Science Japan Bartholomew PDF

THE FORMATION OF SCIENCE IN JAPAN

Building a Research Tradition
JAMES R. BARTHOLOMEW
Yale University Press

New Haven and London
The publication of this book was made possible through the generous
support of The Japan Foundation and the Ohio State University College of
Humanities Publications Award program.
Copyright © 1989 by Yale University.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Bartholomew. James R.. 1941

The formation of science in Japan / James R. Bartholomew,
p. cm.
Includes index.
ISBN 0-300-04261-2 Calk paper)
1 Science—Japan—History. 2. Research—Japan—History.
I. Tide
Q127.J3B37 1989
509.52—del 9 88-36817
CIP
The paper in this book meets the guidelines for
permanence and durability of the Committee on
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1098 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
For Maureen
CONTENTS
Illustrations xi
Tables xiii
Preface XV
CHAPTER ONE The Social Formation of Japanese

Science 1
CHAPTER TWO Science and Societu in the Tokuaawa

Period 9
Recruitment to Science in Tokugawa
Japan 10
Tokugawa Educational and
Scientific Institutions 25
Tokugawa Science in Its
Bureaucratic Setting 35
Scholarly Conduct in Tokugawa
Japan 42
CHAPTER THREE Formation of the Meiji Scientific

Community 49
Recruitment to Science in Meiji
Japan 52
Foreign Teachers and University
Training 63
The Foreign Study Experience 68
The Meaning of Overseas Study 75
Creating the Role for Research in
Japan 82
CHAPTER FOUR Laying the Institutional

Foundations of Science 89
Early Post-Restoration Developments 90
Diet Politics and Science in the
1890s 98
vii
VU1 CONTENTS
The Struggle to Define a Research

Posture 111
Research Capacities on the Eve of
the War 123
CHAPTER FIVE Science and the Bureaucracy 125

The Period of Early Decisions
(1868-89) 128
Decision Making about Science in
the 1890s 135
Decision Making for Science in the
Prewar Years 145
CHAPTER SIX Scientific Research in Its Social

Setting 162
Kitasato and the Institute of

Infectious Diseases 166
Recruitment to Professorships in
Japan s Universities 168
The Research Atmosphere in
Academic Laboratories 176
Competition and Cooperation in
Japanese Science 191
CHAPTER SEVEN Science and the Crisis

of World War I 199
The Administrative Transfer of
Kitasato's Institute 201
Results and Implications of the
Institute Transfer 206
Founding of the Research Institute
for Physics and Chemistry 212
Tokyo University and the Institute
for Aeronautics 217
The Research Infrastructure of
Academic Science 223
Science outside the Academic
System 230
CONTENTS IX
CHAPTER EIGHT
The Research System in an Age of
Transition 238
Changes in the Conditions for
Scientific Research
239
The Ministry of Education's Science
Research Grants Program

247
Establishment of the National
Research Council
254
CHAPTER NINE
Science and Society: A Retrospective 264
Epilogue 276
Notes 281
Index 357
ILLUSTRATIONS
Illustrations follow page 124

1. Shinto memorial service for Robert Koch
2. Kitasato's lieutenants at the Kitasato Institute
3. Aoyama Tanemichi's class in diagnostics
4. Tokyo University investigators of tsutsugamushi disease (August
1915)
5. The Kitasato Institute (ca. 1921)
6. The Institute of Infectious Diseases (ca. 1906)
7. Aoyama Tanemichi
8. Ichiki Kitokuro
9. Tokyo University physicists and graduate students (1903)
10. Yamagiwa Katsusaburo
11. Nagayo Mataro
12. Microscopy training at the Institute of Pathology. Tokyo
University
13. Ogata Masanori

14. Faculty of Science, Tokyo University (ca. 1905)
15. Kitasato Shibasaburo (ca. 1920)
16. Robert Koch in Japanese kimono (Tokyo, 1908)
17. Takagi Kanehiro
18. Nagaoka Hantaro (ca. 1934)
19. Nagai Nagayoshi
20. Yamakawa Kenjiro
21. Kozai Yoshinao
22. Sakuraijoji
23. Kikuchi Dairoku
24. Yasui Kono, Japan's first woman scientist
25. Nakamura Yaroku
26. Hasegawa Tai
27. Makino Nobuaki
28. OkadaRyohei
29. Okuma Shigenobu
30. KatsuraTaro
XI
TABLES
2.1. Samurai as a Percentage of All Tokugawa Scientists 19
3.1. Japanese Doctorates in Technical Fields, 1888-1920 52
3.2. Class Origins of Doctorate Recipients, 1888-1920 54
3.3. Class Origins of Chemists 60
3.4. Foreign Study Expenditures (Doctorate Recipients) 69
4.1. Imperial University Chairs and Graduates (% of Totals) 116
5.1. Educational Backgrounds of Bureau Chiefs (1872
1919) 130
5.2. Bureaucratic Affiliations of Nonacademic Scientific
Laboratories 138
5.3. Post-1900 Affiliations of Nonacademic Scientific
Laboratories 155
5.4. Employment of Bacteriologists 156
5.5. Agriculture Bureau—Deployment of Experts 159
6.1. Institutional Affiliations of Research Scientists (1913) 165
6.2. Personal Connections of University Professors (%) 171
6.3. Preferential Hiring in the Imperial Universities (1877
1920) 175
6.4. The Changing Academic Marketplace in Japanese
Medicine 195
6.5. The Academic Marketplace in Physical Science 197
xiu
PREFACE
People have often asked how I came to be interested in Japanese sci

ence. There are many routes by which an American might develop this
interest today, but my own goes back some years and probably had an
unusual genesis. I think it began in 1952, when I was a naive fifth-
grader in Rapid City, South Dakota. My school happened to show a
documentary film on atomic energy that Bell Telephone Laboratories
(as 1 later learned) had produced and distributed. For reasons I am
wholly at a loss to explain, I remembered just one thing from the film
that day—its brief discussion of Yukawa Hideki, the Japanese physicist
and Nobel laureate! Because of this episode I grew up with an attitude
about Japan which at that time was unusual, namely, that Japan was a
country of great achievements in science. A few years later the Sputnik
crisis came, and I promptly resolved to do my part by studying physics at
Cal Tech or Princeton. What I actually did was enter Stanford, where I
initially hoped to study mathematics. But I soon discovered that my
talents lay elsewhere and completed a degree in history and Japanese.
Thomas C. Smith, who taught Japanese history at Stanford (and later
at Berkeley), had a formative influence on me both at this stage and
later. He first suggested that I study Japanese and subsequently steered
me to a dissertation topic. It might be interesting, he intimated, to find
out why some Japanese became scientists in the Meiji period. I wrote
my thesis on Kitasato's career, but I continued to find Tom's idea in
triguing, and my later research on it became chapter 3 of this book. I
owe Tom Smith a special debt of thanks. He has always been a friend, a
helpful critic, and an unfailing mentor. He read chapters 3 through 6
with particular care. Many of his suggestions I readily incorporated, and
any remaining faults reflect on me and not on him.
The lengthy genesis of this book has caused me to incur a great many
debts. One is to ltd Shuntaro, historian of science at Tokyo University,
who sponsored my affiliation to his own institution and made me part of
his research seminar. My long-time friend Kuramoto Hiroyuki of
Kitasato University put me in touch with the late Otori Ranzaburo,
historian of medicine at Keio University. Otori generously shared his
knowledge of Japanese medical history with me and introduced me in
turn to Dr. Aki Motd, clinical neurologist at Toranomon Hospital and a
gifted historian of medicine. Dr. Aki's vast knowledge of Kitasato
Shibasaburo was very helpful for my work on this subject. Sidney Al
ford, a visiting chemist at Tokyo University, provided intellectual stim
xv
XVI PREFACE
ulation and moral support. Bernard Krisher, Tokyo Bureau Chief for
Neusueek, offered me the needed distraction of part-time reporting and
patiently worked to improve my writing!
At Harvard University, Everett Mendelsohn helped especially by
arranging funding for me and providing leadership to a group of avid
researchers in the Department of the History and Philosophy of Sci
ence. Albert M. Craig gave me an office in the East Asian Research
Center and offered valuable suggestions and interpretive comments on
parts of the manuscript. My long and valued friendship with Nathan
Sivin also dates from this period. Nathan s keen appraisal of an early
version of chapter 6 caused me both to rethink some issues and add new
material. For his assistance and support I am particularly grateful.
Numerous people have assisted me on my research trips to Japan.
Two librarians at the National Diet Library helped me find certain
materials I needed—Sakuma Nobuko. of the Reference Department,
and Imagawa Koichi, Head of the Parliamentary Documents Room.
Miura Yoshiaki, biochemistry professor at Chiba University, gave me
extraordinary guidance in obtaining material from medical journals.
Several other colleagues were also very helpful: Yoshida Mitsukuni.
Fujino Tsunesaburo. Yagi Eri. Oya Shin'ichi, Terasaki Masao. Amano
Ikuo, and Itakura Kiyonobu. Dr. Itakura also arranged my affiliation
with the National Institute for Education Research. My work has bene
fited over the years from discussions with Watanabe Masao, Yuasa
Mitsutomo. and especially Nakayama Shigeru. I must offer Shigeru
particular thanks for our long years of friendship and many discussions.
The notes to his work throughout the present book are one indication of
the respect I have for him.
Several months at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton in
1977 and a seminar presentation to the Shelby Cullom Davis Center for
Historical Studies at Princeton in 1979 contributed positively to my
research. For these opportunities I thank John Elliott, Marius Jansen,
and Lawrence Stone. Other valuable exchanges took place at meetings
of the Midwest Japan Seminar sponsored by the Social Sciences Re
search Council. I owe special thanks for bib ho graphical assistance and
moral support to several colleagues and friends at The Ohio State Uni
versity and the University of Michigan. These include, at Michigan,
Naomi Fukuda and Masaei Saito, and at Ohio State, Alan Beyerchen,
John C. Burnham, Maureen H. Donovan, Barbara Reeves, William J.
Studer, and June Z. Fullmer. Others for whose inspiration and encour
agement I am grateful include James M. Kittelson, Laurence Schnei
der, Gerald Holton, Rolf Barth, Ronald Overmann, Fred Notehelfer,
Alfred Donovan, Robert E. Cole, Michael Les Benedict, Richard Sam
uels, Merrit Roe Smith, Randolph A. Roth, Samuel Coleman, Harry
PREFACE XVU
Harootunian, Bernard Silberman, Byron Marshall, and the late Joseph

Ben-David.
Research projects always cost money, this one particularly so. My
original dissertation project was supported by Stanford University, the
Fulbright-Hays Fellowship Program of the U.S. Office of Education,
and the Josiah Macy, Jr., Foundation. Research for this book was car
ried out with the aid of grants from Ohio State University, the National
Endowment for the Humanities, and the Social Sciences Research
Council. Writing was mostly funded by the National Science Founda
tion, while publication costs have been partly defrayed by the Japan
Foundation and the College of Humanities of Ohio State University.
For help with various aspects of the publication process I am obliged
to: the Japan Society for the History of Science (Ninon Kagakushi
Gakkai) for permission to reprint from my previously published article
"Why Was There No Scientific Revolution in Tokugawa Japan?" in
chapter 2; Princeton University Press for permission to use part of my
article "Science, Culture and Freedom in Meiji Japan" in chapter 5
(from Tetsuo Najita and J. Victor Koschmann, eds.. Conflict in Modern
Japanese History. The Neglected Tradition. Copyright © 1982 by
Princeton University Press. Kxcerpts reprinted with permission of
Princeton University Press); Nakagawa Toru (of the National Science
Museum), Tokuda Hiroshi(of Mainichi Newspapers), and Nakano Mi
noru (of Tokyo University) for help in locating photographs; Alan
Zanyk, Paul ShewTnon. and Dwight Burford (all of Ohio State Univer
sity) for photographic and technical assistance; Charles Grench, execu
tive editor of the Yale University Press, and the Press's reviewer for their
suggestions and encouragement at various stages.
A final expression of thanks goes to my wife, Maureen H. Donovan,
to whom this book is dedicated. There must be few researchers, I think,
who are fortunate enough to receive both emotional encouragement
and professional help from the person to whom they are married. In any
case, I am one—and am deeply grateful for it.
CHAPTER ONE
THE SOCIAL FORMATION OF

JAPANESE SCIENCE
In the years following Japan's defeat in World War II. Japanese scien
tists intensely criticized their own profession. Medical researcher Tam
ura Masao claimed that relatively little original work had been done in
Japan because of the "apprenticeship system." which bound men to
their seniors.1 The physicist and historian of science Hiroshige Tetsu
argued that the power of senior professors was a handicap to cooper
ative effort2 Two physicists and a biochemist lamented the general lack
of democracy in science.1 And the distinguished theoretical physicist
Sakata Shoichi insisted that Japanese science had suffered from aca
demic inbreeding, suppression of freedom, and a tendency to hoard
resources.4
The same critics also took aim at society. Japanese allegedly regarded
scientists as little more than "tools for the extraction of knowledge (from
the West).'* Though treated well enough from this point of view, they
were rarely considered real "creators of knowledge."5 In fact, scientists
were usually excluded from official decisions even when the promotion
of research was at stake,6 and science had little support except from the
Japanese government. One point of view held that this pattern devel
oped in the nineteenth century from the paucity of connections with
industry. In 1868, Japanese capitalism was so far behind capitalism in
Europe that the state had to intervene on its behalf. Because of this
technology and science became dependent upon the state, and their
natural development was distorted.7
Had these various criticisms been an isolated phenomenon, we
might link them to postwar despair. Military defeat had been hard on
the country not only economically but spiritually and psychologically.
The country was controlled by the Allied Occupation, and sweeping
reforms had been launched. It is no coincidence that Sakata defined his
target as science's "Fiihrer system."8 And American delegations of edu
cators and scientists offered their views on Japanese science without
asking whether they were welcome.9
These criticisms of society and science have a far broader context, for
in the 1980s American and English-language media have repeated
THE SOCIAL FORMATION OF JAPANESE SCIENCE
such claims as frequently as the Japanese of decades past. Japanese

organization "tends to stifle initiative, especially youthful initiative,"
according to astronomer Robert J as trow (1983). 1 0 The Japanese have a
saying about the nail that sucks its head up getting hit, noted computer
scientist Edward Feigenbaum in 1981, and "that tells the Japan[ese]
researcher, 'Don't propose something novel."'11 Time criticized
"rigidity in (Japanese] research laboratories" in 1983. 12 A study con
ducted by the Stanford Research Institute knocked academic "inbreed
ing" in Science 85.13 The views of the emigre physicist Leo Esaki are
especially worth noting. I4 Japan, he says, has failed to "shake free of its
copying habit."15 Its strength in technology is "not buttressed by a
broad base of scientific research,' and its "contribution to . . . learning
is minimal." Why is this so? According to him, it is because Japan is a
strongly group-oriented society. Now is the time, in Esaki's estimation,
"to recognize that Japan s future does not lie in group solidarity, but in
the cultivation of individuality."16
Esaki and others who articulate this theme of individualism stand in
a line that can be traced back to 1881. American zoologist Charles Otis
Whitman claimed in a report on the status of his field at Tokyo Univer
sity that the "baneful influence of caste (factions]" had "survived the
overthrow of [Japan's] feudal system' and still had "vitality enough to
work immense mischief."17 A few years later, in 1892, bacteriologist
Sata Yoshihiko claimed that the influence of factions had impaired his
job search. 18 Medical and other journals of opinion were lamenting
factionalism in science by the turn of the century, 19 and a 1917 report
on the scientific community went so far as to attribute scientific success
to the right social system. 20 Between the wars intellectuals continued to
denounce the negative effects of Japanese society on the progress of
science. 21
These complaints on behalf of individualism in science have a long
tradition in Europe and America. Sociologists from Max Weber to Tal
cott Parsons, as well as numerous historians and scientists, have insist
ed for decades that science can develop only in societies that have
thrown off all vestiges of feudalism. Sociologists and social historians
have usually condemned feudalism for obstructing social mobility, im
peding disclosure of technical information, and impairing development
of personality. 22 Leading figures of the French Enlightenment even
saw feudalism as contrary to nature. 23 Some scholars have begun to
recognize the value for early modern science of medieval corporatism,
political decentralization, and the church-state duality associated with
feudalism, but the opposing views are far from extinct 2 4
Whatever the validity of the antifeudal opinions, they do call atten
tion to three basic questions in the Japanese context, where feudalism
had long been entrenched. How did Japan in the modem era—after
about 1860—build a tradition of modern scientific research out of noth
ing? How did the Japanese—officials and scientists—make use of in
digenous and some foreign traditions to construct their model of scien
tific research? And how was the operation of that model tempered or
checked by the various realities of Japanese life—its society, economy,
or political system?25
Such questions are more easily asked than answered. Despite (or
because of) the ideological undercurrents of the various criticisms, the
historical record is especially important. This book, for several reasons,
focuses attention on the Meiji and early Taisho years (1868-1920).
Meiji and early Taisho marked the period in which the Japanese people
created their tradition of scientific research. Critics emphasize this time
on the assumption that such "feudalistic" values as loyalty and soli
darity were more vigorous closer to the Tokugawa period (1600-1867),
when they enjoyed official sanction. The period also marks the era
immediately before and after the formal abolition of feudalism, which
mostly occurred in the 1870s.
This brings us to the question of what "science" is when seen
through the lens of historical perspective. Scientific development any
where in the world was once thought to result from "correct" research
methodology (empiricism), "right" views about nature (the mechanical
world view), or from something called the "scientific attitude." There is
now a recognition (reflected in this book) that these historical features
of early modern science cannot fully carry the burden of explanation,
whatever their importance in some contexts or periods.26
There are other facts to note in discussing Japan. It has not histor
ically been part of the Western tradition, and while this fact is obvious,
some of its implications are not. Japan's dominant Confucian intellec
tual tradition was loosely structured andrelativelytolerant of new ideas
and perspectives. There was no legacy of revealed religion with an
elaborate structure of natural philosophy intricately woven with a for
mal theology.27 Qontroversial theories of modern Western science like
heliocentrism or the origin of species aroused little opposition in the
Japanese context and werereadilyespoused.28 Japanese scientists did
not consider it necessary to slay the dragons of traditional religion but
adapted to popular beliefs and refrained from developing a "scientific"
philosophy.29 The physicist Yuasa Mitsutomo, who noted and disap
proved of this fact, even wrote: "It was as though Japanese science had
had the teeth of its spirit of [cultural] criticism removed."30
Another singular feature of the Japanese scene is the external origin
of science. Science was imported from Europe at the instigation of the
government as a commodity, mostly in the period after the Meiji Resto
ration (1868). The conceptual schemes of Western science at the time

were taken as true because they came from the West,31 and Meiji
commentators gave little attention to differences between science and
technology, regarding them as the same thing, and foreign.32 Decision
makers in the government eschewed debates on the properties of sci
ence. Recruiting men to science, building institutions for teaching and
research, and putting in place the bureaucratic structures to manage
the science establishment were more important.33 It is particularly
notable that Japanese scientists were inclined to support this agenda.
"We should remember," wrote the historian of science Yoshida Mit
sukuni, "that among the scientists (of Meiji Japan] was the desire to
participate in building a new era."34
Japanese science after 1868 was not an amateur occupation. Profes
sionalization was already under way in European science, particularly
in Germany, which most inspired Japan. The German approach to sci
ence was important for how science was organized in Japan, though the
Japanese drew on the experience of several countries. Such questions
as whether science should be housed primarily in universities or in
separate, specialized institutes were hot issues and occasioned much
debate.
Japanese sciencerepresenteda departure from the pattern of devel
opment in Europe. There the classical scientific revolution of the six
teenth and seventeenth centuries began with physics and then spread
elsewhere. Compare with this how Japanese intellectuals first studied
Western science: not through physics, but through medicine.35 Medi
cal endeavors were important in the Tokugawa period for other kinds of
technical studies, and it was medicine that developed most fully be
tween 1868 and 1920.36 Even the concept of science was different in
Japan. Some writers in the Tokugawa period used the term kyuri
("investigation of the basic principles of things") for the subject matter
of physics and, less frequently, other disciplines. But by about 1871 a
new term had been coined which had little to do with the philosophy of
nature. The present term for science in Japanese, kagaku,refersless to
content or method and more to the spectrum of specialized fields.37
Despite changes—in terminology and in other areas—Tokugawa
developments left their mark on modern science. Meiji (1868-1912)
scientists did not draw on Tokugawa ideas, for they were almost entirely
abandoned after 1868, replaced by ideas from the West 38 The
Tokugawa contribution to modem science was not in the realm of the
intellect but in recruitment: the kinds of people, in terms of family
background and class origin, who had shown serious interest in science
during Tokugawa times were the same kinds who came forward after
1868. And this same Tokugawa legacy had a substantial effect on the
growth of particular disciplines. Medical research in Japan did relatively

well after 1868 because medicine had flourished in the earlier period.
Similarly, physics developed slowly in Meiji Japan, partly because of
earlier restrictions.
Tokugawa developments also affected the growth of research institu
tions, not because modern institutions had Tokugawa predecessors,
though a few important ones did, but by the continuity of political
synergisms. Tokugawa Japan had 277 daimyo administrations that re
tained considerable powers despite the centralizing force of the
shogunal government in Edo. In the decades following the Meiji Resto
ration, these local allegiances continued to operate and in some sense
revived, inspiring competition which greatly helped science. Most crit
icism of Japanese science has passed by the issues of recruitment and
the growth of institutions and focused instead on the behavior of indi
viduals, whether scientists or government officials.
The Tokugawa legacy was certainly complex and highly prob
lematic. Meiji Japan's bureaucracy as it came to maturity after 1890
tended to follow est abb shed Tokugawa patterns, and its ways of doing
business were not always congenial to scientists. But the behavior of
the scientists is quite another matter. Criticisms of scientists1 behavior
are suffused with the influence of ideology and are difficult to ap
proach in a spirit of fairness. I would argue that Japanese scientists
have historically tried to balance personal judgment and a scientific
creativity that came, to a certain degree, from the West with deep-
rooted norms of solidarity and loyalty inherent in Tokugawa (and mod
ern) culture. Their success in this effort has been greater than gener
ally recognized.39
This means that the critics are wrong. Japanese science has made
important contributions, contrary to what its critics assert. Two contri
butions of the Meiji-Taisho years should almost certainly have received
the Nobel Prize. In 1901 Emil von Behring of Germany received the
prize in medicine and physiology for the discovery of natural immunity.
But this work was actually done with Kitasato Shibasaburo, and his
exclusion from the accolade has never been explained. In 1926 the
same Nobel Prize in medicine and physiology was given to Johannes
Fibiger of Denmark when it probably should have gone to a Japanese
pathologist, Yamagiwa Katsusaburo of Tokyo University, who during
the World War I years had discovered a technique for induction of
tumors in laboratory animals which many consider basic to modern
oncology.40 (See chapter 6.)
The critics have certainly made some valid points. During the period
before 1914, many Japanese officials did stress importation of Western
technology and science in preference to supporting research at home.
This often expressed itself in spending money on overseas study instead

of on domestic research. The error is to think that these priorities were
unanimous, when they were usually debated rather vigorously. Not
even among officials was there a consensus on the priority of "copying"
foreign work over research at home. Scientists sometimes resisted the
priorities that were set; and they managed to prevail on occasion.
But if the critics are wrong in most of their claims, how does one
explain the persistence of their views? Are they simply ignorant of
facts? Certainly this is a .possibility. Physicists like Esaki and Sakata
take little or no notice of contributions in medicine or at least seem
oblivious to their historical importance, and-they ignore important work
which they themselves have done. Sakata, in partial collaboration with
two other scientists, made a significant contribution to theoretical phys
ics by predicting mathematically the existence of two particles. In 1973
Esaki received the Nobel Prize for discovering the tunnel diode effect.
And both men—contrary to misleading impressions—achieved these
results entirely in Japan.41 Such covering up of facts suggests an ide
ology at work, in this case the individualism so deeply rooted in the
history of science. Probably because it came from the West and there
fore retains a certain prestige, individualism has appealed to Japanese
who find themselves at odds with their society.
Another local factor linked to the past has strongly affected the re
search tradition. This was (and is) the relative isolation of Japan and its
culture from other research centers. As every student of Japanese histo
ry knows, the Tokugawa regime maintained strict isolation from the
outside world for over two hundred years (1639-1853). Travel abroad
by Japanese and travel to Japan by foreigners (especially the former)
were almost nonexistent; the flow of ideas was also, not surprisingly,
limited. There was some traffic in ideas, and on occasion it had signifi
cant local consequences. But Japanese development of science and
technology was much less than it might have been.
Of course, the isolation of Japanese science was not solely political.
Japan is also geographically distant from most other countries, es
pecially those active in science, and its language and culture are highly
distinctive. Rapid communications with Japan were technically impos
sible before World War II. To a lesser extent such factors still matter, as
many researchers are keenly aware.
This book takes up several themes in the formation of modern re

search in Japan. Recruitment, training, and socialization of scientists—
community formation in science—is one. These themes, which are
treated in chapter 3, are related both to Tokugawa experience (chapter
2) and the effects of foreign study. It is my conclusion that the social
object of such efforts (what is usually called the "scientific role") was
not fully established until about 1920 or so. In chapter 41 treat research
institutions as they developed in Japan before World War I. In addition
to the Tokugawa background, I discuss the influence of different West
ern models and the potiOcs of selection. Chapter 5 considers official
decision making as it affected the availability of material resources,
especially in the period before World War I. Who could decide what, and
under what conditions, is a major theme, as are differences between
various government ministries. Chapter 6 looks at behavioral patterns
in the scientific community and their apparent meaning for Japanese
research. It suggests that Japanese scientists usually were able to bal
ance different values in the substance of their actions, if not in the
forms.
Chapters 7 and 8 describe and analyze the impact of World War I on
Japan's scientific establishment. The war marked a turning point in the
organization, funding, and applications of science in Japan and many
other countries. Medical research lost its preferred status as the phys
ical sciences made significant gains. Funding increased substantially
for virtually every field, and new institutions appeared on the scene.
The Ministry of Education"s Science Research Grants Program (1918)
and the National Research Council (hereafter NRC, 1920) were es
pecially important and are discussed at some length for their long-term
implications.
World War I had an impact on science that transcended effects in
particular countries. Shortly before the Armistice in November 1918,
scientists from Allied nations held a meeting in London to decide how to
punish their colleagues in Germany. Because the Central Powers were
deemed guilty of monstrous crimes, many scientists (especially in
France) opposed the renewal of technical cooperation with the Ger
mans or even the Austrians. They organized the International Council
of Scientific Unions (ICSU) partly to bolster their political ostracism.
Because it was formally a leading Allied power, Japan was an organizer
and a charter ICSU member. In fact, participation in this group was a
matter of prestige for so new a scientific community.
It was also a source of considerable discomfort Many of the older
scientists had close ties to Germany, and some were afraid of direct
retaliation. Would the Germans exclude Japanese from access to their
laboratories out of spite for their role in founding the ICSU? Others
taunted those who made this kind of argument because they believed
that Japanese science had now proven itself to the world. Many scien
tists thus saw the issue as one of autonomy or continuing depen
dence—one theme of this book. Certainly the formation of a modern
research tradition demands a complex blending of indigenous and for
8 THE SOCIAL FQRMATION OF JAPANESE SCIENCE
eign influences. I have emphasized indigenous factors in the Japanese

case partly to compensate for the bias of others who attribute the pro
cess to cultural diffusion from the centers of science to non-Western
countries.42 Japan was not a center by 1921, but it had reached the
point of self-sustaining growth and stood on the threshold of major
contributions.43
CHAPTER TWO
SCIENCE AND SOCIETY IN

THE TOKUGAWA PERIOD
The Tokugawa period was in some ways an unlikely time for science to
flourish. Japan was formally isolated from the outside world, and politi
cal affairs were controlled by warriors who were not always keen on
scholarship. These warrior officials consistently tried to shape intellec
tual affairs to serve their own interests. Relatively few institutions with
permanent support existed for scholarly activities. Scientists them
selves were often unable—or unwilling—to share their work, and the
scholarly researcher had no social role.
Nevertheless, Tokugawa Japan was the scene of positive, unprece
dented developments for scientific study Numerous texts on technical
subjects were imported from China and devoured by Japanese scholars,
who in the seventeenth century based their indigenous mathematics
partly on this Chinese-language literature. In the eighteenth century
technical literature was imported from Europe and gradually absorbed
by various groups. Ultimately, of course, these developments seem
abortive, since Meiji Japan made a new beginning after 1868. But
although European science and its leading practitioners did supply the
paradigms and sometimes the precedents for Japanese efforts during
the Meiji period, beneath these Western influences was a layer of at
titudes and practices that had been formed in the Tokugawa period.
Which parts of the Tokugawa experience were decisive? The para
digms in effect in the Tokugawa period were all replaced by Western
ones, and government policiesrestrictingcertain fields did not survive
the demise of the shogunate. The Tokugawa era continued to shape
science through a combination of attitudes and trends in society, for
example, the patterns in recruitment of Japanese scientists, which sur
vived the Meiji Restoration. Inherited institutional weaknesses, and
strengths of particular disciplines, influenced the modern tradition.
Some Tokugawa administrative ^vactices lasted even beyond the end of
the Meiji (1912), and some behavioral norms that had appeared among
scientists in the Tokugawa period affected their successors as well.
Finally, the effects on Japanese research of Japan's long-term isola
IO SCIENCE AND SOCIETY IN THE TOKUGAWA PERIOD
tion—cultural, linguistic, intellectual, and geographical—have yet to

be calculated fully.
Recruitment to Science in Tokugawa Japan

There can be no science without scientists, but the use of the word
scientist in the Tokugawa context can only be ambiguous. In recent
times scientist has had the connotation researcher, but research was
not well developed in Tokugawa times and was only haphazardly prac
ticed. Some people did conduct careful experiments and even publish
their findings, but there was neither an institutionalized research role
nor anything like a modern scientific community. Journals did not
exist—let alone grants awarded by peers. Even those customs of Euro
pean science that developed in the early modem period—a dispassion
ate attitude and a stress on objectivity—were not always accepted in
Japan. And many Tokugawa scientists had an "unprofessional" and
certainly "unmodem" code of conduct They might, for example, keep
vital information from qualified colleagues or refuse to publish their
findings.
Consequently, the term scientist applied to a person of Tokugawa
Japan refers simply to one with an active interest in nature who made a
reputation for that interest. Tokugawa society did not support the pur
suit of knowledge for its own sake, nor did Japanese scientists think that
they should contribute to universal knowledge.l Most commentators
believed that the goal of knowledge was its application, which could be a
search for better surgical procedures and medical therapies, correction
of discrepancies in the calendar, more accurate maps of the Japanese
coastline, or a variety of other uses. Nearly all the translation of Euro
pean and Chinese technical works that engaged so many scientists had
a practical motivation.
How science was denned affected recruitment of scientists, but one
can rarelyfindout why a particular individual chose to become a scien
tist because the pertinent biographical information does not exist in
most cases. Even if it did, the Tokugawa emphasis on heredity for
allocating roles would usually make the information superfluous.2 One
needs to consider broader social forces. Scientists were recruited from
several groups in Tokugawa society. One was the population of official
translators based in the port of Nagasaki, where official foreign trade
was conducted. These men knew Dutch and Chinese and took an early
lead in bringing foreign scientific and technical materials to the atten
tion of other Japanese. Another group was the medical community.
Physicians often had not only the motivation but the intelligence and
SCIENCE AND SOCIETY IN THE TOKUGAWA PERIOD II
the money prerequisite to technical studies. Some abandoned routine

medical practice and devoted themselves to science. Astronomers em
ployed by the shogunate and occasionally by daimyo had (in varying
degrees) the desire and qualifications to undertake scientific work, and
by virtue of their official status, they often had access to resources not
usually available to men working outside the government.
But other Japanese outside these groups also got interested in sci
ence on occasion.3 A few came from merchant families, and some of
those were among the leading scientists. Another source was the gener
al samurai population. Samurai training was not designed to produce
technical specialists, but the spread of formal education among the
samurai in the eighteenth century, together with the desire to improve
their positions, led some samurai into the sciences. And there were even
recruits from the farm population. Beginning in the eighteenth century,
Tokugawa society included a decent number of educated, affluent
fanners who had some leisure time. Certainly, farmers rarely became
active in experimental science, but a number of students of advanced
mathematics emerged from their ranks after the middle of the century.
Samurai society in this period did not especially encourage interest in

science or technology; scholarship of any sort had relatively low pres
tige among samurai when the Tokugawa period began. Before the sev
enteenth century and for decades thereafter, learning was a monopoly
of Japan's Buddhist clergy. (To survive as a scholar, one needed support
from a temple or at least some feudal lord. ) 4 The clergy at that time were
hot well regarded, a condition ambiguous for learning.5 The new
Tokugawa regime eventually separated Confucianism from Buddhism
by creating a separate hierarchy, but even this action did not wholly
solve the problem, for Confucian scholars' status failed to match that of
the learning they espoused.6 For a time scholars became so dependent
on government that they had relatively little standing of their own.7
Tokugawa scholars were chronically underpaid. Where high-rank
ing samurai retainers of the Shogun might receive 8,000 koku per year,
no Confucian scholar ever received more than 3,500—and very few
reached that leveL8 The head of the Hayashi family (which ran the
shogunal academy in Edo) generally earned 3,500 koku but 300 was a
more usual salary for scholars in official positions.9 Compensation lev
els for technical specialists were not very different. For example, the
shogunate paid its astronomers stipends "equivalent only to [those] of
lower grade samurai."10 But the salary range could be greater than that
among Confucian philosophers. The affluent Higo domain in Kyushu
was well known for its medical establishment, and compensation for
physicians there varied from 150 to 5,000 koku.11
12 SCIENCE AND SOCIETY IN THE TOKUGAWA PERIOD
There were also nonpecuniary compensations for professional ser

vice. The professional opinions of official astronomers were highly re
garded by the samurai elite,12 and scholars were often treated deferen
tially. A daimyo might allow them to wear special clothing or even ride
about in palanquins, and when attending a scholarly lecture might
show his respect by taking an inferior seat.13 Warriors, of course, did
not always view technical specialists with a high degree of esteem.
Even in 1869, a local newspaper for samurai readers declared that
physicians were "not greatly respected" in spite of their "considerable
technical knowledge."14
The opinions of other Japanese about scholarly professions also influ
enced recruitment. Commoners respected even ordinary medical prac
titioners without official positions. Prominent Tokugawa intellectuals
like Motoori Norinaga and Ogyu Sorai came from families of physi
cians. 15 At least one samurai native of Satsuma was induced to take up
medical studies by the high social standing of a village physician.16 For
the commoner population of Japan, scholarly activities—including
technical ones—offered the prospect of upward mobility. The great
surveyor I no Tadataka, born in 1743 to a peasant family, rose to samurai
status late in his life almost entirely on the basis of professional achieve
ments, as did the astronomer Shibukawa Harumi.17
Scholarship could not have developed without support of this kind.
Although status was supposed to be inherited in feudal society, schol
arly posts, not being attractive to the warrior class, needed other re
cruits. Scholars were supposed to hold positions on the basis of compe
tence; but what if their heirs were not competent? One answer was
adoption, which became common and in some families normative. The
Hayashi family of Confucian humanists maintained its position over
many generations by a number of careful adoptions,18 and the impor
tant physicist Shizuki Tadao was adopted from the Nakano merchant
family by a Nagasaki family of official interpreters. For Shizuki his
adoption was doubly fortunate since the professional position of his new
family gave him access to the resources he needed.19
None of these features or strictures applied to one technical field—
mathematics. After the earlier decades of Tokugawa rule, mathematics
developed not only outside the formal status system but in many re
spects apartfromthe scholarly world. In part this was the nature of the
discipline, because mathematics shared with astronomy the need for
special abilities among its practitioners if they were to produce impor
tant achievements. Families wishing to specialize in mathematics
might have solved the problem of lack of innate ability by adoption, but
mathematics never became a specialty of particular families, because
SCIENCE AND SOCIETY IN THE TOKUCAWA PERIOD 13
there was little demand for mathematical work and no prospect of eco
nomic gain.20
Conceivably this pattern was unique to mathematics and needs no
special explanation. Even in the developed countries of nineteenth-
century Europe, mathematics had difficulty creating occupational
niches and lost recruits to other technical specialties.21 But the West
ern situation was better in other ways. In Europe and North America,
mathematics at least had a home in universities as a traditionally pres
tigious academic discipline. Tokugawa Japan offered nothing so sub
stantial as a base of material support. Authors of elementary textbooks
like Yoshida Mitsuyoshi, whose 1627 work on the abacus went through
several editions, could live in comfort. But works of advanced mathe
matics, even when published, had a very small market and could not
sustain their authors.22 Most domain schools did not employ anyone to
teach mathematics as a specialty even at the end of the Tokugawa
period.23 Consequently, the occupational base for Tokugawa mathe
maticians, with few exceptions, consisted of inadequate patronage by
wealthy individuals.24
In spite of the practical problems, technical specialties attracted re
cruits and managed to expand their activities. The most important
achievements took place in medicine and to a lesser degree in astrono
my. Medicine, after all, was immediately useful, and a country so de
pendent on rice agriculture needed an accurate calendar. Except in
mathematics, progress in most fields initially depended on the work of
physicians, astronomers (temmongata), and the Nagasaki interpreters.
Medical progress was able to build on the existing base of Chinese
medicine, and physicians trained in the Chinese tradition later helped
to introduce Western science.25
European medicine was first brought to Japan by Spanish and Por
tuguese missionaries and by Dutch traders in the sixteenth century.
Prior to the accession of Tokugawa Ieyasu in 1600, interest in Western
medicine naturally focused on surgery and materia medica. Sustained
investigation of other disciplines began after seclusion was fully in
place. In 1650 the shogunate ordered the Dutch trade mission at
Nagasaki, thereafter Japan's only regular contact with Europe, to pro
cure a European anatomy text for examination by certain officials, and
four years later it directed a Nagasaki physician to study Western medi
cine, but major interest remained focused on surgery for a considerable
period.26
During the eighteenth century there were two important develop
ments in medicine, the diffusion after 1774 of Chinese-style vaccina
tion techniques and the founding of European anatomical studies. The
Kyoto physician Yamawaki Toyo published Zoshi, a book on internal

organs, in 1759 after making some effort to verify the description given
in a German anatomical text by dissection.27 This stimulated consider
able interest in experimental medicine and led directly to the epochal
publication in 1774 of the Kaitai shinsho (New book on human dissec
tion) by Sugita Gempaku and some Edo physicians. Kaitai shinsho was
a translation with drawings of the Dutch edition of Johan Adam
Kulmus' Anatomische Tabellen, first published in 1722.28 Sugita's
translation indicates the strongly empirical approach to nature in
creasingly typical of Tokugawa science; it helped undermine the pres
tige of Chinese medicine.
Progress came more rapidly after the turn of the nineteenth century.
In 1805 Hanaoka Seishu became the world's first surgeon to excise a
breast tumor under general anesthesia.29 In 1807 smallpox vaccination
was introduced to Hokkaido through contacts with the Russians.30
During the 1820s medical studies benefited from the presence at
Nagasaki of Philip Franz von Siebold, member of a prominent
Wurzburg family of professors of anatomy. Siebold opened a small med
ical academy and trained several Japanese.31 In 1832 Takano Choei
published Japan s first translation of a European work on physiology,
and in 1836 Homma Gencho employed stethoscopy in medical diag
nosis.32
The strength of medicine's institutional base was a boon to other
technical fields. By the end of the eighteenth century the medical pro
fession was the "strongest voice raised in behalf of natural sci
ence."33 In fact, those who contributed most to natural sciences other
than astronomy came "mainly from the medical group [of Edo physi
cians)."34 Considerable evidence supports this conclusion. European
botany was completely dependent on physicians, beginning with Noro
Genjo, who published Oranda honzo wage in 1750. Noro was followed
by Ono Ranzan {Honzo somoku keimo, 1803), whom a German physi
cian called "Japan's Linnaeus"; Udagawa Yoan (Botanika kyo, 1822,
and Shokugaku keigen, 1833); ltd Keisuke (Taisei honzo meiso, 1828);
and the most important linnaean pioneer, Iinuma Yokusai (Somoku
zusetsu, 1855).35 Scholarly activity by doctors was also important in
physics: Aochi Rinso contributed by publishing Kikai kanran (Overall
view of the atmosphere) in 1827.36 While Aochi was virtually the only
physician to publish a major work of physics before the Restoration,
only about a half-dozen such works were published altogether, so the
medical contribution was not insubstantial.
There has been a tendency to accord major significance to Aochi's
Kikai kanran, to publication of a longer version, Kikai kanran kogi, by
his son-in-law Kawamoto Kdmin- in 1851, to Shizuki Tadao's un
SCIENCE AND SOCIETY IN THE TOKUCAWA PERIOD 15
published Rekisho shinsho (1798; published after the Restoration) or to

Sakuma Shozan's experiments with electrical phenomena in the 1850s.
Nevertheless, physical knowledge, except for Shizuki's work, remained
rather elementary, did not circulate widely, and rested on an extremely
narrow social base before 1868. The Rekisho shinsho, which introduced
Newtonian mechanics, suffered from the lack of suitable terms for
kinematics and attracted little attention.37 Chemistry had a larger clien
tele, but here as well official impediments to the diffusion of knowledge
hindered advances.
Mathematics did make progress, and so did astronomy. Histories of
Tokugawa mathematics usually begin with the work of Mori
Shigeyoshi, who reportedly first acquired significant portions of the
Chinese mathematical corpus in the 1590s. Mori used the abacus to
teach arithmetic at Kyoto, and Yoshida Mitsuyoshi was his pupil.
Yoshida, the son of a Kyoto merchant (though raised to samurai status),
became famous as the author of the Jinkoki, a book that told merchants
how to perform simple calculations for commercial transactions.38 At a
higher level, the principal early Tokugawa development was Seki Tak
akazu's work in geometry and algebra, which led him to devise a limited
form of calculus. Seki's calculus could not solve problems of motion; his
interest was limited to finding the areas of two-dimensional curved
geometric figures.39 (Later mathematicians were able to calculate the
volumes of solid objects with considerable accuracy.) Through the
efforts of a pupil, Araki Son ei, who inherited Seki's papers, Seki's great
work became institutionalized in the so-called Seki school, several of
whose members worked to extend the boundaries of mathematical
knowledge by importing, translating, and publishing such major Chi
nese works as Mei Wen-ting's eighteenth-century treatise Li-suan
ch'uan-shu (Comprehensive work on calendrical science and mathe
matics). Western trigonometry and logarithms reached Japan by the
end of the eighteenth century through the translation and publication
of other such treatises.40
Tokugawa astronomy focused almost exclusivelyôn producing^bet
ter calendars, and for much of the period depended mainly on the
acquisition (in some cases recovery) of informationjrom China. How
ever, earlier astronomical studies done in Japan by Jesuits also had an
effect This was particularly true of a work known as the Kenkon benset
su (Western cosmography, with critical commentaries). Compiled in
the 1640s by the apostate Jesuit Christovao Ferreira, it gave a detailed,
systematic account of Aristotelian and Ptolemaic views of nature and
the cosmos. Adding to its importance as a cultural artifact are commen
taries by the Confucian scholar Mukai Gensho, who was ordered to
study it by Shogun Iemitsu. Specialists do not agree on how significant
l6 SCIENCE AND SOCIETY IN THE TOKUGAWA PERIOD
the work was, but it did give Japanese readers a first description of
Westerners' views of nature.41
With the introduction from China of the Shou-shih calendar (ca.
1670), Japanese astronomy began slowly to improve. Described as the
"single most important influence on Japanese calendar-making" of the
Tokugawa period, the Shou-shih calendar was noted for the sophistica
tion of its mathematics and attracted attention from leading mathemati
cians like Seki Takakazu and Takebe Katahiro. It also formed the basis
for Shibukawa Harumi's Joky6 calendar of 1684, which the imperial
court in Kyoto adopted alter the failures of its own astronomers.
Shibukawa's success won him the position of official astronomer to the
shogunate and promotion to the status of samurai His work was impor
tant scientifically because it was based on the "first systematic astro
nomical observations in Japan," but it is interesting to note his inability
to resolve the difficult mathematical problem of reducing the ecliptic
coordinates of the sun to equatorial coordinates. Shibukawa stated that
he had merely copied relevant information from tables appended to the
Shou-shih calendar in creating the Jokyo calendar.42
Three important astronomical developments occurred in the eigh
teenth century: introduction of better instruments for observation, dif
fusion by stages of Copemican heliocentrism, and preservation, in trun
cated form, of Newton s mechanics. Importation and translation
between 1726 and 1733 of three major Chinese texts led to thefirstof
these advances. One was the Li-suan ch'uan-shu. The other two, Ling-
t'ai i hsiang chih (1730) and the Ch'ung<hen li-shu (1733), compiled
by Jesuits working in China, explained various European astronomical
instruments, including accurate drawings and descriptions of their use.
New instruments and information made creation of the Kansei calendar
possible in 1798. This was the first time Japanese astronomers em
ployed Western data officially.43
As for the Copemican heliocentric doctrine, the surprising thing is
not its arrival in the late eighteenth century but its absence in the
seventeenth. De revolutionibus orbium coelestium first appeared in
1543, but Japanese astronomers did not hear of it at all until 1769 and
got a superficial description only in 1792. The indifference of seven
teenth-century Jesuit astronomers in Japan and China, together with
Chinese authorities' lack of interest in Western cosmology, meant that
Japanese astronomers had to wait for the importation of texts from
Europe. In 1769 Asada Goryu, an influential astronomer outside the
government, stated that many European astronomers believed the
earth was not the center of the universe, and in 1772 Motoki Ryoei, an
official translator for the shogunate at Nagasaki, first mentioned the
name of Copernicus in a Japanese scientific treatise. Twenty years later
SCIENCE AND SOCIETY IN THE TOKUGAWA PERIOD 17
Motoki produced an extensive nonmathematical description of Coper

nican theory in a handwritten, seven-volume work. Of this work's intel
lectual content, an historian of astronomy wrote: "Elliptic orbits were
introduced but were not associated with Kepler . .. Kepler's second
and third laws were not given; the name of Newton was ignored. Dy
namic theory did not appear, and mathematical formulation was con
sciously avoided.. . . Lack of accurate detail made this treatise of little
practical value to Japanese calendar makers."44 Inability to publish was
a further limitation on the impact of Motoki's achievement. Manuscript
copies circulated among a few intellectuals, but for most educated Japa
nese the details of Copernican theory remained under lock and key in a
government warehouse, although Shiba Kokan popularized the doc
trine.45
Japanese astronomy did not change much before 1868. The most
important developments were in instrumentation. By 1800 Japanese
astronomers were regularly producing telescopes and even grinding
lenses.46 Using a telescope of his own devising, Kunitomo Tobei ob
served sunspots in 1835 and published a drawing of the surface of the
moon; other astronomers began to do systematic observations of the
planets. However, the most important development was arrival (in
1803) of a book in Dutch by the French astronomer J. J. F de Lalande.
Lalande was a preeminent figure in eighteenth-century science, and
his work was the first "advanced treatise on contemporary Western
astronomy" to make its way to Japan. The shogun's official astronomer,
Takahashi Yoshitoki, saw at once the importance of the work. He was
determined to secure translation, with all the mathematics, but he was
also aware that official translators were not up to the job. He therefore
decided to begin learning Dutch in order to do it himself, but, unfortu
nately for the development of astronomy in Japan, died a year later.
Takahashi did leave behind many unpublished notes (Lalande rekisko
kanken [A personal view of Lalande's astronomy]), but no one took
notice of them until many years later.47
That Tokugawa efforts did not lead to modern science directly can be
linked to several conditions. One has to do with long-term trends in the
recruitment of scientists, especially in mathematics and astronomy.
Another relates to research institutions, schools and academies, and
scientists' behavior. Government policy constitutes a third. What did
Tokugawa officials tolerate or support? What did they proscribe or try to
suppress? In examining these issues we look for connections. Did cer
tain people enter onefieldor another on the basis of class? If so, did this
make any difference for science as a whole?- Did some fields have in
stitutional support that others lacked? If so, why?
l8 SCIENCE AND SOCIETY IN THE TOKUGAWA PERIOD
The kinds of people who became active in the scientific movement

varied considerably over the years. In the seventeenth century most
astronomers and students of the physical sciences were commoners. A
substantial proportion came from the twenty or so families of Nagasaki
interpreters.48 Higuchi Gon'emon (1590-1640), Imamura Eisei
(1671-1736), Kobayashi Kentei (1601-84), and Nishikawa Joken
(1648-1724) were among the most prominent figures in the physical
sciences, and all of them came from interpreter families.49 But from
about the beginning of the eighteenth century, more and more came
from the samurai. The samurai HiragaGennai (1729-79), Koike Yuken
(1683-1754), and Yamaji Shuju (1704-72) were active early in the
century, although men of commoner origin like Aoki Kon'yd (1698
1769), Miura Baien (1723-89), Nakane Genkei (1662-1733), and
Nishikawa Seikyu (1693-1756) continued to outnumber their samurai
colleagues.
Samurai predominated in the physical sciences from about the mid
dle of the eighteenth century. Honda Toshiaki (1744-1821), Mori
Shiko (1750-1818), Otsuki Gentaku (1757-1827), and Takahashi
Yoshitoki (1764-1804) were active at this time, and all were members
of the warrior class. By the 1820s samurai were by far the majority.
Takahashi Kageyasu (1785-1829), Aochi Rinso (1784-1833),
Nakanishi Fungaku (1763-1837), and Sakuma Shozan (1811-64)
were notable samurai scientific figures of the late Tokugawa. Of course
there were other famous scientists who were not samurai. Hoashi Banri
(1778—1852), the noted astronomer and Confucian scholar, was not of
samurai origin, and neither were such men as Takeda Shingen (1785
1846) or, slightly earlier, Shizuki Tadao (1760-1806).
Mathematics showed quite a different trend. In the seventeenth
century, most mathematicians came from the samurai population. Mori
Shigeyoshi (1580-1640), Furugoori Hikozaemon (1642-1720), Seki
Takakazu (1642-1708), Araki Son'ei (1640-1718), and other early
pupils of Seki were allfromthe warrior class.50 Samurai were predomi
nant in mathematics into the eighteenth century (examples are Tatebe
Kenko [1690-1760], Fujita Sadasuke [1734-1807], and Matsuoka
Ryosuke [1770-1830]), but their influence was decreasing; by 1800
commoners were more numerous. During the last decades of
Tokugawa rule, wasan mathematics was largely controlled by men like
Uchida Itsumi (1805-82), Kurita Nobutada (1800-70), and Akita Yu
jiro (1811-70), who came from mercantile or agrarian families, al
though a few samurai—Baba Kotaro (1801-60), Abe Yuji (1825
1875), and Kanda Takahira (1832-90) were still active in mathematics.
Table 2.1 shows the evolution of these trends in the Tokugawa peri
od. In 1650 samurai were only 22 percent of the astronomers and stu
2.1. Samurai as a Percentage ofAll Tokugawa Scientists
100
Total N
90
Physical
vv
Year
Sciences Mathematics
80- 1650
13 16
1660
16 23
70- 1670
15 35
Mathematics ^NIL * 1680

15 38
- 1690
13 44
1700
16 52
1710
19 56
c 50 - 1720
19 49
1730
19 50
1740
24 53
1 40" 1750
29 61
1760
34 64
.30- 1770
42 72
•f 1780
45 82
20- Astronomy and Physical Sciences 1790

47 89
1800
49 110
- 1810
59 134
10 1820
68 170
1830
82 203
i • i • i • i • i • i • i • i • i • i <
On 1840
105 208
1660 1670 1690 1710 1730 1750 1770 1790 1810 1830 1850 1850
113 224
Year 1860
108 222
Sources: Dai jimmei jiten 8 v.(1953); KawakiU Chorin, Honcho Sugakka ahoden (1917); Hagino Kogo, "Kyodo no wasanka kenkyu shiryb,"
Shuzankai 103, 104, 106, 109, 110, 111 (1960-61); Oya Shin'ichi, "Kyodo no wasanka kenkyu shiryo hoi," Shiuankai 115 (1961).
2O SCIENCE AND SOCIETY IN THE TOKUGAWA PERIOD
dents of the physical sciences, but 75 percent of mathematicians. By

1700 the physical sciences had attracted more samurai: 45 percent of
physical scientists and 70 percent of mathematicians were samurai.
Samurai and commoners were about equally numerous in the physical
sciences until almost the end of the eighteenth century; samurai spe
cialization in mathematics declined slowly. But by 1820, nearly two-
thirds of physical scientists were samurai, and a majority of mathemati
cians were of commoner origin. Time confirmed these trends. When
the Tokugawa shogunate came to an end, 80 percent of physical scien
tists were samurai; two-thirds of mathematicians commoners.
Table 2.1 is based on many cases (263 astronomers and physical
scientists and 515 mathematicians), but these are only a fraction of the
total. As many as 8,000 mathematicians may have been active in the
Tokugawa period, and there were certainly more students of physical
science than the number represented in the graph.51 But other evi
dence suggests that the pattern table 2.1 presents was real. Sato
Shosuke found that commoners were most active in the physical sci
ences during the early decades of the Tokugawa period.52 The historian
Takahashi Shin'ichi found that an Edo group active in Dutch studies in
the 1850s was mostly samurai.53 Katsu Kaishu in 1855 made a survey
of "European "-style scholars in Edo for the Tokugawa shogunate and
reported that two-thirds were samurai.54 And Meiji publicist Fukuzawa
Yukichi commented (ca. 1865), "During the ninety years that preceded
the Horeki and Meiwa periods 11751-72). most of the students of
Rangaku [Western science) were physicians (mosdy commoners).
However, since the Koka and Kaei periods (1844-54), most of them
have been samurai."55
What accounts for this bifurcation in the scientific movement? To

answer this question we must first look at several others: Why in the
seventeenth century did commoners dominate astronomy and the
physical sciences? Why did samurai control mathematics? Why did
both trendsreversein the eighteenth century? Why did samurai appar
ently lose interest in studying mathematics not long before they got
interested in physical science? In the nineteenth century, why did more
samurai not perceive the need for mathematics? To pose the question
differently, why did more commoners who were active in mathematics
not see the value of their work for the scientific movement?
Commoners became dominant in the scientific movement of the
seventeenth century primarily because of differential opportunities.
With the imposition of strict seclusion in 1639, it became almost impos
sible to import Western books, and contacts with foreigners sharply
declined. But these effects hurt some groups more than others. Since
the warrior class belonged to the chain of command, it was particularly

hard hit by government restrictions. Some were motivated to remain
active in science from an interest in defense and navigation, but they
could not obtain any fresh stimulation and had little incentive to pass on
their expertise. Nagasaki interpreters suffered as well, losing greatly in
numbers and status, although they at least had access to information
from Europe when it was almost impossible for others to get it. Com
moners became most active in science because only they could become
interpreters.56
The samurai's early interest in mathematics reflected the origins of
the subject in Japan. Mori Shigeyoshi had been a retainer of the famous
general Toyotomi Hideyoshi and had studied in China with Hideyoshi's
encouragement and endeavored to obtain Chinese works in mathemat
ics. 57 Mdri's seventeenth-century successors like Seki Takakazu had
also had access to foreign information and were further interested in
applying mathematics. Seki studied European astronomy with a one
time Japanese resident of Macao and formally advised the new govern
ment about the calendar.58 Samurai, as military experts, saw the value
of mathematics for surveying, navigation, and calendar making.
While the imposition of seclusion disrupted these patterns, its partial
relaxation by a subsequent Shogun gave them new vigor and a different
direction. Samurai could have access to new kinds of knowledge once
Shogun Yoshimune allowed Western technical literature into Japan
(1720), but his action was not publicized and its effects were delayed.59
Not until about 1750 did scientific learning change noticeably, and
samurai importance in the scientific movement resulted primarily from
formal education. The government put some effort into promoting edu
cation for samurai, and by 1760 forty-two domains and the shogunate
had established their own schools, which local samurai were encour
aged to attend.60
The preeminence of the samurai had other causes. To begin with, in
the eighteenth century very little science was actually taught in any of
the schools established by daimyo. Those interested in learning Dutch
or a technical discipline had to enroll in a private academy, find a tutor,
or work on their own. Commoners could certainly do any of these
things; that samurai's tendency to do them was greater reflects dif
ferences in attitudes. Second, commoners' access to formal education
was rising for a number of reasons. Certain fiefs established special
schools for commoners beginning in the 1790s, and some domains (like
Higo) even admitted them to the regular school. Commoners could
always attend private academies, which operated in most larger cities.61
By the late eighteenth century affluent commoners were tending to
favor more formal education in emulation of samurai values. "The sam
urai virtues," Fukuzawa Yukichi wrote, "(by the late Tokugawa] were
not confined to those who lived off rice stipends or wore swords [by
virtue of their status]."62
Samurai still had better access to schooling than did commoners,
and the education they got had special features because of their politi
cal position as the governing class. In that sense education for samurai
was not suited to scientific studies but instead emphasized developing
suitable moral character, gaining classical knowledge of the tech
niques of government, and meeting their responsibilities to society.63
It included the military arts and Confucian humanism of a sometimes
arid sort. But samurai education had other features which served sci
ence better, in that it tended to be somewhat philosophical and formal
and was not tied too closely to occupational performance.64 It also
stressed comprehension of knowledge in general, not just mastery of
particular specialties.85
Samurai had incentives to acquire education that were peculiar to
their class, for their socialization seems to have produced a kind of
"need achievement" of the sort that drives people to outdo and dominate
others.66 As their standing in the national economy deteriorated in the
eighteenth century, this attitude combined with a new fervor. Because
samurai youth wererearedon stories of the privations endured by their
ancestors, they had more courage to tolerate hardship in pursuing edu
cation than did commoners. For increasing numbers, at least toward
the end of the century, education was seen as the best way to revive
sagging family fortunes.67
Commoners' education also reflected needs and values, but their
position in society was very different. Their education was heavily prag
matic: language instruction, moralistic aphorisms, and the subject mat
ter required in their various occupations, including a substantial dose of
arithmetic.68 And though local regimes, including the shogunate, had
some official interest in education for commoners, one should not over
state that interest. After all, only a small minority of fiefs provided
special schools for commoners. Official steps were usually confined to
employing itinerant lecturers who instructed villagers in the Confucian
virtues of filial piety and obedience.69 However, another factor influ
enced education for all. This was the sense of deprivation and the
resentment samurai felt toward commoners whose incomes were tend
ing to rise while theirs either remained constant or decreased.70
To explain the bifurcation in the social class basis of Tokugawa
science one needs to consider the role of commoners in mathematics.
Affluent commoners began to pursue mathematical interests when
their position in society changed. Changes of position were linked to
significant changes in the economy. The private commercial sector,
where commoners were active, grew, and grew substantially. After

1700 especially, economic historians estimate that the Japanese econo
my grew significantly faster than total population, and such expansion
demanded proficiency in arithmetic.71 Tokugawa Japanese naturally
distinguished between arithmetic and higher mathematics, but one
could not pursue interests in higher mathematics without some ac
quaintance with arithmetic. Schooling for commoners was organized
differently from that for samurai. Whereas samurai were schooled at
public expense, most commoners were educated privately. Signifi
cantly, this was also the case with higher mathematics. By the mid-
eighteenth century, Tokugawa Japan had nineteen schools of mathe
matics, each headed by a master practitioner who either pursued a
separate occupation or subsisted on tuition payments.72
The private-school experience of commoners contrasts sharply with
the experience of samurai, more and more of whom got their basic
education in daimyo-supported schools where mathematics either was
not taught at all or was limited to arithmetic. Seclusion had eliminated
ocean navigation as a stimulus to interest in higher mathematics, and
most samurai felt that mathematical studies had little or no value for
society. The growing concern in the nineteenth century for practical
studies at the daimyo schools made this sentiment, if anything, strong
er. 73 Samurai could also see that commoners—especially merchants—
were increasingly coopting mathematics. This made a difference in
their fundamental attitudes because of their growing indebtedness to
merchants.74 They increasingly hated not only their creditors but any
thing associated with them. This point of view explicitly included high
er mathematics. Ogyu Sorai condemned mathematicians as early as
1727.75 The astronomer Nishimura Tosato wrote in 1761, "Mathemat
ics is a childish subject in which only people wishing to seek fame by
constructing impracticable theories . . . will indulge."76 The biog
rapher of the Meiji physicist Yamakawa Kenjiro, whoreceivedhis early
education in Tokugawa schools, noted that Yamakawa was unable to
study mathematics at his domain school in Aizu because mathematics
"was despised by samurai as something which only the merchants
should study." According to the biographer, 'The same situation exist
ed in every other fief."77
The negative attitude toward mathematics also had an intellectual
basis. Critics resented the increasingly trivial or esoteric character of
later Tokugawa mathematics. By the time Nishimura was active, or
even earlier, in the lifetime of Ogyu Sorai, wasan mathematics had
developed the characteristics of an art form or a cult. A major preoc
cupation of later mathematicians was a type of problem called yojutsu
("packing problems"), which consisted of efforts to inscribe the largest
possible number of small circles of a certain size in a large circle or to

circumscribe various polygons whose dimensions were given in the
problem. Certainly yojutsu did not represent the whole of Tokugawa
mathematics. Seki Takakazu discovered—and his followers im
proved—the enri calculus for finding the areas of spaces bordered by
curves. Wada Yasushi compiled tables of definite integrals and applied
them to the mathematically infinite and infinitesimal. Other mathe
maticians developed calculus techniques which in some respects were
better than Seki's.78 But these achievements all came early and had no
parallels in later mathematics.
Why should Tokugawa mathematics have been conceptually fertile
in its earlier decades and increasingly sterile as the period went by?
Some think that wasan mathematics* intellectual poverty is largely a
product of the environing culture. Since many of Japan's basic cultural
patterns were derivedfromoverseas, specialists tended toward the artis
tic rather than toward the critical.79 There may be some truth to this
view, but a number of other factors were also at work.
Leaving aside the behavior of mathematicians themselves, the gen
eral direction of Tokugawa mathematics seems to have resulted from
two different forces. One was surely class barriers to intellectual
communication. For example, a samurai student of astronomy like
Takahashi Yoshitoki, endeavoring in 1804 to translate Lalande, would
never think of asking a merchant mathematician like Aida Yasuaki
(1747-1817) for assistance, assuming Takahashi even knew of his
existence.80 The other was the shogunate's policy of national seclusion,
which removed some powerful stimuli toward mathematics.
Instead, samurai after 1800 became increasingly interested in the
physical sciences, aresultin part of Western expansion. Shortly before
and after the turn of the century, British and Russian ships appeared at
Nagasaki; and the Americans were not far behind. These developments
were alarming enough, but the Opium War (1839-42) was much more
so. When Britain defeated China in this uneven conflict, the samurai
were taken aback and began to reexamine their own defense needs.
With coastal navigation and coastal defense suddenly brought sharply
to the warriors1 attention, ballistics, metallurgy, and naval engineering
again seemed relevant to Japan's survival.
One might have expected that samurai and other nineteenth-cen
tury physical scientists would have included mathematics in their stud
ies. Plotting trajectories or casting cannon is nearly impossible without
it Some of these men did see the connection, but wasan mathematics
was incapable of responding to practical needs and was no longer con
trolled by the right kind of people. ThefirstJapanese book on Western
mathematics was published only in 1857, several years after the Perry
expedition. Three factors may explain the tardiness of Tokugawa in

terest in Western mathematics. For one thing, the official Nagasaki
translators did not translate Western works on mathematics and seem
not to have known of local interest in the subject. Second, no important
Western mathematician in this period ever visited Japan (unlike China)
before or after seclusion was abolished.81 Third, so many samurai had
developed a hostility to wasan that it took time to change their minds,
about mathematics.
Curiously, most mathematical experts from the commoner popula
tion also failed to perceive the value of their subject for society, although
there are exceptions. The Tsuwano school of wasan emphasized the
practical value of mathematical work in the rules governing its stu
dents. And another commentator in 1816 declared mathematics a part
of gakumon, a legitimate branch of higher Japanese learning.82 But
many did not much care whether it had any standing or not, let alone
whether it could be applied. The eminent eighteenth-century mathe
matician Fujita Sadasuke spoke approvingly of what he called the "util
ity of the useless,"83 and another mathematician insisted that his col
leagues would take up problemsfromastronomy only if unable to find a
topic from mathematics.84 The forms of the discipline were set, and in
the absence of new stimuli they were quite unlikely to change. The
same lack of access to advanced information from Europe that affected
science in general was also a powerful factor here. Hagiwara Teisuke
(1828-1909), a talented practitioner of wasan, refused to convert to
Western mathematics even after seclusion was lifted because a perusal
of a British calculus text in translation convinced him that wasan was
better.85
Tokugawa Educational and Scientific Institutions

Social class trends of the late Tokugawa may not have aided science in
the early nineteenth century, but they had an effect later on. The mod
ern research community was formed to a surprising degree by the
extension of these trends (see chapter 3). Medicine had attracted a
large share of the available talent in the Tokugawa period and con
tinued to do so in the Meiji, and samurai predominance in the physical
sciences persisted well beyond 1868. The marginality typical of
Tokugawa mathematics exacted its price after 1868. Continuities in
recruitment are striking, but they are much less obvious when we look
at institutions. Relatively few scientific institutions of the Meiji era can
trace their lineage to the Tokugawa period, and the Tokugawa institu
tions often had goals that set them apartfromtheir modern successors.
Scientific institutions in the Tokugawa period developed under di

verse conditions. Some constraints promoted competition and in that
sense benefited learning. The system of Alternate Attendance estab
lished by the shogunate to control the daimyo by compulsory spending
on travel, for example, brought many samurai retainers to Edo, where
they acquired important new information and confronted "intellectual
challenges . . . to their [traditional] way of thinking."86 The political
structure consisted not only of the central administration of the shogun
ate, but also of more than 270 local domains each headed by a daimyo.
Sometimes local domains could be induced to compete in a way that
was helpful to science. Institutions in the purely private sphere could—
and did—challenge the position of those supported by government.
Other factors served to limit competition and constrain the scientific
movement. The shogunate tried hard to dominate European studies
(Rangaku or Yogaku) and in some ways all forms of learning. Parochi
alism in a climate of seclusion certainly impeded some dissemination of
knowledge. Fear of Christianity restricted the growth of the physical
sciences. Some members of well-entrenched intellectual communities
(for example, kampo physicians) even directly restrained competition to
protect themselves. Many besides mathematicians had no wish for
important new knowledge, and the private sector, in spite of its
strengths, was in some respects weak and dependent. As for institu
tional functions, schools and even putative research facilities in
Tokugawa Japan were not necessarily established for fully "modern"
purposes. They were supposed to diffuse scientific knowledge and tech
nical information, at least to those who created them, but they had little
concept of adding to knowledge and never awarded degrees.
Tokugawa institutions were certainly valuable, however, for as R. P.
Dore noted in a classic study, Tokugawa Japan saw a rebirth of learning.
Peacetime conditions allowed for considerable curiosity. Official pa
tronage of scholarship flourished. Subsidies for printing books, main
taining libraries, and hiring lecturers were on a scale without prece
dent, and a substantial recovery of knowledge from China took place.
Also, while one would not wish to exaggerate its extent, there was some
freedom for intellectual inquiry.87 Political structures reinforced this
remarkably favorable climate. Consider the effects of Alternate Atten
dance. Nagasaki, of course, had originally been the site of the Japanese
scientific movement, while Kyoto and Osaka had their parts to play. But
by bringing large numbers of samurai to Edo, the national system of
political control eventually reshaped the learned establishment Alter
nate Attendance indirectly promoted new ways of thinking among
those who undertook to travel and eventually laid much of the ground
work for the capital's preeminence in science. Schools, academies, and
SCIENCE AND SOCIETY IN THE TOKUGAWA PERIOD YJ
other institutions sprang up out of all proportion to the wealth and

population of Edo, and as a result, it came to dominate the scientific
movement after about 1750. The capital's preeminence in scholarship
became permanent in Japanese life.
But Alternate Attendance in and of itself did not bring about these
results. Regional competition also stimulated scholarly activities. About
fifteen daimyo domains built official academies in the seventeenth cen
tury, and by 1770 about thirty more schools had been built, followed by
another sixty or so by the end of the century. School construction had
several motivations. Confucianism held that formal education helped
promote virtue and hence the governability of society, and troubling
events could reinforce this notion. In the 1770s Tokugawa Japan faced
a series of particularly severe famines, bad weather, daimyo financial
crises, and peasant revolts. Some administrators thought that more
education would help, at least with the last two. But building schools
was also a way of keeping up with one's neighbors. In 1755 the Higo
domain in Kyushu built a school at a time when they were still quite
unusual, and this action by the Hosokawa family prompted other do
mains to do the same thing.88
Domains could also improve conditions for technical studies by
adding programs to existing institutions. One domain added a mathe
matics course to its school in the 1760s. Four more did so in the next two
decades, and an additional nine had added mathematics by 1803. Two
domains introduced courses in astronomy—including calendrical sci
ence, geography, and surveying—during the 1790s. Two added medi
cal courses in the 1780s, and seven more did so in the 1790s. In the
nineteenth century this expansion continued, as nine domain schools
added mathematics courses between 1804 and 1829, while one added
medicine and two astronomy. From about the time of the Opium War,
the pace accelerated, so that by the time Perry arrived in 1853, twenty-
two additional domain schools had added mathematics, thirteen had
added medicine, and four had created new courses in astronomy and
related disciplines.89
Thesefiguresmay suggest a preference for mathematics, but in fact,
medicine was usually the discipline of choice and often had its own
institutions. From the mid-eighteenth century on the more affluent
domains began to establish separate academies for medical studies,
Higo once again being the pacesetter. In 1757 the Higo daimyo, Hoso
kawa Shigekata, established the Saishunkan at Kumamoto as a spe
cialized school for medical studies. His initiative was copied by Satsuma
(1774), Kyoto (1782), Aizu (1801), and others.90
Disciplines considered more explicitly Western were also included in
domain academies, though rarely before 1800. Higo's medical academy
offered Dutch surgery from the start,91 but the Chdshu and Sakura
domain schools which did so only after the Opium War (from 1843)
were by far the more typical cases. Often the military rather than the
medical value of Dutch studies led to their adoption in domain acade
mies. 92 Military studies based on Western texts werefirstconducted at
Chdshu and Saga in 1840, and their popularity grew after Perry's arriv
al. The shogunate developed several new programs, but the domains
were slower to act. A few forward-looking daimyo did send young sam
urai to Nagasaki, Osaka, or Edo for technical studies, but that was not
until the mid-1840s.93
With the change of regime (1868) the daimyo began to catch up. In
1870, for example, areformistadministration in Higo closed the tradi
tional Confucian academy (the Jishukan, built in 1755) andreplacedit
with a Western-style school. Securing the services as instructor of a
West Point graduate, the new Yogakko academy offered a broad pro
gram. Captain L. L. Janes devoted the entire first year to instruction in
English. In the remaining three years he taught various subjects, in
cluding algebra, geometry, trigonometry, chemistry, physics, and geol
ogy.94 Separately but simultaneously, the Higo administration created a
new school for medical studies (the Igakko) by reorganizing the exist
ing Saishunkan. Although both schools were reform-minded, their
sponsors viewed them quite differendy. As an antidote to Westerniza
tion, Yogakko students hadregularcompulsory lectures on Confucian
ethics and morality, but Igakko students could attend the lectures or not
as they liked. The Yogakko was housed in a Western-style building; the
Igakko used the Saishunkan's facilities and some of its equipment as
well.95
Medicine's establishment in separate academies was a trend of par
ticular importance. Domain academies taught a little science, but be
fore the Opium War they were not very serious about it Only elemen
tary mathematics, botany, and medical subjects were usual, with
astronomy less frequently offered. Partly for this reason the medical
academies took on additional functions. Especially in the intermediate
period of the scientific movement (1780-1840), the medical academy
of a domain was the leader in accepting Western science. Many of their
teachers of technical subjects were private physicians.96
The private-sector status of many physicians was a source of addi
tional competition for daimyo-supported institutions. Private physicians
were more likely to exploit new techniques like vaccination or Dutch
surgery than their official counterparts. After all, private doctors re
ceived nofixedsalary, and special expertise could justify a boost in their
fees. Saga already possessed several private practitioners of Dutch-style
medicine before it began to be taught in the daimyo's academy. In
Fukui, Dutch medicine was established in the domain academy only as

a result of pressure from private physicians, and even then it was
strongly opposed by conservative doctors on the'academy staff.97 But
the attentions of private physicians were not confined entirely to medi
cine. An important development of the late eighteenth century was the
cultivation of astronomy and other technical subjects by physicians.
The noted Osaka physician Asada Goryu (1734-99) became a highly
successful astronomer. In the 1780s he discovered the secular diminu
tion of tropical-year length, and two of his pupils in 1798 developed the
Kansei calendar for the Tokugawa shogunate after Asada himself de
clined the assignment. This calendar was an important advance, and it
used European measurements officially.98
The shogunate s founding of scientific institutions should certainly
have enhanced the scientific movement. The number of these institu
tions was impressive. The Astronomical Bureau and Observatory (Tem
mongata) was the oldest of the group. Founded in 1684 as a result of
Shibukawa Harumi's work on the Jokyo calendar, the observatory got
effective control over calendar making and made various contributions
of note." In the late eighteenth century it sponsored Ino Tadataka's
survey of the Japanese coast, which used sophisticated mathematical
techniques. 10 ° In the nineteenth century it became the base for many
of the specialists in European astronomy.l01 Partly because of the ob
servatory's successes, the shogunate began to expand its technical in
frastructure, in 1791 adding an official academy of medicine, then an
agency for the translation and diffusion of technical materials (1811), a
full-fledged school for scientific studies (1856), a related bureau for
mathematical studies (1863), and a number of other institutions. Not
much was done, however, between 1811 and Perry's mission in 1853,
and certain parts of the program, particularly in medicine, gained mo
mentum not by competing with, but by coopung the accomplishments
of private institutions. Government policy dictated that scholars at
tached to public institutions dominate and control the scientific move
ment rather than advance its mission.
The official policy of not competing is clear from the beginning, with
the founding of the medical academy, which actually involved recon
stituting an existing private facility. In 1765 the Taki family of shogunal
physicians had established its own school, the Seijukan, for training
Chinese-style doctors. The Seijukan was privately funded, but the sho
gunate publicized its existence among the daimyo and later required
physicians living in shogunal territories to contribute to its mainte
nance. Though neither historically unprecedented nor programmati
cally innovative, the Seijukan was an important institutional develop
ment in the Tokugawa context, and for that reason it eventually became
a public institution.102 It would also initiate a longer-term pattern. The

