Paper short abstract:

This paper examines the development of demographic knowledge in interwar Japan and its influence on domestic and foreign policy. It elucidates the connection between statistical data and the “population problem” (jinkō mondai), placing contemporary demographic issues in a broader historical context.

Paper long abstract:

With 28% of population older than 65, Japan is the most aged society in the world (UN 2019). This demographic state has resulted in debates on socio-economic implications of the “population problem” (jinkō mondai) and potential remedies. Despite ageing being a contemporary issue, “population problem” has existed in Japan since the Meiji period.

This paper examines the interaction between population surveys and policymaking vis-à-vis the “population problem” in interwar Japan, particularly between 1920 and 1931. The 1920s were a formative decade for population inquiry: in 1920 the first empire-wide census was conducted and by 1924 labor surveys implemented. The burgeoning interest in demographic knowledge was stimulated by the economic and social instability of post-World War I industrialization and the Great Depression, which shaped the “population problem” first as a matter of food shortage and subsequently as an unemployment issue. By 1930s, under Malthusian pretext of overpopulation and resource shortage, Japan became a “migration state” (Lu 2019) and embarked on military expansion following the 1931 Manchurian Incident.

First part of the paper analyzes the diversification and political utility of the demographic knowledge in early 1920s. After World War I and 1918 “rice riots,” heterogenous Japanese leadership believed population data were necessary for national development and for finding a solution to the population problem. I first juxtapose how population surveys were created internally for “postwar management” (Garon 1997) and as a basis for debating possible solutions to the population problem – including emigration, expansion, or birth control – while being used externally as a support for claims of overpopulation through “conference diplomacy” (Dickinson 2013). Secondly, I show that the introduction of labor surveys was a common starting ground towards solving social issues for members of the Japanese elite across the political spectrum. The second part of the paper explores how the annual population growth after 1925, together with labor and occupational surveys, came to be used in justifying territorial expansion. The paper shows that, although Malthusian discourse aided imperialism, it would be a teleological interpretation to perceive expansion to Manchuria as an understood result of the ambiguous concept of “population problem.”