In 1853, four modern American warships sailed into Tokyo Bay. The ships were led by Commodore Matthew Perry, a high-ranking Navy officer. The ships’ arrival was a show of power. Perry hoped to force Japan to change its trading approach and allow American merchants to trade. For 200 years, Japan had kept its national economy closed off to the world. The Japanese rarely traded with outsiders. But Americans were rapidly producing pots, cloth, and other goods. American businesses saw Japan as a great new market. The island had a huge population. Perry’s move was not necessarily an act of war. Still, suddenly bringing warships to one of Japan’s largest harbors was risky.

Did Perry’s aggressive marketing work? Check out this Japanese poster from 1887. It gives an idea of how Japan responded to the forceful display. The poster teaches the Japanese versions of “fashionable English words.” Japan in the late 1800s was already one of the world’s most well-read societies. Now, they were learning English. This shows how much they now cared about international business. 

The Tokugawa Shogunate

So why now? Before 1868, for about 700 years, Japan had been ruled by Tokugawa shoguns. There was a Japanese emperor, but he had little real power. Shoguns were military leaders who ruled over certain regions. Some would call them dictators. Their job was to keep society stable in their region.

Japan had a rigid class system during this period. At the bottom were peasants. Above peasants were farmers and makers, or artisans. Above artisans and farmers was a class of soldiers called samurai. The samurai served regional lords, called the daimyo. Stability was important, so the lines between classes were drawn very clearly. However, people were still able to move between classes. In fact, some peasants managed to become important lords.

Japanese society also highly valued thinking and studying. During this time, new art, literature, early forms of comics, and philosophy were constantly emerging there. Japan had more people who could read than most of the world’s other regions at this time. Literature and poems were highly prized. However, contact with the outside world was restricted. Under the Tokugawa shoguns, Europeans were only ever legally allowed to trade at one port, Nagasaki. (That’s another reason Perry’s warships in Tokyo Bay were such a shocking sight.)

But Tokugawa Japan had an economic problem. The shoguns relied on taxing agriculture to keep the country going and to stay in power. It was especially because the regional daimyo lords and samurai had to be paid. Over time, this did not produce enough money for the government. The only way to keep things going was to raise taxes on the peasants. As a result, they were increasingly angry. This weakened the government of Japan at a critical time.

Commodore Perry tried to force Japan to “do business.” Japan’s leaders naturally feared a future takeover. Nearby, China was being torn apart by European states forcing the Chinese to buy Western products. This included opium, a drug that had bad effects on Chinese society. Japan’s leaders worried that something similar could happen in Japan if the country did not modernize. Military and industrial reforms were put in place to prepare for defense against Europe. But these changes made some problems worse. Unrest had already been building within the peasant and samurai classes. The result of these changes was a period of political chaos. Many Japanese argued against copying the Europeans and Americans. They wished to preserve Japanese culture and way of life. In the mid-1860s, a brief civil war broke out. The reformers wanted modernization in the style of those Western nations. Eventually, the reformers won and took power. They were called the Meiji.

Meiji

The new government quickly tried to gain support from the Japanese people. The Meiji took control of the emperor’s palace. The new leaders claimed they were only restoring the emperor to power. But they were really creating a brand new government. That’s why this event is often called the Meiji “Restoration.” Really, though, it was more of a revolution. The Meiji government promoted new forms of national art and literature. Messages praising the new government, the Emperor, and modernization were distributed across Japan. Such printed material and art that is made to spread a political idea is known as propaganda.

To modernize, they quickly studied European and U.S. political systems. But their ideas weren’t an exact copy. Japan’s leaders created a new form of government. It mixed Western industrial styles with their own traditions and needs. They built more schools. They trained people to work in and run factories. The army was reorganized and given new weapons.

Meiji Japan quickly industrialized and modernized. Soon its rulers looked at the United States and Europe as dangerous rivals. The West’s increasing meddling in places like China made Japan nervous. Some Meiji leaders said that Japan could only protect itself by industrializing. This idea is often called “defensive modernization.”

Unfortunately, Japanese industry was at a disadvantage. The island country lacked many raw materials. Japan was lacking coal, for example, a burnable rock. The goods they were able to produce faced high tariffs—import taxes—from already industrialized countries. Still, Japan was determined that its industry grow as fast as possible. So the nation took extreme actions. Business leaders were brought into government. Tax money was poured into the building of industry. Japan aimed for new markets for its goods and resources to make the goods. Like industrialized societies elsewhere, it created some markets by forcefully taking colonies. Korea was an early target. It had many natural resources and a large population to buy Japanese products.

Japan continues to be an industrial power today. However, its industrial economy remains focused on large companies. Many of these companies are closely tied to the country’s government. So, Japan does fit into the wider model of changes to production and distribution brought in by the Industrial Revolution. But its particular place within this system is unique.