Seiyo Igakusho (Academy of Western Medicine) of 1861 was created in
much the same way, and this same nationalizing of private institutions
in the medical field continued beyond 1868.
The creation of the Office for Translating Dutch Books (Bansho
Wage Goyo) in 1811 illustrates two of the shogunate's aims. One was to
obtain useful knowledge through translation, the other to control its
diffusion once the knowledge had been obtained. Before this, the Dutch
studies movement had been in the hands of private physicians and
curious samurai, who sometimes performed experiments while endeav
oring to learn from European texts. But with the establishment of the
translation office, official activities rose to the top, and interest in experi
ments waned. Baba Sajuro, an able Nagasaki translator, and Otsuki
Gentaku, a leading Edo Dutch scholar from the Sendai domain, were
named to the staff of the translation office, but they and their staff were
basically generalists with only occasional interests in science. While
technical materials were included in their purview, much more of then-
work dealt with public administration.103 Moreover, the translation of
fice had duties ostensibly at odds with the scientific movement. Begin
ning in 1842 it had to censor all translations of European materials and
oversee their circulation. Under these circumstances, it is hardly sur
prising that before 1856 the translation office made no more than a
limited contribution to science in Japan.104
After Perry arrived, the government made changes. It expanded the
work of the translation office and built a school in 1856.105 This school
initially taught only Dutch, but in 1862 English, French, and German
were offered along with courses in mathematics, metallurgy, and indus
trial arts. Geography, physics, and history were added in the final years
of Tokugawa rule.106 In the Tokugawa context, the school was inno
vative. Students were admitted from all over Japan without regard to
place of origin or status, and members of the faculty were not educated
generalists but specialists in the subjects they taught.107 Such spe
cialists were hard to recruit. The shogunate could obtain just two of the
teachers from among its own retainers and had to hire the other thirty-
two from other domains.108
The school's program in physics shows its limitations. The eminently
qualified Kawamoto Komin had charge of physics, but it is not at all
clear what he did. Earlier Dutch studies specialists in physics had
investigated topics in ballistics, electricity, friction, and celestial me
chanics, but it is far from certain that any of this work continued in the
Tokugawa academy. Kawamoto and his staff were forbidden to lecture
and confined their efforts to translating documents. The only scientific
work they are known to have accomplished is the installation and study
of a telegraph system.109
Tokugawa institution building did not neglect medicine. Chinese
medicine had had its own academy for decades. Fearing loss of their
status, some of its members had opposed Western medicine, and in
1849 they persuaded the authorities to ban Western medicine except
for surgery and ophthalmology, never specialties of Chinese medi
cine. l10 Ironically, the same year this ban was issued a German surgeon
employed by the Dutch at Nagasaki managed through vaccination to
achieve the desired prophylactic effect against smallpox, and opposition
to Western medicine waned as the information spread.! 11 Accordingly,
a group of private physicians opened a vaccination office at Edo in 1857.
In 1861 the shogunate took it over and made it a medical school. Ini
tially known as the Academy of Western Medicine (Seiyo Igakusho).
this academy later became part of Tokyo University.*l2
During the years of institutional expansion in Kdo. similar events
were occurring at Nagasaki. This is in some ways surprising, given the
capital's rise as a center of scholarship, but throughout the period of
national seclusion Nagasaki was the center of contacts with Europe,
and it attracted several Westerners with scientific training. Philip Franz
von Siebold, J. L. C. Pompe van Meerdervoort, A. F Bauduin, and W. K.
Gratama were especially influential toward the end of the period. Sie
bold was both thefirstto arrive and the most influential. Between 1823
and 1829 he lived in Nagasaki. Nagasaki officials gave him unprece
dented social access. He attracted students to classes in medicine and
biology where he promoted the Linnaean system and various current
views in European medicine.'13 Siebold was particularly well prepared
for his sojourn in Japan. He came from a prominent academic family
and had taken his degree at the University of Wiirzburg. His interest in
Japanese affairs had led the Dutch to appoint him physician at their
Nagasaki trading post, and the same interests eventually got him in
trouble. In 1829 he was expelledfromthe country because the shogun
ate believed him a threat to the nation's security.114
Partly because of this "Siebold Affair," Japanese scientists had few
Western contacts in the years before Perry's arrival. However, Dr. Otto
Mohnike resided at Nagasaki between 1848 and 1850, and he promoted
vaccination and the use of the stethoscope. But a breakthrough came in
1857. when Matsumoto Ryojun, aspiring student of European medi
cine, and the Dutch army physician Pompe van Meerdervoort arrived in
Nagasaki and began a collaboration that stimulated the scientific move
ment With formal approval from the Tokugawa authorities, the two
opened a full-fledged academy of European medicine. Known as the
Nagasaki Igaku Denshu Jo, the academy offered a five-year program

beginning with basic biology, chemistry, and physics and progressing
to medical subjects.'15 The school was formally a companion subordi
nate to another facility located nearby. The simultaneous founding of
this Nagasaki Kaigun Denshu Jo had been motivated by military con
cerns about coastal defense, and it was staffed by Dutch naval officers
who taught physics, mathematics, chemistry, and engineering as well
as various military subjects.116
The Nagasaki Igaku Denshu Jo grew in the 1860s. Pompe van Meer
dervoort left Japan in 1862, but not before he had persuaded the sho
gunate to establish a teaching hospital and new facilities at the medical
school.117 A. F Bauduin, who became his replacement, further recom
mended establishment of a separate academy for basic science, and this
was done in 1864 by moving basic science out of the older institutions.
Presiding over this Bunseki Kyuri Jo, as it came to be known, was
another Dutch physician, W K. Gratama, who reached Nagasaki in
1866. The political instability that preceded the demise of the
Tokugawa shogunate led the authorities to remove the science school
first to Edo in 1867 andfinallyto Osaka in 1869. There it became known
as the Osaka Shamitsu Kyoku or Osaka School of Chemistry, and it
continued to operate until 1881.! 18
The impact of these institutions outlasted their existence. Modern
chemistry was taught at the Nagasaki institutions for the first time in
Japan, and official restrictions on the teaching of physics that limited
the work of the Edo academy (Bansho Shirabesho) had no effect in
distant Nagasaki. The Bunseki Kyuri Jo never had many students after
it moved to Osaka, but two that it did teach became highly influential.
Takamine Jokichi, perhaps the leading chemist of Meiji Japan, received
his earliest training there, and so did Nagaoka Hantaro, its most promi
nent physicist119 Nor was the medical program without long-term
results. Several prominent figures in the Meiji medical community
were students of Pompe van Meerdervoort, including the five earliest
recipients of the D.Sc. degree.120
Public institutions were certainly important for the scientific move

ment, but before the Perry expedition, private institutions had the edge.
Private individuals dominated the movement from 1720 on, when
Shogun Yoshimune had relaxed the ban on technical literature from
Europe. Private physicians carried out thefirstanatomical dissections.
Asada Goryu, a late eighteenth-century astronomer with no official post,
criticized the official calendar and instigated its successful revision.121
Others had established various private academies, and these continued
to proliferate well after Perry arrived. Although little information about
their number exists, we know that by early Meiji there were nearly 1500
higher-level private academies, and some had a "Western" cast to
them. 122 As always, medical institutions were especially numerous.
During the last century or so of Tokugawa rule, twenty-three full-
fledged medical academies opened their doors; the majority were
private.123
Private academies made several contributions. They were the "basic
communities in which the work of introducing and translating medical
texts was sustained." They provided the most capable members of the
shogunate's translation office in the Bureau of Astronomy and of many
of the daimyo academies.l24 Otsuki Gentaku, founding member of the
translation office, opened a private academy (the Shirando) at Edo in
1786. This school was the most important Japanese center of Western
studies in Otsuki's active years (he died in 1827) Of its ninety-four
pupils, a number were quite influential. Udagawa Genshin and his heir,
Udagawa Yoan, were prolific translators of technical materials. In fact,
the younger, in translating Lavoisier's work in chemistry, coined many
Japanese terms still used in that field.l25 Otsuki's initiative also started
a trend. In 1801 two of his pupils established their own academies in
Kyoto and Osaka. A pupil's pupil, Tsuboi Shindo, set up a school at Edo
in 1829. 126 Other notable private foundations of the period included
establishment of the Tekitekisaijuku of Ogata Koan at Osaka in 1838.
From Tsuboi s school came Tsuboi Shogoro, subsequently professor of
zoology at Tokyo University; and from Ogata s school came Fukuzawa
Yukichi and Nagayo Sensai, leading figures in modern research
policy.127
One should not, however, overrate the importance of private or pub
lic academies. They did contribute substantially to the later formation of
the modern community of researchers. And the common responsibility
of the public institutions to serve the state even at the expense of the
learned community did not in itself make them peculiar.128 But in other
respects contributions were limited, and functions were not very mod
ern. With the exception of those for mathematics or medicine, the
academies were rarely very specialized in the courses they offered, but
tended to present a general program that would appeal to young men of
ambition. Even of a prominent institution like Ogata's Tekitekisaijuku,
Nagayo Sensai could write: "[Ogata's academy] was originally de
scribed as a medical school. Actually it was a place for reading Dutch
books. Thus among the pupils were not only physicians but men who
came there for all kinds of Dutch learning, about military matters,
botany, chemistry, or whatever."129
Apart from the character of the learning dispensed, each type of
academy had its own limitations. The public institutions were late in
incorporating Western forms of knowledge (except for some medicine

and a little astronomy, few did much before the Opium War),130 and
they were supposed to restrict the diffusion of knowledge to their re
spective sponsors in government.131 Private institutions did not have
this problem, but they had others that were probably as serious. Daimyo
or the shogunate tended to coopt their best talent, as the career of
Otsuki Gentaku illustrates,132 and most of these schools had limited
funds. Scholars of Western studies could rarely make much money
even when they ran their own schools. Students could not afford to pay
high tuition unless they had scholarships from the shogun or a daimyo.
Teaching at such an academy was more a hobby than arealoccupation.
Proprietors usually got most of their income from medical practice or, if
they were samurai, from a daimyo's stipend.l M The academies were not
very numerous, and they developed too late, for by the time they began
to proliferate, learning in the West was far better institutionalized.
"(Modern science) now. . . required the creation of an institutional
system around not self-taught amateurs, but professional scientists
who had received a modem education."134 As a result, Tokugawa in
stitutions were not, for the most part, direct precursors of modern
institutions.135
The degree of competition the academies generated was limited as
well. Fukuzawa Yukichi argued that Tokugawa scholars were "con
fined to a cage called government" and therefore "spent their time in
anguish within the small universe which this cage created."136
Whether this judgment is true or not, the shogunate certainly wanted
control over European studies at least, and in some sense all learning.
Its skimming of leading scholars from the private sector was partly
prompted by this aspiration, and so was a persisting tendency to link
physical science with the supposed threat of Catholicism. Parochialism
and seclusion impeded the dissemination of knowledge. "It is an old
parochial tradition to seek exclusive profit for one's own fief and to keep
secret any discoveries from others," wrote a "Dutch scholar" about
1800.137 An 1864 incident illustrates this pattern. A Nihonmatsu sam
urai requested permissionfromhis older brother to study applied phys
ics and cannonry in Mito, but the brother refused on the grounds that
pursuing such knowledge would upset society by diffusing very dan
gerous technology.138 Such attitudes were probably common.139
Finally, entrenched opposition and a lack of demand for new knowl
edge could also impede competition. Mathematics gradually became
more detached from society and separatedfromintellectual life. When
mathematical works were actually published, they usually stated only
problems, solutions, and sometimes-rules. Among the reasons for this
was a lack of "product" demand. Because there was such a limited
market for any kind of book in advanced mathematics, production costs

were high, and the authors themselves usually prepared the wood
blocks for printing. 14°
Medicine's problems were entirely the opposite. There was a strong
demand for medical "products" and some incentive to develop new
therapies. Partly for this very reason, medicine was prestigious and
offered specialists a living. Specialists who became successful then
might resist innovations and novelties. It is misleading to say that West-
em science and medicine waged an "uphill battle against [the
older] Chinese-style science."141 But the domain medical schools were
controlled by relatively high-ranking samurai doctors who usually op
posed innovation, and these doctors were able for a time to delay the
introduction into their institutions of new forms of medicine from
Europe.142
Tokugawa Science in Its Bureaucratic Setting

Tokugawa scholarship, asserted Fukuzawa Yukichi. was very little
more than an "adjunct of government." Its practitioners mostly taught
in schools and had little if any power and certainly no influence in
formulating policies.143 Scholars were also treated rather shabbily.
"The samurai had a higher regard for Confucianism than (they did] for
the professional Confucianist," so that scholars rarely became advisers
to persons in power and even more rarely held secure official posts.144
This was even more true of technical disciplines than of humanistic
studies because of Tokugawa officials' no more than occasional interest
in science and firm belief that general administrators should always
hold sway over specialists. Technical experts had subordinate posts and
could lose them at the whim of a shogun.145
Though well established, these patterns did van as periods of out
right proscription or repression alternated with periods of encourage
ment, and attitudes changed when new officials entered office. The
seventeenth century, despite seclusion, offered better conditions for
some kinds of research than any other era save the Bakumatsu years
(1853-67). The official promotion of classroom instruction conspic
uous of the late eighteenth century may actually have damaged the
scientific movement by arousing suspicion of mathematics.
The incongruities between Tokugawa priorities and the needs of
science are clear from the seclusion edicts of the 1630s, which frus
trated navigational astronomy (so important to the work of Newton in
England),146 and in the same decade Shogun Iemitsu issued a ban on
the use of Western mathematics in surveying activities, a proscription
that lasted to the end of the century.147 European astronomy got es
pecially harsh treatment, probably because it was linked to the Jesuits,
who had first introduced it to Japanese officials. Those who were in
terested in European astronomy were often suspected of professing
Catholicism. The European-style astronomer Kobayashi Kentei was
jailed in the 1640s, while a colleague, Hayashi Kichizaemon, was actu
ally executed in 1646.148 And these attitudes of suspicion persisted. In
the eighteenth century only the shogunate and five other domains were
allowed to compile a calendar.149
From the beginning, however, there was a different side to the sho
gunate's treatment of scholarship. Shogun Ieyasu thought that learn
ing would contribute to peace and morality and began to support it once
his power was secured. His policy was mostly confined to library contri
butions and publication subsidies, but successors went considerably
further. His grandson Shogun Iemitsu hired Hayashi Razan to head an
academy which received state support and official recognition. In 1690
Shogun Tsunayoshi authorized construction of new facilities for this
Shoheiko Academy and exempted its faculty from Buddhist holy or
ders. 15° This patronage also extended to the sciences. In the 1680s
Tsunayoshi appointed a talented mathematician of "lower-class" origin
official astronomer and gave him a military rank. This astronomer's
descendants included several mathematicians and prominent astrono
mers. 151 Daimyo governments, meanwhile, followed Edo's policies
closely. A half-dozen had established schools by 1700, and several be
gan subsidizing individual scholars, as, for example, when the daimyo
of Mito created a mathematics post in 1661. 152
These trends continued in the eighteenth century. More schools
were built with official encouragement, and patronage of individual
scholars increased somewhat: in 1730 another daimyo established a
position to support mathematics.153 Other initiatives were soon under
taken. In midcentury the Kumamoto domain launched reforms which
included a medical academy and the mandatory certification by it of
local physicians (1762). 154 Other domains were slower to act, but the
action set a precedent In the shogunal territories, a group of doctors got
permission to publish a book on anatomy (Kattai shinsho; 1774) that
was largely based on a European text, and in 1793 its academy of
medicine admitted Western surgery to the academic program.155
But limitationsremainedstrict. Hiraga Gennai, a samurai student of
both astronomy and medicine, was forbidden by his daimyo to employ
his skills in any domain but his own. 156 Scientists could never be cer
tain that government officials would tolerate their scholarly work.
Which European technical and scientific works were officially trans
lated was determined by government regulations,157 and general cir
dilation of the shogunate's translators' works was invariably forbidden.

Private scholars were not so constrained, but even they could encounter
many problems. In 1765 a work on botany by Goto Rishun was confis
cated upon publication simply because itreproducedthe Dutch alpha
bet, 158 even so long after Shogun Yoshimune in 1720 had authorized
importation of nonreligious books.
Who was in power could make a big difference. Shogun Yoshimune's
administration (1716-45), as often noted, was one of the best. He took
several steps favorable to science besides admitting Western technical
works. In 1730 he named the physician and mathematician Nakane
Genkei to be the official shogunal astronomer strictly on the basis of
Nakane's ability.l59 During his last year in office as Shogun, he autho
rized translation projects by two private physicians who were interested
in European botany. This action was especially important in creating a
precedent, for later officials could not easily oppose translation projects
solely because of their Western subject matter. I6 °
On the other side, the administration of Lord Matsudaira Sadanobu
during the reign of Shogun Ienari was a low point for the scientific
movement. Matsudaira was obsessed with political unity and despised
all kinds of intellectual novelty. This led him to proscribe anti-
mainstream schools of Confucian philosophy and to meddle systemat
ically in the Shdheikd Academy. After proscribing heterodoxy in 1790,
he took control of faculty appointments out of the hands of the
Shoheiko's rector and named professors who agreed with his views. In
1791 he took it on himself to reshape the curriculum and issue new
rules.161 These actions were political and not aimed at science, but the
scientific movement could not remain unscathed. In 1788 Matsudaira
had authorized Honda Toshiaki to conduct geographical surveys in
Hokkaido and Sakhalin, primarily to determine whether Sakhalin was
an island. Investigations confirmed that it was an island, not a penin
sula as many had claimed, but Matsudaira suppressed this by citing
"state security."162 His concept of security was wide-ranging. In 1793
he blocked publication of a work on heliocentrism by the shogunal
astronomer Motoki Rydei even though others had already publicized
the theory.163
By the beginning of the nineteenth century, the scientific movement

had developed to a point where major systemic changes might well
have been expected. The first dictionary of the Dutch language had
been published. Western anatomy was rapidly being assimilated. At
least a small number of Japanese were studying Newtonian physics.
Several botanical compilations had been launched which were based
entirely or in part on the Linnaean classification. A survey of the entire
SCIENCE AND SOCIETY IN THE TOKUGAWA PERIOD
Japanese coastline using the most advanced mathematical techniques

had begun. And the first fundamental revision of the national calendar
using Western data had just been completed.164 Nevertheless, these
developments did not yield the sort of institutional breakthrough that
occurred in European science, and the movement within which these
advances took place did not even lead directly to modern Japanese
science.
Government policy was one reason. The desire of shogunal officials
to use scientists and their work for political goals restricted the diffusion
of technical knowledge. In 1829 the shogunate sentenced its official
astronomer, Takahashi Kageyasu, to prison and condemned him to
death after the fact. In 1839 several intellectuals and scientists were
imprisoned on a charge of opposing the regime. Nor were these acts the
sole forms of oppression. In 1842 the Edo government ordered that
translations of all Dutch books be censored before publication, and in
1850 it handed down an edict requiring that the title of every book
imported from Europe be reported immediately to the governor of
Nagasaki. In 1856, three years after the Perry expedition, the regime
forced the Bansho Shirabesho to censor all translations of technical
(and other) works from any European language.165
Most historians of these events justifiably emphasize Takahashi's
persecution, the so-called Siebold Affair. The Tokugawa government
had almost institutionalized suspicion and paranoia, and the effect of its
policies on intellectual life could scarcely be supportive.166 Takahashi
got into trouble because he had shared I no Tadataka's coastal survey
maps of Japan with Philip Franz von Siebold in return for European-
language materials dealing with the coast of Sakhalin Island. This ex
change occurred in 1828 within the context of an official assignment to
prepare a map of the Sakhalin area Apparently Takahashirealizedthat
his action broke the law, but he willingly assumed the risk of punish
ment because he was strongly committed to the task and because the
information he got was not obtainable otherwise.167 The consequences
were severe. Takahashi was imprisoned and died four months later. His
son was fired from a government post and sent to a place of. internal
exile. Several Nagasaki interpreters who had innocently carried mes
sages between Takahashi in Edo and Siebold in Nagasaki were also
sent to prison. And this was just the beginning. While living in
Nagasaki (1823-29), Siebold had offered formal instruction in Euro
pean medicine to Japanese pupils with the shogunate's approval. All but
one of his twenty-four pupils were arrested and imprisoned because of
this connection. (The exception, Takano Choei, went into hiding. He
was indicted ten years later in connection with the "Bansha Circle"
persecution.) Siebold was detained for some months and then expelled
from the country. The shogun's personal physician in Edo lost his
position and samurai standing for having given Siebold a garment with
the crest of the shogun in return for a medicine used to treat eye
diseases.168
The "Siebold Affair" divided and demoralized the learned communi
ty. Most scholars kept silent, whatever their views, but others felt more
threatened by official hostility. Aochi Rinso, the first Japanese to pub
lish a textbook of European physics, the noted botanist Udagawa Yoan.
and several other scholars who resided in Edo felt compelled to deny
they even knew Takahashi.I69 And effects were by no means confined
to individuals. The "Siebold Affair" hastened Nagasaki's decline as a
center of learning and laid the groundwork for another persecution.170
This "Bansha Circle Incident" of 1839 reflected the rising concerns
about Western expansion and the scattered resentment of technical
experts. In 1804, 1811. and 1837. foreign ships belonging to Russia,
Britain, and the United States entered Japanese waters without permis
sion and exposed the weakness of coastal defenses.>71 Fearing political
criticism for dereliction of duty, the Tokugawa government ordered
countermeasures. The "incident" began when the shogunate commis
sioned a conservative but incompetent official. Torii Yozo, to conduct a
survey of Edo Bay with a colleague named Egawa Hidetatsu. Torii was
formally in charge of the project but lacked the necessary- technical
skills. Egawa was better equipped, because he belonged to a group of
officials and scholars, the "Bansha Circle," who regularly discussed
policy issues. The group, led by Watanabe Kazan, chief administrator of
a daimyo domain, also included the noted mathematician Uchida It
sumi and Takano Choei, the physician who had fled the Nagasaki
dragnet the shogunate had launched in 1829.172
The Bansha group—especially Uchida—was able to help in com
pleting the survey. But Torii Yozo was deeply chagrined by the tech
nical prowess of the Bansha intellectuals and his own incompetence. As
an official censor (o-metsuke) for the Tokugawa shogunate, he also
suspected their political motives and decided to take action against
them. Egawa was too well connected and Uchida too apolitical, so he
focused on Watanabe Kazan.
Police searches of Watanabe's house produced nothing direcdy in
criminating, but they did turn up drafts of policy statements prepared
for Egawa that could be construed as suspicious. One draft argued that
scholars and others concerned with policy should investigate the actual
causes of problems. Another called for an accurate appraisal of Japan's
position in the world.173 Torii claimed that these statements revealed
the circle's opposition to seclusion and were basically treasonous.
His charges had the desired effect. Watanabe was arrested and sent
to prison, where he committed suicide in 1841. Takano went into hiding

and managed to survive for ten years on translation and consulting
work for various daimyo. In 1850 he, too, was arrested and subse
quently committed suicide in detention. Several other "Bansha Circle"
members (though not U chid a) were arrested, while a number of lower-
ranking shogunal retainers connected with the survey were indicted
but escaped imprisonment. Meanwhile, public responses by unindicted
associates followed the pattern of the "Siebold Affair." Egawa Hidetatsu
remained aloof and assumed a posture of indifference. Officials in
Watanabe's domain fell all over themselves in apologies to Edo. Appar
ently this response from his former associates prompted Watanabe to
take his own life.174
Following the "revelations" of the "Bansha Circle Incident," scien
tific and Western studies were engulfed for some years in a cloud of
official suspicion. Besides advance censorship of translations and re
porting of titles of imported books, other measures were felt necessary.
In 1849, physicians living in shogunal territories were forbidden to
practice European-style medicine. In 1850 a ban on diffusion of the
contents of any translation of a European book to the Japanese public
went into effect.175 Even mathematics suffered from the "Bansha Cir
cle Incident." In 1839, Edo stopped publication of a book on tax calcula
tions and practical measurements that was intended to help local
Toku gawa officials!* 7 6
In 1853-54 the American expedition of Matthew C. Perry visited

Japan and ended seclusion. This event heightened the Japanese
awareness of Western technology earlier aroused by the Opium War.
But the Perry expedition did not lead at once to an unqualified embrace
of science and technology. On the contrary, the shogunate displayed
considerable ambivalence about how to deal with the American chal
lenge. It did take some positive steps, in 1857 founding the Nagasaki
Medical Academy (Igaku Denshu Jo) and a military college in the town
of Numazu. The same year it undertook to upgrade the Bansho
Shirabesho and gave it a more appropriate name, the Institute of West
ern Studies (Yogaku Jo). A year later the Edo regime officially recog
nized the superiority of Western medicine over its Asian competitors. It
also ordered shogunalretainersMatsumoto Ryojun and Ono Tomogoro
to study European medicine and mathematics in Nagasaki with the
young Dutch surgeon Pompe van Meerdervoort.177 In 1860 Edo sent
official missions to Europe and North America, partly to collect Western
technical information.178
But in other respects the shogunate's response was half-hearted. As
late as March 1857, two high officials, Kawaji Toshiakira and Mizuno
Tadanori, could issue an edict against the teaching of physics at the

Institute of Western Studies, saying:
It is perfectly appropriate to deal with matters of a military nature
in lectures at the [Western Studies] Institute. But whether works
on science should also be presented is quite another matter. Those
captivated by outlandish theories come inevitably to resemble the
Europeans and Americans in the way they look at the world. Such
things also lead to unorthodox views. There seems to be some
element in physics [kyurigaku] which inevitably gives rise to un
orthodox views. We are concerned that the study of sci
ence will destroy the relations—between lords and retainers
or fathers and sons—which have existed in Japan for so long.
Consequently, ordinary lectures {at the Institute of Western Stud
ies] should deal only with military books.'79
Whatever elicited these particular remarks, they probably drew on
two distinct sources. Torii Yoz6 was certainly one, because he was
serving at the time as adviser to Mizuno His wife belonged to the
Hayashi family, which directed the Shoheiko Academy. And Torii's own
views about European studies were clear cut and thoroughly hostile. 18°
The other resource for the edict's point of view may well have been an
official newsletter.181 The Oranda Fusetsugaki was regularly prepared
for shogunal officials by Dutch representatives employed at Nagasaki to
inform the Japanese about developments in Europe. There is no direct
proof that it provoked Kawaji and Mizuno's statement, but the circum
stances are suggestive. European thinkers had long contended that the
atomistic concept of the physical universe developed by Newton should
serve as a model for human society. Whatever the merits of this notion,
it was highly obnoxious to traditional conservatives who opposed its
espousal of individualism.182 If European conservatives with a legacy of
feudalism could find this offensive and a threat to society, it is hardly
surprising that a feudal regime in Tokugawa Japan should draw a sim
ilar conclusion.
Only in the very last years of the Tokugawa shogunate was the
government's policy toward European science unswervingly favorable.
Eight shogunal delegations traveled abroad between 1860 and 1867,
and they brought back two hundred books to Japan. In 1862 the first
Japanese was sent to Europe for formal technical study. Akamatsu
Daizaburo, an officer in the shogunate's new navy, enrolled at Leiden in
mathematics and engineering. In 1864 Choshu sent Inoue Masaru to
the University of London, also for engineering studies.183 But there
were limits to change under Tokugawa feudalism: in 1863 several
Choshu samurai had to sneak out of the country for studies overseas,184
while under the Restoration government of 1868, Inoue could help

build the country's first railway.
Scholarly Conduct in Tokugawa Japan

The suspicion and paranoia reflected by Tokugawa policies had many
ramifications in the scholarly world. With the shogunate's efforts to
freeze society, occupational recruitment came to be based largely on
inherited position. Although this may not have mattered so much for
farmers, in technical professions like medicine or astronomy it posed
problems. The oldest son of a particular family might not be suited to
continue the specialty. Of course, adoption of a talented outsider was
one solution. The Shibukawa family of shogunal astronomers followed
this strategy, and so on occasion did others.185 Even so, professional
recruitment in Tokugawa Japan was hardly open in any modem sense.
About 1770 the eminent samurai mathematician Fujita Sadasuke re
jected the talented Aida Yasuaki as a pupil in his mathematics school in
part because of his lower-class origins,186 and such occurrences were
probably common.187
Tokugawa policies caused other kinds of problems, too. By adopting
Chu Hsi's intellectually imposing neo-Confucian synthesis of the
twelfth century as the official ideology of state, the regime signaled its
encouragement of ideas and attitudes that looked on the major ques
tions of politics and nature as already answered and exempt from revi
sion. "All that was worth inventing had been invented by the (Chinese]
Sage Emperors; all that was worth knowing had been known by Con
fucius. The task of later generations was simply to absorb this body of
knowledge."188 Such a philosophy could not fail to affect definitions of
scholarship and scholarly conduct as well. According to the ideology,
scholars were "retailers of packaged knowledge," not innovative "par
ticipants in a developing branch of inquiry."189 They worked with a
finished product and were expected to transmit it to students
unchanged.
Another policy intensified the effects of this conservative philosophy.
The Tokugawa shogunate, in reaction to the conflicts that had preceded
its accession, set the highest value on personal loyalties, and this em
phasis affected the scholarly world no less than it did the rest of society.
Students were admonished to be loyal to their teachers. In part this
meant a high degree of formal deference, but at its most intense, it could
include intellectual subservience.190 "It was a basic principle of
[Tokugawa] morality," according to. the Meiji microbiologist Kitasato
Shibasaburo, "that students always took their own status into account
and did not oppose their teachers, whatever they did."191 Formal prac
tices exemplified this loyalty. Upon hearing a lecture or reading a
text, students were supposed to be attentive and hold back their ques
tions. 192 Students' curiosity and personal discoveries were of little
importance. Consideration of different interpretations of particular
texts was seldom allowed or expected. Bonds of loyalty between teacher
and student were usually considered to be permanent and static, so
much so that in some specialties, a student was not supposed to change
teachers under any circumstances. Those who did so were severely
condemned.193
These bonds of loyalty had important implications for the dynamics
of particular groups. Certainly teachers were supposed to show benev
olence toward pupils and offer their advice at critical moments, but they
also insisted on receiving the deference that custom and ideology held
to be theirs.194 If anything, the political marginality and general poverty
to which Tokugawa policies confined most scholars made them particu
larly insistent on respect from their students.195 Personal ties in schol
arly groups affected students' relations with men of learning by promot
ing extreme solidarity. Collective orientations and exclusivity in
scholarship grew out of the "feudal tradition of . . . loyalty toward (the)
master."196
One would like to suppose that the stultifying tendencies of Toku
gawa social norms were confined to the mainstream system of Confu
cian studies or most of the various martial-arts fields, and such patterns
were strongest in fields where feudal loyalties were most vigorously and
consistently articulated. But they were prevalent in the scholarly world.
R. P. Dore argues that the Confucian rejection of intellectual curiosity
seriously stifled independent inquiry in anatomy before the mid-
eighteenth century.197 Mathematicians developed into sectarians,
which greatly affected their discipline. 'The members of the Saijo
school [of mathematics]," wrote one historian, "had a strong group
identification and looked upon [their mentor] Aida Yasuaki as more or
less the founder of a religion."198 The historian of Japanese culture and
science Yoshida Mitsukuni stresses the influence of Confucianism on
every field of scholarly endeavor.199
But the least "modern" aspect of Tokugawa science, which was its
strong propensity toward secrecy, had only tenuous connections with
Confucian aspirations and ideals. For one thing, secrecy antedated the
seventeenth century, when Confucianism became a powerful influ
ence. Much medical knowledge was being transmitted secretly in the
sixteenth century, and so was information in astronomy.200 Medical
documents were still being "handed down privately from master to
disciple" even in the seventeenth century.201 Secrecy was so en
trenched in mathematics that it persisted well into the nineteenth cen

tury. Knowledge—especially of ethics, ultimately of other things—in
classical Confucianism was supposed to be objective and accessible to
all.202 Secrecy was probably connected with Confucianism because of
the system's stress on personal loyalty. Considering the role of the
teacher in transmitting knowledge and the attachment of pupils to their
various teachers, it is not unlikely that the emphasis on loyalty had the
effect of intensifying secrecy.
Secrecy was widespread in Tokugawa scholarship, including the
technical fields. Shizuki Tadao's important late eighteenth-century
work on Newtonian mechanics was never published, only privately
circulated in manuscript.203 There was no publication at all in the
physical sciences until 1827, when the physician Aochi Rinso pub
lished Kikai kanran.204 Even in the 1830s, the astronomy student
Koide Shuki could obtain access to information he needed only by
enrolling in an academy and waiting eight years.205 Nor were the phys
ical sciences particularly unusual: the mathematician Yamazaki
Yasunan was denied access to an important mathematical technique in
the eighteenth century by the head of a school in Kanazawa.206 Seki
Takakazu's major discoveries were kept secret by a few disciples as long
as their master was alive, and even after he died in 1708 publication was
spotty and haphazard.207
By the mid- eighteenth century this extreme solidarity and its pattern
of secrecy had only one exception: medicine. Beginning with the pub
lication of Zoshi (On the viscera) by Yamawaki Toyo in 1759 and the
nearly simultaneous publication of Idan (Perspectives on medicine) by
Yoshimasu Todo, medicine not only abandoned secrecy, it began openly
to debate technical subjects in books. Yamawaki s work was a major
contribution to Japanese anatomy based on a dissection in 1754 and
aroused considerable interest from medical colleagues. It was also ex
tremely controversial. Medical opinion had emphasized the functions of
organs as the basis for treatment, viewing the observation of dead
organs as entirely useless. Battle was joined when a professional rival
developed this argument in a major refutation (Hi Zoshi [Against
Zoshi)), published in 1760. Yoshimasu Todo's work was also controver
sial. Its central argument that all illness is due to a single toxic principle
was not so well grounded in empirical research, and criticisms by his
peers were intense. Hata Kozan published a chapter-by-chapter refuta
tion in 1762 called Seki Idan, (Against Idan\ and other physicians had
their say as well. Whatever the merits of either side in the matter, the
debate clearly stimulated medical thought 208
Tokugawa medicine's pioneering role in abandoning secrecy and
promoting publication requires some brief explanation. In the history of
European scholarship, after all, medicine, as the "elder sister of the

sciences," has usually been seen as extremely conservative and strong
ly attached to "medieval traditions."209 That Tokugawa medicine play
ed a different role was due in some measure to the strength of competi
tion. Doctors were not so close to the centers of power as mathematical
astronomers or scholars of Confucianism. Because of their place in the
private sector they were relativelyfreeof official restraints on new ideas
and procedures. They were also more numerous than other kinds of
specialists. Nearly all samurai had access to doctors, and many villages,
too, had some kind of physician. Other things being equal, this implied
competition for preferment and professional recognition. Moreover, the
medical world was geographically scattered and culturally diverse. The
Taki family of shogunal physicians did try to centralize the medical
community, but they ultimately failed. Doctors could and did move
around; other "professionals" could not. at least not so easily. And un
like mathematics, medicine had no guilds to restrict competition or
restrain new ideas.210
Another reason that medicine took the lead in developing new ideas
and techniques of diffusion was its role in the history of Japanese print
ing. Printing began early (eighth century AD.) in Japan, but for cen
turies it was confined almost entirely to Buddhist religious uses. Late in
the period of unrestrained Western contacts (1542-1616). however, it
began to be used for more secular purposes. As Literacy spread through
the influence of Confucianism, demand for materials to read increased
(this was especially true in the seventeenth century). Publishing and
printing became commercial operations, and many of the earliest
printers were physicians. Ose Hoan (1564-1640), Isokawa Ryoan
(1579-1666), and Manase Gensaku (1549-1631;, three of the earliest
Tokugawa printers, were all wealthy—and also physicians. Their pub
lishing activities (and those of later printers) undoubtedly reflected
their personal interests, but the printing of books was a way to make
money, too. Given the relative independence of doctors in Tokugawa
culture and their financial ability to carry on businesses, their role in
early secular printing is not so surprising.211
The development in printing shows the society's capacity to generate
trends congenial to science. Although secrecy was widespread, some
information was shared. Among Confucian scholars, for example, it was
considered bad manners to refuse to lend a book to a colleague.212
Factional solidarity was not equally intense in every field of study. At
least some circles tried objectively to assess the merits of students. And
one should not overlook the increasing availability and variety of school
ing. The influential Meiji chemist Sakurai jqji, writing in 1910 of
Tokugawa developments, argued that their most important contribu
tion to modern Japanese science derivedfromeducation and its patron

age by officials.213
The deeply rooted factionalism of Tokugawa society helped to gener
ate competition. We have already considered medicine, where the
works of Yamawaki Toyo and Yoshimasu Todo inspired lively debate.
Vigorous public discussion of professional issues, some of it clearly
traceable to factional loyalties and cliques, existed in other fields, too.
Mathematics, divided as it was into nineteen different "schools," is good
evidence for this pattern. One competitive practice in Tokugawa mathe
matics was the posting in public of idai. These were problems that the
challenger had solved and was challenging other mathematicians to
solve. Though hardly akin to the best modem practice, the posting of
idai stimulated mathematical thought and competition among various
schools.214
A late eighteenth-century incident shows how intense mathematical
competition could be. After the samurai mathematician Fujita
Sadasuke rejected the commoner Aida Yasuaki as a pupil, Aida not only
founded his own Saijo school but vigorously attacked Fujita and the
parent Seki school. In 1784 Aida claimed that the Seki school had tried
to monopolize mathematics and had done considerable harm by ne
glecting applications. His attacks were published and aroused great
interest. In 1799 Fujita s pupil, Kamiya Sadaharu, lashed out at Aida in
print for demeaning his teacher and harming mathematics. "(Aida] is
bigoted, has little knowledge, and does not understand . .. the princi
ples of mathematics." For emphasis he added that Aida was guilty of
superstition and of "making a good technique into a bad one." Aida
himself was wholly unrepentant when he finally replied in 1801. "As if
in a war, they boasted o f . . . killing my followers, but all they did was
give us a nosebleed. I can boast of beheading their chief!"215
One does not find such open, public conflict in any of the physical
sciences. On the contrary, the close relationship between I no Tadataka
and his teacher Takahashi Yoshitoki exemplified the dominant pattern.
Takahashi taught I no astronomy and advanced mathematics and con
tinued to advise him throughout his career; his son was a member of
Ino's survey party. Ino expressed the desire in his will to be buried by
the side of his teacher.216 But intellectual differences were by no means
always suppressed. One can find cases like that of Koide Shuki (1797
1865) and Shibukawa Kagesuke (in astronomy), where strong commit
ments to use of empirical evidence stimulated competition between
teacher and pupil and led to improvements in the shogunate's calendar.
But it is true that their differences remained strictly confidential and
never became known outside the government217 If anything, the phys
ical sciences suffered lessfromsuppression of differing views and more
from lack of scrutiny by peers. The work of Shizuki Tadao on Newto

nian mechanics, for example, "may have represented the early stages of
an important new natural philosophy," but in the absence of a "mature
support group," it did not become a new scholarly tradition.218
Assessment of merit in students or others is a critical factor in the
progress of science, and here no clear trends existed. Some scholars
tried to be fair in evaluating students. Many domain schools regularly
seated students according to achievement, not status, and the number
that did this increased over time.219 Emphasis on merit was a well-
established theme in the Confucian tradition. Still, Fujita Sadasuke
apparently did reject the otherwise qualified Aida Yasuaki as a student
of mathematics partly because of his lower-class origins, and this inci
dent was probably far from unique. But the major problem with merit
in professional recruitment was the society. Tokugawa Japan had a
powerful inclination to allocate all roles by ascription, and those who
controlled the highest positions were rarely inclined to disregard
rank.220 Thus when Asada Goryu nominated his two best students for
official posts in the Bureau of Astronomy (late 1790s), the outcome
was wholly predictable. The shogunate would give an official position
only to the one (Takahashi Yoshitoki) with samurai status. The equally
qualified commoner, Hazama Shigetomi, had to settle for a lowly
assistantship.221
Conditions affecting deployment of talent did improve over time,
especially after Perry's visit. It became possible to buy samurai status,
and there was some relaxation of distinctions by class. 222 Society in this
era was very far from stable, and many forces were stimulating new
attitudes and values. There were plenty of men committed to changes,
"despite the efforts of . . . Tokugawa educators."223 Certainly one sees
this in the scientific community. Long-term loyalty to teachers began to
wane, at least in medicine, where the striking publications of the mid-
eighteenth century had already shaken the profession to the roots. Both
lively debates on medical topics and a tendency to "shop around" for
teachers became normal. Omura Masujiro moved around extensively in
his medical studies, and so did Takano Choei, dumping at least one
teacher he considered inadequate.224 And when one considers the case
of Koide Shuki, who began studying astronomy with Tsuchimikado
Yasukuni and later switched to Shibukawa Kagesuke, it is evident that
attitudes were changing in other fields, too.225
Even group solidarity and the sharing of scholarly information began
to change in the late Tokugawa. Mathematics had been the most fac
tionalized of disciplines—and remained so—but even here efforts were
made to change. In 1830 Hasegawa Kan published a readable textbook
of wasan mathematics that thoroughly explained its techniques. He
was, predictably, ostracized by other mathematicians, but their hostile

response did not end such attempts. A mathematician named Akita
Giichi wrote a textbook for local officials in 1837 which is notable for its
stress on applications. The book emphasized such mainstays of political
economy as the calculation of taxes, construction of buildings, and
measurement of fields. The author apparently intended the book as a
response to the Tempo famine that year, but colleagues attacked him
for "disclosure of secrets," showing just how long a way mathematics
had to go. 226
CHAPTER THREE
FORMATION OF THE MEIJ1

SCIENTIFIC COMMUNITY
"Japan," wrote J. M. Cattell and Dean Brim hail about 1920, "had no
distinguished scientific men a generation ago but it may be that in
a few years its contributions to science willrivalours."1 This remark by
the compilers of American Men ofScience is not an accurate assessment
of Japanese science in the interwar period, but it does underscore the
importance of recruitment into science. Technology, ideas, organiza
tion, and values all contribute to the scientific enterprise, but the scien
tific community is the engine of progress. For this reason the Marquis
de Condorcet once cited the "number of men acquainted with science's
leading and most important truths" as the essential indicator of national
progress, while the sociologist of science Jean Dessau lists recruitment,
training, and maintenance of scientists first among requirements for
the "implantation of science" in countries, like Meiji Japan, that have
no tradition of research.2
Specialists on the subject of recruitment disagree broadly on two
basic points. Where were the scientists of Meiji Japan recruited? Did
they come from traditional elites, long engaged in intellectual pur
suits?3 Were they products of a wholly new class?4 Role formation is
also fundamental to community building in science. "The social role of
the scientist and the organizational surroundings of his work in
Japan," wrote Joseph Ben-David in 1970, "(were variations of] social
forms originating in Western Europe. They were [not modifications of]
the traditional pattern of intellectual work that existed there before the
adoption of Western science."5 Some Japanese who were active at the
time would certainly have agreed with this view. According to educa
tion ministry official Koba Sadatake, speaking to a Diet committee in
1893: "The scientists Japan had at the time of the Restoration were
capable only of transcribing foreign books and could not really perform
like scholars in the truest sense."6 Others, however, had a different
opinion. "The scientific or scholarly progress that occurred in the time
of the shogunate," stated the minister of education on this occasion,
"has had a cumulative effect [on science's modern progress]."7 In fact,
49
5O FORMATION OF THE MEIJI SCIENTIFIC COMMUNITY
the role of scientists in Meiji Japan was partly an extension of their

Tokugawa role.
We have to consider the status of scientists in both periods, as well as
any contributions to modern Meiji science made by Tokugawa scien
tific studies. We have seen that by 1800 medicine, dominated by com
moners, held a moderately high-level status well surpassing mathemat
ics but inferior to physical science, where samurai were predominant.
To be sure, Fukuzawa Yukichi criticized one component of traditional
science—kampo medicine—as "old moldy theories."8 Historians of sci
ence like Sugimoto and Swain argue that kampo medicine imposed an
"uphill struggle on modern Western medicine,"9 and another historian
thinks that neither Dutch studies nor the traditional Japanese sciences
provided the basis for Meiji science's great successes.10 But other
scholars think otherwise. Nakayama Shigeru writes that Tokugawa
doctors "brought modern . .. science to Japan."11 Tominari Kimahei
argues that the researches of the Rangaku (Dutch studies) scholars
"justify their being recognized as the forerunners of Meiji science."12
Whether Tokugawa medicine should be described as "old moldy
theories," or whether Rangaku laid the intellectual foundation for Meiji
science is of little concern here, for neither Tokugawa medicine nor
Rangaku was compatible with the Western scientific tradition. Neither
was consistently—or at all—dedicated to the goals of Western science,
nor did either anticipate full-scale efforts to expand human knowledge
of nature. But the latent effect of Tokugawa traditions was substantial
and positive. The kinds of people who went into science had been
pinpointed, their choices of fields to some extent predetermined. And
the Tokugawa legacy influenced the success of efforts to establish a
Western-style researcher role.
Studies of recruitment to science in Meiji Japan face serious meth
odological problems. One study was neither comprehensive nor in any
sense typical,13 another restricted to academic scientists.14 And there is
very little point to a comprehensive study of everyone who received an
undergraduate degree. (About 7,800 such degrees were awarded in
technical fields between 1877 and 1921.) Such a study would identify
the recruitment base for science but would not in itself be entirely
germane, since few such graduates took jobs in research.15 Even look
ing at everyone who contributed to the scientific literature would not be
ideal. Such a search would be cosdy, difficult, and unpersuasive since
many works were not reviewed by peers. We cannot impose a definition
of "scientist" on a society where the role was unformed. Japanese soci
ety had not fully established the scientific role as that role had developed
in Europe. Knowledgeable observers at the time commented on and
FORMATION OF THE MEIJI SCIENTIFIC COMMUNITY 51
commended central differences from Western practice as appropriate to

the needs of society.
Hakusht, or holder of the doctor's degree, is the definition for scien
tist used in this book. The degree was invented by Mori Arinori, minister
of education in the late 1880s.16 It included most learned fields then
recognized in continental Europe: law and letters (which I ignore),
medicine, science, agriculture, engineering, forestry, and veterinary
medicine.17 But the system introduced by Mori lacked explicit prece
dent and cannot easily be linked to a single country's practice.18 Thus,
the meaning of some categories is probably self-evident, but others are
ambiguous. "Science" (rigaku) included mathematics, physics, astron
omy, botany, zoology, geology, chemistry, and physical anthropology.
But exclusivity of labels was not a feature of the system, nor were
boundaries sharply defined. Several different doctoral degrees were
awarded to chemists, and physicists, among others, could qualify for
two (science and engineering).
Degrees were supposed to be conferred for significant contributions
certified by peers. The term hakushi approximates the concept of "sci
entist" operative among government officials and the public. There was
increasing reliance on the doctorate in science as a criterion for appoint
ments at the rank of full professor.19 The German-style trend toward
formal dissertations under academic auspices mitigates the problem of
setting standards. But readers are cautioned that my definition has
problems. Favoritism and clique affiliations were factors in some con
ferrals. One pathologist has suggested that degrees were sometimes
awarded for work never done.20 And my choice of definition excludes
some people who published their papers before 1910 or held probation
ary posts in the imperial universities.
Medicine was the dominant element in Japanese scientific or tech
nical studies. Among the 1,360 holders of the hakushi degree awarded
between 1888 (when conferrals began) and 1920 (when the system
was changed), 656 men (48 percent) did their work in medicine, 366
(27 percent) in engineering, 138 (10 percent) in agriculture or forestry,
and 200 (15 percent) in all other fields (see table 3.1).21 The small
numbers awarded in physics (54) and mathematics (22) are particu
larly significant. In fact, the small number even of undergraduate
degrees (about 452 in physics and 125 in mathematics for all of the
imperial universities combined) further underscores the neglect of
these fields.22
These numbers show the strength of the Tokugawa legacy. The
testimony of Meiji and later commentators, as well as the body of liter
ary evidence, not only singles out medicine as the principal field but
52 FORMATION OF THE MEIJI SCIENTIFIC COMMUNITY
TABLE 3 . 1
Japanese Doctorates in Technical Fields, 1888-1920
SPECIALTY NUMBER SPECIALTY NUMBER
Chemistry (D.Sc.) 27 Agriculture 108

Physics 54 Forestry 30
Biology 56 Engineering 366
Mathematics 22 Medicine 656
Geology 18 Veterinary medicine 23
Sources: Iseki Kurd, ed.. Dai Sihon hakushi roku. 5 vols. (1921-30); Jinji kdshm roku,
1903-37 eds ; Tsunesaburd Kamesaka, ed. Who's Who in Japan, 1914-37 eds.
links its development to the Tokugawa past.23 As we have seen,

Tokugawa doctors had no guild structure to impose uniformity or sup
press competition, were mobile geographically and socially, were usu
allyfreefromofficial interference, and often had money to live in some
comfort Conversely, that small numbers entered the physical sciences
was partly a function of historical obstacles—restrictions on informa
tion, poor job opportunities, few schools (and those latecomers), and
suspicion of contamination by Christianity.
Whether the smallness of the number of Japanese who entered
mathematics after 1868 was also the result of Tokugawa conditions is
an interesting question. Certainly Tokugawa developments had not
been favorable to the growth of modern mathematics. Wasan
mathematicians were competitive, interested in publication, and even
on occasion inventive, but the details of their work were usually con
cealed. Devotees tended to disdain applications. The subject was intro
duced late to the schools, and many of the samurai hated mathematics.
However, even samurai interest in Western mathematics in the
Bakumatsu (1853-67) years failed to yield major results before 1921, so
factors other than tradition must have been at work. The principal
difficulty was the narrow range of occupational choice available to Meiji
mathematicians. They either taught their subject, worked in the gov
ernment, or went into another field.24
Recruitment to Science in Meiji Japan

The predominance of samurai after 1868 was one of the ways
Tokugawa developments affected mathematics and other technical
fields. Though medicine and the physical sciences had been dominated
by commoners in the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, the
influx of samurai after 1775 set the stage for a new situation. More
experiments were carried out. European books became more common.
Domain and shogunal schools showed more interest in the sciences and
after the Opium War taught them more often. Samurai remained domi
nant in the scientific movement throughout the Bakumatsu and Meiji
eras. About 72 percent of D.Sc. recipients in basic chemistry between
1888 and 1921 came from samurai families. In physics they accounted
for 66 percent, in engineering for 64 percent, in mathematics and geol
ogy for 50 percent, and even in medicine for 43 percent of doctorates.
Overall, 53 percent of the scientists active before 1921 were samurai
(see table 3.2).
Categorizing scientists by region shows that samurai status was not
decisive for recruitment into science, though several regions with high
proportions of them did compile good records. Tokyo, with somewhere
between 3.4 (1869) and 2 8 (1889) percent of total population, pro
duced 146 scientists or 11.4 percent. Four (4.0) percent came from
Yamaguchi-Choshu, with its 1.9 to 2.3 percent of total population,
while Fukuoka prefecture (1.3 to 3.0 percent of total population) pro
duced 3.2 percent of the scientists. These areas all had samurai popula
tions above the average for 1889 (5.0 percent). In Tokyo, samurai were
reported as 10.0 percent of population, in Yamaguchi as 7.6 percent,
and in Fukuoka, 6.5 percent. 25
But Osaka and Kagoshima-Satsuma do not fit this pattern. Though
its samurai were just 1.4 percent of the population in 1889, the percent
age of scientists from Osaka was exactly proportional to its percentage
of the national (3.0 percent; 41 scientists) population Kagoshima-Sat
suma, with a 24 percent samurai population, was a conspicuous under-
producer Satsuma had 3.4 percent of total population in 1869 (2.5
percent in 1889) and produced just 19 scientists, which was 1.4 percent
of the total.
Local education was as important for the recruitment of scientists in
Meiji Japan as the number of samurai. The country's four largest cities
yielded many scientists, undoubtedly because of their academies and
schools. Tokyo and Osaka, of course, did well, and so did the city of
Kyoto. With 1.7 (1869) to 2.2 (1889) percent of total population, it
produced 3.3 percent of all scientists. And Aichi prefecture (Nagoya)
with 2.9 to 3.6 percent of Japan's population, produced 4.6 percent of
the scientists. Only the strength of local education could explain the
record of Fukui This region was one of the most remote in the country,
had no large city or even a small one, and its samurai were only 4.0
percent of population. But in 1857 Fukui carried out a sweeping reform
TABLE 3.2
Class Origins of Doctorate Recipients. 1888-1920
SAMURAI COMMONERS SAMURAI COMMONERS

SPECIALTY N % N % SPECIALTY N % N %
Chemistry (D.Sc.) 19 72 8 28 Agriculture 60 55 48 45

Physics 36 66 18 34 Forestry 19 62 11 38
Biology 34 60 22 40 Engineering 232 64 134 36
Mathematics 11 50 11 50 Medicine 281 43 375 57
Geology 9 50 9 50 Veterinary medicine 15 65 8 35
Sources: Iseki Kurd, ed.. Dai Nihon hakushi roku, 5 vols. (1921 -30). Jtnji kdshin roku. 1903-37 eds.; Tsunesaburt Kamesaka,
ed. Who's Who in Japan. 1914-37 eds.
of its educational system that led to great changes. All Fukui officials
were required to prove their attainments in formal education before
assuming any office, and one of the first foreigners to teach science in
Japan, W. E. Griffis, came to Fukui in 1870.26 The results were im
pressive. With only 1.0 percent of total population in 1869 and 1.5
percent in 1889, Fukui between 1888 and 1920 produced 43 scientists,
3.2 percent of the total. Fukui had more scientists per capita than
anywhere else in Japan—one scientist for every 6,784 residents. The
rate for Osaka, an average region, was 1:18,750, and second-place
Tokyo's was 1:6,849.
Kagoshima-Satsuma made a very poor showing, though several of its
daimyo had an interest in science. Shimazu Nariakira, who ruled the
area in the 1850s, was acquainted with Philip Franz von Siebold and
Udagawa Yoan. Shimazu read scientific works in Japanese transla
tions. He sponsored the translation of Pompe van Meerdervoort's trea
tise on vaccination and established a translation agency (1855). In 1856
he created a scholarship fund for Satsuma youth who wished to study
outside their region, and in 1864 his successor established a full-
fledged Western academy. But there was less to this than might appear.
Satsuma suffered greatly from a rebellion against Tokyo (1876-77),
industrial development mostly passed the region by, and it lagged be
hind in creating modern schools. Although 40 percent of Japanese
adults had elementary literacy by 1868, most Satsuma adults could not
read or write even in 1884. If this were not enough, formal education for
samurai in Satsuma did not encourage science.
Consider the anti-intellectualism and controls on free time imposed
by an institution called goju. Goju were neighborhood confraternities of
samurai youth six years of age and above common throughout many
parts of the country and usually dedicated to academic work and mili
tary training. But the goju of Satsuma had a different program. Formal
education was not much emphasized. Unlike the rules of other domain
goju, those of Satsuma ignored all book learning. They instead encour
aged their members to excel in martial arts, morality, recreation, and
obedience. Samurai youth could not escape the system byretreatingto
their homes because goju activities had penetrated the home.27 Their
freedom was restricted, and personal autonomy, including time for ac
tivities and interests apart from the peer group, is an important element
in socializing youth who later enter science.28 The Satsuma system did
not provide this freedom—or many scientists. The pattern was noted at
the time. As Takagi Kanehiro told another leading figure in the medical
community, "Since the Restoration, we Satsuma men have been promi
nent in the Army and government But our record has not matched that
of other domains in the scholarly or learned professions."29
Tokugawa education's contribution to the modem research tradition

can also be seen from the scientists' fathers' occupations. A large per
centage (certainly over half) of Meiji scientists had fathers in traditional
intellectual roles. Kampo physicians formed the largest single group
(perhaps 46 percent) with Confucian scholars (jusha) in second place
(7 percent). A few sons of wasan mathematicians and of Rangaku
scholars became scientists. Most doctors' sons went, predictably, into
medicine, but they also turned up in physics, chemistry, biology, for
estry, and engineering. Confucian scholars' sons were most numerous
in engineering but also studied medicine, geology, and forestry.
Rangaku scholars' sons chose mathematics, zoology, and medicine in
particular, while one son of a wasan mathematician became professor
of mining and metallurgy at Tokyo University.
Sons of officials were numerically second to the sons of kampo
physicians. About 21 percent of scientists came from the families of
Tokugawa or Meiji bureaucrats. They were relatively scarce in the large
medical community (about 9 percent) but in other categories ranged
from 14 (agriculture) to 40 percent (engineering and basic science).
Officials' sons entered every field, but they were especially active in
physics. About 40 percent of the physicists had fathers in official posi
tions; the rest came from doctors' families and various other back
grounds.
Tokugawa traditions aided formation of the entire modern scientific

community, but they certainly did not affect every field equally. Medi
cine received considerable stimulus. There were important linkages in
biology and chemistry. Mathematics received at least some benefits;
physics derived rather few. Individual cases of recruitment to science
help to shed light on the situation.
The first to consider are three recruits into medicine. Neither
Kitasato Shibasaburo, Takagi Kanehiro, nor Noguchi Hideyo was the
son of a kampo or Western-style doctor. Each came to the field
through personal contacts. Three physicians influenced Kitasato: his
great-uncle, Hashimoto Ryu'un, a teacher named Tanaka Shiba, and a
Dutch navy doctor, C. G. von Mansveldt. Kitasato, who was born in
1852, lived with Hashimoto and studied with Tanaka. In 1871 he en
tered Lord Hosokawa's Kumamoto Medical Academy (Igakko) where
he spent about three years with Mansveldt. Mansveldt's influence was
greatest, as Kitasato was not close to Hashimoto personally and ig
nored admonitions from Tanaka to study. Mansveldt made him an
Igakko assistant and took pains to teach him German. The Dutchman
also taught him medicine and introduced him to studies of bacteria
through microscopy. He told Kitasato to study at Tokyo University and

then go to Germany.30
How Kitasato came to study with Mans veldt is not at all clear. His
early interests were in soldiering and martial arts; he was initially unin
terested in book learning, and his parents had hoped he would farm.
Moreover, the young Kitasato could not be easily disciplined and was
not very close to his parents.31 His enrollment at the Igakko was proba
bly the result of contradictory conditions. A friend dissuaded him from a
military career. His parents encouraged his ambitions, and he appar
ently came to view Rangaku as the "basis of European culture."12 Local
choices for formal education were limited to two schools, the Igakko and
the Ydgakkd, whose images differed greatly Kumamoto residents con
sidered the Ydgakkd avant-garde, even radical. Its curriculum—phys
ics, history, English, and the rest—was quite out of the ordinary,
whereas the Igakkd's was more familiar. The two student bodies also
differed. Ydgakkd students were mostly young teenagers facing obliga
tory lectures on Confucian morality, an antidote to Westernization.Ai
Igakko students were older (from eighteen to twenty-four years of age)
and had the choice of skipping these lectures.*4 One cannot know
particular reasons for Kitasato's choice, but a number of factors were
operating. He was already eighteen when the two schools opened. He
had always disliked Confucianism, and he had already had exposure to
medicine. The Igakko offered more advanced training and an easier
adjustment to the future.
Considerations of status, worldly ambitions, and Rangaku contacts
were important to Takagi Kanehiro (1848-1920). Takagi was the son of
a low-ranking Satsuma samurai who also worked as a carpenter. He
reportedly decided on a medical career as early as the age of thirteen. A
local physician aroused his interest in part because of his high status.
Commoners, before the Restoration, could not wear white tabi (socks),
but the doctor was among those who could. Takagi's parents were
impressed by this fact and commended the man to their son. Another
physician'was also influential. Ishigami Rydsaku had studied with
Ogata Kdan in Osaka and became a mentor to Takagi. Ishigami taught
him medicine, arranged his marriage to another doctor's daughter, and
got him a job in a government bureau.35
Noguchi Jlideyo's was a different sort of case. He came from the
peasantry instead of the samurai, and his contacts were wholly with
medicine from the West Noguchi would certainly have gone into farm
ing had a childhood accident not made this impossible. In 1878, at the
age of two, he severely burned his left arm in the family's hearth.
Several years later the principal of his school sent him for treatment to a
doctor in Wakamatsu. The doctor had credentials that impressed young

