Domestic service has been frequently looked upon as an outlet for surplus labor. If this were true, domestic service would have been deprived of workers as the labor demand of industries increased. Domestic service, however, remained a large occupational group after the beginning of the industrialization of Japan. The purpose of this article is to investigate why domestic servants did not disappear although the labor demand of industries expanded during the economic boom of the First World War. This study is based on the manuscripts of the Hiroumi family, a manure and rice merchant family living in the Sennan District of the Osaka Prefecture. The Hiroumi family always employed three to four resident servants. Most were girls under the control of their parents who ultimately received their daughters' wages. Using personal connections, the employer hired workers from the lower classes living in the neighboring areas. Although the terms of work varied, most retired after a little more than a few years. Parents of the girls had another long-standing alternative of sending their daughters to work as domestic servants. There were many weaving factories throughout the Sennan District which required a large number of female workers. On the eve of the First World War, it was more profitable for parents to send their daughters to the weaving factories than to engage them in domestic service. In fact, the Hiroumi family was faced with a severe labor shortage when the labor demand of the weaving factories rapidly increased in the economic boom of the First World War. The problem, however, was soon resolved as the Hiroumi family immediately took such measures as drastically raising wages. As a result, it was profitable for parents to send their daughters to work as domestic servants. Compared to other regional wage levels, similar changes in domestic service were likely to have occurred elsewhere in Japan. During the economic boom of the First World War, many women remained working as domestic servants because their employers had made great efforts to retain them.

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 This is one result of research conducted by the author in Jakarta in 1975/76 with the help of Jopie Wangania. Sixty-eight Japanese wives and eighty-nine Indonesian domestic employees were interviewed intensively to discover any gap in expectations. The Indonesian housemaids regard Japanese wives as stingy, in spite of the relatively good wage they actually pay. The employees' judgement on stigyness bore a close relationship to the employers' behavior patterns in giving small gifts to the employees. The main complaints on the part of Japanese wives were that the maids tend to move frequently from employer to employer and that they seldom apologize when they do something wrong.

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In the early stages of Japan's industrialization, the increased demand for labor in industry caused a labor shortage in domestic service. Nevertheless, domestic servants remained a large occupational group. The aim of this paper is to show how families were able to continue to employ domestic servants through a case study of the Hiroumi family, merchants specializing in fertilizers and rice in the Sennan district of Osaka Prefecture. The Hiroumi family normally employed three to four live-in servants. Most were girls not yet independent from their parents, who were the ultimate recipients of their wages. They were recruited from the poorer families of the neighboring areas. On the eve of industrialization in the 1880s, the cotton-weaving industry had already developed as a cottage industry throughout the Sennan district. Parents were able to put their daughters to work as weavers at home instead of sending them away to domestic service. However, the latter was more profitable for them, and therefore it was easy for employers to hire domestic help. But the situation changed after industrialization began in the 1890s. A cotton-spinning mill built in the Sennan district was willing to employ large numbers of local girls at high wages. In addition, the weaving industry began to flourish owing to a sharp rise in the demand for cotton cloth. It was clearly more advantageous for parents to send daughters to the spinning mill to work, or keep them at home weaving, rather than put them into domestic service. The Hiroumi family was faced with a labor shortage. Employers of domestic servants immediately took countermeasures, such as raising wages, or offering improved payment systems. Although it was not as easy to hire and retain workers as in the past, the Hiroumi family was still able to employ as many domestic servants as it needed.

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戦前の日本では,労働市場の動向には著しい地域差が存在し,なかでも後進地域の労働供給の動向は未解明の問題として残されている。そこで本稿では,工業化が進展せず農業生産力も相対的に低位にあった秋田県北部に焦点を当て,第一次大戦期前後のの雇用動向を分析し,労働供給の動向がどう変化したかを明らかにした。第一次大戦期以前の秋田県北部では,の雇主は下層の娘たちを働き手として容易に雇用でき,その給金は一向に上昇しなかったから,労働供給は無制限的であった可能性がある。だが,この地域では,第一次大戦期以降,稲の反収が急速に上昇した結果,下層の農家は,娘たちを世帯内にとどめ,耕作規模を拡大すれば,彼女たちを奉公に出すよりも多くの収入を得られるようになった。そのため,の雇主は,人手不足に見舞われ,給金を大幅に引き上げて働き手を雇入れる必要に迫られた。このことは,後進地域では,農業生産力の上昇に支えられた地域内の経済発展によって,農業部門から非農業部門への労働供給が制約され,制限的労働供給が顕在化したことを示している。

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  This essay focuses on a working-class woman, called Hannah Cullwick (1833-1901), and studies her ideas of fashion based on her diary. Hannah was a maid-of-all work since she was fourteen. In spite of her humble origin, she kept a diary between 1854 and 1873, because her secret lover, Arthur Munby (1828-1910), recommended her to do so. Munby was an upper-class author and poet to whom Hannah had a life-long relation. In her diary, she recorded her opinions of her works, numerous employers she served, her colleagues, and Munby. Her diary reveals that through her relation to Munby, Hannah cultivated her own ideas of gender, career and fashion.

  Throughout her service, she wore a humble working-dress. Even after her secret marriage to Munby in 1873, which financially enabled her to dress and behave like a lady, she determinedly wore the humble clothes of a lower servant. She self-approvingly noted her financial and mental independence through domestic service, while she pitied 'proudly' dressed middle-class ladies who engaged only feminine activities. Experiencing different social class behaviours and gender ideologies, Hannah found her humble working dress of cotton functioning as a sign of her financial and mental independence, pride of her service, and her identity as a working-class 'woman'. These ideas were definitely different from middle-class stereotypical assumptions of working-class women, or working-class women's standard reactions against them.

  Hannah's life-long relation to the upper-class man may not be a typical experience for a lower-class woman of the period. Unique her experiences and ideas may be, Hannah provides us a new understanding of women in this social segment, their career and gender identity through their dress.

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就業服務法は、外国人労働者を労働力不足を補うための一時的・補完的な存在と位置付けているが、2019 年現在、台湾の外国人労働者の数は71 万人を超え、就業人口の6％を超えるに至っている。法律では限定的にしか認められないことになっているにもかかわらず、なぜここまで外国人労働者が増えたのかについては検討の必要がある。結論を先取りすると、労働部が受入業務の拡大に積極的であったということと、法律の規定が労働部の判断による受入業務の追加を可能にする構造になっていたということがその原因として挙げられる。もっとも、外国人労働者の数が多すぎるのではないかということについては、監察院が調査を行い、改善勧告を出しているため、状況が変化する可能性もある。

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