Unravelling military aggression: Ontological insecurity, great power narcissism, and Japan’s international relations, 1868–1971

Abstract

This article examines the extent to which or how self-identified great powers resort to military aggression following events that challenge their sense of greatness. It problematises the prevalent notion that great powers and events exist and have effects independently of the narratives that constitute them. The article does this by engaging with Ontological Security Studies, Great Power Narcissism, and the psychology of vulnerable and grandiose narcissism, as well as by analysing Japanese identity narratives in two periods seemingly marked by equally challenging events – the Meiji era (1868–1912) and the post-war period (1950–71). It finds that Japan’s military aggression against China in 1894–5 was enabled by vulnerable narratives of shame and insult, while the decision to wage war with Russia a decade later was facilitated more by grandiose narratives. Despite Japan’s overwhelming defeat in the Second World War and the persistent desire among conservative elites for great power status and identity, however, overall post-war narratives did not feature similarly negative emotions and calls for revenge. Japanese great power aspirations were arguably curtailed in this period through intense narrative contestation, notably progressive counter-narratives featuring more self-reflective expressions of guilt and remorse, and even the self-reflexive desire for a non-great power identity.

Video Abstract

Introduction

To what extent or how do self-identified great powers wage military aggression following events that disrupt their sense of greatness? This article aims to interrogate the analytical relationship between such ‘challenging events’, typically understood as defeats¹ or power transitions² and seen as exacerbated by a problem with status (inconsistency, deficit, immobility, denial, dissatisfaction, or anxiety) or external recognition;³ the collective surge of ‘negative emotions’,⁴ such as shame, anger, frustration, humiliation, and resentment; and military aggression, typically linked to the ideologies of revanchism or revisionism. Notorious cases that seem to underscore the significance of this analytical relationship include Nazi Germany’s aggression 1939–45,⁵ and Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine since 2022.⁶

In 2000, Harkavy noted an ‘absence of attention’ to the interconnections between defeat, humiliation, and revenge.⁷ Despite subsequent scholarly contributions, the existing debate remains constrained by the presumption that great powers and events exist and produce effects independently of the narratives that constitute them. Treating status and recognition, or their absence, as objectively measurable, causal factors is equally problematic, as well as surprising if they are to be fully recognised as ‘perceptual, positional, and social’.⁸

Moreover, while the existing literature frequently mentions emotions, it treats these as irrelevant, irrational, and/or epiphenomenal, leading to a lack of appreciation and theoretical exploration. Nazi aggression during the Second World War and Russian military aggression against Ukraine again serve as prime examples. Some argue that Germany and Russia were not genuinely humiliated, perhaps primarily by the ‘events’ of the Treaty of Versailles in 1919 and North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) enlargement in the 1990s and 2000s, respectively.⁹ Yet, in each case, military aggression seems to have been politically facilitated by the co-constitution of great power identity with those and other occurrences through emotionally charged narratives that resonated broadly within society.

This article thus contributes by reconceptualising the relationship between challenging events, negative emotions, and the risk that self-identified great powers wage military aggression. It does so by drawing and expanding on Ontological Security Studies (OSS), particularly Great Power Narcissism (GPN). OSS understands the state self as constituted through biographical narratives that strive towards coherence and consistency. Pride prevails when these narratives are experienced as more coherent and consistent; but when they falter, shame emerges.¹⁰ GPN relies on the same two ‘master emotions’¹¹ – pride and shame – but notes the puzzling tension between a desire for and inflated pride in greatness as well as exaggerated shame regarding weakness in great power biographical narratives.

In starting to develop GPN, I have previously argued that this dynamic renders self-identified great powers ontologically insecure in a way reminiscent of narcissists. In addition, like narcissists, I have contended that the risk that self-identified great powers wage military aggression is most acute when shame and pride are negotiated within a narrative of insult.¹² However, by conceptualising narcissism as a singular, albeit internally conflicted, construct, my previous research overlooked the distinction between vulnerable and grandiose narcissism and their respective similarities with narratives of shame and pride. This oversight hindered a deeper understanding of how narratives of shame and pride evolve into narratives of insult, triggering aggression. The next section addresses this issue by developing a more nuanced understanding of the narrative forms of GPN and their role in transforming and legitimising action, including vulnerable and grandiose narratives of insult and pathways to military aggression.

The third section begins by examining how challenging events and the ostensible lack of recognition manifest differently in vulnerable and grandiose identity narratives. While maintaining the belief that great power narcissism is pervasive, the section then revisits the assumption in OSS that state identities can be negotiated more self-reflexively, exploring the possibility that seemingly challenging events might not always trigger negative emotions and aggression, even among self-identified great powers. The section distinguishes between self-reflexivity and self-reflectivity, clarifying that while often conflated, they do not fully align. The article thus draws a parallel between narcissism and self-reflexivity/self-reflectivity, suggesting that these concepts can equally contribute to understanding the narratives through which states and great powers are imagined and perpetuated.

After outlining the method and material in the fourth section, two empirical sections undertake a ‘plausibility probe’ to establish whether the proposed theorisation warrants further attention.¹³ These sections analyse Japanese identity narratives during two periods equally characterised by seemingly challenging events: the Meiji era (1868–1912), after Japan’s forced opening up; and the post-war period (1950–71), from defeat in the Second World War until the two Nixon shocks, just after Japan had become the world’s second-largest economy.

Was Japan really a great power in the Meiji era, let alone in the early post-war period? The article does not advocate objectivist indicators but demonstrates that dominant Japanese identity narratives have consistently expressed pride in and a desire for greatness, as well as shame related to weakness.¹⁴ It concludes that Imperial Japan’s military aggression against China in 1894–5 was closely associated with narratives characterised by vulnerable great power narcissism, while the decision to go to war with Russia a decade later was underpinned more by grandiose narratives.

Despite Japan’s overwhelming defeat in the Second World War and a persistent desire for great power status and identity among conservative elites – not always recognised in the existing literature¹⁵ – post-war biographical narratives did not exhibit similar negative emotions or calls for revenge. The article finds that Japanese great power ambitions were curtailed in this period through intense narrative contestation. The concluding section addresses the implications for Japan’s security policy in the 21st century – another period marked by seemingly challenging events – and suggests avenues for future research.

