Communism
In political and social sciences, communism is the philosophical, social and economic ideology and movement whose ultimate goal is the establishment of the communist society, a socioeconomic order structured upon the common ownership of the means of production and the absence of social classes and the state. Communism includes a variety of schools of thought, which broadly include Marxism and anarchism, as well as the political ideologies grouped around both. All of these share the analysis that the current order of society stems from its economic system, capitalism; the two classes are the working class—who must work to survive and who make up the majority within society—and the capitalist class—a minority who derives profit from employing the working class through private ownership of the means of production. The revolution will put the working class in power and in turn establish social ownership of the means of production, which according to this analysis is the primary element in the transformation of society towards communism.
Critics of communism can be divided into those concerning themselves with the practical aspects of 20th century communist states and those concerning themselves with communist principles and theory. Marxism-Leninism and democratic socialism were the two dominant forms of socialism in the 20th century; the term "communism" was first coined and defined in its modern definition by the French philosopher and writer Victor d'Hupay. In his 1777 book Projet de communauté philosophe, d'Hupay pushes the philosophy of the Enlightenment to principles which he lived up to during most of his life in his bastide of Fuveau; this book can be seen as the cornerstone of communist philosophy as d'Hupay defines this lifestyle as a "commune" and advises to "share all economic and material products between inhabitants of the commune, so that all may benefit from everybody's work". According to Richard Pipes, the idea of a classless, egalitarian society first emerged in Ancient Greece; the 5th-century Mazdak movement in Persia has been described as "communistic" for challenging the enormous privileges of the noble classes and the clergy, for criticizing the institution of private property and for striving to create an egalitarian society.
At one time or another, various small communist communities existed under the inspiration of Scripture. For example, in the medieval Christian Church some monastic communities and religious orders shared their land and their other property. Communist thought has been traced back to the works of the 16th-century English writer Thomas More. In his treatise Utopia, More portrayed a society based on common ownership of property, whose rulers administered it through the application of reason. In the 17th century, communist thought surfaced again in England, where a Puritan religious group known as the "Diggers" advocated the abolition of private ownership of land. In his 1895 Cromwell and Communism, Eduard Bernstein argued that several groups during the English Civil War espoused clear communistic, agrarian ideals and that Oliver Cromwell's attitude towards these groups was at best ambivalent and hostile. Criticism of the idea of private property continued into the Age of Enlightenment of the 18th century through such thinkers as Jean Jacques Rousseau in France.
Following the upheaval of the French Revolution communism emerged as a political doctrine. In the early 19th century, various social reformers founded communities based on common ownership. However, unlike many previous communist communities they replaced the religious emphasis with a rational and philanthropic basis. Notable among them were Robert Owen, who founded New Harmony in Indiana, as well as Charles Fourier, whose followers organized other settlements in the United States such as Brook Farm. In its modern form, communism grew out of the socialist movement in 19th-century Europe; as the Industrial Revolution advanced, socialist critics blamed capitalism for the misery of the proletariat—a new class of urban factory workers who labored under often-hazardous conditions. Foremost among these critics were his associate Friedrich Engels. In 1848, Marx and Engels offered a new definition of communism and popularized the term in their famous pamphlet The Communist Manifesto; the 1917 October Revolution in Russia set the conditions for the rise to state power of Vladimir Lenin's Bolsheviks, the first time any avowedly communist party reached that position.
