"There are seven emotions: joy, anger, anxiety, adoration, grief, fear and hate, and if a man does not give way to these he can be called patient"
- Tokugawa Ieyasu
How did Tokugawa Shogunate ruling transform Japanese Society?
For more than 250 years the
Tokugawa Shoguns ruled Japan. They were a Shogunate that transformed Japanese society. Before the time of the of the Tokugawa Shogunate reign the country wallowed in lawlessness and chaos during the Sengoku period. The ‘three unifiers’ brought this violence to an end. They worked to bring the warring daimyo back under central control. However in 1603, Tokugawa Ieyasu completed this task and established the Tokugawa Shogunate, which would rule in the emperor's name until 1868. When Tokugawa Ieyasu was
bestowed the title of shogun he established the capital of Japan, Edo. He named his son, Hidetada, Shogun in order to continue the Shogunate under his family’s name. Until his death however in 1616, Ieyasu continuously worked to run the government. This political and administrative knowledge characterized the first Tokugawa shoguns. Many Tokugawa Shoguns followed Ieyasu, yet few made an impact on society. Tokugawa Iemitsu probably made the biggest impact in his reign. Iemitsu is credited for establishing the sankin kōtai system which forced daimyo to spending a certain amount of time (6 months a year) in Edo.
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The key goal of this policy was to prevent the daimyo from becoming powerful enough to overthrow him, by separating them from their ruling provinces and by forcing them to regularly pay a generous sum to fund the immense travel expenses that came with the journey. The system also involved the daimyo's families and heirs remaining in Edo, disconnected from their lord, serving basically as hostages.
This policy created a strong worship between the people and the Shogun. As almost 200 Daimyo were travelling constantly, merchants along the roads thrived, naming them more than just society’s parasites. Tokugawa Iemitsu was also responsible for the separation of the country from anyone from the ‘outside world’; Sakoku. All Europeans were expelled from the country, people who were in Japan could not leave and people who had already left were not allowed to return. Japan’s gates were shut from the world for almost 200 years. In this time Japan had to become self-sustainable and learn to keep under the ruling of the all-powerful Shogunate.
Japanese life was peaceful
under the heavily controlled Shogunate government. May rules, laws and edicts were enforced to keep the country in order. The Tokugawa Shogunate had a major impact in the transformation of Japanese society especially under the reign of Tokugawa Ieyasu and Tokugawa Iemitsu. |