Shinōkōshō

Shinōkōshō ( Japanese 士 農工商 , dt. "Sword aristocracy , agriculture, handicraft, trade") describes the four-class system in early modern Japan of the Edo period , ie the social and economic order between the 17th and 19th centuries. The population was divided into 4 classes depending on their profession and origin. The highest class was formed by the sword nobility ( 武士 , bushi ), followed by that of the peasants ( 百姓 , hyakushō ) and the urban population ( 町 人 , chōnin ), who in turn consisted of craftsmen and traders. Above the system stood the courtiers of the imperial court in Kyoto and the religious professions, below the system the various paria groups ( buraku ).

Sword nobility

Main article : Samurai

This layer, also known as samurai, included the vassals of the ruling elite, but also the feudal lords ( daimyō ) and the shogun itself. Together, the samurai made up little more than 6% of the total population. They were the political and cultural elite in Japan's early modern period and were at the top of the four-class system. Their salary, which was usually measured in rice, they received from their liege lord, to whom they were committed to loyalty. They were only rarely given their own land, from which they then had to support the entire family and servants. They were obliged to live in urban quarters, either in the lord's castle town or in the accommodations of his residence in Edo . Samurai families and their servants therefore made up a considerable part of the city's population.

The sword nobility emerged from a class of military peasants and it was only through the numerous decrees of the Tokugawa government that they rose to the ruling class. Their privileges consisted in the fact that they were the only social class to have family names and to carry two swords, a long sword ( katana ) and a short sword ( wakizashi ). This also made them stand out most strikingly from the crowd. They alone had political and administrative powers. Members of the sword nobility were registered in groups as followers of feudal lords. Access to this class was supposed to be strictly limited by birth, but a clever marriage policy later made it possible for citizens to move up to this class.

Particularly in the early days of the Tokugawa rule , there were also significant and carefully considered class differences among the samurai. For example, it was differentiated whether a samurai served a daimyo or the shogun. With the exception of the very top layer, samurai carried out underpaid routine tasks that left time for further training and entertainment, but forced many to also work as teachers or small traders.

The quality of life increased rapidly after the beginning of the Tokugawa rule. During this entire period, however, samurai always received the same income despite rising and falling rice prices. The ordinances of Bakufu , the government under the Shogun, to maintain a proper lifestyle ( 倹 約 令 , Ken'yakurei ) drove this class in particular very quickly into economic hardship, so that many families and even the richest principalities ( han ) soon joined the rising merchants highly indebted.

farmers

The farmers ( 百姓 , hyakushō ) made up the largest part of the total population with almost 80%. According to Confucian views, they were in second place in society and thus occupied a significantly higher position than was the case in Europe. That is only logical, as they earned the income for the sword nobility, who were actually forbidden from any economic activity. They were also superior to the urban population because they had a much higher social benefit for the tax revenue of the state through rice production.

Agriculture ( 農 , nō ) not only included the cultivation of rice, but also the exploitation of all natural resources, including the production or extraction of products such as fish, seaweed or charcoal. The production of fabrics and yarns also belonged to the area of ​​responsibility of this layer, although the latter was more likely to be carried out by women.

The rural population was organized in numerous villages ( mura ), the inhabitants of which were divided into an upper and a lower class, as is common among the samurai. The upper class of the village consisted mainly of a few wealthy landowners who, in contrast to the rest of the population, were in some cases well educated. Mostly active as village chiefs, they regulated the submission of taxes, the organization of compulsory services and, above all, ensured peace and order. The majority of the rural population, however, worked as small farmers, tenants or agricultural workers. They were under strict control. For example, rioting, direct petitions to higher officials or even rioting were strictly prohibited.

Despite their relatively high position in the social order, the peasant class was one of the hardest hit by the anti-luxury laws. The prohibitions were more precise, and even their language was noticeably more unfriendly. Like the townspeople, they were not allowed to have family names or to carry weapons. Any luxury in clothing, apartment or food was forbidden to them. They were only allowed to wear canvas or cotton, with the exception of the village elder, who was awarded coarse silk, and the restrictions even went so far in later years that a pattern was required for their clothing in order to save fabric.

As far as nutrition was concerned, in most regions they were not allowed to eat rice at all , except on bon (festival of the dead), New Year's or on other special occasions, and were fed on barley, millet, leafy vegetables or beets. In bad harvest years , there were even additional bans on the production and consumption of sake , noodles, dumplings, tofu and the like.

In order to increase productivity, it was common in some areas to deny peasants access to education. In Sendai, for example, the sale of books was banned. In addition, farmers were generally not allowed to attend wrestling matches or the theater. They had to be in the field every day and were even encouraged to part with their wives if they were lazy or had a tendency towards excessive luxury.

