Compare And Contrast Essay Japan Vs China

China vs. Japan: who wins?

China and Japan have had both long and eventful histories. Throughout the years, China has used its big lands and huge population to expand its empire. On the other hand Japan has had a respectable amount of population but not so much land compared to China. Both China and Japan have had similar and different histories. In this essay, we will distinguish the similarities and differences of China's and Japan's Geographical, Political, and economical pasts. To begin with, both China and Japan have obvious geographical differences. The clearest one is that Japan is an island and China is a huge mainland. These both worked as an advantage and disadvantage for both. The advantages that China had were that it had
all that land for use in agriculture and expanding its cities and towns. The advantages that Japan had were that since it was an island, it kept invaders and unwanted intruders out. Throughout China's history, invaders from the north and west kept attacking which caused them to build the Great Wall of China. But with every advantage, there is a disadvantage. Since Japan didn't have that entire mainland, it had less room to expand and grow agricultural crops and goods. And since China was not an island like Japan, it was continually attacked and invaded by outsiders. Meanwhile, politically the two countries shared similar ideas.
Both countries were isolated until about the 1500s when Europeans arrived. Up until then China was practicing its Confucius beliefs while Japan was practicing Buddhism. But eventually Christianity crept its way into both countries along with the Europeans. China held strong Confucius beliefs and opposed Christianity strongly. But Japan on the other hand slowly started converting. Eventually by the year 1600, 300,000 Japanese converts existed. But Japanese officials like China did not give up. Instead they persecuted the Christians, eventually leading Christianity out of Japan and the Japanese returning to their traditional beliefs. China's political system worked like many other basic systems at the time. There is an emperor, high officials, lower officials, and the normal people. Meanwhile Japan's governmental system was mixed up. There was the emperor, shoguns, daimyos, samurais, merchants and peasants. The peasants accounted for most of the population. Samurais were the "Japanese soldiers". Daimyos were sort of like governors or mayors. The shogun was actually the ruler. The emperor was just like a figure head; he had no political status, but was in high
rank. Economically both countries stayed basic of their needs until the arrival of the Europeans. This is also in part of their beliefs. But once the Europeans arrived, it changed their lives forever. The Europeans brought advanced technology never seen or even thought of. These advancements boosted both Japanese and Chinese economy. But Both Japanese and Chinese did not like these advancements and thought it bothered their beliefs. So in order to maintain all this trading, china and Japan shut down their country ports and put only a couple active and under control of the government. They both held the closed country policy. China had a better economy than Japan because Japan was in middle of a civil war and bloodshed in its own borders. Because of that Japan's economy sank because of no stability in leadership of the country. Both China and Japan have had similar histories. Most of this had to do with the geographical locations they were in being so far of from the European advanced world. But even tough they were so close, they both had their differences. Both economically had huge differences. Politically they had different governmental systems. Looking closely at China and Japan, distinguishing and comparing the differences and similarities, we can then see what great empires they ran for the time they were in.