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Review of 明治維新と近代日本の新しい見方 （M・ウィリアム・スティール著、 大野ロベルト訳、 東京堂出版、 2019年）
John SAGERS*
Keywords: Commoners in the Meiji Transformation, Modernization and its
Problems, Cultural Nationalism, Transportation, Famine Relief

This excellent Japanese-language book
is a series of essays by M. William Steele,
longtime professor of Japanese history atInternational Christian University in Japan.
Versions of these essays have appeared
elsewhere in English or Japanese and havebeen translated as needed by Robert Ono. In
this review, I have tried to quote the original
English versions wherever possible.
Since writing his doctoral dissertationon Katsu Kaishu’s role in the Meiji
Restoration, Steele has long been interested
in the lesser known stories and perspectives
on the revolutionary changes following theshogun’s government’s fall in 1868. Steele isespecially interested in what happened to the those who supported the losing
Tokugawa side of the Restoration conflict, how the upheaval affectedcommoners, and the opinions of those who both welcomed and feared
importation of new technologies from the West. Readers interested in a wider
view of the Meiji Restoration and Japan’s subsequent modernization will findthis book a fascinating collection of case studies that shed light on areas ofJapanese history that generally do not appear in conventional Restoration
narratives.
Chapter 1 seeks to explain the Commodore Perry mission in the contextof American politics. While every Japanese history textbook includes* Linfield College McMinnville, Oregon, USA

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Journal of Cultural Interaction in East Asia Vol. 11 2020

Commodore Matthew Perry’s famous arrival in Japan and demands to open
the country for trade, few give much explanation of why he was there at thisparticular time in 1853. This chapter tells the story from the perspective ofAmerican politicians who saw California’s cities as gateways for Pacifictrade. As Secretary of State Daniel Webster noted, an agreement with Japan
would establish, “the last link in that great chain which united all nations ofthe world, by the establishment of a line of steamers” (40). In their voyages
from California to China, American steamships would need coal and othersupplies, so Perry was tasked with securing a treaty with Japan to obtainthese supplies. After these initial observations, Steele turns his attention toCalifornia’s newspapers for a glimpse of what Californians thought of a new
trade relationship with Japan. Editorial writers believed the people of Japan tobe ready for trade but blocked by “the Government of Japan and its attendantaristocracy” which were “bigoted representatives of power.” ( 42 )Furthermore, Americans had destiny to carry freedom and commerce to thepeople of Japan. Californians were delighted when news of Perry’s treaty
reached them and merchants like San Francisco’s Silas E. Burrows quickly
moved to establish trading operations in Japanese ports. From this chapter, wegain a better understanding of Japan’s treaties with the United States asproducts of a global trend toward increased trade facilitated by the rise ofsteamships in commerce.
Chapter 2 is an extended analysis a woodblock print entitled “ACompendium of Events and Record of the Rice Market from 1853 to 1868”
published by the Kintakudo in Osaka in mid-1868. Without the benefit of acoherent historical narrative that comes from hindsight, it was unclear in1868 what the Meiji Restoration would become. Rather than the modernization success story of later historiography, things looked ominous, even apocalyptic, in 1868. The years leading up to 1868 were marked by a series ofpolitical, economic, and natural disasters. Political turmoil was represented bydepictions of foreign “black ships” challenging Japan’s seclusion policy aswell as conflicts between activists for an imperial restoration and theshogun’s supporters culminating in civil war by 1867. Economic events
included government issues of new currency and the rising cost of living forcity dwellers. Natural disasters included a great storm and earthquake in
1855, an outbreak of cholera in 1858, and measles epidemics in 1859, 1860,
1861, and 1862 that affected large segments of Japan’s population. Religious
movements tried to make sense of these destabilizing events. As Steeleobserves, at the time the print was created in 1868, “the imperial forces had
yet to achieve victory over the supporters of the old regime. To the residentsof Japan’s largest cities, Edo and Osaka, the future seemed bleak. The
confluence of political, economic, religious and natural forces offered little

