This paper explores the ways in which global resourceallocation affected the pattern of Japanese (and later East Asia’s)industrialisation, and how it eventually came to underpin the courseof Japanese imperialism and aggression in the 1930s.The Western impact on Asia during the second half of theeighteenth and the nineteenth centuries has usually beenassociated with colonial rule in South and Southeast Asia and theforced opening of East Asian ports to foreign trade. With the comingof colonial administration and modern transport, Asia becameincorporated into the West-dominated international order. Theexchange between Asian primary products and Westernmanufactured goods grew, and Western capital flew into Asia tofinance railway construction and the development of mines andplantations. In this story imperialism functioned as an institutionaldevice to ensure trade and capital flows in Western terms, that is,under the protection of Western human security and privateproperty rights (For the specifically British position of imperialism offree trade, see Gallagher and Robinson 1953). Modern politicalideas and legal institutions were introduced to Asia for that purpose.[...]
