Transition from Military to Bourgeois (chonin) Society in Japan
Author(s): Chitoshi Yanaga
Reviewed work(s):
Source: Oriens, Vol. 8, No. 1 (Oct. 30, 1955), pp. 120-126
Published by: BRILL
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TRANSITION FROM MILITARY TO BOURGEOIS
(CHONIN) SOCIETY IN JAPAN1
by
Chitoshi Yanaga
Yale University
It would be impossible to clearly demarcate a transition period of
history particularly for such a gradual process of change as the shift of
real power in Japanese society from the military to the chonin class.
The purpose of this paper, therefore, is to examine the gradual evolution
of Japanese society and some of the forces which were in operation and
to show how the conflicts and inconsistencies of the feudal structure
itself worked to undermine the predominance and preeminence of the
position of the samurai class. In order to do this, it would be necessary
to go back to the Muromachiperiod, at least to the Sengoku era, circa
1467-1567, for the beginning of the process which culminated in the
predominanceof the power of the chonin class in the Tokugawa period.
The decline in the political power and control of the Ashikaga
Shogunate brought about what Japanese historians have come to regard
as the most lamentable period of their national history. Yet for all the
gloom induced by the epoch, it had its brighter side for it was the incubation period of modernism, though perhaps the darkest hour before
the dawn of modern age. Along with the strong disrespect of law and
authority which had all but broken down, there was a marked flouting
of traditions and conventions. In the naked power struggle which turned
the country into a battlefield for a whole century, there unfolded the
condition of gekokuj', that is, the subversion of the superiors by the
subordinates. This was an age in which upstarts could and did rise from
obscurity to fame and power. It was quite natural that there should
have been a conspicuous and powerful leveling process at work in
1 This was originally a paper read at the meeting of the Far Eastern Association in Washington,
D. C., on March 3I, I955.
120
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Transition to bourgeois society in Japan
I2I
society affecting the social customs and manners, language, and cultural
tastes and activities in the face of the weakening of the moral and
spiritual foundations of the life of the upper classes.
The breakdown of rigid controls in society released the pent up
energies of the masses, giving rise to the vigorous activities of the
commoners and helped to create a condition of unprecedented social
mobility abetted by widespreadpolitical confusion and instability. Many
samurai sold their family genealogies to commonerswhile ambitious and
able peasants trained themselves and became proficient in military arts,
bought samurai genealogicalcharts, and attained high military positions,
some of them eventually rising to the top level as daimyos.
Peasants thought nothing of organizing themselves into all sorts of
ikki for action against oppression from above particularly against the
authorities in protest of heavy taxation 1. They even managed to force
the government to issue proclamationsfor the cancellation of debts which
were euphemistically known as tokusei. Mobs frequently carried out
organizedassaults on pawnbrokersand money lenders who were notorious
for their usurious practices with which they exploited the poor. Sake
brewers who made enormous profits at the expense of the common
people also became the targets of their ire and assault. These mass
outbursts occurred with disturbing frequency as the people saw how
much power they could wield when effectively organized.
In this amoral age virtually all the classes of society were motivated
by the relentless and ruthless pursuit of profit. Corruptionwas rampant
and official positions and court ranks could be purchased openly at
fixed rates. But at least there were some compensating factors. In the
face of selfish individualism born of disorder and chaos, there emerged
the spirit of adventure and enterprise among the common people.
The degeneration of the nobility and the ineffectiveness of the government as well as the samurai class gave undreamed of opportunities to
the common people to assert themselves. In such an age as the Sengoku,
characterized by the ,,survival of the fittest", family background was
no longer of overridingimportance.An individual's ability and frequently
sheer force, counted for more than anything else in finding a niche in
society. At least in the struggle for power, might made right.
The breakdown of the authority of the Shogunate made it necessary
for the military men to depend upon their own strength, and the daimyos
were forced to adopt the policy of developing and strengthening the
economy of their domains. Thus, in spite of, or perhaps more because
1 Honjo Eijir6, ,,Ikki no Kannen," Keizai Ronso, 8:
135-40,
Jan. 1919.
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ChitoshiYanaga
of the internecine warfare which was in progress, it became necessary
to develop a high degree of economic self-sufficiencyin order to survive.
Industries were encouragedand trade flourished as never before 1. Free
markets were established and merchants were given preferential treatment such as exemption from business tax for they were needed to
raise money for the feudal lords and also to serve as purveyors of military
equipment and provisions. Commercialcities developed rapidly and the
method of carrying on trade underwent change. Periodic fairs and
markets gave way to permanent shops in business sections of towns
and cities. A commercial revolution had thus been achieved.
Toward the end of the Sengoku, the use of firearms radically changed
the art of warfare by introducing foot foldiers and formationfighting.
It also brought fortifications from the hills down to the plains for the
utilization of natural barrierswas no longer an important consideration.
Moreover,the headquarters of the daimyo came to be more of a socioeconomic-politicalcenter than a military bastion. The castle towns were
chosen more for the convenience of location and became the collecting
and distributing centers for many of the products of the feudatories.