Urban population

The urban population ( 町 人 , chōnin ) included mainly craftsmen and merchants. Like samurai and farmers, they too were registered not as individuals but as neighborhood groups and were supervised by an officer authorized by the lord of the castle town. Among them, a distinction was not always made between two classes. Most of them were simply summarized as the non-samurai population of the cities. In the early Edo period , however, they still played a small role numerically.

In the bourgeois households there was just as strict a regime as that of the sword nobility. Here, too, the employees were obliged to the strictest obedience to their hosts; an offense could even result in the death penalty. The citizens of the cities had to follow similar rules as the peasants. They had no family names and were not allowed to carry weapons. They were also prohibited from owning land.

The citizens found the greatest advantage in the economic system of the shinōkōshō . Their existence was by no means certain, but they had learned to use this to their advantage. It was precisely their rapid rise that led to the ever more extensive ken'yakurei , the anti-luxury laws that affected all classes. Soon, not only the city's economic life, but also cultural life was in their hands.

Craftsman

Since they had a higher social benefit according to Confucian values, they stood above merchants in the social order. The handicraft ( 工 , kō ) not only included the classic trades, doctors also belonged to this class, although these were initially more “doctor by experience”. It was not until the Meiwa era, in the middle of the 18th century, that a course developed from this with the establishment of the Igakukan ( 医学 館 ), the institute for medical studies.

Craftsmen were mostly in a specific employment relationship with the houses of the bushi , for whom they performed various jobs. The relationship was regulated by so-called oyabun . These were responsible for the supply of labor for private, but also for public works.

Handicraft skills were usually passed on from one generation to the next. You had to learn the father's profession and it was almost impossible to leave the family business. Independence could only be achieved if you had your father or eldest brother appoint you as head of a main or branch family.

A distinction was made between the craftsmen who had a house in the castle town ( 居 職 , ishoku ), craftsmen who left the house ( 出 職 , deshoku ), such as carpenter or bricklayer, and so-called “wanderers” who had no permanent home Had residence ( 渡 り , watari ).

Merchants

Traders formed the lowest stratum of Japanese society in early modern times. Since the Japanese had hardly any opportunities for independent economic activity before the beginning of the peacetime, the role of the traders was enormously underestimated by the bakufu and they were hardly considered in the rules and regulations. Of course, they were also subject to certain restrictions, for example they were only allowed to live in houses with a maximum of one upper floor and were not allowed to own any valuable household appliances. Like craftsmen, they lived separately from the samurai, in neighborhoods with the same professional groups. Otherwise, however, they had a comparatively large amount of freedom and thus the opportunity to achieve prosperity through their own performance.

The idea

In the 1880s, the daimyo Toyotomi Hideyoshi succeeded in uniting Japan under his rule. Through strict controls and surveillance, as well as the removal of the city's rights of self-government, he enforced a strong central authority and tried to stabilize the feudal structures. After Hideyoshi's death, Tokugawa Ieyasu came to power. This was appointed to the Shogun in 1603 and followed the social and economic measures of Hideyoshi. The Tokugawa regime tried to immobilize and freeze society.

After the unification of Japan, the country was divided into principalities, so-called han , which were ruled by feudal princes ( daimyo ). Ein han was a small autonomous state with its own political and economic system. Only the shogun himself stood above the liege prince; they and all their subordinates were obliged to be loyal to him. The center of every han was the castle town, the residence of the daimyo , around which samurai, craftsmen and merchants had to gather. This division helped establish a hierarchy in which each group was a self-governing unit. The decisive factor in this new system was the position and function of the individual and how the state exercised its power over them. Then you were judged first by status and then by group, which meant that each person had a fixed position in society, first in the family context, then in the professional environment. Thus, an arbitrary exercise of power on the individual was largely prevented; at the same time, the entire administrative apparatus became more impersonal, and individuals were given a more objective view of government practices. Hall calls this typically rule by status .

Contradictions

The four-tier system was based on ancient Confucian values ​​that had developed in China 2000 years earlier. It should represent an analogy to nature and the cosmos: "The relation of heaven and earth - the natural 'above' and 'below' - thus corresponded to the relation of ruler and people". However, contradictions emerged very soon after the introduction of this system. After 1700 a long period of economic crisis and stagnation set in, but the income of the sword nobility, which was measured in fixed quantities of rice, could not adapt to the changing circumstances. Their income remained the same throughout the Tokugawa period, almost 300 years. Their craft, namely the war, brought them nothing after the onset of peace, but at the same time they were not allowed to carry out their own economic ventures. So it happened that samurai gradually got into debt with the merchants of the cities. They were able to take advantage of the four-tier structure. Hardly noticed by the shogunate, they used the opportunity for free activity, which was the first in the history of the country. Presumably the rest of the people had played no role at all besides the warriors in the previous centuries, so that the government massively underestimated the effects of the free economy when the system was introduced.