Noguchi. Watanabe Kanae had taken his M.D. at the University of
California. He had also traveled extensively in Europe and owned many
books on medicine and science. Noguchi spent two weeks at his house
and decided to go into medicine.36
Modern Japanese biology was significantly influenced by Tokugawa
developments. The largest single group of biologists came from the
families of government officials, but about 40 percent came from kampo
medical families. Moreover, 20 percent of the biologists (12 of 57) came
from just one area—Aichi-Shizuoka, the former Owari province. The
advances made by the men from Owari could have been predicted. The
intellectually tolerant Asai family had dominated local medicine from
the late eighteenth century. The local Shohyaku society encouraged
scholarship in botany from the early 1820s. And Owari was one of the
first areas in Japan to obtain the Linnaean system.
These advantages help to explain why ltd Keisuke became a biolo
gist. I to was born in 1803 to a prominent Nagoya medical family. His
father, commended by the daimyo for his medical work, was a schol
arly man with an interest in botany, and Keisuke's older brother, who
later became head of the domain's medical academy, also dabbled in
botany. Ito's exposure to medicine and botany was all-pervasive. From
1810 to 1815 he studied with his father. In 1815 he began Chinese
and Western-style medical studies in earnest and later studied botany
with Mizutani Toyobumi. Subsequent studies and research took him
from one end of Japan to the other, including some months' study in
Kyoto and Nagasaki (1827-28). The high point of his early education
was his association with Siebold. ltd originally met the German physi
cian at Nagoya in April 1826 with his father and brother. Two years
later Siebold gave him a comprehensive explanation of Linnaeus' clas
sification, and much later, in 1861, they resumed their discussions.37
ltd was far from typical, as contemporary evaluations show clearly.
From 1828 to 1861 he practiced medicine and carried out and pub
lished botanical studies. In 1861 he became lecturer at the Bansho
Shirabesho in Edo. In 1870 he was named consultant in biology to what
became the Ministry of Education and in 1881 became professor of
botany at Tokyo University. But I to never attended a university or went
abroad and became professor at 78 years of age! On the other hand he
published many important works, helped found the Tokyo Academy of
Sciences, and was awarded the Silver Medal of the Royal Swedish
Academy. A career like Ito's, mixing traditional and modern roles,
evoked varying evaluations from peers. An influential group of scien
tists, including the mathematician Kikuchi Dairoku and the chemist
Nagai Nagayoshi, successfully blocked an important academic award to
Ito on the grounds that he was "not a real university man."38 On the
other hand, the minister of education Inoue Kowashi praised ltd pub
licly for his "contributions to knowledge. "39
Itd's route into science was hardly unique, though his career was
very unusual. The zoologist Ishikawa Chiyomatsu (1860-1935) came
from Ito's area and was similarly encouraged by his father. The elder
Ishikawa was an official in the Shizuoka domain with ongoing interests
in science and was personally acquainted with the anatomist Sugita
Gempaku (1733-1817), with Sugita Gentan, the student of electricity,
and with Philip Franz von Siebold. He was an ardent bibliophile, and his
hobby was natural history. The son was close to the father and shared
his interests in science. From collecting and pressing leaves between
the pages of books, Ishikawa Chiyomatsu progressed to butterfly col
lecting and to notable studies on crustaceans. After graduation from
Tokyo University he studied at Berlin and Freiburg, where he worked
with August Weismann.40
Other important biologists came to their work by much the same sort
of pattern. ltd Tokutaro, who studied at Cambridge University, was the
son of ltd Keisuke and became professor of biology at Tohoku Univer
sity. Mitsukun Kakichi, founder of the Misaki Institute for Marine Biol
ogy, was the son of a doctor who taught European studies. The Tokyo
University zoology professor Tsuboi Shdgoro had an even more im
pressive pedigree. His father was physician to the Fukui daimyo, and
his grandfather was the renowned Tsuboi Shmdo (1795-1848), physi
cian, Rangaku scholar, and teacher of Ogata Koan.
Generalizations about chemistry are much more difficult The field
did not have the high status in Japan that it had in Britain, France,
Germany, or the United States, but the number of chemists (177) was
still substantial.41 Chemists were the third largest group of scientists,
surpassed by only the medical and engineering communities, with
which they overlapped. There were 54 chemists among the 366 Japa
nese holding engineering doctorates and 19 biochemists or medical
chemists among the 656 with degrees in medicine. There were also 25
chemists from the basic science group, 48 pharmacological chemists,
and 31 chemists among the 108 holders of the doctorate in agriculture
(see table 3.3).
Many chemists were not from samurai or professional families, al
though the scarcity of data makes it difficult to tell. Samurai percent
ages varied from 72 percent among chemists with D.Sc. degrees to 32
percent of agricultural chemists and just over a quarter of biochemists.
Physicians' sons were numerous among the basic chemists, pharmaco
logical chemists, and biochemists. Chemists m engineering came from
a cross-section of professional families—teachers, officials, military of
6O FORMATION OF THE MEIJf SCIENTIFIC COMMUNITY
3.3
TABLE
Class Origins of Chemists
CATEGORY NUMBER % SAMURAI *Jo COMMONERS
Basic chemistry 25 72 28
Pharmacology 48 42 58
Engineering 54 39 61
Agriculture 31 32 68
Medicine 19 26 74
Total 177 43 57
Sources Iseki Kurd, ed . Dai Sihon hakushi roku, 5 vols. (1921-30); Jtnji
koshin roku. 1903-37 eds.; Tsunesaburd Kamesaka, ed . Who's Who in
Japan. 1014-37 eds.
ficers, Confucian scholars—while the agricultural chemists contained

a high proportion of men from farming families. Though fragmentary,
the data indicate the range of recruitment motivations. Basic chemists
came to the field from samurai families and for intellectual reasons.
Recruits to chemistry through agriculture or engineering were proba
bly concerned with practical problem solving in the interests of soci
ety.42 An unspecifiable number must have been prompted by desires
for higher social status.
As for individual cases, the decision of Takamine Jokichi, discoverer
of adrenalin (1900), to enter chemistry was primarily the result of en
couragement from his father, a domain physician with an interest in
science. The father studied Chinese and Dutch medicine with Koishi
Genzui in Kyoto and later worked in Dutch studies with Tsuboi Shindo
in Edo. After 1849 he carried out a number of scientific studies, man
ufacturing gunpowder for his domain, making nitric acid from silk
worm cocoons—and gaining a reputation as a clever inventor. These
activities had their impact on the son, as attested by his biographer,
Takamine's involvement in the work of his father, and his later
research.43
Paternal influence also figured in the recruitment of a number of
chemists at Tokyo University. Majima Toshiyuki was the son of a sam
urai physician in Kyoto who had studied Dutch medicine with Ogata
Koan.44 Shibata Yuji was the grandson of a kampo physician and the
FORMATION OF THE MEIJI SCIENTIFIC COMMUNITY 6l
son of a chemist His father served as professor of pharmacology and his

brother as professor of botany, both at Tokyo University.45 Nagai
Nagayoshi's father was a Tosa domain physician who made a point of
taking his son on nature walks in which he explained the medical uses
of local plants. Nagai went into the subdiscipline of pharmacological
chemistry, where he pursued these interests.46 One can see still other
patterns in the choices of Sakurai Joji and Suzuki Umetard. Sakurai
became a theoretical chemist (Japan's first) only after entering the
Daigaku Nanko, later part of Tokyo University. The pathology professor
Miyake Shu, later dean of the medical faculty, had just relumed from
Europe and aroused the young mans interest in chemistry.>T Suzuki
Umetaro, who also became a professor at Tokyo, was a farmer's son who
first came to study agriculture in 1893 and then chose agricultural
chemistry out of a desire to "do something for agriculture."48
Physics had fewer ties with the cultural past than did chemistry or
any other field. A number of physicists came into the discipline by
accident, and relatively few had fathers in related occupations. But the
field did have some links to the past. Samurai representation among
chemists and medical men was only 43 percent of recruits, while
among physicists it rose to 60 percent (among the earliest to well over
80). Tokyo natives were far more numerous among physicists than
among chemists or other scientists. One-quarter of physicists were bom
in the capital, compared to 12 or 13 percent of chemists. Sons of officials
made up nearly half the physicist community, compared to a quarter
among chemists or scientists in general.
The gulf between physics and society could be put down to the earlier
absence of a role for physicists, but the absence of a "modem" profes
sional role was hardly confined to physics. A more plausible reason for
the gap is the earlier suspicion of physics as an adjunct of Catholicism.
Some Tokugawa officials linked the diffusion of physics to social unrest
or political dissent and imposed restrictions on it. Access to books on
physics had been limited to certain samurai officials, and information
about physics could not be published or taught in schools. Predictably,
since acquaintance with physics was restricted to bureaucrats, it was
divorced from advanced mathematics, lacked any place in the schools
or on the job, and had an exceedingly narrow base for recruitment. Most
physicists came from the samurai because most Meiji officials belonged
to that class. Physicists were heavilyrecruitedfrom Tokyo because of its
role in the political system and its high concentration of samurai
families.
Yamakawa Kenjiro illustrates some of these patterns. He was born
into a family of high-ranking officials and came into physics largely by
accident He received a standard Confucian education in Aizu's domain
school between 1862 and 1868 and then studied privately while wan
dering around the country. He began studying Western subjects at the
domain's academy in Tokyo and was sent abroad in 1871. (The govern
ment chose him to study abroad because he came from a very cold
region and thus was thought capable of working where it wanted peo
ple, in Hokkaido.) His commitment to physicsresultedfromevents on
this trip. For example, witnessing a preannounced exchange of mail
between two ships sparked his interest in geometry and physics, and he
happened to read a magazine article by Herbert Spencer that stressed
the importance of physics.49
Yamakawa found areas of agreement between his own way of think
ing and Spencer's ideas. Confucianism explained the achievement of
moral perfection as theresultof education for particular individuals and
society as a whole. Spencer argued that political improvements rest on
social reforms, which depend on sociology, biology, and ultimately on
physics. Yamakawa was attracted to physics because of its place among
academic disciplines. As the field of learning basic to the rest, it clearly
should serve as the basis of morality. By committing himself to a career
in physics, Yamakawa felt he could contribute not only to science but to
social morality as well.50
Tanakadate Aikitsu's decision to go into physics grew from a syn
thesis of influences. Early upbringing in the pro-Tokugawa domain of
Morioka pushed him toward politics and government service, but the
political alliances of the Meiji Restoration made it impossible to fulfill
these ambitions. He considered engineering as a way to make a living
but abandoned this plan under two teachers' influence. Tanakadate
believed strongly in national service and looked for a way to combine his
ideals with the prospects open to him. Physics was the solution because
he thought it "basic" and "pure."51
From Tanakadate's earliest upbringing one could not have predicted
this outcome. He was the grandson of a Shinto priest and the nephew of
a Kokugaku (national learning) scholar. His father was a martial-arts
teacher openly skeptical of book learning.52 But in the large extended
family where he grew up, others made a deeper impression on him, and
he developed the usual samurai affection for scholarship and martial
arts. The family's move to Tokyo in 1870 was a turning point in his life.
There hereada Yamakawa essayrepeatingSpencer's arguments about
physics, and he entered the Keio academy of the science enthusiast
Fukuzawa Yukichi. Fukuzawa having taught him that education must
begin with the most basic studies, and the taint of disloyalty having
ruled out politics, he followed his interests in a scholarly direction.
'Tanakadate," wrote one historian, "rationalized his isolationfrompol
itics and turned it in a creative direction."53
Nagaoka Hantaro and Honda Kotaro came to physics by more con

ventional routes. They grew up in or adjacent to major urban centers
(Nagasaki and Nagoya) and in their youth received Western-style train
ing. Both attended Tokyo University and then went on to study at the
University of Berlin. Beyond these similarities were a number of dif
ferences. Nagaoka's father was a well-connected official; Honda was
the son of a commoner and a farmer. Nagaoka's upbringing led directly
to physics; Honda's led, if anything, solely to farming. Nagaoka is best
known abroad for theoretical work, Honda for experimental studies.54
Nagaoka was encouraged to study science at an early age by his
father, who traveled to the West with the Iwakura mission (1871-72).
When the father returned, he gave his son a book and an influential
piece of advice. The book was the Eton and Harrow text by Balfour
Stewart entitled Physics, and the recommendation was to study it thor
oughly. Nagaoka Chisaburo explained that the early education his son
had received would not be adequate in the Japan of the future and
stressed the importance of scientific study. The father went on to be
come a leading science educator, eventually president of the Tokyo
Prefectural Normal School, and wrote a well-known statement of sci
ence education policy for the Tokyo metropolitan government.55 None
of this spared Nagaoka Hantaro from a year of anxiety over physics. In
1884 he left Tokyo University for about half a year. He seems to have
been troubled by the odd belief that Caucasians alone were creative in
physics and only abandoned this belief after months of reading on the
history of science in China.56 His later work made him the leading
physicist of the period.
Honda Kdtaro, the third son of a farmer, had a low self-image and was
considered a dullard. The origin of his interest in science is unclear, but
we do know that a samurai teacher encouraged his interest and gave
him self-confidence. After elementary and middle school in the early
1880s, Honda followed one of his brothers to the First Higher School
and Tokyo University with the declared plan of studying agriculture.
But he changed his plans when he finished higher school. His brother
convinced him his interests in agriculture were shallow, and his read
ing included an essay on physics thatreflectedSpencer.57 These influ
ences led Honda to physics and a lifetime career.
Foreign Teachers and University Training

Except for Yamakawa Kenjiro and Noguchi Hideyo, trained at Yale and
Pennsylvania, respectively, the scientists discussed in the preceding
section, like 70 percent of their peers, were trained at Tokyo University
or one of its predecessors. This was not fortuitous, for Keio closed its
medical school in 1882 and did not reopen it until 1917; the Harris
School of Science at Doshisha, opened in 1882, closed in 1892; Kyoto
University produced no graduates until after 1900; and Waseda's En
gineering College began only in 1907. Tokyo University's monopoly on
science education was all but complete in the Meiji years. At the same
time, the university had to hire foreigners since formation of an indige
nous scientific community took time. Who were these foreigners, and
what influence did they have?
Having foreign scientists in the universities was vital to Meiji refor
mism. In 1877-78 salaries paid to foreign professors were a third of the
budget of Tokyo University, and during the 1880s they were usually
even more.58 Wide gaps appeared between Japanese salaries and for
eigners'. Ernest Tiegel and Josef Disse. who taught physiology and
pathology, were paid 350 and 380 yen per month in the early 1880s,
while their successors. Ozawa Kenji and Miura Moriharu, received just
120 and 100 yen.59 Similarly, Edward Divers earned 650 yen per month
teaching chemistry in the 1890s, while Haga Tamemasa received 105.
This did not commend instruction by foreigners to numerous percep
tive critics. In July 1875 Nagayo Sensai, chief of the public health
bureau, wrote the chemist Nagai Nagayoshi complaining that many
people the government had hired to teach chemistry were "ignorant
impostors" impeding the field.60 Mori Rintaro, as a medical student at
Berlin University, protested geologist Edmund Naumann s assertion
that Japan was succeeding because of the foreigners, not by their own
initiative.61 Nakamura Yaroku, who had a degree in physics from the
University of Munich, proposed in 1892 to dismiss the foreigners at
Tokyo University on grounds of intellectual senescence, saying, "I have
heard that the present scholarly competence of these men is about
where the level of scholarship was in their own countries in 1883.
Needless to say, today's science is much more advanced. So far indeed
has scholarship progressed that none of these foreigners would be able
to hold jobs if they should return to their homes."62 Wakizaka Gyozo
told the Diet in 1897 that employment of foreign professors should be
solely a last resort, since communities of scientific specialists were
emerging in Japan.63
The foreigners teaching at Tokyo University were the elite of all
foreign employees. The larger group of 8,000 or so foreigners em
ployed by the government over time did include some incompetents
and troublemakers, but this was not true of the university contingent.
A few were cantankerous, but nearly all came from distinguished in
stitutions and continued their careers after leaving Japan, a few to the
summit. E. S. Morse, a zoologist from Bowdoin College, and T. C.
Mendenhall, a physicist from Ohio State University, both became

members of the National Academy of Sciences. C. O. Whitman be
came professor of zoology at the University of Chicago. Josef Disse
became professor of anatomy at the University of Marburg. W. E.
Ayrton became professor of physics at Cambridge University. J. A.
Ewing became professor of physics at the University of London. And
John Milne essentially founded seismology. They were on the whole a
highly competent group.64
Considering the haphazard methods of selection, the degree of com
petence was rather remarkable. By 1870 it was common for medical
men to be chosen in Germany, whereas British subjects and to a lesser
extent Americans reigned in physical science. Germany s Ambassador
Maximilian von Brandt was an influential gatekeeper in the early
1870s. but Japanese officials stationed in Berlin took over the process in
1874. Ambassador Aoki Shuzo. a scholarly man married to a German
and fluent in the language, began to consult various leading professors.
In 1874 he recruited Wilhelm Schultze for anatomy and surgery, in
1876 Ernest Tiegel to teach physiology, and in 1880 Josef Disse for
pathology. There were, of course, other procedures The bureau chief
Nagayo recruited F W Donitz in 1873 following his trip to Europe with
the Iwakura mission. In 1875 Erwin von Baelz began teaching internal
medicine and pathology at Tokyo University following a chance contact
with a Japanese official who became his patient. And in 1876 Bernhard
Gierke began lecturing in anatomy on the recommendation of Albrecht
von Kolliker at Wurzburg.65
Hiring of British and American experts worked somewhat differ
ently. Since the 1856 Consular Act forbade U.S. diplomats to recom
mend Americans for jobs overseas, recruitment in the U.S. was es
pecially chancy.66 E. S. Morse was recruited for the zoology post at
Tokyo because Toyama Shoichi, once a student at Michigan and a
ranking education ministry official, had heard him lecture in Ann Ar
bor.67 Mendenhall was recruited by Morse while Morse was passing
through Columbus on his way to California and Japan.68 Recruitment
procedures in Britain were only slightly more structured. Hugh Mathe
son of the Jardine Matheson Company arranged Henry Dyer's appoint
ment in mechanical engineering and John Milne's in geology at ltd
Hirobumi's request and on the recommendation of W. J. M. Rankine at
Glasgow. Chemists Edward Divers and R. W. Atkinson were recom
mended by Ito's friend Alexander W Williamson, professor of chem
istry at the University of London, where I to had studied in the 1860s.
And the Japanese Embassy found J. A. Ewing with the help of William
son and his physicist friend Lord Kelvin of Glasgow University.69
Foreign instructors in engineering or physical science had more
influence on students than medical colleagues had. Dyer, Milne, Ayr-

ton, Mendenhall, Ewing, and Divers took pains to involve students in
research projects. MendenhalTs students built their own equipment
and used it to measure the sound emitted by a fired cannon, to detect
and measure geomagnetic waves, and to study the forces of gravity over
different latitudes and elevations.70 Divers undertook twenty-seven dif
ferent studies in organic chemistry with four different Japanese collab
orators including Haga Tamemasa, Shimizu Tetsukichi, Ogawa Mas
ataka, and Haneda Kiyohachi.71 Ayrton was a leading student of
electricity, an unabashed workaholic, an active publisher, and an in
spiration to all of his students. In a practically minded academic setting
he stressed theory, together with the cultivation of scientific attitudes,
over memorization of facts, noting Japan's need for generalists able to
solve many different problems.72 Dyer's contribution was mostly in
stitutional. As director of the Imperial College of Engineering (Kobu
Daigakko), he built an innovative program modeled on that of Zurich's
Polytechnic Institute. His college offered curricular depth and diversity
along with three years' practical experience. Later merged with Tokyo
University's engineering faculty, it graduated a number of important
engineers and was imitated abroad.73
Milne, Morse, and Ewing were particularly influential. Milne spent
almost twenty years in Japan (1876-95) and trained a substantial
number of students. He stimulated their interest in earthquakes, in
vented several seismographs, and instigated construction of seis
mological stations. Morse stayed only three years, but his influence was
long-lasting. He was the first active exponent of Darwin's theories in
biology, and his research in Japanese anthropology gave that field a
physicalist bias that it has only begun to transcend.74 Ewing was a
highly accomplished physicist and an inspiring mentor. He constructed
a model based on Weber's theory of magnetism, wrote several papers on
seismology, and received a medalfromthe Royal Society for his obser
vation of magnetic hysteresis. His age (just twenty-five when he arrived
in 1878) affected his relations with students, whom he treated like
peers and strongly supported in their researches. These efforts clearly
paid off. Ewing's pupils, instead of choosing careers in government or
business, mainly became university professors.75
While physical science and engineering flourished, basic medicine
faced problems. The government was primarily interested in producing
medical clinicians, not basic researchers. Facilities for research were
poor or nonexistent in the 1870s and early 1880s. Several of the German
medical professors had difficult personalities, and most returned home
as soon as they could. Theodor Hoffmann and Karl Mueller were the
first to arrive and stayed onlyfiveyears between them. F W. Donitz left
after two years because of a dispute with the Japanese authorities.

Bemhard Gierke came to teach anatomy in 1876 but became seriously
ill and died in a mental institution. Wilhelm Schultze, who taught
anatomy and surgery, had come highly recommended but did little of
importance. Despite his brilliant academic record and studies with List
er, his students disliked him, and he published no papers. Even the
better-endowed clinical side was not exemptfromsuch problems. A. L.
Wernich, who taught internal medicine and obstetrics in 1874-76,
published a number of scientific papers, but became hypercritical of the
Japanese and left in a fit of pique.76
The negative effects on students, however, were less than one might
have expected. Physiology had an excellent mentor figure in Ernest
Tiegel, who stayed six years (1876-82). The paper he pubbshed with
Ozawa Kenji in 1877 on nervous systems in reptiles marked the first
appearance of a Japanese investigator's work in a European medical
journal.77 Pathology had norealspecialist before Josef Disse's arrival in
1880 but still developed a distinguished research tradition, and even
anatomy was not much harmed by erratic leadership from the Ger
mans. There were eight advanced anatomy students during the period
of direct German tutelage; three won their doctorates and continued in
research.78
Foreign professors influence, then, had its limits. Foreigners often
affected students choice to study overseas but rarely the places they
went Von Baelz influenced Aoyama Tanemichi to study pathology (in
Germany), and James A. Ewing induced Tanakadate Aikitsu to study
physics (at Glasgow).79 But usually the influence of foreigners was
limited in this area. Japanese decisions to study medicine in Germany
did not result from contacts with German professors; the German pro-,
fessors were invited to Japan because the government had selected j
German medicine as the model for Japanese medicine.80 Students in
other fields did not necessarily pursue advanced studies in the coun
triesfromwhich their professors had come. Mendenhall was an Amer
ican, but only Yamakawa studied physics in the U.S., and that well
before Mendenhall reached Japan. Shibata Yuji's chemistry professor
in Tokyo was from England, but he chose to study in France and
Switzerland.81 Nagaoka Hantaro went to Vienna and Berlin to con
tinue his research on magnetism even though the teacher who sug
gested this study to him and sponsored his publication on it in English
had come to Japan from Great Britain.82 In another area where influ
ence might have occurred, there is little or no indication of it: few
Japanese chose foreign scientists working in Japan for role models, nor
did foreigners much influence Japanese commitments to particular
lines of research.83
The Foreign Study Experience

Foreign study (ryugaku), however, did inspire commitment to particu
lar kinds of research. It gave Japanese scientists professional role mod
els and values, and it affected establishment of research activities.
Nevertheless, the research tradition was not merely a result of overseas
study and scientists views. The government and the public had opin
ions of their own, especially on the issue of overseas study. There was a
compelling need to reduce Japan's backlog of knowledge. Professors
were required to staff the universities. Experts were needed for facto
ries, experiment stations, bureaus, and commissions. Technical skills
were also essential for military and diplomatic reasons. There were
limits to what could be done: research demanded a level of support that
was not in all cases forthcoming, developmental priorities sometimes
led scientists away from research, and complex, hybrid roles emerged
in response to local demands. Past experience delimited how far West
ern values and norms were adopted. Foreign study certainly affected
development of the researcher role, but so did other priorities and
traditions.
Officials generally saw foreign study as a means of acquiring new
knowledge. An 1872 document declared that only foreign study offered
the prospect of gathering the technical expertise the country desper
ately needed. Inoue Kaoru, as public works minister, spoke in 1879 of
foreign study as a means of "acquiring strength in various fields."84 In
1897 Education Vice Minister Makino Nobuaki declared, "We will not
go forward unless we send people to study in the advanced countries,
observe things, and study the ideas of leading (foreignl scientists.'*85
Putting knowledge to use was equally important Officials put major
emphasis in the 1870s and 1880s on training Japanese to replace costly
foreigners, but this priority had shifted by the late 1890s. The establish
ment of Kyoto University in 1897 and its sister institutions at Sendai
(1906), Fukuoka (1910), and Sapporo (1918) required major expansion
of the university professoriat, and overseas study was the means to
achieve it In 1898 the vice minister of education cited need for pro
fessors as the main reason to increase spending on overseas study,86
and in 1901 Education Minister Kikuchi Dairoku answered a hostile
question about it by stating that almost every university professor or
higher-school teacher had studied abroad.87
Administration of overseas study was designed to further the aim of
training professors and technical experts. In 1869 the Meiji govern
ment resumed support for students sent abroad by the shogunate and
quickly expanded their number. When an 1873 inspection tour by the
Ministry of Education turned up widespread abuses and poorly pre
pared students, the students were ordered home and the rules rewrit
ten. Even then, some compromises had to be made. For example, it was
not initially possible to demand extensive precoUegiate training of all
students selected, and few had the language skills to enter a foreign
university. Students were required to attach themselves to a govern
ment school in Japan and to pass a formal screening.88 Beginning in
1885 the mandatory school affiliation was dropped, but all Japanese
pursuing foreign studies still had to follow rigid rules: they had to
register with the foreign ministry in Tokyo, send annual progress re
ports to the local ambassador, and, if using government money, pledge
two years' public service for every year of support.89
Because growing numbers of critics thought spending on overseas
study came at the expense of domestic research, it is a useful—though
difficult—task to estimate the cost of ryugaku. Unfortunately, records
were kept haphazardly, several different ministries were involved, stu
dents sometimes switched their status from public to private or private
to public, and estimates of numbers vary widely among sources.90 But
estimates of the minimum expenditure are possible if certain assump
tions are made. By accepting my definition of scientist, together with
the figures for time spent abroad and (average) levels of expenditure
reported below (table 3.4), it is clear that Japan could not have spent less
than 6,303,350 yen on overseas study in the fifty or so years being
TABLE 3.4
Foreign Study Expenditures (Doctorate Recipients)
ANNUAL
STUDENT YEARS EXPENDITURE/
ABROAD ( # ) STUDENT (AVG.) COST
1867-77 138 600 yen 82,800 yen

1878-82 163 1,650 yen 268,950 yen
1883-1914 2,842 1,800 yen 5,115,600 yen
1915-20 418 2,000 yen 836,000 yen
Totals: 3,561 6,303,350 yen

Sources: NKGST 8/1: 350-53; Uzaki Kumakichi, Aoyama Tanemichi, p. 54; Watanabe
Minoni, "Japanese Students Abroad and the Acquisition of Scientific and Technical
Knowledge," pp. 254-93.
7O FORMATION OF THE MEIJI SCIENTIFIC COMMUNITY
discussed. Whether this estimate is reasonable or not, it is at least

compatible with another. In the early 1960s, Sato Kenzd of the Ministry
of Education conducted a study of this period that estimated 7,108,054
yen as the cost of supporting government-funded students (only) in all
fields of study.91
Foreign study costs at first had simply to be borne, but later they
caused serious disagreements. One Diet member attacked the govern
ment for excessive spending in 1898. Another that year said that the
idea was good, but students should pay more.92 And in 1901 a third
representative quoted unnamed others as believing the program to be
"of little [or no] value."93 Criticisms intensified as expenditures rose 70
percent in the 1890s and very nearly doubled in the next decade. A 1914
editorial called foreign study spending "foolish," "unbeneficial," and "a
drain on foreign exchange."94 Others demanded outright termination
of the program to improve academic morality. According to them, for
eign education was so highly valued that potential nominees were
bending the rules and "selling their friends for selection.'*95
These criticisms were not true in all cases. Selection procedures
emphasized grades, good character, and faculty recommendations—in
about that order. By 1879, when the program was fully developed, to be
a ryugakusei (foreign-study student) one usually had to have graduated
first or second in one's class, and even that was no guarantee. In 1882
Aoyama Tanemichi, the number three man, was chosen for pathology
and internal medicine along with the number two man because the
number one man had a reputation for drinking to excess. 96 In 1884,
Kitasato Shibasaburo, eighth in his graduating class, got to go because
his employer, the Bureau of Public Health, introduced a tax plan to the
government which yielded more revenues.97 The stipends paid to the
ryugakusei did not assure opulent living. Nagayo Mataro, studying
pathology at Freiburg in 1908, got additional moneyfromhis brother.98
Nagaoka Hantaro, studying physics in Vienna in 1894, had to do his
own cooking and lacked money for books.99 Aoyama could barely live in
Berlin on his stipend. 10° And Kitasato in his first year "saw nothing of
the city but the street which ran between his boardinghouse and the
University of Berlin."101 Honda Kotaro, studying physics at Got tin gen
in 1908, and Nagai Nagayoshi, in chemistry at Berlin in 1879, found
they could Live quite well, but each had an assistantship, a stipend, and
a landlady who kept his rent low.102
Ryugakusei problems were a matter of concern to the officials in
charge. In 1897 Vice Minister Makino pointed out how inadequate were
the stipends for Europe. "Students want to buy books and reference
materials but often cannot. They always ask for more money."103
Oyama Kenzd, chief of the Bureau of Vocational Education, told the
Budget Committee of the House of Representatives in 1898 that the

foreign students "really have to scrimp," explaining that many had
formerly benefited from favorable exchange rates but no longer did
so. 104 Toyama, the minister of education, had this to say:
Ryugakusei sponsored by the Ministry of Education are prac
tically beggars. They have to live in shabby boardinghouses and
cannot go out in society freely. I talked with Prime Minister ltd
[Hirobumi] about this when I was president of (Tokyo] University.
He had seen some of these places in Europe and said we have to do
something.. .. The Ministry of Education's stipends for foreign
students are much too meager. When I and others went to Europe
during the time of the shogunate, we got £200 sterling a year, and
even that amount was not adequate for living in Cambridge or
Oxford. Our present foreign students do not even have stipends
sufficient for them to live in the moreremoteareas of Germany.105
It was appropriate for Toyama to make reference to Germany, since
so many of the ryugakusei went there. In the 1870s Germany attracted
only 27 percent of Japan s budding scientists, but the percentage climb
ed in the following decades. In the 1880s it reached 59 percent, in the
1890s 69 percent; and in the first decade of the twentieth century it
topped out at just under 74 percent. Overall two-thirds of the man-years
of study were spent in Germany during the period 1869-1914. Prior to
the outbreak of war in 1914, no other country did nearly so well. Britain
and the United States attracted between 20 and 35 percent each in the
1870s but rapidly lost ground after Germany became popular. France in
its best year attracted only about 19 percent and was minor for the
period as a whole. In the same forty-five-year period, France got just
under 7 percent of the Japanese ryugakusei, the United States and
Britain got about 11 percent each, and theremainderwere scattered in
other countries—Italy, Belgium, Switzerland, the Netherlands, and
Austria
The pattern was the same for nearly every field. Among scientists
who took agriculture degrees, 43 percent had previously gone to Ger
many. Two-thirds of all chemists went there, 69 percent of the phys
icists, and 90 percent of the medical men. Engineers were less over
whelmed by Germany, but even they made it first choice. While their
pattern of movement makes calculation difficult, a reasonable estimate
says that Germany got 30 percent of their time abroad, the U.S. about 28
percent, Britain 26 percent, and France 14 percent Only a few en
gineers studied or worked abroad in other countries.106
The reasons for Germany's popularity may seem obvious, but this is
deceptive. Certainly German science and engineering were outstand
ing in this period. Wilhelm Roentgen discovered X-rays in 1895. Max

Planck founded quantum theory in the early twentieth century. Adolf
von Baeyer did important work in the chemistry of organic dyes, and
Rudolph Diesel invented the diesel engine. German medicine also at
tained a preeminence unequaled before or since. Robert Koch provided
the first hard proof of the pathogenic specificity of a particular micro
organism. Max von Pettenkofer founded modern public health studies.
Emil von Behring helped establish immunology. And by some esti
mates, in the 1880s a majority of major medical discoveries worldwide
were the work of German scientists.107
Nevertheless, the Japanese inclination to study in Germany could
not have resulted just from intellectual factors. Other countries were
doing good science. Spontaneous radioactivity was discovered first in
France, and the theory of electrolytic dissociation was developed by a
Swede. The chemistry of radioactive substances was most notably in
vestigated by Lord Rutherford of Britain. The structure of the nervous
system was elucidated by an Italian and a Spaniard. Besides, German
preeminence, in medicine at least, was actually in decline. The putative
majority of world medical discoveries in the 1880s dropped to 32 per
cent in the 1890s and to 20 percent between 1910 and 1919 because of
diminishing opportunities for younger researchers.108
But Germany had its advantages. It was more willing than most other
countries (especially Britain) to relax the special privileges accorded its
nationals under the system of unequal treaties (1857-99). 109 German
political philosophy had won considerable favor with the majority of
Japanese officials. In particular, the German academic system made it
easy to collect information. Unlike the French or British systems, where
students studied at one institution, the German system encouraged
migration. A student could attend lectures at Leipzig one term, at
Munich the following term, and finish at Berlin in the term after that.
Registration was easy, requiring just a letter, the array of courses im
pressive, and the number of German universities (almost two dozen)
more than twice that of any other European country. Even so, we really
know little about individuals' motives. Noguchi Hideyo studied with
Simon Flexner at Pennsylvania because of the accident of their having
met in Tokyo. Kitasato worked with Robert Koch in Berlin because of
Koch's work with various microorganisms. Shibata Yuji moved suc
cessively from Leipzig (Arthur Hantzsch) to Zurich (Alfred Werner)
and on to Paris (Georges Urbain) in pursuit of a single research theme:
stereochemistry, initiated by Hantzsch and developed by the others.* 10
But most of thetimeneither government records nor biographies report
the reasons for these choices.
Widely held conceptions of the ryugakusei role may be part of the

reason we know so little. Ryugakusei were supposed to go abroad when
sent, study particular subjects, work with particular professors, come
home when directed, and assume the positions the government gave
them. For many things did work this way. Sakurai Joji quietly complied
with an order to return home from London in 1881 despite his exem
plary record and the excellent work he was doing.'11 Similarly, Shibata
returned to Tokyo in 1913 at Sakurai's insistence even though his
research in Paris had hardly begun to bear fruit.112 Considering how
powerful the government was, it is remarkable that any scientists defied
it. Nagai Nagayoshi, studying chemistry in Berlin in 1874, simply told
his supervisors he would pay his own way when he was ordered to
return home as a result of the 1873 survey by the education ministry.113
Yamakawa Kenjiro wrote Ambassador Mori Arinori a flat rejection to
the same request, partly because a wealthy New Haven widow had
offered to pay his expenses at Yale.' l4 But the most salient example of
student noncompliance involved Kitasato Shibasaburo, who in 1887
shocked his superiors by refusing their order to transfer his studies from
Berlin to Munich.
Kitasato's experience is important because it identifies knowledge
gathering—not research training—as the primary purpose of foreign
study for officials. In 1884 Kitasato graduated from Tokyo University
and entered the Bureau of Public Health, which sent him to Germany.
In keeping with the needs of the public health program, it was decided
he should spend most of his time at Koch's laboratory in Berlin but be
prepared to move if conditions required. In 1887, the bureau's other
ryugakusei, Nakahama Toichiro, who had been studying public health
with Pettenkofer in Munich, asked the bureau to study with Koch. The
government ordered Kitasato to move to Munich to trade places with his
colleague Nakahama115
But Kitasato refused on professional grounds, telling a local official
who relayed the order that the plan took no cognizance of medical
research. Pettenkofer claimed that diseases resulted exclusively from
poor sanitation; Koch defended the pathogenic significance of discrete
microorganisms. Kitasato also insisted that he needed more time to
learn the methods of bacteriological research. Fortunately, Mori Rin
taro urged Tokyo to accept these arguments, and the order to transfer
was canceled. Two years later Kitasato isolated the bacterium causing
tetanus and then helped to found immunology by his discovery of natu
ral immunity.116 Because of Pettenkofer's bitter opposition to the germ
theory of disease, these discoveries might not have occurred had
Kitasato consented to study in Munich.
It must be stressed, however, that Japanese officials did sometimes

recognize and support research as a legitimate component of ryugaku.
In 1891 the Ministry of Education sent three junior faculty members
from Tokyo University to Koch's laboratory to investigate his claim that
tuberculin could help to treat tuberculosis.] 17 In 1894 it granted 1,000
yen to physicist Tanaka Shohei in Germany for research in musical
acoustics. The same year it underwrote Nagaoka Hantaro's studies of
magnetic phenomena. But officials were inconsistent, and their re
sponses to requests for research support could not be predicted. Tan-
aka's study was funded apparently because prominent German musi
cians endorsed it, Kitasato's work through the German instructional
budget. Nagaoka s 1893 request for money to study magnetic distortion
was rejected.l l 8 The Tokyo tuberculin mission proved abortive because
Koch rejected the "students." 119 The education minister, Toyama, was
asked directly in 1898 whether the ministry ever paid the expenses of
Japanese invited abroad for research. Toyama stated that ltd Hirobumi
and Okuma Shigenobu favored this policy, but he admitted it was prac
ticed erratically. The pertinent conditions, he said, were that someone
be officially invited, that Tokyo University professors not object, and
that no ryugakusei already abroad be affected adversely if a researcher
were sent! 120
Toyama's remarks show how solicitous of ryugakusei officials could
be on occasion. Nagaoka s stipend was increased in 1894 after he com
plained of currency devaluations, hunger, and cold.121 Kitasato was
permitted to remain in Berlin even after his fellowship expired in
1888. 122 Tanakadate was given extra money for travel in 1886 despite
his having gone to Britain for physics at his own expense. 123 Nagai
Nagayoshi received personal loans and lucrative commissions in the
1870s and 1880s from a number of prominent officials. Nagai s case is
particularly instructive. In June 1875 he was given 2,300 yen to buy
books and equipment for the Tokyo Medical Academy (later the medical
faculty of Tokyo University). A month later he was asked to help recruit
professors in chemistry and physics. In 1878 the Bureau of Agriculture
began paying him a consulting fee of 30 yen per month (which became
50 yen only two years later). In 1881 the Bureau of Public Health sent
him money to cover travel costs, and in 1883 he got 100 yen in commis
sions for arranging the sale of pharmaceutical manufacturing equip
ment Officials, of course, had excellent reasons to treat ryugakusei
well There were not very many of them, in the early years especially,
and the country was greatly in need of their services. Nagai noted that
Ambassadors Shinagawa and Aoki in Berlin treated him very much like
a personal friend and observed that his status as the only "full-fledged
Japanese chemist" (1878) made him a "prominent person in Japan."124
The Meaning of Overseas Study

Initiation of specific traditions of research was among the important, if
predictable, results of studying overseas. Physicist Honda Kotaro cre
ated a major metallurgical research tradition at Tohoku University fol
lowing three years at Gottingen with the physical chemist Gustav Tam
mann, founder of modem metallurgy.125 Ishikawa Chiyomatsu helped
establish zoological research at Tokyo University after a close collabora
tion with the influential Darwinian August Weismann at Freiburg.12(>
Ishihara Jun made notable contributions to theoretical physics at
Tohoku after studying with Albert Einstein (Zurich) and Arnold Som
merfeld (Munich).127 Nagai Nagayoshi did significant work in pharma
cological chemistry at Tokyo that followed closely from his studies with
Hofmann.128 Tanakadate Aikitsu s researches paralleled those of his
teacher, Lord Kelvin, in ranging from geophysics to magnetism.I29 And
Kitasato Shibasaburo discovered the plague bacillus and established a
tradition of bacteriological research after having studied six years with
Koch.130
Mentor-pupil relationships clearly contributed to many such re
search endeavors. Honda worked diligently under Tammann for three
years at Gottingen, Nagai was Hofmann s assistant for four years in
Berlin, Ishikawa did much of the actual research for the myopic, debili
tated Weismann,131 and Kitasato s closeness to the very reserved Koch
exceeded that of any of Koch's German pupils.'}2 The exceptions high
light the more typical pattern: bacteriologist Kitajima Ta'ichi took a
strong dislike to Emil von Behring and considered his years at Marburg
a waste;133 Nagaoka Hantaro, critical of the aged Hermann von
Helmholtz and the beginner Max Planck, moved from an early interest
in theoretical physics to concentrate on experimental studies;' ** Ogata
Masanori, professor of hygiene at Tokyo, ignored the antibacterial views
of his teacher Pettenkofer to make his career in the field of bac
teriology; 13S chemist Shibata Yuji found Georges Urbain at the Sor
bonne more congenial than Alfred Werner at Zurich, and whether for
that reason or some other, abandoned his work in stereochemistry to
study, like Urbain, the various rare earths.136
Relations with European mentors also shaped the scientists' concep
tions of their roles. Shibata's evolution as an exclusively academic
chemist paralleled the careers of his European teachers.137 Sakurai
Joji's career in theoretical chemistry was certainly influenced by the
later interest of his teacher A. W. Williamson in theory.138 Tanakadate's
interest in research, teaching, and the nonacademic world approxi
mates Kelvin's career pattern, except that the British physicist worked
with commercial interests on telegraphic communications and his Jap
anese pupil with the military on air power. 139 Gustav Tammann and
Honda Kotaro were both interested in pure research and business ap
plications. 14 ° Nagai Nagayoshi shared his teacher Hofmann's commit
ment to experimental results and their utility in industry. 141 Kitasato
modeled his career directly on Koch's, founding a comparable institute
where research was done, serums manufactured, and patients given
treatment. 142
At times, Japanese scientists even adopted the personality traits of
their teachers in Europe. Nagai Nagayoshi, who spent fourteen years in
Germany, took on Hofmann's cosmopolitan style and became Ger
manicized to the point of marrying a German woman, converting to
Catholicism, and adding WUhelm to his name. 1 4 3 "I (consciously] pat
terned myself after Einstein from the time I first came to Zurich," wrote
the physicist Ishihara Jun. 1 4 4 Colleagues said Honda Kotaro had the
same blunt manner as his German mentor, Tammann. I 4 5 Sakurai Joji
imitated the aristocratic, refined style of his British teacher, William
son. 1 4 6 Students often called Tanakadate "Lord Kelvin" behind his
back. 147 And Kitasato adopted the extreme neatness, punctuality, and
fatherly manner typical of Robert Koch. "His actions and gestures are
just like Koch s," according to the German scientist's wife. "They even
hold a pointer the same way when they're lecturing!" 148
Kitasato's emulation of Koch was particularly striking to associates.
In 1908 Koch paid a six-week visit to Japan, and during that time
Kitasato managed to obtain a lock of his hair from a barber. When Koch
died in 1910, Kitasato, thou gh not a believer in life after death, asked the
Shinto priests of the Izumo Grand Shrine to pray for the soul of his
teacher. The following year he built a small Shinto shrine on the
grounds of the Institute of Infectious Diseases, the lock of hair and
photograph of Koch indicating the scientist's presence at the site. On
the anniversary of Koch's death (May 27), he always requested that
prayers be offered at the shrine. 149 Nor was this his sole form of re
membrance. Every year on Koch's birthday (December 11), Kitasato
sponsored a conference to commemorate his mentor's contributions to
medicine. 15 ° "Dr. Koch's soul may no longer exist," Kitasato declared.
"But through our work he is still very much alive." 151
Many of the German professors had strong authoritarian tendencies.
Kitajima described Behring as "quick-tempered," "secretive," "stern,"
and "always the military man." 152 The pathologist Nagayo Mataro ob
served in 1907 that some German professors assumed a "haughty at
titude" toward ryugakusei.153 Shibata Yuji said Alfred Werner could be
"mean, explosive, and sarcastic" if he became angry with a student. 154
Koch was seen by many as cold and rather forbidding. 155 Paul Ehrlich
was described by a Japanese student as supervising students so re
lentlessly that their work invariably reflected his way of thinking. 156
Tanaka Minoru says students were reprimanded by their German pro

fessors if they failed to address them correctly.157
The French were seen differently. The mentor of astronomer Terao
Hisashi, the Sorbonne professor Francois Tisserand, is described as
"modest," "kind," and 'Very solicitous toward young astronomers." 158
Shibata recalled that his teacher, Georges Urbain, criticized the Ger
man professorial style. "He forbade us to address him by the French
equivalent of 'Herr Professor' He said, 'We do not use such German
forms here. You are to call me 'Monsieur Urbain' like Louis, our labora
tory custodian."*159 Britain probably resembled the French pattern
more closely than the German. Williamson is described as the "natural
choice" as a mentor for Japanese students. 160 James A. Ewing of
Cambridge, formerly of Tokyo, spent a great deal of time with visiting
Japanese students or colleagues.161 Lord Kelvin treated anyone sent to
his laboratory by Tanakadate, even for a short visit, as if he were the
Scotsman's own student. l62
Where authoritarian behavior was present (and it was not an unvary
ing feature of German academic culture), it did not always repress
creativity. Koch's laboratory produced a succession of brilliant discov
eries including his own isolation of the tubercle bacillus (1882),
Friedrich Loeffier's discovery of the diphtheria bacillus (1884), Georg
Gaffky's cultivation of the typhoid bacillus (1885), Kitasato's pure
culture of the tetanus bacillus (1889), and the brilliant work on antitox
ic immunity done by Kitasato and von Behring (1890). 163 Nor was the
Franco-German group founded by Werner at Zurich wholly closed
minded and authoritarian. G. Schwarzenbach speaks of the infectious
enthusiasm of Werner's students, an excitement that transcended
every difficulty.164 Shibata says that Werner was "unstinting in his
kindness toward and willingness to help dedicated, capable students."
"He respected and praised those who had the courage to stand up to
him." 165
Authoritarianism in German science did not spring solely from in
clinations inherent in German culture. Joseph Ben-David and
Awraham Zloczower argue that the senility and dependency of junior
scientists toward senior ones appeared in the last quarter of the nine
teenth century as a result of systemic rigidity. Because the universities
allowed only one chair per field, institutional expansion could occur
only by dividing an existing field, by founding new universities, or by
creating a hierarchy of institutions and laboratories. After a certain
point only creation of institutions and laboratories remained viable for
growth. Younger men found themselves increasingly dependent on the
help of their seniors for advancement and were forced to assure their
preferment by obsequious behavior.166
One should also remember that German science, like that of the
West as a whole, inherited the values and ideals of creative research.

"First, completeness and thoroughness; second . . . community, and
[last] cooperation" was the description of John Theodore Merz:
The German man of science was . . . not an isolated thinker
He lived mostly at a university, surrounded by others, whose la
bours came in contact with his own, or who treated the same
subject from a different point of view . . . His object could not be
to produce simply a work of individual greatness or of finished
artistic merit; his work was an integral portion of one great sci
ence. . . .The German man of science was a teacher; he had to
communicate his ideas to younger minds . .. not to teach une
science faite, but to draw out original talent in others, to encourage
cooperation in research, to portion out the common work to the
talents which surround[ed] him.167
Merz went on to say that the German (or Western) man of science had
"generally come under the influence of some . . . school, the teaching
of which he desired either to uphold or to combat."168
Foreign study in this sense aroused behavioral commitments in Jap
anese scientists and affected the ways they conceived of research. Resi
dence in Europe exposed them to the traditional values of European
science in ways that working at home never could have. They learned
directly what cooperation, community, and uninhibited criticism meant
in the laboratory setting. They experienced first hand the criticisms of
academic "inbreeding" or sociopolitical involvements which, however
infrequently observed, were normative ideals in Europe. They inter
nalized—or were at least exposed to—both respect for teachers and
willingness to defend scientific truths whenever occasion demanded.
And they learned to defend their ideas in a professional forum. Foreign
study also inspired loyalties to certain conceptions of science. Medical
study in Britain encouraged a clinical approach to disease; study in
Germany placed greater stress on research. Mentors affected the
growth of ideas and careers.
Takagi Kanehiro's work on beriberi shows the importance of where
one studied in Europe. Takagi, a career physician in the navy, had gone
to Britain in 1875 because he wanted an alternative to German-style
training.169 Following the advice of William Willis, an associate of gov
ernment leaders, Takagi, a Satsuma native, enrolled in the St Thomas
Hospital Medical College of London and spentfiveyears studying anat
omy and clinical medicine. In November 1880 he returned to his work
in the navy, becoming chief of the Bureau of Medical Affairs about a
year later. He also began doing research on beriberi. His compilation of
data on its occurrence in particular settings suggested that diet was a
differentiating element. Takagi obtained funds and authorization for an
enriched diet that produced striking results. The new diet focused on
fresh vegetables, meat, fish, and barley in contrast to rice and pickled
vegetables, greatly reducing the incidence of disease or even eliminat
ing it. Internal opposition, inadequate reporting abroad, and the popu
larity of the germ theory of illness delayed recognition of his work, but
Takagi was the first researcher anywhere to link beriberi convincingly
to dietary factors.170
Takagi might have done this work had he studied in Germany or
France, but his having studied in Britain encouraged such research
more. His conception of beriberi was basically physiological. From actu
al trials he argued that 310 grams of carbon were required in the mili
tary ration for every 20 grams of nitrogen; that is, the ratio of nitrogen to
carbon is 1:15.5.171 Physiology was more highly developed in France
and Germany than in Britain when Takagi was there, but itsrelationto
clinical treatment was different in Britain, far more intimately linked to
practice than on the Continent.172 At the time he did his research,
Takagi's approach was unusual. Researchers were sensitive to the
clinical aspects of beriberi, but many looked exclusively for a bacterial
explanation. This was as true of Japanese beriberi researchers trained
in Germany as it was of Germans.173 Takagi seems to have benefited
from the particular combination of physiological research and clinical
treatment then found only in Britain.
A quarrel between Nagai Nagayoshi and Sakurai Joji shows that
overseas study could also produce divergent conceptions in chemistry.
From 1873 to 1884 Nagai worked with Hofmann in Berlin. Sakurai
studied in London with Williamson (1876-81). Both attempted to fol
low in the footsteps of their European mentors. Hofmann and Nagai
were basically organic chemists interested in experimental work and its
industrial applications, whereas Williamson and Sakurai, despite ear
lier experience, shared an interest in chemical theory. In 1881 Sakurai
returned to a professorship in theoretical chemistry at Tokyo Univer
sity; Nagai stayed in Germany for three more years. When he did re
turn, in October 1884, he received an appropriate joint appointment in
the faculties of medicine and science. But Sakurai took offense at this,
insisted on other arrangements, and in November 1885 secured Nagai's
dismissal from the university on the grounds that his interest in phar
macological chemistry was not academic in nature.174 Nagai was
forced to resign and pursue a career elsewhere. From 1885 to 1888 he
worked for the Ministry of Education, and from 1888 to 1891 he held a
technical appointment in the Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce.
His professorship at Tokyo University was restored in 1893, but
Sakurai's control of the science faculty deanship relegated him to a
position in medicine alone.175
In the case of Nagai and Sakurai, it seems that resentments between
Williamson and Hofrnann (stemming from professional differences)

were either transferred to their Japanese pupils, or else some nonprofes
sional jealousy led to Sakurai's actions. It is possible that nationalistic
rivalries complicated relations between the two senior chemists.
Williamson and Hofrnann had pursued very similar careers for part of
their professional lives, both studying with Justus von Liebig at Giessen
(Hofinann from 1839 to 1843 and Williamson from 1844 to 1846). Both
were active for a time in the same general area of chemistry. Williamson
used Hofrnann s work in his theory of etherification, and both per
formed experiments whose results were important to the theory of
chemical types.176 Both were also concerned with industrial applica
tions of chemistry. Hofmann made a fortune from his work in the
chemistry of dyes; Williamson made his students visit chemical facto
ries and helped found a chair of practical chemistry at London. In
London they were practically colleagues for a number of years, from
1849 to 1863. 177
Their coincidental tenure in London and Williamson's medical prob
lems helped fuel the conflict. Both laboratories—Hofrnann s at the
Royal College of Chemistry and Williamson's at Imperial College—
were flourishing in the early 1850s, but in 1855 poor eyesight and a
paralyzed arm forced Williamson to give up research, and students
began flocking to Hofrnann instead.178 In 1863 Hofrnann went to
Berlin, and by 1870 Williamson was "devoting his time to high-flown
theorizing while posing as a statesman of science."179 Whether or not
the two wererivals,their pupils imputed this to them. Sakurai was not
only a brilliant student of chemistry; by the late 1870s he was just about
Williamson's only student. Similarly, Nagai worked as Hofmann's as
sistant and even consulted with him in choosing a wife.180 The facts
suggest two explanations for the quarrel. Sakurai either transferred to
Nagai a resentment that Williamson felt toward Hofmann or identified
so closely with him that he imagined arivalrythat had never existed. In
either event, the quarrel influenced how chemical research was estab
lished in Japan.
Kitasato's career in bacteriology provides an even more momentous
example of the impact of study in Europe. In 1886, at Koch's instiga
tion, he became involved in a controversy over beriberi that became an
object lesson in the values of science, and in 1893 he repeated Koch's
experience in founding a laboratory of his own for research. Both affairs
conflicted with Japanese values and were resolved in striking ways. The
beriberi dispute required Kitasato to criticize the work of a supposed
professional superior directly. The laboratory affair was seen as a chal
lenge to the preeminence of Tokyo University (see chapter 4). In nei
ther case did the conflict result exclusively from conditions in Japan.
FORMATION OF THE MEIJI SCIENTIFIC COMMUNITY 8l
Foreign study provided both the occasion and the logic for how they
turned out
As we saw in the case of Takagi's career, beriberi research had gener
ated controversy. Medical literature of the period offered five kinds of
explanations, and the true cause—vitamin B deficiency—was not fully
established until well after World War 1.181 Kitasato and others incor
rectly favored a bacterial explanation but disagreed on major details. In
1886 Ogata Masanori claimed to have isolated a beriberi pathogen but
failed to convince Friedrich Loeffler and Robert Koch, in whose labora
tory Kitasato was working at the time. Koch asked Kitasato, as a Japa
nese national, to publish a rebuttal in Japanese, but Kitasato expressed
reluctance: Ogata was considered Kitasato's senior because he had
graduated from Tokyo University a year earlier, and Kitasato said that
Japanese colleagues would reject open criticism from an ostensibly
junior man. When Koch and Loeffler nonetheless insisted that scien
tific professionalism required frank discussion of scientific issues,
Kitasato wrote two reviews for medical journals. The reviews were
objective and moderate in tone, but they aroused exactly the reactions
he had feared.182 Kato Hiroyuki, the president of Tokyo University,
declared him ignorant of how to behave toward superiors. Two medical
faculty graduates employed in the Ministry of War privately circulated a
pamphlet that accused him of jealousy. Mori Rintaro, chief of the
army's Bureau of Medical Affairs, said that Kitasato was guilty of "exag
gerating science and neglecting human feelings."183
Kitasato's understanding of research arrangements was also affected
by his friendship with Koch. Koch was professor of hygiene at Berlin
University during the years that Kitasato first knew him, but in 1891 he
demanded—and got—a laboratory separated from the university. The
immediate cause for the demand was a setback in his tuberculosis
research that he thought academic colleagues had sabotaged, but for a
more adequate explanation one must refer to his career as a whole.
Koch was a maverick in the German profession. Most German medical
scientists concentrated on research to the exclusion of outside involve
ments, but he was socially engaged and concerned with clinical treat
ment He had only an M.D., and most of his peers held Ph.D.'s. He
espoused the germ theory of disease, while many retained affection for
Virchow's cellular theory. He stressed the need in bacteriology for inti
mate relations between clinical and basic medicine—in an era of grow
ing separation between them.184 Academic associates at Berlin were
especially disturbed by his contacts outside the academy. Impractical
research lines and a medical theory like cellular imbalance, which pre
cluded effective treatment, were a means of assuring autonomy in an
authoritarian political setting, so Koch's germ theory, which opened up
possibilities for effective medical intervention, and the unwelcome at

tention the theory attracted, made professors apprehensive. Koch's con
nections outside the university explain his appointment to the direc
torship of the physiological laboratory of the Imperial Health Office
(1880) and his hygiene professorship at the University of Berlin
(1885). 185
Ironically, external connections also led Koch to abandon his pro
fessorship. Trouble began with an announcement at the Tenth Interna
tional Medical Congress in 1890 that he had discovered tuberculin, a
substance elaborated by the tubercle bacillus. Such announcements
were routine, but this one was not quite typical, because Prussia s
Ministry of Education, which acted as host for the congress, wanted the
propaganda value of a spectacular announcement. Tuberculosis and
efforts to cure it were matters of intense concern to the public, and
Koch s findings suggested a cure but were actually inconclusive. The
situation began to unravel when tests raised serious questions. Tuber
cular patients and physicians specializing in treating them, who had
come to Berlin with high expectations, were angered and greatly disap
pointed. The Prussian Ministry of Education was embarrassed. And
Koch was publicly ridiculed.I8G
Herespondedbyresigningas professor. Heretofore Koch had been a
consultant to the Prussian Ministry of Education and as a professor
subject to its authority. But academic string-pulling in the bureaucracy
and university led him to seek another arrangement: the establishment
of a new laboratory' and a transferal of his consulting function in public
health to his former employer, the Imperial Health Office. In this way
he surmounted the characteristically German separation of basic re
search from clinical medicine that had long troubled him, for example,
when as a professor of basic medicine, he had been required to sur
render the testing of tuberculin to two colleagues in clinical medi
cine. 187 This was standard procedure in German academic medicine,
but earlier experience made it unacceptable to Koch, who asked a com
pliant government to build an independent laboratory designed to his
standards.188 This laboratory, called the Prussian Institute of Infectious
Diseases, provided the kind of inspiration for Kitasato's laboratory, just
as Koch's example molded his career as a whole.
Creating the Role for Research in Japan

Japan in the Meiji and Taisho years created an establishment for scien
tific research without quite creating the researcher role. Universities
were founded, laboratories built, and academic societies established;
but the researcher role remained vaguely denned, inchoate, and sur
rounded by hostile forces. Though a paradoxfromthe view of Western
experience, this circumstance was explicable historically, because no
prior analogue existed for the researcher role. While research had been
done, it had followed no pattern. The country also had a tradition of self-
conscious borrowing and a need to overcome the effects of seclusion.
Officials deemed foreign study a means to that end, and scientists
generally concurred, seeing their ends well served.
But demands for expertise also impeded the establishment of a role
for the researcher. Government needed consultants; business, techni
cians; the public, medical treatment and various other services. Univer
sities provided support for research, but their commitment was ambigu
ous. Economic factors caused delays in establishing the researcher role.
Deprivation (real or imagined) and a commitment to maintaining status
led professors to take on extraneous work, while officials cited shortfalls
of income as an excuse to delay founding laboratories. Scientists found
it difficult to organize professional societies. Mathematicians had to
deal with the legacy of wasan. Chemists and physicists were divided for
a time by different languages of instruction, and medical men were
sometimes distracted by factional infighting.
Some saw overseas study as a threat to the researcher role. Bac
teriologist Sata Yoshihiko contended shortly before World War I that
foreign study was undercutting "a genuine respect for research." There
was "no clear reward" for those who didresearch,nor "anyrealpenalty'
for those who did noL Another writer said ryugaku mostly encouraged
the ability to expound Western scientists' theories. A third charged
foreign study with making Japanese scientists lazy and professionally
complacent As a result of the ease with which one could gain the
"sinecure" of a professorship and a doctorate by publishing "one or two
small papers abroad," many scientists were living "half asleep and [no
more than] half awake."189 Foreign study was superfluous in the opin
ion of such critics, because the technique of how to copy had already
been learned, and Japanese scientists had finally surpassed the
achievements of the foreigners who had taught them at home.190
Debate naturally produced suggestions for change. One was that
ryugaku be drastically reduced in all fields and eliminated entirely in
medicine. Any who did go abroad should spend one year at most in
Europe or America and meet stringent selection criteria. They should
be under thirty-five, fluent in German, French, or English, scientifically
competent, and avoid too much deference to foreigners. The govern
ment shouldreformits priorities for science, too. Students sent abroad
should receive larger stipends and be permitted after returning to
choose their place of employment.191 Physicist Yamakawa Kenjiro took
another approach. As president of Tokyo University, he recommended

in June 1914 that the three-year program be cut down to one, with the
savings to go toward research.192 While Yamakawa planned to spend
savings on facilities, Sata Yoshihiko was thinking ofresearchgrants.193
Even some officials favored changes in priorities. In 1899 Kabayama
Sukenori, then education minister, had proposed some reallocation of
funds from ryugaku. Prime ministers I to Hirobumi and Katsura Taro
later advocated reexamining the matter, and Aoki Shuzo as foreign
minister had actually drawn up a plan for reform. But none of these
proposals went into effect until World War I forced a change. As Ikai
jiho noted ruefully in October 1914: "(Foreign study] is less an educa
tional concern [for science] than an administrative and political
problem."19**
Consulting work and other side jobs (naishoku) were also a threat to
research. Noting the large number of professors working in govern
ment ministries part time, a former vice minister of education, Kubota
Yuzuru, in 1899 lashed out at the practice in a speech to the Peers.
"What research have these professors done? What discoveries have
they made? What have they written?"195 "A large number of university
professors," wrote a commentator in 1914, "are in effect social liaison
officers who ljust] teach society how to apply imported knowledge."196
A physician member of the House of Representatives even argued that
if professors did not do moreresearch,they should be forced toretireto
make room for those who would.197 Moonlighting was definitely wide
spread. The vice minister of education Makino Nobuaki admitted in
1897 that most professors of physics and chemistry were holding down
extra jobs, 198 and Ikai jiho reported that 26 of 30 professors in the
faculty of agriculture were doing so in 1898.199 Strong demands for
engineering talent were said to have "corrupted" most professors in the
faculty of engineering, whereas most professors of clinical medicine
were giving the bulk of their time to treating private patients.200
Discussion of the problem focused on salaries and incentives for
research. Many thought that salaries were at fault The minister of
education Toyama Shoichi described salaries as "very meager" in
1898,201 and in 1900 the former vice minister Kubota said professors
needed "two or three jobs" to make a decent living.202 But salaries were
in fact not all that bad. The range for assistant professors at Tokyo
University in 1893 was 500 to 1,100 yen per annum (42 to 92 yen
monthly), which compared very favorably with the starting minimum
for management trainees at the Mitsui Bank (45 yen per month) or
Shibusawa Eiichi's Dai-Ichi Bank (35 yen per month).203 And fiill pro
fessors got much more—1,300 to "1,900 yen annually in 1893, and
about the same in 1898.2O4
But although professors were reasonably well positioned in 1893 and

even in 1898, their progress slowed later on. Subtracting incentive
payments for research achievements, which ranged from 500 to 700
yen, the base salaries were from 800 to 1,200 yen for full professors in
1893 and in 1907 ranged from 800 to 2,000 yen. The range for assistant
professors increased from a maximum of 600 yen to 1,000 yen in that
period.205 But these sums were just not enough—that is, to alter behav
ior, blaishoku continued because incentives were strong and obstacles
weak. One has only to look at professorial incomes in the faculty of
medicine to see what was really at stake. In 1909, when the average
medical professor's salary was a mere 1,800 yen, the actual total in
comes of selected individuals were: 35,400 yen for a professor of der
matology; 41,000 yen for a professor of otorhinolaryngology; more than
30,000 yen for one of the professors of internal medicine and 16,850 for
another; more than 35,000 for a professor of ophthalmology; and 11,050
yen for a professor of pediatric medicine.206 Professors of basic medi
cine were forbidden to treat patients and so earned far less than their
clinical colleagues. The total income for one professor of hygiene was
3,400 yen, and a professor of biochemistry earned 2,500 yen. Signifi
cantly, the leading researcher in the faculty of medicine, the pathology
professor Yamagiwa Katsusaburo, who nearly won a Nobel Prize (see
chapter 6), had an income that year of just 2,350 yen—the lowest in the
faculty of medicine.207
Nevertheless, prior to the war in 1914 little or nothing was done.
Hamao Arata, the president of the university, did try to terminate out
side employment in the 1890s, and Yamakawa Kenjiro tried once again
in 1913, 208 but the professors fought back. Toyama Shoichi tried to buy
them off in 1898 with promises of higher salaries, but few of his col
leagues at the Ministry of Education shared his concern. Kikuchi
Dairoku, president of the university in 1900, said it was "not necessary
to make Tokyo University a majorresearchcenter."209 Ichiki Kitokuro,
the education minister, in 1914 conceded that professors "should not
fall behind in the progress of scholarship," butflatlyrefusedto take any
action.210
Besides the better pay, why else did naishoku continue? After all, the
practice was never explicitly authorized, only tolerated,211 and it ob
viously clashed with official views of the professor's role in society. "The
professor," wrote Inoue Kowashi in 1893, "will deliver lectures, instruct
students, and carry on research in his [particular] field."212 Three fac
tors explain the persistence of naishoku. Men came into academic life
not only because of their talents but because of.the prestige, and in the
earlier years they were paid well directly and made part of the elite.
Demand for theif-services was great The number of providers was
small. In thirty-eight years (1877-1914) Tokyo University had pro

duced just 14,192 graduates in all fields of study, and none had to face
unemployment.213 As late as 1920, the vice minister of education de
clared that professorial side jobs might be desirable, "considering the
[need for services] in Japan."214
Professional societies also contributed to the researcher role, though

their impact had its limits. The Tokyo Mathematical and Physical Soci
ety, founded 1877, was the oldest of its kind and the most unusual. A
majority of early members (83 of 117) were wasan practitioners, and
the earliest leadership was extremely diverse, including military of
ficers, wasan mathematicians, university professors, and undergradu
ate mathematics majors. Apart from the prospects of cultural enhance
ment, the society wished to "communicate with the public." This issue
of utility led to reform. In 1882 a navy mathematics instructor chal
lenged the society's role in its journal. Pointing to the continuing popu
larity of the traditional uasan-style problem, he described such topics
as the number of circles of X diameter inscribable in a certain sized
polygon as irrational, and their devotees as 'small-minded and petty."
He emphasized the need for technological application and greater prac
ticality, predicting major gains once these changes occurred.215 The
instructor's essay had a potent effect. Most wasan mathematicians left
the society. Several adopted the new notation and sense of problematic
of Western mathematics. The society's journal abruptly changed con
tent, and university professors took control of the leadership. In this
way, the Tokyo Mathematical and Physical Society became a typical
Western-style learned academy.
Westernism thus appeared to triumph completely, but the society's
achievement award was designated the Seki Prize after the founder of
wasan, an open-minded wasan mathematician donated space in his
home for the society's first headquarters, and the wasan community
gave the society its critical early momentum. Unlike most Meiji scien
tific societies, this one was founded by Japanese practitioners. Wasan
was not simply replaced by Western mathematics; it faded into it and
was largely absorbed.216
Societies for physics and chemistry conformed more closely to West
ern models. The Tokyo (later Japan) Chemical Society was founded in
1878 by foreign professors and Tokyo University students; the Physical
Society branched off from it just after World War II, in 1946.217 Each
society published a Western-style journal. The Physical Society's jour
nal appeared quarterly from 1903; the journal of the Tokyo Chemical
Society commenced publication in 1880, expanding in 1887 from four
to ten issues yearly.218 Founders of both societies had Western-style
training. Nearly all had studied in Europe at the doctoral level. Practi
tioners in all subspecialties joined one of the groups, and virtually all
members published papers.
The societies' growth and development were not just a product of
Western conceptions. Many founding figures in both were the sons of
Rangaku scholars and kampo physicians, and local conditions helped to
shape institutions.219 The key local factor was the need for instruction.
Because no single country held the palm in physics and chemistry as of
1868, the Japanese for some years carried on instruction in three Euro
pean languages. Physics had a French-language course (1875), an
English-language course (1873), and a German-language course
(1877), and there was no overarching structure until Tokyo University
opened. This situation naturally led to overseas study in each of the
three language areas. Yamakawa Kenjiro, Tanakadate Aikitsu, and
Sekiya Seikei studied in Britain or the United States in English. Kitao
Jiro, Muraoka Han'ichi. and Shiga Taizan studied in Austria or Ger
many in German. Terao Hisashi, Nakamura Kiyoo, and Miwa Kan
'ichiro studied physics in France or Belgium in French 2 2 0 Returned
foreign students with lecture notes in English found it easiest to lecture
in English. Those with notes on their subject in French could most
efficiently teach in French, and those with German-language notes
preferred to teach physics in German.
Tokyo University's founding initiated a sorting-out process. Tanaka
date was appointed to its faculty of science because instruction in that
unit was in English. Muraoka was appointed in medicine because Ger
man was dominant there. Terao joined the astronomical observatory
because its work was conducted in French.221 Publication of Japanese-
language technical dictionaries finally overcame these divisions. In
1883 the Butsungaku jutsugo jisho (Dictionary of physical terms) ap
peared, and in 1891 the Kagaku yakugo shu (Compilation of chemical
terms) was published. These events made lecturing in Japanese possi
ble and marked the beginning of professional traditions.222
Medicine developed a number of practices that differed from German
ideals. After the middle of the nineteenth century, it was common for
researchers and clinicians in Germany to have separate professional
societies,223 and Japanese medical men also formed specialized so
cieties, for example, for anatomy, pathology, and internal medicine, but
directed much energy elsewhere. Many preferred to take part in one of
the two comprehensive associations whose organizing principles were
strictly political. The Meiji Medical Association (MMA), founded in
1893, included virtually all the clinicians and basic researchers who
had graduatedfromTokyo University or one of the two military medical
academies.224 The Great Japan Medical Society, created at the same
time but often knowrn by other names (for example, Japan Federation of
Medical Societies), included ordinary practitioners trained by private
and provincial medical colleges and researchers with ties to Kitasato. 225
Japanese medicine rejected Germany's exclusion of clinicians from
access to research facilities. 226 In Japan, ordinary practitioners could
use academic research facilities, at least when they had the right politi
cal connections. Clinicians with degrees from an imperial university
could do research at Tokyo University, Kyoto University, Kyushu Uni
versity, or one of their affiliated hospitals; those who had trained at
private or public medical colleges used the facilities of these and related
institutions. 227
But German influence on the formation of medical roles in Japan was
not wholly absent. Following a system pioneered by the Germans and
later adopted by others, the Japanese Ministry of Education did sharply
segregate basic and clinical medicine within the academic setting.
Clinical professors (as we have seen) were allowed to treat private pa
tients, while those in basic medicine were forbidden to do so. 2 2 8 Prac
tice in Japan, however, did not conform strictly to practice in Germany.
Professors of basic medicine, while barred from clinical practice, were
not excluded from organizations like the MMA that were seemingly
limited to clinicians. Several professors at Tokyo University served as
presidents of the MMA, and the first president of the Great Japan Medi
cal Society was a professor of anatomy at Tokyo. 229 None of this implied
separation between the roles of practitioner and clinical researcher.
German professors of clinical medicine, while treating private patients,
nevertheless honored the academic ideal. 230 Clinical professors at Japa
nese universities gave most of their time to treating private patients. 231
CHAPTER FOUR
LAYING THE INSTITUTIONAL

FOUNDATIONS OF SCIENCE
Japan took its time creating institutions for research. The research
conducted in the Tokugawa period had followed no discernible pattern.
By 1868 some technical studies were stronger than others, but none
were established securely. So wide was the gap between Japan and the
West that just catching up would consume vast resources. But catching
up began once the new regime was in place, and Japan in due time built
its own institutions. Many difficult questions arose in the process.
Should research be linked to industrial development? What purpose
could it serve in manpower training? Should it be concentrated in high
er education? Was original research necessary? If it were true, as many
believed, that everything could be copied, perhaps Japanese needed
only to absorb what the scientists of Europe had discovered. >
Debate focused at the time on policy essentials. Could one build on
Tokugawa achievements? Who should initiate and carry out policies7
After all, traditionally the government had controlled scholarly activity
Privateresourceswere arguably so weak in Meiji Japan that the govern
ment had to be active.2 But even assuming government sponsorship,
the question was how it should act What Western models could Japa
nese adopt? What should inform specific application? Should academic
growth be based entirely on enrollments? Should other factors also be
taken into account?
Japanese debate about research institutions was very sophisticated,
all things considered. Decision makers followed European develop
ments, but they never adopted Western models unchanged. They never
proposed to build laboratories solely because foreigners had done so.
NOT did they introduce features of foreign universities—privat
dozenten, the one-chair rule—simply because they worked well (or
were thought to work well) in their country of origin.3 One is constantly
impressed by the quality of discussion on how these features would
work in Japan and whether they were needed at all. Officials sometimes
realized that science had needs separate from society's. They did not
base decisions about academic institutions solely on enrollments or
what business wanted.
9O LAYING THE INSTITUTIONAL FOUNDATIONS
The salient issue in institution building was the country's need for
original research, and the history of this issue was mixed. Alternate
Attendance had diffused information. Daimyo domains had competed
with each other. Tokugawa physicians had had some autonomy and
occasional incentive to promote innovations. But private institutions
had often been weak, deficient in funding, and coopted by government.
Tokugawa scholarly institutions all had significant defects: unspecific
programs, inefficient operations, and restraints on real competition.
Nevertheless, the motivations and views of Meiji decision makers were
varied and wide-ranging. A mainstream view minimized research, but
its premises were frequendy challenged. Scientists who had worked
abroad for some years insisted that Japan must conduct its own re
search. Commercial organizations that were challenged in the mar
ketplace decided that research must be part of their strategy. Physician
politicians with scientific training promoted the cause of research while
in office. The role of these groups in building institutions was important
at the time but transcends their own era. With the outbreak of war in
1914, the proresearch movement became the new mainstream.
Early Post-Restoration Developments

