Sakoku

George Mack posts interesting stuff on Twitter here and I get his email newsletter. In today’s email he mentions the practise of Sakoku which is to cut off extraneous inputs so as to allow one to think more freely.

I googled Sakoku, and opted to look at a piece from a Japanese website rather than Wikipedia. The information is fascinating. Once I got stuck into it I googled for the date that Commodore Perry reached Japan – it was July 8, 1853 – and that gave me context to read this information and from there to look at the GRIPS main page and it is the Graduate Institute Of Policy Studies in Tokyo.

Here is the information from the Sakoku page on GRIPS that I have copied to preserve it for easy reference. On a personal note, I have some sympathy for a nation trying to isolate itself from foreign influence, not least because of the shock to the identity of individuals. It is amazing to think how much the world is now in each other’s backyards so to speak, in today’s world.

The reference to Black Ships in this timeline is this:

The Black Ships (kurofune) was the name given to Western vessels arriving in Japan in the 16th and 19th centuries. In particular, kurofune refers to Mississippi, Plymouth, Saratoga, and Susquehanna of the Perry Expedition for the opening of Japan, 1852–1854, that arrived on July 14, 1853, at Uraga Harbor (part of present-day Yokosuka) in Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan under the command of United StatesCommodore Matthew Perry.^[2]  Black refers to the black color of the older sailing vessels, and the black smoke from the coal-fired steam engines of the American ships. In this sense, the kurofune became a symbol of the ending of isolation.

Sakoku (Closure of Country)

Sakoku (鎖国) is a policy of controlled and very limited external contact, for business or otherwise, imposed by the Edo Bakufu. It consisted of monopoly of external trade by the Bakufu, prohibition of Christianity and the ban on Japanese travel to/from abroad. However, the term sakoku, which implies closing the country with chains, became popular only toward the end of the Edo period. Since then, it has been used widely to illustrate the foreign policy of the Edo period, often with a negative connotation, but some historians propose not to use this term any more. Here is some time lines of sakoku.

<Closing the country>
1612 Christianity banned in Bakufu territories
1616 Nagasaki and Hirado are specified for Western ships
1623 UK drops out of trade with Japan
1624 Japan terminates diplomatic and trade relations with Spain
1633 Only ships with bakufu documents are allowed. Japanese living abroad for five years or more are not allowed to come home
1634 Only Nagasaki Port was allowed for foreign trade. Japanese travel to Southeast Asia and return of Japanese from abroad are prohibited
1637 Christian farmers rise against Bakufu in Shimabara, Kyushu, which is suppressed
1639 Japan terminates trade relations with Portugal. Only China & Netherlands are allowed to trade.

<Re-opening>
Mid 18c- mid 19c Russian, British, French & American ships approach Japan but Bakufu rejects them

1825 Bakufu orders hans to repel foreign ships by military means
1842 China is defeated by UK and forced to cede Hong Kong, which shocks Bakufu
1853-54 US Black Ships loaded with cannons negotiate and sign a Friendship Treaty with Japan 1858 US demands and signs a commercial treaty with Japan (implemented in 1859)
1866 Japanese overseas travel for business and study is allowed
1873 Christianity is permitted

Historians still debate why this policy was adopted. The main explanation points to the Bakufu’s intention to control and monopolize trade and ban Christianity. During the sakoku years, foreign trade was officially permitted only at a tiny artificial island at Nagasaki under authority’s strict control, and only with China and the Netherlands.

However, there was also other permitted and unpermitted trade.
Tsushima Han was allowed to trade with Korea. Satsuma Han
traded with Okinawa and China after it invaded and occupied
Okinawa. Matsumae Han, in Hokkaido, was permitted to trade
with Ainu people, a native minority people of Northern Japan (who were regarded as foreigners by the Bakufu). These hans often traded illegally by exceeding permitted limits. There were other hans engaged in illegal trade. Such illegal trade was very profitable for violating hans. The Bakufu tried to police and crack down on them, but only unsuccessfully.

If all of this is new to you, then here is a very spicy history of Japan, including the Sakoku period. You will be entertained.