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Paper short abstract:

I focus on three reformist academics and entrepreneurs in 1920s and 1930s Japan, and follow their contours to proceed in the field of social policy. The main question is the reason why they failed to constrain the right wing ultra-nationalist politics in 1930s and early 1940s.

Paper long abstract:

In the interwar period Japan suffered from long and chronic economic slump, popular pauperism and social unrest, which became the hotbed both for ultra-nationalism and organized socialist movement. Before the First World War young scholars such as TAKANO Iwasaburo, ONOZUKA Kiheiji, and FUKUDA Tokuzo had already recognized the importance of Social Policy as a bulwark against socialism, and they organized the Japanese Verein für Sozialpolitik in 1897 followed the German Verein für Socialpolitik. This association included not only scholars but also labor activist and entrepreneurs who pursued the possibility of social reform in Japan in the early stage of industrialization.

After the First World War there emerged various style of ultra-nationalism as another protestant against capitalism. Then the Japanese reformist academics labor activists and entrepreneurs became obliged to operate on two different fronts. Japanese "semi-feudal, absolutist and militarist" Government was active in suppressing socialism since the late nineteenth century, and after the legislation of Peace Preservation Act of 1925, the main objections became heard from ultra-nationalist and militarist right wing. This paper focuses on three reformist academics and entrepreneurs in the 1920s and 1930s, TAKANO Iwasaburo, OHARA Magosaburo and HIRAO Hachisaburo, who were the last liberal and calm opinion leaders in the period when Japanese right wing activities risen their strength and made direct violence and terrorism against not only socialists but also liberal politicians.

After the disarmaments in the 1920s and early 1930s Japanese right wing politics sought to the expansion of armaments, and the military buildup lead to economic and military invasion into Asian continental regions such as Manchuria, China and Vietnam. The reformist academics and entrepreneurs kept distant from such right wing militaristic movement, but failed to prevent such movement from occupy socio-political scene in Japan in 1930s and early 1940s. How and why they failed to constrain the right wing ultra-nationalist politics? This question is important to understand Japanese past and also the present situations of revitalization of nationalism in the second globalization in the twenty first century.