The revolution transferred power to the All-Russian Congress of Soviets, in which the Bolsheviks had a majority. The event generated a great deal of theoretical debate within the Marxist movement. Marx predicted that socialism and communism would be built upon foundations laid by the most advanced capitalist development. However, Russia was one of the poorest countries in Europe with an enormous illiterate peasantry and a minority of industrial workers. Marx had explicitly stated; the moderate Mensheviks opposed Lenin's Bolshevik plan for socialist revolution before capitalism was more developed. The Bolsheviks' successful rise to power was based upon the slogans such as "Peace and land" which tapp
Tokyo Imperial Palace
The Tokyo Imperial Palace is the primary residence of the Emperor of Japan. It is a large park-like area located in the Chiyoda ward of Tokyo and contains buildings including the main palace, the private residences of the Imperial Family, an archive and administrative offices, it is built on the site of the old Edo Castle. The total area including the gardens is 1.15 square kilometres. During the height of the 1980s Japanese property bubble, the palace grounds were valued by some to be more than the value of all of the real estate in the state of California. After the capitulation of the shogunate and the Meiji Restoration, the inhabitants, including the Shōgun Tokugawa Yoshinobu, were required to vacate the premises of the Edo Castle. Leaving the Kyoto Imperial Palace on 26 November 1868, the Emperor arrived at the Edo Castle, made it to his new residence and renamed it to Tōkei Castle. At this time, Tōkyō had been called Tōkei, he left for Kyōto again, after coming back on 9 May 1869, it was renamed to Imperial Castle.
Previous fires had destroyed the Honmaru area containing the old donjon. On the night of 5 May 1873, a fire consumed the Nishinomaru Palace, the new imperial Palace Castle was constructed on the site in 1888. A non-profit "Rebuilding Edo-jo Association" was founded in 2004 with the aim of a correct reconstruction of at least the main donjon. In March 2013, Naotaka Kotake, head of the group, said that "the capital city needs a symbolic building", that the group planned to collect donations and signatures on a petition in support of rebuilding the tower. A reconstruction blueprint had been made based on old documents; the Imperial Household Agency at the time had not indicated. In the Meiji era, most structures from the Edo Castle disappeared; some were cleared to make way for other buildings while others were destroyed by earthquakes and fire. For example, the wooden double bridges over the moat were replaced with iron bridges; the buildings of the Imperial Palace constructed in the Meiji era were constructed of wood.
Their design employed traditional Japanese architecture in their exterior appearance while the interiors were an eclectic mixture of then-fashionable Japanese and European elements. The ceilings of the grand chambers were coffered with Japanese elements; the floors of the public rooms had parquets or carpets while the residential spaces used traditional tatami mats. The main audience hall was the central part of the palace, it was the largest building in the compound. Guests were received there for public events; the floor space was more than 223 tsubo or 737.25 m2. In the interior, the coffered ceiling was traditional Japanese-style; the roof was styled to the Kyoto Imperial Palace, but was covered with copper plates rather than Japanese cypress shingles. In the late Taishō and early Shōwa period, more concrete buildings were added, such as the headquarters of the Imperial Household Ministry and the Privy Council; these structures exhibited only token Japanese elements. From 1888 to 1948, the compound was called Palace Castle.
On the night of 25 May 1945, most structures of the Imperial Palace were destroyed in the Allied firebombing raid on Tokyo. According to the US bomber pilot Richard Lineberger, Emperor's Palace was the target of their special mission on July 29, 1945, was hit with 2000-pound bombs. In August 1945, in the closing days of World War II, Emperor Hirohito met with his Privy Council and made decisions culminating in the surrender of Japan at an underground air-raid shelter on the palace grounds referred to as His Majesty's Library. Due to the large-scale destruction of the Meiji-era palace, a new main palace hall and residences were constructed on the western portion of the site in the 1960s; the area was renamed Imperial Residence in 1948, while the eastern part was renamed East Garden and became a public park in 1968. Interior images of the old Meiji-era palace, destroyed during World War II The present Imperial Palace encompasses the retrenchments of the former Edo Castle; the modern palace Kyūden designed for various imperial court functions and receptions is located in the old Nishinomaru section of the palace grounds.
