Geographical Review of Japan
Online ISSN : 2185-1719
Print ISSN : 0016-7444
ISSN-L : 0016-7444
Volume 33, Issue 4
Displaying 1-5 of 5 articles from this issue
  • A Case Study in Kurobe City
    Kiyoji MURATA, Masashi KANETA
    1960 Volume 33 Issue 4 Pages 193-205
    Published: April 01, 1960
    Released on J-STAGE: December 24, 2008
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    1. A small city named Kurobe newly born in April 1954 with the population of 32, 200 and 89.28km2. is lying 30km north east to Toyama City, one of the principal cities on the central part of Honshu facing the Japan Sea. The new city induced strongly the attraction of manufacturing industry, because the industrial stucture of the city was characterized by the superiority of primary industry. Namely, at that time most of the inhabitants found agriculture as their means of living. The number of the population of the primary industry was 65.8% of all industrial population in 1950. Thus Krobe succeeded in attracting three kinds of factories to the city. They were zinc-refining, salt-making and slide-fastner-making factories.
    The aim of this study is to classify the process of locational selection of the slide-fastner-making factory named Yoshida Kogyo and some economic effects of that location on Kurobe. TheYoshida Kogyo in Kurobe is the largest factory which monopolizes 85-90% of fastner products in Japan.
    The writers analysed the following three problems in this study. 1) The reason why the Yoshida Kogyo is located at Kurobe which is neither the material source nor the consuming market in spite of the fact fastner production has market-orientation. 2) Some problems of internal economy which have overcome non-economic factors originated from the location in this city. 3) Some economic effects on this region.
    2. Concerning the first problem, there are no locational factors which are generally pointed out by the location theory and no geographical conditions suitable to attract this factory. The main reason which attracted this factory here is in the fact that the industrial land (92, 200m2) required for the future enlargement of this factory was offered by the city authorities. As the Yoshida Kogyo evacuated to Uozu City (adjacent city to Kurobe) from Tokyo during World War II; after the end of the War the management endeavored to go back to Tokyo, butte relocation could not realize by the Jack of in dustrial land in Tokyo.
    Moreover, owing to economic and political causes it failed to get the industrial land for enlargement even at Uozu City. Out of the necessity the Yoshida Kogyo relocated the factory at Kurobe. Observing from the view point of location theory, Kurobe is located outside the location figure indicated by A. Weber. Owing to that circumstance, the Yoshida Kogyo faced the problem to overcome the disadvansages of external economy based on the location at Kurobe. This problem was solved by promoting rationalization of internal economy. The only way for rationalization of internal economy is to adopt a continuous operation (smelting and rolling of metal, cotton-spinning and dyeing of tape, and assembling of parts into a complete slide fastner). The rational continuous operation accompanied with the mechanization and enlargement realized decrease of productive cost and increased the domestic demand strengthened the competitive power of international trade.
    3. The main locational effects of the Yoshida Kogyo on this region are divided into the following three points: 1) productive effect 2) employment effect and 3) financial effect.
    The productive effect was about one billion yen in 1957. This figure is the net effect deduced from the added value of the Yoshida Kogyo the added agricultural value which would have been realized if agricultural land had not been lost.
    The employment effect was indicated by the fact that 30% of the net increase of workers was the inhabitants of this city. But it should be noted that the analysis of employment effect must be considered qualitatively as well as quantitatively.
    The amount of input paid by the city authorities in order to consolidate the locational conditions (purchase of agricultural land and construction of road) was 56, 866, 080 yen, while the tax to the Yoshida Kogyo from 1954 to 1958 was 46, 381, 490 yen.
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  • Seishi TAIMA
    1960 Volume 33 Issue 4 Pages 205-218
    Published: April 01, 1960
    Released on J-STAGE: December 24, 2008
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    I This village is a small farming community with no puddy fields to cultivate, lying just at the top of the alluvial fan of the River Tenryu, which rises in the central mountainous region of Japan proper and pours itself into the Pacific Ocean. It was in the latter part of 1880 that a new religion called “Maruyama-kyo” began to spread in the northern part of the village. The religion had deeply been influenced by the democratic movement.
    The inhabitants in the northern part of the village did much to the prosperity of their own area by organizing au industrial association; it was indeed in the period from 1920 to 1935. As for the southern dwellers, they took part neither in the religious movement prompted by the democratic activities, nor in their fellow villagers efforts to develop village economy. The reason why one community was active in the two movements while the other passive may well be explained by the fact that their regional structures were quite different from each other. One of the most striking contrasts between the two areas was that is the northern part they suffered, from generation to generation, from calamities far oftener than the southerners. In other words, the northern part had the structure that the tilling people were subject all the year round to various kinds of calamities (floods, droughts and frost damages to young mulberry leaves).
    The result was that their productive power was lingering on the lower level, and that the exploiting land-owner system remained in premature state; while the southerners had relatively high productive power which, as a natural turn of things, developed the solid land-owner system which connected with commercial and usury profits.
    Therefore, whenever there appeard any social reform movements in this village, almost always the self-supporting farmers living in the northern region took the lead. It may safely be said that, in the slowly changing process of the mode of agricultural production, the regional structure has a close connection with the geographical conditions (this assertion would not be right if there should occur a revolutionary change in society).
