Japan

Japan is an island country located off the eastern coast of the Asian continent. It is bordered by the Sea of Japan to the west and the Pacific Ocean to the east, and extends more than 3,000 kilometres from the Sea of Okhotsk in the northeast to the East China Sea in the southwest. Part of the Pacific Ring of Fire, Japan encompasses a stratovolcanic archipelago of 6,852 islands; five main islands comprise 97% of the country's total area of 377,975 square kilometres and more than 99% of its population.

Japan is officially divided into 47 prefectures and traditionally into eight regions. About three-fourths of the country's terrain is mountainous, with much of the remainder made up by low-lying coastal plains. As a result, Japan is among the most densely populated and urbanised countries in the world, with more than 90% of its population living in urban areas. The largest of these is the Greater Tokyo Area centred on the capital city of Tokyo, which is the most populous metropolitan area in the world and home to more than 38 million people. Japan is the eleventh most populous country in the world with a population of 126.2 million, of which 97.8% are ethnically Japanese.

The kanji that make up the name of Japan in the Japanese language mean "sun origin"; in the Western world, the country is sometimes 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 characterised the history of Japan.

While archaeological evidence indicates that Japan was inhabited as early as the Upper Palaeolithic period, the first written mentions of the country appear 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. Beginning in the twelfth century, however, political power came to be held by a succession of military dictators, feudal lords, and a class of warrior nobility. After a century-long period of civil war, the country was reunified in 1603 under the Tokugawa shogunate, which enacted a policy of foreign isolationism. This period ended in 1854 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 resulting Meiji period, Japan adopted a Western-style government and pursued a program of industrialisation and modernisation, which transformed the feudal society into a great power. By 1920, Japan had established 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 the atomic bombings of the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan surrendered to the Allies in 1945, coming under a seven-year occupation and adopting a post-war constitution. Japan has since maintained a unitary parliamentary constitutional monarchy with the Emperor as the 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. Though it has officially renounced its right to declare war, Japan maintains a modern military for peacekeeping and self-defence, which has been ranked as the world's fourth most powerful. Following World War II, Japan experienced record economic growth, becoming the world's second-largest economy by 1990. As of 2019, 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 an international leader in the automotive and electronics industries. Japan is categorised as "very high" on the Human Development Index, and its population enjoys high levels of tertiary education and the highest life expectancy in the world, though it is currently is experiencing a projected decline due to ageing and low birth rates. Culturally, Japan is renowned around the world for its art, cuisine, cinema, music, and popular culture, including its prominent comics, animation, and video game industries.

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