Honda Natural Politics Analysis
4.1.2 The Speech of Natural Politics and the role of ‘nature’
The reason why, in the 1790s, Honda turned to a socio-economic problem in full swing from problems of geopolitics in the north, mathematics, astronomy, and calendar was because, following the great famine of Tenmei and the fall of the Tanuma Okistugu’s regime, he published his first book, The Speech of Natural Politics (1795).
The core of Honda’s economic theory, called ‘natural politics’, was—in principle—constructed closely by the linkage of ‘nature’ and ‘politics’. For Honda ‘nature’ was expressed as ‘the essence of nature’, or ‘the law of abundance of every grain and every fruit’. At the same time, it was different from Western natural law because ‘it naturally should be’. …show more content…
Already Daimyo have been in extreme distress. As a result, they have asked for money and financing from merchants. Falling into this situation of today’s hardship, they do not feel shame. Among the more than 260 daimyo, self-sustaining lords are rare, and the rests are all deeply in debt due to daimyo loans by merchants. Consequently, there is no room for their descendants to actively act from now. Or a Daimyo (sixty thousand stones) was divided into sixties to reimburse the new debt at Hyojosho (the Supreme Court of Bakufu), and his total reached nearly one million ryo. It is difficult to see opportunities to repay all without several decades, without extending the terms of the loans even if he compensates with the output of sixty thousand stones. Although it is extremely dishonourable to each lord’s circumstance, lords are suffering the same as they have assigned their domains to merchants because they are mostly in financial distress. Daimyo who asked for money and financing from merchants are carrying out public and private work in their merits. This is nothing different from the fact that Daimyo were deprived of their domains. Are not their circumstances very …show more content…
As long as agriculture is the only industry in Tokugawa Japan, there is no way to increase wealth in Japanese society by simply teaching people ‘how to save’. Furthermore, structurally, the samurai economy and the farmer economy will not be able to obtain sufficient wealth. It is impossible to change the accumulation of wealth as Ogyu thought. Honda, however, thought that the fact that Japan’s wealth was concentrating only on merchants was normal as ‘the world of
The reason why, in the 1790s, Honda turned to a socio-economic problem in full swing from problems of geopolitics in the north, mathematics, astronomy, and calendar was because, following the great famine of Tenmei and the fall of the Tanuma Okistugu’s regime, he published his first book, The Speech of Natural Politics (1795).
The core of Honda’s economic theory, called ‘natural politics’, was—in principle—constructed closely by the linkage of ‘nature’ and ‘politics’. For Honda ‘nature’ was expressed as ‘the essence of nature’, or ‘the law of abundance of every grain and every fruit’. At the same time, it was different from Western natural law because ‘it naturally should be’. …show more content…
Already Daimyo have been in extreme distress. As a result, they have asked for money and financing from merchants. Falling into this situation of today’s hardship, they do not feel shame. Among the more than 260 daimyo, self-sustaining lords are rare, and the rests are all deeply in debt due to daimyo loans by merchants. Consequently, there is no room for their descendants to actively act from now. Or a Daimyo (sixty thousand stones) was divided into sixties to reimburse the new debt at Hyojosho (the Supreme Court of Bakufu), and his total reached nearly one million ryo. It is difficult to see opportunities to repay all without several decades, without extending the terms of the loans even if he compensates with the output of sixty thousand stones. Although it is extremely dishonourable to each lord’s circumstance, lords are suffering the same as they have assigned their domains to merchants because they are mostly in financial distress. Daimyo who asked for money and financing from merchants are carrying out public and private work in their merits. This is nothing different from the fact that Daimyo were deprived of their domains. Are not their circumstances very …show more content…
As long as agriculture is the only industry in Tokugawa Japan, there is no way to increase wealth in Japanese society by simply teaching people ‘how to save’. Furthermore, structurally, the samurai economy and the farmer economy will not be able to obtain sufficient wealth. It is impossible to change the accumulation of wealth as Ogyu thought. Honda, however, thought that the fact that Japan’s wealth was concentrating only on merchants was normal as ‘the world of