Captive Spaces: The Allied Internment Camps in Japan-Occupied China During World War II

Date(s)： 2025/09/11

Time： 10:00~12:00

Venue： Archives 2nd Conference Hall

Host： Prof. Xie Xin-Zhe（Assistant research fellow, IMH, AS）

Speaker：Prof. Lien Ling-ling (Research fellow and Deputy Director, IMH, AS)

Disscussant： Prof. Shu-min Chung (Research Fellow and Director, ITH, AS)

Organizer： IMH

Abstract:
This paper examines Japan’s wartime governance of enemy nationals during World War II through the lens of spatial politics. Following the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, the Japanese established internment camps—officially named “Civilian Assembly Centers”—across occupied territories in East and Southeast Asia, where many civilians from Allied countries were detained en masse until the end of the war. Recognizing that the selection of camp sites, spatial layouts, and environmental conditions profoundly shaped internees’ daily routines and psychological experiences, this study argues that space functioned not merely as a physical setting but as a strategic instrument of ideological control and administrative power. By analyzing the geographic placement, internal organization, and spatial management of the camps, the paper highlights how the Japanese authorities deployed space as a mechanism of surveillance, regulation, and social structuring. At the same time, it explores how internees responded to these constraints—navigating, adapting to, and in some cases resisting the imposed spatial order. Through this dual focus, the study reveals the complex dynamics of spatial governance and lived agency within the internment system.