Institutional developments in the earliest Meiji years (1868-73) were
ad hoc and poorly coordinated. Political confusion impeded most
changes in 1868, but some initiatives were launched in the next two
years. At Numazu, site of the first Western-style military academy,
Japan's first program for science education was established early in
1869. The Osaka Medical Academy opened its doors in December,
while the former Bunseki Kyuri Jo of Nagasaki was reorganized in
Osaka as the Osaka School of Chemistry. In December 1870 a compara
ble institution started up in Kyoto with the aim of fostering scientific
techniques in the ceramics and lacquerware industries of that city.
Dutch instructors staffed the two schools and attracted several pupils
later active in research.4
Poor coordination and ad hoc efforts had their historical cause in the
relatively decentralized scientific activities of the Tokugawa shogunate.
Individual domains controlled their own schools, diffusion of knowl
edge in somefieldswas restricted, there were no national organizations
of scientists or physicians, and the fields of mathematics and physical
science, related in Europe, in Japan belonged to different classes.5 The
society valued each technical discipline differently. Medicine enjoyed
broad social support, widespread official encouragement, a network of
supporting institutions, and the beginnings of Western-style profes
LAYING THE INSTITUTIONAL FOUNDATIONS 91
sionalism.6 Chemistry, biology, and botany were modestly prosperous

because of their links to medicine but were not yet recognized as dis
tinct fields. Mathematics, despite remarkable progress before the mid-
eighteenth century, had consigned itself to cultural irrelevance. Phys
ics was subject to suspicion.7
Meiji officials confronting this legacy soon adopted anractivist pos
ture. They terminated the system of traditional statuses and began to
create scientific institutions. Especially active were Okubo Toshimichi,
grandson of a distinguished Tokugawa physician, and ltd Hirobumi,
sometime pupil of A. W. Williamson. Okubo concentrated primarily on
medicine, ltd on engineering and much of basic science. Using the
control of public health afforded him as home affairs minister, Okubo in
1877 developed Japan's first program for attacking contagious disease,
together with a campaign to counter beriberi.8 I to helped develop the
Imperial College of Engineering (Kobu Daigakkd) and later exerted his
influence on Tokyo University.9
Okubo's initiative was not routine, since bacteriology was still in its
infancy. "Much controversy existed as to whether contagious diseases
were even caused by bacteria."10 It6 also was very forward-looking. On
the recommendation of Williamson s friend Lord Kelvin, he invited the
young British engineer Henry Dyer to Japan in 1871 and gave him a
free hand and sufficient funds to develop one of the world's first com
prehensive institutions for basic science and engineering. Dyer's four-
year program included physics and chemistry, mechanical, civil, and
mining engineering, and courses in the strength of materials. It relied
almost entirely on a British teaching staff.'' No one graduated from it
until 1879, but its founding was still remarkable. Only France and
Switzerland had comparable institutions. There was nothing like the
college in Dyer's own country nor even in Germany before the Franco-
Prussian War (1870-71). l2
The most important innovation was Japan's first university. In April
1877 Tokyo University emerged from a combination of Tokugawa
schools, and it gradually expanded.13 In 1886 it acquired the Imperial
College of Engineering, a school of graduate studies, and the formal
appellation "imperial university." Widely referred to as saiko gakufu, or
"supreme institution of learning," Tokyo University became Japan's
leading "window for the importation of Western knowledge" and gradu
ally a center for research as well. This was not smooth transition, since
many wished to restrict the university to educating undergraduate stu
dents, while others had a broader conception.
Establishing a comprehensive university was far from simple. Meiji
leaders had inherited three institutions from the Tokugawa state—the
Kaisei Gakko, Igakko, and Shoheiko—but did not agree on their
92 LAYING THE INSTITUTIONAL FOUNDATIONS
futures. The Kaisei Gakko had been created under the name Bansho
Shirabesho after the Perry expedition (1853) but actually traced its
lineage to the Office of Astronomy (Temmongata, founded 1684). It
primarily taught foreign languages and natural science. l4 The 1 gakko
had existed under various names from the middle of the eighteenth
century and had taught kampo medicine. But the seventeenth-century
Shoheiko, with its Confucian curriculum, was seen as the most basic
unit. The prior history of these institutions implied a role for the univer
sity different from Western conceptions. In 1868-70, the government
envisioned a university that would censor newspapers and books; inves
tigate (kokyu) and teach languages, mathematics, geography, science,
history, medicine, and kokugaku and Confucian studies as guarantors
of social harmony and national power; and administer state-owned edu
cational facilities in Tokyo, Osaka, and Nagasaki.15 This scheme proved
totally unworkable. Confucian scholars hated its Westernizing aspects,
the censorship functions were reassigned elsewhere, and the plan was
finally abandoned.16
Mindful of the need for Western-style experts, some officials favored
higher professional schools (semmon gakko). But others, including the
Kaisei Gakko director Kato Hiroyuki and the vice minister of education
Tanaka Fujimaro. championed the idea of the comprehensive univer
sity. In 1875, Tanaka proposed—and the government nearly ap
proved—establishing a comprehensive university in rural Chiba pre
fecture, on the grounds that Western universities were generally built
in "elegant, secluded places far from the commotion of urban environ
ments." In February 1877. Kato asked the Ministry of Education to
change "Kaisei Gakko" to "Tokyo Daigaku," or Tokyo University, to
convey the school's function more accurately. "It is misleading to use a
name for our institution so [fundamentally] different from those in the
West"17
Kato's letter raised an issue of importance. In the early years, the
university was clearlyregardedby many as a "training school for offi
cials," somewhere between a middle school and a German Universitdt.
The Gakusei edict of 1872, which envisioned a network of eight univer
sities, mentioned only teaching as the purpose. Research is hardly ever
mentioned in the earliest official documents, but interest in it gradually
developed.18 In 1880 Kato, citing the absence of a graduate school, was
able to establish a special research course at Tokyo University for uni
versity graduates who wanted further study. Returning ryugakusei
brought research interest with them. And prominent officials like ltd
Hirobumi began to see that research activities could divert professors
from involvement in politics.19
Policies toward particular disciplines continued to differ during the
early Meiji period. The Kaisei Gakko from which the faculties of letters,
science, and law derived represented a basic, new concept in Japanese
education; but the I gakko and its modern successor, the faculty of
medicine, were seen to some extent as a single tradition. The post-
Restoration medical school continued for some years to use facilities
that were built by the shogunate. Some of its Japanese instructors were
the same as before. By 1869 experimentation (jikken), if not research,
was described as its function. In contrast, the instructors of the Kaisei
Gakko were all dismissed by the new Meiji government, new facilities
were built in a wholly Western style, and any conception of genuine
research was subsumed under the tepid "inquiry" (ri o kiwame).20
None of this mattered in the early Meiji years, but it did make a dif
ference later on, when research conditions, poor in most fields, were not
quite so bad in medicine.
Tokyo University was institutionally innovative in more than a Japa
nese context. Its inclusion of engineering (1886) and agriculture
(1890) in the curriculum indicates a forward-looking policy rarely en
countered in Europe. Engineering acquired prestige in Japan because
of its connection with the Japanese government and origin in advanced
Western countries,21 but its formal position in the academic system was
higher than in Europe. When the university was founded in 1877, its
college of science had departments of chemistry, mathematics, physics
and astronomy, biology, geology, and engineering all together on a basis
of equality.22
The government gave considerable support to other institutions, as it
did to Tokyo University. The first nonacademic technical agency estab
lished (in 1871) was the navy's Hydrographic Department, charged
with coastal and ocean surveying. Creation in 1884 of a similar land
survey department affiliated with the army may suggest that military
considerations were of primary concern, but most officials were more
interested in the resource base for civilians. The Tokyo Meteorological
Station and Central Meteorological Observatory were established in
1875; the home ministry's Geological Survey materialized in 1878, and
the Geological Survey Institute in 1882. Agriculture programs were
especially well supported. The Naito Shinjuku Testing Station opened
in 1872, the Mita Plant Nursery in 1877, the Forestry Experiment
Station in 1878, and the Tokyo Agricultural Experiment Station in
1882. Rounding out the list were the Drug Control Station (later Tokyo
Hygiene Institute [1874]) and the Komaba and Sapporo agricultural
colleges (1876). 23
Anxiety about manpower skills was a potent incentive to activism.
Foreign experts could be hired to carry out vital tasks, but nationalism
and finances made their long-term use unpalatable, so additional strat
egies were devised. One early effort relied on feudal coercion. In 1870
the government ordered all daimyo territories according to size and
wealth to dispatch students to the Kaisei Gakko, only to discover that
insufficient student motivation—and less preparation—made this
strategy ineffectual.24 More realistic policies followed this so-called
tribute (koskin) system. In 1873 the government began granting
scholarships to students in technical fields. Many, sometimes a major
ity, of students at the Imperial College of Engineering, Komaba Agri
cultural college, Sapporo Agricultural College, and the College of Sci
ence at Tokyo University in the 1870s and 1880s received not only
tuition and fees but access to the refectory, free lodging, and a clothing
allowance.25
Other new programs were also created. Within the new engineering
faculty special departments of arms technology and explosives were
established in 1887. These initiatives were taken to secure engineers
for military arsenals and were unprecedented in Western countries.26
The government, of course, was intent on results. Until 1897 students
in technical programs had no electives in their academic major, and the
level of performance demanded was high. At Tokyo's science depart
ment failure on a single examination meant cancellation of the schol
arship; failure on a second, dismissal.27
The poor state of research facilities was one reflection of the bias
toward training. It has even been argued that Japanese universities and
schools were established in this period only to import foreign science,
not to create knowledge.28 In 1878 the physicist Tanakadate Aikitsu
was unimpressed with the physics laboratory at Tokyo University,
whose equipment comprised a professor's desk, three small tables,
three instrument cabinets, a heliostat for light experiments, and a cur
tain to make a darkroom.29 In 1879 T. C. Mendenhall and his four
students "built everything with their own hands" because there was
"no experimental equipment at all."30 In 1880 the physicist Yamakawa
Kenjiro was only slightly more hopeful. "Unfortunately we are depen
dent on foreign supplies. . . . While poorly equipped for work in elec
tricity and magnetism, we do have equipment for optics, acoustics, and
heat studies."31
Other laboratory facilities were also inadequate. German professors
in Tokyo's medical school constantly complained of the lack of equip
ment in the late 1870s.32 The zoologist Charles O. Whitman lamented
the deficiencies in marine biology, in 1881 calling Tokyo University
"inferior in every particular" to European institutions, upbraiding his
colleagues for their lack of research, and castigating the government for
indifference.
Will any Japanese admit that Dai Nippon, with its 34,000,000
inhabitants, is not able to support one first-class university?
Any science that offers small opportunities for pilfering
squeezers,' makes no promise to improve the rice crop or the
flavor of the sake, serves none of the wants of sensual pleasure,
jingles no bells, and refuses to make use of the sop offlattery,may
be suffered to exist for the sake of appearances, but it is certain to
be stigmatized as unprofitable.33
The inglorious fate of the Tokyo Academy appears to support Whit-

man's view. Toward the end of 1878 education ministry adviser David
Murray had called the attention of Vice Minister Tanaka Fujimaro to
the contributions of foreign science academies to the development of
their respective national states and formally proposed that Japan join
their ranks by creating its own academy of science. Seven members of
the former Meirokusha society learned of Murray's suggestion and add
ed their endorsement Tanaka and these seven met together and agreed
on a number of points: academicians were to choose their own mem
bers, beginning with the nucleus of seven, up to a total of forty; all the
arts and sciences were to berepresented;the minister of education was
to "approve" all appointments; members would meet periodically to
discuss various topics, including current policies of the Ministry of
Education; a ministryrepresentativewould attend each meeting; mem
bers would receive annual stipends of three hundred yen; and the
government would recognize the academy officially. *4
Nothing went as the sponsors had hoped. The academy lost its most
committed supporter when Tanaka fell from power late in 1879, and
few other officials wanted a science academy purely for national pres
tige.35 Instead, they were concerned with useful results, which were
not always quickly forthcoming. Observers like the chemist Sakurai Joji
hinted that this might be due to the small number of natural scientists
who belonged to the academy—only one in 1879, two in 1885, and
seven in 1898.36 Kato Hiroyuki said it was because the government
thought the members were "physical decrepits with no ability."37
Hasegawa Tai claimed itresultedfrom the members' "excessive defer
ence to officialdom," elicited by the overbearing presence of their for
mer Meirokusha colleague Mori Arinori in the office of minister of
education.38 A present-day historian attributes the stagnation to cuts in
support accompanying the Matsukata Deflation (1880-82). 39 Kato
summarized the feelings of contemporary intellectuals when he
claimed that the failure of the Tokyo academy, was a major disgrace to
the nation.40
But Kato's judgment lacked perspective. Meiji Japan had plenty of

other problems: a civil insurrection to put down (1876-77), samurai
indebtedness to resolve, children to educate, technicians to be trained,
factories to be built. It needed to construct railroads and set up modem
communications. Military reform demanded attention, as did medical
care and modern public health. Moreover, Kato's and Whitman's
charges are based on invidious comparisons, which historical facts do
not justify. Conditions in Europe's best universities were better than
those at Tokyo University, but they had reached that level quite re
cently. Prior to 1800 all European universities were supposed to pass on
received information, not create knowledge.41 Only in 1827 did Justus
von Lie big build the first research laboratory in a German university
(Giessen); Britain had nothing comparable until 1845. There was some
expansion of facilities in the 1850s and 1860s. but research laboratories
came to be considered an indispensable feature of the modern univer
sity only after the Franco-Prussian War.42
Nor was the desirability of a science academy clear for Japan at that
time. Men like Galileo, Sprat, and Colbert had promoted them in the
seventeenth century because the universities of their day were hostile
to science, and they spread because the conditions that spawned them
persisted.43 Even in the eighteenth century science remained a modest
component of European culture, despite its growing reputation. Scien
tists were either wealthy or practiced another occupation, and patrons
belonged to the aristocracy or the affluent, rising middle class. Univer
sities continued to reflect the conservative views of the landed elite, and
governments that supported science academies, like that of Russia, did
so for reasons of national prestige.44 None of this changed before the
French Revolution; the functions of academies changed first Rather
than performing contract research at official (or private) instigation,
their primary mission was now to honor scientists. To the founders'
dismay, the American National Academy of Sciences, created in 1863,
served only this honorific function.45 The St Petersburg Academy of
mid-nineteenth century Russia lost some of its research to the reformed
universities.46
The late 1880s brought changes in conditions for Japanese research.
During Tokyo University's first eight years the college of science had
functioned with makeshift quarters, but in September 1885 new facili
ties were completed at the main Hongo campus. The two new buildings
were described by one physicist as elegant Modeled on the buildings at
Berlin University, they had red brick facing and slate-tiled roofs. Chem
istry laboratories and classrooms filled the second floor of one of the
buildings, while physics and mathematics occupied the first47 The
following year was equally momentous, with three major changes on
the Tokyo campus. The Imperial College of Engineering was moved to

Hongo and merged with the engineering component of the college of
science to form a new faculty of engineering. The science and medical
colleges also became faculties, and the graduate school was established.
Creation of several nonacademic laboratories further expanded Japa
nese capacities for research. The Nishigahara Silk Experiment Station
was built in 1886, the Experiment Station of the Bureau of Forestry and
the Misaki Institute for Marine Life Studies requested by Whitman in
1887, and the Tokyo University Observatory in 1888.
These developments were part of a quest for useful knowledge. The
prominent statesman Okuma Shigenobu declared in 1884 that tech
nical research would help Japanese industry, and the Imperial Univer
sity Ordinance (1886) made the same point.48 For thus reason a number
of facilities for applied technical research were established. In 1891 the
Electrotechnical Laboratory appeared, followed by the Central Institute
for Weights and Measures (1903), the Fermentation Laboratory (also
1903), and the Railways Research Institute (1907). Their direction and
the timing of their creation were affected by several different factors.
For one thing, German achievements with scientific institutions
were arousing some interest in Japan. The German technische Hoch
schulen (higher technical schools) were teaching engineering in a sys
tematic, straightforward manner. British-style hands-on experience
was valuable, and Japanese did work in Britain to acquire it, but the
schoolroom approach was faster and generally more efficient. Second,
Germany had more industry-oriented laboratories, with higher levels of
funding, than any other country. Because of this, W. H. Perkin, founder
of the modern dye industry, left Britain for Germany in 1856. Germany's
chemical industry surpassed Britain's.49 Third, the German univer
sities had established the world's first advanced training programs in
medicine and basic science, attracting students from many other coun
tries and eliciting fulsome praise from foreign academic reformers.
Nevertheless, officials in Japan were unwilling to adopt the German
system wholesale. The Germans gave insufficient recognition to disci
plines that they valued highly. Applied technicalfieldslike engineering
and agriculture were established in German academic institutions, but
they were not accepted in German universities.50 They were taught
instead in the higher technical schools and had an implied lack of
prestige. Japanese complained also about German organization. By the
last quarter of the nineteenth century there were some twenty-eight
German-speaking universities adhering more or less to a common set of
traditions. Each field of knowledge at each university was represented
by a single full professor, and professors had almost total control over
the internal affairs of their institutions. Auxiliary, subordinate faculty
members were appointed as needed. Private lecturers were allowed to

offer courses as a means of stimulating academic competition, and they,
together with the students, moved almost at will from university to
university. Japanese officials were ambivalent about this system. Some
praised its freedom of movement. Others thought itrevealeda commit
ment to learning. But most just considered it far too expensive for Japan
to adopt.
Universityrelationswith the German imperial government were also
a source of objections. Although Germany by the last quarter of the
century was a unified nation, the states stillretainedextensive authori
ty, including much power in the area of education. The Universities of
Berlin, Munich, and Heidelberg were state institutions, but the
provinces controlled them, not the central government. Because the
Meiji leaders wanted a highly centralized state, they investigated other
models and were attracted to the French. French education had two
major virtues from their point of view. It was highly centralized, with
the University of Paris and the Ministry of Public Instruction at the top
of a bureaucratic hierarchy, and the makeup of each component al
lowed professorships to be created as needed.
Meiji leaders efforts to centralize also had their centripetal effects.
Many wealthy farmers, now freed of the daimyo, preferred to befreeof
Tokyo as well. Christians and certain intellectuals often aspired to a
higher moral end than the Meiji state and its all-pervasive cult of Shinto
and the emperor. Some physicians cherished the freewheeling tradi
tions of a loosely regulated profession. Samurai from formerly pro-
Tokugawa domainsresentedthe Satsuma-Choshu leadership for block
ing their political advancement. Such attitudes matter here because
they impinged on research: groups with otherwise disparate interests
would conspire in the areas of research and academic policy.
Diet Politics and Science in the 1890s

The 1890s was a watershed period for Japanese science in the years
before World War I. Professors from Europe and North America had
returned to their homes by 1900. Gaps in basic knowledge, which had
previously loomed so large, were in most cases bridged by the end of this
decade.51 The university chair system was created in 1893, Kyoto Uni
versity was founded in 1897, and the government began making com
mitments to basic research. Government initiatives—replacing for
eigners with Japanese professors or founding new chairs—were
particularly conspicuous. But by no means did officials take every for
ward step. Private individuals and groups were also active.
The Imperial Diet, founded in 1890, was the principal instrument

they used. Given the parliament's character and subsequent history,
this is rather surprising, but circumstances made using the Diet effec
tive in this period. The creation of a representative assembly as a coun
terpoise to the leadership and the imperial bureaucracy had been a
central demand of the popular rights movement in the 1870s and
1880s. After the general election of 1890, the first under the new con
stitution, many rich farmers, businessmen, and professionals (includ
ing several physicians) became members of the Diet and began to
oppose the leadership. In 1890 the new parliament cut the budget by
about 10 percent In 1891 it filibustered legislation. In 1892 it almost
impeached the cabinet, and in 1893 it sent a letter to the emperor which
sought dismissal of Prime Minister ltd.32 Some of this behavior was
motivated by a desire to establish its place in the constitutional system
of an autocratic state, but some of it also reflected commitments to
particular policies.
Advancing research in Japanese agriculture was one of the goals of
the Diet. Reflecting the size of the agricultural economy and the Ameri
can Morrill Act precedent (1862) that established agricultural colleges,
the Meiji government had awarded small subsidies for testing and re
search in 1886 and in 1890 had expanded the Agricultural Experiment
Station at Komaba in Tokyo. In 1895 it established a seven-facility
network, but this failed to satisfy the need or demand for a much greater
effort in agricultural research. Further expansion was limited by finan
cial commitments and allegedly by staff shortages, and the way was
open for private individuals to launch their own proposals. A group of
Shizuoka tea growers began agitating for a tea industry experiment
station in 1895. The same year saw legislation introduced to provide
modest subsidies to eighteen local and prefectural facilities. And Naha
Kiyoshi, who had founded an entomological laboratory in 1896, re
quested a subvention in 1899.
Private proposals for research in agriculture were all rejected at first.
In part this was because of costs. Naha's backers requested only 3,000
yen over afive-yearperiod, but the tea growers' proposal and that for the
additional experiment stations called for much larger sums—10,000
and 150,000 yen each year, respectively. As the chief of the Bureau of
Agriculture declared during the Sino-Japanese War: "The government
recognizes the need for these experiment stations but cannot grant
subsidies because of heavy military spending." 53 But cost was just one
of the problems. Did the country have enough agricultural researchers
to manage an expanded program? The Bureau of Agriculture chief
claimed in apparent good faith (but contrary to fact) that research work
ers were not sufficiently numerous. 54 Could they work with farmers
IOO LAYING THE INSTITUTIONAL FOUNDATIONS
and officials? Representative Nakamura Yaroku, who had a B.S. degree

in physics, a D.Sc. in forestry, yet was an opponent of subsidies, said the
researchers who were already working talked over farmers' heads,
while a colleague who favored expansion noted accusations of re
searchers' condescension toward officials.55
The major obstacle in the 1890s was fear of the national government
Most officials approved of subsidies and considered them desirable in
principle; the private sector wanted them desperately but was divided
on the probable effects. Some farmers and their representatives put
economic interests ahead of political concerns; others did just the re
verse. Throughout the 1890s members of the Diet who had either taken
part in the popular rights movement or were actively sympathetic de
picted agricultural research subsidies as a means of intervention by
Tokyo. As Representative Komatsu Sanshd declared in 1896: "When
the government exerts itself to help in such matters, it almost always
creates unendurable interference. . . . If we want to promote popular
rights at all. if we truly wish to defend local autonomy, I am firmly
convinced that we cannot ask for state support and at the same time
avoid the interference by government that [usually] accompanies such
proposals."56 Government finances eased by 1900, and these scruples
were partially overcome. Local experiment stations' first subsidies were
awarded that year; and the Naha Laboratory got support two years later.
But the tea growers had to wait until 1919.
Medical research was also of concern to both private and public
sectors. In the latter seventeenth century government sponsorship had
launched Western studies of anatomy, and in the eighteenth century,
studies of smallpox vaccination. But subsequent breakthroughs in dis
section and anesthesia were made by private physicians, creating a
mixed history that set the stage in Meiji Japan for a complex set of
relationships. The predominant tendency was for the private sector to
be the innovator, while government agencies provided the research
infrastructure and financed important separate projects. But some new
research projects were launched by government agencies, and some
private agencies wanted their own infrastructure. These political trends
led to bitter conflicts between those who wished to keep public and
private separate and those who wanted to merge them.
The establishment of the Institute of Infectious Diseases in 1893
illustrates these crosscurrents. The institute was the most important
research facility built in Japan before World War I, and its legal spon
sorship and initial funding came from the private sector, but the Diet
provided a subsidy, approved only after a plan for full state funding had
been rejected. Executive direction of the laboratory was vested in
Kitasato Shibasaburo, a scientist and low-ranking official at that time.
LAYING THE INSTITUTIONAL FOUNDATIONS IOI
The leading parliamentary sponsor of the subsidy was an irascible phy

sician who had moved freely between the public and private sectors; the
subsidy plan's leading opponent had previously been president of Tokyo
University. All this begins to show the complexity of the forces at work,
but to explain the outcome one must consider the social position of
Tokyo University, the effects of the popular rights movement, and the
impact of German precedents in organizing medical research.
The Institute of Infectious Diseases resulted from spectacular
achievements by bacteriologists in the 1870s and 1880s, but its imme
diate inception traces to the discovery of tuberculin by Koch (1890). As
noted earlier, his description of the substance as a cure for tuberculosis
proved highly controversial and inspired further efforts to clarify the
issues. The bureaucratic structure of medicine in Japan strongly influ
enced these efforts. One program to study tuberculin was initiated by
physicians in the Ministry of Home Affairs, where public health pro
grams were housed, and a second was directed by several university
professors—subject to control by the Ministry of Education. The two
agencies then developed plans for follow-up research as the testing
proceeded. Inevitably, each ministry submitted plans to the cabinet for
a research facility of its own.57
Kitasato's role in the subsequent conflict was a major and enduring
complication. Adamantly opposed to any affiliation with the Ministry of
Education, he had rejected Tokyo University's invitation to join its fac
ulty upon returning to Japan late in 1891 and instead sought private
support for his work. With the backing of Fukuzawa Yukichi, indus
trialist Morimura Ichizaemon, and a private medical foundation called
the Great Japan Hygiene Society (Dai Nihon Shiritsu Eisei Kai), he
managed to open a small laboratory for bacteriological studies in Sep
tember 1892. It soon proved too small. Lacking the money for expan
sion, the society persuaded one of its members, Hasegawa Tai, also a
member of the Diet, to request a subsidy from the national govern
ment In the meantime, the cabinet of Prime Minister ltd Hirobumi
had decided to seek approval of the education ministry's proposal,
which would have created a bacteriological laboratory in conjunction
with Tokyo University.58 This line-up offerees set the stage for a long-
term struggle.
Sponsorship and control were the issues. Both proposals called for
Kitasato to be named research director, but with varying definitions of
authority. Hasegawa's bill assigned him control over budget and staff
appointments and made him a consultant to the Bureau of Public
Health. TTie proposal of the Ministry of Education made no mention of
consultancy and denied him executive independence.59 Particularly
intense debate focused on the role of Tokyo University. Hasegawa
IO2 LAYING THE INSTITUTIONAL FOUNDATIONS
wanted to exclude it completely. According to him, the university did

not need an infectious diseases laboratory because it already had a small
laboratory for hygiene directed by Ogata Masanori. Moreover, the sepa
ration between basic and clinical medicine in the faculty was likely to
obstruct Kitasato's work just as the same structure at Berlin had done
with Koch s. Finally, he argued, the Ministry of Education would proba
bly interfere with Kitasato's work, given the history of conflict between
them.60
Opponents, however—especially the former university president
Watanabe Koki—insisted that the university's role should be large and
argued that private sponsorship was wrong. According to Watanabe,
Tokyo University was Japan's pacesetter for all advanced learning. Gov
ernment sponsorship was necessary because of Kitasato's background
of employment in public health and support from a government schol
arship. Koch's laboratory in Germany was government-funded, so
Kitasato's should be as well. Private sponsorship of such an important
facility might give foreign countries the idea that Japan did not value
research too highly, and supporting someone whose ties with the Minis
try of Education were so strained seemed inherently undesirable.61
The government lost the debate. At the conclusion of formal argu
ment the Diet rejected the education ministry's request for 34,659 yen
and instead awarded the Kitasato group 20,000 yen for construction
and 45,000 yen for three years' operations. This decision did not end the
conflict. Watanabe was so bitterly opposed to what he called the "pri
vate" development of science that he led a campaign to block construc
tion of the new institute. He became a leading spokesman for residents
of Tokyo's Shiba Park district, where the facility was to be built. They
objected to its presence in their neighborhood for a variety of aesthetic,
financial, and hygienic grounds and tried to block implementation of
the enabling legislation. Their opposition failed for a number of reasons.
Kitasato was indispensable—Japan really had no other bacteriologists
at that time—and his supporters proved politically adept Hasegawa
and other backers explained the work of the similarly constituted Koch
and Pasteur institutes in lectures for the general public, they gained the
active support of several Tokyo newspapers, and Kitasato himself held a
series of meetings with delegations of Shiba Park residents. Their suc
cess was assured when the press called Watanabe's movement irra
tional and subjected his actions to "indiscriminate ridicule."62
The legacy of ties between government and variousfieldsof learning
gave Watanabe's views greater currency than his failure suggests. At
tempts to control certain disciplines were by no means eliminated by
the collapse of the Tokugawa shogunate in 1868. Public discussion in
the Meiji period regularly featured conflict between the so-called
LAYING THE INSTITUTIONAL FOUNDATIONS IO3
shigaku (private learning) and kangaku (state learning) perspectives,

focusing on the extent or incidence of private-sector initiative to be
permitted in technical studies.63 Meiji leaders frequently inclined to
ward kangaku but had to accept alternatives. Fukuzawa Yukichi thus
created a medical school at Keio (1874), Okuma Shigenobu an en
gineering program at Waseda (1882) and Niijima Jo a full-fledged sci
ence and engineering college, the Harris School of Science, at Doshisha
(1889). But these actions were only grudgingly tolerated, and all three
programs foundered. The Keio medical program closed down in 1876,
Okuma's engineering course terminated in 1884. and the Harris School
shut its doors in 1897.64 While their circumstances differed, govern
ment refusal to grant these institutions legal equality with Tokyo Uni
versity was a common factor 6 5
Other aspirations and views also contributed to the conflict. Activists
in the popular rights movement, which had directed public anger
against the leadership's power monopoly, took a strong position in favor
of private education and consistently opposed efforts by the education
ministry to restrict freedom of action. Shimada Saburo, Kono Hironaka,
and Hasegawa Tai, who had helped to found the Liberal and Pro
gressive parties (Jiyuto and Kaishinto), all sponsored the subsidy legis
lation for Kitasato's laboratory, criticizing the views of the Ministry of
Education. Hasegawa ran a private medical academy, the Zaisei
Gakusha, which the ministry repeatedly tried to close.66
Confronting them were the government's constitutional advisers
from Germany and their like-thinking Japanese followers. Lorenz von
Stein in 1882 and Herman Roesler in 1890 warned Japanese officials
about what they considered to be the political dangers of private educa
tion. Roesler prepared a memorandum for the education ministry prof
fering this advice: "Ideas and opinions based on science [emphasis
added] determine the nature and the scope of people's knowledge and
exert great influence on their ideas about. . . law, politics, religion, the
state, and society. . . (For this reason] higher education should never
b e . . . private."67 To their credit, however, many Japanese officials
rejected this basic philosophy. In a celebratedriposteto an 1879 memo
randum on the same subject by Emperor Meiji's Confucian lecturer, I to
Hirobumi had dismissed the notion of ineluctable "spillover" from sci
ence to society, arguing that it was actually the politicizing tendency of
Confucianism rather than the rationalism of science that encouraged
seditious or subversive activities.68
Decisions about infrastructure, however, continued to generate con
troversy. Was the level of spending correct? How many universities
should there be? How should they be organized? Was an upgraded
science academy desirable? If so, what should it do? Could the German
private-lecturer system invigorate the learned establishment? How

should professorships be allocated by fields? The cleavages created by
these issues were sharp, and they differed from their common por
trayals. They did not center on which models to adopt, but on how to
combine elements of a number of models. Nor was the conflict between
officials—allegedly advocating German models—and spokesmen for
the private sector favoring modelsfromBritain or France. Instead Ger
man experience set parameters for debate over a "mixed Continental"
system.69
These debates were also ironic in view of the apparent firmness of
policy. A broad array of well-funded programs was supposed to exist,
with access dependent on and proportional to the number of high
school graduates. Professors were supposed to carry on research and
teaching together. And the Ministry of Education was supposed to
supervise a network of seven or eight institutions.70 But serious prob
lems existed in each of these areas and others. There were comprehen
sive programs, but funding was precarious. Many more students
qualified for university admission than one institution could possibly
accommodate. Faculty members wereregularlyaccused of indolence or
lethargy in research, and only one university—Tokyo—was actually
operating. These difficulties, however understandable, gave critics
more room for maneuvering. Representative Kamino Ryo attacked the
concentration in Tokyo of educational resources.7' The education jour
nal Kokka kyoiku deplored the lack of competition among both pro
fessors and students.72 Hasegawa Tai, criticizing the relatively high
ratio of professors to students, labeled Tokyo a "caricature of a foreign
university."73 Such attacks were more than rhetoric. In 1890 the Diet
tried to cut the university's budget by 17 percent—and did reduce it 6
percent in 1892.74
In 1893 the Ministry of Education took steps to respond to outside
pressure. Acting on a proposal from the former university president
Kato Hiroyuki, Minister Inoue Kowashi decided on a change in the
university's structure. Hisreformcalled for establishment of a faculty
chair system. Before this time, Tokyo University had operated under a
department structure that many had attacked for inefficiency. Pro
fessors in a given academic unit—law, medicine, engineering—had
been responsible for teaching any of its courses. This encouraged intel
lectualflexibility,but it impeded specialization and was thought to raise
costs. Inoue wanted a sharper demarcation of professorial responsibility
so he couldreplacecostly foreigners and reduce expenses. After study
ing university organization in Germany and France, he created a chair
system suited to Japan. Each professor wasresponsiblefor a specialty.
Multiple chairs were established in certain high-demand fields. Occu
pants of chairs exercised formal academic and financial control over

younger faculty and graduate students in their areas, and a two-part
compensation system awarded extra funds to the more productive pro
fessors and laboratories.75
Short-term results from these changes were mixed. Some money
was saved. The initial scheme presumed creation of 152 chairs for the
university. Inoue reduced this to 125, but even this number allowed for
expansion of the teaching staff and a 12 percent cost reduction.76 The
provision (after the French model) for multiple chairs in high-demand
fields offered the possibility of greater competition in science. But most
critics of higher education remained unimpressed. Some attacked the
un-German use of full-time university administrators. Why should
deans hold office full time? Could the university president not hold
down two jobs? "At the University of Berlin, the president changes
office every year."77 Others said competition was still insufficient. Pro
fessors would improve their lectures if, as in Germany, students paid
them fees to attend. The same result might follow from appointing
privatdozenten to the faculty.™ Better still would be to create more
imperial universities. As things stood, professors were too often neglect
ing their main duties to attend sessions of the House of Peers in the
Diet, do private consulting, or otherwise pursue side employment.
"Those engaged in scientific research [and teaching], whether medi
cine or physical science, cannot finish anything by working only one
hour a day or three days a week" was the contention of Hasegawa Tai.7<(
Education officials in the 1890s showed a flexible response to these
charges. In some cases they maintained that solutions were in place.
Professors' salaries, for example, were said to be docked if three weeks
of classes were missed.80 In other cases they repeated earlier argu
ments. Throughout the 1890s—and beyond—officials rejected such
German practices as lecture fees, frequent rotation of administrators,
and appointment of unsalaried lecturers on the legitimate grounds that
the necessary conditions were lacking in Japan. Referring to the ab
sence of a large corps of academics or of a national university network,
Vice Minister Kubota Yuzururemarkedthat Tokyo University's organi
zational framework was created "step by step," that officials had tried to
develop organizational forms that were "suitable to Japan," and that the
"foreign devices" suggested by critics would be "difficult to imple
ment"81 But in other situations these same officials were strongly in
clined to equivocate. Asked late in 1893 whether the government
planned to establish a second imperial university anytime soon, Makino
Nobuaki, Kubota's successor, declared to the House of Representatives
Budget Committee: "We do have to consider whether or not we should
establish another university, whether the government or students
would have a need for it. On that basis we might build another one. But I
am not going to promise we will build one this year. There is no real
obstacle if the need exists. If the question is what would be best in
absolute terms, then of course a multiplicity is better."82
Establishment of a second imperial university was, in fact, a major
event. Kyoto University began with faculties of science, engineering,
and medicine which greatly enlarged infrastructure. In 1896 Japan had
85 university chairs in technical fields: 18 in basic science, 24 in en
gineering, 23 in medicine and pharmacology, and 20 in agriculture,
forestry, and veterinary medicine. By 1898 basic science had 25 chairs,
engineering 41, medicine 23, agriculture and the rest 20, for a total of
109. Expansion of this sort was probably inevitable, but its execution
and timing were not. Cost was always one deterrent. In 1898 it cost the
government 3,074 yen to maintain a chair at Tokyo but 4,445 yen for the
same chair at Kyoto, and operating costs per student differed by a ratio
of 28 : 73. 83 Moreover, educational philosophy was another deterrent
for some in positions of influence. Academic administrators like Kiku
chi Dairoku and Kato Hiroyuki saw university education as a route to
power and for a time opposed expansion in order to maintain elitism.84
But the forces in favor of expansion were irresistible. Political de
mands for educational opportunities naturally had an effect. Tokyo Uni
versity reached its mandated capacity of 460 students per graduating
class as the chair system came into being. But the five higher schools
were annually graduating about three times that number, and most
wished to go on. 85 Furthermore, industry, which grew rapidly with the
Sino-Japanese War, consistently demanded more engineers and tech
nical specialists. Engineering enrollments mushroomed at all levels,
and the educational system was hard pressed to respond. As early as
1894 Minister Inoue referred to the problem in a speech to the Diet.
Vice Minister Makino in 1897 stressed the difficulties both of finding
and of keeping engineering professors in his testimony before the
House Budget Committee, and Representative Shiba Sankuro noted
complaints from Tokyo students about academic engineers' neglect of
their duties.86 Such criticisms were justified. Prior to World War I,
academic engineers rarely held one post for long. Universities com
peted for their services with government and business and were fortu
nate to keep them five years.87
But the principal reasons for founding Kyoto University were much
more strictly academic. For example, many believed that Tokyo Univer
sity had stagnated. Suzuki Manjiro, a physician, based his case to the
Diet for a second university on the need to eliminate the "academic evils
that derive from the monopolies of a single institution."88 Toyama
Shoichi, later minister of education, said a second imperial university
would shake Tokyo University out of the "torpor into which it has
tended to drift"89 Hasegawa Tai in 1891 called the establishment of a
second university in the Kansai region "indispensable to the develop
ment of education in Japan," adding: "Attentive observation shows that
because of the lack of competition, [Tokyo University] professors have
ceased to try to discover new scientific theories, and the students have
ceased to pursue their. . . objectives.tygo Many, if not most, in authority
agreed. Inoue in 1894 spoke favorably of Hasegawa's views in a letter to
ltd Hirobumi.91 Others commented approvingly on the rivalries be
tween Cambridge and Oxford in Britain and between Yale and Harvard
in the United States.92 Vice Minister Makino underscored this theme at
the time that Kyoto was founded, saying: "|Kyoto University] was cre
ated out of practical necessity We [in the Ministry of Education] hope
competition between the two institutions will yield many benefits.
Our hopes for progress had diminished with only the single universitv
in Tokyo . . . (However), both institutions will have chairs in matching
fields. So if one of the professors invents something, he will become
widely known and trusted, and the students will greatly respect him. '^:i
The university chair system Inoue had instituted also elicited con
cern. Hasegawa was a vigorous defender of the one-chair rule and was
in principle opposed to large faculties. In December 1891 he had com
pared Tokyo with its 316 professors and 2,590 students unfavorably
with Berlin (324 and 6,626) and Munich (172 and 3,646), citing the
case of physics as a subject taught in two different colleges. "If first-
year engineering students are weak in physics, they should enter the
science college and study it for a year with a specialist. "94 After the chair
system came into existence, he continued to insist on this view It was
"ridiculous" to have three chairs in pharmacology.95 There should be
no duplication of programs for applied chemistry.96 Multiple chairs in
physiology were not needed.97 The Ministry of Education and it allies,
of course, had their own views. Not only was it cheaper to expand by
adding chairs as opposed to whole universities, one had always to con
sider objectives. "Our need for knowledge," said Representative
Nakamura Yaroku in reference to mathematics, "is one of the reasons
for the large number of university professors." Vice Minister Tsuji Shin
ji declared, "Scientific knowledge in Japan lags far behind that of other
countries. For that reason we have to do a great deal of research. It is
completely erroneous to say that there are too many professors for the
number of students. . . .The professors must first investigate the theo
ries of the leading foreign scientists. . . .Our scientists study their work
and are making it known here."98 Theresult—KyotoUniversity—was
a compromise that allowed the country to develop a university network
while avoiding fixed limits on chairs.
Founding a second university was difficult; making it function was

more so. By imperial ordinance universities were supposed to be com
prehensive and had to have at least two faculties. Because of the intense
demand for more engineers and physicians, having faculties in those
areas was a foregone conclusion, but little else was certain. Some mem
bers of the Diet favored faculties of agriculture and commerce; some
officials were partial to letters and law." The education ministry's basic
plan called for a university two-thirds the size of Tokyo with space for
1,250 students: 400 in science and engineering, 400 in medicine, 300
in law, and 150 in letters. But the cost of this plan was too great for the
limited resources. President-designate Kinoshita Hiroji estimated that a
four-faculty institution of this size should cost 10 million yen, at a time
when the government's entire budget for postsecondary education was
only 1.5 million yen. l 0 ° As a result, the decision was made to begin with
engineering, science, and medicine and shortly thereafter add law.
Lack of funds caused other adjustments, too. Basic science and en
gineering were combined in a single faculty that excluded geology and
the biological sciences. Maximum use was made of existing academic
facilities. Because higher school programs paralleled those at the uni
versity level, for only 300,000 yen facilities for applied chemistry, metal
lurgy, and mining engineering were added to the physical plant of the
Third Higher School, located in Kyoto, and the whole transferred to
Kyoto University.l01 The government also got outside support. After
lengthy negotiations, the Kyoto prefectural authorities donated 16.2
acres of land to the new university and 31,000 yen for construction.102
Similar plans for the faculty of medicine, however, could not be fulfilled.
One called for locating the faculty in Osaka and using the physical plant
of the Osaka Prefectural Medical College. This had partisans in the
Diet, the Ministry of Education, and the office of Osaka's prefectural
governor, but the prefectural assembly balked, and the Kyoto au
thorities opposed it. 103 A second plan was to build the faculty in Kyoto
and use the facilities of its prefectural medical college, but this ran afoul
of the college's dean, Inoko Shikanosuke, who argued that the 51,000
yen budgeted was wholly inadequate. The upshot was an additional
land purchase and the establishment of new facilities in Kyoto.104
Another difficulty in founding the university was a serious shortage
of professors. One solution was to send more ryugakusei abroad to
qualify themselves for professorships. Vice Minister Makino estimated
in March 1897 that a hundred professors should be hired just to open
the first two faculties. Only about half that number were available, so
the government requested 39,166 yen to support foreign study for 25
more.105 Another solution was to appoint some foreigners. According to
proponents, foreigners would not just compensate for a shortage of
Japanese, but their employment would shorten the time needed to

"raise Japan to the level of [advanced] foreign countries." The for
eigners would stimulate their Japanese colleagues. "There is a chance
for renewal with the foreigners here since they bring new ideas . . . and
present them to students."106 Other solutions—to delay the com
mencement of programs or to hire private school graduates—were also
proposed, but not with any enthusiasm.
Although none of these solutions got wholehearted support, some
were less offensive than others. Increasing the number of students
abroad was described as unnecessary, too expensive, and embarrassing
to the academic community. Japanese universities were probably "not
very good" if so many new professors were needed. Hiring the gradu
ates of Doshisha or Keio would "weaken private education." Delay in
starting up academic programs would be "highly unfair to the stu
dents."107 People particularly resisted hiring foreigners, saying that it
would cause "friction with less educated (Japanese] professors,"1O8 that
linguistic problems would impede intellectual exchange, and that Japa
nese surely could cope with the complexities of 'newfangled sci
ences."109 After much debate, the government decided to postpone
academic programs scheduled to begin in September 1899 to January
1900 for science and engineering and March for medicine and law. The
proposal for expansion of overseas study was approved when the vice
minister of education testified: "There is nothing more important for
our country than implanting these advancing fields of science. We will
regret it a hundred years from now if this effort is frustrated. . . .It is
quite impossible to push scientific research ahead by merely relying on
foreigners."110
The university's problems raised serious issues of quality. Diet mem
bers worried that inordinate haste in appointing professors might pro
duce an inadequate faculty. An education ministry spokesman said the
library was much too small. Two years after the formal opening the
university president complained that Kyoto had "no books, no equip
ment, no specimens, nothing." The greatest problems by every account
existed in physical science. The physics section needed gas purification
machines to break down water. The physical chemistry laboratory had
no generators. The research facilities in general could not stand foreign
comparison, and returned ryugakusei had few colleagues. Officials
thought that the reasons for this were largely historical "Quite a
number of people have carried on scientific research in the thirty years
since the Restoration took place," the vice minister of education noted.
"But we Japanese have little experience with any of the physical
sciences."111
Public debates on the science academy were even more forceful and
1IO LAYING THE INSTITUTIONAL FOUNDATIONS
pointed. The academy had originally been conceived of as an adviser to

government. Ministers of education were supposed to seek members'
counsel on a wide range of issues, especially those important to policy.
But after Mori Arinori's tenure in office (1885-89), the academy was
pushed aside, and its influence declined. Instead of advising govern
ment officials, members devoted their energies to private consulting,
translation activity, and editorial work for one journal. Each received an
annual stipend of 300 yen for these tasks. Diet members once active in
the popularrightsmovement deeply resented the changes, arguing that
the academy had lost its guiding inspiration and had nothing substan
tive to say. They charged that some academy members were "senile,"
that only "sycophants" could become members, and that what little the
academy did do was "inconsequential" and a waste of money. Rather
than spend money on this kind of "almshouse," the government should
give it to Tokyo University or direct it to some other purpose.'12
Education officials rejected these charges and developed a defense
claiming that the actual cost of the academy was rather small, that it
was producing "good results for a backward country," that other coun
tries with academies of science were receiving "significant benefits,"
that the Tokyo Academy of Sciences was "not really an academy in the
foreign sense." and that one should never forget how far Japan had
come in the years since the shogunate ended.113
Ministry officials also came up with an argument of greater impor
tance: the Academy of Sciences was desperately needed for scholars
who were academic misfits.114 Their case in point was ltd Keisuke
(1803-1901), the noted physician and botanist As mentioned earlier,
ltd did botanical research before the Restoration and remained quite
active after it. He helped to found a group dedicated to scientific studies
(the Ydydsha), became director of Tokyo University's botanical garden,
helped found the Tokyo Botanical Society, and joined the Tokyo Acade
my of Sciences as one of its earliest members. Between 1881 and 1886,
ltd also served as professor of botany at Tokyo University. In 1888 he
received the first doctoral degree.! 15
Nevertheless, I to was not fully a part of the academic mainstream
and was rejected by some (see chapter 3). This implied a need for other
support, and options were not very numerous. A sinecure with the
Tokyo Museum paid him 480 yen per year, while the botanical garden
post and university professorship brought in 600 more yen. 116 The 300
yen ltd got from the academy was essential for a middle-class life.
Minister Inoue Kowashi explained the situation this way: "There are
still people [from Tokugawa times] with considerable experience who
have made valuable contributions to the progress of knowledge. One
such person, ltd Keisuke . . . would be reduced nearly to poverty if the
LAYING THE INSTITUTIONAL FOUNDATIONS III
300 yen we give him were taken away. It would not berightto treat this
eminent scholar in such a [cavalier] way."117 The Diet was only partly
convinced. It authorized payments of money to ltd but dismissed all
plans to expand the academy.
The Struggle to Define a Research Posture

By the end of the nineteenth century the Japanese scientific and tech
nical community had entered a new steady state, with support guaran
teed but at minimal levels. Facilities were inadequate, budgets inse
cure, and expectations low except in medicine, where infrastructure
and research activity occasionally reached the levels of the West. The
fifteen years preceding World War I saw several major efforts to im
prove the situation. The imperial university system expanded with new
foundations in Kyushu (at Fukuoka) and the Tohoku region (at Sendai).
The government decided after all to expand the Tokyo Academy of
Sciences and restate its objectives. Several commercial organizations
became actively interested in research. A slow but significant trend in
government laboratories away from testing and toward genuine re
search showed itself. Various elements of society besides the research
community sought to build up the physical sciences.
Some groups wanted more imperial universities, since such institu
tions could help to raise local levels of development In 1901 Represen
tative Noma Itsuzd, from the Tohoku region, claimed that economic
development in the Japanese islands was deformed and stressed that
universities were "important for inducing civilization locally."118 Es
tablishing additional universities would also make education more ac
cessible to Japanese youths outside Tokyo. In 1900 Representative
Sugawara Den called the contrast between a vigorous Japanese military
buildup and the neglect of higher education a "shameful circum
stance," noting that Japan had only two universities for forty million
people, whereas Germany had over twenty, and even Britain had at least
five.119 In 1902 Representative Ozaki Yukio, proponent of an imperial
university in Tohoku, compared the small number of Japanese univer
sity students unfavorably with far larger numbers in Europe and insist
ed that students were the wealth of the nation.120
Other proponents of university expansion were concerned for aca
demic well-being. In 1902 Tokyo law professor Takane Yoshito pub
lished an influential book claiming that five years with two univer
sities—Tokyo and Kyoto—had done little to promote competition. Since
academic researchers become "lethargic and slack off," he argued,
unless stimulated by external forces, it was imperative to found more
chairs and universities and to involve graduate students in their pro

fessors1 research.121 His view was both popular and justified. In 1901
Representative Hiraoka Manjird embarrassed the Ministry of Educa
tion by charging that Tokyo University was full of professors who "took
ten hours to do two hours' work."122 In 1911 the Kawakita shimpo
newspaper in Sendai published a major editorial declaring that univer
sities had a duty to compete with each other and deserved to be crit
icized severely if they "catered slavishly to society" or neglected
research.123
For the government, universities were expensive to start up, and
more so to maintain. On the other hand, the founding of Kyoto in 1897
had broken the ice for expansion, and basic public policy would never
again restrict access to universities on principle. Both Yamagata
Aritomo's second cabinet and the first cabinet of Okuma Shigenobu
developed plans for serious expansion in 1898, and in 1900 ltd
Hirobumi's new Seiyukai party made a similar declaration of intent.124
The government had promised university admission to every student
with a higher-school diploma, and it had to make good on its promise. In
1894 there were only about 1,400 university students, but by 1898 the
number of higher-school graduates had reached 2,400, and it was ex
pected to growfivefoldin a decade.i2S
Fortunately outside support for added facilities was available. Almost
before planning had begun, Yamagata's minister of education, Ka
bayama Sukenort demanded and received commitments of 500,000
and 350,000 yen, respectively, from Fukuoka and Miyagi prefectures,
where the new institutions would be. Tohoku University became possi
ble only in 1906 through support from a wealthy industrialist One other
factor also deserves to be stressed. Certain ministry officials were con
cerned about the obstacles faced by university researchers and were
determined to improve conditions. Referring in 1897 to the difficulties
faced by Japanese scientists who had come back from Europe, Vice
Minister Makino Nobuaki noted that in Japan their "level of perfor
mance falls behind because of their lack of opportunity to debate issues
with prominent scientists and the [poor] facilities they have for
research."126
Even so, the government could not take up these problems simul
taneously and was obliged to set priorities. On the basis of purely objec
tive need, the case for engineering was most compelling. Makino noted
in 1897 that the worst situation of neglect of students by professors was
in engineering, that there were "not nearly enough facilities for en
gineering research in Japan," and that in some engineering fields there
were scarcely any professors.127 Conversely, the facilities in anatomy at
Tokyo University were described at the time as "comparable to those in
European and American universities," whereas two years later (1899)

hygiene, physiology, and pharmacology at that institution were said to
have "the kind of equipment needed for research, in fact, the best
available today."128 And engineering facilities were cheaper to build.
Startup costs, excluding land purchases, were estimated at 350,000 yen
for engineering and 604,000 yen for medicine in 1901; annual mainte
nance costs for an engineering faculty were a fraction of those for a
faculty of medicine.129 But medicine still got priority in this phase of
expansion. To the dismay of Diet members from the Tohoku region,
Ito's cabinet in 1901 decided to build a faculty of medicine in Kyushu
while shelving indefinitely a faculty of engineering proposal for
Sendai.130
Decisions in favor of medicine were common. The cause of medical
research benefited from the prominent role in the imperial Diet of phy
sicians—Suzuki Manjiro, Wakasugi Kisaburo, Yagi ksuro, Tsuchiya
Seizaburo, and especially Hasegawa Tai. Hasegawa was the era s lead
ing parliamentary expert on educational and technical matters, and
while he sought to promote all technical fields, he definitely favored
some over others.13! In 1893 he criticized the vice minister of education
Kubota Yuzuru for his apparent lack of interest in the needs of en
gineering even as he himself proposed eliminating funds for an applied
chemistry laboratory in Tokyo's engineering faculty and building in
stead a biochemistry laboratory* in the Tokyo faculty of medicine.132
Second, the favorable publicity that Kitasato and other medical re
searchers received aided the cause of medicine. Such achievements as
the discovery of the plague bacillus in 1894 and the dysentery bacillus
in 1897 captured widespread attention and made support of medicine
attractive to government and public alike. Engineers and physical sci
entists had less to boast of in the pre-World War I era and could not
arouse this kind of interest. Third, the government always tried to use
existing facilities as a way of cutting the costs of university expansion.
When Kyoto was built in the 1890s, the engineering and science faculty
initially used the facilities of the Third Higher School, and major
(though abortive) efforts were made to use those of a prefectural college
for the faculty of medicine. In the second wave of expansion, the gov
ernment proposed to convert the Sapporo Agricultural College into a
university-level faculty of agriculture for Tohoku University and to turn
an existing prefectural medical college in Kyushu into a university-level
faculty of medicine.133
This short-term practice of preempting facilities for imperial univer
sities' use points to a more permanent one. Medicine expanded with
particular rapidity in the Meiji period because it began from a position of
strength. When the Yamagata cabinet decided to build the Kyushu
faculty of medicine in 1901, it was able to expand facilities for medical

education that had been in Fukuoka from the end of the Tokugawa
period.134 Few thought that using such facilities was unusual. (By
contrast, the building of engineering and science facilities had earlier
been seen as a radical, though necessary, move.)135 The bias toward
medicine and the desire to use existing facilities were so deeply en
trenched that the minister of education Kikuchi Dairoku, trained in
mathematics and physics, not only endorsed them but at political cost to
himself intervened with cabinet and Diet in their favor.136
After 1901 the cause of expansion entered a period of stasis. Continu
ing military buildup prevented any budget increases for science or
higher education in 1902 and 1903. In 1904 and 1905 government and
public concentrated their attention on the Russo-Japanese War. Finan
cial dislocations at the end of the war brought retrenchment in all
ministries, and in 1906 the Saionji government was mosdy concerned
with the nationalization of the country's trunk railways. But at what
seemed an unfavorable moment, interest in expansion revived. Saion
ji's finance minister. Hara Kei, a Furukawa Corporation director and
native of the Tohoku region, asked a wealthy friend and industrialist to
help build a university in Tohoku. Hara reminded Furukawa Torano
suke of the public's bitterness against his corporation for polluting agri
cultural waterways in the Ashio copper mine scandal and suggested
that contributing to the cause of an imperial university might help to
reduce the ill will. Furukawa assented to Haras proposal and donated
1,060,000 yen. As a result, the Saionji cabinet decided to build an
imperial university in Sendai.137
Tohoku University's internal constitution may seem as unlikely as
the factors which led to its founding. Despite public demands for more
engineers and better trained doctors, and earlier planning by the Minis
try' of Education, Tohoku did not begin with faculties of engineering or
medicine but with a faculty of science and a faculty of agriculture.
Behind the founding of a faculty of science was a desire to achieve
regional balance in facilities. The existence of applied science faculties
in Kyushu (medicine from 1903, engineering projected for 1911),
Kyoto (engineering and medicine from 1897), Hokkaido (the Sapporo
Agricultural College, now transferred in jurisdiction to Tohoku), and
Tokyo made these programs initially less essential for Tohoku. Another
factor was vagueness. Unlike university proponents in Kyushu, neither
Ozaki Yukio, the Miyagi prefectural government, nor anyone else from
the region was ever specific about what they wanted in a university.
Seemingly most important were the views of the minister. Giving cre
dence to the criticism that "policy changed when the minister
changed," Makino Nobuaki, upon assuming office in 1906, decided to
LAYING THE I N S T I T U T I O N A L FOUNDATIONS II5
proceed with a faculty of science. Makino considered mathematics,

physics, and chemistry the proper basis for all applied sciences and
decided to organize the university accordingly.138
Makino's decision may appear remarkable for the time. According to
many observers, the Japanese public and government viewed basic
science with indifference. A 1907 editorial in a professional journal
complained that basic researchers were considered "eccentrics whose
work is a form of dissipation."139 But Makino's decision was not so
peculiar as such evidence would suggest. Certainly there was a connec
tion between industry and the academy favoring applied science. Minis
try officials or their constituents frequently requested government
funds on the basis of enrollment or social demand.
Motives behind decisions about infrastructure, however, were never
so simple. They were sometimes dictated by notions of how science
functioned or where it was heading. In February 1901 a ministry coun
cillor, Terada Yukichi. told the Budget Committee of the Diet's lower
house that biochemistry at Tokyo University had not been accorded a
separate laboratory in 1896 because it was then a mere "part of phys
iology" but must now be so established because it had become mature.
In December 1901 Okada Ryohei, later minister of education, denied
that growth in the number of students was the only criterion for ex
pandingresearchfacilities and insisted that electrical engineering must
have additional space at Tokyo University because of "scientific pro
gress [which has occurred) in that field."140
The role of notions about scientific progress is especially clear when
we compare the number of chairs with changes in student preferences.
Imperial university faculties of science produced only 5.2 percent of the
graduates in 1900 yet contained 14.1 percent of the chairs, whereas the
faculties of engineering held 23.8 percent of the chairs while turning
out 32.7 percent of the graduates. Faculties of medicine had 17.8 per
cent of the chairs and produced just 8.3 percent of the graduates,
whereas faculties of law held 21.6 percent of the chairs while turning
out 31.7 percent of the graduates. Nor were the figures for 1900
atypical. Table 4.1 indicates that "overrepresentation" of basic science
(and in part, medicine) was common before World War I. High student
enrollment in some fields paid the costs of low enrollment in others.
Early developments in the new universities show the strengths and
limitations of this policy. Kyushu University began in 1911 with the
medical faculty transferred from Kyoto and, following the request of
local industrialists, with a faculty of engineering as well. Both faculties
were popular and reasonably well funded. Spme 1,300,000 yen was
spent on the faculty of medicine, and about a third of Furukawa's
1,060,000 yen went to the faculty of engineering.141 Kyushu's first
TABLE 4.1
Imperial University Chairs and Graduates (% of Totals)
1895 1900 1905 1910 1915
LAW
-Chairs 17.7 21.6 22.3 19.8 18.0

-Graduates 37.5 31.7 34.5 33.4 41.7
SCIENCE
-Chairs 14.5 14.1 12.6 10.8 12.8

-Graduates 7.8 5.2 3.7 4.2 4.1
ENGINEERING
-Chairs 16.9 23.8 20.2 16.4 21.9

-Graduates 21.6 32.7 31.3 22.9 19.2
LETTERS
-Chairs 16.1 10.8 9.2 14.5 12.1

-Graduates 11.2 18.9 11.4 12.3 7.0
MEDICINE
-Chairs 18.6 17.8 25.6 22.9 20.7

-Graduates 10.8 8.3 14.9 18.3 16.9
AGRICULTURE
-Chairs 16.1 11.9 10.1 15.5 14.5

-Graduates 11.2 3.2 4.1 9.0 11.1
Sources. Tokyo Teikoku Daigaku goju nen shi, 2 vois. (Tokyo Teikoku
Diagaku. 1932); Kyoto Teikoku Daigaku shi (Kyoto Teikoku Daigaku,
1943); Kyoto Daigaku nanaju nen shi (Kyoto Daigaku, 1967); Tohoku
Daigaku goju nen shi, 2 vols. (Tohoku Daigaku. 1960); Kyushu Daigaku
goju nen shi, 3 vols. (Kyushu Daigaku, 1967).
president, Yamakawa Kenjird, a physicist serving concurrently as presi

dent at Tokyo, was effective politically, securing two new chairs from
the ministry. The first group of 55 engineering students completed
their studies in 1914, and in the same year some 83 finished in medi
cine. 142 Conditions at Tdhoku were not quite so good. No money came
to it from the national treasury in its first year, and only 361,262 yen of
Furukawa s money was available to the faculty of science, since the rest
was devoted to agriculture. Money for equipment was scarce, and at
first there was concern among the basic science professors whether
students would actually appear for instruction.l43
Nevertheless, professors at Tohoku University were happier than
their colleagues at Kyushu. Tohoku had an excellent first president in
Sawayanagi Masatard. Though trained in humanities. Sawayanagi was
fully trusted by the scientists because he deliberately took over their
administrative burdens and paid for their research-related travel.
Tdhoku students showed an interest in mathematics, physics, chem
istry, and geology, and twenty-four graduated in 1914. The Ministry of
Education managed to allocate another 60,000 yen for equipment in the
faculty of science after the mandated funds were exhausted.I44 And a
vigorous climate for basic research developed in most fields (see chap
ter 6).
Kyushu University, by contrast, had no basic science program at all.
Its engineering faculty (apart from the engineering chairs) contained
one chair in mathematics and mechanics, to which Yamakawa in 1912
added a chair for chemistry and another for physics. Program building
efforts all failed in this period, and this structural weakness dismayed
the Kyushu professors. Mano Bunji, a mechanical engineer, considered
the inability to solve it his biggest failure as dean. Upon hearing that the
ministry had decided to build a faculty of science at Tdhoku and an
engineering faculty at Kyushu, pharmacology professor Hayashi Haruo
accused the authorities of giving Tdhoku the "brains" and Kyushu the
"remains." Similarly, the Kyushu anatomy professor and medical fac
ulty dean Goto Motonosuke said it was wrong to give engineering pri
ority over basic science because applied sciences like his were so depen
dent upon i t 1 4 5
Ambivalent government actions can also be seen in the movement to
reform the Tokyo Academy of Sciences. Although reform had failed in
1898 conditions had changed by 1905. The Russo-Japanese War may
have aroused deeper appreciation for science in some quarters, but a
desire to achieve national prestige as reflected in science was clearly the
proximate cause. 146 Prior to becoming minister pf education and estab
lishing the faculty of science at Tdhoku, Makino Nobuaki had served as
ambassador to Austria when its government invited Japan to a con
Il8 LAYING THE INSTITUTIONAL FOUNDATIONS
ference (1906). The Austrians proposed a meeting in Vienna of the

world's science academies and hoped that Japan could attend. This, of
course, created a problem, because Japan did not have a real academy.
Makino saw the invitation as an important opportunity and proposed to
establish such a body. The government responded by deciding to up
grade what it had, and the Tokyo academy was officially renamed the
Imperial Academy of Sciences.147
The reforms that followed had a twofold result. They first served to
enhance the prestige of scientific studies. Academy membership had
been fixed at forty, with the majority of the membersfromlaw and the
humanities. Membership in the new institution was expanded to sixty,
with the sciences to constitute half. In keeping with what was then the
dominant view, the term sciences was broadly defined. Thus imperial
academy members represented medicine, engineering, and agriculture
as well as mathematics, biology, chemistry, and physics.148 Reform had
another at least equally important result: it helped the academy attract
outside support for research and other activities. Fulfilling expectations
that were voiced from the start, the heads of two business conglomer
ates (zaibatsu) and the imperial family in 1911 donated modest sums
that were used to fund prizes for published research.
What was the meaning of all thesereforms?Beginning in 1912, the
academy launched five new journals as it had money to pay their ex
penses. It provided a more substantial way to give scientists recognition
than anything previous. After a member of the Diet contrasted the
substantial recognition accorded in Germany to Paul Ehrlich for work
on syphilis with the modest recognition in Japan of hisresearchpartner
Hata Sahachiro, the government proposed to award the Blue Cordon to
prominent scientists and to recognize their achievements more pub
licly. 149 A development with great potential took place in 1913. Using
small sums donated by Furukawa Toranosuke, Sumitomo Kichizae
mon, the wealthy expatriate chemist Takamine Jokichi, and a handful
of others, the academy was able to announce its support for scholarly
research in progress.150
But these developments meant less than one might imagine. The
academy's operating budget was only 10,000 yen a year. Supporting
research in progress was important as a precedent but could be done
only very modestly. Until 1919 members alone could apply for the
funds. The amount of money spent was small—2,460 yen in 1914—
and the funds were divided among six projects that year, only three of
them being in natural science.151 Lack of funds forced termination of
the journals after only a handful of issues. 152 Such disappointments
disturbed the academy. Theoretical chemist Sakurai Joji observed
plaintively that science academies in Europe usually had budgets of
LAYING THE INSTITUTIONAL FOUNDATIONS
more than a million yen. l 5 3 Even the academy's more optimistic presi
dent, mathematician and former minister of education Kikuchi
Dairoku, conceded that economic factors had prevented the academy
from fully achieving its objectives.154
But economic factors relating to overseas competition were already
producing new support for research related to Japanese industry.
"When people, especially university professors, leave Japan on indus
trial inspection tours nowadays, (the foreigners] are said to be secretive
and afraid to show them anything," Kikuchi Dairoku told the House of
Peers in February 1900. "Because of this secrecy, the benefits to be
obtained have been greatly reduced. . . and national needs can no
longer be met merely by relying on foreign information. " I55 At least
some in the Diet agreed. In February 1899 several members represent
ing banking and other business interests had criticized both the private
and public sectors for their neglect of commercially applicable research,
demanding that attitudes change. They contrasted European manufac
turing and export success with Japan's stagnant exports and outmoded
techniques and insisted that only greater commitment to technical re
search could repair this growing imbalance.156
Establishment of the Industrial Experiment Laboratory (Kogyd
Shiken Jo) in June 1900 was an immediate result of these pressures.
This new Tokyo facility was charged with general "testing, analyses,
and industrial appraisals"; but it specialized from the start. The Indus
trial Experiment Laboratory was basically a facility set up to do applied
chemical research for private industry on a contract basis. The govern
ment's commitment was constrained by cost, so the laboratory began in
a small way with two divisions, chemical analysis and industrial chem
istry, and a research staff of eleven (four technical experts or gishi and
seven technicians or gishu).157 Institutional growth was slow for its
first five years, but the war with Russia proved a turning point. As one
member of the Diet later declared: "The Russo-Japanese War provided
a solemn warning to us from the Western powers. After it, our citizens
were refused entry to their factories and [laboratories] because of the
alleged relationship between these tours and the commercial practices
[of Japan]. They said we would just tum around and copy (their de
signs] if they showed their facilities to us."158
For this reason, the government was obliged to increase support for
the Industrial Experiment Laboratory. In 1906 the research staff
jumped to twenty-nine positions from the earlier ceiling of twelve. In
1911 two more positions were added and new divisions established for
ceramics, dyeing, and electrochemistry. A drawback was that laborato
ry staff members were not so well trained as their colleagues in imperial
universities. Only two had doctorates, and most were technicians (nine
I2O LAYING THE INSTITUTIONAL FOUNDATIONS
teen of thirty-two in 1912). Nevertheless, the work they did was of value
and was publicly praised by professors. In 1910 Osaka Yukichi, pro
fessor of chemistry at Kyoto University, declared that investigators at
the Industrial Experiment Laboratory were doing "systematic re
search" and had achieved some "useful results."159 And in 1912 Kamoi
Takeshi, professor of chemical engineering at Tokyo University, noted
that the laboratory was conducting some of the research needed to
reduce Japan's unfavorable trade balance in chemical products.160
It was all a matter of perspective. Conditions in Japan for industrial
research in chemistry had improved somewhat from the late 1880s,
when Takamine Jokichi had to emigrate to the U.S. for his work, but
they were far from meeting Western standards.161 Most Japanese in
dustrial chemists had too many extraneous duties to devote themselves
to research. Even when assigned to research tasks, they rarely had the
equipment they needed.lt>2 And the Industrial Experiment Laboratory
did not nearlyfillthe gap. In 1911 it was visited by a member of the Diet
who said it appeared to be doing "important, valuable work" despite a
number of problems: its staff was too small; its capacity was limited; the
work it did took too long to complete; and few in business even knew it
existed.163
Government officials acknowledged these deficiencies and promised
to remedy them. The vice minister of agriculture and commerce, who
supervised the laboratory, declared a need to expand the industrial
chemistry and dyeing sections, and in early 1914 his ministry requested
200,000 yen in new funding for research in dyeing, electrochemistry,
and the testing of iron and steel. Some of this money was earmarked for
work on color fastness in silk textiles where, according to Minister
Yamamoto Tatsuo, long-term deficiencies had produced major export
losses to French and Italian producers. The situation had become so
bad that only the Mitsui Bank would even finance sales overseas of
finished Japanese silk textiles.164
Despite these increases in funding for research, the old inclination to
copy died hard. In 1913 the Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce
requested 20,000 yen to expand a facility called the Commercial Exhi
bitions Hall located near the Industrial Experiment Laboratory. Influ
ential members of the Diet attacked (but could not defeat) this request
on the grounds that exhibiting Western designs and prototypes in the
hall would overshadow the work of the laboratory and encourage copy
ing by Japanese producers, which was certain to embarrass the
country.165
The Meiji record of research in agriculture shows many of the same
ambiguities. By 1900 Japan had the nationally sponsored Agricultural
Experiment Station at Nishigahara, Tokyo (with nine local branches),
and nineteen stations supported by prefectures. The national facilities

officially—and the prefectural stations unofficially—were assigned
three major functions: "testing related to the improvement and expan
sion of agricultural production; itinerant lecturing [to farmers]; and the
analysis and appraisal of soil, fertilizer, seed, and all other substances
relating to agriculture."166 But this does not fully explain what was
occurring on a day-to-day basis. The chief of the Bureau of Agriculture
thought the national stations should carry on "high-level research" and
entrust applications to the prefectural facilities.167 But ambiguities pre
vented execution of such ideas as conceived by officials. Representative
Suzuki Kizaemon complained in February 1900 that the Agricultural
Experiment Station was "too small and its budget wholly inade
quate."168 In fact, the station in 1900 had a total budget of only 39,000
yen for 10 facilities—less than the average annual expenditure of 4,509
yen of the prefectural stations.169 The salaries paid to the technical
experts (gishi) were very low even by Japanese standards In 1900 its
forty technical experts—including those who had graduated from
Tokyo University—were receiving just 400 yen per year, which was a
technician's salary at the Infectious Diseases Institute. I7 ° The system
of experiment stations as a whole was substantially cut back later on.
Though there had been some expansion of formal capacity in the 1900
05 period, in 1906 Nishigahara's nine branches were cut to three, while
in 1910 the technical staff decreasedfromeighty-six to seventy-two.1T1
Japanese spending on agricultural research was low by European
standards. In 1899 France reportedly spent 2,760,000 yen for this pur
pose, and Germany even more (4,270,000 yen). Japan had fewer re
sources, but that does not explain everything. If one considers total
agricultural income a measure of capacity to pay, it seems significant
that even in this sense, Japan's efforts were small. France's effort was
sustained by an agricultural income exceeding 4.6 billion yen, that of
Germany by an income of 4.2 billion. Japan, with areportedincome of
700 million yenfromagriculture, was spending at most 250,000 yen on
research and diffusion—and even this figure is probably too high. 172
The Germans were investing in agricultural research as a function of
ability to pay at a rate three times that of the Japanese, and the French at
about a 160 percent greater rate.173
Nevertheless, one should not assume that the Japanese did nothing
of importance. To do so would obscure informalredefinitionsof formal
authority by scientists with political sensibilities. Serving as director of
the Agricultural Experiment Station for the period from 1903 to 1920
was the agricultural chemist Kozai Yoshinao, concurrently professor at
Tokyo University. Kozai was both a skilled researcher and a good politi
cian—in the early 1920s he served as Tokyo University's president—
quite capable of exploiting opportunities. In 1903 he proclaimed scien

tific research to be the principal duty of the Agricultural Experiment
Station, which was not what its official description had stipulated.174
And despite the budgetary retrenchment of 1906, Kozai also established
a horticulture division at the Kinai (Osaka) station and had its staff
investigate seed varieties of rice.175 From work at Nishigahara he pub
lished a book in 1906 on the chemistry of fermentation, while
Daikubara Gintaro did research on the relationships between soil acid
ity and seed varieties later used to improve yields in Hokkaido, Taiwan,
and Korea.176
Informal redefinitions of formal authority were unnecessary at the
Institute of Infectious Diseases, where "research into the treatment,
causes, and prevention of infectious diseases" was set forth as the prin
cipal mission.177 This facility prospered greatly in the 1890s and ob
tained full government support in 1899. From a budget that year of
56,036 yen, the institute's authorized spending rose to 60,540 yen in
1902 and continued to increase thereafter.'78 In 1905 the Institute for
Infectious Diseases acquired an entirely new physical plant, together
with full legal control of the home ministry's Vaccine Station and
Serological Institute; by 1912 its regularly budgeted spending exceeded
210,000 yen. 179 It is clear enough from the staff's small size that sal
aries were not the main item. Despite the institute's possession of re
search facilities, animal barns for serum and vaccine production, and a
hospital ward for human patients, there were only thirteen technical
experts or technicians in 1900, seventeen in 1902, and twenty in 1912.
Only eight of that number were gishi, but some of the others earned
doctorates and managed to upgrade their positions.180
It is symbolic of medicine s position in the research community that
the institute was a world-class laboratory. It had superior facilities, an
excellent staff, and a director of the highest reputation. Japanese and
foreign contemporaries compared it to the Pasteur Institute in Paris and
the Koch Institute in Berlin, and the comparison was by no means
farfetched.181 The Institute of Infectious Diseases achieved major ad
vances in medicine (see chapter 6), as its clinical work so clearly re
flects. Kitasato had helped to create serology and serum therapy. As a
result, Japan became thefirstcountry in the world to use serum therapy
against cholera, tetanus, and diphtheria.182 Kitasato called the diphthe
ria serum his colleagues manufactured the "best in the world" and, in
fact, exported it to Europe and America.183
The physical sciences, however, had achieved nothing of compara
ble importance. As a result, university administrator and physicist
Yamakawa Kenjiro from 1897 on began urging the establishment of
major research facilities in physics and chemistry.184 In 1908 his uni
versify physicist colleague Nakamura Seiji called public attention to

such laboratories in Europe as the Physicalische Technische Reich
sanstalt (PTR) in Germany, the National Laboratory in Britain, and the
Institut Centrale des Arts et Manufactures in France and urged that
Japan follow suit by constructing its own facilities.I85 In 1910 Okuma
Shigenobu, who became prime minister in 1913, wrote an article stress
ing the importance of "first-class facilities for research" in all fields,
with special emphasis on chemistry.186 But it took the return to Japan of
the expatriate chemist Takamine Jdkichi in 1913 to bring these move
ments together. In addition to promoting research facilities in meetings
with industrialists, scientists, and government officials, Takamine de
livered several speeches on the subject. He declared that Japan had
gone as far as it could in imitating the West and would now have to
reach a higher stage in science. l87 Several years later, all of these men
became key players in a major new venture, the Institute for Physics
and Chemistry.
Research Capacities on the Eve of the War

