For many people, Japan is still pretty mysterious – and that’s not only because it’s a
country where people push their dogs around in prams and drink coffee in places full of
cats.
Not at all.
Despite being an overpopulated area with scarce natural resources, Japan is one of the richest
and most developed countries in the world, with the highest average life expectancy on
the planet, so it’s no wonder that it, never ceases to amaze us.
But... hold on just a moment, because Japan wasn’t always the economic powerhouse we
know today.
Quite the opposite.
Until the mid-nineteenth century this country operated under a political and economic system
that was very similar to Medieval Europe’s.
At that time, Japan was a poor and backward territory, closed off to the world and with
a strongly stratified society.
Now...
The question is, how did the great change occur?
How did Japan manage to rise up from its status as a poor rural country to that of a great
industrial power?
Was it all because of the influence from and help of the United States after the Second
World War?
Was it the result of a meticulously designed plan by the government?
Well, we can say that this entire process involved two major stages.
We’ll talk about the first one in this video, which began 150 years ago with the so-called
Meiji Restoration.
150 years?
Yes we’re covering this on an anniversary year.
The second stage, which we’ll talk about in a future video - so now that you know,
don’t forget to subscribe to VisualPolitik - began at the end of the Second World War.
But having said this, let’s start with the story.
Here we go.
(THE MEIJI RESTORATION)
150 years ago, the Meiji Restoration of 1868 ended the dominance of the Tokugawa, a clan
that for more than 250 years, since 1603, had virtually supplanted the emperor’s power,
turning them into the great lords of Japan.
We’re talking about a long period during which Japan remained isolated from all contact
with the outside world., And while many western countries were throwing themselves into the
Industrial Revolution, this isolation caused Japan to retain social, political and economic
structures that were more similar to the Middle Ages than to modern times.
At that time Japan was a feudal society, dominated by warlords and, for no less than 14 centuries,
had behaved like a kind of vassal state of the Chinese Empire.
- Come on, that’s very different from the Japan we know today.
We’re talking about a country that prohibited the use of its ports by foreigners to stop
their influence from contaminating the local culture and traditions.
Of course... that also ended any trade and any possibility that its rigid political estates
would move to the beat of the times.
This was the situation until in 1853 a modern US fleet arrived in Tokyo Bay with a mission
and a message: either the Japanese authorities accepted and allowed trade or they’d have
to face the consequences.
(«Steamboats/the hawks of the Pacific break their rest/four boats are enough/to make us
lose sleep at night» Japanese poem referring to the American ships that arrived in the
country in 1853)
Obviously, the far less developed Japanese institutions could do little in the face of
a modern, technologically advanced war fleet.
So they had no choice but to accept and open up.
That was the beginning of the end of the Tokugawa regime.
Within a few years, disgusted by the more than palpable loss of sovereignty, by the
humiliation of feeling like a poor and incapable country and having seen the decline of the
Chinese empire, the samurai – Samurai which by the way, were much more modern than those
we usually see in the movies – took control and restored imperial Japan.
We’re talking about the well-known Meiji restoration which, against all odds, launched
Japan into the arms of a broad reform program that changed practically every field.
After all, dear friends, given the enormous technological, economic and military superiority
of the Western powers, the best way to preserve Japan's sovereignty was to take note and promote
the country’s development.
And, you know what?
They did just that.
Within a few years, not even the Japanese themselves could recognize Japan.
These are the steps that the country followed to jump from the feudal age to the modern
world.
Listen up.
At the political level, many of the old institutions were terminated and an independent judiciary
power, a bicameral legislature and a modern prefectural system were introduced to govern
the country’s various regions.
The old taxes on the sale of rice were replaced by a land tax, which led to two huge advantages:
First, it facilitated the calculation of the revenues the government obtained each year
– after all, the amount of land doesn’t change but the rice production does change
every year – which allowed the government to, for example, design, finance and build
several infrastructures.
This then helped determine land ownership with precision, establishing a modern property
rights system for it.
But that wasn’t all.
Being aware of the importance of knowledge and new technologies, in 1872, just four years
after the Meiji Restoration, the Japanese government established a universal primary
education system and within a few years the Tokyo Institute of Technology and the University
of Tokyo were created.
And, of course, in addition to everything we’ve seen, Japan’s openness was also
encouraged.
Foreign experts and professionals were attracted to transmit their knowledge, and many Japanese
students were granted scholarships to study both in Europe and in the United States.
The result of this whole process was that in just 50 years Japan managed to go through
its own industrial revolution.
That’s one-third of the time it took Europe.
That way, in the following decades, Japan continued its takeoff process and changed.
And that’s also when it began extending its influence to neighboring countries like
Korea, China, Russia and Taiwan.
In 1902, they also signed a friendship agreement with Great Britain, an agreement that not
only boosted its industry, but when World War I arrived, enabled Japan to become an
important supplier, further boosting its economy.
In these years many Japanese entrepreneurs became millionaires.
- For one reason or another, in the end, when countries boost their trade, every party usually
benefits.
Mr. Donald Trump, take note.
But folks… that’s how we got to the year 1926, the year when the darkest time in Japan
began.
Listen up.
(THE WAR ECONOMY)
1926, the year that Emperor Hirohito ascended the throne... where he remained until the
year 1989.
And from that exact moment in the 20s, Japan began to deepen its most warlike profile.
In 1931, Japanese troops occupied the Chinese province of Manchuria... where they not only
committed an enormous amount of crimes, but in occupying the province, also triggered
the tense relations between Japan and most of the Western powers.
And that’s not all.
Once Hirohito came to power, the government began to boost the war industry to such an
extent that in 1931, while the troops invaded Manchuria, the Japanese government authorized
and encouraged the creation of Cartels among large companies, especially among the heavy
industry, that is to say the industry related to steel, boat, machinery, truck construction,
etcetera, etcetera.
That way, the government could urge large companies to agree to increase production
as quickly as possible while limiting the entry of new competitors.
And that’s not all.
In the following years the government also injected a lot of capital into these companies,
until it became co-owner of several of them.
All while military spending wouldn’t stop growing:
Of course this massive amount of government intervention in the economy had consequences:
small businesses were ravaged, and almost every civilian industry closed long before
the US bombing during World War II.
The consequences of this war economy didn’t only lead to a more authoritarian government,
and a greater military influence which ultimately ended up in a war, but also in the general
impoverishment of the Japanese.
Of course, military material had to be produced, instead of goods that would improve people's
lives on a day-to-day basis.
- More rifles and less sewing machines.
Very successful, but much poorer in the end.
And, you know what?
It’s not strange at all.
History teaches us that militarist policies tend to be very efficient and boost the power
of the elite while impoverishing the majority.
The fact is that, as we all know, at the end of World War II, Japan wasn’t only a defeated
country, the Japanese economy was shattered and the Japanese had gone back decades in
terms of their standard of living.
All this, of course, in addition to the tragedy of having lost more than 3 million lives during
the conflict.
Now, some of you may be wondering, but...
What happened after the war?
How did Japan manage to become such a great power within a few years?
Folks, we'll get those answers in a future video here on VisualPolitik.
So far, in this one we’ve already seen how Japan made the great leap and went from the
Middle Ages to the modern world.
So I really hope you enjoyed this video, please hit like if you did, and don’t forget to
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Don’t forget to check out our friends at the Reconsider Media Podcast - they provided
the vocals in this episode that were not mine.
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And as always, I’ll see you in the next video.