Observed from an objective distance, the rise of Japanese economic power in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries is a testament to the logistical genius of its governmental officials. The program of modernization and industrialization, adopted during the Meiji Restoration and continuing for the following half-century, allowed Japan to evolve from the feudal, agrarian country of the Tokugawa period to one of the economic leaders of the modern world. Further study of the social costs of such rapid development undermines the value of such a successful maturation, however. Mikiso Hane, in Peasants, Rebels, & Outcastes: The Underside of Modern Japan (Pantheon Books, New York: 1982; 297 pp.), argues that the costs and consequences of modernization were most deeply and painfully endured by the lower classes of Japan. While the wealthy industrialists and city merchants enjoyed the benefits of a modern economy, the peasants, who accounted for the majority of the Japanese population, felt increasingly alienated, both economically and culturally, from the urban elites. This gulf between the rich and the poor only worsened as Japan continued to modernize. The sole outlet that the peasants believed available to them was the military, yet Hane argues that the army too was merely a tool for exploiting the lower classes. Hane’s arguments are thorough and convincing, although obviously written from a leftist point of view. His liberal convictions lend credence and potency to his dissertation, however, and despite a few minor flaws, such ideological determination remains the strongest aspect of the book.
One of the principal outcomes of the Meiji Restoration was the commencement of modernization in Japan. Government officials immediately embarked on a program to industrialize Japan and bring it to a more equal socio-economic and technological level with the western countries. Such a program is of obvious importance to the prosperity of a nation in the modern world, yet Hane explores the social consequences of such rapid development. His most noticeable fault is that sub-textually he seems to condemn industrialization completely: the consequences outweigh its benefits. He does not make any reference to the similar periods of industrial growth in the western countries, when exploitation of the lower classes was just as marked as it was in Japan. Neither does he consider that such a painful stage of growth is perhaps necessary for the development of a civilization. Thus, his book has a mild romantic undertone, a form of nostalgia for traditional rural values. It can be argued that the peasants of the pre-industrial era did not in fact live more pleasant lives than those of the early industrial era. They were equally exploited by the Tokugawa ruling class, and had to lead a dreary, plodding existence consisting of heavy work under a constant threat of death from starvation and disease. Their lives were no more diverse, interesting, or certain than their modern-era counterparts. Conversely, efforts were made during the Meiji Restoration to ameliorate their social standing. While such measures as the abolition of the samurai and the redistribution of land had few immediately positive effects, they would lead to the more egalitarian social system in place by the middle of the twentieth century.
Hane’s arguments should not be rejected for the sole reason of such “rural-nostalgia” however, as they do remain powerful. The supplementary material that he provides — excerpts from diaries, interviews, and fictional works — allows the reader to more completely grasp the suffering and hardships endured by the lower classes. Indeed, many of the extracts quite explicitly demonstrate the inhumanity shown by the Japanese government and industrialists for their own countrymen; in several instances some Japanese, most notably the burakumin, were treated as badly or worse than non-citizens and prisoners of war. Hane treats such instances with an understandable bias, and perhaps even with a subtext of disgust. While the diary entries convey a powerful simplicity and immediacy of emotion, it is the more lengthy fictional extracts which truly provide a vivid description of life during such a difficult period. In this manner Hane demonstrates an awareness that the true reflection of a turbulent society is its artistic output. He therefore provides the reader with a direct association with the plight of the lower classes, and consequently one feels sympathy towards them. The extracts also provide a more human and emotional quality to an otherwise conventional sociological study.
It becomes explicitly clear that few peasants immediately benefited from modernization. Farm life did not improve drastically during the industrial era, and in many instances prosperity decreased for farmers as they had to face the increasing tax demands forced on them by the government to pay for the program of modernization. In times of severe economic stress, mostly caused by low crop yields, although a bumper crop could be equally detrimental, peasant families had to resort to extreme measures to remain alive. Many lost their property to more wealthy landlords, and thus entered into the debt-cycle of tenant farming. While the tenant farmers themselves were relieved from paying taxes, the rent charged by landlords frequently exceeded the tax levels that had been charged by the government. Hane skilfully and importantly focuses on two of the measures that were followed to relieve economic strain: infanticide and prostitution. He conveys the sense of utter hopelessness that was felt by the peasants, which had to have reached a truly great level to force families to adopt such horrible practices. While they did regret, for example, selling their daughters into brothels, many of the source documents describe the families as without any other means of survival; receiving several hundred yen for the sale of a daughter was likely a godsend to most peasants who were heavily in debt to landlords and money-lenders. Hane tactfully, yet explicitly, details the wretched lives of the girls sold into prostitution: although they were frequently abused by their clients and perhaps even more so by their employers, they were commonly in debt to the brothel owners and therefore had no legal opportunity to escape to a more “human” existence.
