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The main objective of the Japanese delegation in Paris, 1919 was to obtain Racial Equality. The delegation comprised of Marquis Saionji, Viscount Chinda and Baron Makino and they held the belief that in order for the country to participate in the proposed league of nations, ‘depended on the inclusion of a racial equality clause in either the body or the preface of the planned covenant…’ states Lakes and Reynolds. In this sense, Racial Equality was focused on eliminating racial discrimination within the western powers and the discrimination faced by their nationals in other countries. Overall the Japanese delegates were unsuccessful in their attempts to gain racial equality due to conflicting interests with other delegations such as that of Australia and the view that according to Lake and Reynolds ‘their real objective was to enable their nationals to migrate to any land of their choosing’ and thus conflicting with the white Australia policy at the time. The rejection was not taken lightly by Japan and those within the country, Lake and Reynolds claim that many observers of the events ‘felt the Japanese failure had served the purpose of exposing and placing on record the real truth concerning the attitude of whites towards non-whites’.

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Manela writes ‘The Great War of 1914-1918 was an event unprecedented in the sheer scale of its destruction. It extinguished millions of lives and caused untold devastation; it also threatened the collapse of order and stability in international relations.’ This was the case that allowed the phenomena of self-determination, popularised by Woodrow Wilson, to encapsulate colonial societies. Self-determination is the idea that countries should be free to determine their own economic, political and social situations within international relations free from the interference of imperialism. In the Paris Peace conference Manela states that ‘Wilson had hoped that the application of self-determination, defined as government by consent, would help to remove the revolutionary impulse and promote change through gradual reforms.’ in nations which have previously been victim to colonialistion, however Wilsons efforts remained in vein insofar as granting these countries independence as his points were not accepted due to directly conflicting interests of the bigger colonial powers (Great Britain and France). As the failure to establish these principles in the Peace conference, nations subjugated by imperialism would begin to establish their own need for self-determination and sparked a series of ‘near-simultaneous revolts against empire that helped shaped the subsequent movements…  in India and China’ as Manela claims.

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The initial idea of self-determination for Woodrow was the governing by consent and freedom of countries to be economically and culturally independent where it was possible to do so and still yet mainly under imperial rule. While he was more of an advocate for the colonies of recently defeated  powers to flourish under self-determination, it was the intellectuals of nations which were already exposed to the cruel system of western imperialisation such as China and India who brought new meaning into the ideas and as Manela writes  ‘read in the U.S president’s rhetoric a universalist message capable of transcending the East-West chasm and thus auguring a new era of universal human brotherhood’. For many Indian intellectuals they saw Woodrow as the man who would be able to best represent their interests at the peace conference, their interests were heavily placed on self-determination in accordance to Woodrow’s principles. In one case Manela claims ‘Tilak wrote Wilson directly’ and asked for the principles of self-determination to be related to India’s situation. Woodrow’s differing perspective about self-determination can be seen as Manela further states that Wilson ignored the pleas in many cases ‘in which demands for self-determination conflicted interests of one or more victorious powers’, This shows the contrast between the two versions of self-determination, one in which a country becomes independent for the nations benefit and another perspective where a country become ‘governed by consent’ while still benefiting an imperial power. While the Indian wish for self-determination failed at the reluctance to be represented by Woodrow, China did have a delegation to advocate for their view of self-determination. The Chinese delegates held the belief that, as Manela claims ‘might obtain abrogation of the “unequal treaties and full recognition of its sovereignty’ while also having land claims over formally German controlled enclave now being claimed by Japan. Self-determination was also heavily linked with nationalist Japanese thought where many intellectuals desired to see China ‘emerge from it’s state of weakness, disunity and humiliation’ as Manela writes. Prominent Chinese and Indian intellectuals saw self-determination as a philosophy to guide them through the new era post-war and outlined a belief system that would allow them to flourish in international relations and reach a new level of harmony between the eastern and western world which had hitherto been unable to achieve due to the authoritarian nature of imperialist rule.