Japanese Intellectual History

• Confucianism remained the dominant ideology
• , but tensions arose between traditionalists and reformist intellectuals.
• A national studies group emerged, praising Japanese traditions, including the emperor's office and Shinto religion.
• A writer in the late eighteenth century expressed a sentiment that Japan was the native land of the Heaven-Shining Goddess, excelling all other countries.
• The national studies school's influence grew in the early nineteenth century, inspiring ultranationalist sentiment later on.
• Some Japanese scholars formed a minority group focused on Dutch Studies.
• Major Western works were initially banned, but Japanese translators kept Dutch knowledge alive to deal with traders in Nagasaki
• The ban on Western books ended in 1720, leading to a new interest in Western scientific advances.
• Japanese scholars interested in "Dutch medicine" helped with the increased interest in Western advances, based on the realization that Western anatomy texts were superior to those of the Chinese
• Schools of Dutch Studies were established in major cities by 1850.
• Students urged freer exchange with the West and rejected Chinese medicine and culture.
• Japanese culture showed an important capacity for debate, the Japanese economy continued to develop into the nineteenth century.
• Commerce expanded as big merchant companies established monopoly privileges.
• Manufacturing gained ground in the countryside, especially consumer goods industries like soy sauce and silks, often organized by city merchants.
• These developments were similar to changes in the West, giving rise to arguments that Japan had a running start on industrialization.
• By the 1850s, economic growth slowed, leading scholars to stress Japan's backwardness compared to the West.
• Technological limitations constrained agricultural expansion and population increase.
• Rural riots increased from the late eighteenth century; they were not overtly political, but like many rural protests, protested wealthy peasants,merchants and landlord controls
• The authorities were able to put down the unrest easily, and the protests contributed to wanting to change when joined by an outside challenge

The Challenge to Isolation

• Some Japanese became worried about potential outside threats.
• A book advocating a strong navy was issued in 1791.
• Russia's Asian expansion and the West's growing power heightened these concerns.
• In 1853, American Commodore Matthew Perry arrived in Edo Bay near Tokyo with a squadron and threatened bombardment.
• Perry demanded that Americans be allowed to trade.
• These events launched the Opium War for Japan. The United States pressured Japan to open its markets.
• In 1854 Perry returned and won the right to station an American consul in Japan.
• A formal treaty was established in 1856, which opened two ports.