A Preliminary Study of Standardization and Nationalization in the Wartime Japanese State

Abstract

In wartime Japan, large numbers of national standards were established in order to regulate everyday life; a national uniform (Kokumin-Fuku),national housing (Kokumin-Jutaku),and national food (Kokumin-Shoku).This paper scrutinizes the relationship between these regulations and industrial technologies resulting from mass production. How the wartime Japanese state subsumed individual life through measurement and quantification in light of the standardization and nationalization of everyday life is described in this paper. Furthermore, how individuals were forced to govern their lives to fit those standards is also explored.