Ruffians Yakuza Nationalists Read online

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  RUFFIANS, YAKUZA, NATIONALISTS

  The Violent Politics of Modern Japan, 1860–1960

  Eiko Maruko Siniawer

  CORNELL UNIVERSITY PRESS

  ITHACA AND LONDON

  To my parents, and in memory of obāchan, and to Pete

  Contents

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  Acknowledgments

  Introduction

  Political Violence in Historiographical Perspective

  Violence, Violence Specialists, and Politics

  Violence and Democracy

  Approaches to Comparative History

  1 Patriots and Gamblers

  Shishi: Assassins, Rebels, Patriots

  Shishi Legacies in the Early Meiji Period

  Bakuto: Outlaws, Robin Hoods, Local Leaders

  Bakuto and the Meiji Restoration

  Bakuto as Political Violence Specialists: The Freedom and People’s Rights Movement

  2 Violent Democracy

  From Activist to Ruffian: Sōshi in the 1880s

  Exporting Violence: Nationalist Tairiku Rōnin across Borders

  Parliamentary Politics and the Professionalization of Sōshi

  State Violence and the Second General Election

  3 Institutionalized Ruffianism and a Culture of Political Violence

  The Jiyūtō Ingaidan and Its Bosses

  The Seiyūkai Ingaidan in Party Politics

  Cultures of Violence: Yakuza Bosses in Diet Politics

  4 Fascist Violence

  Fascist Ideologies

  Fascist Violence

  The Nationalist Nexus in the Metropole and Beyond

  Violence in the Decline of the Political Parties

  5 Democracy Reconstructed

  The Decline of Sōshi and the Remaking of Ingaidan Violence

  Violence as a Political and Discursive Weapon in Diet Politics

  “Bōryokudan” Redux: Yakuza and the Conservative Nexus

  1960: The Apogee of Postwar Violence Specialists

  Coda: Political Violence after 1960

  Afterword

  Violence, Fascism, Militarism

  Violence Specialists and History

  A Contemporary Perspective on Violent Democracy

  Glossary

  Notes

  Bibliography

  Acknowledgments

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  The writing of this book was, in many ways, a collaborative endeavor. From its inception to its publication, this project was shaped and improved by colleagues and friends who have taught, challenged, and supported me over a number of years. In those moments when research and writing felt solitary, someone would remind me of how much this work is a dialogue with others. So I am grateful for this opportunity to remember, acknowledge, and express my appreciation to all those who helped make this book better than it otherwise would have been.

  I owe an intellectual debt to Andrew Gordon, whose approach to Japanese history has greatly influenced my own. Only recently have I come to realize just how much this book reflects his concerns, from democracy to transwar history. Always fully engaged with my work, even when juggling many responsibilities, he has been a model of both scholarship and academic citizenship. I am also indebted to Daniel Botsman, whose expertise in the history of crime and extensive knowledge of Japanese historical scholarship added depth to several chapters. His thoughtful provocations and high expectations were welcome intellectual challenges. Finally, I would not be a historian of Japan were it not for Peter Frost, who introduced me to the subject and continues to be a true mentor. His incisive questions helped shore up the weaker parts of the manuscript, but it is his generosity of spirit above all that I have long appreciated. All three former advisers have had a direct impact on this book, having read and critiqued its many iterations.

  Others were kind enough to share their ideas about all or part of the manuscript. John Dower’s eye for the big picture and commitment to comparative history have, I hope, left an imprint here. Fujino Yūko has been an extraordinary sparring partner. Her enthusiasm and insights about this topic, willingness to put me in touch with scholars in Japan, and desire to tackle difficult questions have been incredibly heartening. Amy Stanley brought her expertise in Tokugawa history to bear on the first chapter, pointing me toward important reading and interesting ideas. David Ambaras and Sabine Frühstück were also very giving with their suggestions and time. And Thomas Havens commented on an earlier version of this work.

