War and State Building in Medieval Japan

War and State Building in Medieval Japan PDF Author: John A. Ferejohn
Publisher: Stanford University Press
ISBN: 0804774315
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 192

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Book Description
The nation state as we know it is a mere four or five hundred years old. Remarkably, a central government with vast territorial control emerged in Japan at around the same time as it did in Europe, through the process of mobilizing fiscal resources and manpower for bloody wars between the 16th and 17th centuries. This book, which brings Japan's case into conversation with the history of state building in Europe, points to similar factors that were present in both places: population growth eroded clientelistic relationships between farmers and estate holders, creating conditions for intense competition over territory; and in the ensuing instability and violence, farmers were driven to make Hobbesian bargains of taxes in exchange for physical security.

War and State Building in Medieval Japan

War and State Building in Medieval Japan PDF Author: John A. Ferejohn
Publisher: Stanford University Press
ISBN: 0804774315
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 192

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Book Description
The nation state as we know it is a mere four or five hundred years old. Remarkably, a central government with vast territorial control emerged in Japan at around the same time as it did in Europe, through the process of mobilizing fiscal resources and manpower for bloody wars between the 16th and 17th centuries. This book, which brings Japan's case into conversation with the history of state building in Europe, points to similar factors that were present in both places: population growth eroded clientelistic relationships between farmers and estate holders, creating conditions for intense competition over territory; and in the ensuing instability and violence, farmers were driven to make Hobbesian bargains of taxes in exchange for physical security.

Samurai, Warfare and the State in Early Medieval Japan

Samurai, Warfare and the State in Early Medieval Japan PDF Author: Karl F. Friday
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134330227
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 248

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Book Description
Karl Friday, an internationally recognised authority on Japanese warriors, provides the first comprehensive study of the topic to be published in English. This work incorporates nearly twenty years of on-going research and draws on both new readings of primary sources and the most recent secondary scholarship. It overturns many of the stereotypes that have dominated views of the period. Friday analyzes Heian -, Kamakura- and Nambokucho-period warfare from five thematic angles. He examines the principles that justified armed conflict, the mechanisms used to raise and deploy armed forces, the weapons available to early medieval warriors, the means by which they obtained them, and the techniques and customs of battle. A thorough, accessible and informative review, this study highlights the complex casual relationships among the structures and sources of early medieval political power, technology, and the conduct of war.

Samurai, Warfare and the State in Early Medieval Japan

Samurai, Warfare and the State in Early Medieval Japan PDF Author: Karl F. Friday
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781857287486
Category : Japan
Languages : en
Pages : 236

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Book Description
A study of the institution of war in Japan over seven centuries.

Coins, Trade, and the State

Coins, Trade, and the State PDF Author: Ethan Issac Segal
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 1684175070
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 289

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Book Description
Framed by the decline of the Heian aristocracy in the late 1100s and the rise of the Tokugawa shogunate in the early 1600s, Japan’s medieval era was a chaotic period of diffuse political power and frequent military strife. This instability prevented central authorities from regulating trade, issuing currency, enforcing contracts, or guaranteeing property rights. But the lack of a strong central government did not inhibit economic growth. Rather, it created opportunities for a wider spectrum of society to participate in trade, markets, and monetization. Peripheral elites—including merchants, warriors, rural estate managers, and religious leaders—devised new ways to circumvent older forms of exchange by importing Chinese currency, trading in local markets, and building an effective system of long-distance money remittance. Over time, the central government recognized the futility of trying to stifle these developments, and by the sixteenth century it asserted greater control over monetary matters throughout the realm. Drawing upon diaries, tax ledgers, temple records, and government decrees, Ethan Isaac Segal chronicles how the circulation of copper currency and the expansion of trade led to the start of a market-centered economy and laid the groundwork for Japan’s transformation into an early modern society.

Akutō and Rural Conflict in Medieval Japan

Akutō and Rural Conflict in Medieval Japan PDF Author: Morten Oxenboell
Publisher: University of Hawaii Press
ISBN: 0824875338
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 212

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Book Description
This volume offers the first in-depth analysis in English of an understudied phenomenon in medieval Japanese history: the so-called akutō (literally, “evil bands”). Employing chronicles, laws, and legal documents from the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, as well as recent Japanese scholarship, Morten Oxenboell examines the significance of akutō in legal proceedings to provide a nuanced understanding of how rural communities organized for and engaged in violent conflicts. He deconstructs the image of akutō as instigators of violence by underlining the significance of the term as a rhetorical device used by litigants to voice their grievances in Kamakura legal proceedings. The many instances in which akutō appear offer a clear example of the ways in which the new legal vocabulary concealed realities behind rhetorical flourishes and narratives of violence and predation. Violence was certainly a part of the negotiation for rights and privileges in the estate system, and Oxenboell demonstrates how conflicts developed and were untangled by local actors, who were rarely given a voice in sources from this period. By peeling away the rhetoric, he presents us a unique view of rural populations organizing their communities in the face of violence, whether as victims of outside aggression or as aggressors themselves against landlords or neighbors. The book therefore goes beyond the usual focus on elites in medieval Japanese history by concentrating on local mobilization schemes and strategies, which were often framed and defamed by central elites. Rural residents, who could not rely on the authorities for protection, handled their own security concerns via complex social mechanisms that tied together locals and absentee landlords in an uneasy relationship of mutual dependency. By examining the fissures in this relationship—in the form of akutō complaints—Oxenboell shows that violent activism was part of the daily management of estates and that such conflicts do not indicate an absence of order but rather a system of checks and balances that helped create a vibrant society.