Consequently, many young people from the lower classes believed that a better life for them was to be found working in the newly emerging factories and mines. Alternately however, they were merely exploited as a source of inexpensive labour, and were accordingly treated as expendable and unimportant. Indeed, as had been the case throughout the early industrial period and especially in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, in order for the workers to maintain the pace of the production level of the machines they operated, they themselves had to act as machines in a Dickensian fashion. Workers frequently laboured in shifts of more than fourteen hours and in a few instances, mostly in the mines where quotas were demanded, as much as twenty or more. Additionally, the workers were kept labouring and “coordinated” by foremen who exercised their authority in a very brutal manner. Hane provides explicit accounts of workers treated almost as poorly as Korean prisoners of war (pp. 230-42). Although some workers received wages of greater than one hundred yen per month, a considerable sum compared to farm life, the majority earned a much lower pay. Indeed, as many workers were sold to the factories by their families — in a similar manner as the young girls had been sold into prostitution — they were in debt to their employers and thus could not legally leave their jobs. Perhaps the greatest strength of Hane’s text is his treatment of these industrial workers. Their cruel and inhumane predicament remains one of the most persuasive aspects of his argument, as the extracts he provides elicit great sympathy from modern readers.
Of secondary importance to Hane is the nature of the Japanese educational system during this period. It stressed moral purity and loyalty to the Emperor and the state (shūshin and chūkun aikoku respectively), and indeed it became a potent tool for indoctrinating the Japanese populace towards the support of the Emperor. Hane is convincing in his argument that the cult of the Emperor as taught in public schools was quickly and seamlessly converted to one of militant nationalism that fuelled the armed forces (pp. 59-62). Young peasant men who had been educated with the chūkun aikoku morality would certainly have seen the army as the most favourable means of escaping the poverty in their villages. Additionally, they would be elevated in status, as to the Japanese populace the army was seen as glorious and auspicious. Despite the lure to the population however, Hane reveals that the armed forces were as equally exploitative of the lower classes as the industrialists stated above. They had to endure a great amount of abuse from their superior officers, and they in turn maltreated their inferiors, which included foreign civilians, most notably the Koreans. The appeal of the armed forces continued however, and it proceeded to envelop the Japanese population and society. So too did the chūkun aikoku ideology, which reached a zenith with the Kamikaze pilots of World War II. While the educational system did ensure obedience to higher authorities, and especially a subservience to the Emperor, it was never completely successful at indoctrinating the population. There were a great many revolts and uprisings during the early industrial period, ranging from tenant disputes to factory strikes. In this instance Hane is slightly incomplete in his argument, as he does not correlate the reform movement with the dogma taught in the educational system. This inconsistency is linked with the anti-industrial subtext outlined above. It is precisely because of the educational and economic gains produced by modernization that peasants began to become aware of the exploitative relationship between them and the upper classes, and consequently act to reform the Japanese socio-economic structure. Hane’s criticism of the educational system during this period remains valid and convincing however, despite such a minor oversight.
It is perhaps far too easy in the late twentieth century to agree with Mikiso Hane’s arguments concerning the welfare of the lower classes. Contemporary readers are much too accustomed to the apparent freedoms of today’s social and economic climate to appreciate the journey that is required to achieve those liberties. Arguably, the period of poverty and despair that accompanies the early stages of industrialization are required in order to proceed to a post-industrial state. Such a harsh reality of Dickensian social costs has certainly existed in the history of every modern nation, and despite Hane’s “rural nostalgia”, Japan was not to be exempted from the consequences of modernization. Nevertheless, he has provided an important study on the lower classes during the transition from a pre- to a post-industrial society. His arguments are largely complete and, especially to a leftist reader, convincing. The text is highly readable and clearly communicated, and is therefore readily understood by both academics and the general population. Indeed, the diaries and fictional extracts lend Peasants, Rebels, & Outcastes a vivacity and emotionalism not usually associated with socio-economic academia.
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