How a Russian revolutionary foresaw the rise of Japan (opens in new tab)

What often goes unmentioned is that Japan had endured famine and economic upheaval during the 1830s. Domestic reforms had already been enacted ten years prior to the black ships in an effort to control a nascent market economy and the novel problem of high inflation. Perry's actions, while less than noble, helped provide a path out of their predicament by fostering external trade without the restrictions of the preceding 250 years.

He was in that respect is a representative of his movement (Narodniks). Russian revolutionary movement in the mid 19th century consisted of 2 main parts - Zapadniks (Westernists) who was emphasizing technical aspects of government/society/economy organization and transition and Narodniks https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narodniks who was more about organic transition through build-up from the bottom, through enlightenment of the regular, poor, people. Narodniks almost wanted to see what was happening in Japan as a kind of such revolution.

The Narodniks were also pretty close or overlapped on many issues with Slavophils - where ideas were of building up upon supposedly great intrinsic national qualities of Russian/Slavic people (again in many cases it was in opposition to the idea of following Western civilization). Such principle - only replacing Russian/Slavic with Japanese - was also very close to the corresponding political movement in Japan then.

Funny how both Russians and Americans sent out gunboats to "open up" a can of whoop ass on themselves and bystanders.

Hindsight, blah blah. The story of an improbable timeline where Japan was left alone would make a fine alternate history book.

The question is how the Japanese "mutual aid" societal philosophy came about and actually lead to societal changes and development. Was it just part of the east asian Confucian ethics or something else? Figuring this out could be useful for many parts of the world wishing to progress from their current state.

If you're not my Caste, you're non-human to me; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nanking_Massacre

While this article seems to be rather accurate, there is too much revisionism around Japanese history and the international community is heavily biased when it comes to them.

Anarchists seem to be pretty good at predicting geopolitical events in general