In addition to the points outlined above, the article makes two empirical contributions to the OSS literature on Japan. First, it emphasises that Japan’s struggle with ontological insecurity is not solely rooted in misrecognition or identity threats¹⁶ but is also intricately connected to lingering Japanese great power desires since the Meiji restoration. Consequently, the frustrated oscillation between shame associated with weakness and pride in greatness in Japanese biographical narratives is not merely a product of ‘comparisons to the West’¹⁷ but is arguably intrinsic to great power narcissism, understood as a socially and narratively produced predicament of self-identified great powers. Second, it identifies certain domestic sources of ontological security in progressive counter-narratives featuring self-reflective expressions of guilt and remorse as well as the more self-reflexive desire for a non-great power identity in the post-war period. It proposes these as a potential remedy to great power narcissism, thus supplementing previous propositions that the Japanese self could learn from its Okinawan other to live with its alleged weakness or, alternately, seek a cure for its Westphalian desires in East Asian medicine.¹⁸

The narrative forms of vulnerable and grandiose Great Power Narcissism

According to psychological research, the distinction between vulnerable and grandiose narcissism reflects the contradictory nature inherent in narcissistic personalities. Both forms exhibit ‘grandiose fantasies and expectations about the self, a sense of entitlement, and a willingness to exploit other[s]’,¹⁹ while also harbouring chronic, underlying shame.²⁰ While personality and self-identification processes can oscillate between vulnerable and grandiose expressions,²¹ developing each in an ‘ideal type’ fashion remains helpful.²²

Vulnerable narcissism, first, is marked by shame stemming from failed attempts to inflate ‘hubristic pride’.²³ This is manifest through expressions emphasising the self’s inferiority, inadequacy, and helplessness, reflecting a lack of self-confidence, low self-esteem, and ‘hypersensitivity and disappointment stemming from unmet entitled expectations’.²⁴ Adapted to GPN, expressions of shame feature most prominently in a narrative of shame. In that context, it typically enables a political agenda premised on self-restoration or self-betterment, and the mobilisation of resources aimed at approximating the desired/threatened sense of greatness, primarily through military, economic, industrial, cultural, and/or social reforms.²⁵ The prevalence of ‘shame about shame’, however, means that shame is seldom on full display.²⁶ Hence, consistent with the definition of narcissism, a narrative of shame also reflects entitlement and latent pride. Previous research indicates that small state biographical narratives tend to highlight alternative sources of pride,²⁷ a trend that is mirrored in the case of self-identified great powers, particularly when that status and identity have openly become the objects of shame. In the realm of international politics, such a compensatory narrative of pride may for example feature boasts about soft power.²⁸

Grandiose narcissism, by contrast, is characterised by ‘hubristic pride’.²⁹ This is manifest through expressions emphasising the self’s superiority, uniqueness, and privilege, as well as its ‘status, power, dominance, and physical beauty’.³⁰ It is reflected in arrogance, an exaggerated sense of self-importance, attention-seeking behaviour, self-aggrandisement, and ‘little observable anxiety’.³¹ Adapted to GPN, these features signify a narrative of pride, often by boasting about traditional markers of a great power, such as military, economic, and industrial power, large territory, and a glorious past. Originally conceptualised as a separate narrative form,³² denial is better subsumed within a narrative of pride, since the grandiose palette includes ‘denial of weaknesses’.³³ Consistent with the definition of narcissism, moreover, shame linked to weakness is also reflected in a narrative of pride, albeit in a latent and indirectly discernible manner.

Associated with anger, hostility, and aggression, the third narrative form of GPN – a narrative of insult – is consequential in the context of this article.³⁴ When shame linked to weakness cannot be verbally denied through a narrative of pride or mitigated through talk about reform in a narrative of shame, the self faces a threat of annihilation. In such circumstances, self-representations of weakness and greatness, along with their associated feelings of shame and pride, tend to be mediated through a narrative of insult. This may involve blaming others for a lack of recognition, which can lead to calls for revenge.³⁵ Similarly, narcissists become ‘angry and aggressive after experiencing a social rejection’.³⁶ To maintain a sense of superiority, they resort to aggression, comprising ‘any behavior intended to harm another’.³⁷ Groups that endorse narcissistic beliefs are similarly prone to ‘retaliate to imagined provocations against the ingroup’.³⁸ Adapted to the realm of great power politics, a narrative of insult is thus believed to enable actions aimed at demonstrating that a self-identified great power truly deserves this status and identity.

How narratives of shame and pride transform into a narrative of insult centred on the negative emotions of insult/humiliation and enable great power aggression, however, is somewhat unclear.³⁹ This is where the distinction between vulnerable and grandiose narcissism proves particularly helpful. To begin with, vulnerable narcissism is described as fuelling ‘suspiciousness, dejection, and angry rumination’ and as a ‘powerful driver’ of anger, hostility and aggression.⁴⁰ Vulnerable narcissists are sensitive to social evaluation and perceived rejection or betrayal; they become ‘upset or angry when they do not receive what they think they deserve’.⁴¹ They openly struggle with shame and are more dissatisfied and frustrated than grandiose narcissists. Since they seldom experience a steep drop in self-esteem, however, expressions of anger and hostility may be sufficient to restore some pride, at least temporarily. Moreover, their aggression can also be ‘covert and indirect’.⁴² These insights could help to explain why some self-identified great powers wage military aggression towards weaker and previously uninvolved third-party actors when experiencing humiliation.⁴³ The article posits that such a scenario is most plausible when great power identity narratives are characterised more by vulnerable narcissism.

Vulnerable narcissism is also associated with ‘unrelenting resentment’.⁴⁴ Resentment figures prominently in scholarship on the links between events, revisionism, and aggression.⁴⁵ Closely related to anger and envy, resentment stems from ‘a sense of loss of entitlement, regard and position … in comparison and relations with others’,⁴⁶ particularly when that loss is interpreted as unjust. It is a more persistent form of anger than humiliation. This article proposes that narratives of insult may express resentment when the capacity to restore some pride through aggression is deemed insufficient. Therefore, resentment is also expected to surface more frequently when a self-identified great power’s biographical narratives are characterised by vulnerable narcissism.

