HISTORY OF CHINA AND JAPAN

Q. Explain in detail the term ‘Meiji Restoration’ with reference to the political and
economic changes that it entailed. Is it appropriate to term it a ‘Revolution’? What
were the consequences for Japan?

The term ‘Meiji Restoration’ refers to the nominal restitution of the powers of the
Japanese emperor in the 1860s. While the institution of the Emperor was an ancient
one, for centuries the emperor had been a mere figurehead. Real power was vested in
the hands of the Shoguns, a line of military generals who commanded the military and
political support of the various hierarchically subordinate feudal lords (the daimyo)
amongst whom the territories of Japan were parceled out. The line of Shoguns was
drawn from the house of Tokugawa which was the largest landowning house in Japan.
The effective seat of power in Japan was in Edo, at the residence of the Shogun while
the city of Kyoto, the capital of the Emperor had a largely ceremonial purpose. The
Tokugawa Shogunate operated through an elaborate administrative apparatus called
the bakufan system.
The control of the Tokugawa Shogunate began to deteriorate towards the middle of
the 19th century in what is referred to as the ‘Bakumatsu period’ of the Shogunate. For
over two centuries, the Shogunate had followed a policy of international seclusion
(sakoku), refusing to trade with the various foreign trading missions that arrived on
the shores of Japan. The defeat of China in the First Opium War brought home the
threat of the West to observers of international currents in Japan and the arrival of an
American trading mission commanded by Commodore Perry in 1853 insisting upon
trading rights upon threat of war profoundly upset the basis of the Tokugawa control
over Japan. In 1858, the bakufu ratified an unequal treaty with Townsend Harris, the
American Consul, opening up eight ports including Kobe, Eido, Nagasaki and
Yokohama and surrendering tariff autonomy and legal jurisdiction over the traders in
these ports to the Americans. Similar treaties were signed with the other Western
trading powers in the early 1860s. These treaties, as Andrew Gordon observes
effectively subordinated Japan to foreign governments and gave it a semi-colonial
status. The meek submission of the bakufu to the slightest threat of military force
from the West and the unwillingness of the Shogunate to consult the other daimyo of
Japan coupled with the disregard for the opinion of the Emperor resulted in a backlash
against the Tokugawa Shogunate.
Led by the militarily powerful ‘outer daimyo’ domain lords of Satsuma, Choshu,
Hizen and Tosa the discontent daimyo of Japan rebelled against the Shogunate,
overthrowing the Shogun and in 1868 proclaimed the assumption of power by the
fifteen year old Emperor Mutsuhito who took on the title ‘Meiji’ and inaugurated the
Meiji era (1868-1912).

POLITICAL RESTRUCTURING

It was initially expected that the institution of the Shogunate would continue despite
the restoration and that the daimyo of Satsuma, Choshu, Tosa and Hizen would
control the institution. However the daimyo resolved to abolish the Shogunate
altogether, laying the foundation for a new political system.
In the early months of 1868 the new leaders proclaimed the Charter Oath which
broadly established the principle of wide consultation before taking decisions and
spelt the end of the old exclusiveness of the bakufu system. This was intended to
secure the support of the other daimyo as well as that of the old officials of the
Tokugawa order whose administrative expertise was of vital importance in
establishing the new order.
In practice, however, as the Meiji leaders grew more secure about their position,
gaining confidence, there was a tendency towards the concentration of power. While a
loosely organized consultative assembly of samurai was established, power
increasingly came to be exercised by the members of the Dajokan, an Executive
Council. The members of the Dajokan, with the support of a number of advisors
exercised control over the six departments of the government. Once again, the
Imperial Princes and the Emperor only had titular power and actual power was vested
in the hands of the Councillors.
It is interesting to note that while power had been seized by the domain lords,
effective power under the new order came to be devolved upon a new class of lower
to middle ranking samurai: men who had learnt to manipulate their own feudal lords
and gradually, the Emperor and his courtiers.
By the end of the 1860s, the ‘Meiji oligarchy’ had come into existence consisting of a
small group of talented administrative officials and courtiers drawn from the chief
domains including Satsuma, Choshu, Tosa, etc. These men were united in their
mission to resolve the surviving problems of the Tokugawa order: military and
economic weakness, political fragmentation and a social hierarchy that failed to
recognize talent. The rise of a new national sentiment after the humiliation of Japan at
the hands of the Western power also instilled the desire to transform Japan into a
modern state, capable of holding its own against Western imperialism. The Meiji
oligarchy now launched a systematic programme of modernization along a Western
model.