As we have seen. Japanese research capacities grew considerably be
tween the founding of Kyoto University and the outbreak of World
War I. Nevertheless, most of these developments were seriously limited
in purpose, in scale, or in both. Total spending on the imperial univer
sities did grow in this period, and Kyoto University did overcome its
financial and other early problems. But the budget for Tokyo Univer
sity, which had the only comprehensive facilities for research, was cut
in 1905 and 1913 and grew scarcely at all in other years before the
war,188 and the university itself was far from ideal. Ikaijiho complained
that in all the imperial universities teaching came first and research
second.189 Chemistry professor Sakurai Jqji noted that faculty research
was nearly always funded surreptitiously as part of the instructional
budget 190 Other observers suggested that the standard for university
professors was their ability to "name the [prominent) foreign scientists
and explain their particular theories."191 The Imperial Academy of
Sciences offered small compensation, since its budget was tiny and its
research stipends few.
Despite these significant institutional weaknesses, some areas of
research fared better than others. Medicine and to a lesser extent en
gineering were well endowed by Japanese standards. Counting the
medical preparatory program of Tohoku University, which was estab
lished in 1912 and achieved faculty status in 1915, each imperial uni
versity had faculties of medicine and of engineering, whereas agri
culture existed at just two schools and basic science at three. Basic
science was also represented differently. Mathematics, physics, and
chemistry were each represented by chairs at all four universities,
though at Kyushu they were stuck in the engineering faculty. Geology
was established at Tokyo and Tohoku, but biology as established in a
faculty of science could be found only at Tokyo.192
1. Shinto memorial service for Robert Koch, held annually at
the Kitasato Institute on the anniversary of his birth (May 27)
2. Kitasato's lieutenants at the Kitasato Institute

Back row, left to right: Otani Morisuke. Umeno Shinkichi,
Kusama Shigeru, Koga Gensaburo.
Front row, left to right: Terauchi Yutaka, Miyajima
Mikinosuke, Kitajima Ta'ichi, Shiga Kiyoshi. Hata Sahachiro.
Aoyama Tanemichi's gnostics

4. Tokyo University investigators of tsutsugamushi disease
(August 1915)
Left to right: Mitamura Makujird, Nagayo Mataro, Imamura
Yoshk), Miyagawa Yoneji.
5. The Kitasato Institute (ca. 1921)
6. The Institute of Infectious Diseases, Japan's leading re

search laboratory in the Meiji period (ca. 1906)
7. Aoyama Tanemichi 8. Ichiki Kitokuro
9. Tokyo University physicists and graduate students (1903)

Front row, far right: Nagaoka Hantard; second from right:
Tanakadate Aikitsu. Back row, second from right: Honda Kotaro
10. Yamagiwa Katsusaburo 11. Nagayo M atari
12. Microscopy training at the In- 13. Ogata Masanori

stitute of Pathology, Tokyo University
14. Faculty of Science, Tokyo University (ca. 1905)

15. Kitasato Shibasaburd (ca. 1920) 16. Robert Koch in Japanese kimono
(Tokyo. 1908)
17. Takagi Kanehiro 18. Nagaoka Hantaro (ca. 1934)

19. Nagai Nagayoshi 20. Yamakawa KenjirO
21. Kozai Voshinao 22. Sakurai Joji

23. Kikuchi Dairoku 24. Yasui Kono. Japans first woman
scientist
25. Nakamura Yaroku 26. Hasegawa Tai

27. Makino Nobuaki 28. Okada Ryohei
29. Okuma Shigenobu 30. Katsura Taro

CHAPTER FIVE
SCIENCE AND THE BUREAUCRACY
It is both intuitively obvious and a matter of record that the establish

ment and prosecution of scientific research demand procedures for
mobilizing resources. Without a means of expressing their views or
making their desires known to the pertinent authorities, scientists
would be as restricted in their work as if they had no facilities at all.' Yet
many critics have both faulted the Japanese bureaucracy for failing to
understand the scientific enterprise and called into question the gov
ernment's philosophy of management.2 Scientists supposedly found it
hard to gain access to officials and had communication problems when
they did. Sakurai Joji, whose career spanned Meiji and Taishd. believed
that scientists could rarely influence the governments policy even
when they all joined forces together.3 In such a case, the result was
totally predictable: decisions inappropriate for science and for society.
One finds four explanations for the pathology of decision that has
been imputed.. First, the Meiji government was reluctant to accept
autonomy or equality for science. It tried to coopt almost even* private
interest and to make science the servant of the state.4 Then, traditions
of policy management were highly autocratic. The political culture of
Tokugawa Japan had been typified by a "preponderance of power,"
according to the Mejji educator Fukuzawa Yukichi.5 Third, the tech
nically trained came to be excluded from the supervisory ranks of the
higher civil service. Scientists and engineers "could not hold high gov
ernment office in areas of the bureaucracy concerned with science,"
wrote W. H. Leonard and H. C. Kelly in a 1948 report for the U.S.
Occupation. "These posts were reserved for those with legal training
[who had graduated} from the imperial universities."6 Last, scientists
failed to protest because of the way they had been socialized. They were
"citizens first and servants of truth . . . second," wrote Bertrand Rus
seD in 1931.7 The "medieval spirit of servile solidarity" lay heavy upon
them, argued Thorstein Veblen.8 Worst of all, insisted Nakane Chie,
scientists' own loyalty to particular factions disrupted the unity needed
to check the state's power.9
One hears echoes in these views of technocratic thought and the
Enlightenment from which it derives. Diderot, Condorcet, Saint Simon,
and others thought the rationality of science would eliminate ignorance
125
126 SCIENCE AND THE BUREAUCRACY
and political authoritarianism and usher in an era of leadership by

scientists.10 The disillusionment caused by two world wars and the
unwillingness of most scientists to resist modem oppressions have di
minished such views in Western democracies, but they remain influen
tial in Japan.11
Meiji Japan's legacy from the Tokugawa period is one reason.
Tokugawa society had repressed scholars and experts, rarely granting
them a voice in determining public policy. The shogunate and its im
itators in the ranks of the daimyo had sought to control political thought
generally and technical knowledge selectively. These same regimes
had usually given priority to lineage or personality over "merit" or ex
pertise in recruiting officials.l2 The Meiji regime abandoned this stance
but imposed its own priorities. The new leaders were obsessed with
power and the issue of legitimacy and adopted a strategy of political
cooptation to impose their control on society.13 They did not at first
accept foreign ideas of academic freedom and were obliged by circum
stances to place burdens on scientists that limited their time for re
search. Partly to satisfy the Western great powers in respect to the
Unequal Treaties, the leadership carried out its legal reforms in ways
that affected scientists adversely.
In fact, the Unequal Treaties were a powerful incentive to change in
the government of Meiji Japan. Foisted on the country in 1857 and
remaining in force until 1899, they took away Japan'srightto control its
own tariffs and usurped jurisdiction over foreigners charged with
crimes occurring on Japanese soil. Termination of the treaties was a
cardinal aim of the Japanese government, but the United States and
Europe imposed a high price. Japan must change its whole legal system
to look like that of the West. This was no easy task, and it took a long
time. The civil service reforms that were part of this process were,
however, mostly in place by 1887
Japan's civil service was ostensibly based on systems in continental
Europe. One took an examination to secure appointment, but suc
cessful performance required formal training in what the Germans
called Cameralismus (public administration). Frequentlyreferredto by
the English word law, cameralismus actually included what today
would be called economics, statistics, law, and police administration.14
As in Europe, the training and examinations excluded science, mathe
matics, engineering, agriculture, and medicine. But since no modern
state could function without them, the Japanese adopted the European
practice of recruiting the needed experts in these fields by screening—
and assigning them to inferior posts..15 In one particular the Japanese
departed from European precedents in their civil service system. The
Germans and some other Continental nations imposed the requirement
SCIENCE AND THE BUREAUCRACY 127
of multiyear, probationaJ unpaid service on men who had passed the

civil service examinations before they could receive a salaried appoint
ment This was done to assure some level of experience in the hope of
improving performance in office. But Japan rejected unsalaried proba
tion as inherently unfair and prejudicial to the cause of recruitment
based on merit 16
The form of Japan's modern civil service posed significant problems
for the country's efforts in research. Meiji leaders like Yamagata
Aritomo, ltd Hirobumi, and Inoue Kaoru were determined to create an
authoritarian state, and in Europe this was linked to legal training.17
But they failed to consider all the pertinent ramifications. Japan was not
Europe. It lacked the array of broadly educated talent found in the most
developed Western countries. And there was no proof that legal training
was uniquely relevant to administrative performance. In fact, contem
porary observers argued that the legalistic bias of the central bureau
cracy and its correlate, neglect of technical expertise, produced ineffi
cient management low morale among the technically trained,
duplication of effort, and bad decisions.18
Some qualifications are clearly in order here. Most scientists (over 80
percent) were employed in the prestigious public sector, not at the
bottom civil service rung, but usually somewhere in the middle. Ten
ured university professors always held the second of the three major
ranks (sonin, within the classification system hannin, somn, and
chokunin). University presidents held chokunin status, the same as
bureau chiefs, who usually made policy; and a few n on academic scien
tists like Kitasato, the director of a major state laboratory, also came to
hold chokunin rank.19 Conditions in some ministries were better than
in others. The Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce was quite uncon
genial, and the Ministry of Home Affairs had particular defects. But 79
percent of the scientists employed in government worked under the
aegis of the Ministry of Education, and its managerial supervision was
rather better.20
Scientists were respected in society. They tended, for example, to
many well. Kitasato, from a humble family and before becoming fa
mous, married the daughter of Baron Matsuo Shinzen, later governor of
the Bank of Japan.21 They were recognized in other ways by the central
government Several were appointed to the House of Peers, and two
named to the Privy Council.22 Somefieldscoped better within the rigid
system. Medicine was naturally ensconced in the imperial universities,
but it was also well established in lesser institutions. It was also
uniquely well positioned in the private sector. This gave medicine a
political advantage, and medical researchers could fulfill ambitions be
yond those of colleagues in any otherfield.These patterns were old and
deeply rooted, but they were reinforced by contemporary priorities and

persisted through 1914.
The Period of Early Decisions (1868-89)

In the earliest years of the Restoration government, a few leaders took
major initiatives and had few constraints on their power. There was no
parliamentary assembly. The bureaucracy was immature, and the
Council of State (Dajokan) had executive authority. ltd Hirobumi and
Oku bo Toshimichi were the most influential in science policy matters,
but they were not alone in their activism. Between 1876 and 1880
Matsukata Masayoshi came to share Okubo's interest in animal breed
ing techniques, and through their control over both the Ministry of
Home Affairs and the Ministry of Finance they were able to force sub
stantial investment in animal husbandry.Xi These efforts at first relied
on technical supervision by foreigners. In 1878, however, Okubo
launched a medical project conducted by Japanese doctors. Pursuant to
his interest in contagious diseases, he acted on the then common sup
position that beriberi was such a malady and ordered several university
physicians to study it.24 This project had Little success, but it did indi
cate an official interest in the subject that scientists could use to
advantage.
Another characteristic of the earliest years was the use of Western
consultants. The American Medical missionary Guido Verbeck guided
the leadership away from British medicine and toward that of Germany.
Henry Dyer had some influence in engineering and physical science
because of his work at the Imperial College of Engineering. The British
envoy in Japan, Sir Harry Parkes, helped in recruiting Western tech
nical experts. But the direction of policy was in Japanese hands, and the
foreigners were clearly subordinate.25 The government was eager to
use Japanese experts whenever they could be had. Men like Nagayo
Sensai and Kanda Takahira, trained under the shogunate, served the
new regime, which extended equal favor to Western-trained arrivals.26
While bureaucracy existed in the earliest years (1868-80), its struc
ture was quite immature. From 1868 to 1885 there existed an agency
known as the Ministry of Public Works (Kobusho) which controlled the
Imperial College of Engineering as well as the operations of govern
ment-owned factories. The Ministry of Education had formal control
over most government schoolsfrom1871. The Ministry of Home Affairs
(originally the Ministry of Civil Affairs or Minbusho) held jurisdiction in
most other technical matters. At the top were the Ministry of Finance,
with control over revenues, and the Council of State, which set policy.
SCIENCE AND THE BUREAUCRACY I2g
Lines of authority were naturally subject to change. For example, the

Ministry of Education controlled all medical affairs from February 1872
through May 1875, but in 1875 the Council of State gave health admin
istration to the Ministry of Home Affairs, leaving medical education
with the Ministry of Education.27 With its jurisdiction over transporta
tion, telecommunications, industrial promotion, police, agriculture,
and public health, the Ministry of Home Affairs was a powerful agency.
Because its authority was also diffuse, it was a target of bureaucratic
reformers. Following the phasing out of the Ministry of Public Works in
the late 1870s, the leadership created the Ministry of Agriculture and
Commerce in November 1880. Because this agency was assigned some
functions of the Ministry of Home Affairs, disputes between ministries
were inevitable.28
A second major feature of the early bureaucracy was the role played
by technically trained men. In the early and middle years of Meiji, the
government frequently assigned senior line positions in technical areas
to men with technical training. Yoshikawa Akimasa, who had studied at
the Imperial College of Engineering, became chief of the Bureau of
Telegraphy in 1874. Nagayo Sensai, a physician, was named chief of
the Bureau of Public Health in the next year. Tanaka Yoshio, a student
of botany under ltd Keisuke at the former Bansho Shirabesho, in 1881
became chief of the Bureau of Agriculture.29 Nor were these excep
tional cases. The appointment of such men at the bureau chief level was
common before the legal reforms were completed (see table 5.1).
During the 1870s scientific research was not well defined for the
leadership. The Naito Shinjuku Testing Station for agriculture, the
Central Meteorological Observatory, and other institutions of that dec
ade were seen by officials as instruments for exploiting foreign knowl
edge; the Imperial College of Engineering and other government
schools were supposed to produce educated manpower. Tanaka Fu
jimaro in the Ministry of Education, however, did promote the estab
lishment of the Tokyo Academy of Sciences and also of Tokyo Univer
sity. The Ministry of Home Affairs encouraged some work in medicine.
In 1874 it established the Tokyo Hygiene Laboratory, in 1875 the Bu
reau of Public Health, and in 1879 the Central Hygiene Commission.
Only the Hygiene Laboratory didresearch,but all three were important
for Kitasato's career.30
Thereluctanceof many officials notwithstanding, one could get sup
port forresearch.As noted in chapter 3, Takagi Kanehiro, a career navy
officer and a physician trained at St. Thomas Hospital in London, con
ceived the idea of a link between diet and the incidence of beriberi in
late 1880 and sought funding to prove his hypothesis. A number of
barriers stood in his way (apart from the commitment of medical col
5.1 Educational Backgrounds of Bureau Chiefs (1872-1919)
1871 1875 1879 1883 1887 1891 1895 1899 1903 1907 1911 1915 1919
I i I i I i I i I I I i I i I i I i 1 i I i I i I
Ministry of Home Affairs
Bureau of Public Health V//////////////////
Bureau of Civil Engineering Y7//7////////////////////
Ministry of Education
Bureau of Professional Education V/////7/////////////
Bureau of Technical Education Bureau chiefs
training
Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce H Technical
VA Legal
Bureau of Agriculture V777/A

iown/
Bureau of Forestry other W////////////7///77/
Bureau of Industry V///////////////AY///////////
Bureau of Mining 77////////////////////////
Bureau of Patents Y/////////A V/////////////////
Directorship of Steel Industry
Ministry of Communications
Bureau of Telegraphy
Bureau of Electrocommunications V//////////7.
Bureau of Industry
Source: Ijiri Tsunekichi, ed.,Rekidai kenkan roku (Tokyo: Hara Shobo, 1967).
leagues to bacteriology). One was cost: the process of upgrading the

diets of numerous sailors and comparing the results was very expen
sive. Another was resentment from colleagues in the military. A third
was the tepid interest of superiors in the navy. Takagi's handling of
these various problems throws light on the making of decisions at the
time. In essence, he exploited the scarcity of well-trained physicians
and contacts with three top officials.
Takagi succeeded because the leadership saw his educational
achievements as a way to impress Europeans—and because his Sat
suma origins gave him entree to the minister of finance, Matsukata.
When Takagi returned from London in 1880, Inoue Kaoru sent a letter
to the Tokyo diplomatic community recommending Takagi's services as
a doctor and reminding them of Japanese progress. When Takagi decid
ed to pursue the beriberi research, he used this goodwill effectively. In
November 1882, Prince Arisugawa got him an audience with the Em
peror. In October 1883 he became chief of the navy's Bureau of Medical
Affairs. In late 1884 Matsukata and ltd got him invited to a meeting of
the Council of State. These connections were essential because of the
costs—about 50,000 yen for dietary protocols—and because of the au
thority he needed to function. Army officials like Yamamoto Gombei
and Dr. Ishiguro Tadanori opposed his program, and even the minister
of the navy, Kawamura Surruyoshi, a Satsuma native, was at best
lukewarm toward the project.31
Takagi's success in the 1880s undoubtedly aided the cause of re
search, as did an event of the previous year. The Emperor's Confucian
lecturer Motoda Eifu charged in an 1879 letter that emphasis on "sci
ence" was politicizing society and endangering traditional morality. ltd
Hirobumi, in rebutting these arguments, laid the blame for so
ciopolitical disputation in the lap of Confucianism and developed the
notion of research as a weapon. Building on an argument of Otto von
Bismarck, the Chancellor of Germany, ltd concluded that the most
effective way to control intellectuals was to encourage them in academ
ic research. Then they would quickly abandon politics and concentrate
on specialized topics.32
But Ito's view of research was not popular everywhere. In the early
1880s the Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce saw very little need
for significant new research, reflecting the views of their business con
stituency.33 The sericulture research program of the 1870s based at the
Naito Shinjuku Testing Station contracted sharply after the ministry
got control of it, and manufacturing research was completely ne
glected.34 What did get attention was animal husbandry. The ministry
imported Shropshire and Southdown sheep and placed them in special
breeding pastures designed for their needs. The sheep did poorly, but
the ministry persisted, spending hundreds of thousands of yen

uselessly.35
The most important development in the Ministry of Agriculture and
Commerce was the creation of the modern patent system. In the 1870s
patent applications had been handled by the Ministry of Home Affairs
on an ad hoc basis, but pressure from foreign and local business alike
soon led to a different procedure. The problem was how to balance
interests potentially opposed to each other. Japanese business wanted
to import as much technology as desired. Foreign interests wanted
protection for their own technology and future inventions. The Japa
nese government tried to satisfy both interests. Without new tech
nology the economy would stagnate; but only legal reforms would end
the Unequal Treaties, which limited Japan s sovereignty.36 The minis
try reached a solution in the 1880s. Following the suggestions of Taka
hashi Korekiyo. the chief of the Bureau of Patents, and his technical
adviser, the chemist Takamine Jdkichi, the patent system of France
was initially chosen as the basis for Japan's system.37 But in 1888 three
bureau chiefs criticized its protection of foreign inventions as an imped
iment to imports of technology. And the result was Japan's adoption of
Spain s patent system as Western but not too restrictive.38
By the end of the decade Agriculture and Commerce was rapidly
taking the lead in other ways, too. It became the first ministry with
significant interests in science, technology, or medicine to witness the
takeover of bureaucratic decision making by graduates of the university
faculties of law. Nakamura Yaroku, who had a B.S. in physics and
subsequently acquired a D.Sc. in forestry, joined the ministry in 1883
when he finished his studies at Munich. In 1887 he noted that the
ministry had "initially needed men with new (technical] knowledge"
but was now being taken over by those who "lacked the ability to under
stand this new knowledge." For him the exclusion of technically edu
cated men from major posts was not just shocking but dangerous. In
1889 he was fired from the ministry, entered private business, and (in
1890) got elected to the Diet.39 Nakamura was not alone in his views,
but there were some countertrends in the ministry. The first minister of
agriculture and commerce, Kono Togama, in 1881 created an intra-
ministerial committee that later helped to found the Industrial Experi
ment Laboratory.40 His prescient vice minister, Shinagawa Yajiro, in
1884 gave private assistance to the chemist Takamine when he left
government to work in American private industry.41
The Ministry of Education in the 1880s had a more nuanced posture
toward research. Motoda s fears about "science" were not dead despite
Ito's intervention, because influences from Germanyreinforcedthem.
In 1882 Councillor Kawashima Atsushi prepared a paper on the subject
inspired by Lorenz von Stein of Vienna and quickly found his misgiv
ings being echoed by the incumbent minister, Fukuoka Takachika
(1881-83), and even by Mori Arinori (minister 1885-89). 42 But these
two men were quick to take action. Fukuoka advocated Germany as
Japan's academic model because of the affinity in law and basic out
look.43 Mori, who shared Itd's views, developed a program for averting
any problems.
Active promotion of "practical research" was one of Mori's principal
strategies. He constantly invoked the applied-science argument, and
during the years he held office as minister took steps to realize his
views. Establishment of the faculties of engineering and agriculture at
Tokyo University (in 1886 and 1890, respectively) can both be at
tributed to this.44 Even prominent members of the university commu
nity joined in support of his views. President Watanabe Kdki declared in
1886 that the level of learning in Japan would be raised not only by
producing men "learned in the principles of science" but equally by
those with practical abilities.45 And in 1888 Watanabe insisted that the
most important part of the research done in Tokyo's college of science
that year was an eminently practical "magnetic field survey of the
[Japanese] countryside."46 Some scientists opposed this trend. The
mathematician Kikuchi Dairoku claimed that science's search for truth
"produces infinitely more benefits than do the enterprises of the prac
tical man. "47 And theoretical chemist Sakurai Joji praised the scientist's
role as "architect of the castle of knowledge. "48 But the applied-science
movement was sufficiently powerful to win support even here. In 1889
Terao Hisashi, professor of astronomy and director of the university
observatory, gave a lecture to a group of young mathematics students in
which he declared that it was wrong to study mathematics "solely
because of one's personal interests." One had to use it in service to
society.49
Autocratic management was another component of Mori's approach
as minister of education. Three weeks after he took office, he and I to
forced Kato Hiroyuki out as university president and installed their ally
Watanabe Kdki.50 Then the Imperial University Ordinance (1886)
made their intentions even clearer. This declaration omitted any refer
ence to an advisory role for the university president in the making of
policy, authorized the minister of education to appoint faculty members
to the university senate, and required the president to inform the minis
ter about the discussions of the senate in detail.51 Of course, there were
carrots attachedtothe stick. Mori tried to flatter individual professors by
inviting themtothe ministry for private conversations. And he sought to
impress the university as a whole by giving speeches at academic func
tions. Some observers correctly see a more intimate relationship be
134 SCIENCE AND THE-BUREAUCRACY
tween ministry and university during Mori's time in office than at oth
ers, but the relationship was at best a mixed blessing for professors.52
The management style of the minister of education finally produced
a reaction. During the 1880s the routine interests of the scientific com
munity were well represented in the ministry. Hamao Arata, who held
the position of chief of the Bureau of Professional Education, while not
trained in science, was sympathetic. In 1881 President Kato had pro
posed a necessary division of the undergraduate physical sciences pro
gram into separate majors for physics, mathematics, and astronomy.
Hamao had actively supported this initiative and managed to persuade a
reluctant minister, Fukuoka Takachika, to allow it 5 3 Hamao also steer
ed several able students into the natural sciences when he was univer
sity president (1893-97) and later helped found the Tokyo Institute of
Technology.54 But the managerial style instituted by Mori did not en
courage officials to act like Hamao or professors to be involved in policy
making, and demands that the university be granted autonomy began
while Mori was still in office.
Three aspects of the professors' earliest campaign for university au
tonomy are worthy of notice. One is the lack of timely agreement on how
to achieve autonomy. Two major proposals were put forward in 1888
89, but they differed in important details. One proposal was developed
by the deans. It called for permanent faculty tenure but envisioned
appointment of professors and allocation of funds entirely by the deans,
with the professors to have a mere "right to assent." The other was
developed by assistant professors who had recently returned from Ger
many. They requested financial autonomy and election of the president
and faculty council, with nearly all powers to reside in the council.55
The second noteworthy aspect is the scientists' role. The impression is
that most were conformists (the appointment of scientists to sensitive
posts in the 1930s, at a time of rising military influence, illustrates this
well).56 But the 1880s were quite another matter. Three of five deans
active in the movement were scientific professionals at that time. So
were most (63 percent) of the assistant professors.57
Less surprising but equally important was society's reaction to the
autonomy campaign. In early 1889 a small group of professors called on
the senior statesman Matsukata Masayoshi to argue on behalf of their
cause. But a meeting of minds did not take place, and their appeal was
clearly a failure. Matsukata called their request "unthinkable," and one
young professor described the conversation as "wind in the ear of a
horse."58 Nor were other commentators much more responsive. Several
newspapers accused professors of ignoring their place in Japanese soci
ety, and Fukuzawa Yukichi's Jiji shimpo sanctimoniously declared that
a "university that must rely on public support ought not to be opposing

the will of the public."59
In truth some of the concern of the young professors and part of the
reaction against them derived not from the actions of the ministry but
from the role expected of the Diet. In 1889 the entire country was
awaiting parliamentary government with a mixture of hope and anx
iety. Liberal young professors wanting support for their mission feared
the Diet would cut back their funding. But liberal intellectuals like
Fukuzawa Yukichi expected it to check the power of the leadership and
resented what seemed like a threat to its power. These reactions show
the importance of the Diet, and in fact, the emergence of the Diet in
1890 fundamentally changed how decisions were made.
Decision Making about Science in the 1890s

Several new trends came to the fore in the 1890s. The Imperial Diet
asserted itself vigorously in matters of science and higher education.
The Ministry of Education maintained a highly intimate—some would
have said incestuous—relationship with Tokyo University that gave
professors some voice in policy but occasionally cost them in scholarly
research. Under the auspices of competent officials in the Ministry of
Home Affairs, Kitasato's leadership produced a flourishing tradition of
scientific research defended by allies and political maneuvering. The
Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce came under the control of law
faculty graduates whose actions were a scandal to some of the scien
tists. There were, of course, some negative trends in all of the ministries
involved with science, but they were strongest in the Ministry of Agri
culture and Commerce.
The Diet was a partial corrective to such trends in the various minis
tries. As in any system of parliamentary government, it had to approve
the spending of money, but this was by no means the extent of its
power. The Diet had the authority to summon officials to explain recom
mendations and justify their policies. It could invoke the authority of
technical experts by inviting scientists and others to testify. It could
organize special commissions of inquiry. And it could offer its own
legislative proposals. The Imperial Diet did all of these things, some
times with stunning results. Since few of the members knew much
about science, one would not have predicted this behavior.60 Neverthe
less, it is important to stress that a handful of members were well
informed. Elected in the first general election of 1890 and continuing to
serve for a number of years were the physician Hasegawa Tai and the
former official Nakamura Yaroku, with his degree in physics from

Munich. These two men were very well informed and invariably raised
major policy issues.61
Especially typical of the 1890s Diet was a tendency to originate legis
lation. Later proposals with a chance of success came from one of the
ministries, but in the Diet's first years it was active on a number of fronts
in the hope of making its mark. Policy toward science was one such
arena. The Diet overrode the ltd cabinet's proposal for a medical labora
tory at Tokyo University and instead voted to favor a Kitasato-backed bill
(see chapter 4, above). In 1892 the Diet funded the Ministry of Educa
tion's modest proposal for the Seismological Research Commission by
cutting the budget for the army.62 These were quite spectacular inter
ventions, but they were not historically unique. During its first decade
the Diet took up seven privately sponsored proposals for science. Three
were approved and implemented.63
While the Diet routinely summoned officials to discuss their policies,
it called on scientists rather sparingly. But in May 1892 it did invite
Noro Kageyoshi, professor of metallurgical engineering, to explain the
technical details of a steel mill proposal the government wished to see
funded.64 And in December 1893 it heard testimony from Koganei
Yoshikiyo, professor of anatomy, about subsidizing charity patients at
Tokyo University Hospital as a way to gain the necessary research
material.65 On no occasion during this decade did it summon a member
of the faculty of science, although the mathematician and physicist
Kikuchi Dairoku when education minister gave expert testimony in
1901 on the work of the Seismological Research Commission.66
Other than supporting Kitasato and needling officials, the greatest
contribution of the Imperial Diet was its appointment of a number of
special commissions. The most important such body established in the
period was the Committee to Investigate the Academic System
(Gakusei Chosa Kai). Originally created in the House of Peers by the
former education vice minister Kubota Yuzuru in 1894, the committee
did little in itsfirstthree years because most Diet members trusted the
educational leadership of the government In 1897 and 1898, however,
the cabinets of Matsukata Masayoshi and Okuma Shigenobu showed
some inclinations toward educational reform, and a lively debate en
sued. This debate focused on a number of issues, among them the role
of research.67
Stress on research is surprising despite the support that I to Hirobumi
and Mori Arinori gave it Certainly the ministers of education of the
1890s gave consistent backing to the research ideal. In 1890 Yoshikawa
Akimasa declared that the "flourishing or decline of a country has much
to do with the flourishing or decline of its science."68 In 1891 Oki
Takatd maintained that the "investigation of basic theoretical principles

and the advancement of high-level knowledge in all disciplines are the
factors that bring about progress."69 In 1897 Hachisuka Mochiaki
praised Tokyo University as a "place for investigating basic princi
ples."70 But the gap between rhetoric and action made research support
a big issue. The Ministry of Finance was extremely parsimonious in its
funding of higher education.71 University scientists were under pres
sure from the Ministry of Education to help build professional institu
tions.72 The Diet itself was committed to reducing the level of public
expenditure. It was symptomatic of the general situation that one of the
strongest proponents of scientific research, Hasegawa Tai, was also a
leading budget cutter.73
The combination of such contradictory stances made the education
ministry both defensive and aggressive. For example, in 1890 Kitasato
Shibasaburo requested support for an additional year of research in
Germany. Because of his accomplishments and general reputation his
request should have been routine. But Kitasato had previously (in 1886)
criticized the work of a university professor. Sensitive as ever to the
university's reputation, Katd Hiroyuki apparently retaliated. Using his
authority as university president, he decided to oppose Kitasato's re
quest, and the ministry withheld its approval.74 This was to prove a
momentous decision. When Kitasato returned to Japan fifteen months
later, he refused to cooperate with the Ministry of Education, and their
hostility was fixed for life. The ministry relentlessly pursued control
over Kitasato's laboratory and launched a campaign to gain control over
nonacademic laboratories in general.75 In 1890 it took the Forestry
Experiment Station over from the Ministry of Agriculture and Com
merce, in 1896 the Central Meteorological Observatory from the Minis
try of Home Affairs, and also in 1896, the Tokyo Astronomical Obser
vatory came under its aegis. While the Ministry of Education controlled
just five percent of nonacademic laboratories in 1893 (see table 5.2), by
the end of the decade it had nearly a quarter.
The Ministry of Education's administrative imperialism aroused
more than a little resentment. Hasegawa Tai in 1893 described the
ministry as "feudalistic" and "good at holding its [political] ground" and
attacked it for treating Kitasato as an "irreconcilable enemy" and for
"constantly plundering the resources of others."76 The education jour
nal Kyoiku jiron in 1897 criticized it for employing "too many [Tokyo]
professors as administrators."77 And Representative Ichijima Kenkichi
in 1899 deplored the university's "inordinate influence" in the ministry,
claiming that relations between the two were "self-serving."78
A demand for general reform arose. In 1897 the ministry took the
lead by creating the Higher Education Council (Koto Kyoiku Kaigi).
I38 SCIENCE AND THE BUREAUCRACY
TABLE 5.2
Bureaucratic Affiliations of Nonacademic Scientific
Laboratories
1885 1893 1900

c
MINISTRY N 7c N % N /c
Home Affairs 7 47 8 42 7 23
Agriculture and
Commerce 5 33 7 37 11 35
Public Works and
Communications 1 7 1 5 2 7
Navy 1 7 1 5 3 10
War 1 7 1 5 1 3
Education 0 0 1 5 7 22
Totals1 15 101 19 100 31 100

Sources Yuasa Mitsutomo. Gendai kagaku gijutsu shi (Tokyo.
1962 •; TCS/G. various numbers.
'Percentage totals may be slightly higher or lower than 100 due to
rounding.
This body had members (including ten scientists)froma broad profes

sional spectrum, but its accomplishments were few. It had no guide
lines.79 Its members were named by the minister of education.80 And it
could only give advice on request81 In fact, the president of the House
of Peers, who opposed reform, described it approvingly as an in-house
committee.82
For just this reason the Diet insisted that there must be an outside
commission. It was not acceptable for a commission to report to the
Ministry of Education; it must have access to the prime minister di
recdy. But this did not have to mean confrontation. "The Diet's Com
mittee to Investigate the Academic System will try to assist the ministry
and encourage its work." Since Tokyo University was a source of the
problem, the minister and the Imperial Diet might want to form an
alliance against it. Putative reformeis had differing views. Some wanted
to shorten the total course of study. Others wanted encouragement for
private education. Still others favored diversion of resources to the vari

ous higher professional schools.83 There was little consensus on what
should be done, but on one point ten were agreed. "The imperial univer
sities should become institutions where research . . . is the principal
function."84
Actually the ministry was committed to promoting research by en
larging the size of the faculty. Between 1893, when the chair system
was established, and mid-1901, when new efforts were launched, eigh
teen chairs in science were added at Tokyo University. But progress in
building research infrastructure was never uniform over time. During
the presidency of Hamao Arata six chairs were added, while one more
was established during Toyama Shdichi's eighteen months in office.
But the most rapid growth came under Kikuchi Dairoku. During the
thirty-eight months between April 1898 and June 1901, eleven chairs
were founded in the sciences, and all the faculties were represented.85
No comparable growth took place again on the Tokyo campus until long
after World War I.
Chairs were not established by one mans fiat. Article 14 of the Impe
rial University Ordinance had given faculty appointment powers to the
minister of education. But exercising these powers required much con
sultation, and the president's role was important. It was. after all. Presi
dent Kato Hiroyuki who in 1890 had actually proposed the system of
chairs. Minister Inoue consulted fully with Kato's successor (Hamao
Arata) on which chairs to establish.8*7 The presidents themselves did
not have free rein. While legally they could proceed as they wished
(since their authority had not yet been challenged), they could not
ignore the professors' advice.87 When Inoue requested Hamao's views
on chairs in 1893, Hamao immediately sought opinions from the fac
ulty.88 The Ministry of Education made a point of underscoring pro
fessors* involvement In March 1897 Vice Minister Makino Nobuaki
told the Budget Committee of the House of Representatives: "We [in
the ministry] hold meetings with faculty members at the university to
determine whichfieldsare most urgently needed. I cannot tell you what
they will be in advance because this is decided periodically."89
Nevertheless, the skill of the president was very important in deter
mining the pace of expansion. Presidents Hamao and Kikuchi had both
served extensively in the Ministry of Education before becoming presi
dent at Tokyo University, while Toyama moved, conversely, from uni
versity to ministry. All had extensive high-level connections and knew
how to play the administrative game well. Hamao's accomplishments
were limited by the financial pressures of the war with China; Kikuchi
had the advantage of serving in peacetime. Even so, one has only to
compare Kikuchi's accomplishments at Tokyo with those of his coun
terpart at Kyoto to appreciate the importance of the president's role.

Kyoto had been created on a wave of enthusiasm. Its first president,
Kinoshita Hiroji, had been chief of the Bureau of Professional Educa
tion (1893-97). But Kinoshita complained bitterly of financial neglect
and managed to add only eight chairs in technical fields between 1898
and 1901. Kikuchi had excellent support and was able to found eleven.
One cannot know all the pertinent factors, but their backgrounds were
probably important. Kinoshita was a lawyer with no technical training,
while Kikuchi was a scientist.90
In the 1890s scientific progress at the imperial universities benefited
from sympathy at the Ministry of Education. Each of the chiefs of
Professional Education was overtly sympathetic, and several were par
ticularly helpful.91 Professors had access to most top officials and were
closely involved in the bureau.92 Individual professors or academic
units could propose a chair or laboratory, obtain support from the higher
authorities, and hope to find it established in due time However, an
important point to note in comparative context is the formal nature of
these ties. The Bureau of Professional Education was officially charged
with promoting "all of the sciences and the arts" as well as with super
vising the imperial universities.93
Ostensibly, the Ministry of Home Affairs and the Bureau of Public
Health had a similar relationship with the Institute of Infectious Dis
eases. Under the terms of an 1893 letter to Kitasato from Minister Inoue
Kaoru, all regulations of the institute, together with any revision or
diversion of budgeted items, had to be approved by the minister of home
affairs. The laboratory's activities were supposed to be supervised by the
public health bureau's chief. The minister of home affairs had to be
informed about activities in writing annually. The Board of Audit was
empowered to inspect the institute's accounts whenever it wished.94
But in some respects the relationship was rather anomalous. Before
nationalization (March 1899), the Institute of Infectious Diseases was
legally private, and Kitasato just a consultant. No restrictions or audits
were ever in fact imposed, because Kitasato had the power to prevent
interference. Shortly after nationalization, Ikai jiho declared: "Mr.
Kitasato is the dominant force in the Bureau of Public Health. Every
thing it does is based on his views."95
Kitasato's friendships with successive bureau chiefs bolstered his
status. Nagayo Sensai, in office until August 1891, was Kitasato's first
major patron. In 1884 he gave Kitasato his first job (bureau technician
and Hygiene Laboratory researcher) and in 1890 got additional funding
for the now famous scientist after the Ministry of Education refused its
support ^ Kitasato was even friendlier with two of Nagayo's successors.
He and Goto Shimpei met in 1883 when both were working in the
bureau and became close friends in Berlin about 1887 while studying
bacteriology together. In 1892 Goto became chief, and in 1893 he
helped Kitasato found the institute.97 Gotd left office in 1898 and was
succeeded as chief by Hasegawa Tai. Hasegawa had served as legisla
tive architect of the institute subsidies in 1893 and remained through
out his life Kitasato's ardent ally. Neither man was trusted by university
professors. They called Hasegawa 'Kitasato's puppet," and Goto an
"oppressor."98
These epithets symbolize the reality of factions in Japanese medi
cine. Sources disagree on their number and structure. One common
depiction put graduates of the Tokyo University medical faculty in the
"university faction," while Kitasato's associates were said to form an
other faction.99 Whatever the validity of particular descriptions, polar
ization between factions was real. The Ministry of Home Affairs even
respected these hostilities when it decided to sponsor a venture in re
search. In spring 1894 the Japanese consulate in Hong Kong informed
Tokyo by cable of a plague epidemic afflicting the city. A brief consulta
tion between a section chief in the Bureau of Public Health and one of
Kitasato's research associates established that plague was not extinct,
as had been thought, and that prestige would accrue to any country
whose scientists succeeded in discovering the cause. Accordingly, the
bureau recommended a medical expedition to Hong Kong. After due
deliberation, the minister chose the university's Aoyama Tanemichi for
the clinical work and Kitasato for the basic research. 10°
The scientific outcome of the Hong Kong expedition was important
in at least two ways. Kitasato managed to isolate the bacillus and an
nounced his success in The Lancet.101 This, of course, was very big
news, and when the expedition returned to Tokyo, a welcoming recep
tion was held—ironically at Tokyo University. Prominent public figures
heaped praise on the mission, and the Emperor's cousin captured the
mood. According to Prince Konoe Tokumaro, the discovery by Kitasato
of the plague bacillus "reflects credit on Japanese medical science and
makes our civilization shine to the heavens. . .. Such achievements can
only raise the level of our nation and bring it [universal] acclaim."102
Prince Konoe's words had policy implications. In 1894 Kitasato be
gan accepting short-term special students (denshusei) at the Institute
of Infectious Diseases. Because most were public health officials, the
home minister in 1895 requested—and the Diet authorized—prefec
tural governors to recommend candidates with the government to pay
for their training. These state-supported students, and others who paid
their own way, studied bacteriology, epidemiology, toxic prevention,
microscopy, culture making, and methods of clinical treatment.103 By
nationalization, this public program at a private institution had pro
duced 450 graduates who had their own organization and were political
allies of Kitasato.104
Kitasato's objectives were simple enough: maintenance of his auton
omy and political independence, bolstering of funding, and above all
protection of the Institute of Infectious Diseases from formal annexa
tion by the Ministry of Education. He used service functions to protect
his research, taking advantage of the institute's structure and ostensi
ble mission—research, clinical treatment, and public health consulta
tion. The denshusei program meshed well with this mission, as did most
of his other activities. Kitasato and his staff gave lectures for physicians,
traveled to epidemic-infested areas at the home minister's request, and
took even.' opportunity to publicize their work.105 The results were
impressive. Not surprisingly, a long-time associate was able to write:
"Ordinary people considered Dr. Kitasato a (typical] oyabun [boss] or a
common politician"106
If scientists' influence was greatest in the Ministry of Home Affairs, it
was lowest in the Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce. This ministry
hadresponsibilitiesin forestry and industry as well as agriculture, and
in virtually even1 bureau the "lawyers" were powerful. After Maeda
Masana retired as chief of the Bureau of Agriculture in July 1890,
nonexperts controlled the office for thirteen years. In the Bureau of
Forestry, one expert had three months' control in 1897; in the Bureau of
Industry no technical man was ever bureau chief after October
1889. l07 Of course, control was not wholly definitive, for all three bu
reaus employed technical experts, and some of them made a significant
difference. Some of the laboratories under the ministry had more auton
omy. But technical projects were hard to advance, given the bureau
cratic climate.
Consider the Bureau of Agriculture. With chiefs who were lawyers or
even politicians, and technical men who were sometimes professors,
there was a serious possibility of failure to communicate. Some mem
bers of the Diet criticized the Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce's
concept of agricultural research, its deployment of resources, and its
application of results. "The ministry's development plan was inade
quate." "We need moreresearch!"(Imai Isoichiro). Trie ministry was
"sacrificing export profits by failing to stress agricultural research"
(Nakamura Yaroku). The ministry was wasting money at the Agri
cultural Experiment Station by putting up Western-style buildings;
traditional styles would be much more appropriate (Nakamura Yaroku).
Technical experts were not used effectively because so many were at
work in the ministry's headquarters (Fujita Magohei). Experiment sta
tion experts talked over the heads of the farmers; their extension pro
grams were totally "haphazard" (Nakamura Yaroku). Ministry officials
could not explain the technical work of the station even to the members
of the Imperial Diet (Fujita Magohei).108
Responses to these chargesfromthe chief of the bureau were par for
the course. Since money was insufficient, the bureau had to rely on the
cooperation of various private groups which "often do not follow
through." It was difficult to obtain foreign seeds and plant species. The
extension program needed "time to evolve." One had to proceed "slowly
and cautiously." The research programs of the experiment station were
"just a beginning."109 But the bureau chief was willing to concede that
many of the charges were valid. The number of technical experts at
ministry headquarters was quite large but at the same time essential for
"administrative purposes." The number of truly well-rounded agri
culture experts was admittedly "not very large." The chief confessed
that he was a "novice" in scientific agriculture, did "not understand
much of farmers' conversations," and "did not know the scope of the
[experiment station's] work in any real scientific sense"!110
In the 1890s the bureau's performance at the topmost level showed
marginal improvement at best. Technical experts, for example, were
never deployed in a manner suitable for research. In 1896 the bureau
had thirty-one technicians and technical experts at its administrative
headquarters, but only thirteen at the experiment station at Nishiga
hara. In 1899 twenty experts worked at central headquarters and elev
en at Nishigahara, both located in the city of Tokyo. •' ! The chief of the
bureau for most of this period (March 1893-May 1898), Fujita Shiro,
was the first "lawyer" to hold the position and was undoubtedly appoint
ed for reasons unrelated to agriculture. In 1896 he tried to meet the tea
industry's demand for a research program by simply transferring 1,372
yen from the already modest budget for sericulture.112 In February
1899, while serving as vice minister, he brushed aside requests for more
research support saying it was "wrong to spend money. . . just to en
courage agriculture."113 This came at a time when Japan's spending on
agriculture research was embarrassingly small.
In the Bureau of Forestry in the 1890s the problems were about the
same. Technical and nontechnical men had to communicate, and bar
riers between them were real. Worse, the technical men were divided
among themselves. In 1891 Shiga Taizan, who was both professor of
forestry at Tokyo University and an expert employed in the Bureau of
Forestry, recommended forestry conservation policies based on re
search, but these had to obtain the ministry's approval before the Diet
could debate them, and that gave rise to two big problems. One was the
composition of the ministry's review committee, the other the status of
the technical men. Making up the committee were seventeen "lawyers"
and two technical men. Other technicians were wholly subordinate.
The "lawyers" reacted with incomprehension, and the other technician

challenged Shiga s findings. When Shiga protested at this reception, he
was "warned directly by the minister himself."114
Indications are that the Bureau of Forestry had serious morale prob
lems. Many well-trained experts worked there, but they never had any
real authority. No matter how many years of commendable service they
had or how much the administrative system was supposed to be based
on scientific knowledge, they could never rise beyond section chief.
Later this became a big issue (see chapter 8). 115
Then there was the Bureau of Industry. The same kinds of people
who served as bureau chiefs in agriculture or forestry were present
here, too, and the men with technical degrees who did the major work
were, like everywhere else, subordinate. Yet in other respects the Bu
reau of Industry was an exception. Its staff was small. In 1897 the
Bureaus of Agriculture and Forestry hadfifty-nineand forty-eight men
on their staffs, respectively, while the Bureau of Industry had a mere
twenty-three.'l6 Other things being equal, an engineer or scientist
employed in this bureau stood a somewhat better chance of obtaining a
hearing. Moreover, the private-sector clients of the Bureau of Industry
were more powerful than those of its rivals. Most forested land was
government owned, so there wererelativelyfew clients for the Bureau
of Forestry, and the wealthy farmer clients of the Bureau of Agriculture
were no political match for industry's wealthy businesses.
The real problem for science in the Bureau of Industry was the
complacency of most clients. Before 1895, most private firms were
uninterested inresearchand maderelativelyfew demands for it on the
government.!I7 But once they saw the need to take action, they were
powerful enough to get things done. After Japan's victory in the Sino-
Japanese War, European facilities for industrial research and sophisti
cated manufacturing became less accessible to Japanese visitors.! 18 In
1897 a bureau expert made a systematic effort to dispel business com
placency. Takayama Jintaro, a chemical engineer, began publicizing
the need for industrial research after officially touring facilities in Ger
many. The Japanese private sector responded to his efforts by organiz
ing a group to carry on lobbying.! 19
The aim of this group, the Association for the Chemical Industry—
and the major scientific project of the Bureau of Industry—was to
establish what became the Industrial Experiment Laboratory. In Oc
tober 1898 the bureau recommended the plan to the intraministerial
committee of the Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce. This body
consisted of the ministry's eight bureau chiefs and had been created in
1881 by Minister Kono Togama. Committee approval was necessary
before any official proposal could be reviewed by the Ministry of Fi
nance or the Diet Given the different backgrounds of the bureau chiefs,
this procedure could easily have posed a problem, but in 1898 the
committee contained an influential and atypical member, Watanabe
Wataru, who had a B.S. degree in chemistry, was professor of metal
lurgical engineering, and had for some months been chief of the Bureau
of Mining. 12 ° His presence may have made the difference. The commit
tee decided to back the proposal.121 Private business also tried to lobby
the ministry. When the matter went to the Diet in February 1899, it was
under private sponsorship, with the ministry's assent.122 Of course,
European precedents were critical in persuading the government to
found the Industrial Experiment Laboratory.123
Decision Making for Science in the Prewar Years

Decision-making trends in the years before the war did not simply
replicate earlier patterns, although changes may have been more appar
ent than real. The Imperial Diet was still influential, and the influence
of the "lawyers" became more pervasive. In the Ministry of Education
in the 1890s and in the opening years of the twentieth century, a few
professors held major offices and could make decisions themselves, but
they were succeeded mostly by "lawyers," who tended to delegate sig
nificant decision-making powers. Changes of this kind could also be
latent, not perceptible to contemporary observers. Kitasato had as much
power in the Ministry of Home Affairs after as before 1902, when "law
yers" replaced doctors in the Bureau of Public Health. But his position
did change, and changes were partly due to the actions of "lawyers."
But "lawyers" had not completely overrun the bureaus. In the Ministry
of Agriculture and Commerce, where they were most entrenched, an
agricultural chemist became agriculture bureau chief in 1903 and an
other vice minister in 1908.
The year 1900 saw intensified concern over higher education and
science, with the Ministry of Education again under attack from politi
cians and educators. Representative Shimada Saburo accused the
ministry of having a "closed-country mentality" and of lacking interest
in reform.124 Kyoikujiron claimed the ministry's approach to manage
ment was "shallow and prejudiced" and attacked it for carrying on
administration in secret 12S Even Kato Hiroyuki saw the ministry as a
{dace where accomplishments were few because officials were "preoc
cupied."126 But the sharpest criticisms in these early years had more
to do with research by professors. On thefloor,of the House of Peers,
the former vice minister of education Kubota Yuzuru charged that
university professors had done too much consulting and not enough
research. After denouncing their neglect of research, he laid the blame

on the ministry itself, saying it was largely "indifferent to higher
education."127
Responses to Kubota's charges varied. The incumbent minister, Ka
bayama Sukenori, who agreed, criticized what he considered an exces
sive emphasis on overseas study, with its implied drain on funds and
consequent diminution of faculty research, and proposed a program to
turn this around. 128 His successor, Matsuda Masahisa, backed a
number of ad hoc projects for scholarly research. 129 But some pro
fessors at Tokyo University took a far less favorable view of the
charges. The former university president Toyama Shoichi had his own
reform ideas and reportedly used "vituperative language" in his re
sponse. 13° Physics professor Yamakawa Kenjiro thought Kubota's
statements only made it more difficult for scientists to function profes
sionally. n i The definitive reply came from mathematician Kikuchi
Dairoku. Using the House of Peers as a forum, he stated that faculty
were actually doing plenty of research (see chapter 6). Kubota had just
failed to grasp its meaning. Foreign scientists had cited university
publications for their research results, and faculty consulting was an
other form of research. l32
Over the next five years these views were tested by four different
ministers. The first was Kikuchi himself. Appointed to office in June
1901. he served two years and was then forced to resign. After an
interim successor who served just two months, the office of minister
was filled by Kubota. Kubota served two years and was also forced to
leave office (in December 1905), after which the prime minister filled
out the term. In the modem administrative history of Japanese science,
nothing else resembles these five turbulent years. Continuity was sup
plied by the prime minister, who held office for the entire period, and his
views gave some coherence and unity.
This man, Katsura Taro, was atypical among Meiji prime ministers.
He was a career military man who had also lived seven years in Berlin.
He had an "extraordinary understanding of science" and was deter
mined to promote it effectively.133 Katsura saw two major problems in
higher education and science. One was what he identified as the "com
mon evils of the academic community."134 The other was what he
considered an excessive reliance on Europe for technical and scientific
information.135 But science and higher education were not his only
interests. He was even more dedicated to strengthening Japans inter
national position, and for this reason he signed the Anglo-Japanese
Alliance (1902), launched a major military buildup (1903), and went to
war with Russia (1904-05). Unfortunately the domestic and foreign
objectives of the Katsura cabinet were in basic conflict. The Diet would
not allow higher taxes to pay for the military buildup and war,136 and
this led inevitably to major retrenchment, the issuance of bonds, and
the deferment of new spending.
The prime minister aggravated his problems by his choices for minis
ter of education. Kikuchi and Kubota appeared to be qualified, but they
offended their major constituencies. Kikuchi's tenure was troubled
from the start. In June 1901 he announced a plan to promote competi
tion by instituting lecture fees, pooling the funds, and redistributing
them to professors with large class enrollments. This lacked appeal for
most scientists since their enrollments were usually small.137 In Sep
tember he proposed a two-track preprofessional education system that
academic colleagues managed to defeat at a regular meeting of the
Higher Education Council.l38 In November he denied any need for an
imperial university in Kyushu, even though he had previously endorsed
it. 139
Of course, Kikuchi did some things his colleagues liked In De
cember 1901 he gave a masterful defense of the Seismological Re
search Commission, which some Diet members had opposed because
the work it had done had not yet led to long-term prevention of earth
quakes!140 In 1902 and 1903 he did propose and help to secure signifi
cant budget increases for the imperial universities. But in March 1903
he tried to prevent Waseda from acquiring the title university, saying it
was in most ways inferior to Tokyo University.141 Kikuchi favored re
search, but his policy views were unusual. Unlike most concerned
Japanese, he wanted to stress education in the imperial universities and
concentrate research in the Tokyo academy.142
Considering his past record and the prime minister's expectations,
Kikuchi's term was a failure. Kyoiku jiron had criticized his admin
istrative abilities in 1897 when he was serving as chief of the Bureau of
Professional Education, but his overall record had belied it 1 4 3 He was
the only scientist ever to serve at this highest level of the government.
He had served not only as professor of mathematics and dean of the
science faculty but as university president and vice minister of educa
tion. Unfortunately his training and views made him politically un
qualified to serve in the post of minister. Kikuchi had done university
work in mathematics and science at St. John's College, Cambridge,
from 1873 to 1877, and he came under the influence of Isaac
Todhunter, a capable mathematician of reactionary views.144 Cam
bridge was peculiar even in Britain, and Todhunter peculiar in
Cambridge. While most British universities were institutionalizing sci
ence, the classical legacy was very strong at Cambridge. This implied
vigorous opposition to experimental science and strict adherence to
aristocratic values. Todhunter saw Cambridge as training members of
the elite. He rejected aspirations for upward mobility and especially

aspirations for changing society.145 Kikuchi's views were not wholly
Todhunter's, but they were closer to them than expediency dictated. In
July 1903 the House of Representatives voted no confidence in Kikuchi,
partly over the issue of university expansion.146 The prime minister
then appointed the home minister, Kodama Gentaro, as acting minister
of education. Kodama proposed, and Katsura even supported, a scheme
to abolish the Ministry of Education.147 Kikuchi had gravely offended
the Diet and the cabinet. When the Privy Council blocked this radical
scheme, Kikuchi's long-time enemy Kubota Yuzuru became minister of
education.
Ultimately, Kubota fared little better. A graduate of Keio, he had few
connections at Tokyo University. Because of the military buildup and
the war, he could not promise to allocate more money. In fact, funding
for the two universities was frozen in 1903, and Tokyo took cuts in
1905. 148 Professors and scientists hated Kubota because he demanded
so much and delivered so little. In 1905 they were given their chance.
Seven Tokyo professors criticized the modest gains that came to Japan
in the settlement with Russia, and Kubota imprudently sought their
dismissal. This "Tomizu Affair" brought massive opposition from the
university community, which was seeking to achieve institutional au
tonomy.149 Many scientists joined the movement ostensibly in support
of their colleagues but soon made their true feelings known: the issue
was not upholding a principle but eliminating a foe. Once Kubota had
been forced to leave office, their interest in politics faded. 15°
This turbulent era eventually gave way to greater stability. Makino
Nobuaki became minister of education in March 1906 and set out to
accomplish what his predecessors could not Both imperial universities
got significant funding increases for 1906 (13 percent for Tokyo, 14
percent for Kyoto) and decent ones for 1907 (5 and 10 percent, respec
tively).151 The number of chairs in technical fields grew more rapidly
than it had in some years.152 The Tokyo academy was radically re
organized, and the decision was made to launch Tohoku University.
Formal establishment of the Tohoku science faculty offers a salient
example of the "new" decision making. Under the rules of the higher
civil service, scientists were not to hold policy positions, but they were
allowed to contribute their views when officials considered them essen
tial. Since Makino's administration embodied both views, he dispatched
his subordinate to the Tokyo campus.153 In early 1907 the vice minister
Fukuhara Ryojiro, who was also chief of the Bureau of Professional
Education, conferred with the physicist Nagaoka Hantaro about inter
nal details of the proposed new faculty. This all-day meeting yielded two
SCIENCE AND THE BUREAUCRACY I49
principal results. Nagaoka proposed names for academic appointments,

and the two men agreed on an organizing committee.154
As proposed, this committee would monitor developments, and for
that reason it was made up of prominent scientists.155 In fact, once it
was known who would be the new professors, it was they who did most
of the actual work. Their most important task was to allocate money for
facilities and equipment. Four programs were to be funded—in geol
ogy, mathematics, physics and chemistry—and the government im
posed a limit on spending (150,000 yen). Unfortunately, the efforts of
the young professors yielded a budget twice that size, but over some
months the problems were solved. The professors reached a formula for
allocating their funds. The geology program was postponed for a year.
The ministry decided to reward them with additional funds for
equipment 156
Of course, Makino and his successors could make such commit
ments because military spending was dropping. But the success he
achieved while holding this office cannot fully be explained in this way
Makino Nobuaki had a profound understanding of w hat one would now
call the sociology of science and higher education. During his four years
as vice minister of education in the 1890s he had pointed out Japan's
special lack of experience with the physical sciences, expressed sympa
thy for the difficulties of Japanese research scientists after they re
turned home from Europe, defended the hiring of foreign academics as
a stimulus for Japanese professors, supported university expansion as
"best for the progress of learning." and stressed the importance of
competition between chairs as beneficial to scientific research.157
Makino had other qualities few colleagues could match. He was the son
of Okubo Toshimichi, one of the Meiji state's founders, he had spent
much time abroad in his formative years (primarily in the United
States), and he had more than a modicum of political judgment. In
1908, when the Beriberi Research Commission was established with
money from the Ministry of War, he refused to support professorial
demands that the Ministry of Education be granted control on the
grounds that this was not a fight he could win.l M Makino s efforts were
greatly appreciated by the scientific community. Tokyo University's
president, the physicist Yamakawa Kenjiro, said in 1911 that Makino
Nobuaki was "among the ministers of education who accomplished the
most" 159
Certainly no one said this of the three who succeeded. Komatsubara
Eitaro (1908-11) was described as a "used-up official with neither the
capacity nor the inclination for administration." His successor, Haseba
Sumitaka (1911-12), was called "deficient in the ability to understand
I5O SCIENCE AND THE BUREAUCRACY
anything about education." And the third, Shibata Kamon (1912-13),

was said to represent the "quintessential bureaucratic style."160 The
evidence supports such remarks. None of these men had served in the
Ministry of Education before becoming its head. Haseba had never
been to college, and Komatsubara had spent just one year at Keio. None
of the three had taught in a school, and none was known for intellectual
interests.161
Other trends in the higher bureaucracy made the situation, if any
thing, worse. Komatsubara's appointment (he was concurrently minis
ter of agriculture and commerce) epitomized a tendency to assign
someone to the Ministry of Education as a kind of secondary duty. l62
Shibata's appointment marked the definitive takeover of the ministry by
university graduates of the faculties of law. So conspicuous was this
trend that Kyoiku jiron, which in 1897 had editorialized against the
appointment of technical men to administrative offices, in 1913 re
versed its judgment to argue that men with legal training were "not
necessarily qualified to serve as bureau chiefs, [at least] in the Ministry
of Education. "lt>J
But it was in the area of policy decisions that the effects were most
glaring. The period 1908-14 was a period of lost opportunities, al
though substantial institutional growth did occur at the two new re
gional campuses. Tohoku's science faculty with its twelve chairs was
inaugurated in 1911, and the faculty of engineering at Kyushu Univer
sity commenced the same year. Partly this expansion was based on
policy Yamakawa Kenjiro, serving as president at Kyushu in 1911, got
Haseba to agree that the two new universities must be made equal to
their peers in Tokyo and Kyoto,164 but education ministers in this peri
od were otherwise not much involved. Makino had committed the gov
ernment to the Tohoku project before leaving office, and Kyushu's
expansion was owing to decisions under Kikuchi and to the political
intervention of industrialists. The price that was paid for this regional
expansion could be, and certainly was, challenged. Between 1908 and
1914 Kyoto University managed to add only one chair in a technical
field (internal medicine in 1909) while Tokyo added just four (miner
alogy, 1909; geography, 1911; agricultural engineering, 1911; mining
engineering, 1912). How they did it at all is not clear, since their bud
gets were virtually frozen.165 Not surprisingly, Chuo koron in 1913
called the Ministry of Education a "place long lacking in accomplish
ment"; while Kyoiku jiron in 1914 considered it the "principal victim of
the government's cuts in spending."166
The pattern of government spending justified this criticism. Meiji
Japan had never spent lavishly on higher education. In 1900 Kubota
Yuzuru reminded the House of Peers that France and Germany were
SCIENCE AND THE BUREAUCRACY I5I
spending about 8 percent of their budgets on public education, as com

pared to 5 percent in Japan.167 Kikuchi Dairoku testified in 1901 to
education's status as a lower-ranking item on the financial agenda of
the country.168 The reasons for this are both comprehensible and in
comprehensible. Historically, the samurai class had linked education
not only with morality but also with frugality. The Meiji leadership was
inevitably committed to a high level of spending on the Japanese armed
forces. The tax base was narrow for a good many years, and much of the
Diet was vigorously dedicated to a relatively low level of public
expenditure.
But one should not overlook the Ministry of Finance and its role in
the budget process. This ministry was a conservative agency whose
officials invariably chopped budgets. It was also an agency of consider
able prestige, where many university graduates of the faculties of law
first got their footholds 169 Ministers and vice ministers were not law
graduates until after the Russo-Japanese War, but several had been
bureau chiefs before the turn of the century. The predilection for ap
pointing law graduates worked against science. In 1911 Yamakawa
Kenjiro lamented the small number of competent generalises among
university graduates and especially deplored the "ignorance of science"
that typified the modern legal man. I7 ° The ministry had in fact blun
dered badly in 1906 when it blocked a plan by electrical engineers in the
Ministry of Communications to standardize frequencies of electrical
transmission.171 Coincidentally Yamakawa had lashed out at the basic
posture of the Ministry of Finance. The ministry's worst feature, ac
cording to him, was a tendency to support proposals from the military
uncritically while inclining to "meddle in educational [and technical]
matters where they wrongly think they are competent."172
Predictably the last man to serve as minister of education before
World War 1 was a person who fit the legal mold closely. Not that Okuda
Yoshindo lacked pertinent expertise, for in 1899-1900 he had served as
vice minister of education, and he had some understanding of higher
education. He was a staunch promoter of Tokyo University and had
graduated from its law faculty in 1884. In 1913, as minister of educa
tion, he rejected proposals for privatdozenten and lecture fees because
the conditions needed to support them were lacking in Japan.173
But Okuda Yoshindo was above all else an expert in law and finance.
He never served in the Ministry of Finance, but he had held a compara
ble job in 1900-02, when he was chief of the cabinet Bureau for Legal
Affairs. There he developed the plan for cutbacks that Katsura had
endeavored to follow. But Okuda was largely unaware of technical is
sues. He claimed that Tokyo University "set the standard for scientific
research in Japan" and recommended transfer of Kitasato's institute to
the university.174 Despite major opposition he proposed this again (un

successfully) in 1911 and in 1913.
But in 1914 Kitasato's laboratory was transferred, though many con
temporary observers attributed the transfer to Dean Aoyama s machina
tions. Professor of internal medicine from 1887 and dean of Tokyo's
faculty for sixteen years (1901 -17), Aoyama Tanemichi was a Kitasato
rival who was powerful, well-connected, and politically informed. He
helped add six new chairs during the years of his deanship and avoided
budget cuts during the years of no-growth funding.175 In 1908 he
managed to get a member of the medical faculty on the war ministry's
Beriberi Research Commission.176 He was also a close friend of Okunia
Shigenobu, one of the country's most powerful politicians.177 Many
thought this connection led to the transfer. Since Okuma was prime
minister at the time (see chapter 7), and since the two men dined
together nearly even1 Friday evening, it was plausible that the dean had
persuaded the prime minister to carry out this action.
In fact, Aoyama was neither responsible for the transfer nor capable
of achieving it by those means.17" Before he authorized the transfer,
Okuma had supported Kitasato, and in any case Aoyama had other
priorities. Certainly he did medical research, but his principal interests
were treatment of patients and finding positions for academic clients.
To that end he tried to influence the selection of students for overseas
study, involved himself intimately in faculty appointments, and con
vinced the people holding the pursestrings to create new positions for
university-trained doctors.179 Aoyama was more adroit than other
deans and held office longer, but his career was typical. Sakurai Joji as
dean of science, Watanabe Wataru as dean of engineering, and Kozai
Yoshinao as dean of agriculture all used this same strategy.
Institution building on behalf of research required more than these
sorts of talents, for one had to have support from laypeople and control of
resources simultaneously. In 1914, before the war began, members of
the faculty of science had neither. An effort to engender support by
delivering lectures at the Tokyo School of Physics, a very poorly funded
private institution, yielded no lasting results.180 The faculty of science
produced a relatively small number of fully trained graduates. The
private money received to support basic science was not used entirely
by that faculty. Private business had limited interest, and no basic
scientist's name was a household word.181
Agriculture's situation was, in principle, different, because it was a
traditionally strong field that had some support for nonacademic re
search and a capable leader in Dean Kozai Yoshinao. Kozai had access
to the powerful. In 1913 he was invited by the cabinet to discuss a
proposal for agricultural research at one of its regular meetings. In
terestingly enough, this proposal—for an animal husbandry institute-

was never adopted despite a favorable reaction.I82 But the Yam am o to
cabinet whose initiative it was soon fell from power, and the proposal
could be faulted on the merits. Did Japan really need an animal husban
dry institute when it had so many other needs? It is likely that the
principal difficulty was lack of external support. Such a facility would
have benefited only a few wealthy farmers, a clientele not organized
politically. Agriculture generally had few academic support groups, and
those that it did have were formed late. l83
Academic engineering faced similar obstacles. Professional and
other support groups existed, but their influence was small,18*' and
Japanese business's bias toward foreign technology made it disinclined
to give money. About 1909 the metallurgical physicist Honda Kdtaro—
who did raise private money after 1914—described the relationship
between private business and academic research as "like that of part
ners in a very late marriage."185 Aoyagi Eiji. professor of electrical
engineering at Kyoto University, in 1912 complained in print that aca
demic engineers had "very few contacts in the business communi
ty."186 Even having such contacts was not always enough. In 1911 the
Ministry of Finance managed to block a proposed mining research
laboratory despite support from academic engineers, their business al
lies, and the DieL187
Kitasato's career in the Ministry of Home Affairs showed quite a
different pattern. In 1899 he secured the dismissal of a section chief in
the Public Health Bureau, apparently on personal grounds.188 In 1903
and 1912 he defeated proposals from the Ministry- of Finance to reduce
the budget of the Institute of Infectious Diseases.189 In 1914 he insti
gated the founding of a national network of sanatoria and hospitals for
victims of tuberculosis.190 The size of his "empire" grew steadily. In
1905 the government built new facilities for the laboratory and hospital
and added new agencies to them. Attaching the Vaccine Station and
Serological Institute for vaccine and serum production to the Institute
of Infectious Diseases significantly increased Kitasato's power, because
such production was a government monopoly.191 Not surprisingly, the
Bureau of Public Health was then said to be little more than an "exten
sion of the Institute of Infectious Diseases," and the bureau chief
"could never take action without consulting Kitasato in advance."192
Kitasato took steps to hold on to his power. In about 1901 he got
control of the Central Hygiene Commission, whose function was medi
cal consulting. He exploitedfriendshipswith Tanaka Giichi (later prime
minister) and Fukuzawa Yukichi to gain regular access to their two
publications. He made extensive use of the Japan Federation of Medical
Societies and later served as its president. And he threw lavish parties
for the federation's members on the grounds of his private estate.193

Kitasato could do this because of his wealth. Beginning in 1893 he had
established a private sanatorium for tubercular patients, and it proved
exceedingly lucrative.194
The major bureau chiefs were also Kitasato's friends. Kubota Seitaro,
who served as chief of the Bureau of Public Health for about seven
years, was the first of many lawyers to hold this position. After graduat
ingfromTokyo University's faculty of law, he worked as an attorney in
the Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce and as a councillor with the
Court of Administrative Appeals. In 1903 he was named chief of the
bureau, where he consistently supported Kitasato's proposals.I95 His
immediate successor was a lawyer-politician who was Kitasato's child
hood friend. Kobashi Ichita (1910-13) went from Kumamoto to Tokyo
University, then to the Bureau of Public Health, the Bureau of Civil
Engineering, and the vice ministership of home affairs. In 1929 he
became minister of education. Some considered Kobashi an effective
bureau chief because in 1912 he got significant new funding for the
Institute of Infectious Diseases when the Ministry of Finance was de
manding cuts everywhere,196 but others were less happy with him.
These critics stressed his lack of influence in 1911, when Saionji's
cabinet proposed to transfer the institute to the Ministry of Education,
and his seeming ineffectiveness in 1913, when Okuda Yoshindo want
ed to abolish the bureau.197
The most interesting aspect of Kobashi's performance is how his
background in law contributed. Since he was Kitasato'sfriendand tried
to support him, it is tempting to conclude that it made little difference.
But the editor of the medical journal Ikai jiho was not convinced this
was true. This man, Uchigasaki Tojiro, himself a graduate of the Tokyo
law faculty, made two criticisms of his fellow alumnus. According to
him, Kobashi had fallen short because he lacked institutional loyalty
and because he was insufficiently familiar with the matters he con
trolled. "The chief of the Bureau of Public Health should be a physi
cian," he wrote. "But since the changes were made in the higher civil
service, they are no longer being appointed."198 Interestingly enough,
Uchigasaki was not the only lawyer who considered the system too
rigid. Bureau Chief Kubota once noted that Kitasato had never held a
post with much formal power and attributed this record to "bureaucrat
ic defects."199
A bureaucratic lawyer eventually caused Kitasato to lose his position.
The laboratory transfer of 1914 was primarily the work of Ichiki
Kitokuro, from 1894 to 1905 professor in the Tokyo law faculty and for
several years thereafter a career civil servanL Ichiki came to dislike
Kitasato after having been in posts where he could observe the scien
tist's maneuvering. In 1899, as a member ex officio of the Central

Hygiene Commission, he watched Kitasato use the commission to fire
an obnoxious civil servant In 1903 and 1911 he had to tolerate
Kitasato's destruction of the bureaucratic reform plans drafted by
Okuda Yoshindo, who preceded him as cabinet bureau chief for legal
affairs. During the period from 1908 to 1911, while serving as home
affairs vice minister, Ichiki became particularly incensed by the grow
ing national power of the "Kitasato faction" and their consistent ability
to disrupt administration he thought appropriate and reasonable.200
But Ichiki could act only after Kitasato was weakened (see chapter
7), which happened for at least three different reasons. One was the
diminished role of the Ministry of Home Affairs in supervising scientific
laboratories (see table 5.3).
TABLE 5.3
Post-1900 Affiliations of Nonacademic Scientific
Laboratories
1900 1909 1915
MINISTRY N N N c
/c
Home Affairs 7 23 7 17 6 13
Agriculture and
Commerce 11 35 15 37 15 33
Public Works and
Comm u nications 2 7 2 5 2 4
Navy 3 10 4 10 4 11
War 1 3 3 7 3 7
Education 7 22 8 20 13 28
Railways 0 0 1 2 1 2
Finance 0 0 1 2 1 2
Totals 31 100 41 100 45 100

Sources: Yuasa Mitsutomo, Gendai kagaku gijutsu shi (Tokyo,
1962); TGSIG, various numbers.
One year after Kitasato's institute was nationalized, the Ministry of

Agriculture and Commerce had a 35 percent share of all nonacademic
laboratories controlled by the government, with Education running 22
percent and Home Affairs 23. This in itself was alarming enough; the
longer-term trend was much worse. By 1909 the Ministry of Home
Affairs controlled only 17 percent and the Ministry of Education about
20, and by 1915 Home Affairs had dropped to 13 percent, while Educa
tion s share had risen to 28. A trend so momentous did not pass un
noticed. As early as 1901 a member of the House of Representatives
remarked that the decline of the home affairs ministry had "created
difficulties for various projects" and demanded to know why. In re
sponse, the chief of the Bureau of Civil Engineering testified that the
Ministry of Home Affairs indeed "lacked backbone" and had no "special
plan for carrying out (its) programs."201
The growing numbers of bacteriologists also eroded Kitasato's posi
tion. There were only seven bacteriologists in Japan when the Institute
of Infectious Diseases was founded. Within a year of nationalization,
the number had increased to twenty-four, and there were thirty-one
Japanese bacteriologists when Okuda first recommended the institute's
transfer. By 1910 there were forty-two, and another crucial one was
added by 1914. 2O2 The percentage of bacteriologists working for organi
zations controlled by admirers of Kitasato was declining (see table 5.4).
In 1893, four of Japan's seven bacteriologists worked with Kitasato, and
three worked in the hostile environments of Tokyo University and the
TABLE 5.4
Employment of Bacteriologists
IN PRO-KITASATO IN OTHER
ORGANIZATIONS ORGANIZATIONS
YEAR N % N %
1893 4 57 3 43
1900 13 54 11 46
1910 18 43 24 57
1914 18 42 25 58
Sources: Iselci Kuro, ed, Dai Nihon hakushi roku, vols. 2,3 (Tokyo:
Hattensha, 1930), and various biographies.
Tokyo Hygiene Institute.203 In 1900, 54 percent of the bacteriologists

in Japan still worked in institutions or for organizations controlled by his
allies, but by 1910 thisfigurehad dropped to 43 percent, and by the eve
of the war to 42.
Erosion of skill monopoly and loss of political leverage made the
decline in Kitasato's bacteriologists an important development. Most
Japanese bacteriologists before 1900 were both loyal to Kitasato and
employed in organizations where they were free of conflicting loyalties,
but their movement into organizations controlled by hostile elements
changed this pattern substantially. In 1898 Yokote Chiyonosuke be
came an assistant professor of bacteriology at Tokyo University, in 1908
Ishihara Kikutard left the Tokyo Higher Normal School to assume the
same position, and in 1909 Futaki Kenzd accepted a junior faculty post
at Tokyo.204 But the move that damaged Kitasato most was that of
Saizawa K6zo in 1913 to the faculty of the Army Medical College, where
he was subject to the authority of a long-time critic, Mori Rintaro, chief
of the Bureau of Medical Affairs in the Ministry of War. Saizawa's move
was particularly damaging because of his special combination of skills.
Yokote, Ishihara, and Futaki were competent researchers, but none had
a prior Kitasato connection or the range of qualifications required to
replace him. Saizawa, who had worked two years with Kitasato (1907
09) and two more at Koch's laboratory (1910-12) was not only trained
in research and clinical treatment but was formally qualified to super
vise production of serums and smallpox vaccine.205 Because Ishihara,
Futaki, Yokote, and Saizawa were reasonably well trained, and because
Saizawa held a politically vulnerable post, the Ministry of Education in
Okuma's government, by allying itself with the Ministry of War, was
able to assemble a pool of talent that could formally replace the Kitasato
staff in October 1914 when they resigned to protest the institute's trans
fer. None of this was apparent beforehand. According to Ikai jiho,
Kitasato until that moment continued to occupy a "very special position
in the Ministry of Home Affairs."206
No scientist had any such position in the Ministry of Agriculture and
Commerce, but there were two or three with more than average influ
ence. Sako Jomei studied in Germany and taught in the faculty of
agriculture at Tokyo University before joining the ministry in 1892.
During the next ten years he established himself as a leading agri
cultural chemist, received his doctorate, and held two section chief
posts in the Bureau of Agriculture. In a highly unusual move, Katsura's
government in May 1903 elevated Sako to the post of bureau chief,
which he occupied for three and a half years. The reasons for his ap
pointment are not completely clear, but a number of factors were at
work. For example, Katsura was more interested in science than most
prime ministers, Sako had impressive credentials, and afriendof Sako,

Hirata Tosuke, who had more formal education than most of his peers,
had become minister of agriculture and commerce. Hirata was the first
Japanese to obtain a Ph. D.fromthe University of Heidelberg; and while
his degree was in political economy, he had also translated medical
works into Japanese and was a friend of Shinagawa Yajiro, a prominent
lay promoter of the chemical industry.207
If Katsura and Hirata wanted radically new leadership, Sako did not
disappoint them. He built on his own research in setting directions. In
the 1890s he developed, and as bureau chief promoted, the "dry rice
field thesis," which called for leaving at least some paddy land fallow
when cultivating rice. He drafted legislation for agriculture. Under
Sako, laws governing fertilizer use, regulating agricultural societies,
and attempting to minimize damage from insects were all approved by
the Diet. He also took initiatives in several other areas, giving new
emphasis to livestock breeding, agricultural research, and taxation of
imported grain.208
Sako Jomei's striking contribution was to make the best use of re
sources. Critics had attacked the wasteful policy that appointed law
graduates as chiefs of bureaus with technical duties and then hired
experts to act in their place.209 Earlier chiefs of the Bureau of Agri
culture had clearly been guilty of this. In 1896 there had been only
thirteen experts in agricultural research and thirty-one pushing papers
at headquarters. But this ratio changed after Sako took office, and by the
end of his tenure it had been reversed. Unfortunately for the bureau,
the change was not permanent. Sako could evaluate technical matters,
but his successors, trained in law, had to rely on subordinate experts, so
that the number of experts working at headquarters once again exceed
ed those in research (see table 5.5). Sako's leadership was quite suc
cessful. Contemporaries called him the "famous bureau chief," and
Katsura in 1909 offered him the post of vice minister.210
After Sako, the bureau again came under the control of lawyers and
other nonexperts. Maki Naomasa (1906-07), Oda Hajime (1907-08),
and Shimo'oka Chuji (1908-12) were all from the Tokyo law faculty,
while Doke Hitoshi (1912-20) was a liberal arts graduate. Certainly
these men had good intentions. They proclaimed the need for Japan to
increase food production, sought to reduce dependence on imports of
cotton and wool, and tried to boost exports of silk. But their policy
priorities did not always build on comparative economic advantage.
Sericulture was seriously neglected, while animal husbandry research
was stressed. There was no serious interest in a silk research laboratory
until 1909, and even then it developed quite slowly. (Because of sharp
price declines in the two prior years, private producers were the ones
SCIENCE AND THE BUREAUCRACY I 59
TABLE 5.5
Agriculture Bureau—Deployment of Experts
BUREAU NISHICAHARA
YEAR HEADQUARTERS EXPERIMENT STATION
1896 31 13
1899 20 11
a
1904 50 46
1906* 51 52
1910 52 54
1913 52 46
Source Naikaku InnatMikvoku. «J . Shokutnroku

•Years lhai Sak6 Jdmei t D Sc Afcr ) was chief of the Bureau of
Agriculture.
wanting research; the ministry was not in the vanguard of action, and
legislative progress was slow.) Only in 1911 did the Diet get a bill
proposing the Silk Research Laboratory, and the actual foundation was
delayed two more years.211 Complacency figured largely here. When
scientists employed in the ministry recommended in 1909 immediate
research on synthetic fibers, their superiors did not respond well. Igno
rant of foreign progress, they considered the challenge to silk insignifi
cant 2 1 2 In 1912 such attitudes prompted a member of the Diet to
contend that the ministry was behind current needs. 213
But the lawyers did not make even decision. Interest in animal
husbandry was longstanding, beginning with Matsukata and Oku bo in
the 1870s, and annual imports of wool exceeded thirty million yen. 214
In the late Meiji years Kozai Yoshinao exercised great influence in favor
of animal husbandry. When he spoke before the cabinet, an agriculture
expert who attended the meeting said that just "two or three members"
understood all the issues, but that Kozai's "sincerity and reputation"
had been decisive.215 Moreover, this use of Kozai was by no means
unique. Trie ministry also tried to promote the use of new strains of rice
by featuring him at a conference.216
This raises the issue of the role of experts in determining sound
public policy. There were serious arguments against a domestic sheep
industry. Foreign sheep adapted poorly to the humid Japanese climate
and did well only in Hokkaido. Much of their food was imported from
l6o SCIENCE AND THE BUREAUCRACY
Europe. Dense rural population made traditional grazing impossible.

