MODERNITY, POSTMODERNITY AND JAPAN EXPERIENCE OF THE 2

The lack of comparative analyses of Western and non-Western civilisations in modernity and modernisation theories - according to the author particularly pronounced with regard to Japan - as well as the present relationship between the concept of Westernalization and modernisation is analysed in this paper. The author presents some new interpretative guidelines to Japanese civilisation and its road to modernity, precising some reasons for taking Japanese modernity seriously. However, of particular interest to the author is the contrast between the majority of theorists' failure to meet this challenge and the frequent references to Japan in a postmodernist context. The author seeks to show that attempts to interpret Japanese experience from a postmodernist perspective can be interpreted as partial insights into the problematic of Japanese modernity. The paper concludes that the postmodernism's attempted annexation of Japan is indicative of a new interest in comparative cultural hermeneutics, stimulated by one of Western modernity's recurrent self-reflexive turns.