  While conducting research, I was aided by many who opened new lines of inquiry. Hiraishi Naoaki sponsored several stays at the University of Tokyo and gave useful advice at key stages. Thought-provoking conversations about violence were had with Anzai Kunio, Nakajima Hisato, and Suda Tsutomu. Hoshino Kanehiro, Nemoto Yoshio, and Iwai Hiroaki all shared their considerable experience with studying the yakuza. The faculty at the Ōhara Institute for Social Research at Hōsei University was very welcoming. And others (such as Mitani Hiroshi, Nakamura Masanori, Narita Ryūichi, Obinata Sumio, and Tamai Kiyoshi) kindly met with me when I was still groping my way through the dark. At a later stage, Helena Harnik endured a demanding summer as my undergraduate research assistant, making sense of a pile of sources on the 1960s that have since made their way into the last chapter.

  The staffs at various libraries and archives were also indispensable. This was particularly true at the Ōhara Institute, Freedom and People’s Rights Movement Archive in Machida City, National Archives of Japan, and Harvard-Yenching Library. I was also glad to explore the collections at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, National Diet Library, Tokyo Metropolitan Library, Ōya Sōichi Library, National Theater, Fukuoka Prefectural Library, U.S. National Archives in Maryland, and the various libraries of the University of Tokyo.

  I have been fortunate to enjoy several institutional homes. Williams College is an exceptionally supportive place to work and has been generous with both leave time and funding. My colleagues in the history and Asian studies departments have been especially helpful with this project—I am very appreciative of their engagement and encouragement. The Institute of Social Science at the University of Tokyo hosted me on several occasions, and the Reischauer Institute of Japanese Studies at Harvard University invited me into its community as a visiting scholar. Through various experiences at Harvard I was touched by the intellectual camaraderie of Cemil Aydin, Jeff Bayliss, Jamie Berger, Marjan Boogert, Michael Burtscher, Rusty Gates, Hiromi Maeda, Noriko Murai, Izumi Nakayama, Emer O’Dwyer, Hiraku Shimoda, Jun Uchida, and Laura Wong. And Yoichi Nakano worked through the themes of the book with me, with great perspective and honesty.

  I must thank Roger Haydon at Cornell University Press, who took interest in this project when it was still embarrassingly rough and who guided the book through the publication process with ease and good humor. Two anonymous reviewers also provided very constructive feedback on the manuscript.

  As much help as I have received, the voice and decisions in this book are mine. Many of those mentioned above take issue with certain approaches and arguments presented here. And as always, the responsibility for all flaws and weaknesses rests on my shoulders alone.

  Finally, the book could not have been researched and written without generous funding from the Japan Foundation, Social Science Research Council, Reischauer Institute, and National Endowment for the Humanities.

  To my parents, for their sacrifices and belief in my abilities—I am most grateful. Extended family warmly took me in when I was in Japan. And I hope that obāchan’s strength, spirit, and love of history have found their way into this book. I am sorry she did not live to see its publication.

  To my husband Pete, I cannot adequately express h
ow much his confidence in my work, patience, and unwavering support in all things have sustained me these many years. My hope is that he knows how truly appreciative I am.

  EIKO MARUKO SINIAWER

  Williamstown, Massachusetts

  Introduction

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  Violence has been an enduring force in the history of modern Japanese politics. The very birth of the modern Japanese state was violent. In the 1850s, the early modern Tokugawa regime (1600–1868) faltered when threatened by ominous foreign gunboats that appeared off its shores, and in the 1860s was forced to its knees by rebel assassins and armies of defiant domains. The fall of the Tokugawa shogunate in 1868 has been described by many historians as peaceful, with the new Meiji emperor declaring the abolition of the old order in January and the last Tokugawa shogun surrendering the capital in April. Although the Meiji Restoration of 1868 was relatively bloodless when compared to the extraordinary carnage of the French Revolution in particular, it should not be forgotten that the civil war between Tokugawa holdouts and Meiji loyalists continued well into late June of 1869, claiming the lives of thousands of men. In this sense, the founding of the new Meiji government was a moment of violent rupture.

