Farmers' Movements
Japanese farmers face demographic and economic challenges. Their political strength of the early post–World War II period has waned due to a demographic shift away from rural areas. Deregulation of the agricultural commodity trade has put further pressure on Japanese farmers.
Comprehensive taxation on farmers was introduced from Tang dynasty China during the seventh century. Farmers faced an additional burden as drafted foot soldiers during the warring states period of the late-fifteenth to mid-sixteenth centuries. Their repeated rebellions against local lords resulted in confiscation of all swords from the farmers in 1588 by Toyotomi Hideyoshi and their complete separation from the warrior class.
Heavy tax burdens, especially during poor harvests, prompted farmers to rebel against domain lords. During the Edo period (1600/1603–1868), the decentralized and more sophisticated taxation on farmers by local domains and the ban on land transactions kept most farmers small-scale and poor. While most rebellions were quickly suppressed by the domain forces, the widespread rebellion by mostly Christian peasants in Shimabara (1637–1638) required intervention by the central government. Frequent famines after the late-eighteenth century and the development of urban commerce and industrial activities prompted informal transfer of land titles, dividing the farmers into a few rich landowners and many poor tenant farmers.
The two-tiered structure of the farmers largely continued throughout the pre–World War II period, despite limited land reforms, and the dual burdens of taxation to fuel state-led industrialization and military draft fell heavily on the tenant farmers. Some Marxist intellectuals, like Kawakami Hajime and his followers, and anarchists insisted on a political alliance of industrial workers and tenant farmers but had limited success due to state suppression. Farmers took part in the prewar proletariat movements in the stream of worker-farmer parties, such as Rodo Nominto, Nihon Ronoto, and Zenkoku Rono Taishuto. However, the military government and its control of agriculture through the Food Control Law of 1942 tightly incorporated farmers into the war efforts.
More than half the Japanese population was engaged in agriculture at the end of World War II. The American-led occupation forces implemented a major land reform program, breaking large land holdings into small independent farms. The collective support of these small farmers became a backbone of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party. The government used the Food Control Law for encouraging production and orderly distribution of rice under its monopoly during the food shortage following the war. The farmers set up the Central Union of Agricultural Cooperatives and successfully pressured the government into raising its purchase price of rice until the mid-1980s. Government efforts to deregulate the rice distribution system and discourage rice production through crop diversion programs had limited success. In other commodities, such as oranges and beef, quota-based imports started in the 1980s.
In the face of U.S. demands that Japan open its rice market to imports, Japanese farmers launched political campaigns to block imports and promote quality domestic rice. The former campaign delayed the opening of the rice market until 1994, when Japan agreed to institute a quota-based import program. In 1999, a tariff replaced the quota system. Meanwhile, the "quality rice" campaign networked farmers, environmentalists, and quality-conscious consumers and may provide a way for innovative farmers to compete successfully with imported rice. By the late 1990s, less than 10 percent of the Japanese population was engaged in agriculture, and half Japan's farmers produced commodities other than rice. The monolithic political strength of the farmers has vanished.
Further Reading
Donnelly, Michael W. (1984) "Conflict over Government Authority and Markets: Japan's Rice Economy." In Conflict in Japan, edited by Ellis S. Krauss, Thomas P. Rohlen, and Patricia G. Steinhoff. Honolulu, HI: University of Hawaii Press, 335–374.
George, Aurelia. (1988) Rice Politics in Japan. Food Policy Study no. 54. Tokyo: Agricultural Policy Research Center.
Karube, Kensuke. (1997) Nichibei Kome Kosho: Shijo kaiho no shinso to saikosho he no tenbo (U.S.–Japan Rice Negotiation: The Truth About the Market Opening and the Vision Toward Renegotiation). Tokyo: Chuokoron-sha.
Sato, Yoichiro. (1996) "Sticky Efforts: Japan's Rice Market Opening and U.S.–Japan Transnational Lobbying." In Japan Engaging the World: A Century of International Encounter, edited by Harumi Befu. Denver, CO: Center for Japan Studies, Teikyo Loretto-Heights University, 73–99.
Soda, Osamu. (1994) Kome wo kangaeru (Thinking of Rice). Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten.
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