Why was Malthus wrong about Japan?

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Japan Essay

Why was Malthus wrong about Japan?

Today Japan is a highly developed first world country with a vast population and a booming economy.  The demographic history of Japan and how it reached this renowned economic status has been the focus of much theorising and has engaged the minds of many demographers, economists and historians for centuries.  Japan is unique in the way its population has changed and its economy has developed without the stimulus of overseas markets.  It does not boast the best physical landscape, being 85 percent mountainous, and it is not well endowed in terms of resources.  Despite these negative attributes however, Japan has developed, and to such an extent it can now boast one of the worlds leading economies.  Indeed Japan was the only country outside the western world to have developed at a similar rate.  In the 18th century a Swedish doctor, P. Thunberg commented on Japan, ‘Of all the countries that inhabit the three largest parts of the globe, the Japanese deserved to be ranked first, and to be compared with the Europeans.’  (Modern Japan, P. Duus.)   It stands to reason therefore that Japan’s history merits such a wealth of discussion amongst academics.

Part of Japan’s success as a country has to be attributed to its longstanding political regime.  For centuries Japan was an empire ruled by an emperor based at Kyoto.  From the 12th century however Japan was governed by Shogun (military leaders) who oversaw the day-to-day life of the Japanese people. The emperor, in effect, was under house arrest, taking a submissive role being more of a spiritual leader to the people.   The year 1600 saw an important event for the political governing of Japan.  It was in this year that a battle (Sekigahara) established the supremacy of the Tokugawa family as ruling shoguns.  From 1600 to 1868 this family ruled and these 268 years of Japan’s history became known as the Tokugawa period.  It is this period that is of fascination to many demographers as during this time Japan experienced stagnation in its population but it also seemed to be the onset of its economic success.   From the early 18th century to the Meiji restoration in 1868 Japan’s population stayed at around 33 million.  It is this 150-year period of stagnation that is of interest to studiers of the demographic history of Japan. There is also much discussion as to whether the population as it was, was inextricably linked to economic growth or vice versa.

Searches for explanation of population trends date back centuries.  One of the earliest and probably the most famous explanation of observed population figures in the world in general, was put forward by the Rev. Thomas R. Malthus in the 18th century.  In 1798 Malthus’s ‘Essay on Population’ was published, in which he wrote at length on past, present and future population trends of mankind.  His most famous stance on population levels was that ‘population, when unchecked increases in geometrical ratio; subsistence only in an arithmetical ratio.’  (Malthusian Population Theory, McCleary.)   He believed that mans (sic) power to produce population is greater than his power to produce subsistence, thus meaning that that the population of a country was constantly held in check by misery and vice.  From this a simple model is produced illustrating the point that if populations increases; food prices will increase; real income will decrease; and thus mortality will increase (figure 1.)  The ultimate check according to his works was the want of food, but this was never an immediate check except in the case of actual famines.  The constant checks can be classified into two sets, preventative and positive.  Positive checks are multifarious and include such components as exposure to the elements, epidemics, war, plagues, famines and extreme poverty.  The preventative checks can be further sub-classified into vice and non-vice.  According to Malthus however, there is only one preventative check that can be classified as vice and this is moral restraint. The consideration of moral restraint was a latter thought from Malthus, added to his ‘essay’ in 1803.  From this a more optimistic model of possibility was constructed (Fig 2.)  The two checks vary inversely from one another and can be in operation with varying affect according to the society in which there are operational.    

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The situation as it was in Japan must have had some constituent that caused the observed trends in population.  If Malthus’s theory is believed to have been operational in Japan then some sort of check was holding the population at its stagnated rate.  Japan, unlike Europe at the time was a closed system.  Emigration was unheard of and likewise nobody entered the country.  Internal migration was also low, although would not have affected population figures.  This was mainly due the Tokugawa establishing a period of isolation, cutting Japan off from the rest of the trading world.  In terms of Japans ...

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