On a much more modest scale, the residence of the current Emperor and empress is located in the Fukiage Gardens. Designed by Japanese architect Shōzō Uchii the modern residence was completed in 1993. Except for Imperial Household Agency and the East Gardens, the palace is closed to the public, except for reserved guided tours from Tuesdays to Saturdays; each New Year and Emperor's Birthday, the public is permitted to enter through the Nakamon where they gather in the Kyuden Totei Plaza in front of the Chowaden Hall. The Imperial Family appears on the balcony before the crowd and the Emperor gives a short speech greeting and thanking the visitors and wishing them good health and blessings; every year a poetry convention called Utakai Hajime is held at the palace on January 1. The old Honmaru and Sannomaru compounds now comprise the East Gardens, an area with public access containing administrative and other public buildings; the Kitanomaru Park is the former northern enceinte of Edo Castle. It is the site of the Nippon Budokan.
To the south are the outer gardens of
Hara Takashi
Hara Takashi was a Japanese politician and the 10th Prime Minister of Japan from 29 September 1918 until his assassination on 4 November 1921. He was called Hara Kei informally, he was the first commoner appointed to the office of prime minister of Japan, giving him the informal title of "commoner prime minister". He was the first Japanese Christian prime minister. Hara was born in a village of the feudal Morioka domain in Mutsu Province, he was the son of a samurai-class family which had resisted the Meiji Restoration and the establishment of the government which Hara himself would one day lead. Due to his association with a former enemy clan of the new Imperial Government, dominated by the feudal clans of Chōshū and Satsuma, Hara for long remained an outsider in the world of politics, he went to Tokyo by boat. He failed the entrance examination of the prestigious Imperial Japanese Naval Academy, instead joined the Marin Seminary, a French-established, free parochial school, it was here. Soon after that he joined the law school of the Ministry of Justice, but left without graduating to take responsibility for a student protest against the school’s room and board policy.
At the age of 17 he was baptized as a Roman Catholic, taking the name of "David", though it was speculated that he became Christian for personal gain at the time, he remained a Christian in public life until the day he died. At the age of 19, Hara broke away from his family's samurai class and chose instead the classification of commoner. At various times in his political career, offers were made to raise his rank, but Hara refused them every time on the basis that it would alienate himself from the common men and limit his ability to gain entrance to the House of Representatives. Beginning in 1879, Hara worked as a newspaper reporter for three years, he quit his job in protest over efforts of his editors to make the newspaper a mouthpiece for the Rikken Kaishintō political party of Ōkuma Shigenobu. In 1882, Hara took a position in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs at the request of Foreign Minister Inoue Kaoru. Based on discussions Hara had with him on his views for the future of Japanese politics during a trip both men took to Korea in 1884, Inoue appointed Hara to become consul-general in Tianjin, the first secretary to the embassy of Japan in Paris.
Under Mutsu Munemitsu, Hara served as ambassador to Korea. He left the Foreign Ministry to work as a journalist for several years, became the manager of a newspaper company, the Osaka Mainichi Shimbun. In 1900, Hara joined Itō Hirobumi's new-founded party Rikken Seiyūkai. Hara became the first secretary-general of the party, he ran for the lower house as a representative from Iwate Prefecture and was appointed Minister of Communications in the Fourth Ito Administration. He served as Home Minister in several cabinets between 1906 and 1913. Hara was able to effect many reforms from the powerful position of Home Minister. Hara realized that a fundamental political issue in Japan was the tension between the elected government and the appointed bureaucracy, his career was dedicated to weakening the power of the non-elected bureaucrats; as Home Minister, he systematically dismissed local bureaucrats in local governments in every capacity from governor down to high school principal. Any public employee who fell under his power would be replaced by someone in whom he saw real ability instead of a mere useful recipient of a favor.