Unification and Centralization

Although power had formally been restored to the Emperor, a central authority
remained to be created. The central government enjoyed no control over jurisdiction
in the domains, there was no uniform system of taxation which generated revenues for
the centre and the army still depended upon feudal levies. The immediate challenge
before the Meiji oligarchy therefore was the dissolution of feudalism and the
establishment of a single central authority.
The effort began with the reiteration of the bakufu regulations on the activities of the
daimyo, preventing them from contracting marriage alliances and issuing coins, for
instance. The vast estates of the Tokugawa were also confiscated and placed under
imperial officers, rather than redistributed amongst loyalists by way of reward. The
first concrete step towards unification occurred in 1869, when the lords of Satsuma,
Choshu, Tosa and Hizen under the influence of the Meiji oligarchs submitted a
memorial putting their lands and troops at the Emperor’s disposal. The court
responded by confirming the lords as governors in their own domains with the right of
choosing their own subordinates. While the lords now formally became imperial
officials, as W.G. Beasley notes, the whole event has something of the air of seeking
confirmation for existing privileges as was customary when one feudal regime
succeeded another.
However, the centre soon made it clear that it had every intention of enforcing the
creation of a unified empire. Orders were passed re-allocating domain revenues to
various sectors and reports concerning levels of taxation, military force, population,
etc were called for. The centre also pressed the daimyo to appoint men of talent to key
administrative posts.

In 1871, the emperor proclaimed the abolition of the domains. All land was now to
become imperial territory. Local jurisdiction was ended and all domain armies except
those under imperial command were ordered to disband. With this, the centre laid
claim to monopoly over the use of legitimate force, establishing the effective
sovereignty of the Meiji government.
The governors were relieved of the responsibility of allocating revenue and were
granted stipends which amounted to one-tenth of the revenue collected from the
newly created ‘prefectures’. The government also assumed responsibility for the debts
of the daimyo, this providing incentive for loyalty. Barriers between provinces were
dissolved, opening greater opportunities for travel within the empire.

In this way the central government in the space of about 4 years acquired control over
jurisdiction over the entire population, together with control of all the former revenues
of the domains, dissolving a system that was over 260 years old and laying the basic
requirements for the creation of a modern state.

ECONOMIC REFORMS

The Meiji government when it was called into existence in 1868 was dependent on the
finances of the Satsuma and the Choshu domains and possessed no means of
generating revenue from the lands nominally under the Emperor’s control. The
taxation of the Tokugawa lands proved enough to meet immediate expenses but the
state only became solvent once it had laid claim to revenue rights from the domains as
well.
However, the state found it necessary to reorganize the system of revenue collection
and institute a modern system of taxation.
Land Revenue

With the abolition of the feudal ban on the sale and transfer of land, a land market was
created, together with property rights. By 1872, a new land tax system based on the
principles of individual assessment of revenue, assessment based on the market value
of land, and cash payments was brought into existence. The landowner was expected
to pay an annual tax of 3 percent on the estimated market value of the land, rather
than a portion of its produce. This brought fallow lands under the plough as well and
encouraged the extension of cultivation on existing plots of land. The amount of
revenue was now predictable because it did not vary with the harvests. It also afforded
fewer opportunities for tax evasion, as Beasley points out.

Stipends

Although the state had succeeded in acquiring control over the financial resources of
the domains, the pensions and stipends due to the daimyo and samurai continued to be
a major drain. The stipends of the samurai were scaled down substantially,
impoverishing many of the erstwhile warrior class and creating social tensions. In
1876, the stipends of both the daimyo and the samurai were commuted to government
bonds at varying rates of interests and varying time periods. This served the purpose
of securing funds for industrialization and militarization while simultaneously
guaranteeing the support of the politically disaffected classes for the Meiji regime.
The government was also able to reduce its annual expenditure on this item to about
half the earlier amount.

Modernization

Committed to transforming Japan into a modern industrial state, the Meiji regime
initiated a series of reforms in the economy. The state was directly involved in the
task of industrialization and the economic policies of the Meiji government reflect its
concern for industrial growth and stability.

Agriculture

Recognizing the principle that a modernized agriculture is a precondition for

effective industrialization, the state embarked upon a programme of agricultural
improvement.
The state hired foreign advisors and sent students abroad to learn more advanced
agricultural techniques. A number of new kinds of plants and seeds were imported
and various experimental agricultural stations and colleges were established to test
new methods of planting and to advise farmers on improved techniques.
New lands were opened up to cultivation and the introduction of new techniques
facilitated a 30 % increase in rice production between 1880 and 1894. There were also
tremendous advances made in the production of silk.