The center of activities and also of wealth and economic power
shifted from the daimyo's castle to the market place in the business
section controlled by the chonin. The coming of the Europeans in the
middle of the I6th century led, in a matter of decades, to the establishment of foreign trade activities centering at Nagasaki and whetted the
commercial appetite of the daimyos. Hideyoshi who was in every
respect a nouveau riche developed a tremendous liking for gold and
treasures and an insatiable taste for wealth. In no time, he developed
into a mercantilist. His mercantilism, however, was aided and abetted
by his contacts with the Europeans who came to Japan.
It hardly needs to be emphasized that the growth of cities like Osaka,
Hy6go, Yamaguchi and others owe greatly to the role played by the
merchants and the commerce they developed. The city of Sakai, the
forerunnerof Osaka,untouched by warfareduringthe Sengoku,prospered.
Nobles from Kyoto, scholars, writers, merchants, and artisans flocked to
the city which was an oasis of prosperity in the midst of internecine
warfare and helped to make it into not only a great commercial center
of the nation but a cultural center as well. Christianmissionariesestablished their headquarters and Western learning was absorbed and
disseminated through the city which became the center of Western
medical science. It was to the city that the treasury of the Ashikaga
1 Miura Hiroyuki, ,,Ashikaga Jidai no Tsfsh6." Keizai Ronso, 23: 88I-90I, Dec.,
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I926.
Transition to bourgeois society in Japan
I23
Shogunate looked for revenues as well as the skill necessary for its
management.
The Azuchi-Momoyamaperiod which brought about the consolidation
of fragmented power and restored peace and national unity exemplified
the rise of the power of the common people which was the outgrowth
of a century of devastating civil warfare. Men with ability had risen to
prominence and power despite the lack of family background and social
status. Countless instances are found of those who rose from humble
beginnings to positions of influence and power. No better example can
be found than the great commoner Toyotomi Hideyoshi himself who
had risen from the position of sandal bearerto that of the Prime Minister
and the military-political dictator of the nation. Many of the daimyos
were of such lowly origin that until they achieved power, they had no
social standing at all. Maeda Toshiie whose fief in Kaga province was
the largest of all daimyo domains with more than a million koku in
annual rice stipend, Kato Kiyomasa of the Korean Expedition fame,
and Asano Nagamasa for whom the 47 ronin demonstrated their unswerving loyalty in their celebrated act of vengeance were daimyos whose
ancestries could be traced to the peasantry. Konishi Yukinaga, Hideyoshi's Christian general and Ishida Mitsunari another outstanding
general under Hideyoshi were both of chonin origin. It is in the light
of this general social background of the Azuchi-Momoyamaperiod that
the developments of Tokugawa society, which is in a sense its continuation, must be viewed.
Hideyoshi, the mercantilist, who dreamed of a vast commercial
empire under his control extending over much of Eastern Asia for the
achievement of which he undertook the unprofitable Korean expedition,
was followed by Ieyasu whose policies were motivated by the strong
desire for wealth and power not any less than his predecessor's.However,
Ieyasu was a cautious, patient and astute planner who left nothing to
chance and was not given to spectacular adventures. With consummate
skill and great care he planned so that the political power which he
achieved after a long struggle would be perpetuated in the Tokugawa
family. All his planning and policies were therefore directed toward the
achievement of this single goal. He would achieve it through peace,
stable social structure, and prosperity. The policy of seclusion which
was effectuated after his death and kept the nation in isolation more
than two centuries was designed to achieve this purpose.
Ieyasu and his successors instituted policies and legislation which
were designed to insure political and social stability. The class system,
first initiated by Hideyoshi dividing society into four main functional
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Chitoshi Yanaga
classes had the effect of separating the samurai completely from the land
and the peasantry to which they had been closely tied. Stable peace so
successfully enforced by the Tokugawa deprived the samurai class of its
traditional and specialized function and turned it into an unproductive,
parasitical, and superfluouselement of society. It became a leisure class
but without the necessary means to enjoy the fruits of leisure. Yet they
went ahead and indulged themselves in those pleasures patronized by
the wealthy chonin. The specialized talents of the samurai were not
needed in a peaceful society and actually became atrophied beyond
repair as their activities and interests and tastes became further and
further removed from their normal function. The samurai thus turned
into civilians.
From a virile, vigorous, and frugal life in rural surroundings, the
samurai class was transformed into an extravagant, degenerate urban
class dependent on the help and support of the peasants on the one
hand and the merchants on the other. By leaving the land behind and
moving to the city, the samurai ceased to be self-sustaining1. The
income which was adequate for rural living no longer sufficed in the city.
Their standard of living rose sharply and their purchasingpower dropped
as they found themselves impoverished by high prices as well as by the
losses invariably suffered in the process of exchanging their rice income
into money. This was the price they had to pay for their urbanization.
Their economic position was renderedunstable and insecure for they had
no control over price fluctuations which were more often than not
induced by the deliberate manipulations of the merchants.
