It is the intention of this essay to examine the ideological constructs produced within Japanese society between 1931 - 1945. This essay will theoretically posit that the ideological constructs that were created during this timeframe, were an intentionally formulated belief and value system that emphasised an historical and cultural continuum with socially perceived Japanese traditions.

The analytical conclusion to be drawn from this applied theoretical praxis will be that the ideological constructs that existed within the "Pre-war" and "Wartime" eras of Showa Japan, manifested in a cultural hegemony of ultra-nationalism that [re]invented traditions, primarily to validate current national aspirations.

In essence, what this essay will demonstrate, is that the created cultural hegemony of Japanese ultra-nationalism during the 1931 - 1945 timeframe, recruited through the use of [re]invented ideological constructs, the mass participation of all societal factions. In short, for ultra-nationalism to be a fully realised ideology, it had to be aligned to at all levels of society, from political elite's to popular culture level for mass societal participants.
Yet even "fascism from above" required and in fact possessed its counterpart in "grass-roots fascism" at popular level.¹

This essay will look at the two thematic areas in Japanese historiography commonly denoted as the "Pre-war Era of Showa Japan 1931 - 1940", and the "Showa Era of Japan's Asia Pacific War 1941 - 1945".

These two eras of Japan's historiography are inextricably inter-related in terms of ideological production. This is primarily because the ideological constructs, which were formerly devised in the "Pre-war Era", were in the "War Era", consolidated and entrenched within the cultural, social and political framework of Japanese society.

The prewar Japanese political structure, which plunged Japan into a disastrous war, was a relic of the Meiji period.²

1. Carol Gluck and Stephen R. Graubard (Editors), Showa: The Japan of Hirohito, W.W. Norton & Company, U.S.A.,1992 , (Introduction, p. XV1, Carol Gluck).

2. Ibid., and Masataka Kosaka, "The Showa Era 1926 -1989", in Gluck, op. cit., p. 27.

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