ABSTRACT
My hypothesis is that there exists a relationship between these three phenomena (the vogue of nippology, that of tokyology and that of postmodernology), and that this relationship reveals the emergence of a collective fantasy (kyôdô gensô) in the sense of Yoshimoto Ryûmei Yoshimoto employed this expression, notably, in regard to the emergence of the state. I shall use it in regard to the not uncommon idea that the XXIst century might be that of a Japanese hegemony, superseding the hegemony of the United States during the XXth century. In this sense, the problem is whether and how Japan can produce a paradigm of its own, and how tokyology can be related to this possibility.