Soon after the beginning of the peace period, traders and merchants attained a level of prosperity that was very considerable for the position of the class and they began to undergo cultural training. Their standard of living increased so much that it was soon hardly inferior to the bushi , even surpassing it, even if only sporadically at first. This was, of course, a thorn in the side of the ruling elite , and the Laws of Ethical Conduct ( Ken'yakurei ) were introduced. They related to all areas of life. In them, the material, color and pattern of clothing, household furnishings, architecture, permitted food, and even the equipment of puppets in the theater were specified. With the advancement of prosperity, however, many merchants made less and less of the increasing number of regulations. They retired to the entertainment districts of the cities, where anti-luxury laws did not apply and they could live on their income.

A big problem of the Ken'yakurei was above all that they not only restricted upwards, that is, said that one should not live above one's level, but at the same time also implied that one should not live below it. The rising cost of living therefore represented a major financial hurdle, especially for the sword nobility. They were now forced to take out loans from wealthy merchants, and there are supposed to be sources that claim that the daimyō's debt alone made up a hundred times the amount of money in circulation. The main reason for the high level of debt is that the daimyo usually ran two households, one in their own castle town and one in Edo. They were also responsible for building schools, repairing traffic routes and other similar endeavors in their fiefdoms.

Some citizens who had rendered special services to the government were even allowed to have family names and also to carry two swords. Little by little, the rigid boundaries between the four estates disappeared - not least because of a clever marriage policy, which the government soon stopped. Because especially in the 80s of the 17th century, rich citizens let themselves be adopted into samurai families for large sums of money in order to become some themselves. A lively ascent and descent within the classes had begun, because even some lower samurai decided not infrequently to give up their nobility status and thus a life on the subsistence level and to become citizens.

The contradictions between this four-tier ideology and social reality became clear very quickly. There were both rich and poor representatives in each class, and the quality of life, but also the education of the individual, was determined more by economic criteria than by their position in the social hierarchy. The four stands only reflected social appreciation, because even a well-earning trader was still under the poorest samurai and had to treat him appropriately.

Of course, this form of society also brought positive things with it: The techniques in agriculture, for example, improved steadily and relatively quickly moved the rural community from a self-sufficient to a demand-based agriculture. In addition, the Edo period is considered to be one of the greatest heydays in Japanese cultural history.

Beyond shinōkōshō

The four classes covered under the term Shinōkōshō and their social position completely ignores some groups. These include the courtiers ( kuge ), members of the imperial family , as well as Buddhist monks and Shinto priests, who existed according to traditional ideas about society.

On the other hand, it also neglects the broad stratum of servants in urban households and shops, day laborers such as migrant workers, performers and entertainers, the residents and actors of the entertainment and brothel districts, which alone made up 2% of the population, and of course the broad stratum of the Paria groups , the outcasts ( Buraku ). They were mainly found in the Kyoto area and western Japan.

As for the performers and entertainers, it is not the big stars of kabuki and puppet theater that are representative of this class. The low position in the class system relates much more to the many street performers, jugglers, storytellers, dancers and fortune tellers. Their activity was often equated with begging, which made them close to the Hinin .

Courtiers

Main article : Kuge

Above the Shinōkōshō stood the Kuge, the nobles of the court in Kyōto, who had already lost their power in the 11th century, but still fulfilled a ceremonial function.

About 70 families belonged to them, who were connected to the imperial family by consanguinity or by tradition. Here too, as in the other layers, there was an inner hierarchy. The offices that these families held were, however, only of a purely formal nature and only came into effect when they concerned activities within the court.

During the entire Tokugawa rule they, like the emperor ( Tennō ) himself, had no influence on political events. They were forbidden to mingle with the people or even to enter certain parts of the city, and so they lived almost completely separate from the rest of society.

Like the sword nobility, the courtiers were assigned a fixed salary depending on their position. As a result, they were usually hardly better off economically than the majority of the direct vassals of the Shogun ( Hatamoto ) and they usually gave additional lessons in poetry and calligraphy .

Paria groups

Main article : Buraku

The exclusion of entire groups of people from society has a long tradition in Japan. The causes lie not least in the division of society into four classes. According to the ideology of Confucianism and Buddhism behind this system, one was considered "impure" if, for example, one had to do with death in any way professionally. Extensive registers were also kept of these groups, so that the problem of discrimination continues to this day.

Even if the term Eta-Hinin is now used as a summary for outcasts in the Edo period, there were significant differences for those belonging to these groups.

Eta

Eta ( 穢 多 , dt. "A lot of dirt") were all those who mainly had to do with leather production and processing. This becomes clear in the original name Kawata , which means leather worker. However, they were not only active there, but also served in prison services and other fields of work that were considered unclean or frowned upon. From the 17th to the 19th century, their main duty was to remove animal carcasses. It was basically, like leather production, a monopoly trade granted to them by the authorities.

