Abstract
Takuji Ogawa (1870-1941) chose geology as his main subject at the Imperial University of Tokyo, and also studied geography, especially the geography of China. When he wrote A Regional Geography of Formosa (1896), he attached great importance to geographical descriptions of the old China and became interested in the historical geography of China. Since he held the chair in geography in the History Department at the Imperial University of Kyoto in 1908, he progressed in his research through cooperation with Sinologists and access to various historical documents. Ogawa studied under impetus from F. v. Richthofen's China, although he took a critical attitude toward Richthofen who was servile to the views of Confucian scholars.
Ogawa attached great importance to historical documents that were regarded as heresies by Confucian scholars, and then tried to strike out on a path of his own to the exclusion of the classicism of Confucian scholars. Moreover, since Ogawa was not satisfied with the Occidental system of historical geography which disregarded the East Asian cultural region, he attempted to establish another system based on the Chinese classics and historical documents. From this viewpoint, he studied the relationship between the ancient East Asian and the Mediterranean culture. For example, he pointed out the influence of the West on the history of cartography and herbalism in China, and common or similar features of legends concerning the Flood, versions of the origin of earthquakes, and the method of division of land in the Orient and Occident. Moreover, he determined the location of traffic routes from the Orient to the Occident and gave evidence of cultural interchanges between the Orient and Occident earlier than the Chin dynasty (3rd century B. C.).
Under his influence, historical geography and the history of geography came to be studied extensively in the Department of Geography at Kyoto University, and the study of the historical geography of China progressed in the Research Institute for Cultural Sciences at Kyoto University. Moreover, he influenced the academic world in France and China. However, the writer considers that Ogawa, who did not have far-reaching influence, went against what he had expected in the academic and educational worlds of geography, and the academic world of Oriental history in Japan.
Ogawa started a controversy about the administration of China from the middle of the 1910s. At first, he examined Richthofen's work in China, similar to his study of the historical geography of China. Ogawa argued from the viewpoint of a colony administrator, and expressed opinions that adapted to the trend of the times in Japan. Although he expressed his own opinions as a specialist in Sinology, he later changed them after the Lukow-kiao (Marco Polo Bridge) Incident of 1937. He looked upon the National Government of China as an enemy, lost his desire to cooperate with China, and regarded China as a mere means to make war on the imperialistic countries.
OGAWA's study of war geography formed the background to such arguments. Since he was interested in war geography from very early in his career, he dealt with the essential qualities of war geography in 1916. He regarded war as a human geographical phenomenon and advocated the study of war geography as a subject in political geography. He regarded geopolitics as a branch of political science, not as a branch of political geography. But in his studies on war geography in the 1930s, the contents dealing with actual national policy were increased and went beyond the province of war geography as a branch of political geography. He explained that geopolitics was a new applied branch of political geography, and theorized that war geography involved a geopolitical element. The writer considers that with this idea OGAWA began to argue extensively about the administration of China in view of the emergency situation.