    II
    In the creed of “Maruyama-kyo” there was a fanatic, heretical nature that, if a man shoul offer his arable land to the god, he would be awarded with a divine favor. But on the other hand, “Maruvama-Kyo” had so fanatical a doctrine as to deny the things of the time that, 30 years afterwards, their young descendants inherited their ancestors' fanaticism and accomplished a feat of organizing an industrial association. It may not be the case with “Maruyama-kyo” only, but most of the religions in this country hab and have a peculier character to let the believers play the role of denying the social situations at that time.
    In this case, we cannot testify the direct influence of religious ethics toward the economic spirit as M. Weber makes it clear in his famous work.
    The conclusion is that the situation mentioned above is closely connected with the development of Japanese capitalism which did not encourage the growth of the middle class, though it can easily be examined in the modern English history.
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  • Takashi NAGAO
    1960 Volume 33 Issue 4 Pages 219-231
    Published: April 01, 1960
    Released on J-STAGE: December 24, 2008
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    In this paper the variation of weather situation on the singularity accompanied with increase or decrease of annual mean sun-spot numbers is discussed. For this investigation, Lettaus concept of “specific singularity” is applied. We have found that the variation of weather situation accompanied with sun-spot numbers before and after the singularities such as December 30th, February 5th and April 6th is almost similar on the respective cases. (Fig. 8) The principal characters obtained are as follows.
    (I) On the singularity as divided by sun-spot numbers into three cases a), b) and, c),
    a) When the annual mean value of sun-spot numbers is larger than 60, the daily preciptatatatiion amout over Japan is somewhat plentiful than the normal value (Fig. 4, B), and the positive anomaly of daily mean temperature is observed over the western Japan. (Fig. 5, B).
    b) When the sun-spot number is smaller than 15, the negative anomaly of daily precipitation amount is especially remarkable along the Japan Sea side. (Fig. 4, E) On the same calendar day, the anomaly of daily mean temperature is negative over the eastern Japan. (Fig. 5, E) Over Japan and her neighbourhood, the number of cyclone and anticyclone is remarkably small. (Fig. 6, E)
    c) When the sun-spot number is between 15 and 60, the daily mean temperature over Japan is colder than the normal temperature. (Fig. 4, I) It may be considerd that this distribution relates closely to anticyclones locating over Tohoku district. (Fig. 5, I)
    (II) On the day before or after the temperature singularity showing the maximum range of frequency distribution of daily mean temperature, the anomalies of precipitation and temperature are also examind as related to the magnitude of sun-spot numbers.
    a) When the sun-spot number is larger than 60, the negative anomaly of daily precipitation amount is observed over the southwestern Japan with its center near Shikoku district. (Figs. 4, (A, C)) The temperature anomaly is positive over almost the whole Japan which its center over the northern Japan. (Figs. 5, (A, C)) It is probable that above characters become distinct when the anticyclones appear over the eastern China or the East China Sea. (Figs. 6, (A, C))
    b) When the sun-spot number is smaller than 15, the positive anomaly of daiy mean precipitation is observed along the southern coast of Japan. (Figs. 4, (D, F)) The distribution of temperature anomaly is not so distinct in spite of the positive anomaly over the western Japan. (Figs. 5, (D, F)) Above distributions are primarily explained by anticyclones over Japan. (Figs. 6, (D, F))
    c) When the sun-spot number is between 15 and 60, the positive anomaly of precipitation is observed over the western Japan, (Figs. 4, (G. I)) and the temperature anomaly is negative over the area which extends from the west of Tohoku district through Shikoku district. (Figs. 5, (G, I)) It may be seen that these results are caused by numerous cyclones over the East China Sea. (Figs. 6, (G, I)) As already noted, variation of the distriburions of daily precipitator amount and daily mean temperature corresponding with that of the sun-spot numbers are caused indirectly by the passage of cyclones and anticyclones over Japan and her neighbourhood. This result is also verified by comparing the frequency distributions of daily mean temperature at Hiroshima. (Fig. 7)
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  • Katsuo KUWAJIMA
    1960 Volume 33 Issue 4 Pages 232-237
    Published: April 01, 1960
    Released on J-STAGE: December 24, 2008
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
    Various phenomena observed in the prices of commodities have seldom been made the main object in the study of shopping-streets. In the present paper, however, the author has taken up to examine, selecting Sendai City as his field, what interrelations exist between these phenomena and the functional differentiatiation of shopping-streets. The results gained are as follows:
    1. The kinds of stores which shopping-streets are composed of have been closely examined in the study of the central shopping-streets, but commodities being sold also vary in price according to the localities of shopping-streets.
    2. Though of the same kind, more expensive commodities are dealt in only at the central shopping-streets, and this tendency is more conspicuous in the case of articles of luxury and in vogue. Popularized ones, on the contrary, show no differences in price with the sites of the shopping-streets.
    3. So far as Sendai is concerned, the adoption of the differences in price as an indicator for the central shopping-streets, has the following meanings different from what the previous indicator brings with it.
    (1) The degree of function can be grasped in terms of the numerical values of the prices of commodities.
    (2) The functional differentiation is expressed by the differences in the prices of commodities.
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  • 1960 Volume 33 Issue 4 Pages 238-246_1
    Published: April 01, 1960
    Released on J-STAGE: December 24, 2008
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
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