The Kyoto School’s Wartime Philosophy of a Multipolar World

Abstract

1. Introduction During the early twentieth century, the Eurocentric worldview was beginning to be challenged, initiating its apparent decentering.1 With the rise of Japan as a non-European power challenging the West by waging what the Japanese called “the Greater East Asia War” (大東亜戦争) (World War II), the Eurocentric worldview, for the first time, came under threat by a non-European power. Japan claimed to fight for Asia’s defense and preservation against the hegemony of Western imperialism in order to establish a new, pluralistic world order of Asian nations.2 During this time, a circle of philosophers, called the Kyoto School (京都学派),3 felt it their duty to philosophically contribute to what they believed to be the unfolding of a new world order.