By contrast, grandiose narcissists wage aggression when suffering ‘a blow to their ego’, the risk of which is greatest when their self-esteem is most inflated.⁴⁷ Grandiose narcissists act aggressively ‘to maintain their inflated view of the self’.⁴⁸ Those who construct identity based on exaggerated pride may be less sensitive to shaming and stigmatisation in the first place. However, in cases where denial fails to restore a sense of pride, the drop in self-esteem can be experienced as steep, thereby propelling violent aggression. Tracy et al. suggest that this emotional and behavioural pattern cannot be explained without considering narcissists’ struggle with shame: ‘If narcissists genuinely believe their aggrandised self-representations, it is not clear why they would need to defend them so fiercely, rather than brush off any critique or insult.’⁴⁹ Similarly, there is a risk of violent aggression when self-identified great powers ‘face’ challenging events at a time when their identity narratives are at their most inflated. This article conjectures that such aggression might also be waged against those identified as ‘peers’. Building on the above discussion, Table 1 identifies indicators for the various narrative forms, adapted to the psychology of vulnerable and grandiose narcissism.

Table 1. How to recognise the narrative forms of GPN, adapted to vulnerable and grandiose narcissism.

In originally conceptualising GPN, I positioned the uneasy oscillation between exaggerated shame and pride within psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan’s ‘fantasmatic’ narrative structure, which features the juxtaposition of horrific and beatific future scenarios.⁵⁰ Clearly, a narrative of shame shares similarities with the horrific scenario. A narrative of pride, by contrast, may seem to offer a complete escape with its beatific scenario, but since shame is believed to drive the desire for pride, it does not. Although self-identified great powers may appear more secure in their status and identity than states identifying as ‘small’,⁵¹ shame about weakness is reflected in that which exaggerated expressions of pride seek to conceal or refute. Narratives of this kind often carry gendered connotations. This is evident not only in the stark contrast between shameful (feminine) weakness and desired/proud (masculine) strength but also in the association between weakness and feminisation, which is in turn narrated as requiring a strong (male) protector and the projection of masculinist logics of strength.⁵²

Finally, while the narrative focus in GPN diverges from mainstream psychological approaches to narcissism, it aligns well with OSS scholarship,⁵³ narrative psychology,⁵⁴ and collective narcissism research.⁵⁵ In addition, scholars agree that emotions are detectable through ‘the systematic analysis of discourse’.⁵⁶ The assumption of a narrative ontology applies to both people and states,⁵⁷ although state ontology is arguably characterised by greater narrative contestation and uncertainty.⁵⁸

Revisiting the link between events, emotions, and aggression

The existing research on the links between events, emotions, and aggression does not engage with the realist concept of external/exogenous/strategic ‘shock’ but could do so given its objectivist inclinations and the realist anticipation that such shocks cause the ‘use of force’ or ‘force generation’.⁵⁹ The OSS equivalent of a shock, termed a ‘critical situation’, is defined in markedly less objectivist terms as a situation in which ‘states are overwhelmed with anxiety due to their inability to maintain their self-identity narratives’.⁶⁰ Critical situations may thus seem narratively constructed ‘all the way down’. However, Ejdus and others suggest that certain events – notably ‘power transitions’ – are more likely to trigger narrative ruptures than others.⁶¹ They thus portray critical situations as events that states ‘face’ and must react to partly by constructing narratives,⁶² rather than being narratively constructed from the outset.

Narrative psychologists similarly understand some life events – such as receiving an HIV diagnosis or enduring chronic pain – as inherently traumatic.⁶³ However, if critical situations are indeed constituted as part of identity narratives, certain occurrences that may not appear inherently shameful, humiliating, or insulting might still be narratively constituted as such, and vice versa. Recall again the cases of interwar Germany and contemporary Russia.

Moreover, a lack of recognition – especially from a significant other – is often said to intensify a critical situation and generate ontological insecurity.⁶⁴ As noted above, recognition often figures as an intervening variable between events, emotions, and aggression. While the actual or empirically identifiable lack of recognition can undoubtedly intensify negative emotions, GPN conceptualises shame regarding weakness as a more intrinsic feature of great power self-identification and ontological security-seeking than is typically acknowledged – hence the relevance of narcissism. Narcissists are described as ‘so highly attuned to ego threat or social rejection that they perceive threats where none are intended’.⁶⁵

By not granting actual recognition and its absence a greater analytical role, the above discussion might seem to downplay social relations. However, great power identity narratives undeniably feature relational comparisons in hierarchical terms, such as ‘we are greater than x but weaker than y’. Additionally, ‘collective beliefs’ clearly underlie the projected desires and accompanying frustrations.⁶⁶ As Vulović and Eberle elucidate through Lacan, ‘states do not just decide to desire a random object’,⁶⁷ and self-identified great powers primarily desire great power status and identity.⁶⁸ These signifiers are integral to master narratives within the symbolic order. The subject identifies ‘vicariously’ with them to enhance its self-esteem and prestige,⁶⁹ ‘not least through cementing the state’s club/positional status’.⁷⁰ Thus, the specific emotional landscape of a self-identified great power is presumed to be socially and narratively produced in the first place, forming part of its predicament.

To fill the lack, moreover, self-identified great powers yearn for specific ‘empirical’ objects, typically markers of prominence and reputation across the board, perhaps particularly military capabilities and a capacity to project power and use force abroad.⁷¹ In contrast, self-identified small states might primarily desire membership of the imagined West and stable relations with Finland, such as in the case of Sweden, or a sense of ‘normality’ in international society, such as in the case of Abkhazia. As such, these states have sought to fill their respective lacks by applying for NATO membership and sustaining diplomatic relations with remote and tiny islands, respectively.⁷²

Returning to the distinction between vulnerable and grandiose narcissism, the tropes of challenging events and misrecognising others arguably recur more frequently in narratives premised on the former. The same goes for dissatisfaction, the collective surge of which is not necessarily limited to states either ‘rising’ or ‘declining’ in an objectivist sense. Instead, the question is when the biographical narrative of a self-identified great power exhibits the most frustration, which may revolve round a ‘lack of external recognition’ as well as ‘relative decline’ or ‘lost greatness’.⁷³

Meanwhile, as Schweller argues, ‘while all revolutionary states are dissatisfied, not all dissatisfied states are revolutionary’.⁷⁴ GPN thus needs to remain open to the possibility that a narrative of insult could trigger courses of action beyond revisionism and aggression. Resentment is again a case in point, offering a temporary reprieve from aggression. More crucially, however, must great power self-identification and ontological security-seeking remain narcissistic in this way, or could it become more self-reflexive – a potential inherent in the existing OSS scholarship?

