A Vein of Political Economy in the Japanese Enlightenment

Abstract

In Japan, during its era of Westernization from the mid-nineteenth century, political economy was introduced by way of a link in the chain of reception of Western enlightenment thought, which was characterized by its confidence in human reason and social progress. Afterwards, in line with national policy, political economy was rapidly institutionalized in Japan's higher education. Political economy was required to play a part in the authoritarian national order system. However, the vein of political economy as a component of enlightenment thought had never been eliminated. Such a political economy was observed in the non-main currents, beyond the so-called enlightenment period.
This essay provides some examples from the latter half of the Meiji era to the Taisho era. Taguchi Ukichi and Keizaigaku Kyokai, Toda Kaichi and “Kyoto Keizaigaku”, and Takano Iwasaburo and Ohara Shakaimondai Kenkyujo, Osaka Rodo Gakko are all discussed from the viewpoint of the formation of scholars' groups. These scholars' groups spared no pains to emancipate political economy from the teachings of national policy and to locate it instead in civil life.