  The emergence of a modern Japan did not translate into an era of peaceful and gentlemanly politics; quite to the contrary, it spawned a certain political roughness that persisted in various forms over the next hundred years. Protesters turned to violence in political movements, the earliest being the Freedom and People’s Rights Movement of the 1870s and 1880s in which activists put pressure on the Meiji oligarchs to write a constitution, establish a parliament, and widen political participation. Then, in the years between the signing of the Treaty of Portsmouth in 1905 and the so-called “rice riots” of 1918, tens of thousands of people voiced their discontent with specific government policies by physically attacking symbols of the state. Violence was also a volatile component in ideological battles, especially in the decades after the Russian Revolution, as leftists of various stripes, from anarchists to labor unionists, clashed with nationalist organizations and a nervous state. Assassinations littered this period from the 1860s to the 1920s, but perhaps best known are those that were part of the attempted coups d’état of the 1930s through which young officers in the military, though failing to seize the reins of government themselves, facilitated the military’s ascent to political power.

  Interwoven with these violent politics were the central figures of this book—ruffians, yakuza, and their kin. They were, in short, those who were practiced in the use of physical force and known for their main purpose: to be violent. These violence specialists, as I call them, were not just bound up with the popular protests, assassinations, and coups d’ état familiar to students of Japanese history. They also wielded a kind of violence, much less known, that transcended these eruptive moments. Their ruffianism—brawls and fistfights that often went together with vandalism, threats, and intimidation—was embedded in the practice of politics, demonstrating that violence was not an episodic phenomenon, but a systemic and deeply rooted element of modern Japanese political life.

  The questions of how and why violence specialists became so entwined with politics drive this exploration of a rough political world. At issue too are the meanings and ramifications of violence for politics in Japan, from the last years of the early modern regime in the 1860s through the post–World War II re-birth of democracy in the 1950s. This is also a story of how violence specialists and their violence were legitimized, and how there formed a culture of political violence in which the use of physical force was viewed by many political actors as a viable and at least tacitly acceptable strategy. This culture of political violence, however dynamic and changing, helped perpetuate a brand of politics that was consistently and often unapologetically violent.

  Political Violence in Historiographical Perspective

  By placing violence at the center of a story about Japanese political history, this book attempts to demonstrate that politics was often dangerous and far more violent than has been previously understood. The general subject of political violence in Japan was understudied for many years; when it was dealt with, violence was mainly considered in the context of social or political movements and treated only as evidence of other political phenomena, be it the emergence of a democratic consciousness or right-wing extremism. Violence was rarely examined as a phenomenon in and of itself.

  In the United States, violence was initially neglected by historians in the several decades after World War II. American historians of the 1950s and 1960s were working against wartime stereotypes that lingered into the postwar years, one of which was the popular image of “the Japanese” as an aggressive and savage people. Accordingly, historians emphasized what they appreciated as the positive aspects (or in the words of historian Marius Jansen, the “brighter side”) of Japan’s past.1 Scholars of the so-called modernization school attempted to divert attention from the idea of a repressive and feudalistic Japanese political system by framing Japan as an extraordinary success story, highlighting what they viewed as the country’s rapid progress in the Meiji period (1868–1912).2 The misstep of war acknowledged but largely set aside, Japan was held up as a model for modernization and a bulwark against communism.3