In my previous research on GPN, I acknowledged the possibility of more self-reflexive identity narratives, yet I expected them to be marginal where traits ‘central to the self’s greatness are at stake’.⁷⁵ This is arguably because great power identity remains largely ‘traditional’, whereas reflexive identification is more prevalent in post-traditional societies, hinging on a ‘decisive break with tradition’ and even ‘radical doubt’.⁷⁶ Consequently, self-reflexivity is defined as self-awareness or the capacity to turn the attention back on oneself. This entails making ‘aspects of the self strange’, by ‘stay[ing] with personal uncertainty, critically informed curiosity … to consider changing deeply held ways of being’.⁷⁷

Given the high threshold, this article proposes a distinction between self-reflexivity and self-reflectivity. While there is debate over whether these terms denote the same concept, it seems advantageous to view self-reflection as a potential precursor to self-reflexivity.⁷⁸ In this context, self-reflection is defined as the capacity to learn from experience ‘through examining what we think happened on any occasion, and how we think others perceived the event and us’.⁷⁹ This definition resonates with the healthier emotions and peaceful courses of action that some studies have identified even in conjunction with challenging events.

For instance, Lu argues that following a defeat, guilt could ‘inspire a transformative, liberating politics of critical self-reflection and political reform’, fostering reconciliation.⁸⁰ Whereas shame revolves around the self in a general sense, guilt derives from ‘a negative evaluation of a specific behavior’. Guilt is thus defined as ‘a painful feeling of self-reproach that arises from one’s recognition of the (negative) consequences (to significant others) of one’s agency’.⁸¹ It can prompt reparative action, including acknowledgement, confession, apology, and efforts to make amends.

According to the psychological literature, self-reflectivity can also manifest in expressions of ‘authentic pride’ – another ‘healthy’ emotion, ‘marked by feelings of confidence, productivity and self-worth’.⁸² Like guilt, authentic pride is directed towards specific behaviours and relationships rather than the self in a broad and abstract sense.⁸³ By critically questioning the desire to be great or recognising that the self is already ‘good enough’,⁸⁴ however, a narrative of authentic pride can evolve in a more self-reflexive direction. These definitions are operationalised in Table 2.

Table 2. How to recognise and distinguish between self-reflective and self-reflexive narrative forms.

Finally, a critical perspective has been raised that even self-reflexive practices might not necessarily lead us closer to a ‘critical understanding of ourselves’,⁸⁵ as subjects can hardly engage in such understandings autonomously of the master narratives that constitute them.⁸⁶ Consequently, the goal might need to be more modest: the substitution of ‘destructive fantasies’ with ones that are less harmful.⁸⁷ This is again where the additional focus on self-reflectivity might prove useful.

Method and material

In any empirical setting, multiple identity narratives reflecting diverse narrative forms are expected to coexist and compete for dominance. Empirical analysis, therefore, necessitates a wide array of sources, also representing the wider public. However, obtaining such empirical material presents challenges, particularly for the Meiji era (1868–1912). Therefore, this article focuses on more readily accessible elite narratives. While some scholars suggest that elites can craft narratives about decline and humiliation more or less at will,⁸⁸ elite narratives and their embedded emotions are arguably better understood as co-constituted with broader societal narratives.⁸⁹ From a Lacanian perspective, certain emotional narratives gain resonance and persist exactly because they tap into widely shared desires and anxieties⁹⁰ – in the case of self-identified great powers not least the desire for full and undisputed great power status and identity, as well as anxieties related to unfulfilled aspirations. Notably, in the case of Meiji Japan, foreign visitors to were struck ‘by the way in which governments and people appeared to be struggling for common goals such as national strengthening and well-being’.⁹¹ Moreover, even competing narratives can share common themes. For instance, most great power narratives are marked by pride in and a desire for greatness as well as shame regarding weakness.

In both periods, the selection of historical textual materials is driven by the objective of minimising investigator bias and unjustified selectivity.⁹² The analysis of the Meiji era relies on the writings and recorded statements of prominent officials and intellectuals, in material accessed in English. The focus on educator and journalist Fukuzawa Yukichi (1835–1901) and historian and journalist Tokutomi Sohō (1863–1957) might appear disproportionate. However, Fukuzawa was the leading intellectual in the early Meiji era, and his writings sold millions of copies. He was the voice of Meiroku zasshi (Meiji Six Journal), a defining Japanese publication of the 1870s.⁹³ Similarly, Tokutomi’s periodical Kokumin no tomo (The People’s Friend) was hugely popular in the 1890s, and ‘a great many Japanese, perhaps even most, shared his views at every turn’.⁹⁴ Drawing on secondary sources, I seek to make informed assessments about which identity narratives dominated in Japan during this period.

The analysis of elite narratives in the post-war period (1950–71) relies on the ‘general policy speeches’ (shisei hōshin enzetsu or shoshin hyōmei enzetsu) delivered by prime ministers from the Liberal Democratic Party (LPD) at the opening of extraordinary Diet sessions, having been elected in a special session or appointed during an ordinary session.⁹⁵ In these speeches, prime ministers typically reflect on Japan’s past and outline their visions for its future. To capture narrative diversity, the analysis also includes the response speeches by a member of the main opposition party, during the period of investigation the Japan Socialist Party (JSP). The use of more consistent material in this period is facilitated by the relative ease with which post-war prime ministers’ speeches can be analysed by someone able to read contemporary Japanese. Findings are again contextualised and triangulated using secondary sources.

Narrative analysis is conducted with the goal of distinguishing, first, between narcissistic and self-reflective or even self-reflexive narratives; and second, between different narrative forms. Rather than singling out complete narratives from each source, the analysis adopts an ‘approach of aggregation’.⁹⁶ The focus is on how key actors, events, and solutions are described and emplotted using emotional language. A narrative is considered dominant if a ‘critical mass of social actors’ is emotionally invested in it and uncritically reproduces it.⁹⁷ The historical analysis in this article also inevitably assumes a narrative form, the structure of which is shaped by the theoretical themes introduced above.⁹⁸

The Meiji Era, 1868–1912

The analysis in this section proceeds chronologically from the Meiji Restoration in 1868 to the Sino-Japanese War in 1894, and then from the war until the end of the Meiji era in 1912, exemplifying in turn more vulnerable and grandiose narratives.