Improvements in productivity enabled Japan to export agricultural products such as

silk helping to restore a favourable balance of trade and pay for expensive investments
in foreign machinery. The agricultural reforms of the Meiji government also resulted
in an increase in rural incomes, defusing social tensions and helping to create a home
market for local consumer goods.
With state encouragement, agriculture also became increasingly specialized and
commercialized promoting a trend towards concentration of land and increased
tenancy. It also led to the expropriation of poor tenant farmers who moved towards
the towns, supplying cheap labour for urban industrialization.

Industrialization

The Meiji state took an early interest in strategic industries. The Ministry of Industry
was established in 1870 with the purpose of encouraging industry amongst the people
and building Japan’s economic strength. Consciously following the modern of
Prussian ‘latecomer industrialization’, the government began with investments in
heavy industries such as mining, metallurgy, armaments, etc. The growth of consumer
industries in Japan was slower and took off much later. A number of factories and
workshops were set up by the state itself as ‘model enterprises’ which were later sold
off to private entrepreneurs. These included engineering works, glass, sugar, textiles,
etc.

Mines were placed directly under the control of the government and while in many
cases they were operated by the government itself, in some instances permission was
granted to private enterprises to open new mines and sell the products to the state.
The state also hired several foreign technical experts and advisors who were
employed in the state-operated industrial enterprises. Investments were made in
expensive foreign machinery as the state carried out a programme of heavy
mechanization.
The state undertook the task of providing the infrastructure for economic growth,
building railroads and inaugurating a railway system, improving port facilities and
establishing shipyards, opening industrial schools, improving communication by
establishing a well knit telegraph network, etc.
On the whole the state was wary of foreign investment and sought to repay existing
foreign loans quickly while discouraging industries from contracting new debts.
Foreign owned industrial undertakings were purchased by the state and trade
regulations were rewritten to discriminate against foreign businessmen. This was part
of a deliberate strategy to protect new enterprises.

While state investment was a conscious decision, it is certainly true that the inability
to persuade private investors including mercantile and landowning interests to invest
in the risky new ventures had also made it a compulsion. Economic historians today
are skeptical of the significance of the government’s role in the industrialization of
Japan. It is argued that the government invested far less in industries outside the
military sector and that the few enterprises established and run by the state invariably
failed to turn a profit. However it must be conceded that the state enterprises
succeeded in training the first generation of managers and engineers and creating a
small industrial work force.

By the 1880s, while retaining control of military-strategic industries (like railways,

telegraphs, shipbuilding, arms-manufacturing, and arsenals), the Meiji government
began selling off other industries to a few trusted private companies at very low
prices. These industries were no longer financially viable and had become a drain on
state resources. The Meiji leaders had also begun to feel that sustained long-term
industrial growth could only by carried out under the auspices of a private capitalist
class.
Henceforth, the Meiji government, instead of actively and directly founding,
managing and controlling industries herself, took on the role of indirect protector and
supervisor of industrialization.
The state owned enterprises passed into the control of a very small group of private
industrial concerns which were soon to become monopolistic financial giants: the
zaibatsu. These concerns included the Sumitomo, the Mitsui, the Mitsubishi and the
Yasuda. The zaibatsu ran a wide range of economic interests from banking to
manufacture and free economic competition was suppressed. The zaibatsu also
developed an alliance with the state and at times, the role of big business was even
subordinated to state interest.

Foreign Trade

The Meiji leaders recognized the need to stabilize the currency of Japan and initiated
a reform basing the yen on the gold standard. The state sought to establish equal
trading relations with the West and in the early years of the Meiji regime a number of
deputations were sent to Europe and to America to renegotiate trade treaties ratified
by the Shogunate which remained a source of popular discontent. By 1894, Japan had
achieved a level of industrialization comparable to that of the European countries and
a treaty revision placed her on equal trading terms with Britain.

IMPLICATIONS OF THE MEIJI RESTORATION

The Meiji Restoration marked a final break with the ancient feudal order in Japan and
marked its transformation into a modern, industrialized society. The Meiji leaders
took deliberate measures to reorganize the social order of Japan, destroying the status
system and opening all fields of occupation to every section of society. Barriers on
labour mobility were removed thus opening the channels to socio-economic upward
mobility. The Meiji Restoration also firmly resolved the ideological tension between
status and merit in Tokugawa Japan in the favour of merit.
The Meiji Restoration also resulted in the establishment of a national system of
education focused on mass compulsory education. The effect of this in the long run
was that by the turn of the century elementary school attendance had reached levels of
90 percent or more. Mass education was an important transformative factor in the
society of Meiji Japan.