This status probably developed from the poorest parts of the population. They had to live in special villages or neighborhoods outside the cities. Belonging to this group was also based on strict heredity and the internal order again corresponded to the hierarchical model. So there was an elder in every village, over whom Danzaemon, the “head of the Eta ” ( Etagashira ), stood. Similar to the liege lords, he had to reside in Edo and was directly responsible to the shogunate, but also had considerable material wealth, especially for an outcast.

Discrimination against this group was not very advanced at the beginning of the Tokugawa rule. The term Eta did not come into use until the middle of the 17th century and was first used in a legal text of the government in 1657. Especially from the middle of the 18th century, Kawata were severely discriminated against by large parts of the population and harassed by numerous special laws. Eta became a common term in official documents during this period. Relatives continued to refer to themselves as Kawata .

Particularly noteworthy for the status of the Kawata are the regional variants of this occupational field. According to Ooms, farmers in some areas were able to slaughter animals or even act as hunters without "getting dirty". In some areas in north-east Japan there are even said to have no outcast communities, although there was a productive leather processing industry there too. This example shows that there was no uniform system even in united Japan after the introduction of Shinōkōshō .

In

Hinin ( 非人 , dt. "Non-humans") were convicted criminals, the disabled, the blind, lepers and those who were rejected by their families. There were even a few who chose this life for themselves. Also Hinin lived together with the Kawata in separate neighborhoods or villages outside the cities. It was a completely impoverished lower class that existed mainly through begging, but also included the entertainment arts and classic Kawata tasks such as burying the dead and skinning animals.

The most important difference to the Kawata was that one could leave the Hinin status under certain circumstances. However, this did not apply to those who were born into this class or who had belonged to it for more than ten years. With the approval of the family and the authorities, the others were able to become citizens again.

Like all other status groups, this one was also very well organized. They had regional leaders whom they were obliged to obey, but who in turn could find them work and also represented them in the authorities. They too could not avoid the strict regulations on clothing and living standards, which make their low social status clear and thus help to maintain the class order.

After the Meiji Restoration

In 1869 the Shinōkōshō was abolished as part of the Meiji Restoration . Farmers, traders and artisans became ordinary citizens. Eta and Hinin also received citizenship, but were marked with a stamp as "new citizens". Kuge and Samurai were combined to form the Kazoku , a new nobility based on the English peerage system.

Article 14 of the current Japanese constitution expressly forbids any form of nobility and stipulates that all state medals and decorations must have no effect on the next generation.

literature

• Johannes Barth: Edo. History of a city and an era in Japan . Tōkyō, German Society for Nature and Ethnology of East Asia (OAG) and Japanese-German Society eV 1979 (communications from the German Society for Nature and Ethnology of East Asia, Volume LXXVI) pp. 183–189
• John K. Fairbank , Edwin O. Reischauer , Albert M. Craig: East Asia. Tradition and Transformation . Houghton Mifflin Company and Charles E. Tuttle Company, Boston, Tōkyō 1976, pp. 392-435
• Gerald Groemer: The Creation of the Edo Outcaste Order , in: Journal of Japanese Studies Vol. 27, No. 2, (Sommer, 2001) pp. 263-293
• John W. Hall: Rule by Status in Tokugawa Japan , in: Journal of Japanese Studies Vol. 1, No. 1, (Herbst, 1974) pp. 39-49
• Herman Ooms: Tokugawa Village Practice. Class, Status, Power, Law . University California Press, Berkeley, Los Angeles, London 1996
• Renate Ruttkowski: From the Paleolithic to the end of the Second World War , in: Hans Jürgen Mayer, Manfred Pohl (ed.): Country report Japan. Geography, history, politics, economy, society, culture . Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, Darmstadt 1995, pp. 54–65
• Donald H. Shivley: Sumptuary Regulation and Status in Early Tokugawa Japan , in: Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies Vol. 25, (1964-1965) pp. 123-164
• Klaus Vollmer : Concepts and foundations of social order in East Asia , in: Sepp Linhart , Susanne Weigelin-Schwiedrzik (Ed.): Edition Weltregionen. Volume 10: East Asia 1600–1900. History and society . Promedia Verlag, Vienna 2004, pp. 115-138

Individual evidence

1. ^ Fairbank 1976
2. ↑ ^{a b} Barth 1979
3. ^ Hall 1974
4. ^ Hall 1974: 44
5. ↑ Vollmer 2004: 119
6. ↑ Running two households was a remnant from previous decades. It was mainly used to control the liege princes who had to travel to the capital with their vassals once every two years. This weakened them economically and reduced the risk of revolt. This "phenomenon" was called Sankin kōtai .
7. ↑ Vollmer 2004: 122
8. ↑ Groemer 2001: 267
9. ↑ Ooms 1996: 275