The Meiji Restoration. he Meiji Restoration saw the fast modernization and westernization of Japan. By sending many Japanese scholars and politicians to Europe and North America to study the western system and technologies; reforming domestic backward fe
The Meiji Restoration —— 明治維新
#Background#
- In the mid-nineteenth century of Asia, Japan was dominated by the last shogunate - Tokugawa shogunate. The ruler of Japan, Tokugawa Ieyasu, had worried deeply that if the European might to conquer his country. To "protect" the territory, the Tokugawa shogunate decided to isolate Japan from the western countries. For nearly 200 years, foreign trade was almost prohibited except for several Chinese, Korea and Dutch ships which only could be allowed at Nagasaki once per year. The Christianity was absolutely outlawed at all whether you were a Japanese or foreigner. All the missionaries, merchants and common people from the western countries were forced to leave by the shogunate.
However, during the same period, a cottage industry and a handicraft workshop had started to grow up in.some economically developed regions of Japan. The "employment system" appeared in some workshops firstly and became the formation of the capitalist production system. The appearance of this, had strongly impacted on the nature economy which was under a feudalism system for a long time as well as undermine the rule of the shogunate radically. As the form of commodity economy was in a rapid expansion, the merchant class of the country, especially the one who worked in a financial industry had a gradually increase in their strength and influence power. They finally realized that the old feudal system in Japan had seriously restricted their development of businesses, and started to call on a new political institution. With these daimyos and samurais who preferred to have a capitalism and also grasped amount of political power, the people formed a league to against the Tokugawa shogunate, which was the basic strength of the later rebellion.