It is patently clear that Tokugawa policy was responsible for the
impoverishment of the samurai class from the daimyo down to the
lowest man in the feudal structure. The system of sankin kotai, or
alternate residence, of periodic shifts of fiefs, and of expensive public
works and construction though designed to keep the Shogunate strong
drained the coffers of the daimyo and his retainers and weakened them.
Urban living nourished extravagant tastes but contributed nothing
toward the ameliorationof financial difficulties. Hamperedand stultified
by the rigid control exercised over them, the samurai class suffered from
the loss of vigor and courage as well as imagination, originality, and
initiative and for the most part they had lost their raison d'etre,though
not the zest for extravagant living.
The Shogunate's unrealistic policy of encouraging agriculture and
discouragingcommerce in its attempt to preserve the economic basis of
1
Honj6 Eijir6, ,,Bushi Kaikyfi no Kyubo6",Keizai Ronso, 24: 202-223,
Jan.,
I927.
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Transition to bourgeois society in Japan
I25
feudalism did not producethe desiredresults. Prolongedpeace encouraged
extravagance as well as the expansion of commerce neither of which
was compatible with the preservation of feudalism. In spite of constant
efforts of the authorities agriculture suffered while commerce prospered.
The development of money economy and the accumulation of capital
in the hands of the chonin shifted the locus of power from the samurai
to the townspeople for, indeed, wealth had supplanted status as the
source and basis of power. The samurai class was no longer in possession
of financialpower or even financialsecurity for the merchantshad absolute
control of market prices as well as credit. The ruling class was at the
mercy of the chonin without whose financial support it was no longer
able to keep the feudal system intact. So powerful had the chonin of
Osaka, the financial capital of Tokugawa Japan, become that it used to
be a common saying that the wrath of Osakamerchantscould turn the 300
daimyos pale and make them tremble with fear. For indeed, it was
possible for the kakeya1 or the financial agents of the daimyos to blacklist
any offending daimyo and collectively deny any credit until and unless
amends were made.
Until about the middle of Tokugawa, land was the chief if not the
sole form of wealth since productionwas derivedlargely from it, However,
a change in the form and substance of wealth came about as the result of
the rapid development of mining especially of gold and silver and the
rise of commerce and manufacturing.All these new means of production
affected the living conditions of the samurai who found that the productivity of the land which they controlled was no longer adequate for their
support. Even the amount of land which remained in their control
decreased steadily as wealthy merchants acquired land and became
landowners.
Living in urban environment and in close proximity to the townspeople, the samurai soon caught the chonin spirit and developed a keen
interest in money and profit which they had not so long ago held in
contempt as unbefitting their dignity and status. Now they refused to
do anything which was not remunerative or profitable. By the Ky6ho
era, (I716-I735), driven partly by poverty and partly by extravagant
living, the samurai were looking for profit even in the arrangement of
marriages and adoptions 2. Not a few of the farsighted samurai had
abandoned their career for which they saw no future and entered the
1 For the relationship of the daimyo to the Kakeya, see Yokoi Tokifuyu, ,,Daimyo to Kakeya
to no Kankei", Shigaku Zasshi, 9: 7I3-I6,
2
(I898).
Tsuchiya Takao, ,,Ippan Bushidan no Keizaiteki Taihai to Henshitsu", Shigaku Zasshi, 42
(193I):
1-38.
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Yanaga, Transition to bourgeois society in Japan
more attractive field of business. The Mitsui family had the foresight
to turn to business as early as the seventeenth century to build the
greatest financial house in Japanese history.
The influence of commercial capital made its impact felt on the life
of the samurai class and the nature of their everyday life. Samurai
families in financial distress were forced to enter into productive activities in order to keep themselves together. They became a part of the
cottage industries which flourishedin late Tokugawa and participated in
the manufacture of commercial goods such as paper lanterns, paper
parasols, brooms, baskets, toothpicks, writing brushes, fans, candies,
and other things 1. Not a few of them were engaged in spinning and in
weaving while others operated pet shops handling birds, singing insects,
and gold fish, flower shops and nurseries. Some even engaged in poultry
raising as well as fishing.
There was little doubt that financial control was firmly in the hands
of the chonin by the middle of the Tokugawa period. But it was quite
obvious too that they also occupied a commanding position in the
social and cultural life of the nation although they were barred from
direct participation in political affairs. The chonin had become the
producers and consumers as well as patrons of the arts, literature,
learning, and the sciences. Without their wealth and patronage, the
theatres and the arts could not have flourished as they did. In the field
of drama, particularly the kabuki, the playwrights, players, and patrons
were for the most part the townspeople. In the fields of fiction, poetry,
and colorprints, the masters came from the choninclass as in mathematics
economics, pharmacology, etc.
Thus, it is clear that the Tokugawa period witnessed the gradual
passing of actual power in society from the military to the newly-risen
bourgeoisie,in spite of the fiction which was maintained that the samurai
class was in complete control of society. Of great significance is the
wide dissemination of the chonin spirit that provided the foundation
necessaryfor the industrialrevolution and the establishmentof capitalism
in the second half of the nineteenth century.
1 Ibid.
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