Costs of production typically exceeded the resources of individual farm
ers. The financial salience of these arguments was especially apparent.
As we have seen, the immediate prewar years were difficult, and many
programs were cut in funding. For 1914 the ministry proposed to re
duce sericulture research by 35,000 yen. 217 Tokyo University had to
accept a modest cutfromthe Ministry of Education, and even Kitasato's
funding was seriously threatened in the Ministry of Home Affairs. In
this situation the Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce designated
animal husbandry research a target for major new funding (50,000
yen).
Certain members of the Diet were greatly displeased by the minis
try's action. One got Vice Minister Hashimoto Keizaburo to acknowl
edge the successes of the sericulture program. Hashimoto noted that a
university zoologist had returned from Europe with the news that Ja
pan's progress had eliminated the need to ape foreign models. But the
chief of the Bureau of Agriculture took a different position when asked
about the breeding of sheep. He admitted a lack of progress in the
ministry's program but attributed it to ignorance of animal diseases, the
difficulties of animal raising in a crowded environment, and neglect of
systematic crossbreeding. He also insisted that progress was occurring,
citing modest successes in the Hokkaido region as a reason to increase
support218
Technical experts' views were only one factor in generating sound
public policy. As dean of Tokyo's faculty of agriculture, Kozai Yoshinao
could hardly be expected to oppose his own field's interest. Animal
husbandry was an integral part of the agriculture program and had
intrinsic interest for agricultural scientists. In the Ministry of Home
Affairs money was even allocated for medical research that turned out
to be based on error. Kitasato, in the last twenty years of his research
career, spent a large but undetermined sum of the ministry's money on
an unsuccessful effort to cure tuberculosis.219 The real problem with
the Bureau of Agriculture was its structural imbalance. It kept its tech
nical experts totally subordinate and relied on academic authorities
with self-interested motives.
The Bureaus of Forestry and Industry did not even do this. Forestry
after 1900 used "lawyers" to supervise experts, making use of their
work but denying them recognition.220 Industry promoted only lawyers
and assigned them the task of advocating research. Oka Makoto, chief
of the bureau for a decade, was considered a competent official by
scientists, but he actually knew nothing of scientific matters. One of his
duties was to present his budget to the Budget Committee of the Diet.
Because he had control over the Industrial Experiment Laboratory, Oka
SCIENCE AND THE BUREAUCRACY l6l
had to meet its director on occasion. These conversations were a chal

lenge to them both. On one occasion Oka grilled Director Takayama
Jintaro about minute details without being able to understand the an
swers he was getting. Takayama believed the questions were ridicu
lous, and the discussion became an emotional struggle.221
The worst manifestations of the bureaucratic system were not yet
fully apparent In early 1914 technical experts continued to work in the
ministries, and there was some expansion and greater autonomy in the
imperial universities. Kitasato's network of influential friends seemed
intact A major proponent of scientific research became head of the
government in April. Prime Minister Okuma Shigenobu was at least as
knowledgeable about science as Katsura Taro, and some of his actions
in office (1914-16) proved it Okuma increased spending for science
and higher education, helped found a major new laboratory', encour
aged research in private institutions, and proclaimed the need for in
volvement in government by prominent members of the scientific com
munity. Ironically, his government also transferred the Institute of
Infectious Diseases to the Ministry of Education, damaging signifi
cantly in just a few weeks what it had taken Kitasato many years to
create (see chapter 7).
The fate of Kitasato is an instance of government's coopting science.
By awarding subsidies for appointments or research, and monopoly
status for production of serums, officials had hoped to control his ac
tivities, and by moving his laboratory to the Ministry of Education, this
control could surely be strengthened.222 Of course, these policies had a
much broader context As part of its plan for maintaining legitimacy,
the government tried to deflect competition by emphasizing rules, im
partiality, expertise, and bureaucracy as crucial to the making of proper
decisions.223 Not that these strategies were simple to execute; scien
tistsresistedin various ways, the academics demanding autonomy and
Kitasato constructing a political support group. The bureaucracy could
rarely act as a unit More than one ministry was often involved (or
aspired to involvement) in projects for science, and scientists could
make them compete with each other. The results were beneficial for
research.224
CHAPTER SIX
SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH IN
ITS SOCIAL SETTING
Among the problems Japanese research had to surmount in its for

mative years, few aroused greater interest than the values of the re
search community. Could Japanese scientists be equally faithful to the
Western scientific norm of impersonal criticism and to Japanese soci
ety's expectations of loyalty to mentors? Would Japanese academics
willingly ignore clique affiliations to choose the man who was best for
the job? Could they respect the public nature of science by sharing
information and other resources? While scientists everywhere confront
these issues, they were particularly salient for Japan because the formal
structures of Japanese feudalism, samurai privileges, had disappeared
so recently and because the experience of studying abroad had exposed
Japanese scientists to the ethos and values of the Western scientific
tradition. In July 1898 the journal Koshu iji (Public health) noted that
professors in the faculty of medicine at Tokyo University were being
accused of giving more thought to who should marry their daughters
than to what they might contribute to knowledge.1 In August Ikaijiho
declared that many Tokyo professors "fear and try to resist the develop
ment of new forces, respond to those who flatter them, suppress people
with vitality who antagonize them, ignore morality and scholarship, and
only seek influence for their cliques."2
One of the principal issues was favoritism in recruiting professors.
Becoming a professor was said to require an undergraduate degree from
the institution where one wished to work, a relative on its faculty, or a
powerful patron who would execute "underhanded, crafty maneuvers."
According to a leading daily newspaper: "Professorial posts are ac
quired by inheritance. A professor with a daughter will choose a son-in
law from among his students. He will then send that student abroad
even if another to whom the opportunity has been promised must be
kept at home. Upon the student's return, the father-in-law will appoint
the son-in-law to succeed him, even if he has to remove some inconve
niently placed assistant professor."3 Other observers showed greater
interest in the allegation that the imperial universities recruited faculty
solely from the ranks of alumni. In a 1905 essay, Ikaijiho praised the
162
SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH IN ITS SOCIAL SETTING 163
appointment of Sudd Kenzo as assistant professor of biochemistry at

Tokyo University on the grounds that his undergraduate association
with Hasegawa Tai's Zaisei Gakusha medical academy presaged a trend
toward "merit" appointments.4
Another contention was that scientists had created self-sufficient,
isolated enclaves that blocked most cooperation across factional lines.
Critics thought researchers should compete to discover new knowledge
yet willingly share facilities and information with rivals. In 1902
Nakahama Toichiro asserted that "nothing could be further from the
behavior of a scientist than what he saw as an effort by Kitasato to
extend his "privatefiefdom"to Tokyo University.5 In 1914 an anony
mous writer in Ikaijiho claimed that the university itself was no more
than an "accumulation of individual cells" where every research group
was demanding a separate laboratory, specimen room, library, and
other facilities.6 In the same year Yagi Itsuro persuaded the Diet to
reject a special university appropriations bill on the grounds that pro
fessors who "refuse to cooperate and confine themselves to small do
mains" were really not scientists at all.7 The problem with such behav
ior, according to critics, was really intellectual in nature. It harmed
science by inhibiting the synthesis of knowledge and experience.8 and
it could keep vital information from those who most needed it. In 1913
physicist Nishikawa Masaharu investigated hemp and asbestos fibers
that would have interested a number of chemists, but university re
strictions on cross enrollments kept them in ignorance for seven more
years.9
Critics remarked less frequently on behavior uithin groups.
Tokutomi Soho in 1902 did say that the atmosphere at Tokyo University
was "suffocating" and warned that "disputes between the authorities
and learned circles opposed to feudalism" would continue if nothing
were done about i t 1 0 Similarly, Wakasugi Kisaburo in 1914 referred in
the House of Representatives to "decrepit professors" whose presence
at the university was discouraging younger scientists from doing more
research. Another Diet member said much the same thing in 1918. n
The issue of free discussion was very important to Japanese scientists.
During the controversy over beriberi, Kitasato wrote in a medical jour
nal: "If a theory is deemed false, it must be publicly criticized whether
the scientists involved are father and son, brothers, teacher and stu
dent, or friends. This is a great responsibility for scientists {To do
otherwise] would reveal a spirit of servility counter to the spirit of scien
tific journals."12
Kitasato was the most influential critic of Japanese science in this
period A prodigious investigator with a broad reputation, he himself
professed strong commitment to open recruitment,freediscussion, and
164 SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH IN ITS SOCIAL SETTING
cooperation with other professionals. In 1910 he denounced scientists

who "accept the theories of others uncritically" and declared that it was
in the nature of science to cause conflict between teachers and stu
dents. 13 From the founding of his laboratory in 1893, he recruited his
staff from many institutions and criticized the university for lack of
professionalism. In 1892 he cited these alleged misbehaviors as his
reason for declining an appointment and even said they negated the
attempts of the Tokyo faculty to carry on research.l4 For twenty years
he resisted the Ministry of Education's attempt to tie his laboratory to
Tokyo University, and in 1914 he left government service rather than
accede to the change.
The institutional focus of this conflict over values reflected the state
of science in this period (1870-1914; see table 6.1). On the eve of World
War I, Tokyo University employed 38 percent of the country's research
scientists. The Institute of Infectious Diseases ranked first among non-
university facilities. Kyoto University was second among the four uni
versities, with Kyushu University in a distant third place. Tohoku Uni
versity ranked last in professors with doctorates but was actually second
in chemistry' and physics.
Medicine dominated Japanese research in numbers and quality. By
early 1914 there were 147 medical researchers working in four univer
sities, thirteen government colleges, two government laboratories, and
one private academy. Medical men had received 300 of the 652 docto
rates in technical fields conferred before 1914 and obtained seven of the
twenty-six prizes of the Imperial Academy conferred before 1921.15
Physicists also received seven of the prizes awarded in this period
(1911-20), but neither physics nor any other field matched medicine's
overall record. By January 1914 Japan had produced only 30 physicists
with doctor's degrees, of whom 27 were employed in three universities,
four government laboratories, and one normal school. Research chem
ists of all kinds numbered 96 at the time; they worked mostly in applied
fields. Of the 16 with degrees in basic chemistry, 12 were employed in
universities, two at the Tokyo Higher Normal School, one at the Tokyo
Higher Technical School, and one at the Sixth Higher School.16 The
state of chemical research in Japan is to some extent indicated also by
the small number of Imperial Academy prizes it received—just three in
the prizes' first decade.17
These figures help in evaluating the criticisms referred to above.
Information on whom university professors married and where they
studied makes it possible to discuss academic recruitment with some
precision. But reliance on literary sources requires selectivity in dis
cussing concrete cases. Among the independent laboratories, the In
TABLE 1
Institutional Affiliations of Research Scientists (1913)
INSTITUTE OF OTHER HIGHER

TOKYO KYOTO KYUSHU TOHOKU INFECTIOUS GOVERNMENT MEDICAL TECHNICAL
UNIVERSITY UNIVERSITY UNIVERSITY UNIVERSITY DISEASES LABORATORIES COLLECE SCHOOLS OTHERS
N % N % N % N % N % N N % N % N %
Pharmacology 4 21 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 4 21 7 37 0 0 4 21
Forestry 4 57 0 0 0 0 2 29 0 0 1 14 0 0 0 0 0 0
Veterinary
medicine 6 60 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 10 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 30
Medicine 38 24 35 22 9 6 1 1 8 5 1 1 63 40 1 1 0 0
Engineering 36 43 24 29 14 17 1 1 0 0 4 5 0 0 4 5 0 0
Science 47 55 10 12 0 0 11 13 0 0 8 9 0 0 10 12 0 0
Agriculture 12 46 0 0 0 0 « 23 0 0 3 12 0 0 0 0 5 19
Totals 147 38 69 18 23 fi 21 5 9 2 21 5 70 18 15 4 12 3
Sources: Dai jinmei jiten, 10 vols. (1957). Dm Ninon hakusht rvku. !> vols. (1921 .10) Jmji koshtn roku. 1st ed. (1903); 2d ed (1908); 4th ed. (1915);
7th ed. (1925); 8th ed. (1928); 9th ed (1931); 11th ed (19.17) Who's Who in Japan, i d cd (191.1), 17th ed. (19.16) The Japan Biographical
Encyclopedia and Who's Who, 1st ed. (1958)
l66 SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH IN ITS SOCIAL SETTING
stitute of Infectious Diseases is a compelling place to begin. Tokyo

University is represented by four laboratories because it employed 38
percent—and trained 70 percent—of the Japanese scientists active in
the period. Within the university, I discuss laboratories in physics and
chemistry because of their importance for a developing tradition, those
in pathology and internal medicine to represent varying accomplish
ments in medicine. I also analyze conditions at Tdhoku because of their
meaning for Japans basic science and to illustrate transmission of val
ues from Tokyo University to sister institutions.18
Kitasato and the Institute of Infectious Diseases

Kitasato Shibasaburo was impartial in recruiting his staff when he is
judged by the usual standards. The permanent members of his re
searcher corps came from several different schools and rarely, if ever,
had "connections." His first appointment (Umeno Shinkichi) was a
graduate of the Tokyo School of Veterinary Medicine, while the second
(Asakawa Norihiko) came from the undistinguished Zaisei Gakusha
owned by Hasegawa Tai. Kitajima Ta'ichi was the first graduate of
Tokyo University to be hired and Shiga Kiyoshi the second. After the
Institute's first few years, about half theresearcherscamefromTokyo
University and the rest from other institutions. For example, Shiba
yama Gorosaku's appointment (Tokyo) was balanced by that of Hata
Sahachiro (Okayama Medical College) in 1898; in 1900 Terauchi
Yutaka (Tokyo) and Toda Toranobu (Morioka College of Agriculture
and Forestry) were hired. Between 1901 and 1914 Kitasato added six
men from Tokyo University, twofromOkayama Medical College, and
one each from Kyoto University, Nagasaki Medical College, and the
Zaisei Gakusha. None of these appointments was nepotistic. Asakawa
married one of Kitasato's daughters, and Shibayama married Kitasato's
wife's sister, but this was after, not before, they entered the institute.
Kitajima married the daughter of a prominent physician, but only one
staff member had a father in medicine.19
Kitasato was as careful in developing his talent as he was in recruit
ing it. He encouraged the diligent,reprimandedthe lazy, stimulated the
curious, and challenged the skeptical. His objective was always to en
courage independence. Hata Sahachiro says he told them to work hard
and accept only the research results they hadreplicatedthemselves.20
"Dr. Kitasato wanted us to develop strong personalities," wrote Miya
jima Mikinosuke.21 Shiga Kiyoshi states: "Kitasato never gave us de
tailed instructions. Instead, he followed Koch's method. That is, we
were supposed to compile our own bibliographies and perform our own
experiments as a way of learning responsibility and advancing by

ourselves."22
At the same time, Kitasato was a disciplined man and demanded the
same of his colleagues. He was a stickler for punctuality, order, and
routine. He arrived at the laboratory by eight in the morning and worked
energetically untilfivein the afternoon.23 "He took a very strict attitude
toward research students," according to Shiga, "and showed no mercy
if anyone slacked off." Students and staff members secredy dubbed him
"kaminari oyaji" (Papa Thunder) for the way he bawled out lack
adaisical colleagues, and Shiga says he could sometimes be heard sev
eral doors away venting his anger on a hapless researcher.24 Asakawa,
when approaching Kitasato's office, would look at theflooras a way of
deflecting criticism if he thought the director was angry with him.25
Miyajima tells of a photographer visiting the institute who became so
rattled by Kitasato's angry voice that he snapped his picture of the
incubating room with the lens cap still on the camera!26
But it seems unlikely that Kitasato's explosive character damaged
staff morale. Evidence suggests that colleagues used the nickname
"kaminari oyaji" more to imply affection than to express discontent.
Kitasato was the quintessential oyabun (boss), and Kitajima said a
conversation with him was often like "talking to my father."27 The
director had a deep personal affection for the people working under him
and was highly adept at getting the response that he wanted. He se
cretly lent students money to finance their studies, entertained mem
bers of the staff and their families at an annual picnic, and constantly
used his influence to advance their careers in research. He never actu
ally criticized members of the staff publicly even though his voice was
sometimes overheard, and, according to Miyajima, he constantly
praised to outsiders even those he privately criticized.28
The institute's contributions to science under Kitasato show that his
leadership helped creativity. As we have seen, he himself discovered the
causative agent of plague at Hong Kong in 1894. In 1897 Shiga Kiyoshi
isolated the pathogen of dysentery (Shiga bacillus) in Tokyo. In 1901
Umeno Shinkichi proved that a species of streptococcus bacteria causes
lymph gland disease in horses. After 1900 the group divided its atten
tion about equally between clinical and basic research. Hida Otoichi in
1902 produced a diphtheria serum much superior to its predecessors by
adding sugar and peptone to a burdock culture base. In 1905 Umeno
developed an improved inoculation technique for smallpox that diluted
the antitoxin by passing it through animal bodies before it was adminis
tered to humans. After 1905 Kitasato himself worked primarily on a
never-found cure for tuberculosis, while Miyajfma, Asakawa, and Kita
jima, among other things, clarified the relationship between field mice,
chiggers, and tsutsugamushi disease.29
Recruitment to Professorships in Japan's Universities

Notwithstanding the claims of some critics, marriage to the daughter of
a professor was not particularly common in the Meiji and early Taisho
periods. Of thefifty-onemen who by 1920 had served or would serve as
full professors in Tokyo's faculty of medicine, only five had done so, and
three of these were cited by Tokyd Asahi Shiminin in a 1914 expose.
The assistant professor Kakiuchi Saburo in biochemistry was said to
have secured his appointment by marrying the daughter of Koganei
Yoshikiyo, professor of anatomy. Mitamura Makujird reportedly be
came assistant professor of pathology by marrying the daughter of the
ophthalmology professor, Komoto Jujird; while Manabe Kaiichiro was
said to be in line for a post in internal medicine by virtue of being the
son-in-law of Hirota Tsukasa, the professor of pediatrics.30
But family connections were numerous in medicine and could cer
tainly help a career. Koganei Yoshikiyo became assistant professor in
anatomy after marrying the sister of the army's medical affairs bureau
chief (Mori Rintaro), and Ogata Masanon got an appointment in
hygiene after he married the sister of a professor of psychiatry (Sakaki
Hajime). Not all connections were established through marriage.
Nagayo Mataro (pathology) was the son of Nagayo Sensai, one-time
chief of the Bureau of Public Health. Ozawa Gakutaro (anatomy) was
the adopted son of Ozawa Kenji, physiology professor and at one time
dean of the faculty. Miyake Koichi (psychiatry) was the son of Miyake
Shu, professor of pathology and dean of the faculty in the 1880s.31
Asahi Shimbun singled out Miyake, since his maternal grandfather
(Sato Susumu) had also been physician to the Emperor, and two of his
brothers-in-law were active in medicine.32 If true kinship relations are
added to relations by marriage, thirteen of thefifty-onedoctorate hold
ers who served on the faculty of medicine in this period had significant
family connections.33
Tokyo University was hardly unique in this sense among its sister
imperial universities. At Kyoto, five professors (out of seventy-one) in
the faculty of medicine had married the daughters of professors, three
in medicine at Kyoto, one in medicine at Tokyo, and one in engineering
at Kyoto. Of the five, however, only one was adopted by the father-in
law—Asayama Chuai (internal medicine), who married the daughter of
Asayama Ikujiro (ophthalmology). Besides thesefive,one professor was
the son of a professor in medicine at Tokyo, and one had a brother on the
engineering faculty there. Two of the Kyoto medical faculty, Ozaki
Yoshitane (orthopedic surgery) and Ozaki Yoshizumi (pharmacology),
were brothers. In addition, two had married sisters of a Kyoto medical
professor, and two other professors' sisters.
Professors of medicine at the newer institutions had more connec
tions than those at the older ones. At Kyushu University, relationships
established through marriage undoubtedly influenced the appoint
ments of Ishizaka Tomotaro in pharmacology and Sakurai Tsunejiro in
anatomy. Each one's father-in-law was both a Tokyo professor and in
the same field. The professors Mochizuki Daiji and Takayama Masao
married the daughters of Tada Gakusaburo and Nakahama Toichiro,
both doctors of science in medicine. Kure Ken (internal medicine) was
a nephew of Kure Shuzo, professor of psychiatry at Tokyo. Ogawa
Masanaga (bacteriology) married I to Keiko, daughter of the Tohoku
zoologist ltd Tokutaro and granddaughter of the Tokyo botanist I to
Keisuke. Sakaki Yasusaburo married the sister of Kato Terumaro,
D.Sc.Med. and physician to the Meiji emperor.
At Tohoku University Kimura Onan (pathology) apparently bene
fited from his marriage to the daughter of Kure Shuzo, as did Sato Akira
(pediatrics) from marrying the sister of Tokyo's professor of otorhino
laryngology, Okada Waichiro. Two other Tdhoku professors, Yama
kawa Shotaro and Inoue Tatsuichi, had close relatives with doctorates
in medicine. Ohara Hachiro (surgery) married the niece of Kumagawa
Muneo, professor of biochemistry at Tokyo. Three more of the Tohoku
faculty had brothers who were professors in technical fields at Tokyo.
But the professor whose family connections evoked greatest comment
was Kumagai Taizo (internal medicine) whose appointment allegedly
resulted from the fact that his brother (Kumagai—now Aoyama—
Tetsuzo) had become yoshi (adopted son) to Tokyo's powerful dean
Aoyama.35
The real issues are not the pattern per se but its typicality and im
plications for academic quality. Consider the scientists with engineer
ing (kogaku) degrees. In Japan, kogaku included not only such stan
dard fields as civil, mechanical, mining, or electrical engineering, but
also applied chemistry, applied physics, and applied mathematics. Al
though basic physics, geology, mathematics, or theoretical chemistry
were generally excluded, it was common enough for men in those fields
to have begun their studies in an engineering subspecialty or to have
done basic research under the engineering label. This fact gives us
some understanding of intermarriage among scientists with basic sci
ence (rigaku) or agriculture (nogaku) degrees, even where the 1923
17O SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH IN ITS SOCIAL SETTING
loss of Iseki Kuro's data on the subject in the Kanto earthquake and fire
precludes more precise estimations.
Certainly "engineers" married into academic families. While only
one man at Tokyo University (Kamo Masao in mechanical engineering)
married the daughter of a Tokyo engineering professor (becoming the
son-in-law of Watanabe Wataru [mining and metallurgy]), three mar
ried daughters of Tokyo law professors, one the daughter of a professor
of physics, and another the daughter of a professor of medicine. Be
cause the fathers-in-law of three of these men became university presi
dents, the career benefits of their marriages should be obvious (Terano
Kanji (applied chemistry] married the daughter of Yamakawa Kenjird,
who was president at Tokyo from 1901 to 1905 and 1913 to 1920;
Tawara Kuniichi (metallurgy] and Kondo Toragoro (civil engineering]
each married a daughter of Kato Hiroyuki, president from 1877 to 1886
and 1890 to 1893). Other engineering professors were equally fortu
nate. Inoue Jinkichi (applied chemistry) married the sister of Araki
Torasaburo, D.Sc.Med., who became president of Kyoto University in
1914. And Ishii Keikichi (architecture) became brother-in-law to Mano
Bunji, D.Sc.Engr. and president at Kyushu from 1913. Several others
had useful connections. Sakurai Seizo (naval architecture) was the
brother of the chemist Sakurai Joji, dean of Tokyo's science faculty.
Suehiro Kyoji and Terano Seiichi. both also naval architects, had broth
ers in the faculty of law at Kyoto and in applied chemistry at Tokyo.
Marrying into an academic family from Tokyo aided several men in
their careers in engineering at Kyoto. Takeda Goichi, in architecture—
an engineering discipline in Japan—married the daughter of Sakata
Teiichi in mechanical engineering. Matsumura Tsuruzo(also architec
ture) married the sister of Kinoshita Seichu (obstetrics and
gynecology). Ogura Kohei (electrical engineering) and Otsuki Chiri
(chemistry) both married daughters of Kikuchi Takeo (Tokyo faculty of
law), while Yokobori Jisaburo (mining and metallurgy) married the
daughter of Watanabe Wataru, a prominent figure in his field. Two of
the Kyoto men had relatives on the Kyoto faculty. One was Nakazawa
Yoshio in chemistry, whose father, Nakazawa Iwata, was also professor
of chemistry; the other was Tomonaga Shozo (mechanical engineer
ing), whose brother, Tomonaga Sanjuro, was professor of philosophy.
His nephew, Tomonaga Shin'ichiro, later won a Nobel Prize (physics,
1965).
At Kyushu and Tohoku universities, professors of engineering more
commonly had relatives on the Kyoto faculty. Ono Akimasa (Kyushu,
mechanical engineering) married the daughter of Miwa Kan'ichiro,
professor of mathematics at Kyoto. The brother of Torikata Uichi
(Kyushu, electrical engineering) was Torikata Ryuzo, professor of sur

gery first at Osaka Medical College, then at Kyoto. At Tdhoku, as we
have seen, Inoue Jinkichi (chemistry) married the sister of Araki
Torasaburo (physiology). The main Tokyo connections of Kyushu pro
fessors were those of Yoshimachi Taroichi (civil engineering), who
married the daughter of Hiroi Isamu, a Tokyo professor in his field, and
of Nonaka Sueo (naval architecture), whose father-in-law, Yoshimura
Chosaku, was professor of civil engineering.
Thus, a significant percentage of professors with pre-1921 docto
rates had connections in academic society (see table 6.2). But the
meaning of these connections is far from self-evident. Critics implied
that men with connections not only advanced professionally, but did so
undeservedly. This assumption is open to doubt: academic families
wereremarkablystrict about whom they accepted into their ranks.
A principal mechanism for recruiting both sons-in-law and pro
fessors for Tokyo's faculty of medicine was arigorous,comprehensive
examination, administered to all graduates of the four-year M.D. course
regardless of family or prior performance. Achievement determined
both a student's rank in the graduating class and which sections of the
graduate program would be accessible to him. Those who did well were
eligible for admission to one of the prestigious clinical laboratories;
those who performed less impressively could anticipate acceptance by
Ogata in hygiene, Kumagawa in biochemistry, or some other professor
TABLE 6.2
Personal Connections of University Professors (%
FIELD
UNIVERSITY ENGINEERING MEDICINE
Tokyo 19 (N = 85) 25 (N = 51)
Kyoto 22 (N = 36) 24 (N = 71)
Kyushu 17 (N = 35) 32 (N = 41)
Tdhoku 33 (N= 6) 32 (N = 28)
Averages 20 (N = 162) 27 (N = 191)

Source: Iseki Kuro, ed., Dai Nihon hakushi rokik, 5 vols. (Tokyo: Hat
tensha, 1921-30).
in basic medicine. Examination performance also determined the select

fewfromwhom professors chose their sons-in-law or successors. So far
as possible, they confined their choices to men placing first, second, or
third in the examinations. The talented young medical man—as de
fined by the examination—might then marry a professor's daughter
and, through that means or another, proceed with a career in academic
medicine.36
The resulting keen competition among the students presumably as
sured that any potential recruit to the faculty had attained a standard of
excellence. One successful veteran of the examinations, M ana be Kai
ichiro, recalled that when he graduated at the top of his class in 1904,
the competition was "unbelievably severe," because the examination
"determined a person's fate for the rest of his life."37 Nor was competi
tion confined to the students, as professors also competed for the most
promising sons-in-law and successors. Professors in prestigious fields
of clinical medicine had the advantage.38 Dean Aoyama, for example,
was able to get the number two man in the class of 1907, as his Internal
Medicine Section was particularly well regarded.39 Ogata, whose
Hygiene Section ranked considerably lower in student estimation, tried
but failed to marry his daughter to the top man in the class of 1902.40
Family ties undoubtedly helped men get appointments in basic sci
ence and agriculture, but we cannot know how far this went The
marriage of Suzuki Umetaro to the daughter of Tatsuno Kingo, pro
fessor of architecture at Tokyo, may well have helped him become
professor of chemistry in the Tokyo agriculture faculty.41 Similarly,
Shibata Keita and Shibata Yuji, professors respectively of zoology and
chemistry in the Tokyo faculty of science, probably benefitedfromtheir
father's having been professor of pharmacology.42 At Hokkaido Univer
sity, founded in 1918, Hemmi Takeo's appointment to the faculty of
agriculture was probably helped along by the prior appointment of his
brother (Hemmi Fumio) to the faculty. But examination performance
didn't hurt: Tanakadate Aikitsu, Nagaoka Hantaro, and Honda Kotaro
became professors of physics at Tokyo and Tohoku, and each man had
held first place in his graduating class.43 Recruitment procedures in
agriculture or basic science probably did not differ significantly from
those in other technical fields.
The prevalence of academic inbreeding in all universities and fields
of science supports this conclusion. The editor of Ikaijiho was wrong in
claiming that the 1905 Sudo appointment in biochemistry at Tokyo
would set a trend for the future. Except for three professors educated
under the shogunate (Hashimoto Tsunatsune, Miyake Shu, and Tagu
chi Kazuharu), two educated abroad (Ikeda Kensai and Ozawa Kenji),
and one educated at Kyoto (Nakamura Hachitaro in pathology), Sudo

was the only Japanese appointed to the Tokyo medical faculty in the
entire forty-three-year period between 1877 and 1920 who did not have
a Tokyo undergraduate degree—and he was appointed in a poorly
funded field and failed to receive tenure.44
Kyoto, Kyushu, and Tohoku were about as faithful as Tokyo in ap
pointing only from among themselves. Between 1897 and 1921 Kyoto
hired only two men without imperial university degrees: Shimada
Kichisaburo, graduate of Kanazawa Medical College (to an assistant
professorship of anatomy in 1908), and Matsushita Teiji from Nagasaki
Medical College (to a chair in bacteriology in 1903). During its first
decade, Kyushu made only one such appointment. Hikita Naotaro.
graduate of Okayama Medical College, who held an assistant pro
fessorship in ophthalmology for only two years. Tdhoku chose two non-
imperial university men. both in 1915: Suzuki Tatsuo from Niigata
Medical College (assistant professor of pathology) and Shikinami Ju
jiro, graduate of the Kanazawa Medical College (assistant professor of
anatomy).45
Medicine was not the most inbred field. Between 1877 and 1921.
only four non-Tokyo graduates received academic appointments in
Tokyo's faculty of engineering, but three of them had foreign degrees—
Yamamoto Nagakata (Glasgow), appointed in naval architecture in
1917, Dan Takuma (MIT), assistant professor of mining engineering,
1881-84, Yamada Yokichi (Stevens Institute of Technology), professor
of mechanical engineering, 1886-90—and only one a degree earned in
Japan. Miyahara Jiro, who graduated from the Imperial Naval Academy
in 1875 and pursued further studies at the Royal Naval College, Green
wich, became professor of naval engineering in 1888. In the other
imperial universities, no outsiders were appointed to positions in
engineering.
Basic science was a special case, since so few places taught it. D6
shisha University in Kyoto had offered chemistry and physics at its
Harris School of Science (1889-97), but bureaucratic hostility killed
the program. Neither Waseda nor Keio managed to establish a basic
science program.46 Since only the imperial universities could produce
fully trained basic science graduates, anyone contemplating a career in
physics, chemistry, biology, geology, or mathematics had few choices.
Of course, the same was true in reverse. Imperial universities obtained
all basic science professors from sister institutions, except for those
trained abroad. Between 1877 and 1893, seven non-imperial university
graduates were appointed: Nagai Nagayoshi and Matsui Naokichi in
chemistry, Yamakawa Kenjiro and Kitao Jiro in physics, Harada
Toyokichi in geology, I to Keisuke and Yatabe Ryokichi in botany. All

but ltd had foreign degrees, and all went to Tokyo when candidates
were scarce.47
Agriculture, forestry, and veterinary medicine had the largest
number of professors who did not fit the pattern. There were nine
outside appointments nationwide in these fields between 1877 and
1918: six at Tokyo, two at Hokkaido, and a single nomination at
Tohoku. Two of these men (Kato Yasuharu in veterinary medicine,
Miyawaki Atsushi in animal husbandry) had foreign degrees; four had
graduated from the Tokyo School of Agriculture and Forestry (Tdkyo
Norin Gakko). If one excludes the foreign-educated and those trained
under the shogunate, the fields by degree of inbreeding would be basic
science (126 appointments, all from an imperial university), engineer
ing (166 appointments, one outside), medicine (217 appointments, five
outside), and agriculture (105 appointments, six outside).
"Academic inbreeding" also includes preference for one's own alum
ni, and by that definition was very widespread. Except for the earliest
years, when one could become an assistant professor merely by gradu
ating from Tokyo University or one of its parent institutions, possession
of a doctor's degree became essential for those who were seeking full
rank. Because 70 percent of all doctorates awarded before January 1921
went to graduates of Tokyo University, reliance on the doctorate as a
condition of appointment gave them an edge. Theirrepresentationin
the professoriat ranged from 52 percent in agriculture to 89 percent in
engineering. Nevertheless, each university preferred to employ its own
graduates whenever possible (see table 6.3).
Consider the proportions of alumni on the faculties of each institu
tion. Column A indicates the percentage of all doctorates, B that of
professorships held by the alumni of each university; preferential hiring
is shown when B over A is greater than one. Graduates of Kyushu
University accounted for only 2 percent of all doctorate holders in medi
cine, but 13 percent of its medical faculty had obtained degrees there.
Only 6 percent of doctorate holders in basic science had obtained their
degrees at Tohoku University, yet 19 percent of the Tohoku basic sci
ence faculty were alumni. Graduates of Kyoto University accounted for
just 5 percent of basic science doctorates, yet 25 percent of the pro
fessors in that area at Kyoto held degreesfromit And 82 percent of the
Tokyo agriculture faculty had Tokyo degrees even though the percent
age of all agriculture degree holders from Tokyo was substantially
smaller (52 percent).48 Nitobe Inazo, D.Sc.Agr., graduate of the Sap
poro Agricultural College (later the faculty of agriculture at Tohoku,
then Hokkaido, University) did serve for many years at Tokyo Univer
TABLE 6.3
Preferential Hiring in the Imperial Universities (1877-1920)*
AGRICULTURE
FORESTRY
\FIELD VETERINARY
MEDICINI MEDICINE SCIENCE ENGINEERING
UNIVERSITY\ A B A B A B A B
N * 72 N = 44 N - 70 N = 89
Tokyo 62 90 52 82 72 90 89 94
N - 72 N - 2 N - 24 N - 39
Kyoto 21 35 0 0 5 25 4 15
N = 40 N - 4 N- 5 N - 33
Kyushu 2 13 0 0 0 0 0 0
N • 25 N - 25 N - 27 N = 6
Tdhoku 0 0 26 76 6 19 2 17
Total N,
A Columns N - 622 N = 161 N = 177 N = 365
Sources. Dai jimmeijiten. 10 vols. (1957). Dai Nihon hakushi wku. 5 veils (1921-30) Jtnji kdshin roku, Isted (1903). 2ded. (1908); 4th
ed. (1915); 7th ed. (1925); 8th ed. (1928), 9th ed. (1931); 1 lth ed < 1937) Who's Who m Japan. 2d ed. (1913). 17th ed (1936) The Japan
Biographical Encyclopedia and Who's Who. 1st ed (1958)
•Figures exclude Hokkaido University
sity, but he was one of just three Sapporo men to do so—and he had at
one time studied at Tokyo.49
Once the pattern was established, it never changed. Aspirants to
professorships in imperial universities needed first to hold a doctorate or
get one fast. They usually must have graduated high in their class from
an imperial university, preferably the one where they wanted to work.
They ought to have connections with an academic family. Only 8 per
cent of those in medicine had married a professor's daughter at Kyoto
and about 10 percent at Tokyo, compared to about 6 percent of those in
engineering at Kyoto and 12 percent in the same field at Tokyo. But the
proportions of those with valuable connections ranged from about 17
percent in engineering at Kyushu to a third in medicine or engineering
at Tohoku—and these estimates are probably low.50 The prominence of
such connections at Tohoku and Kyushu suggests that inbreeding be
came more important, not less, over time.
More to the point is whether this mattered. Were the principles of
scientific universalism really compromised by personal connections?
Not, it would seem, if examination scores had the importance that the
evidence implies. When a young scientist had to pass an examination to
qualify' for an academic marriage, it seems that achievement was con
trolling ascription, not ascription achievement. But caution is war
ranted inreachingconclusions. It could be argued, and was at the time,
that examination scores were dubious indicators. Kitasato, who became
world-famous, ranked only eighth in his graduating class. Yamamoto
Tatsuo had to leave Japan for the Pasteur Institute because he ranked
fiftieth. But the system also helped others advance. Yamagiwa Kat
susaburo graduated first in 1889 and nearly got a Nobel Prize (1926),
while Nagayo Mataro, who had finished second in his class, did impor
tant work on viral diseases.51
The Research Atmosphere in Academic Laboratories

Men from the past cannot be observed, much less interviewed, and
literary evidence supplies most of what we know about atmosphere in
the laboratories. But descriptions are not always numerous, and even
when they are available, they probably show bias. Who wants to admit
that his mentor was really a tyrant who suppressed creativity? Extant
accounts may have been atypical, and the availability of sources may
vitiate typicality. If a man had many students and dedicated coworkers,
we may learn much about his group. If students were few and col
leagues indifferent, we may be able to learn very little. Problems not
withstanding, the existing documentation should not be overlooked.
Bias can be controlled using concrete examples (as opposed to charac

terizations), and by focusing on Tokyo, which trained most scientists.
Tokyo's Physics Laboratory. With the departure of Mendenhall
(1882) and Ewing (1883), physics became a Japanese enterprise.
Though there were only one full professor (Yamakawa Kenjiro), one
assistant professor (Tanakadate Aikitsu), and two lecturers (Muraoka
Han'ichi and Nagaoka Hantaro) for most of the decade, changes began
toward its end. In 1888 Tanakadate left for Europe, and Nagaoka as
sumed his duties.52 Sekiya Seikei joined the group in 1889, and
Tsuruu Kenji in 1894, but Sekiya died young (1896), and Tsuruta was
inactive.53 Yamakawa was senior and at first set the pace in spite of his
inadequate training and few publications.M His contribution was to
stimulate students and give them professional confidence. Yamakawa
once asked a student to discover how to use equipment employed by
Fresnel in work on the conical refraction of light He told the man he
would be the first in Japan to observe the phenomenon if only he could
learn how to use it The procedure worked well, and the student suc
ceeded. By spending long hours of effort in the laboratory's darkroom,
he repeated this classic experiment.55
Some questioned Yamakawa's effectiveness as a mentor. One called
his loud voice intimidating, like "a general chewing out an army."56
Takagi Teiji, Japan s leading mathematician of the pre- World War II
era, said his lectures were unorganized and his manner distracting.57
But others thought differently and praised them quite highly, and even
those who thought Yamakawa intimidating also said he was kind.58
Well before Tanakadate returned from Europe in 1904, Yamakawa
had slacked off and resigned his professorship, becoming university
president in 1901. Muraoka took a position at Kyoto (1897), and Tana
kadate assumed supervision. Partly because of his work under Kelvin,
Tanakadate was interested in magnetism. He and Nagaoka had super
vised a geomagnetic survey of Japan beginning in 1887, publishing
their results in the following decade.59 The work had continued despite
his absence and contributed to seismology. Tanakadate published forty
papers in the course of his career, gave many public lectures, made trips
abroad, and attended a number of scientific conferences. After 1905 he
turned more toresearchand was a pioneer for Japan in aeronautics (see
chapter 7). 60
Tanakadate was an excellent mentor. Like Mendenhall and Ewing
before him, he involved students fully in his own work and tried to teach
them whatever he knew. The physicist Nakamura Seiji wrote that stu
dents were grateful for Tanakadate's "appreciation of their ideas and
their questions." Imamura Akitsune, later professor of physics at Tokyo,
was impressed by his poise and control. "He would never lose his com
posure the way we did if some piece of equipment were missing but
would always try to solve the problem with something on hand in the
lab." Tomoda Chinzo remembered his patience and tolerance. "He was
quite different from many professors in the way he responded to ques
tions. Some would just observe that the answer could be found on such-
and-such page of a book, but Tanakadate always gave his own an
swer."61 But Tanakadate, like his teacher Lord Kelvin, was hard on
advanced students if they made many errors.
His affability, sense of humor, and basic egalitarianism were what
made Tanakadate successful as a mentor. He was informal with his
coworkers, a characteristic that may have come from research trips or
dormitory life with students before he got married. In any event, he
continued the pattern as a senior professor. At five o'clock every after
noon, the physics researchers generally gathered by a largefireplacefor
physics discussions, storytelling, and a general socializing that
Nakamura called "thoroughly agreeable." Perhaps Tanakadate's style
was summarized best by physicist Tomoda Chinzo. "Dr. Tanakadate,"
he wrote, "always gave an impression that he was learning right along
with us."62
Before Tanakadate fullyretired(1916), Nagaoka took over and set a
new tone. Despite the misgivings he had had as a student (see chapter
3), his stance was one of self-confidence. In 1888 he hadridiculedhis
teacher, C. G. Knott, in a letter to his friend Tanakadate, and he was
known to hold no one in awe.63 Nagaoka impressed some as cynical,
cold, and unfriendly, and was famous for criticizing those he disliked.
'Dr. Kinoshita Suekichi [later professor of physics at Tokyo] almost
trembled around him," wrote physicist Matsuzawa Takeo.64 'The stu
dents feared his [intellectual] acuteness and strict demeanor," accord
ing to Ishikawa Teijiro.65 Some were annoyed by his management
style: "Every half hour," Matsuzawa recalled, "Dr. Nagaoka would
come down to the basement [where I was working] from his office on
the secondfloorand yell out, 'What's happened?11 wasflabbergastedby
this, but my sempai [older graduate student] finally yelled back, 'He
just started the project!'"66
But Nagaoka had another side in his dealings with physicists. "He
always tried to draw out the students' ability and enthusiasm," wrote
Ishikawa, "and he could explain things to them when Tanakadate
could not" 67 Unquestionably Nagaoka favored the more competent,
more motivated students. The Nobel laureate Yukawa Hideki was fa
miliar with Nagaoka'sreputationas.a "rather forbidding individual'1 and
met him with some initial trepidation. "But after I became secure in my
work, we often talked physics, and I felt like his grandson."68 Mat
suzawa himself recalled, "On one occasion I had to see Nagaoka with
Miyamoto Kyuichiro about the experiments we were doing that term.
[When we met him at his house] his expression was totally different
from the impression he gave in the laboratory. He acted like an easygo
ing father and ate peanuts and fresh fruit with us. After disposing of
business, he never mentioned work."69
Whatever was thought of Nagaoka's style, his professional lead
ership was clearly effective. He was an excellent physicist, and by 1905
his wide-ranging work in geomagnetism, acoustics, metals, tidal wave
action, optics, and atomic structure constituted the fulcrum of physics
at Tokyo. Aichi Keiichi (later professor at Tdhoku) took a casual obser
vation by Nagaoka about the diffraction phenomena of the telescope
and developed it in work on rainbows. Honda Kdtaro's important work
on metals, though assisted by Tammann. actually began during his
days with Nagaoka. Terada Torahiko wrote a paper on the acoustics of
the Japanese flute (shakuhachi) that Nagaoka also inspired. And few
dissertations were directed by either of the other full professors.70
Nagaoka never ceased being critical about work. August Kundt, pro
fessor of physics at Berlin University, had mildly disparaged Japanese
physics in 1894; Johannes Stark was harsher twenty years later.71 The
Germans insisted on fundamental research and expected that the Japa
nese would adopt their standard. This was a viewpoint Nagaoka shared.
Like Stark, he thought Japanese physicists must stop doing what he
called the "dull, mechanical" work exemplified by the national geomag
netic survey and instead offer findings of broad general interest "It
shows the backward state of our physical sciences that | Kundt and
Stark] would think this [geomagnetic stuff] appropriate for us," he
wrote in a 1913 essay. "It is very lamentable for the scientific communi
ty that information imports from Europe to Japan exceed our exports by
several thousand times."72
Actually, his view was too harsh. Three recent historians of physics
have noted that Japanese physics by 1913 was not all "mechanical" or
"dull." Graduate student Kuwaki Ayao, later professor of physics at
Kyushu, was aroused by Einstein's 1905 paper on special relativity and
began to work on relativity theory. Tamaki Kijuro of Kyoto University
(later the mentor of Yukawa Hideki) joined this work in 1909. Ishihara
Jun introduced quantum theory about 1913 after working with Einstein
and Sommerfeld. Nishikawa Masaharu delivered a famous paper on x-
rays at about this same time.73
Chemistry in the Tokyo Faculty of Science. Chemistry lacked a

dominant figure, but it had important pioneers. One of these was
Sakurai Joji, who had studied in London with A. W. Williamson from
l8o SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH IN ITS SOCIAL SETTING
1876 to 1881. Sakurai was an excellent chemist. Though a normative

speaker of English, he led his class in chemistry and physics and pub
lished two major papers while studying in Britain. Two British histo
rians of science have even called his papers (dealing with iodide deriva
tives of methane) the "only important research done in Williamson's
laboratory after 1855."74 In 1881 Sakurai returned to Tokyo as the first
Japanese chemist to become full professor. The work he did justified his
rank. He investigated the molecular weights of substances in solution
and developed a new technique for determining their boiling points.
Samejima Tsunesaburo, later professor of chemistry at Tokyo, called
this the "first truly significant chemical research in Japan."75 Although
Sakurai continued to do research, his administrative duties often inter
fered. From 1907 to 1918 he served as dean of the faculty of science and
in 1914 as acting university president He was also at that time presi
dent of the Imperial Academy and represented Japan at international
meetings.
Scanty information complicates our assessment of Sakurai as a direc
tor of research. Colleagues and acquaintances considered him the es
sential English gentleman because he was dignified, well-mannered,
and always impeccably dressed. He was also a stickler for form and
publicly reprimanded students who came late to class or failed to polish
their shoes. He also defended his version of the Williamson legacy by
removing a colleague from a chemistry professorship (see chapter 3),
but he did not consistently foist his ideas on others. In 1900 he arranged
for Majima Toshiyuki to study organic chemistry in Zurich and then to
join the Tokyo faculty even though Majima rejected Sakurai's advice
about his career.76
Sakurai was not the only senior chemist in Tokyo's faculty of science.
Edward Divers served as full professor for more than a quarter of a
century (1873-99), and Haga Tamemasa for thirty years (1883-1913).
There were six assistant professors in the early 1880s, but four trans
ferred to the engineering faculty in 1886, and the other two (Kuhara
Mitsuru and Yoshida Hikorokuro) left when Kyoto was opened, creat
ing a place for a new senior man, Ikeda Kikunae. For the next twenty
years there were very few changes. Matsubara Koichi joined the group
after Divers went home (1899), and Majima took a post in 1903. Shibata
Yuji was appointed in 1913, and Katayama Masao in 1919.77
Haga Tamemasa was Sakurai's opposite. Sakurai Joji was elegant
and imposing, Haga Tamemasa rumpled and ordinary. Sakurai was
strict and slightly aloof, Haga open and readily accessible. Sakurai
worked alone, Haga with others. Sakurai was ever the efficient admin
istrator; Haga played the role of the lovable Mr. Chips. Samejima re
SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH IN ITS SOCIAL SETTING l8l
membered Haga as "erudite but guileless"; Shibata called him a "very

kind man."78 But how effective was he as a model for students? He
neither repressed nor threatened them. He even went so far as to con
fide in students. Though his work on acids was described as "unrivaled"
by Japanese peers,79 Haga in other ways was not so effective. He stut
tered so badly that listeners could scarcely take notes on his lectures.
His cooperative research took another kind of toll, for Shibata argued
that Haga worked so much with Divers that he never really learned how
to do his work alone.80
Ikeda Kikunae, one of only two noted scientists to hail from Satsuma,
was probably the best research director of the faculty's three senior
chemists. He was trained at Tokyo and Berlin universities and joined
the department in 1896. Shibata testifies to Ikeda s effectiveness:
Ikeda had a particular character as an educator. He was not the
type of professor who could present lectures adroitly or guide us
according to some kind of model.. .. Nevertheless, he inculcated
the essence of scholarship in us. Using simple scalar containers
like burettes and pipettes as equipment, he patiently helped us
greenhorn students to trust the results of our experiments while
discussing the spirit of observation, explaining the methods and
results of our calculations, and making us aware of our errors.81
Ikeda s success as a mentor in research might explain his attraction for
students, but that attraction also had other causes. Ikeda was a physical
chemist who developed an interest in the chemistry of taste. In 1908 he
discovered and patented a technique for producing monosodium gluta
mate by hydrolyzing protein. Production of thisflavor-enhancingitem
became a major Japanese industry (Ajinomoto Ltd. is one of the com
panies) and made Ikeda Kikunae rather a wealthy man. Students in
terested in using their research to succeed in the marketplace would
naturally have flocked to one who had already done so. 82
While physics or physical science has usually been considered pro

gressive and open, medicine is perceived as conservative and closed.
The physicist John D. Bernal attributed the conservatism of medicine to
its preservation of medieval traditions.83 Bernhard J. Stem thought it
derived from the reliance of medical men on authority in the face of
conflicting theories and methods.84 Others, including some so
ciologists, explain thefields'characteristics as a function of client rela
tions, arguing that physicists or chemists, unlike medical men, escape
the particularizing effects of nonprofessional judgment by manufactur
ing no product for laymen.85 Of course, medicine is not scientific the
way physics is, but some of its patterns are not very different. Bernard
Barber, in an essay called "Resistance by Scientists to Scientific Discov
ery," noted that the physicists Helmholtz and Kirchhoff resisted
Planck's ideas on the second law of thermodynamics as strongly as
medical men of that period opposed Lister's theory of antisepsis.86
Thomas S. Kuhn showed long ago that scientists in all fields cling to
tradition.87
Pathology at Tokyo. The Pathology Laboratory at Tokyo Univer

sity, however, was a model for innovative research. Its senior and junior
professors were open to students, accepting new ideas, and encouraged
creativity. Several of its publications were praised overseas, and one was
a breakthrough in cancer research. In 1916 Yamagiwa Katsusaburo
achieved one of the most important advances in cancer research by
demonstrating that tumors can be produced in animals by prolonged
application of tar to their skin. This work was important for theory
because it placed Virchow s doctrine of chronic irritation as a cause of
cancer on a sound experimental basis, and for methodology because it
enabled researchers to induce tumors in host animals more easily.88
The Lancet declared: "It is impossible to over-estimate the importance
of Yamagiwa's discovery for the study of cancer," and in 1926 he be
came a leading candidate for the Nobel Prize in medicine.89
Actually Yamagiwa's work is worthy of attention for both social and
scientific reasons. Colleagues remembered him as persistent and in
domitable, and some mention his strong will and straightforward man
ner.90 Students considered him a source of fatherly encouragement and
responded with feelings of loyalty. Yamagiwa later said the paper could
not have appeared without their support, and the evidence corroborates
this. As a long-term victim of pulmonary tuberculosis, Yamagiwa suf
fered from very poor health. Lacking the support of colleagues and
friends, he could scarcely have done research at all.91
Yamagiwa was a true pioneer, but he was not thefirstman to serve at
his rank. Erwin von Baelz was professor for three decades (from 1873 to
1902), and Josef Disse and Miyake Shu taught pathology in the 1880s.
Nagayo Mataro taught the subject beginning in 1907. But the Japanese
pathologist who first built a program was an unassuming man named
Miura Moriharu (full professor from 1887). Miura was neither brilliant
nor energetic, but he was effective with students. His younger col
league Nagayo Mataro quoted him as saying in 1909 that the laboratory
could do without electric lights because scientists "need to work only
during the day and should rest their brains at night" 92 Another col
league told lkaijiho that Miura was capable of filling an hour's lecture
in pathology by reading half a page of a book! 93 He is also remembered

as a kind, dignified man who appreciated good humor and enjoyed
leisure time. On research trips outside Tokyo Miura often patronized
geisha establishments, and on Saturday afternoons he took laboratory
members on walking trips and to dinner at a Western-style restaurant.
Such outings usually concluded with a drinking party at which, in
Yamagiwa's words, "reserve between professors and students was com
pletely set aside." 94 Lunch-hour socializing within the laboratory was
equally common as a means of easing tensions. "Every day," according
to Sata Yoshihiko, "the entire staff and Professor Miura would gather at
lunch time for o-bento (box lunches] and pleasant conversation, no
matter how busy we w e r e . . . . Dr. Miura would discuss his views on
everything from scientific matters to world affairs and expected us to
express our opinions, too. We all looked forward very much to these
gatherings." 95
Miura encouraged criticism from colleagues and students. Between
1896 and 1899 he published several papers and a book on ben ben. all
erroneously calling it a paralysis of the peripheral nervous system
caused by a toxin in freshwater fish. On one occasion he asked Sata to
read and criticize this work and to collect pertinent material on a re
search trip to Hokkaido. Both men expected the material to confirm
Miura's work, but the results badly damaged it. Miura accepted the
verdict quite calmly and continued using Sata as a critic of his research.
but Sata's reaction was not nearly so calm—he thought he had betrayed
his own teacher. 96
Since Yamagiwa was sick for much of the time, and Miura was not in
good health either, Nagayo directed routine affairs nearly from the day
he entered the group. A quiet but imposing man from a prominent
family, he provided excellent leadership in all his endeavors. He be
lieved in group solidarity and egalitarianism and sought to instill them
in the members of the group. He cultivated the members by drinking
tea and eating cakes with them every afternoon, and he tried to prevent
the graduate students from deferring to him—especially when they
were nearly his age—by levying small fines on the use of honorifics.
Mitamura Makujiro, later professor of pathology at Tokyo, wrote that
Nagayo hoped in these ways not only to develop solidarity but to incul
cate his views about scientific objectivity: "Professor Nagayo was never
inhibited in criticizing other scientists' work, including theories identi
fied with his own teacher [Ludwig Aschoff], and was not at all bothered
if students opposed his i d e a s . . . . He always emphasized the need to
respect truth, freedom, and especially impartiality/'97 Because of the
patterns he helped establish, Nagayo and his staff became very close
and undertook several projects together. In 1908 and 1909 they did
work in serology and cytology that sought to relate changes in the bodily
constitution to secretions in the intestines, and in 1914 they "pointed
scientific investigation in a new direction" by anatomical and patholog
ical studies showing cirrhosis of the bver existed in two forms.98 But
their greatest achievement was the conquest of scrub typhus (Ricket
tsia tsutsugamushi), whose pathogen they found and confirmed."
Nagayo Mataro was both able and self-confident. One acquaintance
says he had a "will of iron" and admired historical figures like Martin
Luther who never admitted defeat. Another recalled the time he told
Dean Aoyama to mind his own business after the dean contradicted one
of his explanations while attending his class as a visitor. This self-
confidence probably resulted from having a father (Nagayo Sensai) who
was a pioneer in modern Japanese medicine and an older brother
(Nagayo Shokichi) who was both a prominent Tokyo internist and a
member of the House of Peers. Whatever the source of this quality,
Nagayo's career was impressive. In 1933 he became dean of the faculty
of medicine and in 1934 president of the university. In 1936 he declined
Prime Minister Hirota Kola's invitation to serve as minister of
education. I0 °
Aoyama's Laboratory of Internal Medicine. Aoyama Tanemichi

was Tokyo University's senior internist for much of the period dis
cussed here. Joining the faculty in 1887 after his studies at Berlin
University, he became dean of medicine in 1901 and held the position
for about sixteen years. He was an enigmatic figure at best, an out-and
out tyrant at worst. Contemporaries remember the mature Aoyama as a
proud, even arrogant man, self-confident and paternalistic; but Aoyama
as a youth was exactly the opposite. His father had considered him an
economic burden. He stuttered badly in his earlier years, and his confi
dence was low. But appointment to the faculty made his career and
changed his personality. Aoyama gained friends and patients who were
wealthy and powerful, became the confidant of Okuma Shigenobu,
moved into a large house, and spent 100 yen a month on Cuban
cigars.101
Aoyama mixed little with underlings. One acquaintance says he con
fined socializing with coworkers to an annual dinner at a Chinese res
taurant Another states that alcohol was very rarely served. Given the
rarity in Japan of attitudes like this, it is important to consider what their
motivations were. Aoyama as a young man was quite fond of drinking,
but later in life his opinion changed. Mitamura attributed the change to
Aoyama's sympathy for Protestantism, and another associate agreed.102
Takahashi Akira, a student of Aoyama who later joined the faculty,
recalls Aoyama's scolding students who he thought drank too much and
telling him to "supervise them closely" once he became a professor.103
Disagreements complicate any assessment of the climate in his labo
ratory. Some sources depict Aoyama as a paragon of professional virtue,
but others imply that he was a tyrant. Imamura Yoshio wrote that
Aoyama "disliked absolutist ways of thinking" and "respected the rights
of the student."104 Fujita Shuichi stated that Aoyama's skill in diag
nosis won the respect of all internists, and added that he was "meticu
lous in teaching his students."I05 Other reports say Aoyama "showed as
much interest in the professional success of his students as if they were
his children" and tried to encourage their labors by eating supper with
them on occasion.I06
An evaluation by Mitamura is especially noteworthy. In 1959
Mitamura praised the "mutual competitiveness" and "flourishing re
search spirit" he thought pervaded the laboratory, and he assigned most
of the credit to Aoyama. By his telling. Aoyama was indeed "arrogant"
and "haughty" but was also "resolute," "manly," "dignified," and "fa
therly." He says Aoyama never assigned research topics to students, but
allowed them to study whatever they wished and seldom interfered
once their work was under way. Upon its completion, he would offer a
"few criticisms," and he readily supported publication. As a result,
talented men "gravitated to Aoyama's laboratory" and produced a "suc
cession of scientific publications."107
But Mitamura's assertions are suspect. The laboratory did attract a
respectable number of students—156 during the thirty years of
Aoyama's professorship—including many of the more capable. But the
lucrative nature of internal medicine and the career benefits of the
dean's patronage, rather than a particularly favorable research climate,
probably accounted for this.108 Much of the evidence suggests that the
atmosphere inhibited creativity. Arai Tsuneo says students "reacted
sharply to Aoyama's slightest smile orfrown"and would hardly ever
venture an opinion that was known to run counter to his. 109 Yamada
Jiro wrote that the only way to pass Aoyama's oral examination was to
"expound to him nothing but his favorite opinions on any particular
disease." *10 Of his leadership in the research laboratory, his biographer
wrote:
Whenever a student wrote a paper and submitted it to Aoyama, he
would scrutinize it with great care and criticize it sharply. He
seldom accepted a new thesis atfirstreading. In the event that a
student presented a particularly bold idea, Aoyama would scold
him, saying, 'Are you certain you want to write something so
audacious?' Moreover, if the student had contradicted a leading
authority, Aoyama always warned him he must reconsider that

part of the argument.!'l
Significantly, the Aoyama group made few contributions to knowl
edge. The most important one by Aoyama himself was his anatomical-
clinical work on plague at Hong Kong (1894). Other members of the
group worked on beriberi, investigating its effects on the kidneys, mus
cles, and diaphragm; on acute and chronic myelitis; on liver disease;
and on diseases caused by the leptothrix and salmonella families of
bacteria. But none of this matched the standards of other laboratories,
and the situation improved substantially only "after (1918 when] Dr.
Inada [Ryukichi] took over the laboratory."112
Tohoku's Science Faculty and Honda's Physics Laboratory. The
faculty of science at Tohoku University had a good intellectual climate
from the start. Professors did complain at first of cramped quarters and a
scarcity of colleagues, but in general they were very well pleased. The
equipment they had was new, in fact, "had just been imported from
Germany."113 For several years there was no other on-campus faculty
to compete for funds and resources.114 The university president was
unusually supportive. Sawayanagi Masataro held the job only from
1911 to 1913. but he managed to ingratiate himself with the scientists.
He was a great believer in the German proposition that professors
should devote themselves to teaching and research—and keep their
noses out of everything else. Mentioning teaching and research as the
"two main duties of the university professor," Sawayanagi called ad
ministrative service by them undesirable and declared that a university
professor "who cannot do research is a professor in name only."115
Thus a strong esprit de corps, with a powerful commitment to re
search, appeared. "Students who came to this university acquired a
particular outlook," according to one of the early professors. "Producing
research was the only thing that mattered.. .. Some of the professors
practically lived in their laboratories. Faculty and students alike worked
late into the night with hardly any other real concern." This spirit took
tangible form in journals—Rika hokoku/Science Reports of the Tohoku
Imperial University, which appeared when the campus first opened,
and Tohoku sugaku zasshi (Tohoku journal of mathematics), published
by the mathematicians privately even before it had opened. All the
groups—mathematicians, geologists, physicists, and chemists—had
seminars that helped to encourage their work by giving opportunities to
report on new research, especially work that was still in progress.
Teachersfromthe Second Higher School, the Miyagi Industrial School,
and the local medical college as well as the university community at
tended. Researchers allowed time at the biweekly meetings to reporting

on the pertinent literature. The chemists called their seminar the
Zasshi kai (Journal society) and offered summary reports of papers
appearing in the international chemical journals. Not surprisingly, in
view of all this, the professors had high aspirations. "We were filled,"
one of them remarked, "with the idea that we had to impress people at
even the most prestigious universities abroad."116
Honda Kdtard's laboratory in physics exemplified these trends. He
and Nagaoka had "shed their 'inferiority complex' toward Western
counterparts." Honda aspired to create his own school,'17 and members
of his group worked exceedingly hard. When a student asked permis
sion to suspend a project because of equipment failure, Honda told him
to fix the equipment even if it took all night. On one occasion Nagaoka
came to Honda's home in Sendai on New Year's Day in hope of explor
ing an idea but did not find Honda at home—he had already gone to the
laboratory. Honda and the members of his laboratory had a clear sense
of purpose. There were no differences of treatment meted out except
where Honda himself was concerned. This senior professor was the
rare farmer's son to enter basic science and had little, if any, respect for
anyone's place in society. Honda treated everyone the same. Wearing
old clothes, he once arrived an hour late for a talk to business executives
who supported his work and proceeded to lecture without an apology.
He was also famous for his placid disposition. "No one ever heard him
raise his voice or saw him pound the table." wrote Ishikawa Teijiro.
"Only by his features could you tell he was angry. The students used to
say his birthmark turned red."118
But this senior physicist was not very patient, for like his mentor,
Nagaoka, Honda customarily visited each member of the laboratory
group at least three or four times a day to discover what the person had
accomplished since the last conversation. Kaya Seiji stated that Honda
would even ask a student about his research if they happened to be in
the men's room. "Once when I was working on iron crystals and the
influence of magnetism on them, I happened to be standing in the
men'sroomat the stall next to Honda's, and he insisted on knowing the
details." Ishikawa thought this kept the students working hard, but
Kaya found it highly annoying.l w
What was the climate in this laboratory setting? Honda was not the
defender of orthodoxy that Aoyama was in medicine. He would tell
members of his staff that while the physics literature contained many
insights and facts, there were also numerous errors needing the correc
tion of "proper experiments."120 But he never saw his own work as
needing correction. "Honda's leadership in research was so strong,"
wrote a colleague in physics, "that researchers under him were not

allowed to publish results that were incompatible with (his] theory or
results in similar experiments."121 His biographer wrote as follows of
those who considered such action:
If a young assistant professor in Honda's laboratory expressed a
view contrary to his, Honda might say: "I do not think that is right.
If you were to do more research you would agree with me." And if
he thought a personality conflict was present, he might go further
and say, "I would like to ask how thoroughly you have investigated
this. Over what temperature range did you test the material? Have
you published a paper on your findings? I would like to see some of
your data. I worked on this problem for two years at Tokyo Univer
sity under Professor Nagaoka. The names of Nagaoka and Honda
have appeared on research reports. Please read these reports. I
then continued working on this subject in Germany under Pro
fessor Tammann's direction and was able to show that my pre
vious reports were correct. These papers were published in a Ger
man journal under Dr. Tammann's sponsorship. And they are
recognized all over the world. If you are suggesting that some of
what I have said is wrong, you have to prove it with experimental
evidence." But by this point the younger scientist's head would be
down.122
There seems little doubt about Honda's intolerance. After all, his
research paradigm had a prestigious history. Identified closely with the
pioneering work of the physical chemist Gustav Tammann, it was basi
cally classical physics with none of the new quantum theory.123 Honda
spent three years with Tammann at Got tin gen and Rend Du Bois at
Berlin (1907-10), where he compiled a record of distinction in re
search. He published eight papers on the nature and properties of met
als that extended Tammann's findings, and he studied the relationship
of temperature changes to magnetic properties of forty-three elements
when heated to a very high level (about 1000 degrees centigrade). This
study in particular brought Honda recognition. Cambridge University
asked if he were interested in a possible appointment to its faculty, and
Nagaoka said he had made himself immortal.124
The laboratory results he got in Tohoku continued to be impressive
for a good many years. After returning to Japan in 1911, Honda as
sembled a staff of young scientists with training in chemistry and phys
ics. Many of these men became professors; others took employment in
industry. While they were working in the Honda laboratory at Tohoku,
they made important contributions to metallurgy as well as to physics
and chemistry. One was the invention of a calorimeter which came to be

widely used in mining for estimating the volume of ore in a vein. An
other was the invention in 1916 of the so-called K.S. magnetic steel,
then considered the best in the world. Other studies the group con
ducted dealt with changes in the magnetic properties of metals when
exposed to temperature extremes.
As for Honda's personality, the mature man was widely recognized as
having enormous energy and self-confidence, but the child had been
just the opposite. Fifth son of a middling level fanner, he was sickly, shy
and by reputation slow-witted. But he entered the First Higher School
with his brother's support and later graduated from Tokyo University.
At Tokyo, he was the top physics major of the class of 1897 He did
research that eventually got published the 1902 publication of his work
on magnetic distortions in cobalt, nickel, and steel led Nagaoka to call
him a capable man. He was extremely hardworking. A young physicist
once asked Honda what to do when round-the-clock work had ex
hausted him. Honda's reply was. "You could read a book." "But suppose
I'm too tired to even read a book?" "In that case, do your experiment.
That is what I did when I was your age."125
Unquestionably this climate could be oppressive. The stall con
stantly complained of overwork. "We have to work too hard." "The
director is too pushy." "What is life for if we can t let off steam?"126
Honda was not inclined to socialize He assigned people topics rather
than letting them choose their own. And the research paradigm that the
laboratory followed was gradually losing potential. "A characteristic of
Honda's school |of chemical physics]," wrote Miyahara Shdhei, "was
the effort to pursue 'how does a substance change?', and not (to ask]
'what is a substance in its essential structure?'" Indeed, Honda "could
not understand [the] quantum mechanical theory [of metals and mag
netism]," according to Kawamiya Nobuo.127
Despite Honda's views, though, researchers played sports. Kaya Seiji
(president of Tokyo University after World War II) enjoyed mountain
climbing. Hayakawa Kazuma was a hunting enthusiast. Others played
baseball and tennis. No one really gave up on his work. "Mostly they
just played pachinko while exchanging their discontents." There was a
certain solidarity in the group—a "mixture of jewels and stones," Ishi
kawa called it, "rather like a household sharing a common fate."128
There were also limits to Honda's intransigence. By the mid- 1930s, his
theory of metals had been exposed as inadequate and had attracted
many critics. But in many respects Honda himself had helped produce
this result "The scientists and engineers who developed the science of
metals beyond Honda," wrote Kawamiya, "were, more often than not,
19° SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH IN ITS SOCIAL SETTING
those who had studied [with him] . . . He . . . made the most impor
tant . . . contribution to the science of metals in Japan by producing the
driving force for it, a mass of ambitious researchers." 129
One other feature of the Honda group serves to mitigate a harsh
judgment Despite its affiliation with Tohoku University, his was not a
purely academic laboratory. The business interests that came to support
him thought his work theoretical, but academics considered it ap
plied. 130 For applied science his style of direction was appropriate.
Industrial laboratories often stress directed research, not "pure" contri
butions to knowledge. Honda's approach to his students may have been
suited to his fundamental goals.
Despite Honda's authoritarian behavior, his staff revered him and
were strongly united. Critics of factionalism in Japanese science have
usually stressed the role of the professor, but staff solidarity merits
scrutiny, too. Solidarity probably impeded creativity at Aoyama's labora
tory. If a student dissented too sharply from Aoyama's views, the others
would reprimand him. 111 On one occasion, Aoyama s students dis
rupted a student protest movement against the medical administration
so that their own professor, who happened to be dean, would not lose
face in the struggle. ! 3 2
Criticism and solidarity could, of course, coexist. The Honda group
ate meals together, held informal discussions, took part (minus Honda)
in sports, invented a new calorimeter, developed a new type of steel, and
did other kinds of valuable research. The Tokyo physics laboratory,
which socialized every afternoon, did useful studies in geomagnetism,
spectroscopy, acoustics, relativity theory, and other areas. The pa
thology section of Miura, Yamagiwa, and Nagayo made basic contribu
tions to international medicine and developed a "spirit of harmonious
cooperation and mutuality" by regularly eating, talking, and drinking
together. 133 Solidarity was only one factor. What most seemed to matter
was the management of tension—to which some use of alcohol could
make a contribution.
Indulgence in alcohol is popular everywhere, but not in perhaps the
same way. Societies may use it to dull sensation or to create certain
moods. The Japanese use it to restore solidarity.134 In an inebriated
state, real or feigned, one can speak freely without retribution.
Aoyama's attitude is a most revealing case, especially because of his
well-known aversion to alcohol. On one occasion he attended a banquet
where one of his section members became very drunk. Boasting loudly
and cavorting around, he ridiculed Aoyama and called him a horse. The
next day, of course, he regretted his actions and tried to avoid his
professor. But Aoyama approached him, expressed his forgiveness, and
told him he knew what had happened. 135
SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH IN ITS SOCIAL SETTING
No consistent pattern of authoritarian behavior existed among the

