accelerated the organizational reinvention of Chinese religions. Even more far-reaching, the Cultural Revolution dramatically stimulated a quick rise of Protestantism vis-à-vis other religions and fundamentally reshaped the religious landscape in parts of China, making China no exception to the global trend of religious resurgence, despite its isolation at the time. Religion in today’s China and related phenomena, in particular the uneven distribution of religious revival, the development patterns of rural organizations, and state-religion relations, cannot be fully explained without reference to the Maoist legacy. / East Asian Languages and Civilizations

This dissertation examines Piero Gobetti’s activity as a student of Russian language and culture, and proposes that it be understood as a formative phase in a larger process of self-construction, through which Gobetti attempted to incarnate the ideal figure of the Genius. Gobetti, an icon of the Italian antifascist resistance, has long been known to have nurtured a particular interest in Russian culture, but the details of his engagement with Russian language, literature and history have generally been left aside in discussions of his accomplishments, or presented as a response to the October revolution. Examination of Gobetti’s personal library, his published writings and correspondence, and the personal papers and correspondence left by his wife, Ada, reveals that Gobetti’s interest in Russia and Russian culture began before the October revolution, however, sparked by the discovery of literary heroes in whom he could see himself reflected. From these beginnings the dissertation traces the development of Gobetti’s Russian studies through language learning, literary translation and criticism to the historical study of the Russian revolutionary tradition, and proposes that the stages of Gobetti’s pursuit of the Russian spirit were driven by a search for images of genius which contributed, in turn, to a larger process of imaginative self-construction. Viewed in this light, Gobetti’s Russian studies appear integral to his life and work, and open a new perspective on his achievements and his heroic myth. / Slavic Languages and Literatures

This dissertation investigates Chinese Muslim (Hui) intellectual currents from the late Qing dynasty to the early years of the Communist Republic, 1908–1957. By analyzing a vast number of Muslim reformist journals, Chinese translations of Islamic sources, and diaries/memoirs of intellectuals who were connected to other zones of the Islamic world, I examine the process by which reformists sought to redefine Chinese Muslim identity and revive “true principles of Islam”—both in negotiation with the Chinese state and in conversation with local and transnational intellectual currents. In particular, this dissertation considers the ways in which intellectuals struggled to “awaken” Chinese Muslims so as to transform their past identity as Muslim subjects of the Qing Empire into “politically conscious and active” citizens of the Chinese Republic. Chinese Muslims were defined either as a religious community or an ethnic group (minzu), and this debate occupied the minds of reformist intellectuals in this period, the topic of the first two chapters. How it was settled would determine the political, social, and religious status of the Muslim community in China, where definitions of nation and ethnicity/race were constantly reassigned. Debates concerning Muslim integration into China hinged on their connection to the global Muslim community (umma). Newly introduced technologies of travel and communication, such as the steamship and print, facilitated Chinese Muslims’ participation within transnational and cross-confessional networks. I argue that it was through the selection, appropriation, and adaptation of ideas from the prominent centers of the Islamic world that these intellectuals navigated a path of integration in the Chinese context that did not put their distinct Muslim identity at risk. From these diverse sources, they were determined to find solutions to the challenges they faced in China—whether posed by the hegemonic discourse of the Nationalist Party or the iconoclastic New Culture Movement. In successive chapters, I focus on the intellectual connection of Chinese Muslims to the Kemalist secularism of Turkey, the Ahmadi movement of India, and Egyptian reformist currents. Thus, I demonstrate how a seemingly “peripheral” Muslim community in the Far East participated in complex transnational networks at a critical moment of transformation. / Inner Asian and Altaic Studies

Abstract not available.

Abstract not available.