Military Thought of Asia

Military Thought of Asia PDF Author: Kaushik Roy
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000210790
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 267

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Book Description
Military Thought of Asia challenges the assertion that the generation of rational secular ideas about the conduct of warfare is the preserve of the West, by analysing the history of ideas of warfare in Asia from the ancient period to the present. The volume takes a transcontinental and comparative approach to provide a broad overview of the evolution of military thought in Asia. The military traditions and theories which have emerged in different parts of Eurasia throughout history are products of geopolitics and unique to the different regions. The book considers the systematic and tight representation of ideas by famous figures including Kautlya and Sun Tzu. At the same time, it also highlights publications on military affairs by small men like mid-ranking officers and scattered ideas regarding the origin, nature and societal impact of organised violence present in miscellaneous sources like coins, inscriptions, paintings and fictional literature. In so doing, the book fills a historiographical gap in scholarship on military thought, which marginalises Asia to the part of cameo, and historicises the evolution of theory and the praxis of warfare. The volume shows that the ‘East’ has a long unbroken tradition of conceptualising war and its place in society from the Classical Era to the Information Age. It is essential reading for those interested in the evolution of military thought throughout history, particularly in Asia.

The Cambridge Economic History of the Modern World: Volume 1, 1700 to 1870

The Cambridge Economic History of the Modern World: Volume 1, 1700 to 1870 PDF Author: Stephen Broadberry
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1009038028
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 514

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Book Description
The first volume of The Cambridge Economic History of the Modern World traces the emergence of modern economic growth in eighteenth century Britain and its spread across the globe. Focusing on the period from 1700 to 1870, a team of leading experts in economic history offer a series of regional studies from around the world, as well as thematic analyses of key factors governing the differential outcomes in different parts of the global economy. Topics covered include population and human development, capital and technology, geography and institutions, living standards and inequality, international flows of trade and labour, the international monetary system, and war and empire.

The Historical Sociology of Japanese Martial Arts

The Historical Sociology of Japanese Martial Arts PDF Author: Raul Sanchez Garcia
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1351333798
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 251

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Book Description
Winner of the Norbert Elias Book Prize 2020 This is the first long-term analysis of the development of Japanese martial arts, connecting ancient martial traditions with the martial arts practised today. The Historical Sociology of Japanese Martial Arts captures the complexity of the emergence and development of martial traditions within the broader Japanese Civilising Process. The book traces the structured process in which warriors’ practices became systematised and expanded to the Japanese population and the world. Using the theoretical framework of Norbert Elias’s process-sociology and drawing on rich empirical data, the book also compares the development of combat practices in Japan, England, France and Germany, making a new contribution to our understanding of the socio-cultural dynamics of state formation. Throughout this analysis light is shed onto a gender blind spot, taking into account the neglected role of women in martial arts. The Historical Sociology of Japanese Martial Arts is important reading for students of Socio-Cultural Perspectives in Sport, Sociology of Physical Activity, Historical Development of Sport in Society, Asian Studies, Sociology and Philosophy of Sport, and Sports History and Culture. It is also a fascinating resource for scholars, researchers and practitioners interested in the historical and socio-cultural aspects of combat sport and martial arts.

Routledge Handbook of Premodern Japanese History

Routledge Handbook of Premodern Japanese History PDF Author: Karl F. Friday
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 135169202X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 433

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Book Description
Scholarship on premodern Japan has grown spectacularly over the past four decades, in terms of both sophistication and volume. A new approach has developed, marked by a higher reliance on primary documents, a shift away from the history of elites to broader explorations of social structures, and a re-examination of many key assumptions. As a result, the picture of the early Japanese past now taught by specialists differs radically from the one that was current in the mid-twentieth century. This handbook offers a comprehensive historiographical review of Japanese history up until the 1500s. Featuring chapters by leading historians and covering the early Jōmon, Yayoi, Kofun, Nara, and Heian eras, as well as the later medieval periods, each section provides a foundational grasp of the major themes in premodern Japan. The sections will include: Geography and the environment Political events and institutions Society and culture Economy and technology The Routledge Handbook of Premodern Japanese History is an essential reference work for students and scholars of Japanese, Asian, and World History.

Early Modern China and Northeast Asia

Early Modern China and Northeast Asia PDF Author: Evelyn S. Rawski
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1107093082
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 351

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Book Description
Evelyn Rawski presents a revisionist history of early modern China in the context of northeast Asian geopolitics and global maritime trade.