Passing the Showa Genroku: The "Heisei Hoei" Era

2019/04/22

If we compare the Showa era to the Genroku era, then the Heisei era corresponds to the Hoei era. This is speaking in terms of metaphors using era names from the Edo period. In the past, the economic critic Taichi Sakaiya likened the Showa era to Genroku, calling it the "Era of the Mountain Pass." However, now that Heisei is coming to an end and Mr. Sakaiya has passed away, looking back calmly, it feels as though it was a prophecy that Showa was the peak of Japanese history and the eras following it would be a downhill slope.

Indeed, this may have been true for both the economy and the population. As you know, entering the Heisei era, this country's bubble economy completely burst, leading to ultra-low growth, and the population began to decline. Furthermore, with the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake and the Great East Japan Earthquake, an era arrived where first-class rivers, which had not been seen to overflow for a long time, flooded.

An era similar to this in the Edo period was the Hoei era, which followed Genroku. It was a period marked by many natural disasters, especially earthquakes. In fact, the very reason for changing the era name from Genroku was an earthquake. In the 16th year of Genroku (1703), a massive earthquake occurred in the Kanto region. This was the Genroku Kanto Earthquake caused by the movement of the Sagami Trough; its recurrence was the Great Kanto Earthquake of the Taisho era, but the magnitude of the Genroku Kanto Earthquake itself was much larger. Even if the Kanto region or Edo were significantly damaged by an earthquake—rather than the area around Kyoto—era names were not easily changed back then. However, due to the strengthening power of the Shogunate and the scale of the damage, the era name was changed even for a Kanto earthquake, becoming Hoei.

Once the era became Hoei, because it was an active period for seismic activity, the Nankai Trough moved next. This was the Hoei Earthquake of the 4th year of Hoei (1707). The range over which the earthquake was felt reached nearly 800 kilometers in length; literally all of Japan shook. Not only did it shake, but on the 49th day after the earthquake, even Mount Fuji erupted. A crater formed on the side of Mount Fuji, creating what is known as Mount Hoei, and the shape of the mountain changed.

Thinking about it, Heisei resembles this Hoei era. First, the population growth of the Edo period reached a plateau around the Hoei era. In the 17th century, the development of new rice fields progressed and food production increased, causing the population to nearly double. However, the Hoei Earthquake brought tsunamis to the lowlands, and it seems people of the Edo period began to realize that the development of new fields through land reclamation had reached its limit. Consequently, the population peaked around the Hoei era, and for a little over 100 years after that, Japan's population hardly increased. While the warm southwestern Japan, where double-cropping of rice and barley was possible, saw increases, the colder northeastern Japan actually saw a decrease. This is exactly as the historical demographer Akira Hayami clarified.

The same is true for Heisei Japan; both the total population and the working-age population have begun to shrink. The GDP (Gross Domestic Product), which was second only to the United States, was overtaken by China, and the GDP per capita is also dropping in rank. I hear predictions that by the mid-21st century, China's GDP will be seven times that of Japan and India's GDP will be about four times that of Japan, so the world is perhaps reverting to the era of "Kara and Tenjiku" (China and India).

And Heisei had many natural disasters. This is where it most resembles Hoei. One might say Showa was characterized by war damage, while Heisei was characterized by natural disasters. I remember clearly the time of the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake that occurred early in the morning on January 17, 1995 (Heisei 7). At that time, mobile phones were not as widespread as they are now, and information technology was not advanced. Until noon on the day the earthquake struck, centered on Kobe, the situation was not correctly recognized in Tokyo. Many people involved in the National Diet went about their normal business until noon, and the Prime Minister's Official Residence was so empty in the early morning that one might call it "unmanned" by today's standards.

For a graduate student, it was the time for submitting reports during the exam period. On that day, rubbing my sleepy eyes after finishing a report overnight, I went to the Mita Campus to submit it. When I brought the report to the Mita Campus, I was told, "There was a huge earthquake in Kobe and the highway overpasses have flipped over." When I said, "That's a problem. I won't be able to return to my hometown in Okayama by Shinkansen next month," a certain professor said, "Isoda-kun, it will be restored by then." I wanted to talk back and say, "If the highway overpasses have collapsed, the Shinkansen overpasses must surely be down too. It should take more than three months to restore," but I remember keeping quiet because I was just a lowly graduate student.

Even the great scholars of Keio University were so carefree that they did not think a major disaster would strike, to the point of making such errors in judgment. In fact, even when February came, the Shinkansen had not been restored, and I passed through the city of Kobe, which had been destroyed by the earthquake, by bus and on foot to somehow return to Okayama.

"Showa Genroku, Heisei Hoei"—so, what kind of era comes next? After Hoei came the era name Shotoku, a period when the intellect of the scholar Arai Hakuseki greatly influenced politics. There are pros and cons to Arai Hakuseki's politics, but it is certain that he advanced policies by researching well across time and space and utilizing knowledge widely. Today, as the country is on a downhill slope and disasters continue, I believe there is a role for the intellect of Keio University to play.

I like the jitsugaku (science) approach of Yukichi Fukuzawa-sensei. If society is in trouble, one thinks academically about the means to solve it. No matter what era we are in, I believe it is important for everyone to steadily carry out this obvious task.