Vol. 72, No.5

Keishi SHIRATORI
Open-market operations by the Bank of Japan and regional banks during World War II

This article is an attempt to analyze the relationship between the Bank of Japan’s open-market operations and regional banks. To that end, I offer a critique of the academic perspective that suggests a ‘peacetime logic in financial policy’ in the open-market operations of BOJ during World War II. In addition, the article emphasizes the point that BOJ was forced to accept a role subordinate to that of the financial operations of the military government.

During the war, BOJ deemed the selling of government bonds as the optimal policy for enabling the government to efficiently procure funds sufficient to cover its war expenditure. In order to prevent the collapse of the total war system, BOJ actively implemented this policy from the time of Japan’s invasive war on China.

When it became impossible for city banks to buy bonds from BOJ from 1940, BOJ looked to regional banks as the most important substitute buyer of the bonds. As a result, BOJ’s decision to leave regional banks intact as a group lingered. However, in 1944 it also became impossible for regional banks to buy the bonds. This is one of the important reasons for the collapse of the comprehensive war system in Japan.

Yoshiyuki AIHARA
The distribution mechanism of timber in southeastern Guizhou Qingshui-jiang valley during the mid-Qing period: analysis of Caiyun Huangmu Andu

In the 18th century, the Miao in southeastern Guizhou began to produce shanmu timber [Cunninghamia lanceolata (Lamb.) Hook.] in great abundance. The timber used for the construction of the palace in Beijing was procured from this region. Every year, a bureaucrat from Hunan province traveled to southeastern Guizhou to procure the timber. In this article, the author examines the distribution mechanism of timber in this area, using the historical records Caiyun Huangmu Andu [Archives on felling and transporting imperial timber], written by a lower bureaucrat who was in charge of the procurement in the years 1777 and 1781.

Two things made it difficult for the bureaucrat to procure the timber. First, large-size timber was rare and valuable. Second, the actual cost of the timber far exceeded the legal statutory budget. Under these circumstances, the bureaucrat had to carry out a smooth procurement while saving on costs and also managing to gain private profit for himself. At times, the bureaucrat conflicted with the local middleman, and at times he cooperated with him; and he also cooperated with the merchants from the lower area of Yangtze valley, e.g., Huizhou merchants. The manager of the forest, meanwhile, sold timber when the price was high and thus earned capital for reforestation.

Hisao KOKUBU
The social impact of tramway construction in the suburbs of Marseille: the case of les Camoins (1872-1931)

A characteristic feature of the urbanization of France from the end of the 19th century to the beginning of the 1930s was the process by which tramway networks were established in cities and, in particular, by which suburbs developed. Based on the examination of two main historical sources, the manuscript census registers and materials of the tramway management, this paper studies the social impact of tramway construction in the suburbs of Marseille by focusing on families and individuals.

The quarter of les Camoins, located in a farming area approximately 13 kilometers from the city center, suffered from a population drain to urban areas in the mid-19th century. However, this quarter began to be reactivated when large-scale plants moved out to the suburbs and with the diffusion of urban-type agriculture from the end of the century. Although conflicting interests caused considerable delay in tramway construction, the opening of tramway traffic in 1907 accelerated reactivation of the area.

Les Camoins as a health resort first gained strength in 1911, and in 1931, with the coming of the tram age, the quarter was transformed into a true residential area. Furthermore, local people began to settle there permanently, and people from other areas and other countries (mainly Italy) increased, lending a Mediterranean character to les Camoins and thus transforming a suburban quarter of a large city.

Masahiko SAKAGUCHI
Organization and dissolution of sericultural cooperative in Shimoina, Nagano Prefecture

This paper examines the postwar reform movements that aimed to organize sericultural cooperatives, particularly the establishment and management of all silkworm-raising cooperatives in Shimoina area, Nagano Prefecture. Few case studies have been made on this topic. I attempt to identify the characteristics of postwar agrarian society based on an analysis of the existing social and economic conditions of sericultural cooperatives and the cooperatives themselves. The movement to organize sericultural cooperatives in the Shimoina area was centered around Tenryusha, a silk-reeling cooperative. No less than 72 cooperatives were organized, but most of them were dissolved from 1949 to the middle of 1950s. This was caused by government regulation, the decline of the sericultural industry and, above all, the shift from sericultural cooperatives to general agricultural cooperatives in Tenryusha.

But Shimohisakata Sericultural Cooperative continued to exist for an exceptionally long time. This is mainly attributed to the dependence of the area on the sericultural industry and the leadership of Naoto AOSHIMA, a sericulturist. I discuss the major role that he played as a typical technocrat in the postwar agrarian society.

Jun FUKUSHI
The 1886 Colonial and Indian Exhibition and Canada

This article considers the significance of the 1886 Colonial and Indian Exhibition held in London from a Canadian perspective. Although it has received little attention in past historiography, this exhibition aimed to strengthen economic relations within the British Empire as advocated by the Royal Commission, the exhibition’s organizer. Canada approved this vision and participated in the exhibition.

Canada’s stand on economic unity, however, differed from that of the Royal Commission. Canada saw itself not only as a staple export country but also as the second largest industrial presence within the Empire after Britain. Canada was attempting to strengthen its economy through manufacturing exports as well as agricultural exports. The Royal Commission, in contrast, represented a self-sufficient Empire that consisted solely of Britain as its industrial centre, with the other colonies and dependencies serving as natural resource suppliers.

This article concludes that, despite their consensus as to the objective of this exhibition, Canada and the Royal Commission were seriously divided regarding the economic unity of the Empire. Through its participation in this exhibition, Canada illustrated the dual roles that it intended to play within the Empire after the turn of the century.