Abstract
In this paper, the writer wants to examine the "Policy of the Peasant Emigration to Manchuria" in the period of Japanese imperialism through the analysis of the emigration plan in Shonai district (Yamagata Prefecture). Rural district all over the country was hard hit by the Agricultural Crisis. Especially, the Tohoku district was driven to want by the bad crop(1934) and heavy snowfall(1935). The Government had been taking various agricultural policies for relief since 1932. One of these policies was the "Agrarian Reorganization Movement". It was based on the conservative landownership, and therefore, futile to betterment of agrarian economy. But agrarian directors attributed its failure to the shortage of arable land. Thus, they formulated the "Shonai Emigration Plan". Emigration to "Manchuria" was propelled by d group of fanatic patriots in a rural district("Kokokunomindan"). Emigration settlements were constructed on the land ` Manchurians' were robbed of. The object of emigration was to found "Manchukuo" and replant mother villages of Japan in "Manchuria". But the main part of emigration was the poor peasants and the agricultural labourers, so that replantation of the mother villages resulted in dream. The Pacific War destroyed agricultural productive power and frustrated the emigration movement. Eventually, emigration in "Manchuaia" died a tragic death due to the defeat of Japan.