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hope for a return to everyday stability and established morality; not only was
the world turned upside down, but at what seemed to be a dead end” (111112). Uncertainty and fear, therefore, were important elements of theJapanese people’s experience of the Meiji Restoration.
Chapter 3 also examines the experiences of Edo commoners in 1868 using
woodblock prints and popular printed materials as sources. We learn that Edo
commoners were often not very sympathetic to the imperial forces whommany believed to be lawless hoodlums. In the confusion, public order broke
down and commoners were increasingly willing to accept any governmentthat could restore the city’s normal operation. In this context, we see that thenew government’s decision to move the emperor to Edo and rename the city
Tokyo can be seen as part of a strategy to secure legitimacy and use theexisting government bureaucracy to bring order after the uncertainty of civil
war. Steele argues that while many Edo residents did not like being ruled byoutsiders as new officials from Satsuma and Choshu took over government
functions from the Tokugawa, commoners generally muddled through andtried to resume their lives under the new regime. In an analysis of woodblock
prints from the era, we learn that although prayers might now be directed tothe emperor rather than the shogun, “The contents of thoseprayers...remained basically unchanged: a chance to work hard, prosper, andenjoy life.” (149-150).
Chapter 4 investigates Katsu Kaishu’s 1880s revision of Meiji Restoration
history in terms more favorable to the Tokugawa regime. After the Matsukata
Deflation, the Freedom and Popular Rights Movement grew critical of theMeiji oligarchs’ hold on power and what they saw as a general lack ofprogress toward greater political participation since the Restoration. In the1880s and 1890s, Katsu Kaishu and others assembled documents from theTokugawa archives and reevaluated the Tokugawa side of the Restoration
conflict. They argued that the Tokugawa had acted out of a desire to protect
the country and promote its interests. In fact, the Tokugawa regime deserved
most of the credit for opening the country to trade, sending missions abroad,and beginning to modernize Japan’s military. In Katsu’s view, the Meiji
government continued rather than reformed many of the Tokugawa
Shogunate’s initiatives. Moreover, nostalgia for the Tokugawa in history
writing became an avenue for criticizing the problems of the Meiji government.
Chapter 5 looks at the cultural conservative Sada Kaiseki who wassuspicious of things imported from the West. He believed that replacing
Japanese products like lamps, paper, and writing brushes with items imported
from the West would undermine Japan’s independence and culture. In Sada’sview, the Civilization and Enlightenment movement’s love of Western things

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was misguided and would lead to serious problems. Later nationalists andcultural conservatives would express similar ideas as they looked back toearlier Japanese culture with nostalgia.
Chapter 6 examines the effects of wheels, rickshaws, and bicycles on
Japanese society. When restrictions on the use of wheels were lifted after
1868, transportation allowed people unprecedented mobility. At first bicycles
were status symbols ridden by men, but by the 1920s and 1930s they had
become utility vehicles for all classes and genders. For women, bicycles wereoriginally associated with a lack of morality, but gradually became more
popular as physical fitness was incorporated into women’s education.
Bicycles and the mobility that they brought to people’s lives became closely
associated with modernization.
Chapter 7 looks at how Japanese folk arts drew from Western critics ofmodernization and rationalism. In response to the global spread of modern
science and technology, nationalists turned to distinctive cultural traditions,arts, and crafts to preserve their cultural identities. When Japanese students
went to Europe, they encountered this new value put on premodern crafts andreturned to Japan with a desire to promote Japan’s folk arts and crafts as partof the nation’s cultural heritage. Yanagi Muneyoshi was a philosopher andscholar of the folk-art movement who looked to traditional Japanese arts tocounter what he believed to be the excessively mechanical, artificial, andindividualistic elements of Western culture. Western scholars like Basil Hall
Chamberlain also found much to admire in the arts of Japan. This chapter
demonstrates that the Japanese folk-art movement really developed as part ofan international conversation regarding the aesthetics of traditional Japanesearts and crafts.
Chapter 8 focuses on the Great Northern Famine of 1905-1906. Cold andwet year led to crop failures in area around Sendai. Western missionaries inthe region were among the first to spread the news of the ensuing famine anda worldwide relief effort developed. The international attention on Japan
during these years was mixed. While praised for Japan’s victory over Russia,
the Japanese government was also criticized for not doing more to help thevictims of the famine. The Japanese government called on self-help andshamed the people of Northeastern Japan for their backwardness that invited
misery. Western missionaries joined in promoting the view of the region’s
backwardness and helped organize a relief effort. Sending relief to far off
places was a new practice in the 1870s and 1880s with missionary organizations like Salvation Army and International Red Cross leading the way. Theirefforts were facilitated with faster telegraph communications, growing
popular Christian journalism, the ability to wire money internationally using
services like Western Union. The Northeast region’s reputation for backward-Book Reviews

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ness continued into the twentieth century and there were some echoes of thisview in the international relief efforts following the 2011 earthquake andtsunami.
A chapter on Kume Kunitake’s views of the Meiji experience forms thebook’s epilogue. Kume was an official present at the start of the Meiji
modernization project and was the author of the official report of the Iwakura
Mission that toured Europe and the United States between 1871 and 1873.
At 90 years old in 1929, Kume compiled his own autobiography which put
his earlier experiences in historical perspective. He recognized that scienceand technology brought national wealth and power, but as the First WorldWar had shown, modern wars were inhuman and highly destructive. From hisperspective, modernization had helped Japan solve some problems, but also
introduced a new set of dilemmas for the future especially in the field ofinternational relations.
Hopefully, Steele will continue his research on the international contexts
of many of the changes people in Japan were experiencing and the ways
Japanese thinkers contributed to a global debate on the nature of modernization during the Meiji era. It is well known to historians of Japan thatJapanese enthusiasm for “Civilization and Enlightenment” and globalization
was often in tension with the forces of cultural pride and nationalism. It
would be interesting to explore further how these trends in Japan bothreflected and contributed to global movements toward internationalism andisolationism in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
In sum, this book is a welcome series of case studies examining the Meiji
transformation’s effects on people outside the realms of government and bigbusiness. It also demonstrates that Japan’s modernization was not enthusiastically embraced by all and shows us the real ambivalence people at the time
felt about the changes they were observing. The book is highly recommended
for anyone interested in alternative views of Japan’s modern history.