Thus, he created a system in which people with talent could rise to the top of the bureaucracy, regardless of their background or rank. Hara understood that maintenance of the supremacy of the elected leaders depended on the government’s ability to develop the Japanese national infrastructure and on a long-term economic plan that would address regional as well as national interests. In 1914, after heated debate, he was appointed the president of the Rikken Seiyūkai to replace the outgoing leader, Saionji Kinmochi. Under Hara's leadership, Seiyukai first lost its majority control of the Diet in the 1915 general elections, but regained its majority in the 1917 general elections. In 1918, Terauchi Masatake fell from office due to the Rice Riots of 1918. Hara was appointed as his successor on 28 September 1918, it was the first cabinet headed by a commoner. Hara was the first civilian in Japanese history to become the administrative chief of any of the armed services, when he temporarily took charge of the Navy Ministry, in absence of the Navy Minister, Admiral Katō Tomosaburō, serving as the Japanese representative at the Washington Naval Conference.
As prime minister, Hara suffered in terms of popularity, because he refused to use his majority in the lower house to force through universal suffrage legislation. Hara's cautious approach disappointed liberals and socialists, who accused him of delaying universal suffrage as it would endanger his position in power; as a party politician, Hara had never been the favorite of the conservatives and military, he was despised by the ultranationalists. During his term of office, Japan participated in the Paris Peace Conference, joined the League of Nations as a founding member. In Korea, Japan used military force to suppress the Samil Rebellion, but began more lenient policies aimed at reducing opposition to Japanese rule. Following the Samil Uprising, Hara pursued a conciliatory policy towards colonies Korea, he arranged for his political ally, Saitō M
Home Ministry
The Home Ministry was a Cabinet-level ministry established under the Meiji Constitution that managed the internal affairs of Empire of Japan from 1873 to 1947. Its duties included local administration, public works and elections. After the Meiji Restoration, the leaders of the new Meiji government envisioned a centralized state to replace the old feudal order. Within months after Emperor Meiji's Charter Oath, the ancient ritsuryō structure from the late Heian period was revived in a modified form with an express focus on the separation of legislative and judicial functions within a new Daijō-kan system. Having just returned from the Iwakura Mission in 1873, Ōkubo Toshimichi pushed forward a plan for the creation of an “Interior ministry” within the Daijō-kan modeled after similar ministries in European nations, headed by himself; the Home Ministry was established as government department in November 1873 as an internal security agency to deal with possible threats to the government from disgruntled ex-samurai, political unrest spawned by the Seikanron debate.
In addition to controlling the police administration, the new department was responsible for the Family register, civil engineering, topographic surveys and promotion of agriculture. In 1874, administration of the post office was added to its responsibilities. In 1877, overview of religious institutes was added; the head of the Home Ministry was referred to as the "Home Lord" and functioned as the Head of Government. The Home Ministry initially had the responsibility for promoting local industry, but this duty was taken over by the Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce in 1881. In 1885, with the establishment of the cabinet system, the Home Ministry was reorganized by Yamagata Aritomo, who became the first Home Minister. Bureaus were created with responsibilities for general administration, local administration, public works, public health, postal administration, topographic surveys, religious institutions and the national census; the administration of Hokkaidō and Karafuto Prefectures fell under the direct jurisdiction of the Home Ministry, all prefectural governors came under the jurisdiction of the Home Ministry.
In 1890, the Railroad Ministry and in 1892, the Communications Ministry were created, removing the postal administration functions from the Home Ministry. On the other hand, with the establishment of State Shinto, a Department of Religious Affairs was added to the Home Ministry in 1900. Following the High Treason Incident, the Tokko special police force was created in 1911; the Department of Religious Affairs was transferred to the Ministry of Education in 1913. From the 1920s period, faced with the growing issues of agrarian unrest and Bolshvik-inspired labor unrest, the attention of the Home Ministry was focused on internal security issues. Through passage of the Peace Preservation Law#Public Security Preservation Law of 1925, the Home Ministry was able to use its security apparatus to suppress political dissent and the curtail the activities of the socialists and the labor movement; the power of the Tokkō was expanded tremendously, it expanded to include branches in every Japanese prefecture, major city, overseas locations with a large Japanese population.
