Asian nations have long searched for a stable balance between modernity and tradition. Reform has battled reaction with each adoption of the tools of the West. China under Xi Jinping is using Western ideas, but within Chinese constraints, to help boost China against Western competition. Japan kicked off the region’s reformation in a similarly conflicted way: seeking modern power, but without the Western values that produced it.

Young samurai warriors, frustrated by social and political immobility, first broke the bonds of Japan’s past 150 years ago this week. On Jan. 3, 1868, they overthrew the Tokugawa samurai family, which had loosely controlled Japan for more than 250 years in the name of the emperors. The rebels announced a “restoration” of ancient imperial rule, naming the new era “Meiji” (Enlightened Rule).

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