Japan vs. China

Main Difference

The main difference between Japan and China is that the Japan is a constitutional monarchy in East Asia and China is a state in East Asia

• Japan

  Japan (Japanese: 日本, Nippon [ɲippoꜜɴ] (listen) or Nihon [ɲihoꜜɴ] (listen)) is an island country located in East Asia. It is bordered by the Sea of Japan to the west and the Pacific Ocean to the east, and spans more than 3,000 kilometers (1,900 mi) along the coast of the continent from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Philippine Sea in the south. Part of the Pacific Ring of Fire, Japan encompasses a stratovolcanic archipelago of about 6,852 islands, with five main islands (Hokkaido, Honshu, Kyushu, Shikoku, and Okinawa) comprising 97% of the country’s total area of 377,975 square kilometers (145,937 sq mi).

  Japan is officially divided into 47 prefectures and traditionally into eight regions. Approximately two-thirds of the country’s terrain is mountainous and heavily forested, and less than one-eighth of land is suitable for agriculture. Consequently, Japan is among the most densely populated and urbanized countries in the world, with over 90% of its population living in urban areas. The largest of these is the metropolitan area centered on the capital city of Tokyo, which is the most populous in the world and home to more than 38 million people. Japan itself is the world’s eleventh most populous country with a population of 126.2 million, of which 97.8% are ethnically Japanese.

  The kanji (or “Chinese characters”) that make up the name of Japan in the Japanese language mean “sun origin”; in the Western world, the country is often known by the sobriquet “Land of the Rising Sun”. Periods of influence from other regions, primarily China, followed by periods of isolation, particularly from Western Europe, have characterized the history of Japan.

  While archaeological evidence indicates that Japan was inhabited as early as the Upper Paleolithic period, the first written mention of the archipelago appears in Chinese texts from the first century AD. Between the fourth and ninth centuries, the kingdoms of Japan became gradually unified under an Emperor and imperial court based in Heian-kyō (modern Kyoto). However, beginning in the twelfth century, de facto political power came to be held by a succession of military dictators (shōgun) and feudal lords (daimyō) and enforced by a class of warrior nobility known as samurai. After a century-long period of civil war, Japan was reunified in 1603 under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate, which established a government in Edo (modern Tokyo) and enacted a policy of isolationism. This period ended in 1853 when a United States fleet forced Japan to open to the West, leading to the fall of the shogunate and the restoration of imperial power in 1868. In the following Meiji era, Japan adopted a Western-style government and pursued a program of industrialization and modernization; this transformed the feudal society into a great power, with Japan establishing a colonial empire in East Asia after decisive victories in the First Sino-Japanese War and Russo-Japanese War. In 1937, the Empire of Japan invaded China, beginning the Second Sino-Japanese War; in 1940, it signed the Tripartite Pact and entered World War II the following year on the side of the Axis powers. After suffering major defeats in the Pacific and two atomic bombings, Japan surrendered to the Allies in 1945, coming under a brief occupation and adopting a new post-war constitution. Japan has since maintained a unitary parliamentary constitutional monarchy with the Emperor as a ceremonial head of state and an elected legislature known as the National Diet.

  Today, Japan is a member of numerous international institutions, including the United Nations, the OECD, the G7, and the G20. Although it has officially renounced its right to declare war, Japan maintains a modern military for peacekeeping and self-defense, which has been ranked as the world’s fourth most powerful. Following World War II, Japan experienced record economic growth, recovering from the war to become the world’s second-largest economy by 1980. Today, Japan’s economy is the world’s third-largest by nominal GDP and fourth-largest by purchasing power parity; it is also the fourth-largest importer and exporter and a global leader in the automotive and electronics industries. Japan is ranked “very high” on the Human Development Index; its population enjoys high levels of education and the second-highest life expectancy in the world, though it currently is experiencing a projected decline due to low birth rates. Culturally, Japan is globally renowned for its art, cuisine, literature, cinema, music, and popular culture, including its prominent comics, animation, and video game industries.

• China

  China (Chinese: 中国; pinyin: Zhōngguó; literally: ‘Central State’), officially the People’s Republic of China (PRC or PR China), is a country in East Asia and the world’s most populous country, with a population of around 1.404 billion in 2017. Covering approximately 9,600,000 square kilometers (3,700,000 sq mi), it is the third or fourth largest country by total area. Governed by the Communist Party of China, the state exercises jurisdiction over 22 provinces, five autonomous regions, four direct-controlled municipalities (Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai, and Chongqing), and the special administrative regions of Hong Kong and Macau.

  China emerged as one of the world’s first civilizations, in the fertile basin of the Yellow River in the North China Plain. For millennia, China’s political system was based on hereditary monarchies, or dynasties, beginning with the semi-legendary Xia dynasty in 21st century BCE. Since then, China has expanded, fractured, and re-unified numerous times. In the 3rd century BCE, the Qin reunited core China and established the first Chinese empire. The succeeding Han dynasty, which ruled from 206 BCE until 220 CE, saw some of the most advanced technology at that time, including papermaking and the compass, along with agricultural and medical improvements. The invention of gunpowder and movable type in the Tang dynasty (618–907) and Northern Song (960–1127) completed the Four Great Inventions. Tang culture spread widely in Asia, as the new Silk Route brought traders to as far as Mesopotamia and the Horn of Africa. Dynastic rule ended in 1912 with the Xinhai Revolution, when the Republic of China (ROC) replaced the Qing dynasty. China as a whole was ravaged by Japan during World War II. The subsequent Chinese Civil War resulted in a division of territory in 1949, when the Communist Party of China established the People’s Republic of China, a unitary one-party sovereign state, on mainland China while the Kuomintang-led nationalist government retreated to the island of Taiwan. The political status of Taiwan remains disputed.

  Since the introduction of economic reforms in 1978, China’s economy has been one of the world’s fastest-growing with annual growth rates consistently above 6 percent. According to the World Bank, China’s GDP grew from $150 billion in 1978 to $12.24 trillion by 2017. According to official data, China’s GDP in 2018 was 90 trillion Yuan ($13.28 trillion). Since 2010, China has been the world’s second-largest economy by nominal GDP and since 2014, the largest economy in the world by purchasing power parity (PPP). China is also the world’s largest exporter and second-largest importer of goods. China is a recognized nuclear weapons state and has the world’s largest standing army and second-largest defense budget. The PRC is a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council as it replaced the ROC in 1971, as well as an active global partner of ASEAN Plus mechanism. China is also a leading member of numerous formal and informal multilateral organizations, including the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), WTO, APEC, BRICS, the BCIM, and the G20. China has been characterized as an emerging superpower, mainly because of its massive population, economy, and military.