Vulnerable narratives (1868–94)

During the early Meiji era, a dominant narrative of shame portrayed Japan as weak, inferior, and subordinate and reflected dissatisfaction with this predicament.⁹⁹ This revolved around the forced signing of unequal treaties with the United States and European powers in 1854 and 1858, following the arrival of US ships in 1853 – ‘events’ that contemporary Japanese leaders characterised as shameful, insulting, and a ‘disgrace’.¹⁰⁰ The sense of shame was arguably reinforced by the prevailing social Darwinism, which depicted the Japanese as racially ‘inferior to Caucasians’.¹⁰¹

At the same time, Japanese elites – notably Fukuzawa in his 1875 book – complained that the public failed to ‘realize’ the extent of their weakness.¹⁰² As a solution, Fukuzawa proposed that Japan should not only prioritise material progress – military, economic, and infrastructural – but also adopt Western ideals, legal systems, and political institutions.¹⁰³ More than a decade later, Tokutomi Sohō advanced a similar narrative of shame: ‘Japan, like China, is backward and weak; Japan’s position in the world is perilous.’¹⁰⁴

Meanwhile, most Japanese elites did not accept the country’s weakness as natural but saw their country as destined to achieve parity with, and preferably surpass, the existing great powers. Hence, a sense of indignation narratively intertwined with entitlement and the desire to become a great power,¹⁰⁵ or a ‘country of the first rank’ (ittō koku).¹⁰⁶ ‘The West’ was construed as both threatening and an object of desire, and Japanese elite narratives vicariously identified with it to foster independence and civilisation,¹⁰⁷ and to create a ‘rich country, strong army’ (fukoku kyōhei).¹⁰⁸ Fukuzawa, for instance, aimed to elevate ‘Japanese civilization to parity with the West, or even … surpassing it’.¹⁰⁹ In the early 1880s, two army generals expressed similar entitlement, stating that ‘Japan’s aim in maintaining armed forces is … that of the first-class powers’.¹¹⁰

From the late 1870s, a compensatory narrative of pride emerged, praising Japan’s allegedly unique history, culture, and identity.¹¹¹ Motoda Eifu (1818–91), Confucian tutor to Emperor Meiji, claimed in 1879 that Japan possessed superior moral values absent in ‘foreign civilization’.¹¹² Such narratives occasionally linked history and culture with race, showing that the latter was not only an object of shame.¹¹³ Moreover, by the mid-1880s, there was increasing concern that Japan might forsake its ‘cultural soul’ by emulating the Western powers.¹¹⁴

Another compensatory narrative of pride emphasised Japan’s superiority over Asia, particularly China, which Fukuzawa deemed ‘not equal to Japan’.¹¹⁵ These depictions assigned gender roles to Japan and China, depicting them as masculine and feminine, respectively.¹¹⁶ Fukuzawa urged Japan to ‘depart’ from Asia to demonstrate its inherent strength and distinctiveness.¹¹⁷ Similarly, Tokutomi described Japan as the ‘most progressive, developed, civilized, and powerful nation in the Orient’, which nonetheless ‘cannot escape the scorn of the white people’.¹¹⁸

In 1893, a year before the Sino-Japanese War, journalist and statesman Shimada Saburō (1852–1923) stated that Russia, China, or Japan would eventually conquer Korea, which he described as ‘a vassal state’.¹¹⁹ Comparing Japan to a European great power like Russia reflected a nascent narrative of pride. As early as 1891, Tokutomi asserted: ‘we are above Spain and abreast of Italy’,¹²⁰ explaining that Japan’s ‘productivity is higher than that of France, Spain, Italy and Austria’.¹²¹ However, there was also ‘shame about shame’, and he lamented the people’s lack of confidence, stating that some Japanese ‘place us in the ranks of ruined nations like Turkey, Egypt, and Persia’.¹²²

A narrative of insult strengthened towards the end of the period, shifting the focus from a fear of being conquered and colonised to a fear of being unable to conquer and colonise other states.¹²³ This emerged primarily around the unequal treaties. Statesman Iwakura Tomomi (1825–83) wrote in the early 1870s that the treaties ‘disgraced the Japanese Empire’, asserting: ‘We should not endure the affront.’¹²⁴ Journalist Kuga Katsunan (1857–1907) echoed this sentiment in 1889, declaring: ‘If we tolerate interference, we shall be classed with Turkey and Egypt.’¹²⁵ While initially appearing to be a narrative of shame, this can also be interpreted as a call to action. However, the widespread resentment towards the ‘Western’ great powers suggests that contemporary elites believed Japan was still incapable of alleviating the sense of insult.¹²⁶

Grandiose narratives (1894–1912)

In the 1890s, the narrative of insult intensified, resentfully targeting both the lack of respect from the great powers in the imagined West and China’s lingering and increasingly unwarranted condescension towards Japan.¹²⁷ Zachman notes that the ‘public bristled with just indignation and called for war’ with China.¹²⁸ Tokutomi, for example, emphasised that Japan should fight ‘to determine once and for all … [its] position in the world’. He construed military aggression as a means of proving Japan’s greatness and dispelling ‘all previous misconceptions’ through ‘a brilliant victory’. These ‘misconceptions’ allegedly amounted to the Japanese being a race ‘close to monkeys’.¹²⁹ Similarly, statesman Soejima Taneomi (1828–1905) advocated war to make Japan ‘strong’.¹³⁰ Japan declared war on China on 1 August 1894, following a series of events tangibly centred on control over Korea.

