名古屋市の陶磁器工業について
その性格と展開過程
1960 年 12 巻 1 号 p. 31-50,95
詳細
1960 年 12 巻 1 号 p. 31-50,95
Since the Meiji Restoration with the advance of manufacturing techniques and the growth of markets, there have been many developments in the pottery industry new productive centers, and concentration of production and changes in production system. As a result, regional difference in production have become obvious.
In the case of the pottery industry in Nagoya city, it was not a traditional center for pottery and was far from the clay deposits. Nevertheless, it became a pottery producing center at the beginning of the Meiji era and has since developed more than the traditional pottery centers since 1908; it now claims 20% of the pottery production in Japan. There are only a few large-scale factories which produce foreign-style table wares and insulators for export, but many small-scale specialized enterprises which produce export goods.
Nagoya pottery centers have special characteristics which differ from the traditional centers in respect to the kind of production, size of the factories and the system of production. Finishing processors have played an important role in the development of Nagoya centers. They have bought unfinished pottery from traditional pottery centers such as Seto and Tono (eastern part of Gifu Pref.) and have decorated it to meet the demands of foreign markets.
Since the Nagoya industry was managed by former farmers and marchants and not by traditional pottery-producers. They were able to subordinate traditional poducers by contracting home-industry workers and Samurai who had lost their social position. In this way, they have been able to produce and sale at a low price and have gotten control of the foreign market over more advanced countries. Nippon China Co. which is the largest pottery-producing factory in Japan has grown in just this way.
Nagoya has the advantage of being a port-city and of being located near the traditional pottery centers. Other general tendencies such as Japan's developing role in world trade, and the development of transportation and manufacturing techniques have contributed to the growth of the industry in Nagoya. But, even more important is the fact that capital and labor in Nagoya have been able to work efficiently without the restraint of tradition.