Japanese scientists of this period. Aoyama and Honda were frequently
autocratic, but many of their colleagues were not. Yamakawa Kenjiro,
Tanakadate Aikitsu, Nagaoka Hantaro, Sakurai Joji, Haga Tamemasa,
Ikeda Kikunae, Yamagiwa Katsusaburd, Miura Moriharu, and Nagayo
Mataro were generally tolerant and open. The authoritarianism we do
find has no obvious source—certainly not "feudalism." "tradition," or
the prominence of medicine in the research community. Honda, a
physicist, was at least as hostile to criticism of his work as anyone in
medicine. Miura, a pathologist, sought out criticism even when it went
against him. Many of the senior professors were arguably more "tradi
tional" than either Aoyama or Honda. All were former samurai and
active patrons of students, trying to instill the traditional value of group
solidarity by socializing with them.
Honda and Aoyama were atypical. Each was viewed with indif
ference by his father. Aoyama s father wanted no more children, and
Honda's father thought his youngest son was stupid. Both scientists
suffered disabilities as children: stuttering in one case, adenoids in the
other. Both were considered unpromising by teachers, and both suf
fered for a time from low self-esteem. Honda, the farmer's son. ignored
differences in status. Aoyama rejected drinking with students because
of his Protestant ideals. In short, when Japanese scientists acted like
autocrats, it was probably a function of individual psychology. Japanese
culture and the prominence of medicine should not be made the
scapegoats.136
Competition and Cooperation in Japanese Science

Given the prominence of group solidarity, a kind of "roping off* process
was probably inevitable. One would expect this result from Tokugawa
patterns and from their continuation in Meiji society. Students in the
faculty of science at Tokyo did not dare consult or study pharmacolog
ical chemistry with Nagai Nagayoshi while Sakurai Joji was serving as
dean because it was "not regarded favorably and was apt to be dan
gerous."137 Men belonging to the internal medicine laboratories of
Miura Kinnosuke and Irisawa Tatsukichi would not use an institute for
x-ray treatment and hydrotherapy established jointly by the three Tokyo
internists because the third internist, Aoyama, had made a student of
his its director.138 During World War 1, researchers from the Tokyo
laboratories in pathology and hygiene simultaneously worked on tsu
tsugamushi disease yet did not share information, personnel, or facili
ties. 139 At Tokyo, information was sometimes not exchanged even be
ig2 SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH IN ITS SOCIAL SETTING
tween the laboratories of physics and chemistry.140 If this kind of group

solidarity characteristic of feudalism did indeed prevent general cooper
ation, the critics would clearly berightin accusing Japanese science of
rejecting scientific values.
In the more complicated situation that existed, scientific cooperation
could occur. In 1888 two Tokyo internists admitted a pathology student
of Miura Moriharu to their beriberi clinic as a way of enabling Miura to
collect the material he needed for research. In 1889 Miura allowed
Iijima Isao, from the faculty of science, to use a lecture hall belonging to
pathology.141 In 1894 Kitasato Shibasaburo established PasteureUa
pestis as the cause of plague through a major cooperative study at Hong
Kong with Aoyama Tanemichi even though the two came from hostile
institutions.142 In 1896 Ogata, from hygiene, and Yamagiwa, from pa
thology, worked together on plague in Taiwan.143
Later the patterns changed. After 1900 the physical sciences con
tinued to cooperate. I n 1913 Jim bo Kotora of geology and Shibata Yuji of
chemistry at Tokyo shared lectures and laboratory time because of their
common interest in mineralogy. In the same year Shibata taught Honda
Kotaro and Ogawa Masataka of Tohoku the use of the spectroscope.144
In 1916 Tawara Kuniichi, a metallurgist at Tokyo, lent Honda his own
microphotographs.] 4 5 But cooperation in medicine became very rare, as
the behavior of the internists shows. In 1910 Aoyama got his Tokyo
colleagues to work on tsutsugamushi disease just because other
schools' researchers had shown interest in it "We must not allow Kyoto
University and Okayama Medical College to surpass our achieve
ments," was justification enough for the dean.146 Lively competition
between the Kitasato and Tokyo groups developed over the cause of the
1918 influenza pandemic.147
Consideration of professional societies sheds additional light on com
petition and cooperation. Professional societies had members from all
institutions and offered possibilities for close interaction. One could
freely criticize the work of one's colleagues while receiving the critical
reactions of others. Medicine led other fields in developing these pat
terns of criticism. In 1885 the Great Japan Hygiene Society and the
Tokyo Medical Society sponsored contradictory lectures on beriberi.
Takagi Kanehiro, at the hygiene society, related beriberi to diet Ogata
Masanori, speaking to the medical society, attributed it to a bacterium.
This exchange led to a flurry of research, claims, and counterclaims.
One development deserves attention. Besides exchanges in letters and
journals, the debate was pursued face-to-face. When Ogata presented
his widely heralded yet spurious demonstration of the "beriberi
bacillus," Takagi not only attended the lecture, but following its conclu
sion strode to the podium and refuted Ogata's claims in detail.148
Open discussion of technical issues was relatively common, particu

larly in medicine. In the latter 1890s Ogata, Yamagiwa, and Kitasato
carried on a lively debate over the details of Kitasato's report on plague
in The Lancet.149 In 1902 another debate unfolded over the question of
cholera's etiology. The scientific issue was quite modest: whether the
incriminating bacteria was or was not the komma bacillus of Koch. But
the professional issue was potentially momentous for the future of Japa
nese medicine. Should exposure in the dailies or exposition in profes
sional journals serve as the vehicle for proper debate? Ultimately the
journals won out, but by no means quickly or easily.150 Meanwhile,
professional societies played a crucial role in developing the mores of
science. Not only Kitasato but others as well sought to use their poten
tial for stimulating debate. At academic meetings, Tokyo pathologists
Yamagiwa and Miura had sharp exchanges on a regular basis, but they
set bounds to their argument. "One of them would say after leaving the
meeting, 'Forgive my rudeness,' while the other replied, 'Not at all. In
science things must be this way.' " l51
The physical sciences, especially physics, were slower to develop
professional patterns of disagreement. In December 1903. at a meeting
of the Tokyo Mathematical-Physical Society, Nagaoka Hantaro present
ed an important model of atomic structure that arranged electrons out
side a central positive charge. The model was purely mechanical, not
chemical, in nature, and it assumed the adequacy of classical elec
trodynamics for describing the behavior of atomic-sized systems.152
But it reflected some cogent analysis and was taken rather seriously in
Europe. Henri Poincare called it a "very interesting attempt"'53 Ernest
Rutherford, who received greater credit for modeling work, conceded
that Nagaoka had partly anticipated the atomic structure assumed in
his modeL154 In Japan, however, reaction to this work was muted.
Tomoda Chinzo called it "new" and "credible" in 1905,15S but very few
reacted at all, and Nagaoka accused Japanese physicists of excessive
timidity in public.156 However, physicists became more openly critical
in the years after World War I. In the mid-1920s several meetings of the
Physical Society were enlivened by a dispute over hydrodynamics.157
Chemistry was somewhere between physics and medicine: criticism
flourished at the Chemical Society, but not in so forceful a manner. The
professional integration of Japanese chemists was one of the aims of the
group, whose membership came from all pertinent specialties. Some
represented basic science, but more were recruited from agriculture,
engineering, or medicine.158 An effort was made to diffuse information.
Beginning in 1890, the Chemical Society held conferences on foreign
journal literature. The place and time of the meetings changed often,
but by 1913 they were fixed. Once a week on Thursday afternoons they
194 SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH1N ITS SOCIAL SETTING
convened in Tokyo's chemistry department. Reports were given on

major foreign papers, and socializing followed the meetings.159
The Chemical Society also tried to influence how things were pub
lished in chemistry. Papers by university scientists had often been pub
lished in European languages, but the society dedicated itself to the use
of Japanese for this purpose. In the early years (1878-99) publication in
the society's own journal (Tokyo kagaku kaishi) was determined by a
vote of the members, l 6 ° but by the turn of the century the society had
set up an editorial board.161 All this becomes important when we con
sider that as a "colonial" endeavor, science in areas outside the "center"
has often lacked firm local moorings. Scientists at work in developing
societies would concentrate their efforts on pleasing foreign peers and
neglect to build ties of their own. 162 This was not the case in Japan, and
the Chemical Society is one of the reasons.
The Chemical Society held monthly meetings, and attendance was
invariably small. About twenty people would discuss three or four pa
pers given by members and attend the dinner that followed. The atmo
sphere was usually polite; one source calls it "pleasant." But a plenary
session was held once a year, and here things were different. Chemists
attendedfromall over Japan and delivered a wide range of papers. Few
holds were barred in discussion, and the sessions were always quite
"lively." In fact, the growth of chemistry outside the capital eventually
changed the society, as in 1921 the Tokyo Chemical Society became the
Chemical Society of Japan.163
It is actually not surprising that the physical scientists lagged behind
colleagues in medicine. Medical men had debated major issues even in
the Tokugawa period, when students of physical science had to strug
gle just to obtain information. Physicians had worked more or less
independently, but physical scientists had been dependent on the gov
ernment. 164 Moreover, physical scientists were few, their tasks daunt
ing. For example, they had to spend a great deal of time simply reading
retrospective and current literature. At Tokyo University special com
mittees of chemists read and reported on materials in English, while
others read German, and still others French.165 Similar arrangements
existed in all fields, including medicine.166 But the pattern of competi
tion was different because medicine had the most money.
By 1914 medicine had substantially moreresearchersthan any other
field, with 156 doctorate holders in research positions, compared to 86
D.Sc. holders for all of basic science.167 It had more facilities for re
search in upper and lower rank schools, enjoyed leadership with pres
tige and power, and had major discoveries to its credit. In other ways,
however, medicine was beginning to lose its clout The number of its
facilities ceased to expand, and whereas the number of chairs for medi
cine had steadily increased in the earlier years, growth greatly slowed
down later on. Between 1908 and 1917 the number of chairs in medical
specialties grew from 71 to 99, a 28 percent increase, but all of this
increase came on regional campuses. Tokyo added no chairs. The
number of students at the graduate level, however, did consistently rise
in medicine. In 1897 there had been eight graduate students in pa
thology at Tokyo University, three in hygiene, and five in Aoyama's
section of internal medicine. By 1908 these figures had risen to twenty-
four for pathology,fivefor hygiene, and ten for the Aoyama section. And
in 1917 there were forty-six pathology graduate students, along with
fifteen in hygiene and twenty-one in the Aoyama section. Between 1908
and 1917 graduate enrollment increases ranged from 100 to 200
percent
The employment situation was undoubtedly worsened for would-be
researchers when they considered the true dimensions of the candidate
pool for university chairs. Professional roles were still inchoate at this
time. A man did not have to pass through the graduate school to aspire
to a chair. He needed only a degree. From that point of view, the in
creases in the numbers of men with degrees must have been truly
alarming (see table 6.4). Back in 1893 there had been nearly as many
chairs as candidates to fill them, that is, thirty degree holders and
twenty-three chairs. In 1900 the situation was still not too bad: thirty-
three chairs andfifty-sixcandidates. But by the time of the war, condi
tions were changing. In 1915 there were four potential candidates for
every chair in medicine, and the ratio of candidates to chairs was about
5:1 in 1919and6:lby 1920.
If small-group research in social psychology gives any indication,
strong uncooperative ingroup-outgroup sentiments are a likelyresultof
these patterns. Hare and Bales argue that group solidarity is signifi
cantly affected by size. 168 Other things being equal, a large group is
more apt to avoid cooperation with other groups because increased
numbers produce greater conformity by individuals and because the
internal availability of diverse talents reduces the need for contributions
from others.169 Similarly, Collins, Raven, and Dion suggest that cooper
ation is apt to be undermined by a "perception of opposed fate" such as
may arise from the threat of external attack, the sharing of common
attitudes, or the realization that the demand for resources exceeds the
supply. In either case, group cohesion increases, and greater suspicion
of others results.170 Still a third effect of increased numbers is an
obstruction of the group's ability to reach the difficult decisions that
may be required in cooperation by scientists. James alludes to this
problem of reaching decisions; Hare stresses the diminished ability of
even a strong leader to speed up the process.171
TABLE 6.4
The Changing Academic Marketplace in Japanese Medicine
NUMBER NUMBER OF LIVING

YEAR OF CHAIRS DEGREE HOLDERS RATIO
1893 23 30
1900 33 56
1905 61 114
1910 74 198
1913 74 287
1915 84 357
1917 100 445
1919 104 510
1920 105 578 1
Sources For numbers of chairs see Tdkyd Tetkoku Datgaku goju nen shi.
2 vote.. 1932; Kyoto Teikoku Daigaku shi. 1943; Kyoto Datgaku nanaju nen
siii. 1967; Tdhoku Daigaku goju nen shi. 2 vote.. 1960; and Kyushu Datgaku
goju nen shi. 3 vols.. 1967. The numbers of living degree holders were
calculated from information contained in the following: Dai jtmmet jtten, 10
vols 1957; Dai Sihon hakushi roku. 5 vols.. 1921-30; Jinji kdskin roku.
1st ed. (1903); 2d ed. (1908); 4th ed. (1915); 7th ed (1925); 8th ed. (1928);
9th ed. (1931); 1 lth ed. (1937); Who's Who in Japan. 2d ed. (1913); 17th
ed. (1936); and The Japan Biographical Encyclopedia and Who's Who, 1st
ed. (1958).
Competition for chairs did not exist elsewhere to anything like this
extent Tokyo University had six graduate students in physics in 1897,
the same number in 1908, and nine in 1917. The situation in chemistry
was similar, except that the numbers were even smaller. In 1897 there
were four graduate students in chemistry at Tokyo University. There
were still four in 1908 and just six in 1917. Honda's laboratory at
Tdhoku University had nine at the end of this period.172 And em
ployment prospects for academic scientists remained goorjin both phys
ics and chemistry (see table 6.5).
In 1893 Japan had two chairs in basic chemistry, both at Tokyo, and
five living holders of the doctorate*in that field. In 1900 there were five
chairs and six degree holders. In 1913 there were eleven chairs and
TABLE 6. 5
The Academic Marketplace in Physical Science
CHEMISTRY PHYSICS
NUMBER NUMBER
NUMBER LIVING NUMBER LIVING
OF DEGREE OF DEGREE
CHAIRS HOLDERS RATIO CHAIRS HOLDERS RATIO
1893 2 5 1 :2 2 8 1 4
1900 5 6 1 : 1 5 11 1 2
1905 6 9 1 :2 5 16 1 3
1910 7 13 1 :2 7 22 1 3
1913 11 16 1 : 1 11 28 1 3
1915 12 17 1 : 1 11 29 1 3
1917 12 20 1:2 11 33 1 3
1919 13 23 1 :2 14 38 1 3
1920 13 22 1 :2 14 46 3
Sources. For number of chairs see Tokyo Tetkoku Datgaku goju nen sht. 2 vols . 1932;
Kyoto Teikoku Datgaku sht, 1943: Kydto Datgaku nanaju nen sht. 1967. Tohoku
Daigaku goju nen sht. 2 vols.. I960; and Kyushu Datgaku goju nen shi, 3 vols.. 1967.
The numbers of living degree holders were calculated from information contained in:
Dai jtmmei jiten, 10 vols . (1957); Dai Nihon hakushi roku. 5 vols < 1921-30); Jtnji
koshin roku, 1st ed. (1903); 2d ed. (1908); 4th ed (1915); 7th ed (1925); 8th ed.
(1928); 9th ed. (1931); 11th ed. (1937); Who's Who in Japan. 2d ed. (1913); 17th ed.
(1936); and The Japan Biographical Encyclopedia and Who's Who. 1st ed. (1958).
sixteen doctors of chemistry, and by 1920 these numbers had risen only
to thirteen and twenty-two. About the same was true of physics. In 1893
there were two chairs for eight degree holders, but in 1900 chairs in
physics had increased to five, while only eleven men held a doctor's
degree. In 1913 the system had eleven chairs compared to twenty-eight
holders of the doctorate, and in 1920 fourteen chairs and forty-six de
gree holders. For more than a quarter of a century, the ratio of university
research and teaching positions to people qualified to hold them re
mained almost stable (1:2 in chemistry and 1:3 in physics). Younger
physicists and chemists were much less affected by the state of the
market They had considerablefreedomand were reasonably assured of
positions in their field. Young medical researchers had to conform and

depend on senior professors. Moreover, the medical community was
well endowed with talent and resources, while the physical and chem
ical communities had to stretch theirs. All things considered, it is hardly
surprising that medical men were less cooperative and more restrained
than physicists and chemists.
CHAPTER SEVEN
SCIENCE AND THE CRISIS

OF WORLD WAR I
World War I posed a major challenge to Japanese science, as it did to

science worldwide. 'The war differed from previous wars in that it
involved whole nations and not only armies," wrote the British physicist
John D. Bernal. "Agriculture and industry were pressed into . . . ser
vice and so was science."1 In Japan the war heightened interest in the
physical sciences. Indeed, one chemist called it a "blessing from heav
en."2 Nonacademic researchflourishedthere as never before. A signifi
cant shift of research activity into private firms and institutions took
place. Both public and private sectors showed more inclination to spend
money on science at home. Businessmen and officials who had earlier
disdained research now became its promoters. Costly projects like the
Research Institute for Physics and Chemistry, which could not have
gained a foothold before 1914, now moved to the top of the country's
agenda.
The blockade of Germany by Britain and f ranee helped to produce
these results. Before the summer of 1914, Japan had depended heavily
on Germany for industrial chemicals, Pharmaceuticals, and precision
instruments. All of the Salvarsan 606 used to treat syphilis came from
Germany,3 and most of the thirty-four million yen spent on imported
Pharmaceuticals also went to that country.4 Much of the information
used in producing aniline dyes was obtained from German-held pa
tents.5 About 150 Japanese traveled to Germany each year for medical
studies.6 Two years of every three spent abroad by Japanese scientists
were spent in Germany.7 And Germany was the site favored by most
Japaneseforexhibitions and academic conferences.8 The blockade cre
ated a crisis. Prices of German-made products soared—when one could
obtain the products at all. In a matter of weeks, aniline dyes jumped to
twenty times their previous price.9 Serious shortages developed. By late
September Tokyo "reportedly had a six months' supply of most basic
medicines, but Osaka had nearly run out.10
Panic and fear were the first responses. As early as August 29, before
Japan had activated its alliance with Britain, Ikaijiho worried: "Some
[German] universities have adopted an anti-Japanese attitude."11 In
199
2OO SCIENCE AND THE CRISIS OF WORLD WAR I
mid-September, it wrote: "The shortages are causing great consterna

tion."12 In May 1915, the vice minister of agriculture and commerce
declared, 'This blockade has caused major difficulties for many of our
Japanese industries."13 Fear rather quickly gave way to anger—and to
a search for appropriate scapegoats. Asahi Shimbun ran an expose se
ries on Tokyo University's faculty of medicine, charging neglect of
research by professors.14 Ikai jiho published articles with the same
theme. A prominent member of the Japanese Diet expressed himself on
the subject as follows: "Now that our ties with Germany are broken, we
must establish our own independence. . . But how can we do that with
professors who pursue their own profit and insist on holding down
various side jobs? . . . Not only does this hinder research, it destroys
(academic] discipline all over the country and leads to a loss of profes
sional authority !"15 Demands were made for basic change. Three scien
tists who were university presidents saw the prospects for it as great 16
The aforementioned speaker in the House of Representatives wanted
resignations from lazy professors. Some thought other reforms were in
order. "For [Tokyo University) to be a place of research, the remnants of
factionalism \gakubatsu] must be swept out the door."17
Foreign study was greatly affected and generated bvely debate. Over
two-thirds of the 155 men studying abroad when the war broke out were
in Germany, and there was no possibility of their staying. Most were
able to leave through Sweden, with Britain or the U.S. as their destina
tions. 1B Some commentators called the cessation in theflowof students
to Germany a golden opportunity to stop being an "importer of |techni
cal) knowledge" and become its "creator."19 "We shall have to discon
tinue our copying of Germany, however distasteful that is. %t2° But others
thought the estrangement was temporary. After all, the war resulted
from the "Kaiser's ambitions, and not from hostility between the two
peoples."21 Moreover, other destinations were not satisfactory. The
U.S. in particular was thought lacking in scientists.22 Despite the wide
range of views on the subject, the context of foreign study had changed
fundamentally. By the time the war ended in 1918, the number of
Japanese who studied abroad had sharply declined.
Japan, of course, was not alone in facing this challenge. Britain and
other countries were also affected, as was Germany, with its strength in
research.23 Like Japan, Britain faced serious shortages—in dyestuffs
(90 percent previously imported), Pharmaceuticals, tungsten, and
zinc.24 Technical manpower was also at a premium. Chemical en
gineers were few in Britain.25 And even in basic science, talent was
scarce. But these shortages were relative. England and Wales in 1914
had three hundred graduate students in all basic sciences. In Japan's
case, sixty would be a generous estimate.26 Major concerns were also
SCIENCE AND THE CRISIS OF WORLD WAR I 2OI
aroused in all three countries about optimum procedures for using

resources. In 1916 German engineers demanded admission to the high
er civil service, and their colleagues in Britain and Japan followed
suit 2 7
In due time, of course, Japan regrouped and responded to most of the
challenges. By December 1914 the government had launched a major
survey of research facilities.28 In 1915 Honda's facilities at Tohoku
were upgraded. A special program of chemical research was inaugu
rated at Kyoto University. The Industrial Experiment Laboratory ex
panded. In 1916 company engineers produced giant turbines, which
had earlier been imported. In 1917 the Research Institute for Physics
and Chemistry opened its doors, and it was followed in 1918 by the
Institute for Aeronautics. A new university (Hokkaido) was founded
that year, and so was a government program of grants for research.
Private universities were finally authorized. A project for fixation of
nitrogen received support. Nor were these efforts the limit of progress:
private firms also built research facilities, and private foundations for
research appeared.
But the progress had limits. University funding increased only slow
ly. The distribution of benefits brought by the war caused ripples of
controversy. The position of technical men in the Japanese bureaucracy
was not upgraded at all. High-handed government interference was a
problem in medicine that had especially wide implications. When the
Okuma government gave Kitasato's institute to the Ministry of Educa
tion in October 1914, it had little understanding of the events which
would follow. Yet by the time they had run their course, the context of
scientific research in Japan had changed in major ways.
The Administrative Transfer of Kitasato's Institute

The transfer of the Institute of Infectious Diseases marked the end of an
era. Over twenty years Kitasato had built a famous and effective re
search program with total control over Japan's public health. But he had
also antagonized the Ministry of Education by resisting its blandish
ments and overshadowing its client Tokyo University had long com
peted with Kitasato's institute and came to control it completely. But the
government's victory over the "Kitasato faction" proved to be pyrrhic.
The university did not do well with serum production and attracted
much criticism. Its political victory had unfavorable consequences for
the Ministry of Education, further antagonizing a hostile Diet, exposing
the ministry to attacks in the press, materially affecting educational
policy, damaging serum production for the duration of the war.
2O2 SCIENCE AND THE CRISIS OF WORLD WAR I
Political reasons were behind the transfer, but few would say so
directly. Leading defenders went so far as to claim that it would actually
strengthen research. The minister of education, Ichiki Kitokuro, told
the Doshikai's Government Affairs Study Committee on November 28
that the transfer would save money, rationalize administration, and
further the aim of research independence. "Because of the present war
in Europe," he said, "it has become impossible for us to send students to
France or Germany. We are drawing up plans for greater autonomy and
hope the transfer will further them."29 Prime Minister Okuma had
earlier expressed such views. "Kitasato and his coworkers," Okuma
claimed, "should be grateful for the association with Tokyo University,
because it sets the standards for Japanese research."30
Kitasato s reaction, though tardy, was hostile in every respect He
gave Okuma a noncommittal answer on October 6, when the prime
minister first informed him of the transfer and asked that he stay as
director.31 A few days later he told Ichiki he was "incapable of under
standing the way a scientist thinks," as he prepared to resign from the
Ministry of Home Affairs.A2 In a speech to his institute colleagues, he
gave his reasons for quitting. First, the transfer decision was wrong
because it assumed the institute to have a nonexistent connection with
formal scientific education. Then again, it was wrong because it ran
counter to worldwide trends in health administration. Third, it was
wrong because it threatened to "destroy comprehensive research \sogo
kenkyu] at the institute."33 To his mind, the Institute of Infectious
Diseases was concerned only with combating infectious diseases and
advising the government about them. Affiliation of the institute with
Tokyo University would contradict the foreign practice of housing bac
teriology in separate institutions, while the university's separation of
basic and clinical medicine would damage vital aspects of the laborato
ry's mission.34
Kitasato s resignation (October 19) and those of his colleagues posed
a serious dilemma for Okuma s cabinet Okuma was openly anxious:
"Scientists and academics who engage in this kind of [research] work
are apt to misunderstand simple facts and cling toridiculousideas. We
must pay no attention to them.. . It is perfectly apparent to anyone
with the slightest scientific knowledge that this transfer has been car
ried out in a reasonable manner."35 Ichiki also admitted that the resig
nations were "causing certain difficulties," and told a Diet committee
he did "not care what ministry or bureau qualified successors might
belong to."36 Both officials were troubled by the shortage of serum
technicians. After 1905 Kitasato's staff trained various technicians, but
none wished to work for the Ministry of Education, and few held posi
tions that could force them to. One, Saizawa Kozo, opposed the assign
SCIENCE AND THE CRISIS OF WORLD WAR I 203
ment, but his position in the military made him vulnerable. Under
direct orders from Mori Rintaro, he ignored charges of betrayal from
Kitasato's pupils and offered his services to the Ministry of Education.37
Home ministry officials resented the decision to transfer the labora
tory. For one thing, they had not been consulted. Okuma had personally
assumed the home minister's portfolio when he organized his cabinet,
and he excluded ministry officials from the transfer planning process
out of concern for Kitasato's influence.38 Such maneuverings naturally
raised anxieties about the ministry's role in the government. Vice Min
ister Shimo'oka Chuji told Okuma the university might destroy the
organizational arrangements of the institute after acquiring control and
raised questions about public health administration.39 Okuma rejected
the first point while conceding the second. He added provisions to the
transfer documents stating that the Ministry of Education accepted a
continuing relationship between the Ministry of Home Affairs and the
university-con trolled institute. Education guaranteed the laboratory's
rights to continue consultations in epidemiology.40
Members of the Diet criticized the transfer and the political moti
vations of its sponsors. Two members of the House of Representatives
said the institute's affiliation with Tokyo University would damage its
research program. Another said it would increase the cost of public
health. Two more lamented Kitasato's possible subjection to a hostile
section of the bureaucracy. Wakasugi Kisaburo, a physician who had
also graduated from Tokyo University, blamed the entire affair (er
roneously) on political machinations by Dean Aoyama. Yagi Itsuro from
Nara, also a physician, said Okuma and Ichiki were completely ignorant
of the "peculiarities of scientific research" and had gravely insulted all
Japanese scientists by excluding Kitasato from prior consultation. He
and Representative Yoshiue Shoichiro of Hokkaido further charged the
cabinet with a lack of political honor. One said the Ministry of Educa
tion showed no clear logic in its annexation of research facilities; the
other contended that the transfer was "simply a political act"41
A Seiyukai party manifesto denounced the transfer in the Asahi
Shimbun, arguing that Tokyo University and the Institute of Infectious
Diseases were incompatible institutions, since the one was interested in
teaching while the other was dedicated to research. The institute would
suffer from this association because the university was filled with
cliques, rigidly organized by chairs and deficient in research output
The Ministry of Education's annexations of research laboratories were
illogical, inconsistent, and uninformed by the measure of foreign expe
rience, and new procedures imposed on the institute by the transfer
would cost more than the old and would probably endanger the produc
tion of serums and vaccine.42 At the instigation of Seiyukai leaders, the
House of Representatives voted to condemn the transfer (187 to 171 ) . 4 3

Nor were hostile reactions confined to those holding office. Senior
statesman Yamagata Aritomo expressed grave reservations about the
transfer a week after the government's announcement. 44
Professional reactions were surprisingly compliant. Several prefec
turaJ medical societies passed condemnatory resolutions, but most
medical and scientific colleagues either supported it, stifled misgivings
in private, or pubbcly feigned indifference. 45 Koganei Yoshikiyo, pro
fessor of anatomy at Tokyo University, came out in favor of the transfer,
probably because Mori Rintaro was his brother-in-law. He was belatedly
joined by Hirota Tsukasa, professor of pediatrics.46 Ishiguro Tadanori
tried to mediate the conflict from his chairmanship of the Central
Hygiene Commission, but he backed off completely when Okuma re
buked him. 4 7 Nagayo Mataro, professor of pathology, was also opposed
to the transfer but decided his university position demanded a public
show of compliance. 48 The most revealing response was that of the
president of the Great Japan Hygiene Society, Kitasato's sponsor in the
1890s. Kanasugi Eigoro began by calling the transfer—in private—the
"result of an insidious plot." He decided to protest to Okuma and orga
nized a group for that purpose. But once in Okuma's office, his de
meanor changed markedly. As he told a meeting of Hygiene Society
members, "It was an extraordinary thing for a mere group of physicians
to visit His Excellency the prime minister and take up his time discuss
ing this matter. The members should understand that we did this only
to save appearances.... If you are all dissatisfied and want us to visit
him again, we will. But we felt overwhelmed to have said as much as we
did to His Excellency on this subject." 49
Of course, the transfer was not wholly political; it did have some logic
behind it. The Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce administered
several research programs with industrial applications. The Ministry of
Home Affairs controlled some research in medicine. And the Ministry of
Communications had a foothold in the field of electrical engineering.
But Imperial Ordinance 279 gave the Ministry of Education an un
usually broad mandate by authorizing it to "supervise and encourage all
[my emphasis] the sciences and the arts."50 This meant in practice that
Home Affairs, Agriculture and Commerce, and Communications con
centrated on research with known applications, while Education had
the political upper hand in the area of basic research. Thus Home
Affairs controlled such facilities as the Tokyo Hygiene Laboratory, the
Osaka Hygiene Laboratory, and the Institute of Infectious Diseases.
The Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce supervised the Industrial
Experiment Laboratory, the Agricultural Experiment Station, and the
SCIENCE AND THE CRISIS OF WORLD WAR I 2O5
Sericulture Research Institute. Communications had jurisdiction over

the Electrotechnical Laboratory and the Railways Research Institute.
Education had charge of the SeismologicaJ Research Commission and
the Mizusawa Latitudinal Observatory. Education had used Imperial
Ordinance 279 to good advantage while enlarging its role in administer
ing science.
But anomalies remained and were frequently criticized. Yagi Itsuro
demanded to know why the Fermentation Laboratory was located in the
Ministry of Finance rather than the Ministry of Education—if admin
istrative uniformity were really so important.51 Kyoikujiron suggested
that the government ought to transfer the Industrial Experiment Labo
ratory to the Ministry of Education, "if it is really so concerned about
money."52 Yagi also thought that the ministry s commitment to medical
research should have given it control of the Bcriben Commission.5* But
policy decisions were not based solely on reason. In 1903 the ministry
had denied Hasegawa Taj permission to call his Zaisei Gakusha medical
academy a "higher professional school." as permitted by law, because of
his association with and support for Kitasato.5*1 Throughout the Meiji
period, the Ministry of Education declined jurisdiction over the Fer
mentation Laboratory on the grounds that its undertakings were "not
academic," yet in 1914 it took control of the Fisheries Institute, which
had even fewer pretensions to research activity.55
Political motivations were behind the transfer of Kitasato's laborato
ry. Ichiki despised Kitasato and finally admitted this openly.56 He made
three bizarre statements in his remarks to the House of Representatives
Budget Committee. He first observed that "private researchers" were
incapable of improving the "unsatisfactory state of bacteriological re
search and vaccine manufacturing in Japan." Then he remarked that a
government laboratory had to manufacture serum and vaccine, be
cause no private agencies were doing so. Finally he said changes had
taken place at the institute in 1899, when Kitasato became director of
this newly established "national laboratory."57 These remarks as a
whole are logically incoherent because the institute was a government
facility; Kitasato was its director; and only the institute produced
serums and vaccine at the time. But if one imputes a political moti
vation, the statements begin to make sense. Kitasato was supposedly
employed by the government, but his attitude suggested the contrary;
the institute was a government laboratory in name but a private labora
tory in fact; and Kitasato was obnoxious because he wielded an inordi
nate amount of informal power, not because he had broken the law.
Ichiki never conceded the transfer's true purpose, but one of his
colleagues did. In his memoirs, Izawa Takio, the inspector general of
the Metropolitan Police in the Ministry of Home Affairs, openly admit

ted that the real objective behind the affair was the destruction of the
scientist's power:
[Before its transfer to the Ministry of Education], the Institute of
Infectious Diseases was a real barrel of rotten apples. It was sup
posed to be a state institution, but Dr. Kitasato had made it com
pletely his own property. The chief of the Bureau of Public Health,
who was supposed to supervise it, could not do anything without
consulting him. Everything at the institute was under Kitasato's
control. Since things had been this way for over a decade, one
would have to say that the bureaucratic system had been dis
rupted. The government decided to transfer it to the Ministry of
Education because its aims were not being realized where it was,
under the Ministry of Home Affairs.58
The Ministry of Education got control of the institute, but the price it
paid was high. Kitasato managed to establish himself in a situation of
even greater autonomy. The ministry lost prestige because of the in
stitute's problems after the transfer, and failed to gain control of several
new laboratories which precedent should have accorded it Fear of
cooptation by ministry officials was a factor in each of these results. It
manifested itself in the founding of laboratories as an issue of bureau
cratic jurisdiction. In the problems of the institute after the transfer, it
took the form of a heated debate over the quality of serums and smallpox
vaccine. And in Kitasato's activities, one sees this concern reflected in
three different ways—his singular estabbshment of a new private labo
ratory, his acquisition of a government license to manufacture serums
and vaccine, and his attempts to influence government policy by mate
rially aiding candidates for office.
Results and Implications of the Institute Transfer

Kitasato's reestablishment in a new private laboratory was the first
major setback for the Ministry of Education. He began planning the
Kitasato Institute even before he resigned and almost immediately be
gan research on a temporary basis ac facilities he owned. The new
institute was somewhat smaller than its well-known precursor, but it
set itself much the same mission: research, clinical treatment, and
production of vaccine and serums. It also incorporated two major
changes, representing simultaneously a broadening of mission and a
narrowing of focus. The Kitasato Institute directed its research not only
to bacterial diseases but to human and animal diseases in general,
SCIENCE AND THE CRISIS OF WORLD WAR I 1QTJ
giving special attention to tuberculosis.59 Kitasato's interest in tuber

culosis was a major reason for his vigorous opposition to the laboratory's
transfer and his establishment of the Kitasato Institute. Professors in
the faculty of medicine at Tokyo University had unequivocally stated
their lack of faith in the efficacy of Koch's tuberculin and their lack of
interest in the prophylactic approach to the disease that Kitasato had
tried to advance.60 Establishment of his own laboratory was motivated
by his desire for both intellectual autonomy and institutional freedom.
Money was naturally one source of his strength. From 1893 onward,
he had operated a private sanatorium for wealthy tubercular patients.
This facility, known as the Yojd'en, was built on Fukuzawa Yukichi's
land with additional funding from a wealthy industrialist, and it proved
so lucrative that Kitasato bought out these two in a year. Charges by
critics that the Yojo'en's treatment of former institute patients con
stituted a "mixing of public and private interests" prompted secrecy
about its finances, but word Altered out, and its reputation grew.'1' No
figures are available on its profits, but they must have been large. Con
struction of the new Kitasato Institute in 1915 cost 400.000 yen—about
30 percent of Tokyo University's annual budget.62 Of this amount.
48,000 yen came from "alumni" and colleagues, another 48.182 yen
from the Great Japan Hygiene Society, and 4,500 yen from other dona
tions. The rest of the costs Kitasato bore personally.63
The Ministry of Education suffered a second major setback when
Kitasato and his institute got a license to make serums. He was able to
do this in defiance of the government because he had friends who were
still sympathetic and powerful. Two days after his meeting with Okuma
(October 6), he sent Kitajima Ta'ichi, his loyal deputy director, to see a
certain official of the Metropolitan Police, which belonged to the home
ministry and had jurisdiction over public health matters in Tokyo. Kita
jima requested and obtained this official's seal on the request for a
license and forwarded it to himself as chief of the Bureau of Public
Health's Section for Preventing Epidemics. He presented the request to
the chief of the bureau, who promptly agreed to support it The bureau
chief returned the documents to the Department of Police, which pro
ceeded to issue the license.64 This set the stage for a bitter public fight
over the quality of serums and vaccine.
Battle was joined once the Kitasato group reorganized. The Institute
of Infectious Diseases had an inexperienced staff, and their products
were soon questioned. Some medical authorities charged that the im
munizing capability of the serums had declined, causing a rise in the
death rate. Others said the Ministry of Education was trying to conceal
the problem by lowering the price of the Japanese serums and making
up poor quality by American-made imports. Still others said the in
sutute's serum production was operating at a loss because the public

had no confidence and would not buy the products.65 The Ministry of
Education tried to blunt these charges by developing a plausible de
fense. Although the immunization count of the new serums had indeed
dropped, the cure rates had gone up. Prices had been lowered, but only
for the purpose of promoting distribution. The amount of American
serum imported was small and only for "experimental purposes," and
the loss of income resulted from price-cutting, not the refusal of the
public to buy.66
Self-interest played a role in each of these arguments. The judgment
of education ministry critics, for example, might have been affected by
ties to Kitasato. Hida Otoichi, who raised the issue of immunization
capability, was a bacteriologist on the staff of the Kitasato Institute.
Tsuchiya Seizaburo, who leveled the charges of higher death rates, had
studied epidemiology with Kitasato.67 The Kitasato Institute had a con
flict of interest Government subsidies were not available to it, and the
Yojo'en income was not sufficient Continued operation required other
income, and most of this came from serum and vaccine production.68
But the government's claims were just as dubious. A 1915 study assert
ing the efficacy of the serums is suspect because it was carried out
under the auspices of the Ministry of Education by a professor of pedi
atrics at Kyushu University.69 Assertions of improved cure rates were
supported by only a single hospital study at a Tokyo University affili
ate.70 The Ministry of Education tried to defend its share of the vaccine
and serum market by too-strict inspection of the Kitasato Institute's
production.71
The ministry's critics were almost certainly right Vice Minister
Fukuhara Ryojiro denied all allegations of inept performance in serum
and vaccine manufacturing on the floor of the Diet, but he admitted in
the privacy of the Budget Committee chamber that the "limited ability"
of the new serum technicians—including Saizawa Kozo—might very
well lead to inferior products.72 Others who had also favored the trans
fer were concerned on this point In the winter of 1914 Tokyo Univer
sity's president, Yamakawa Kenjiro, told Ichiki's predecessor, Okuda
Yoshindo, that there was "some concern whether serum manufactur
ing could be carried on at the university."73 Mori Rintaro wrote in his
diary of "anxiety" over the professors' total ignorance of the serum
manufacturing process.74 The chief of the Bureau of Professional Edu
cation, Matsuura Chinjiro, told the Budget Committee that the pre-
transfer diphtheria serum had a higher immunization level than the
serum produced by the posttransfer staff.75 Serum production chief
Saizawa admitted in 1928 that it had been "very difficult" to obtain the
required minimal level of five hundred immunization units in the first
years after the transfer.76 In view of such facts, it is scarcely surprising
SCIENCE AND THE CRISIS OF WORLD WAR I 2Og
that Vice Minister Fukuhara had pleaded with the Diet in 1914 for a
cessation of criticism about the laboratory transfer issue, arguing that
rumors about incompetent performance and higher death rates from
diseases were "not good for the (reputation of the] Ministry of
Education."77
Another result of the transfer decision was an increase in factional
strife. Aoyama got off thefirstshot even before the transfer's announce
ment According to him, the Kitasato group had "not accomplished
much for a number of years," despite a large budget and top-flight
facilities.78 About the same time, a long-time Kitasato friend and one
time business partner observed that "jealousy of Dr. Kitasato has in
creased greatly of late."79 Relations worsened after the transfer. "The
university and Kitasato groups became (real) enemies as the crisis de
veloped," Nagayo M atari) wrote. "Aoyama asked me if he should attend
the wedding of Kitasato's daughter, and I told him he'd best stay
away."80 In early 1915 Kitasato's associate, Shiga Kiyoshi—discoverer
of the Shiga bacillus—published an essay in which he said, "Those
university professors are so lazy they cannot do simple arithmetic!" As a
retort, Aoyama called Shiga "a petty little man" in his hearing.81 The
Kitasato camp responded in mid-December 1914, when dedicating the
Kitasato Institute. Viscount Kiyoura Keigo, who became prime minister
in the next decade, contrasted the honor shown in Britain toward the
deceased German scientist Paul Ehrlich with the treatment accorded
his friend. "In this country, the only world-famous scientist we have,
Dr. Kitasato, has been driven from his lifelong headquarters, the In
stitute of Infectious Diseases."82 Not surprisingly, by 1917 the Japa
nese medical community was more deeply divided than ever.83
Even at the time, much of the problem was linked to factions in
medicine. The minister of education, Kikuchi Dairoku, spoke plain
tively of it even while in office,84 and with good reason, since fac
tionalism was very widespread. "Each of the genro [senior profes
sionals] had his own faction," wrote Sakai Tanihei many years later.85
The press often chimed in by exposing the pattern at Tokyo. "This evil,"
wrote one publication in 1915, "exists throughout the entire univer
sity."86 University officials, as the war dragged on, showed growing
concern about the problem, and President Yamakawa decided to re
spond after several newspapers had featured the subject and linked it to
poor research output "These so-called gakubatsu [factions] are alleged
to exist, but it is hard for us to accept this." The university had contrib
uted to society, and its record was wholly praiseworthy. Of course, it was
bad if such patterns existed, but one should not take them too seriously.
After all, talk about factions was just a result of some peoples' "feelings
of jealousy."87
It is especially significant that in 1914 the issue got hooked up with
210 SCIENCE AND THE CRISIS OF WORLD WAR I
politics, that is, the politics of the larger society. Dean Aoyama and
Tokyo University were linked to Prime Minister Okuma's ruling Do
shikai party, while the rival Seiyukai was favorable to Kitasato.88
Aoyama had been afriendof Oku ma, and many saw his influence as the
cause of the transfer. The Seiyukai had published a manifesto opposing
the transfer that Kitasato may even have written. Kitasato had ties of
long standing with Hara Kei and other Seiyukai stalwarts, and one of his
major colleagues in research called the opening ceremonies of the
Kitasato Institute "an attack on the Okuma cabinet."89 With the pass
ing of time, these relations, if anything, polarized more. During the Diet
elections of 1917. Kitasato campaigned for Seiyukai politicians and
contributed to their coffers.90
For the twenty years previous to the transfer, the Ministry of Educa
tion had been increasing its role in administering science, but in the
half-dozen years following it, this position was seriously damaged.
Since the apparent decline in its share was quite small, one would not
know this from the figures. The ministry's share of research laborato
ries declined onlyfrom13 of 46 laboratories (28 percent) in 1914 to 18 of
67 (27 percent) in 1920. But this indication is misleading, since the
numbers are somewhat inflated. The Japanese government built five
new specialized laboratories during the war, and the Ministry of Educa
tion got control over the three located at imperial universities by default.
The ministry's control was minimal at one of these laboratories—the
Institute for Aeronautics—and some opposed it Education had to share
control with another agency, and the professors in charge made no little
effort to minimize its voice in the project. Finally, the two other labora
tories, to which the Ministry of Education could have laid claim, were
assigned elsewhere. In all of these cases suspicions aroused by the
transfer affair were a major part of the reason.91
There remains the question—considering the consequences—of
how such an event could have happened. Kitasato had offended many
people, and several were determined to punish him. His government
base of support had diminished as the power of the home ministry
waned. The triumph of administrative legalism (hoka banno) worked to
challenge his reliance on politics. And the growth in the number of
bacteriologists made his replacement seem at least formally possible.
The minister of education, Ichiki Kitokurd, represented these forces
and actively promoted the transfer, but Prime Minister Okuma's sup
port of the transfer was what actually allowed it to happen.
This was highly ironic on the face of it Okuma's life experiences and
interests gave him every reason to admire Kitasato, or at least to leave
him alone. He was a long-time associate and admirer of Kitasato's pa
tron, Fukuzawa Yukichi, and had materially aided Fukuzawa in the
founding of Keio University. He had himself founded a major private

institution of learning, Waseda University. He had a deep commitment
to personal independence and freedom of inquiry, which he expressed
in Waseda's motto (Gakumon no dokuritsu [independence of learn
ing]). He was actively interested in scholarly matters, most especially
engineering and science, working for many years to establish such a
program at Waseda. Okuma's interests in technical studies went far
beyond those of most politicians. He frequently proclaimed that physics
was the "base of all knowledge." He relished attendance at lectures by
scientists whom the Imperial Academy favored with prizes. And he
went so far as to state in an essay that scientists—especially medical
scientists—should be active in secular politics.92
Okuma admired Kitasato and at first resisted the transfer. "He was
strongly opposed to Ichiki's plan," according to one source, "because of
his high idealism."93 He even sent a formal directive on September 3 to
the Ministry of Home Affairs, in which he called attention to the drug
production program and stressed its importance for the nation's public
health.94 Okuma was not one to ignore Kitasato's achievements in his
Institute of Infectious Diseases. National prestige, after all, did not
depend solely on military power but also on the power of science.
Kitasato's scientific contributions had enhanced this prestige and de
served greater support95
But Okuma finally approved of the transfer. Why did his views
change? We cannot be certain of the reason, but a number of factors are
worth considering. Okuma was deeply committed to enhancing na
tional prestige. For many years he had criticized Japan for reliance on
others and stressed the need in matters of science for greater research
creativity.96 He was also a devout believer in the university model of
how to organize science. "1 [approved the transfer],1' he told a visitor,
"because medicine is commonly an academic matter and because of the
convenience for research."97 The war affected his assessment of na
tional needs. "We send too many students to Germany each year," he
told Kanasugi Eigoro, implying that this must be changed.98 Moreover,
"He was deeply impressed by Germany's ability to contend with several
enemies at once," wrote Yanagita Izumi. "Upon considering the matter,
he decided this was due to the strength of German [science and]
culture."99
One should also take account of the man's personality. Okuma was
intellectually curious, convivial, and known for his wide range of con
tacts. He had an optimistic outlook on life and believed strongly in the
future. But he was also exceedingly sure of himself and could be down
right pigheaded. "Once he decided his course, he was even willing to
make serums and vaccine if he had to," wrote Kitajima in his
memoirs. 10 ° Moreover, Ckuma was never attentive to details and was

prone to miscalculation,101 and in some ways, this fault explains why
the transfer took place as it did.
Founding of the Research Institute for Physics

and Chemistry
While the transfer of Kitasato's laboratory did not reflect credit on
Okuma, the founding of the Institute for Physics and Chemistry owed
much to his intervention. More than any single figure, Okuma brought
together the disparate coalition of forces needed to plan and construct
this facility. Okuma prodded the Diet into approving the necessary
subsidies, and Okuma, more than anyone else, helped to organize the
private fund-raising effort. Most of this was done in a quiet, almost
clandestine manner and attracted little notice, but this in no way ob
scures the importance of what the prime minister did. Without the
efforts of Okuma Shigenobu, the institute would have been greatly
delayed and might not have materialized at all.
Okuma had not been its original proponent Physicist Nakamura
Seiji had suggested such a laboratory in 1908, and Baron Mitsui, of the
zaibatsu family, endorsed the idea in 1909. In 1913 the emigre chemist
Takamine Jokichi had attracted attention by a major proposal—cre
ation of a large-scale national laboratory for all fields of science, with a
price tag of twenty million yen—the cost, as he put it, of "just one
battleship." This was considered too great a sum by the business com
munity, and his proposal withered on the vine, to be brought back to life
in the winter of 1914. Eight university scientists found several allies in
the business community, drafted a proposal asking for five million yen,
and approached certain members of the Diet. Nothing was done on this
occasion, but the first major step had been taken.102
Japanese proponents of physics and chemistry were in part respond
ing to trends overseas. In 1887 the Germans, after many difficulties,
had built the Physicalische Technische Reichsanstalt (PTR). The
French by century's end had the Institut Centrale des Arts et Manufac
tures. The British had the National Laboratory. The Americans estab
lished the National Bureau of Standards. The Germans then upped the
ante in 1911 with the Kaiser Wilhelm Gesellschaft (KWG) network of
laboratories. Nor were all the pertinent initiatives taken by public au
thorities. A major new trend in Germany and the U.S. was for industry
to carry on research. By the turn of the century, facilities for research
were rapidly appearing in chemistry, photography, transportation, and
especially the electrical fields.103
Nevertheless, domestic stimuli were important to Japanese efforts.

Japan was simply not well equipped for chemical and physical research.
Facilities in thesefieldswere limited in 1914 to the four imperial univer
sities, the Imperial Academy of Sciences, the Industrial Experiment
Laboratory, and the Electrotechnical Laboratory belonging to the Min
istry of Communications. Even they had limitations. "There was no
special provision for research in university budgets," wrote Sakurai Joji.
"Professors simply diverted to research money from the budget for
student instruction."104 And Nagaoka Hantaro recalled in 1933: "I
turned to theoretical physics for a time because it was so difficult to get
money for equipment. The research facilities we have now were un
imaginable then."105
With the coming of the war. all of this began to change. In October,
the Association for the Chemical Industry (Kdgyd Kagaku Kai) formally
asked the Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce to establish a larger
facility for chemical research, and the ministry appointed a committee.
The committee, known as the Chemical Industry Study Commission
(CISC or Kagaku Kdgyd Chosa Kai ), was chaired by the vice minister
and included a number of academic chemists. They promptly took up,
among other topics, the matter of whether to deal with the problem by
enlarging the Industrial Experiment Laboratory or to build a new labo
ratory—and what to do about physics. Significantly, they opted for an
entirely new facility, with physics an integral part. Agricultural chemist
Kozai Yoshinao and the chemical engineer Takamatsu Toyokichi were
especially influential in debate. They argued that chemistry would suf
fer if separated from physics, and that both must receive greater
stress.1O8 Takamatsu s views were decisive. He insisted that the pro
posed institution undertake research in chemistry "as a scientific disci
pline,1' not primarily in chemistry as an industrial enterprise. Simply
enlarging the Industrial Experiment Laboratory would not solve the
problem because of its aim. 107 Considering his position as the laborato
ry's director, his views could be seen as objective.
In March and April 1915, details were addressed more directly. The
CISC designated five chemists to approach colleagues in physics and
solicit their views about the project. Nine physicists, including es
pecially Yamakawa Kenjiro and Kikuchi Dairoku, contributed ideas.
After the main commission received thereportsit decided to seek not
less than 10,000,000 yen for the institute, of which 4,500,000 would
cover construction, the remainder to be invested in research. About
160,000 yen was expected to sustain annual operating costs. These
recommendations were drafted as a bill and went to the Diet in May.1O8
Reactions in the Diet were in many ways posftive. "The present war
in Europe i s . . . making us keenly aware of the need for scientific
research," a member of the House of Peers noted. "Yet our country

lacks these [large-scale] facilities."109 A colleague in the House of Rep
resentatives exclaimed, "We cannot continue to copy foreign countries
as we have been doing. All the advanced Western countries have estab
lished high-level research institutions for physics and chemistry."110
Almost everyone present endorsed the idea and conceded the need for
the institute, but the real issue was cost. The minister of communica
tions, Taketomi Tokitoshi, called the proposed ten million yen absurd
and implied he could never support it. Representative Aijima Kanjiro, of
the nongovernment Kokuminto party, thought this might be a fatal
defect, since the cabinet was divided. *11 For the moment the issue was
shelved by changes in the text of the bill. Instead of requiring that the
government "adopt an appropriate plan to catch up with advanced
countries at this time," the Diet added a proviso calling for the plan to be
developed "in accordance with the present financial situation." This
was passed by a voice vote.' l2
At this point Oku ma became more assertive. Probably because
Yamakawa Kenjiro, Sakurai Joji, and Wa tan a be Wataru had lobbied
him twice in April, he began to hold meetings of academic scientists,
industrialists, bankers, and officials at his Waseda home. A small meet
ing was held on June 3, and a bigger one convened two weeks later.
Okumareferredto the Anglo-French blockade of Germany as a "major
problem" and insisted that action be taken. Everyone agreed on the
need for the institute, but not on the proper procedure. They finally
decided to appoint a committee in the hope of resolving the matter.J13
Lengthy delays in reaching agreement showed that the subject was
far from routine. The attempt had been made—and had failed—to
establish the institute solely with government funds. Yet proponents
insisted on five million yen as a minimum, and raising such a sum was
not easy. Private businessmen would have to come forward. Iwasaki
Koyata of Mitsubishi showed considerable enthusiasm when Sakurai
asked him for money and at once pledged 500,000 yen, 114 but not all
businessmen were so forthcoming, and the fund-raising effort was
slow. "Outside the academic community," Sakurai wrote, "few saw the
need for scientific research. And funds for research were still
scarce."115 It was eight months after the June meetings before the
groundwork was complete. Letters were sent in January 1916 to the
prime minister, the minister of agriculture and commerce, and the
minister of finance requesting ten years' subsidy totaling 2,000,000
yen, with 250,000 yen to be paid the first year. Okuma held two more
meetings with potential private donors, and a small committee chaired
by Shibusawa Eiichi of the Dai-Ichi Bank and physicist Yamakawa
Kenjiro tried to line up more private contributions.116 These efforts had

succeeded by February 21; the rest was up to the Diet
Responses in the Diet were mixed. Members praised the project as
such and considered the money affordable. "The first thing to learn
from the present war in Europe is the need for independent re
search."117 "I am delighted it has become government policy." "If only
the Japanese Empire had established this kind of laboratory five years
ago, or better yet, ten." But questions lurked behind the enthusiasm,
revealing a range of concerns. Had the government truly done its best
on the issue? A number of members thought not "Last year Mr. Take
tomi called this proposal absurd." 'The proposal is late, and the scale [of
the plan] is too small."118 "Does the government really have the for
titude to carry it out?" Would scientists be available once the institute
was built? One member claimed that the shortage of research person
nel exceeded the shortage of money. Another called the situation
"pitiful." "In (Tokyo University's! faculty of science there are about
thirty students in chemical research and twenty in physics with various
professors supervising them. But the money they have is just 4,000 yen,
which would never be true in a foreign university."119
Members of the Diet raised several other issues more divisive, if
anything, than these. What precisely was the institutes mission? "The
main purpose of the laboratory will be applied research," said the chair
man of the subcommittee with control of the bill. 12° "This institute is to
be essentially a place for pure research," claimed a former education
vice minister.121 Which was it to be? When Representative Suzuki
Umeshiro sought clarification from the minister of agriculture and
commerce, he was told in essence that it was both.122 Documents
drawn up by the legislative sponsors had stipulated both kinds of work.
The question was politically charged. If applied research were the prin
cipal aim, then control would be given to the Ministry of Agriculture and
Commerce, but if basic research were the objective, then the Ministry
of Education could claim it
Scientists and some of their supporters in business were determined
that basic research would come first. "In my laboratory [built in 1916]
we do only applied research," Iwasaki Koyata told Sakurai Joji. "So I am
happy that the institute will stress basic research."123 Nevertheless, the
Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce got control of the laboratory. Its
minister, Kono Hironaka, said it was partly because of the industrialists'
interests in research applications. The ministry had frequently sup
ported industrial research, said a political councillor in the Ministry of
Education, so the industrialists thought this would speed up the pro
cess. 124 Moreover, the idea of control by the Ministry of Education
2l6 SCIENCE AND THE CRISIS OF WORLD WAR I
alarmed some. Never mind that the ministry had "not done enough" to
promote physics or chemistry in the imperial universities, which an
education official admitted lacked large-scale facilities.125 The real is
sue was its record in science. The Ministry of Education was "behind
public thinking in matters of technical research." It had not done
enough to promote innovation, and it had grossly interfered with long-
established programs.
This was the decisive reason. "The Ministry of Education drove Dr.
Kitasato to establish his own independent laboratory," charged Yokota
Koshi, a pharmacist from a district in Hyogo. "This is an instance of
[clear-cut] malfeasance."126 Another representative who cited this
case wanted to know how the Ministry of Education envisioned its role
in regard to the Institute for Physics and Chemistry.127 A third mem
ber said the ministry's takeover of the Institute of Infectious Diseases
showed bureaucratic control, not promotion of research, to be its fun
damental long-term concern.128 These Diet members were not alone
in their views. The real reason for the institute's affiliation, according
to Minister Kono Hironaka, was the concern of unnamed people about
the Ministry of Education. "It might try to take over the [Institute for
Physics and Chemistry) the way it did the Institute of Infectious
Diseases."129
Education officials were greatly displeased, 'industrial academies
are all supervised by the Ministry of Education," noted former vice
minister Okada Ryohei. 13° "Tokyo University's science faculty must be
seen as the foundation for the Research Institute for Physics and Chem
istry," argued former councillor Egi KazuyukLI31 The Ministry of Edu
cation certainly did control the faculty of science, conceded the new
minister of finance, Taketomi Tokitoshi.132 Okada Ryohei—himself
named minister on October 9—was especially irate. He noted sar
castically the contradictions in descriptions of the institute's mission
and denounced its assignment to a rival government ministry as a
"disruption of procedure" and a "violation of our laws."133 The educa
tion minister, Takada Sanae, former Waseda president and afriendof
Okuma, was not too happy himself. He tried to put the best face on the
matter by stressing industrialists' connections with the Ministry of Agri
culture and Commerce but with minimal prodding declared that the
Ministry of Education "should have had control from the outset" 134
What, then, was the institute'srelationshipto the Ministry of Educa
tion? "[Agriculture and Commerce] will necessarily proceed in con
sultation with the Ministry of Education," the minister offinanceprom
ised. After all, the university's faculty of science "will serve as the
institute's base."135 In that case, Egi observed, more money would be
needed at Tokyo University. But would the funds actually materialize?
The minister of finance responded, "It is our intention to offer the

money to assure the [program's] success. In fact, the budget is well on
its way/' 136 The budget had some way to go. In December 1916,
Sakurai Joji, dean of the faculty of science, noted that just five thousand
yen was budgeted for research in physics, while chemistry had even
less (four thousand yen). "Members of the faculty can accomplish very
little, and promising graduate students are taking other jobs."137
The Ministry of Finance was not very generous. In June 1916 Presi
dent Yamakawa began planning the expansion of physics and chem
istry at Tokyo University in connection with the research institute.
After seeking the views of Sakurai Joji, he approached the minister of
education, Takada Sanae. Takada was very understanding, but prob
lems arose in the cabinet The new minister of finance, Shoda Kazue,
was not well disposed and demanded postponements in spending.138
Yamakawa, however, did not waver from his course, and in late 1917 his
plans were approved. Even then, they were somewhat restricted. Most
of the money (650,000 yen) went for facilities. No new faculty chairs
were created, and actual appropriations were delayed twelve months
more.139
But the cause of establishing the institute continued to gather mo
mentum. The entire Diet approved the subsidies on February 27,
1916, and the corporation to receive them was established in March.
Prime Minister Okuma began to create a committee of guarantors and
in just a few weeks had recruitedfifty-five.Thirty of this number pro
ceeded to organize a Founding Commission, with Shibusawa as chair
and two chemists, Sakurai and Takamatsu, as members. The indus
trialists and Okuma did most of the fund-raising, and by March 1917
had 2,187,000 yen. 140 Actual operations were planned by the scien
tists. One basic scientist and one applied scientist had charge of each
discipline, and all four were professors at Tokyo University.M • In April
1917 the imperial family donated 1,000,000 yen, and in September
operations commenced
Tokyo University and the Institute for Aeronautics