After the war, a narrative of pride gained prominence, revolving around Japan’s political, economic, and military progress, in particular the military victory, treaty revisions, and Japan’s annexation of Taiwan in 1895. Elites increasingly framed Japan as ‘a world power’ and equal to other great powers.¹³¹ Tokutomi expressed satisfaction that ‘we have tested our strength, we know ourselves and we are known by the world. Moreover, we know that we are known by the world!’¹³² Foreign Minister Mutsu Munemitsu (1844–97) remarked that Japan had ‘commanded the world’s respect’ and become ‘the object of some envy’.¹³³ Similarly, in 1897, politician Ōkuma Shigenobu declared that Japan was ‘recognised as a truly independent Power, and … accorded the treatment of an equal’.¹³⁴ Statesman Itō Hirobumi (1841–1909) commented that Japan’s progress was ‘seldom paralleled in the modern history of the world’.¹³⁵

However, the narrative of pride soon became tainted with shame again, especially due to frustration that Japan’s victory was ‘not crowned with a triumphant entry into Beijing’. Newspaper articles condemned ‘the weakness’ of the Japanese negotiators of the Treaty of Shimonoseki with China in 1895 for failing to humiliate China or prevent it from becoming a future rival.¹³⁶ A more grandiose narrative of insult emerged after the so-called Tripartite Intervention, when Russia, France, and Germany forced Japan to retrocede the Liaodong Peninsula, which it had obtained as a concession from China. Scholars note that feelings of ‘bitter shock’,¹³⁷ humiliation’,¹³⁸ and ‘swollen resentment’¹³⁹ fuelled Japan’s ambitious rearmament in the late 1890s and later influenced the decision to wage war on Russia in 1904–5 – one of ‘revenge’ for the intervention, according to Nish.¹⁴⁰

After the Russo-Japanese War, a narrative of pride again intensified, focusing on Japan’s victory over Russia and territorial expansion into Korea in 1910.¹⁴¹ Japanese elites proudly asserted that ‘Japan had finally joined the ranks of the great powers’.¹⁴² According to Iriye: ‘That was the moment of glory the Japanese had dreamed of since the humiliating days half a century earlier.’¹⁴³ In 1907, for example, Ōkuma stated that Japan ‘has raised itself from its lethargy to such an extent that it has been able to cross swords with a leading military power of the West, has inflicted upon it defeat after defeat … and has aroused the interest of the whole world’.¹⁴⁴ Soejima similarly concluded that Japan’s development was ‘probably unprecedented in the world’s history’,¹⁴⁵ and Shimada stressed that Japan’s position was ‘among the great Powers of the world’.¹⁴⁶ Philosopher and author Miyake Setsurei (1860–1945) boasted that Japan’s success had ‘replicated the 450 years of modern history’ but ‘within a span of forty-five years’.¹⁴⁷

Overall, at the outset of this period, Japanese identity narratives began to portray weakness as a flaw that required proactive measures to resolve. In line with the revised version of GPN developed in this article, I thus interpret Japan as waging wars to restore its pride and allegedly rightful place among the ‘civilised’ and ‘Western’ great powers. Japan’s military aggression initially targeted Asian neighbours rather than the group it sought to join. However, once vulnerable, Japanese identity narratives became more grandiose after the victory in the Sino-Japanese War. A grandiose narrative of insult centred on the trope of revenge arguably helps to elucidate the decision to go to war with Russia, which was identified as a great power ‘peer’.

The post-war period, 1950–71

While beyond the scope of this article, secondary sources reveal that Japanese identity narratives in 1913–45 remained rather grandiose but were also tinged with frustration over Japan’s status as a ‘second-rank’ great power, unable ‘to impose her conception of justice onto the rest of the world’.¹⁴⁸ To achieve parity with or surpass ‘the established “have” powers’¹⁴⁹ and to alleviate the sense of insult, such narratives yet again advocated war.¹⁵⁰ Moreover, Japan’s aggression, notably the attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941, targeted another ‘peer’, which narratives directly blamed for Japan’s predicament.

This section analyses speeches by post-war prime ministers from Japan’s Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and opposition politicians from the Japan Socialist Party (JSP). It interprets the former as reflecting vulnerable narratives of shame and compensatory pride, and the latter as characterised more by self-reflectivity and, to some extent, self-reflexivity. The section supports Dower’s view that ‘there was no single or singular “Japanese” response to the defeat apart from a widespread abhorrence of war’.¹⁵¹ Instead, the period was characterised by narrative contestation and mixed feelings.¹⁵²

Vulnerable narratives (LDP)

During the 1950s, LDP prime ministers portrayed Japan’s lack of sovereignty and dependence on the United States as leaving Japan vulnerable and as a source of dissatisfaction. For instance, Yoshida Shigeru (1878–1967) expressed ‘alarm’ at the ‘loss of independence [dokuritsushin] and patriotism’,¹⁵³ while later celebrating Japan’s return to the international community in 1952.¹⁵⁴ Notwithstanding, three years later Hatoyama Ichirō (1883–1959) lamented that Japan was not yet a ‘truly independent state’ (shin no dokuritsu kokka) and still needed to be ‘brought back’ (tachikaeraseru).¹⁵⁵ In the 1960s and early 1970s, LDP prime ministers crafted a narrative of shame around territories under foreign control, but there were also some signs of pride, particularly after the 1971 decision to to put an end to US occupation of Okinawa.¹⁵⁶ According to Seraphim, conservatives drew parallels between Japan’s post-war condition and the unequal treaties of the Meiji era.¹⁵⁷ Okinawa’s annexation in 1879, driven by Meiji Japanese desires for great power status and identity, arguably made its return to Japanese control particularly reassuring for those nurturing similar aspirations.

From the mid-1950s, LDP prime ministers began to construct a narrative of pride regarding Japan’s economic development,¹⁵⁸ citing the country’s tripling of gross domestic product between 1952 and 1960. The 1960s saw the emergence of ‘a kind of economic nationalism’,¹⁵⁹ with prime ministers praising ‘the remarkable growth of the Japanese economy’,¹⁶⁰ calling it ‘the wonder [kyōi no mato] of other countries’.¹⁶¹ Prime Minister Satō Eisaku (1901–75) said that Japan possessed ‘pivotal economic power’ (sūyō na keizairyoku),¹⁶² stressing its ‘major influence [ōkina eikyō o oyobosu] on the international community’.¹⁶³ However, leaders also continuously articulated shame about various lingering problems of the economy.¹⁶⁴

Being ‘peaceful’ or ‘pacifist’ soon became another central identity construct in post-war Japan,¹⁶⁵ paradoxically fuelling a desire for great power status and identity among some conservatives. Yoshida, for instance, crafted a compensatory narrative of pride about Japan’s exceptional peacefulness, its people that ‘loves peace’, and contributions ‘to world peace’.¹⁶⁶ In the 1960s, this narrative became more dominant, with Satō declaring the realisation of ‘true peace’ (shin no heiwa) to be Japan’s national policy. He portrayed the Japanese people as ‘more eager for … peace than any other people in the world’ and the maintenance of peace as an issue of ‘national honour’ [kokka no meiyo]’.¹⁶⁷ Meanwhile, other conservatives allegedly associated peace with weakness and shame for undermining Japan’s sovereignty.¹⁶⁸

