Royalist ideology, censorship and compilation projects during the late Tokugawa period

The aim of the present article is to reexamine the relationship between the Tokugawa Bakufu policies regarding censorship and compilation projects in relation to the prevalence of royalist ideology（sonno 尊王; lit. emperor worship）during the later stages of that regime. The term “sonno ideology” will conjure up such lines of argument as the emperor being the ultimate authority for agents of governance（taisei-inin 大政委任 or miyosashi みよさし）, the debate over reform of the imperial household and xenophobia regarding the appearance of westerners once again on Japan’s shores（joi 攘夷）.<br> The research to date on the subject has focused mainly on such fundamental aspects as the ideology’s formation process and function. For example, groundbreaking studies have been conducted on its relationship to neo-Confucianism, to domestic political affairs（anti-Bakufu activities by the aristocracy）, foreign affairs（Russian diplomacy and the arrival of the Perry mission from the United States）and the political crisis of the last years of the Bakufu, known as the Bakumatsu era（controversy over shogunal succession and the mass arrests/executions of anti-Bakufu dissenters in 1858‐59）. <br> In order to build on this research, the author proposes the adoption of two new topics of interest, the first being the relationship between Bakufu policy and the spread of “sonno ideology.” The ideology’s conventional image brings to mind its spread during late Tokugawa on the strength of a rise in the authority and prestige of the emperor/imperial court and anxiety over a possible foreign threat, thus enabling it to avoid Bakufu attempts at censorship. Although such an image has been bolstered by the supposedly increased censorship of published material in the austerity reforms enacted by the Bakufu and feudal domains beginning in 1841, the sonno movement continued to spread openly through the circulation of such polemical works as Osaka pedigogue Nakai Chikuzan’s Sobo Kigen 草茅危言 collection of acerbic comments on the social issues of the day, Rai Sanyo’s unauthorized history of the samurai（buke 武家）houses from the Heian era Minamoto and Taira Clans up to the regime of Tokugawa Ienari（Nihon Gaishi 日本外史）, and Mito Domain scholar Aizawa Seishisai’s radical treatise on the need for political restructuring in response to foreign threats from modern nation-states（Shinron 新論）. Inquiring as to how such a phenomenon came into being, the author investigates the process and atmosphere of the spread of “sonno ideology” in relation to Bakufu policy regarding censorship and compilation projects.<br> The second topic advocated by the author is the relationship of the image of the emperor to the image of the agents of actual governance, which in late premodern Japan was characterized by the Bakufu’s strict regulation of the imperial court. This is why any examination of the image of the emperor during that period must deal with the relationships between the emperor and the country’s governors in the form of the shoguns and their vassals （daimyo 大名）. <br> In the pursuit of these two points, the author traces the process of censorship policy and the development of compilation projects from the 18th into the 19th century, including events and background regarding the drastic changes in the former brought about by the Tenpo era reforms from 1841 on, leading to an analysis of their effects and functions. The author concludes from his analysis, that it was the relaxation of regulations regarding censorship conceded by the reforms which clearly marked an important turning point for not only the further spread of “sonno ideology”, in particular, but also the continuity and discontinuity marking the transition into the turbulent Bakumatsu era.