In the late 1920s and 1930s, the Tokkō launched a sustained campaign to destroy the Japanese Communist Party with several waves of mass arrests of known members and suspected sympathizers. In 1936, an Information and Propaganda Committee was created within the Home Ministry, which issued all official press statements, which worked together with the Publications Monitoring Department on censorship issues. In 1937, jointly with the Ministry of Education, the Home Ministry administered the National Spiritual Mobilization Movement, the Home Ministry assisted in implementation of the National Mobilization Law in 1938 to place Japan on a total war footing; the public health functions of the Ministry were separated into the Ministry of Health in 1938. In 1940, the Information and Propaganda Department was elevated to the Information Bureau, which consolidated the separate information departments from the Imperial Japanese Army, Imperial Japanese Navy and Foreign Ministry under the aegis of the Home Ministry.
The new Jōhōkyoku had complete control over all news and public events. In February 1941 it distributed among editors a black list of writers whose articles they were advised not to print anymore. In 1940, with the formation of the Taisei Yokusankai political party, the Home Ministry strengthened its efforts to monitor and control political dissent through enforcement of the tonarigumi system, used to coordinate civil defense activities through World War II. In 1942, the Ministry of Colonial Affairs was abolished, the Home Ministry extended its influence to Japanese external territories. After the surrender of Japan, the Home Ministry coordinated with the Allied occupation forces to maintain public order in occupied Japan. One of the first actions of the post-war Home Ministry was the creation of an sanctioned brothel system under the aegis of the “Recreation and Amusement Association”, created on August 28, 1945; the intention was to contain the sexual urges of the occupation forces, protect the main Japanese populace from rape and preserve the "purity" of the "Japanese race".
However, by October 1945, the scope of activities of the Home Ministry was limited, with the disestablishment of State Shinto and the abolishment of the Tokkō, with censorship and monitoring of labor
Meiji oligarchy
The Meiji oligarchy was the new ruling class of Meiji period Japan. In Japanese, the Meiji oligarchy is called the domain clique; the members of this class were adherents of kokugaku and believed they were the creators of a new order as grand as that established by Japan's original founders. Two of the major figures of this group were Ōkubo Toshimichi, son of a Satsuma retainer, Satsuma samurai Saigō Takamori, who had joined forces with Chōshū, Hizen to overthrow the Tokugawa shogunate. Okubo Saigō a field marshal. Kido Koin, a native of Chōshū, student of Yoshida Shōin, conspirator with Ōkubo and Saigō, became minister of education and chairman of the Governors' Conference and pushed for constitutional government. Prominent were Iwakura Tomomi, a Kyoto native who had opposed the Tokugawa and was to become the first ambassador to the United States, Ōkuma Shigenobu, of Hizen, a student of Rangaku and English, who held various ministerial portfolios becoming prime minister in 1898. To accomplish the new order's goals, the Meiji oligarchy set out to abolish the four divisions of society through a series of economic and social reforms.
Tokugawa shogunate revenues had depended on taxes on Tokugawa and other daimyo lands, loans from wealthy peasants and urban merchants, limited customs fees, reluctantly accepted foreign loans. To provide revenue and develop a sound infrastructure, the new government financed harbor improvements, machinery imports, overseas study for students, salaries for foreign teachers and advisers, modernization of the army and navy and telegraph networks, foreign diplomatic missions, such as the Iwakura mission. Difficult economic times, manifested by increasing incidents of agrarian rioting, led to calls for social reforms. In addition to the old high rents and interest rates, the average citizen was faced with cash payments for new taxes, military conscription, tuition charges for the newly introduced compulsory education; the people needed more time for productive pursuits while correcting social abuses of the past. To achieve these reforms, the old Tokugawa class system of samurai, farmer and merchant was abolished by 1871, though old prejudices and status consciousness continued, all were theoretically equal before the law.