While these narratives of pride, centred on economic strength and peace, may appear to have constructed great power status and identity in a somewhat unconventional manner, they arguably reflected a shifting master narrative about great powers in the post-war period. While Japanese elites identified vicariously with such narratives,¹⁶⁹ it is also possible that Japan played a role during this period in expanding them in such a way that suited its specific purposes and constraints.¹⁷⁰ Satō, for instance, explained that ‘the days when military power was the only premise for peace assurance have passed’, linking Japan’s aspiration for peace to its economic prosperity.¹⁷¹ Similarly, LDP prime ministers frequently associated Japan’s power, status, and recognition with increasing international ‘expectations’ (kitai), ‘responsibilities’ (sekinin), and ‘obligations’ (gimu), especially towards other Asian countries.¹⁷²

The ‘obligation’ (gimu) to compensate Japan’s wartime victims might be interpreted as a self-reflective expression of remorse¹⁷³ but arguably also reflects lingering Japanese feelings of superiority over Asian countries.¹⁷⁴ While some prime ministers expressed a desire to ‘overcome narrow national interests’¹⁷⁵ and transcend ‘the egoism of one country’,¹⁷⁶ most seem to have viewed the prerogative to take responsibility as reflective of Japan’s imagined greatness. Japanese apologies for wartime atrocities have also been criticised as ‘cheap talk’ and ‘selfish’ rather than self-critical, let alone self-questioning.¹⁷⁷

While vulnerable narratives prevailed in the period, prime ministers’ speeches also consistently addressed Japan’s power, status, and recognition. This reveals a sense of entitlement and a desire to be a great power among Japanese conservative elites, albeit more implicitly than in the Meiji era. From the late 1950s, prime ministers’ continuous boasts about Japan’s booming ‘national power and international status’ (kokuryoku to kokusaiteki chii)¹⁷⁸ featured a strong aspirational component. Prime Minister Ikeda Hayato (1899–1965), for example, hoped that Japan would be ‘highly regarded around the world’, while worrying whether this goal had been achieved.¹⁷⁹ Later, Satō expressed ‘pride [hokori] … in being a leading member of the international community’,¹⁸⁰ as well as in Japan’s ‘great development’ (idaina hatten) and ‘internationally high reputation’.¹⁸¹ According to Kolmaš, these conservatives aspired to restore Japan’s ‘“first-rate power” (ittō koku) status’.¹⁸²

Self-reflective and even self-reflexive narratives (JSP)

Japan Socialist Party representatives such as then party leader Suzuki Mosaburō (1893–1970) also criticised Japan’s lack of an ‘autonomous, independent and self-reliant economy’ (jishu, jiritsu, dokuritsu keizai), which he perceived as ‘the basis for … the independence of a self-reliant nation state’.¹⁸³ While this may seem to echo LDP prime ministers’ narrative of shame, the JSP narrative centred on Japan’s subordination to the United States and complicity in US great power excesses rather than the desire for an independent great power identity.¹⁸⁴ In addition, JSP Diet Members members proudly agreed that the Japanese economy had ‘achieved miraculous growth’ (kisekiteki na seichō) ‘from the very bottom of defeat’.¹⁸⁵ Yet they were far more critical of the capitalist system as a basis for growth,¹⁸⁶ and Japan’s economic dependence on the United States, arguing there was ‘a dark downside’ (kurai mainasu men o rotei shi) reflected in worker exploitation and environmental degradation.¹⁸⁷

Throughout the period, JSP Diet members also agreed that peace should be a marker of Japanese greatness and identity, albeit not necessarily great power identity. They hailed the spirit of Japan’s constitution as ‘unparalleled in the world’¹⁸⁸ and expressed hope that the country would become a ‘unique new form of state aiming for peace’ (heiwa o mezasu tokuyū no atarashii kokka).¹⁸⁹ However, their warnings that Japan’s decision to forgo rearmament and the right to belligerence was ‘gradually being forgotten’ reflected a degree of self-awareness and self-criticism.¹⁹⁰ JSP leader Suzuki, for instance, cautioned that Japan risked being ‘plunged into international conflicts’ due to its nascent alliance with the United States.¹⁹¹ In a revealing quote, he described Japan’s pursuit of peace as the ‘Garden of Eden’, which Prime Minister Yoshida had jeopardised by eating the ‘forbidden fruit’.¹⁹² JSP Diet member Hososako Kanemitsu (1896–1972) even accused Yoshida of being ‘obsessed with the evil spirits of rearmament’ (saigunbi no akuryō).¹⁹³

In the 1960s, JSP members continued to narrate government actions as antithetical to peace: its lack of ‘efforts to ban nuclear tests and atomic bombs’,¹⁹⁴ violation of ‘the rights to self-determination in Vietnam, China, and Korea’,¹⁹⁵ lack of remorse for invading China,¹⁹⁶ and Okinawa’s role as a ‘front-line base for the Vietnam War of aggression’.¹⁹⁷ JSP Diet Member Kitayama Airō (1905–2002) even cautioned against Japan becoming ‘a vanguard of US imperialism and the stigma of being a “yellow yankee” [ierō yankii]’.¹⁹⁸

Through their expressions of remorse, narratives promoted by JSP politicians arguably displayed self-reflectivity, whereas the ambition to construct a non-great power identity for Japan through a focus on peace even sounds self-reflexive. Dower notes that many ‘progressive intellectuals’ similarly formed a ‘community of remorse’ and ‘self-criticism’, dwelling ‘openly on their guilt and responsibility for having failed to take a principled stand against repression and aggression’.¹⁹⁹ According to Orr and others, they approached ‘their past with integrity and compassion for all who suffered during World War II in Asia and the Pacific’.²⁰⁰ However, their sense of pride in ‘having the courage to acknowledge past wrongs and squarely face the past’²⁰¹ was not necessarily just ‘authentic’. Japanese progressives arguably also focused greatly on Japan’s own victimisation,²⁰² reified pacifism as uniquely Japanese,²⁰³ and construed their own group as ‘humanitarian leaders of moral conscience’.²⁰⁴

In sum, although some argue that post-war Japan was a singular ‘success story of international reconciliation’,²⁰⁵ the fact that post-war identity narratives did not simply ‘embrace defeat’ suggests otherwise.²⁰⁶ However, narrative competition, and especially the prevalence of more self-reflective and even self-reflexive counter-narratives among JSP Diet members and other progressives, appears to have restricted Japan’s great power narcissism during this period.

