AH Challenge: Early Constitutional Monarchy in Japan

[JimmyJimJam]

Here it is: make up a plausible story about how the Divine Emperor was transformed from god-on-earth to a (mostly) enlightened monarch, earlier than in OTL. Go ahead and have this happen just about at any point during WWII or before. Extra points if you somehow keep the samurai around during this democratic revolution, or if you create a plausible scenario wherein a shogunate/dictatorship is overthrown during a war. Extra extra points to you if you can explain how Japan's hypothetical democracy is "homegrown"--not the direct result of influence from outside of Asia.

[MerryPrankster]

Perhaps the Emperors convert to Nestorian Christianity sometime in the late 900s, or a Christian daimyo becomes Shogun during the 1600s. There was a viable candidate--I'm thinking Hideoyoshi or someone with a similar name. Someone did a TL entitled "No Emperor but the Lord" about him.

I think it'd be difficult to have worship of a political leader when said leader or his most powerful lieutenant (who in effect runs the show) worship the Christian God. Even if Christianity doesn't become especially widespread among the people, a Christian Shogun or Emperor would probably discourage Emperor worship.

Of course, that doesn't mean there'd be a constitutional monarchy, especially with the earlier POD. A Nestorian Emperor could easily become a Byzantine-style "Shadow of Christ on Earth" or something altogether worse (in my Nestorian Japan thread, someone suggested Japanese Nestorianism might teach that the Emperor automatically possess the Holy Spirit or be a reincarnation of Jesus or something bizarre like that).

The later POD holds more promise b/c other foreign ideas (like firearms, which make a peasant able to take down a samurai with minimal training) are infiltrating Japan as well.

The relative empowerment of the peasants and disempowering of the samurai clans (which was stopped by the confiscation of guns and swords from the lower classes by one of the Shoguns) might mean a more democatic society overall.

[Abdul Hadi Pasha]

Here it is: make up a plausible story about how the Divine Emperor was transformed from god-on-earth to a (mostly) enlightened monarch, earlier than in OTL. Go ahead and have this happen just about at any point during WWII or before. Extra points if you somehow keep the samurai around during this democratic revolution, or if you create a plausible scenario wherein a shogunate/dictatorship is overthrown during a war. Extra extra points to you if you can explain how Japan's hypothetical democracy is "homegrown"--not the direct result of influence from outside of Asia.

How is this different from OTL? Japan WAS a constitutional monarchy.

[Faeelin]

How is this different from OTL? Japan WAS a constitutional monarchy.

Right, and next you'll tell us that the Weimar was a democracy.

[Abdul Hadi Pasha]

Right, and next you'll tell us that the Weimar was a democracy.

Sometimes it's hard to tell in what way you're being sarcastic. But if this is directed at what I said, a Constitutional Monarchy is a state with a constitution headed by a monarch, both of which said conditions applied to Japan from the late 19th c.

[Faeelin]

Sometimes it's hard to tell in what way you're being sarcastic. But if this is directed at what I said, a Constitutional Monarchy is a state with a constitution headed by a monarch, both of which said conditions applied to Japan from the late 19th c.

Seriously: Weimar Germany was a democracy; it was unstable, but then almost all European democracies at the time were.

Japan was a constitutional monarchy, and remained one until the mid 1930's.

[MerryPrankster]

How is this different from OTL? Japan WAS a constitutional monarchy.

He wants it to be much earlier than OTL.

[Abdul Hadi Pasha]

He wants it to be much earlier than OTL.

All states have constitutions, just some of them are unwritten. If by Constitutional Monarchy we mean a state headed by a monarch constrained from exercising absolutist power by a State mechanism empowered by precedent and tradition, then Japan has been a constitutional monarchy for at least 1,400 years.