Economically, the Meiji Restoration led to the increasing monetization and

commercialization of the economy. A unified national market in land and
commodities was created. Most significantly of all, of course, a modern industrial
sector of the economy was established which expanded from heavy to light industries.

For the first time, under the Meiji regime Japan was effectively politically united with
a single constitution, a centralized system of tax collection and resource allocation, a
standing army and a unified system of jurisdiction.

It must be mentioned that not all of the measures of the Meiji government met with
support from the people of Japan. Many met with opposition from the very outset.
The land revenue reforms were held to have imposed a greater burden on the peasant
than ever before and resulted in a number of rural riots and protests. The loss of status
of the samurai also resulted in protest and fuelled an opposition movement with a
distinctly militaristic character. Even a progressive measure like the introduction of
compulsory education was resisted by a section of the population because of the
imposition of an educational cess.
The monopolization of power by the Meiji oligarchs also stimulated a movement for
greater democracy in the political system with the launching of the Popular Rights
movement which ultimately culminated in the proclamation of a new Meiji
Constitution in 1890.

THE MEIJI RESTORATION: A REVOLUTION?

The question of whether or not the Meiji Restoration qualifies as a revolution is one
that has vexed many writers in the past. Albert Craig argues that the Restoration was
certainly not revolutionary in its intent. Some writers go so far as to assert that at the
time of the Restoration, the leaders had no intention whatever to change the existing
system of the Shogunate. Rather than any desire to modernize, hostility towards the
Tokugawa clan and the bakufu are seen as the guiding motive in the Meiji
Restoration.

Many scholars have dealt at length with the role played by the loyalist low-ranking
samurai (the shishi) who with their motto ‘expel the barbarian, worship the Emperor’
turned public opinion against the Shogunate and in particular its supine attitude
towards the Western powers. Nonetheless it must be acknowledged that the leadership
in the Restoration came not from the lower samurai but from the feudal lords of the
‘outer domains’ of Satsuma, Choshu, Tosa and Hizen.

The class character of the Restoration has received much attention from some
scholars, particularly those of the Marxist persuasion. While some believe that it was
a basically bourgeois movement which terminated feudalism in Japan, others hold the
view that feudal relations continued in the countryside through non-economic
constraints on tenants. Andrew Gordon critiques the argument that the Meiji
Restoration was a distorted revolution which was led by aristocrats and resulted in the
establishment of a capitalist order, arguing that the notion of a nineteenth century
revolution as led by the bourgeois class imposes a Eurocentric understanding on a
Japanese phenomenon and does not stand as an adequate category of analysis.

W.G. Beasley notes that the Restoration did not result in any change in the ruling
class of Japan. The new leaders, the Meiji oligarchs came precisely from those
sections of society that had traditionally governed Japan. In both its stated intent and
in the composition of its leadership therefore the Meiji Restoration cannot be held to
be revolutionary. It is perhaps more appropriate to see the Restoration as an
aristocratic coup de etat. For Gordon however, the leadership of the Restoration was
drawn from a frustrated sub-elite class which cannot be seen as identical with the
aristocratic class. Gordon therefore rejects the argument that the Meiji Restoration did
not change the ruling class.
However in an assessment of the true character of the Meiji Restoration it is necessary
also to examine the changes that the new regime instituted in Japan. When the full
extent of the Meiji reforms is taken into consideration, there can be no doubt that the
regime itself was revolutionary. This has led many scholars including Andrew Gordon
to conclude that the Meiji Restoration was a case of ‘revolution from above’, an
‘aristocratic revolution’. Kenneth Pyle notes that the interests of the ruling class ---the
samurai and the daimyo--- were the first to suffer from the reforms initiated by the
Meiji regime. Particular interests therefore were sacrificed in the interest of economic
strength, industrialization and modernization. The realization of the need to
modernize seems to have imbued the Meiji Restoration with revolutionary
significance. While there was no common social purpose at the time of the Meiji
Restoration itself, the Meiji regime seems to have created a common interest: to call
this a revolution is by no means inaccurate.

BIBLIOGRAPHY:

1) W.G. Beasley: Modern History of Japan

2) Nathaniel Peffer: The Far East: A Modern History
3) Andrew Gordon: A Modern History of Japan: From Tokugawa Times to the
Present
4) Marius B. Jansen (ed): The Emergence of Meiji Japan
5) Hugh Borton: Japan’s Modern Century from Perry to 1970
6) E.H. Norman: Japan’s Emergence as a Modern State