Helping to perpetuate social distinctions, the government named new social divisions: the former daimyō became peerage nobility, the samurai became gentry, all others became commoners. Daimyō and samurai pensions were paid off in lump sums, the samurai lost their exclusive claim to military positions. Former samurai found new pursuits as bureaucrats, army officers, police officials, scholars, colonists in the northern parts of Japan and businessmen; these occupations helped stem some of the discontent. The 1873 Korean crisis resulted in the resignation of military expedition proponents Saigō and Councillor of State Etō Shimpei. Etō, the founder of various patriotic organizations, conspired with other discontented elements to start an armed insurrection against government troops in Saga, the capital of his native prefecture in Kyūshū in 1874. Charged with suppressing the revolt, Ōkubo swiftly crushed Etō, who had appealed unsuccessfully to Saigō for help. Three years the last major armed uprising—but the most serious challenge to the Meiji government—took shape in the Satsuma Rebellion, this time with Saigō playing an active role.
The Saga Rebellion and other agrarian and samurai uprisings mounted in protest to the Meiji reforms had been put down by the army. Satsuma's former samurai were numerous and they had a long tradition of opposition to central authority. Saigō, with some reluctance and only after more widespread dissatisfaction with the Meiji reforms, raised a rebellion in 1877. Both sides fought well, but the modern weaponry and better financing of the government forces ended the Satsuma Rebellion. Although he was defeated and committed suicide, Saigō was not branded a traitor and became a heroic figure in Japanese history; the suppression of the Satsuma Rebellion marked the end of serious threats to the Meiji regime but was sobering to the oligarchy. The fight drained the national treasury, led to serious inflation, forced land values—and badly needed taxes—down. Most important, calls for reform were renewed; the following were leading figures in the Meiji Restoration, when and in the subsequent Government of Meiji Japan: From the Court nobility: Iwakura Tomomi Saionji Kinmochi Sanjō Sanetomi From Satsuma Domain: Godai Tomoatsu Kuroda Kiyotaka Matsukata Masayoshi Mori Arinori Ōkubo Toshimichi Oyama Iwao Saigō Takamori Saigō Tsugumichi Terashima Munenori From Chōshū Domain: Inoue Kaoru Itō Hirobumi Kido Takayoshi Ōmura Masujirō Takasugi Shinsaku Yamagata Aritomo From Tosa Domain: Gotō Shōjirō Itagaki Taisuke Sakamoto Ryōma From Hizen Domain: Etō Shimpei Oki Takato Ōkuma Shigenobu Soejima Taneomi Others: Hayashi Tadasu Inoue Kowashi 1844-1905) Katsu Kaishū Yokoi Shonan Yuri Kimimasa Genrō Government of Meiji Japan Meiji Restoration Japan: Country Studies - Federal Research Division, Library of Congress This arti
Freedom and People's Rights Movement
The Freedom and People's Rights Movement and Civil Right Movement, or Free Civil Right Movement was a Japanese political and social movement for democracy in the 1880s. It pursued the formation of an elected legislature, revision of the Unequal Treaties with the United States and European countries, the institution of civil rights, the reduction of centralized taxation; the Movement prompted the Meiji government to establish a constitution in 1889 and a diet in 1890. Chiba Takusaburō, author of the "Itsukaichi constitution", a draft constitution for the Empire of Japan Etō Shinpei Fukuda Hideko Gotō Shōjirō Ido Reizan Inoue Kaoru Itagaki Taisuke, founder of the first Jiyūtō, former leader of the Jinshotai Yamamoto Yae Nakae Chōmin Ōkuma Shigenobu Shimizu Shikin Soejima Taneomi Yamaji Motoharu, former Jinshotai commander Tokutomi Sohō Ueki Emori Azenbō Soeda, prolific enka bard Saionji Kinmochi, one of the last Meiji period democrats, who tried to prevent the Tripartite Pact Liberalism in Japan Japanese dissidence during the Shōwa period
