Meiji period

Statue of Emperor Meiji at Naminoue Shrine in Okinawa, identified as kokka (国家), or, "The State."

• Dates: 1868-1912
• Other Names: 近代 (kindai)
• Japanese: 明治時代 (Meiji jidai)

The Meiji period, spanning the years from 1868 to 1912, saw dramatic changes in myriad aspects of politics, economy, culture, and society, and marked the emergence of the modern nation-state of Japan.

Politics

Following the Meiji Restoration which overthrew the Tokugawa shogunate, a new Imperial government under the Meiji Emperor was established, patterned after the constitutional monarchies and democracies of the West. After much consideration and debate, a Constitution was written up, and promulgated in 1889.

That said, though the history of this period is often, necessarily, simplified, the Meiji government did not, in fact, have a set plan from the beginning, which they then smoothly laid out step-by-step, addressing all the key problems in good order and good time. Quite to the contrary, during that time from 1868 until the promulgation of the Constitution in 1889, things were quite unstable. There was much disagreement within the government, and without. The Restoration could have fallen apart, or gone in a dramatically different direction, at any of numerous points.

• Abolition of Han. As part of the dismantling of the feudal system, the central government took control of most of the country's castles. Many were demolished at this time. Some were turned over to governmental or military purposes. Many former daimyô clans relocated to secondary residences, turning these into primary family mansions; the Hotta clan mansion which survives in Sakura, Chiba prefecture, and the Shimazu clan's Iso mansion at Sengan'en in Kagoshima are examples of this.
• Genro, etc.
• Iwakura Embassy
• Seikanron
• Satsuma Rebellion & other shizoku rebellions
• Constitution
• National Diet

Japan also began along the path of imperialism in the Meiji period, annexing Ezo (Hokkaidô) in 1869, the Ryûkyû Islands in 1879, Taiwan in 1895, and Korea in 1905-1910.

Economics

In terms of commerce, industry, and infrastructure, the country modernized perhaps more quickly than any country ever has. Railroads, electricity, gaslamps, steamships, and countless other technological advances which began to be introduced in the Bakumatsu era spread, quickly becoming ubiquitous. Banks, factories, import-export companies, and other sorts of modern corporate businesses abounded, and Japan quickly became a competitive force on the world stage. The government hired some 3,000 foreigners to serve as advisors and teachers in guiding these infrastructure efforts, and in teaching the first generation of Japanese experts at the newly established Imperial universities. The majority by far were experts in engineering and architecture, and were employed by the Ministry of Education.

Much of these economic changes were driven by individual entrepreneurs, including many of the former merchant class (such as the founders of Mitsukoshi, etc.), and also many of the former samurai class; for example, the Shimazu clan shifted their family wealth into the Shimazu Corporation, and low-ranking samurai Iwasaki Yatarô founded Mitsubishi. But much of this economic modernization and growth was also fueled by the government, which promoted nationalist slogans such as bunmei kaika (文明開化, "civilization and enlightenment"), fukoku kyôhei (富国強兵, "prosperous country, strong military"), wakon yôsai (和魂洋才, "Japanese spirit, Western technique"), and shokusan kôgyô (殖産興業, promotion of industry).

Society

The samurai class was abolished in 187X, and the system of feudal domains (han) in 1871. Though all were now meant to be relatively equal, as Imperial subjects, no longer divided into Confucian classes of merchants, peasants, and artisans, a new aristocracy was formed to include the former daimyô, court nobles, and others.

Culture

Everyday culture changed dramatically, from food to fashion to architecture, as Western styles were adopted. Much was retained, of course, or evolved into new modern forms without being discarded entirely; still, modernity came quickly, especially in the big cities, in these respects.

A national culture was born for the first time. Public education, nationwide newspapers, and the abolition of the feudal system & centralization of government under Tokyo, along with numerous other factors fueled the development of a single national culture. Regional culture was celebrated, but it was also suppressed, as the government put into place nationwide public education curricula, encouraged the development of a "standard" Japanese language, and so forth.

Further, in the arts, considerable efforts were made to develop and promote "national" arts; many new art forms, such as Nihonga (neo-traditional painting) and yôga (Western-style oil painting) were born out of this, while many older art forms, such as Noh, kabuki, and tea ceremony, were formalized or re-invented as "national traditions." This was born, in part, out of much the same motivations as a number of other cultural developments of the period: namely, the desire to prove to the Japanese people, and to the world, that Japan was modern, civilized, and possessed just as worthy a tradition and history as any other great nation. The city of Kyoto was intentionally shaped into a symbol of Japan's great, noble, past, and numerous historical figures (such as Kusunoki Masashige) were revived and celebrated as national heroes. Nitobe Inazô invented and promoted the notion of bushido as a corollary to Europe's great tradition of chivalry. A European-style aristocratic peerage, complete with titles equivalent to Baron, Duke, and Marquis, was implemented, and many classical government positions were given equivalent European names; for example, the post of Naidaijin was named Lord of the Privy Seal, and was, at least partially, patterned in its new, modern incarnation, after the position of Lord of the Privy Seal in European courts.

For the first decade or two of the period, the Meiji government made little concerted effort to guide the (re)building and shaping of Tokyo and Kyoto, and in fact for the first several years of the period the government remained undecided as to which city would be the official capital, or whether they might have multiple capitals. Even after it was decided that Tokyo would be the national, Imperial, capital, for many years little coordinated effort was made to reshape the city into a national symbol and modern capital in the Western/modern mode. Only in the late 1880s and 1890s (albeit with a few earlier exceptions) did the government begin to build grand boulevards, triumphal arches, massive public parks, and statues of national heroes. And it was only at that time, in fact, that the Tokyo Imperial Palace itself was (re)built, from being a samurai castle which largely burned down in an 187X blaze, to being a modern Imperial palace. Similarly, the old imperial capital of Kyoto was largely left to simply fall into disrepair from 1868 until the 1880s, before the government decided to make a concerted effort to shape Kyoto into a powerful symbol of Japan's illustrious past. Beginning in the 1880s, the Kyoto Imperial Palace was repaired, and much of its grounds transformed into a public park, with many other sites in the city attracting government attention and support as well. Historian Takashi Fujitani writes of a "museumification of Kyoto" which was effected at this time, transforming the city into something "not unlike a public museum in its display of objects that were to be appreciated as the true representations of history."

State Shinto was also developed, along with a complex set of rituals, tradition, and national ideology surrounding the Emperor. However, like much else in this period, this developed over time. Though many of the earliest Meiji period documents express adulation of the emperor, continuing the sonnô jôi and kokugaku rhetoric which preceded them, it was only after the 1895 victory over the Chinese that the ultranationalist forms of "emperor-worship" emblematic of the 1930s-1940s began to settle into place. Buddhism was at the same time very briefly but very powerfully suppressed; a great many temples were closed in 1869-1870 or so, and a great many Buddhist artworks, icons, and artifacts were either sold to foreign collectors or were destroyed.