As will be explained in the Introduction, Handbook of Confucianism in Modern Japan was conceived with the aim of expanding scholarship on modern Japanese Confucianism—a field which has until recently been neglected in Anglosphere Asian studies and comparative philosophy. A secondary aim was to facilitate contributions to that scholarship by scholars who would not normally write and publish in English, thereby enriching it with perspectives cultivated in non-English speaking research communities, but under-represented in Anglosphere academic research. This handbook, then, was planned to address a double neglect, though I hope it makes clear that blame cannot easily be assigned for such neglect.

I would first of all like to thank the scholars who helped fulfill the aims of this handbook by contributing to it, patiently enduring rounds of peer review, revision and editorial correspondence during a global pandemic which has impacted deeply on the professional and personal lives of scholars worldwide. My deep gratitude is also due to academic translators Ruth and John McCreery at The Work Works, who translated seven of this handbook’s chapters from Japanese and Chinese into English.

Finally, I would like to thank Mark Gresham at MHM Limited for inviting me to edit a book for their handbook series, for enthusiastically endorsing the topic I proposed for this handbook, and for his assistance during its final editing stages; and Huang Chun-chieh, Paula Harrell and Avery Morrow, for the assistance they rendered in the preparation of this handbook for publication.