Conclusions and implications

The existing research on great power politics, power transition, defeat, status, recognition, revisionism, and/or humiliation explores links between challenging events, negative emotions, and great power aggression. While significant, this scholarship is restricted by its objectivist, rationalist, and causationist inclinations, as well as dismissals of emotions as irrelevant, irrational, or mere by-products of manipulation or material developments. Two episodes in Japanese history, each seemingly marked by equally challenging events, highlight this problem.

In the Meiji era, dominant narratives indeed featured negative emotions, and the military aggressions of 1894–5 and 1904–5 followed a collective ‘realisation’ that Japan was entitled to be a great power and was therefore humiliated by states narrated as holding Japan back. Conversely, post-war Japan was marked by globally unprecedented military restraint despite defeat and enduring ambitions among conservative elites for great power status and identity. The crux is that Japan’s great power status and the meaning of the events that it ‘encountered’ are inseparable from the identity narratives that dominated in each period.

This article proposes a ‘solution’ by addressing the variability of identity narratives. While OSS provides a more helpful conceptualisation of the event as a ‘critical situation’, it does not always acknowledge its dependence on narrative construction all the way down. This article establishes an analytical framework by significantly updating the concept of Great Power Narcissism. By distinguishing between ‘vulnerable’ and ‘grandiose’ narcissism, it delineates shame- and pride-based pathways to a narrative of insult and military aggression. In addition, the article contributes by differentiating between self-reflectivity and self-reflexivity, to explore the extent to which or how such processes of self-identification and ontological security-seeking might help mitigate great power narcissism as a phenomenon.

The empirical analysis highlights the relevance of the theory development and provides a foundation for further inquiry. In the early Meiji era, vulnerable narratives dominated, evolving from a narrative of shame to one of insult as weakness became increasingly portrayed as an affront necessitating violent action to restore national greatness. Consistent with research on vulnerable narcissism, Japan’s aggression was first ‘covert and indirect’, targeting a weaker Asian neighbour – China – rather than the group of states Japanese leaders sought to join. Future research should investigate whether vulnerable narratives of insult have also enabled military aggression in other contexts and whether grandiose narratives of insult have facilitated aggression against ‘peers’, as seen when Japan later went to war with Russia in 1904 and arguably also when it attacked Pearl Harbor in 1941.

Analysis of speeches by LDP prime ministers in 1950–71 reveals a shame/pride dynamic again centred on Japan’s independence/autonomy, economic development, and power. Similar tropes appeared in opposition speeches, but JSP members’ narratives self-reflectively expressed guilt and remorse, while self-reflexively engaging in self-criticism, ultimately advocating a non-great power identity for Japan. Intense narrative contestation of this kind likely curbed Japanese great power narcissism in the post-war era, as defeat was not generally associated with negative emotions and calls for revenge. Recent research concurs that domestic narratives might play a crucial role in explaining why some states pursue radically revisionist agendas while others do not.²⁰⁷

Additional research has noted that German conservatives attempted to subvert a political agenda premised on critical self-examination following the Treaty of Versailles,²⁰⁸ and that the ‘hard right’ is particularly reactionary, nostalgic, and prone to feelings of humiliation when its sense of national greatness is threatened.²⁰⁹ Further research is necessary, however, to address whether political progressives generally display more self-reflectivity or even self-reflexivity and thus a willingness to relinquish great power status and identity, or whether this is particularly the case if they identify as anti-imperialist and internationalist. Meiji socialists, for instance, opposed Japan’s imperialist ambitions and the pursuit of national greatness but were a minority at the time.²¹⁰

What are the implications for present-day Japan? Economic decline and China’s rise have undoubtedly become ‘events’ in the context of contemporary Japanese identity construction and ontological security-seeking,²¹¹ once again challenging Japanese great power desires. Some liberals and progressives propose that Japan should embrace the path of a ‘middle power’ (middoru pawā)²¹² or even a ‘small country’ (chiisana kuni or shōkoku),²¹³ but these are again minority views. Instead, elite narratives continue to display the same old tension between pride and shame, as famously reflected in a statement by Japan’s late former prime minister Abe Shinzō: ‘Japan is not, and will never be, a Tier-two country.’²¹⁴

As in previous periods, shame and pride continue to be negotiated primarily through vulnerable narratives of shame and compensatory pride. The latter emphasises soft power²¹⁵ and the ways in which Japan remains ‘great’ (sugoi), ranging ‘from rice and fish consumption to etiquette, hygiene, and physical training methods’.²¹⁶ Nationalist conservative elites also express resentment, particularly directed at China and South Korea, as well as Japan’s policy of relative military restraint.²¹⁷

Resentment should be monitored because of its intrinsic connection to a vulnerable narrative of insult. Others argue that current great power ambitions in Japan should instead be viewed as an ‘interlude’ and that the Japanese will eventually accept their country’s position as a non-great power.²¹⁸ Future research will need to explore these propositions further, while bearing in mind that narratives do not necessarily reflect material circumstances and often evolve gradually as they invoke and are empowered by other pre-existing narratives. Furthermore, Japan’s recent remilitarisation²¹⁹ and the decline of the progressive left might potentially lessen existing barriers to great power narcissism in Japan.

Finally, the findings of this article have significant policy implications for contemporary international politics, particularly in an era where emotional narratives rapidly disseminate digitally within and across states. However, relying solely on qualitative narrative analysis might not be sufficient to grasp the prevalence of different narratives and narrative forms among self-identified great powers, or to pinpoint ‘tipping points’ when narratives of shame and pride transform into narratives of insult. While problematic in the case of Japan, the issue is even more serious with other self-identified great powers. For instance, to better understand the emotional narratives behind Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and Sino-US tensions over Taiwan, future research could explore data-mining and machine-learning techniques to detect and analyse narratives within extensive textual datasets.²²⁰ This approach could also help establish connections between the emotions of GPN and the broader emotional landscape at play in great power politics.