  This is not to say that modernization scholars avoided the topic of violence altogether, but they seldom grappled with the implications and meanings of violent action. Jansen, for example, did innovative research on rebels and adventurers who were not shy about using physical force. Yet even he occasionally slipped into presenting these violent types as patriots and reformers, inadvertently legitimizing their own self-perception, and seemed more interested in ideologies (liberalism, nationalism, pan-Asianism) than the violence wielded in their name.4 In one essay, Jansen did consider violence in relation to modernization, focusing on three assassination attempts (or actual assassinations, in the last two cases)—of statesman Katsu Kaishū in 1862, Prime Minister Inukai Tsuyoshi in 1932, and socialist politician Asanuma Inejirō in 1960. Jansen selected these particular incidents to illustrate how Japan had grown more politically and socially complex over these hundred years. The political and social contexts of these examples were unquestionably different, but to frame such violence in terms of progress is not only questionable but also reveals the extent to which Jansen’s concern with modernization tempered his treatment of violence.5

  Other historians countered the stereotype of Japanese aggression more directly than the modernization scholars, implying or even claiming a supposed Japanese cultural affinity for harmony. Unfounded generalizations about a Japanese desire to avoid conflict crept into the fundamental assumptions of works that made misleading arguments about the strong sense of community in early modern villages, the lack of strife in postwar labor relations, and a weak Japanese legal consciousness.6

  Finally, the political historians of this generation tended to leave violent conflict unexamined, focusing instead on institutions, thought, and elite figures.7 This was important work, but it did tend to paint the political world as consisting mainly of dignified oligarchs, calculating politicians, lofty intellectuals, and respectable bureaucrats.

  In Japan during these same decades, there was an initial postwar flurry of writing about the violence of the recent past, especially in newspapers and journals. And some historians, such as Shinobu Seizaburō, began to tackle the history of protests including the “rice riots” of 1918.8 Considered mainly in the context of protest, violence was framed as a form of political expression and a challenge to the government.

  Outside this subfield, most Japanese historians of the 1950s, heavily influenced by Marxism, were primarily concerned with economic structures as a precipitating factor in social change and revolution.9 Even those who wrote books on the fascism of the country’s recent past rarely dealt with violence; there were notable exceptions, but most authors honed in on the ideological or institutional causes of what had transpired in the 1930s and early 1940s.
10 In his classic essays on the topic, historian Maruyama Masao grappled with the structures, functions, ideologies, and social bases of Japanese fascism but rarely confronted the issue of violence.11 The nationalist thought of specific organizations and figures generally garnered more attention than their violence, save the obligatory descriptions of the attempted coups d’état in the 1930s. Also, as in the United States, political histories tended to be rather narrowly conceived, as studies of structures and ideas.12

  This changed in the 1960s and 1970s as the topics of interest to historians such as Shinobu were embraced by a group of scholars who began to place “the people” at the forefront of their research. Inspired in part by the mass demonstrations against renewal of the U.S.-Japan Security Treaty in 1960, those who wrote people’s history (minshūshi) divorced themselves from their Marxist heritage and took issue with modernists and modernization theory, choosing instead a grassroots approach that highlighted the role of the nonelite as a driving force in history.13 Kano Masanao and Yasumaru Yoshio thought about politics writ large, publishing books on “Taisho democracy” and social movements. Violence also became more of a concern, with Irokawa Daikichi in particular writing about the popular uprisings of the Freedom and People’s Rights Movement. This work of the people’s historians, especially Irokawa and Yasumaru, has left its mark here, through both its conceptual move away from a singular concern with political elites and its rich body of research on which I have drawn.14

  Like the minshūshi scholars, American historians of Japan in the late 1970s and 1980s began to incorporate violence into their work, mainly through research on popular protest. Roger Bowen wrote a compelling book on the place of “commoners” in the Freedom and People’s Rights Movement, Michael Lewis penned an important monograph on the “rice riots” of 1918, and Andrew Gordon reconceptualized Japanese democracy, bringing attention to the “era of popular protest” that extended from 1905 to 1918.15 Tropes about Japanese harmony slowly began to lose their appeal as they were exposed as an invented tradition, and more attention was given to the place of conflict in Japan’s modern history.16