Creation of the Institute for Aeronautics at Tokyo University was equal
ly difficult, or more so. Kitasato's supporters in the Diet and elsewhere
were intensely opposed to academic ties for it The military establish
ment came to view the facility as a trophy to which it had best claim. Not
everyone well placed in the central bureaucracy thought such research
deserved top priority. But World War I and accompanying develop
ments placed a premium on military research. A small group of parlia
2l8 SCIENCE AND THE CRISIS OF WORLD WAR I
mentarians (especially in the Peers) was dedicated to the aeronautics

project Prime Minister Oku ma was supportive, and most of all, two key
physicists were determined to make it succeed. Yamakawa Kenjiro,
Tokyo University's president, and a retiring professor of physics, Tan
akadate Aikitsu, were the forces behind its creation. In mobilizing sup
port for the Institute for Aeronautics they followed Kitasato's strategy.
Japan's earliest interest in aeronautics had a military basis. Several
army officers were interested in fixed-balloon reconnaissance and dur
ing the 1904-05 war with Russia set out to exploit its potential. None of
them, however, had much technical training, and none of their efforts
bore fruit This opened the way for academic scientists. In 1905 Fu
jisawa Rikitaro was serving as professor of mathematics both at Tokyo
University and at the army's School of Artillery and Engineering, and
he described the project's failure to his academic colleague in physics.
Tanakadate agreed to help out, and the army put him in charge.142
An apparent turning point came in 1909. The army and navy were
given authority to establish and control a Research Commission on the
Military Uses of Balloons, whose chairman was an army lieutenant
general. A number of officers were members. But the services' lack of
technical expertise once again gave the scientists a role. Tanakadate
was still the main figure. Between 1909 and 1912, he attended semi
nars on aeronautics at Got tin gen and Berlin universities, built a small
wind tunnel back in Japan, and recruited two students of physics to
help him. It was not enough to assure success. The navy withdrew
cooperation in 1912 and created its own small program. The army's
interests were exclusively practical. Basic research made very little
progress.143
The outbreak of war gave the program an important, though limited,
boost Tanakadate and an engineering colleague, Yokota Seinen, pro
fessor of naval architecture, argued that aeronautics needed a new
research format that the university alone could provide. President
Yamakawa agreed with this view and presented it to Prime Minister
Okuma. Tanakadate and Yokota, at about this same time (March 1915),
approached three of their friends in the Peers. Furuichi Kffi, Kubota
Yuzuru, and Okada Ryohei each had an interest in aviation and science
and promptly agreed to help. Their interest proved valuable. Furuichi
had been dean of the engineering faculty, Kubota had served as minis
ter of education, and Okada had twice been vice minister. All belonged
to the Aviation Society, as did Okuma. As a result of this growing sup
port, the cabinet took up the issue in May.144
But 1915 was a year of missed opportunities. Because aviation re
search was entirely new, its constituency was not very powerful. Some
businessmen championed the cause of the Institute for Physics and
Chemistry because the blockade cut off the imports they needed, and
SCIENCE AND THE CRISIS OF WORLD WAR I 2IQ
government officials were also persuaded by the need to end depen

dence on Germany. Aeronautical research was quite a different matter.
One might have expected support from the military, for in European
countries caught up in the war, such interest in aviation was strong. But
no such pattern evolved in Japan, since military pressures were few.
With only three hundred casualties for the whole war, there were far
fewer military incentives to innovate.
In 1915 Japan's real interest in aeronautical research was mostly
confined to scientists, and they were attached to Tokyo University,
which was controlled by the Ministry of Education. The new minister of
education, Takada Sanae. was not actually hostile, but neither was he
actively interested. On December 22, he presented his budget to the
House of Representatives and commented on the subject as follows: "I
do believe aeronautical research is needed at this time, and I would like
to ask the Diet to approve the funding for it. After all, you only get
something out if you put something in. But we need a lot of things, and
the financial situation will just not allow it."145
Forces were mobilizing, however, to bring about change. On June
13, 1915, Tanakadate met with a groupfromthe Peers. For two and a
half hours he answered questions about the future of aviation, arousing
considerable enthusiasm.l46 In December and January Takada was
attacked in the Diet Baron Kubota Yuzuru demanded a full explanation
in the Budget Committee of the Peers.147 Dr. Suzuki Manjiro did the
same in the House. 'The Ministry of Education realized that physical
[and chemical] research were needed, so they decided to contribute
some money. But in this case they are very complacent and need to
rethink their views. We need an aeronautics facility now.148 Okada
Ryohei told President Yamakawa of the attacks on Takada in parlia
ment, and Yamakawa began to move. On January 21 he summoned two
section chiefsfromthe Ministry of Education to meet with him and two
other scientists, Tanakadate and Yokota. The five of them drew up a
budget that Yamakawa showed to the vice minister. Bypassing the
minister of education altogether, the two men met in Yamakawa's office
on January 24, and the deal was cut 1 4 9 Education agreed to support a
line-item budget request for land and then for equipment 15°
It is not clear when Takada converted, but he soon did his best in the
Diet:
As you [members] all know, aeronautics has made extraordinary

progress of late. The war especially has given it a boost In fact,
aeronautics has shown astonishing growth in all the [belligerent]
countries during the past year. Of course, some design, and con
struction of airplanes has been done in Japan. . . but we lack
facilities for basic research. . As a response to this need, we
22O SCIENCE AND THE CRISIS OF WORLD WAR I
propose to build a laboratory at Tokyo University. I probably do not

need to mention this, but [foreign] countries are very competitive
in this field, and their military aircraft [research] is secret.. . We
cannot wait for what others may do but will have to do our own
basic work.151
The minister of education then mentioned the efforts of Britain, Ger

many, and France and announced that 79,640 yen was requested to
purchase the site for the laboratory and 103,950 yen for construction.
On February 28, just five days later, the Diet approved the request152
For the next two years the major activity focused on Tokyo Univer
sity. In February President Yamakawa allocated ten thousand yen of
the university's money to launch aeronautics research. It was initially
housed in the engineering faculty's department of naval architecture.
But the faculty of science did the theoretical work, and Tanakadate was
the head. In April he took charge of a Study Commission to Develop
Aeronautics, and in August this group found temporary facilities to
carry out simulated flights.153 But more support was needed than the
program had thus far received. Late in 1916 the government offered
fifty thousand yen to build a wind tunnel, and in early 1917 Yamakawa
drafted plans for a major staff expansion. The university's full-scale
program for aeronautics research required four new chairs in the en
gineering faculty and one in the faculty of science.154 At this point a
group of supporters raised a troublesome issue. How did basic research
on the campus relate to military needs? "I am concerned," said a mem
ber of the House on January 29, 1918, "about possible neglect of prac
tical needs, since the university is controlling the program." The minis
ter of education denied any problem. "Liaison is working very welL
Many researchers are at work on the problems. Naturally they are
working together and helping each other as much as they can."155
More difficult problems soon appeared on this otherwise clear hori
zon. With construction completed and a request for new chairs on the
table, the Diet was obliged to reopen the subject The Budget Commit
tee of the House of Representatives conducted a major review. These
sessions were highly contentious. Several of the members had admired
Kitasato, and they were not pleased by the ministry's plans. In the
discussions, which lasted several days (from January 30 to February 8,
1918), three separate issues were raised. How did the professors at
Tokyo University see themselves as professionals? What was the Minis
try of Education's conception of the academic's professional role? And
what should be the proper foundation for the Institute for Aeronautics?
University professors were said as a group to have at least two major
pertinent faults. They were described as mostly concerned about teach
ing and only sporadically interested in research. 'The purpose of uni

versities, after all is to pass on received information." Moreover, the
methods of research they actually use are, for the most part, "very old-
fashioned."156 University professors were also accused of partiality.
'Too many chairs in imperial universities," said the scholar of Buddhist
studies Higuchi Hideo, "have been established for particular indi
viduals." Tokyo University had improbably gotten an unneeded second
chair in pharmacology because the dean of the faculty wanted to make
one of his friends a professor.157 Worst of all, the professors at Tokyo
consistently favored their own proteges: "People are very concerned
about this constant tendency to form factions inside the campus. The
professor is the father at Tokyo University; the lecturers and assistant
professors are treated like sons he's adopted.. . .Even within the uni
versity, some people think this is wrong."158
Parliamentary critics claimed that the Ministry of Education had
views out of tune with the times. Universities have one function, labora
tories another, according to Tsuchiya Seizaburo. "The United States,
Britain, and Germany have all found that things work best if some
professors focus on teaching, while others do only research." A world
wide trend had developed toward research in specialized laboratories,
but the Ministry of Education had insisted on "evil uniformity," always
considering Tokyo University both the "supreme institution for higher
education" and the principal agency for scientific research. The Okuma
cabinet had even attached the Institute of Infectious Diseases to the
medical faculty, thus confusing an agency for scientific research with
one for scientific education. The "evils" of doing so foolish a thing were
clearest in exactly this case. Worst of all, according to critics, was the
ministry's failure to learn from the war. "Why has Germany shown such
military strength?" Tsuchiya challenged his colleagues. "It is because it
has succeeded in applying research to the various needs of the war!"
The universities of Germany were not the ones to make the greatest
inventions. These inventions have rather come out of laboratories sep
arated from them. This [relative backwardness of the German univer
sities] is why the Kaiser donated large sums for a network of specialized
laboratories."159
Tsuchiya made yet one more claim that seems pertinent to most—
but not all—of the others. This was his apparent conviction that cre
ative research was related to a certain kind of ethos. "Learning in Japan
has tended to follow the traditions of [classical] China in its concern for
the health of the state. But it is really the scientific endeavors of private
individuals which have produced the greatest success. Indeed, this has
been a major trend in the history of science worldwide." How, then,
should the institute be organized to achieve its greatest potential? First,
it should be entirely free of supervision by university professors. He

called the idea of establishing the institute at Tokyo University an "ex
ample of infantile thinking." Second, it should assemble specialists
from the pertinent disciplines with no involvement in teaching. "The
Imperial Institute at Munich did not attain its objectives when pro
fessors from Munich University were appointed to work there occa
sionally." Last, it should be intimately affiliated with the Japanese
army and navy. "This research is important for national defense. Aero
nautical research has made progress undreamed of in the countries
now fighting in Europe.. . . But our country is lagging behind. To
hand over this work to incompetent professors is like fighting a war
from an armchair."160
Top-ranking officials from the Ministry of Education responded to
most of these charges. They were somewhat conciliatory on teaching
and research. Vice Minister Tadokoro Yoshiharu conceded the pos
sibility of incompetence among professors but refused to comment at
length. "One always expects the replacement of incompetent [acade
mics] by those who can help advance knowledge."161 Nevertheless,
there was no possibility of a laboratory without any teaching. "The
[Aeronautics] Institute will have to do teaching," according to Minister
Okada, "because of our lack of aeronautics experts. [Teaching] is as
urgent as research. Japanese experts must do double duty."162
Ministry officials were equally tactful on the issue of academic fair
ness. "The chair system is unique to Japan," said the chief of the Bu
reau of Professional Education. "We cannot compare the situation here
with that in various other countries."163 For example, "the German
universities have few full professors, but they do have lecturers who
offer various courses." "We have always tried to be fair in our faculty
appointments and have tried to nominate the person best qualified/1164
But in regard to the German example and the lessons of the war, the
ministry's officials showed someflexibility.Vice Minister Tadokoro did
show surprise at Tsuchiya's opposition to the academic link. "Great
research has been done in the various universities of Germany." Placing
the institute at Tokyo University was "especially convenient" for Japan,
although the ministry suspected that particular care was required. Min
ister Okada stressed that despite the facility's attachment to Tokyo
University, it would not belong to any one department The person who
would be named to serve as director might not even be a university
professor. Matsuura emphasized this point in the testimony he gave two
days later. Aeronautics would probably become a separate department
that would in no way exclude thosefinomoutside. The ministry would
assure that anyone requiring a knowledge of aeronautics could "attend
its lectures and take part in its programs."165
This defense by the Ministry of Education was sufficient to carry the

day. The House of Representatives gave its approval on February 12,
and the House of Peers on February 19. By the end of the month the
issue was settled. But the ministry's approach did not silence all critics.
While not agreeing entirely with Tsuchiya, the House Budget Commit
tee had formally called on the Ministry of Education to "eliminate favor
itism from the imperial universities and promote the development of
[scientific] research/'166 This caused comment on thefloorof the Diet,
where a Kitasato ally moved to give it some teeth. "Some members think
there are various forms of favoritism in the imperial universities. If
these are not eliminated, no aeronautics laboratory must be established
at Tokyo University."167
Although the Ministry of Education appeared to have won over its
opponents—the institute opened on April 1, while the new chairs were
funded in July168—its victory was less than complete. Yamakawa had
originally supported the administrative transfer of the Institute of Infec
tious Diseases but was later disturbed by its outcome. As a result, he
began taking steps to prevent a possible recurrence. Yamakawa decided
that a direct attachment of the Institute for Aeronautics to the Ministry
of Education would expose the new facility to interference by officials.
Even having it under his personal control might not be good enough, so
he established a special account for the Institute for Aeronautics, sepa
rate from the university's general fund. Yamakawa s biographer called
it a "clear example of |the president'sl concern."169
The Research Infrastructure of Academic Science

Of course, not all new developments in research infrastructure were
tied to these specialized laboratories. Even aside from one whole new
faculty, Japan's universities got ten new chairs in technical fields dur
ing the first three and a half years of the war. In 1915 Kyushu Univer
sity got a new chair of civil engineering, while Tohoku received chairs
in geology, mathematics, agronomy, parasitology, and agricultural eco
nomics. In 1916 a chair in entomology was created at Tokyo University
and one in bacteriology at Kyoto, and in 1917 new chairs were added at
Tohoku University in applied chemistry and agronomy. All but two of
these chairs had traditional definitions, which seems to show that new
understandings of the need for research took time tofirmup in Japan.
The motivations for most of these chairs is not clear from the sources,
but it is almost certain that enrollments were behind them. 170 Their
foundation occurred in a period of fiscal austerity. At Kyoto the faculty
of science and engineering was divided in 1914 into two faculties, but
no new funding went with it. Apartfromone small increase in funding

at Tokyo, budgets at Kyoto and Tokyo were constantfromthe beginning
until nearly the end of the war. m
Tohoku University was the exception to this pattern of very slow
growth. It gained seven of the ten new chairs in technical fields and an
entirely new faculty (medicine) in 1915. In 1916 it became the location
of a major new laboratory whose mission in part grew out of the war.
Some of this growth was predictable. Since Tohoku had been the small
est and worst funded of the four imperial universities, its expansion
potential was greatest. The faculty of medicine was all but inevitable in
view of the discipline's status. But the creation in 1916 of the Institute
for Metals Research was in many ways qualitatively new, and the pro
cedures by which both it and the faculty of medicine came into exis
tence show the importance of innovative leadership and the prospects
for a new land of funding.
Consider the case of the faculty of medicine. The local prefectural
assembly had formally asked Tokyo for a medical program as early as
1881 and actually received it in 1901. But the facilities were modest,
and quality was suspect Even upgrading in 1913 did not by itself lay the
basis for a good faculty of medicine. Two interventions were needed. In
1906 the governor of Miyagi prefecture persuaded his assembly to ap
propriate 400,000 yen for a new prefectural hospital and attached medi
cal college. This impressed the Ministry of Education and led it to think
that a faculty was affordable, so that there was little resistance when in
1913 it was proposed to make them a faculty. But these facilities had not
been established with the mission of a university in mind. Most of the
faculty had no advanced training, and the equipment they had was
deficient Thus, Hojo Tolataka, the president of the university, insisted
on fundamental changes. In 1915 he dismissed all but four of the
twenty-one staff members and won commitments for new medical
laboratories.172
Hojo was equally effective in creating the Institute for Metals Re
search. Before coming to Tohoku University in 1913, he had taken an
undergraduate degree in mathematics, which he taught at the pres
tigious First Higher School in Tokyo. Following this, he became prin
cipal of the Fourth Higher School in Kanazawa and then of the
Hiroshima Higher Normal SchooL173 Although he lacked a doctorate,
this background helped him considerably in mobilizing support for
research.
The Institute for Metals Research began with a memo to Hojd. Early
in 1915 the physicist Honda Kotaro asked the president to represent his
needs in discussions with the Ministry of Education. Honda described
work he had recently begun on casting procedures for gears and pro
peUers, and he expressed the desire to launch several new projects

relating to quality improvements in the casting of iron and steel and the
development of various new alloys. Stressing the importance of such
work for the Japanese military, and its value for private shipbuilding,
Honda formally requested a budget of fifty thousand yen for basic
equipment and another fifteen thousand yen for researchers' salaries.
To this request Hojo was favorable, and he readily agreed to mediate.!74
The Ministry of Education was also sympathetic, but the proposal
was not easily realized. Wakatsuki Reijiro, the minister offinance(April
1914-August 1915), insisted on a 50 percent cut in the funding re
quested. This, Honda said, could not be tolerated, since he had already
made verbal commitments. Hojo accordingly continued his efforts; but
the Ministry of Education finally broke off discussions, saying that the
Ministry of Finance was not to be moved and no more money could be
obtained. At this point Hojo conceived a new strategy. During his years
at the Fourth Higher School he had recommended students for various
positions and had saved one man's career. The former student was now
an executive with Sumitomo Metals, and Hojd decided to approach him
directly. The executive undertook to advance the proposal, and Sumito
mo agreed to pick up the difference—twenty-one thousand yen—with
clear indications that more would come later. With the necessary fund
ing now fully in place, the institute was able to open its doors on April 1,
1916. 175
Institutional developments on the Tdhoku campus served to stimu
late activity elsewhere. With the university's acquisition of a faculty of
medicine, it now possessed the minimum two faculties required of an
imperial university and no longer needed the facilities in Sapporo to
justify its legal existence. This encouraged major expansion in the form
of a new university. Certain influential people in the city of Sapporo had
long sought to obtain an imperial university, and the chances for realiz
ing so ambitious a goal had, nearly overnight, become more realistic,
although creation of the new Hokkaido University proved to be very
expensive (see chapter 8). But no one could foresee this, and legal
approval was readily obtained.
Demands for a university in this northernmost region were very long
standing, having scarcely ceased from 1876, when the Sapporo Agri
cultural College first opened.176 Demands had tended to focus on a
program in medicine. Because of the climate and the frontier condi
tions, certain illnesses were unusually prevalent, and the authorities
had sought to address them. An 1871 mission to the region by an
American physician had led to the founding of a medical academy, but
this solution was not seen as permanent The facilities were poor, the
training deficient, and the location constantly shifting. Permits to prac
tice in Hokkaido were occasionally issued to men who could not qualify
elsewhere.177
The later campaign to secure a university was not, atfirst,tied in with
medicine. In 1910 a Hokkaido University Establishment Committee
was founded by local officials, and their personal views of its constituent
parts were vague. An influential statement by a Sapporo newspaper was
only slightly more precise. This declaration, made in November 1914,
called for adding a technical faculty to the one in existence (agri
culture), to be followed by law or humanities. Some thought engineer
ing or basic science should probably come first, but their convictions
were not firm. Thus when the prefecture got a major new hospital in
1915, public sentiment shifted toward medicine.178
Members of the cabinet in Tokyo were generally well disposed but
raised questions about the details. The Hokkaido committee had pro
posed a budget of 1,460,000 yen. to be expended over eight years, with
90 percent to go to the faculty of medicine. To make their proposal
more attractive, they eschewed any claim on the treasury. According
to the members of the Hokkaido committee, the sale of certain proper
ties of the faculty of agriculture, together with contributions from the
Sapporo government, and, if needed, private individuals, would suf
fice. This proposition, though superficially plausible, was among the
more questionable aspects. Would students enroll in a medical pro
gram located in a place like Sapporo? Did not Hokkaido need a faculty
of engineering even more than a faculty of medicine? And would the
financing scheme actually yield enough revenue for the long term? In
the final analysis the plan was approved because the Ministry of Edu
cation's three highest officials were solidly behind its key features.179
Members of the Diet were equally impressed and raised almost no
objections of substance. One member of the Budget Committee in the
House of Representatives represented a district on the island of
Shikoku, and he called it unfair that Kyushu and Hokkaido would each
now have an imperial university when Shikoku lacked even a high
school.180 But no one else protested, and the budget was readily
approved. Thus, on March 30, 1918, the fiftieth anniversary of the
opening of Hokkaido, the founding of Hokkaido University was
announced.181
The last major expansion during the war years took place at the two
oldest imperial universities. Tokyo University got a chair in genetics in
its faculty of science and a chair of serological chemistry in its faculty of
medicine. The first was well enough received, but the other was quite
controversial Certain members of the Diet were hostile to the field and
with some justification saw the action as political. Similar new develop
merits at Kyoto and Tokyo were also intensely discussed. When the
Ministry of Education requested major new funding in their faculties of
engineering, a lively new debate on a very old subject—naishoku, or
moonlighting, by university professors—showed simultaneously both
how limited and how unbounded were the prospects for change.
Genetics was afieldin which Japan took the initiative. Gregor Men-
del's epochal studies were rediscovered in 1900, and in 1902 the young
cellular biologist Fujii Kenjiro arrived in Europe to conduct research in
the field. In 1905 he returned to Tokyo University's faculty of science
and began requesting a chair for genetics.182 Related developments
were occurring in the university's faculty of agriculture. In 1906
Toyama Kametaro took his doctorate in agricultural chemistry but
promptly switched to the attractive new field. Toyama used silkworm
studies to show that Mendel's work applied to insects as well as to
plants. His valuable research was praised by foreigners, but Toyama
never studied abroad.l83 He paid a high price for not doing so.
Genetics did well in Japanese institutions. Plant breeding research
was conducted at the Agricultural Experiment Station from 1907. In
1915 Tohoku University got a chair of agronomy whose work focused
heavily on genetics. From 1911 Toyama began working in the newly
founded Sericulture Institute while continuing to teach at Tokyo Uni
versity. In 1912, his colleague Fujii became full professor in the faculty
of science. Since his doctorate was not conferred until a year later, this
was clearly unusual. Under ordinary circumstances, a full professor
ship should have gone first to Toyama, whose degree had been awarded
six years earlier. But Fujii had spent four years abroad, while Toyama
had never left the country. It is highly probable that this affected the
founding of the chair of genetics. On June 12, 1917, the Osaka se
curities tycoon Nomura Tokushichi gave a partial endowment to Tokyo
University specifically for genetics.l M While it was not entirely the first
of its kind, it was the first to be named for genetics, and it went to the
faculty of science instead of the faculty of agriculture. Fujii was named
to the chair of genetics, undoubtedly because of his background.
Toyama, whose work was probably better, soon died an assistant pro
fessor. The Diet was probably unaware of these facts since it readily
approved supplementary funds when approached by the Ministry of
Education.185
Serobgical chemistry was quite a different matter. The Ministry of
Education, as we have seen, had badly miscalculated in annexing
Kitasato's institute. The quality of its vaccine and serums had plum
meted, and the resulting lost sales had led to a deficit. The education
minister, Takada, on December 16, 1915, openly conceded a deficit of
eighty thousand yen, but he insisted that various "reforms" had cut this
figure to thirty thousand yen. Hie Diet was asked to make up the loss,
and after wrenching debate it agreed to cooperate.186 But money was
not the whole issue; there was also the matter of technical skill. The
faculty of medicine now running the institute did not have the knowl
edge to manufacture serums and therefore required a serological
chemist
This request did not have smooth sailing. University authorities had
planned for the chair in 1915, but Minister Ichiki Kitokuro was so
sensitive to the politics that he refused to endorse it 1 8 7 Meanwhile,
problems continued at the institute. By 1917 the issue was critical, and
Minister Okada decided to act The need for caution was soon appar
ent Tsuchiya Seizaburo had vigorously attacked the ministry's plan to
establish aeronautics at Tokyo University and was equally opposed to
this plan. Noting that serological chemistry was usually considered
part of toxicology or even bacteriology, he claimed that these subjects
were already covered in the university's faculty of medicine,188 a long-
standing argument Tsuchiya was loyal to his one-time teacher
Kitasato and determined to embarrass his opponents. In this case he
revived an argument once expounded by Hasegawa Tai, the need for
the one-chair rule, which the university had regularly ignored.
Tsuchiya claimed that this separate chair was proposed for political
reasons.189 By this point, however, the one-chair idea was fading, and
the new chair was easily approved.
Engineering expansion also caused controversy, though everyone
agreed that expansion was needed. There were three major issues. Was
the rationale for expansion properly presented? Were the solutions pro
posed equal to the problems? And would the solutions themselves not
breed more problems?
The need for expansion was patent Because of the war and the
blockade, companies had begun in-house research in attempts to devel
op substitute products. Sometimes firms were successful both tech
nically andfinancially.Marumiya Chemicals built a laboratory in 1915
and successfully developed soaps, while several zaibatsu firms made
synthetic dyes. 190 But problems remained, and progress was slow.
There was an insufficient supply of technical personnel. "Our need is
presently greatest in applied chemistry, metallurgy, and mining en
gineering," according to the education minister, Okada Ryohei Much
more research was needed in thesefields."In the past we thought it was
all right just to copy the discoveries of foreigners."191 Industries were
finding it hard to compete withfirmsoverseas without major assistance
from imperial universities. "Fields like applied chemistry are nowadays
the basis for industry, and the university professors are really its
vanguard."192
SCIENCE AND THE CRISIS OF WORLD WAR I 22O,
Recognizing these trends, the imperial universities had developed a

plan for expansion. In June 1916 Tokyo's president Yamakawa began
discussions with Watanabe Wataru, dean of the Tokyo faculty of en
gineering. Once they had reached agreement, they approached not the
minister of education but the minister of agriculture and commerce.
Nakanokoji Kiyoshi fell in with their ideas and promised support in the
cabinet Only three weeks later was the Ministry of Education in
formed.193 Certain adjustments were made, but the proposal's essen
tials remained, and it was presented to the Diet in July 1917. Enroll
ment was to be sharply increased in applied chemistry, metallurgy, and
mining. Faculty positions could be added, but only at the level of as
sistant professor. Funding would be considered a supplement, to be
paid from the general account of the treasury.194
Members of the Diet focused attention on the rationale advanced for
expansion. No formal mention had been made of research, and some
thought this inappropriate. "Surely the Ministry of Education under
stands the need to expand our efforts in applied chemical research as a
function of trends overseas."'95 Far more was needed than simply more
graduates. "Factory engineers engaged in the production of aniline
dyes are having to cope with problems in which they lack formal in
struction. There has been progress, but. . . the companies need help
from imperial universities." Representative Kodama Ryotaro was con
vinced that more was required even than research. "Do we not need a
system whereby professors give lectures outside universities for the
particular benefit of Japan's private industries?"196
To these views the minister of education was, for the most part, very
sympathetic. More research was imperative. BASF in Germany had
manufactured synthetic dyes with no contributions from any univer
sity, but Japan's situation was different. More off-campus lecturing was
definitely needed. "We will all recognize even more of a need for this in
the future."197 Okada candidly admitted that the solutions he proposed
were inadequate. The additional students whom the funding could
educate would "probably not meet the private demand," and even if
Japan could organize better, "The proposals I have made will not be
enough" to match the Germans in research. Nevertheless, the minister
stressed that he continued toremainoptimistic. A professor at Tohoku
University had recently produced nonflammable celluloid. Honda
Kotaro's magnetic steel would now be manufactured by Sumitomo Met
als. And Salvarsan 606 had been produced in a special program at Kyoto
University and was already being used in its hospital wards. "When
[Japanese scientists] carry out research, they are by no means lacking
in [technical] originality."198
In the view of some members, the solutions proposed were worse
23O SCIENCE AND THE CRISIS OF WORLD WAR I
than the problems. Market demand for technicians and scientists would
be met by fine tuning of major enrollment. Vice Minister Tadokoro
Yoshiham noted that during the first three years of the war, admissions
at Tokyo University for applied chemistry, metallurgy, and mining en
gineering had gone from 35 annually to 105. Things were similar at
Kyoto and, on the level below, at the nation's higher schools. The minis
try thought this could not be ignored. "We are looking at patterns in the
various higher schools," according to Minister Okada, "and trying to
match them in the engineering faculties." Indeed, the ministry was
trying to meet the expectations of students with as much precision as
possible. "Are you not afraid this policy will lead to confusion? asked
Representative Takami Hidemichi. "No," replied the bureau chief Mat
suura. "Students must often study their second- or third-place subject
One would naturally expect this."199
But the greatest concern of the Budget Committee was outside em
ployment Strong sentiment existed on the one hand for more, not less,
consulting (komon) by university professors in various fields. It was not
simply a question of lectures. Industry's need for assistance was so
great that professors should probably be doing research (kenkyu) at
industrial laboratories for two or three months of each year.200 But even
granted the needs of some firms, such a procedure had drawbacks.
Representative Takaoka Tadaichiro argued that excessive consulting
harmed the instruction of university students by removing their pro
fessors from laboratories and classrooms. "Mathematicians are helping
insurance companies, and medical professors are treating private pa
tients People in law and all the technical fields are doing [consul
ting]. There seem to be norestrictionsat all." The minister of education
could not let this pass. "Most of the consultation is taking place in
engineering and medicine. Other professors generally work at private
schools." In any case, it could not be avoided. "For the good of the
country and the private sector generally, we must allow academic
consulting."201
After considerable discussion, the plans for expansion were ap
proved. By mid-July 1917 the Diet had authorized the expenditure of
211,740 yen for Tokyo and 122,766 yen for Kyoto. One new assistant
professor was immediately hired at Kyoto, and two at Tokyo. In 1918
Kyoto added one chair in applied chemistry, and in 1919 another.
Tohoku University got an applied chemistry chair in 1917 and an en
gineering faculty in 1919.202
Science outside the Academic System

The emphasis on consulting was predictable given the wartime expan
sion of science in major corporations and the Japanese private sector
generally. A host of firms and other private groups had begun new
research ventures in many different fields. The Kitasato Institute,
founded in 1914, was only the first of its kind. In 1915 Takeda Phar
maceuticals, previously only a marketingfirm,began producing its own
merchandise by establishing a research division. In 1916 a competitor,
Sankyo Pharmaceuticals, followed the same strategy. Nor was the trend
unique to medicine. Several firms active in the chemical industry—
Marumiya Shoten, Mitsubishi, Mitsui Mining, and Sumitomo Metals—
developed research programs. In 1916 Osaka industrialist Shiomi Seiji,
who had made a fortune in the chemical industry, gave a million yen for
a specialized private laboratory. Known as the Shiomi Institute for
Physics and Chemistry, this enterprise affiliated itself with the Osaka
prefectural government and was later taken over by the Ministry of
Education.203 Many companies and fields benefited from wartime con
ditions. The blockade initially caused shortages and created a panic, but
confiscation of German patents and market withdrawal of Western
competition led to an economic boom.204 Tokugawa Yoshimi was able
to build the Tokugawa Institute for Biological Research in 1917. Asahi
Glass could found an applied chemical laboratory in 1918. Tokyo Elec
tric Company established a research laboratory for applied physics the
same year, and in 1919, the government-controlled Yawata Steel built
an institute for research of interest to it. 205
Government officials had come to favor this trend. Between 1914 and
1920 various bills were presented to the Diet calling for tax reductions,
cheap credit, export subsidies, special research programs, and the
like—all proposalsforhelping the private sector generate new technical
knowledge and more effectively utilize knowledge that already existed.
Most of this legislation was officially approved and even drafted by
government officials whose domains were directly affected. Several
different ministries were active, but the Ministry of Agriculture and
Commerce was the busiest With control of everythingfromthe Patent
Bureau to the Bureaus of Industry, Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries,
it was inevitably the center of action. But its strategic position in this
major new movement was sometimes unfortunate. Its traditional re
liance on direction from outside made it ill-equipped to take risks, and
its practice of naming lawyers to all line positions made it slow to recog
nize trends.
The Bureau of Patents is a case in point After 1905, all patent bureau
chiefs were trained exclusively in law. Two of the seven who held the
position before that time had been trained in law. Not one of the bureau
chiefs was a man trained in a technical discipline.206 Japan's modern
patent system, as we saw in chapter 4, was heavily based on Spain's. It
structured regulations and policies to facilitate acquisition of foreign
technology and minimized any individual's rights to protection. Under
Japanese law, for instance, an employee of an imperial university, gov

ernment laboratory, or publicly supported higher technical school could
not obtain patent protection for any invention or discovery on the
grounds that research was part of his job. Income obtained from such
an invention went entirely to the government employer.207
This provision was canceled in 1911, but a number of problems
remained. The patent office was understaffed. The bureau chief,
Nakamatsu Mono, called attention to this in January 1912, but the
problem got steadily worse.208 In 1912 the number of applications for
patents surged as a result of changes in the law, yet in 1913 the Bureau
of Patents took a 14 percent cut in staff and had to make do with
"assistant examiners." These assistants worked under qualified spe
cialists, but most of them lacked university degrees. No relief was forth
coming until the last year of the war, and even then did not restore all of
the cuts. 209
Shortage of funds compromised the bureau's mission across the
boards. Why was the patent office's Exhibit Hall for Inventions com
bined with the Hall for General Commercial Exhibits? This was indeed
unfortunate, according to Vice Minister Oshikawa Norikichi (whose
undergraduate degree was in chemistry), but financial shortages "had
rendered change difficult."210 Various other critics thought the laws
were deficient. "We have not done very much in our legal system or
anywhere else to encourage Japanese invention," said Representative
Suzuki Bun'ichi in January 1912. "We must find a means [to promote
invention], but the government has not found it yet" Suzuki proposed a
system of grants to inventors and a fifty thousand yen pool to launch
such a program. When a colleague asked for official reaction, the re
sponse was positive. "The government thinks this is urgently needed,"
said Nakamatsu. "But the Bureau of Patents has no extra money it can
use for promoting inventions. Finances have always made such action
impossible."211
Perceptions changed in part with the war, when the need for reform
was more evident Most people in positions of authority realized that the
period of patent protection needed to be lengthened, that violations of
patents had to be treated morerigorously,and that the general popula
tion had to display more sensitivity to the need for inventive activity. Yet
even in these years, change was not rapid. Certain features of the patent
laws "have produced stagnation in industrial inventions and gadgets,"
lamented Representative Oda Ryo in 1916. "This has been harmful to
national development" According to Oda, the short period of patent
protection was one of the negative features. Since a minimum of three
years and a maximum of ten did not afford adequate protection, he
favored patents for twenty-five years. (About seventeen is common to
day.) But the government found this excessive. "We do intend to make
changes," the bureau chief, Kawasaki Saijiro, promised. "But they are
still being studied, and I cannot explain fully."212
One change favoring invention did come in the following year. On
October 13,1917, the Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce issued its
"Regulations for Transferring Funds to Encourage Invention."213 But
these regulations authorized loans, not grants, and did not address
other needs of inventors. In November 1917 the Japanese Society of
Mechanical Engineering sought to spell out those needs in detail, issu
ing a report written by a long-time patent examiner. Sakata Teiichi, who
was also principal of the Tokyo Higher Technical School, proposed a
number of reforms: creation of a permanent exhibition hail solely for
patented inventions, official regulation of the training of invention con
sultants, the convening of periodic exhibitions ofJapanese inventions at
which native inventors were honored, improvement of laws for protect
ing the rights of inventors, more stringent regulation of patent law
abuses, and the establishment of an agency for resolving suspected
violations of patents. "The present system for protecting inventions," he
noted, "still has many deficiencies."214
In fairness to the Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce, one should
not judge its actions too harshly. Some of its officials did see the need for
major reform. Nakamatsu Mono in particular, the bureau chief from
December 1907 to June 1913, and also a lawyer, called attention to the
role of patent law in stimulating both indigenous technical creativity
and economic growth as early as 1889.215 In 1916 the ministry and the
bureau tried for reform but were thwarted by lack of support in the Diet
Substantial revision of patent law posed many complicated problems,
and the Ministry of Finance was always ready to deny funding. But the
Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce can be faulted on two major
grounds. It gave too little attention to its technical staff and was too
inclined to accept outside direction. "What kind of reform will encour
age invention?" the bureau chief asked in 1918. "Should we give pa
tents to chemical products? To methods of research? We asked the
Association for the Chemical Industry (Kogyo Kagaku Kai) about this,
but they could not give us an answer."216 The bureau chief seemed not
to understand that this group was not the best source. Most of its
members had made their fortunes exploiting confiscated patents once
held by the Germans, and they were not very likely to change their
approach.217
Taking the case of research on synthetic fibers, we can see that the
ministry did not respond quickly to trends. The first known patent for
the manufacture of synthetic silk (better known as rayon) had been
issued to a British chemist as early as 1855, and by the 1890s a number
of companies in Europe were successfully producing it. Progress in

synthetic fibers made great strides after the turn of the century. Re
searchers in France and the U.S. made significant chemical break
throughs, and German firms in particular improved the means of com
mercial production.218 Japanese scientists had taken notice by 1909
and recommended research at that time. But the Ministry of Agri
culture and Commerce rejected their views on the grounds that natural
silk was superior (chapter 5). In 1913 300.000 yen was spent on im
ports of the foreign-made textile.219
How should Japan respond to this challenge? In January 1914, six
months prior to the war, the ministry was relatively confident When
Oka Makoto, chief of the Bureau of Industry, testified before the House
Budget Committee at the end of the month, he admitted that a problem
existed but saw it as manageable. Japan's market position in natural silk
remained very strong, especially by comparison with rivals—France,
China, and Italy. Synthetic silk, though cheaper than natural silk, still
was not of high quality; color fastness, resistance to Are and moisture,
and consistency of weave could not in every case be assured. Every
thing was under control. The government had made research in the silk
industry a continuing budgetary item. In particular, research was
taking place at the Kuramae Higher Industrial School, the Ueda
Sericultural Technical School, and the Industrial Experiment Labora
tory. While the budget for this work was not large (16,000 yen at the
Industrial Experiment Laboratory), the ministry was "pleased with the
results of the work." Oka expected that importation of synthetic silk
would "soon be restricted or prohibited entirely."220
But his presentation was seriously deficient, as Oka, a Tokyo law
graduate with no technical training, was incompetent to judge. In 1911
he had an acrimonious conversation with the director of the Industrial
Experiment Laboratory that showed his lack of understanding (chapter
5). The ministry was later forced to concede that Japan would have to
develop a new textile fiber "to withstand competition in the mar
ketplace," according to the agriculture and commerce minister, Kono
Hironaka. In consultation with textile manufacturers, the ministry had
agreed to support such an effort The ministry thought this would take
about three years, but the manufacturers thought more time would be
needed. Research and development costs were estimated at five million
yen, but the companies considered this estimate inadequate. Predict
ably, the Ministry of Finance felt challenged by the size of the project—
but might support funding if the time were extended.221
The issue was not whether natural silk was better than rayon, or even
whether silk could hold onto foreign markets. The real issue was the
future of textiles and the place of research in the textile industry's
future. Not everyone found the ministry's report reassuring. Represen

tative Nishitani Kinzo, who was in the silk business, was among the
more nervous. "It seems impossible to predict when or how this prob
lem will be solved. And because of the importance (of textiles] in Japan's
foreign trade, the search for solutions makes us all very anxious."222 A
colleague's response was even more vigorous. "It seems one cannot get
a detailed, satisfactory answer from the minister of agriculture and
commerce no matter how many questions one asks," said Representa
tive Horikiri Zenbei, professor of economics at Keio University:
At this critical time, when many Japanese are trying to do some
thing for agricultural, industrial, or commercial development, the
Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce either makes others do
everything or acts arbitrarily.. . . They have no ideas about the
future. They try to evade responsibility by saying that the matter is
under study or that. . . they cannot give an answer because it
would trouble the Ministry of Finance.. . .Would it not be better if
we just abolished the Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce? It
would be more rational to put (its bureaus] under the Ministry of
Finance. We could save the eight thousand yen presently paid in
salary to the minister and use it to hire some other officials. This
would be excellent for bureaucratic efficiency!223
These remarks angered Kono but did Horikiri no harm. After the war
he became a councillor in the ministry, and a few years later was ap
pointed ambassador to Italy.224
In a third wartime research project, the problems were more subtle.
The Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce in 1915 proposed to expand
the Industrial Experiment Laboratory, but many were not sure this
would work. Some thought the rationale for expansion defective, even if
the expansion itself was essential. Others thought an early termination
of the war in Europe might prevent a return on investment There was a
suspicion that many private firms might not cooperate fully. One well-
placed critic thought ministry interference might make the desired
results unobtainable. Nevertheless, the project moved forward to a suc
cessful conclusion, since no other alternatives appeared.
The need for expansion was not in doubt A 1912 report by a Tokyo
professor (see chapter 4) had documented the country's trade deficit in
chemicals, and the war made the situation worse. The deficit, more
than twenty million yen at the time of the study, had reached thirty
million yen during thefirstyear of conflict; the Ministry of Agriculture
and Commerce became seriously alarmed.225 Their concern was justi
fied by the response of private business. Privatefirms,as we have seen,
began to take action, but their efforts too often fell short As of mid-1915,
Asahi Chemicals wanted to manufacture soda. Mitsui was trying to

produce synthetic dyes. Several other companies hoped for success in
producing synthetic ammonia. But all needed help from the Industrial
Experiment Laboratory to achieve any success. 226
The failure in industrial research at the beginning of the war is not
surprising. Few companies employed even as many as ten researchers.
Such personnel usually belonged to a company section for product
inspection or testing, implying that managers considered their func
tions practical. Many in the past had had as a primary task the monitor
ing of foreign technology. Few privatefirmswere equipped to deal with
complicated technical problems, for this had been the function of the
Industrial Experiment Laboratory and was still more or less its assign
ment 2 2 7 The Chemical Industry Study Commission (CISC) in May
1915 recommended to the minister of agriculture and commerce that
the laboratory be greatly expanded.228
When the Budget Committee took up this proposal, members
focused on the probable outcome. Could one expect private firms to
produce dyes and other chemicals if the capacities of the laboratory
grew? For once Oka did not play expert but deferred to a qualified
scientist Takamatsu Toyokichi, the laboratory's director, a CISC mem
ber, and a chemical engineer, gave a carefully hedged response. Since
the talent required was available, success was "certainly not impossi
ble" if the firms could mobilize this talent, and if the laboratory were to
help them. 229
Some members of the Diet were not so certain. Representative
Yamada Seinen worried that a premature end to the fighting in Europe
could preclude any long-term success. Western competitors would im
mediately return to East Asian markets with much cheaper chemical
products than those Japan could produce.230 Representative Shimizu
Ichitaro was greatly concerned by a lack of creative incentives. "We do
not have the kind of [patent] legislation that would allow (company
employees] to reap the rewards of inventive activity to the extent that
inventors in Germany can do. [Japanese] get salaries, but not too much
else/ 1231 The strongest challenge to the ministry's proposal came from
Representative Muto Kinkichi, who was active in textiles and banking,
and edited a newspaper called Industrial News.232
Muto criticized the plan for two reasons. One was its excessive con
cern with import reductions. The other was the treatment of technical
personnel in the ministry. "Whether the Industrial Experiment Labora
tory is well-equipped or not, little research will be done and little enough
accomplished unless the engineers are paid better and respected more.
But in the past engineers have not been much respected in the Ministry
of Agriculture and Commerce."233 Minister Kono had to respond, and
he made three major points in rebuttal. Japan, he said, had to stop

copying the products of others. "Until recently, Japanese manufactur
ing enterprises rarely operated on a scientific basis. Most of them just
copied foreign products." But the same private firms could certainly do
better if, as in this case, the government were to help. "These com
panies in the chemical industry could produce these substances if we
gave them certain kinds of assistance." He as minister would have to do
more. "I realize that I myself must concentrate attention on the Indus
trial Experiment Laboratory."234 But the ministry did not change its
ways, and Mutd did not even comment on its treatment of engineers,
which would soon become a major issue.
CHAPTER EIGHT
THE RESEARCH SYSTEM IN

AN AGE OF TRANSITION
About a year before the war ended in Europe, Aoyama Tanemichi spoke
about changes in the scientific community at his retirement dinner.
"Our empire, he said, "has shown [of late] the vitality and energy of a
newly emerging country. Our academic community has a new spirit, a
growing enthusiasm for research. This has come about because scien
tists took advantage of the present situation. Truly this spirit of scien
tific research is the glory of the nation."1 The retiring dean did not
stretch the truth. Significant change was under way, and it did indeed
change the climate for research. World War I had inspired a strong
inclination toward independence in science and technology, and during
the early postwar years, this movement would feature not only greater
independence in general but a particular interest in independence of
Germany. Primarily because of the war and the attitudes to which it
gaverise,Japanese scientists were forced to decide more precisely than
before where they stood in the world science community. This scrutiny
was painful for some. It was also important for professional growth.
The early postwar years, 1918-20, saw many changes. Public expec
tations about research by scientists had risen during the war. Now the
structure of incentives to carry on research also changed. As before,
new facilities were built and old ones upgraded. But a new and potent
combination of rewards for those who did research—and penalties for
those who did not—was also made part of the system. It included fresh
attacks on academic moonlighting, stepped up efforts to stimulate com
petition, and offered more grants and prizes, earlier retirement for se
nior professors, and sharply higher salaries for those who remained.
Several university faculties received new facilities, and the concept
of the research professorship was born. Private foundations aiming to
support research first appeared on the scene. Several new laboratories
were created from scratch. Most important, Japan established a com
petitive system of grants for research and, at the end of this period, a
National Research Council. Potent new attitudes favorable to scientific
research became characteristic throughout society. Private universities
238
THE RESEARCH SYSTEM IN AN AGE OF TRANSITION 239
started to become active in technical research, as did the Imperial Army

and Navy.
Not surprisingly, a growing feeling that scientists should take part in
making the decisions that governed their lives accompanied these
sweeping changes. Members of the academic and technical commu
nities demanded that people with scientific educations be elected or
appointed to serve in the Diet, and they made cogent proposals to fur
ther that end. Within the central bureaucracy there sprang up the so-
called engineers' movement, which sought better treatment for govern
ment officials with technical backgrounds, including more access to
policy-making jobs. The university community did not lag behind. Pro
fessors sought and obtained more control over academic appointments
and the running of their own institutions. Ultimately, many of these
demands would be frustrated, but for a while they seemed to win out.
By 1920 former samurai were no longer a majority in the scientific
community. Modern education had made careers in science accessible
to the general population, including, for the first time. Japanese wom
en. 2 Research facilities and programs were now in place for scientists in
all technical and scientific fields on some kind of regular basis. And
criticisms of the scientific community for perpetuating "feudalistic"
behavior became ever more widespread and strident For all of these
reasons the early postwar years marked the end of an epoch.
Changes in the Conditions for Scientific Research

There were many indications after World War I that Japanese society
took research more seriously. Criticism of professors for neglecting
research continued unabated. "The value of the nation's universities is
called into question if professors shirk their duty by neglecting re
search," declared an editorial writer in 1919.3 "We do not want to turn
out ordinary scientists," insisted Representative Yokota Koshi, a phar
macist, during a 1920 meeting of the Budget Committee of the House of
Representatives. "We cannot continue the system now prevailing in the
country's imperial universities."4 Both critics demanded an end to fac
ulty consulting; Yokota wanted more competition and raises in salaries.
A physician colleague of Yokota's in the Diet, Kanasugi Eigoro, wanted
to go even further. "Some of these professors are too decrepit to do any
work, and even some of the younger ones do very little. These people
should be fired at once."5
Because of such pressures, some changes that improved the climate
for research were made. Salaries went up. The Ministry of Education
24O THE RESEARCH SYSTEM IN AN AGE OF TRANSITION
claimed that the average salary for university professors in 1918 was
2,370 yen. Given the realities of wartime inflation, that was probably
inadequate.6 But in 1920, a 30 percent hike took place, making the lives
of academics more comfortable.7 Some measures to increase competi
tion were also put into effect. In February 1920 education's vice minis
ter, Minami Hiroshi, announced that whenever a single professor repre
sented an entire academic subdiscipline, his major lecturing would be
shared by colleagues in fields close to his.8 Later in 1920 a new policy,
whereby all professors at imperial universities were obliged to retire
upon reaching age sixty, was implemented. It was instigated by
Yamakawa Kenjiro, president of Tokyo University, and it reflected
broad faculty acquiescence in the view that younger professors would
do more research 9 But on one issue, consulting or outside employment,
there was no policy change. Of course, it might be better if professors
did not have side jobs, the vice minister of education conceded. "But
considering the present state of Japanese culture, [outside em
ployment) may not be so bad."10
These policy changes were important for research, but so was the
willingness to allocate more money. One could use prior gains to justify
asking for more. On March 20,1918, Count Hayashi Hirotaro delivered
a speech to the House of Peers that utilized this strategy effectively. He
noted with satisfaction the large sum of money (78,700 yen) now bud
geted at Tokyo University for the Institute for Aeronautics. He also
pointed out that this level of spending had introduced some major
distortions. The two parent faculties, science and engineering, with
total authorized spending levels of 58,960 yen and 78,761 yen, respec
tively, were about to be completely overshadowed. The obvious solution,
he pointed out, was to spend more money on both. n The government
was willing to oblige him, and in 1919 the cabinet recommended, and
the Diet approved, substantial new funding for science and engineering
at both Tokyo and Kyoto universities. Tokyo got new facilities and
equipment Kyoto got three new chairs in physics, one in biology (its
first), and an additional chair in applied chemistry.12 Even more re
markably, 700,000 yen was approved and allocated for a new astro
nomical observatory at Tokyo University in 1919, after five years in
budgetary limbo.13
The government even founded several new laboratories for particu
lar missions. Experiment stations or institutes were established for the
tea and silk industries in 1918 and 1919. An Institute for Research on
Nitrogen Fixation (IRNF) was built in 1918. Nutrition and fuel re
search both came to be housed in specialized laboratories (1920), while
marine and high-altitude meteorological observatories were built at the
end of the decade.14 The National Institute for Nutrition Research
THE RESEARCH SYSTEM IN AN AGE OF TRANSITION 24I
(NINR) illustrated one important new trend. This was the tendency to
draw on American, and not only European, precedents. The NINR was
the brainchild of Saiki Nori, a bacteriologist trained at Yale University,
where a comparable institution existed. Its chief legislative sponsor in
the Diet was Kono Tetsushi, a physician who had received his M.D.
degree from the University of Pennsylvania.15
The NINR reflected in part the general enthusiasm for research into
vitamins that swept the world at the end of the war,16 but it also had
roots in Japan. "One of its objectives," noted Dr. Yagi Itsuro, a leading
supporter in the Budget Committee, "will be to evaluate our rice-based
diet with the aim of supplementing or even replacing it." Another root
was its relationship to the national bureaucracy. The Ministry of Educa
tion did not claim this institution, but the Ministry of Finance did its job
for it. The finance vice minister, Shinno Katsunosuke. argued that
nutrition studies were a part of physiology and for this reason should be
housed on a university campus. Yagi opposed this on the basis that
faculties of medicine in Japanese universities did not allow mission
research. "(Medical) researchers might investigate the pathological as
pects of a topic. If the results interest them, they might investigate its
chemical or bacteriological aspects. But each of these sections—pa
thology, biochemistry, bacteriology—is independent, so the investiga
tors must ask members of each to do the work for them. The latter might
say they would do it if they had time [for the project)." Yagi was actually
thinking of Kitasato's one-time institute, whose transfer he had opposed
in 1914. "Precisely because universities are divided into all of these
separate sections.. . . Robert Koch left (Berlin] University to establish a
separate laboratory."17 Yagi's objections had their effect The NINR
was assigned to the Ministry of Home Affairs and not to the education
ministry.18
Postwar stress on scientific research was apparent in other ways,
too. Small research funds for biochemistry and physics were estab
lished at Tokyo University at the instigation of the retired professor
Shibata Keita and in honor of the retired professor Tanakadate Aikitsu,
respectively.19 The Imperial Academy in 1918 created a new prize for
research contributions that it named for the former prime minister
Katsura Taro.20 Several private foundations sprang up with the de
clared aim of supporting research in all of the natural sciences. The
most important of these was the Keimeikai. Created with an endow
ment of one million yen, the Keimeikai made its intentions unmistaka
bly clear by naming as its president the former minister of education
Maltino Nobuaki, sponsor of the Imperial Academy and the faculty of
science at Tohoku University.21
Other developments on the policyfrontalso exemplified change. In
242 THE RESEARCH SYSTEM IN AN AGE OF TRANSITION
1920, the Ministry of Education unveiled a plan to spend the extraordi

nary sum of seventy million yen over a ten-year period on the construc
tion of new research laboratories at all the imperial universities.22 It did
not, in fact, carry out this plan, but it did do three other things: create a
system of grants for research, present the concept of the research pro
fessorship (initially at the Aeronautics Institute in conjunction with
Tokyo University),23 and complete the establishment of Hokkaido Im
perial University. The initial plan for Hokkaido had envisioned an out
lay of 1,460,000 yen to be obtained mostly by selling agricultural land
that the government had owned for some time. But this strategy did not
work, and the actual cost was much higher. In 1919 the land was sold,
and in 1920 thirty-one private individuals and local government agen
cies donated a total of 470,700 yen. Even with that, the two basic
programs (agriculture and medicine) were not yet in place. The basic
faculties were not complete until 1925, and it cost more than 3.6 million
yen, beyond the funds received from private contributors.24
Limits to the stress on research included the cost of projects like the
establishment of Hokkaido University. Tokyo University's faculty of
medicine, which had grown very little for ten years, was authorized to
expand in 1918, but construction of facilities did not begin until 1922.25
The Research Institute for Physics and Chemistry, though formally
inaugurated in 1917, had no facilities of its own for another five years.
Members of its research team continued to work in laboratories at their
home universities.26 Kyushu University was repeatedly thwarted in its
effort to obtain a faculty of science. First proposed in 1919 by President
Mano Bunji, a mechanical engineer and former official in the Ministry
of Education, the plan was blocked by either that ministry or the Minis
try of Finance.27 The Kyushu science faculty was considered again in
1922-and on a number of other occasions—but was not actually built
until 1939.28
As for laboratories, the ad hoc Institute for Research on Nitrogen
Fixation, formally inaugurated in 1918, reflected wartime concerns
about self-sufficiency in fuels and chemicals.29 But it was geared to
ward work on the synthesis of ammonia because that work, by chemist
Fritz Haber, had been highly influential in Germany's earlier military
success. 30 With access to reports on the subject by Haber, scientists at
the IRNF duplicated his work in 1920,31 but they had very little fund
ing. The IRNF was set up with an outlay of just 200,000 yen at a time
when, Diet members claimed, the U.S. was spending forty million yen
on the problem. The Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce, to which
the IRNF was attached, flatly refused in public testimony to authorize
more funding, tax exemptions, or any other form of assistance on the
grounds that the Japanese chemical industry was making large profits
THE RESEARCH SYSTEM IN AN ACE OF TRANSITION 243
(March 1918). M This situation did not last very long. When hostilities
ended in November 1918, the Japanese chemical industry faced serious
hardships.33
Even with these limits, new attitudes favoring scientific research
permeated society. The armed services, for example, established signif
icant new research facilities. In 1919 the army opened both a Technical
Headquarters (Rikugun Gijutsu Hombu) and a Laboratory for Scien
tific Research (Rikugun Kagaku Kenkyu Jo). In 1920 it established a
facility called the Aerological Observatory (Rikugunsho Kdkukyoku).34
Together with the navy's establishment in 1918 of its Naval Aircraft
Experiment Station (Kaigun Kdkuki Shiken Jo), these facilities gave
the military limited independence of the professors at Tokyo University.
The services continued to rely on Tokyo University for advanced aero
nautics training,35 and they lost their bid for control over the Institute
for Aeronautics. In September 1919, President Yamakawa thwarted
their effort to name a deputy director whom they could control through
the chain of command.36 Theyfinallyhad to settle in July 1921 for the
appointment to the institute of several researchers who were officers.37
Attitudes favoring scientific research were apparent in other ways,
too. In 1918, the government granted the forces of private higher edu
cation a major victory by authorizing their use of the term university.
On the surface, this simply meant that private institutions like Keio and
Waseda would enjoy the same legal status and privileges as the five
imperial universities. But this action by government was also important
for scientific research. Because of the high cost of technical educa
tion—and even more, of technical research—Keio, Waseda, and Do
shisha in the nineteenth century had all been forced to abandon their
efforts to offer programs in technical subjects. In 1908 Tokyo Univer
sity physicist Yamakawa Kenjiro questioned whether private institu
tions would ever have theresourcesfor work in medicine, engineering,
or science.38 For a considerable period it seemed that Yamakawa's
doubts were justified. Wasedafrom1908 made a serious effort to estab
lish a faculty of science and engineering, but limited funds and student
demand made its growth slow. Before World War I, in fact, the Waseda
faculty had only two engineering programs housed in one small frame
building.
The war was responsible for the change, because wartime conditions
created a demand for more engineers and technicians. Industrial
growth brought far greater profits to industry and higher tax revenues
to government Public pressure on the imperial universities to admit
more students overwhelmed their limited resources. Not surprisingly,
men like the former education minister Kikuchi Dairoku, who had once
opposed rapid expansion of higher education, in 1915 now did a com
plete about-face and advocated fundamental change.39 New ventures

became possible. In 1916 Waseda was able to add applied chemistry to
its program in technical studies, and in October 1918 it began construc
tion of a laboratory for research in this field.40 Keio University was not to
be outdone. Between 1917 and 1920 it built a faculty of medicine with
superior equipment costing over 2.7 million yen.4' The legal change in
the status of the private universities was not, as such, the cause of these
ventures, but the high costs and risks of technical programs make it
difficult to imagine their taking place without it
It also seemed for a time in the early postwar years that government
decisions about scientific research were going to be handled differently.
Before the war, men with scientific and technical degrees had some
times held bureaucratic posts with the right to make policy, while a
number of such men had all along served in the House of Representa
tives. Their participation in the Diet tended to increase, though slowly.
Kitasato, for example, campaigned heavily for physician Diet candi
dates in the 1917 general election and managed to get three or four
elected.42 But by World War I technical men were no longer repre
sented in policy-making posts in the national bureaucracy, though they
continued to serve lower down.
The issue of participation in government decisions was troubling to
many with technical backgrounds, and they began to address it more
fully. In 1916, Shiraishi Naoji, a descendant of a long line of Confucian
scholars who was also a civil engineer, was elected to the Diet from
Kochi on a platform of opposition to bureaucratic legalism and support
for technical education.43 The physicist Yamakawa Kenjiro, Tokyo
University's president during the war, complained of scientists' lack of
influence in high-level policy making in a 1919 letter to the minister of
education.44 A 1919 editorial in Ikai jiho offered its analysis of the
problem: the bureaucracy had a relative monopoly on scientific and
technical information; the Diet was supposed to supervise its actions
but lacked the knowledge to do so; but even so, a solution was apparent,
namely, to elect more physicians to the Diet Doctors, after all, belonged
to a profession with a "scientific basis" and were able to "think
scientifically."45
Others snared this point of view and sought to follow through on it
Two scientists, Kitasato Shibasaburo and Kikuchi Dairoku, had already
been named to the House of Peers (December 1917). In 1919, President
Yamakawa managed to secure appointment to the Peers of chemist
Sakurai Joji as well.46 In 1920, Matsushita Teiji, professor of bac
teriology at Kyoto University, was elected to the House of Representa
tives. By that time medical men held more than a dozen seats in the
Diet's lower house. Eight of them had formed a caucus to focus on

medical scientific, and technical policies.47
While these critics concentrated attention primarily on the Diet,
others took on the bureaucracy. In June 1916, the Institute of German
Engineers (Verein Deutscher Ingenieuren) had sent an open letter to
Chancellor Theobald von Bethmann-Hollweg demanding that top-
ranking posts in the German civil service be opened to men with tech
nical training.48 This action got attention not only in Germany but in
Britain and Japan. The London Times Education Supplement published
a translation in November 1916, and this set off a lively debate. In April
1917, a Japanese translation appeared in T6y6 gakugei zasshi. Its au
thor, Matsubara Koichi, professor of chemistry at Tokyo University,
added his own comments to the engineers1 text According to him sci
ence was important not only for industrial and commercial development
but had a profound relationship to social welfare and the problems of
society. It was very important that European countries were debating
the exclusion of science graduates from the higher civil service. Britain
in particular could well expect to benefit. Finally, the reexamination
had evidently come from broad recognition of "this present-day evil."49
Matsubara's essay was significant both for what it said and for what it
omitted. He made no demand for changes in the substance of Japan's
examinations for the higher civil service but only implied that technical
men serving in the government should receive better treatment. The
chemist's essay attracted wide notice and served to define the terms of
debate for what came to be called the "engineers' movement."
This movement began in 1918 with technical experts in the forestry
bureau of the Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce. The basic argu
ment of these (mostly young) men was that science and technology be
accorded a greater (dace in postwar public administration. Since better
treatment for technical men was part of this scheme, they formed a plan
to secure the promotion of Matsunami Yoshimi, a noted forestry expert
with many years' experience, to the office of bureau chief. In this effort
they enjoyed support not only from technical experts in the rest of the
ministry but also from another bureau chief,fromthe vice minister, and
initially from the minister. These officials, however, reckoned without
the vigorous intervention of the incumbent chief of the Bureau of For
estry. Okamoto Eitard, a graduate of the Tokyo law faculty and a career
civil servant, complained to the vice minister that making a technical
man head of a bureau would "destroy bureaucratic order," and the
proposal was dropped.50
Matsunami'sfrustrationdid not end the movement It survived the
division of the agriculture and commerce ministry in 1925 and spread to
the rest of the government. Engineers' caucuses (gijutsusha kon

wakai) formed in many of the ministries. Their members held conven
tions, gave speeches, and signed and submitted petitions to bureaucrat
ic superiors, but no big changes ever resulted. The reasons even now
are somewhat obscure.51 One can call this, of course, a legacy of
feudalism, but the same pattern existed in other countries. Before 1945,
only Britain among the European powers made substantive changes in
engineers' roles in the national bureaucracy.52
In Japan the long-term effort by many professors to win greater
autonomy on university campuses promoted narrowness of perspective
in some important groups and made communication among them more
difficult For some time before the end of the war, professors had had a
major influence over most matters pertinent to the growth of research.
In some ways this influence had grown. When Aoyama died late in
1917, President Yamakawa consulted the full professors in Tokyo Uni
versity's faculty of medicine and accepted their choice for his suc
cessor.53 In December 1917, when Kyoto University was preparing to
add a chair of biology, its authorities called in an outside consultant who
was himself a professor of biology.54
This level of involvement was not enough for some. Following a 1913
confrontation between President Sawayanagi Masatard (who had
movedfromTohoku University) and his faculty of law at Kyoto, support
for the idea that professors should elect the university president grew
rapidly. In 1915 the Ministry of Education conceded this right and
others as well. In 1919 university senates were given theformal(not, as
before, merely informal) right to advise the minister on the creation of
chairs. In 1920 the ministry authorized awarding doctorates directly on
the basis of faculty decisions.55 But these changes did not always have
the expected result, and by the mid- 1920s scientists were complaining
that their influence had actually decreased.56 Academic autonomy
tended to enhance the alienating effects of bureaucratic legalism as a
negative influence on science.
The postwar era, however, witnessed a powerful push for indepen
dence in science, including psychological independence of Germany.
The founding of the National InstituteforNutrition Research, based on
an American model, was one indicator. There were others as welL From
1917 into the 1920s, the Institute for Metals Research had a lucrative
partnership with Westinghouse Corporation through its Japanese pa
tron, Sumitomo Metals.57 In 1918, the Ministry of Education estab
lished a system of grants intended to increase research productivity. In
1920, the country established a National Research Council as a result of
political changes in science worldwide. These initiatives unquestion
ably strengthened the research system. They also forced Japanese sci
entists to consider their own position in the international community of

science. Were they, as some held, clearly second-rate? Were some fields
particularly stronger than others? And were some on the verge of even
greater contributions?
The Ministry of Education's Science Research

Grants Program
Establishment of a system of grants for research was a very important

development in Japan's research system. Competitive research grants
weakened the near-monopoly professors at imperial universities had on
the resources available for research. They served to alleviate the lack of
resources in various academic institutions, promoted competition
among Japanese scientists in all kinds of professional roles, and helped
spread money around in the way that was thought most efficient Most
of all, the Science Research Grants Program established the principle
that research would be encouraged and supported in all technical
fields, not just in those popular at the moment or whose leaders were
politically astute.
Such an innovative program did not emerge quickly. The Imperial
Academy of Sciences had begun a system of competitive grants in 1913,
though its importance was largely symbolic. The total amount of money
involved was very small (2,460 yen in 1914, 7,000 yen in 1916, and
20,000 yen in 1918). Funds were divided between humanistic and
technical projects and between prizes for prior contributions and for
research in progress. Before 1919 only academy members could even
apply for the grants.58 For thesereasons,scientists and other observers
of the academic scene began demanding an alternative program. Bac
teriologist Sata Yoshihiko called for a system of grants for research in a
1914 essay.59 Sawayanagi Masataro, former president of Tohoku and
Kyoto universities, added to the pressure in 1915 with a critique of the
academy's operations.60
Nevertheless, it is hard to determine how the program originated or
why it took certain forms. Originalrecordsfromthe Ministry of Educa
tion no longer exist, and memoirs rarely mention the subject From
academic journals and Diet records it is possible to shed some light on
these questions. One thing we know is that thefinancialconstraints of
the war's early months brought academy programs under scrutiny. On
June 2,1915, Wakatsuki Reijird, the minister of finance, recommended
eliminating the special research fund of the Imperial Academy because
of financial convenience. Wakatsuki qualified his proposal by saying,
"It will be necessary tofindanother way to administer funds with which

to encourage [scientific] research."61 His statement later proved to be
prescient In 1921 the academy fund merged with the science research
grants system to create a better-funded program.62
The Ministry of Education's unwillingness or inability any longer to
carry the political burden of apparent favoritism toward government
schools was surely another factor in the birth of grants. Ichiki
Kitokurd's serious mishandling of the 1914 laboratory transfer had sig
nificantly damaged the ministry's credibility. Moreover, Takata Sanae,
his successor, had been president of Waseda University, and if any
thing was thought to favor private-sector schools.63 The politically as
tute Okada Ryohei, who succeeded Takata in October 1916 and re
mained in office until September 1918, probably saw the need to
balance competing public and private demands in the Science Re
search Grants Program, while spreading the money as far as he could.
Such a conclusion seems justified by his defense of the program to the
Budget Committee of the House of Representatives.
The committee debated the ministry's budget, including this pro
gram, on February 2,1918. Three committee members raised a number
of questions. Hay as hi Kiroku, then professor of economics and later
president of Keio University, noted that 20,000 yen was now supporting
research through the Imperial Academy of Sciences. He called this a
"paltry sum of money" and said the academy program had been far too
inflexible and its aims too specialized. Implying that the new program
should avoid these shortcomings, he declared that much more money
should clearly be spent but that "even a coolie" should be able to recog
nize its purpose. Representatives Matsunaga Yoshizaemon and Kono
Tetsushi spoke more directly to the new program's features. Both ex
pressed concern about availability of funds (150,000 yen for the first
year). Matsunaga raised two other issues. According to him, the pro
gram did not consider the needs of new recruits to afield.Grants would
be so small as to exhaust the funds simply on the purchase of foreign
journals and books. Then, the relationship of the program to other
means of support for research had not been adequately defined by the
ministry. Citing the foundation of the Research Institute for Physics
and Chemistry as a major development for Japanese science, he insist
ed on the need for a unified structure through which to pursue basic
scientific research.64
Okada's response showed how far the Ministry of Education had now
moved away from any compulsion to centralize research. The Science
Research Grants Program, he insisted, was not supposed to be related to
any particular laboratories. Rather, it would try to alleviate the lack of
facilities and resources in existing institutions. The money could be
used anywhere. "We are talking about helping people to do research

even if it is not at their own institution." He also hoped to promote
competition. "It is not good if people are doing research at one place,
while those at other places are doing none.. . . Scientists mostly suc
ceed and obtain best results when they compete with each other." But
the government's resources were too limited to expand equipment bud
gets everywhere, so the ministrÛiad decided to support individual and
team research projects. "We hope as much as possible," he concluded,
"to encourage research at many different places."65
On the whole, the program managed to do this. The first research
grants, sixty-five altogether, were announced on July 20, 1918. They
were shared by ninety-two investigators at thirty-four academic institu
tions. Allfiveimperial universities wererepresented,together with sev
eral higher schools, medical colleges, specialized academies, and a few
private institutions, including Waseda University. All broadly defined
fields wererecognized.Grants were awarded for work in physics, chem
istry, biology, geology, engineering, medicine, forestry, and agriculture.
But it is difficult to say what the distribution meant, since we have only
grant titles without descriptions and no information about their bud
gets. Kydikujiron, apparently the soleremainingsource of information
on the subject, reports only that the largest grant was 10,000 yen and
the smallest 500. According to it, the research topics selected by the
grant recipients "all focused on important problems" and showed the
Japanese scientific community's highest [accomplishments] as of this
moment"66
Not everyone agreed with this fulsome assessment Miyajima
Mikinosuke, now associated with the Kitasato Institute, faulted the
program on four counts in an essay published aboutfiveweeks after the
Kyoiku jiron article. First of all, partiality was blatantly evident, with
private-sector scientists badly short-changed and Tokyo University re
searchers too highly favored. In particular, several competent investiga
tors of tsutsugamushi disease—Kawamura Rinya (Niigata Medical
College), Ogata Masanori (Tokyo University), and Hayashi Naosuke
(Aichi Medical College)—had not received grants for work on this topic.
All the funding had gone to Nagayo Mataro's pathology team from
Tokyo University's faculty of medicine. This was particularly unfortu
nate because the Nagayo group had made claims that had not yet been
accepted. Second, grant sizes were often inexplicable. The Nagayo
group was getting too much, while Yamagiwa Katsusaburo's important
cancer project had not nearly enough. Third, some research projects
were not operating properly. Among the fifteen xeam projects that had
received the first grants, Miyajima again singled out the Nagayo pa
thology team because each of the three subtopics—pathogen connrma
tion, prevention, and treatment—was assigned to one of the three team

members. "A professional scientist," according to him, "would surely
find this regrettable." Finally, the grant conferrals were apt, however
unintentionally, to discredit those projects that did not receive funding.
Because the lay public tended to regard official approbation as tanta
mount to correctness, there was a danger that the work of scientists
who did not receive grants would not be widely accepted.67
Officials in charge at the Ministry of Education clearly felt obliged to
respond. First, Kawamura Rinya and Ogata Masanori were hastily add
ed to the list of recipients.68 Then these same officials predicted that
funding would increase. As of early September, they promised to in
crease funding by 100,000 yen, 69 but by late October, they scaled this
back to 50,000 yen, and they were ultimately able to give no increase at
all.70 The chief of the Bureau of Professional Education, Matsuura
Chinjird, issued a disclaimer with the results of the second year's grant
competition.
This year (1919) we gave out 113 grants.. . . And those who re
quested the grants were about twice the number who actually
received them. There should not be any implication that those
who did not get grants were unqualified. Some of those [not
awarded grants] may be better researchers than those who did get
them. But the Ministry of Education's plan was to give the money
for one year; and if their work were going to cost too much money,
we had to exclude them with regret from funding. Some people
are sure to say [we should fund it] if the project is good, no matter
how much it costs. But the Ministry of Education's thinking was
that we would rather fund two people than one, or two types of
research than one.71
The bureau chief then added plaintively: "This problem [disbursing the
money for grants] caused us a great many difficulties!"72
Matsuura's comments raise two issues of major importance. How
were the decisions actually made? Were they in any sense reasonable?
In dealing analytically with either of these questions, one should recog
nize the difficulties involved. Matsuura and his colleagues faced a diffi
cult task, and so do present-day historians. The applicant pool for the
first round of grants was particularly large, the community of medical
researchers heavily factionalized, and the Ministry of Education itself
lacked a man who had a technical background and could advise about
decisions.
Consider the size of the application pool. According to Matsuura
himself, the 1918 requests from scientists at government institutions
alone amounted to 3,000,000 yen. But only 145,000 yen was actually
THE RESEARCH SYSTEM IN AN AGE OF TRANSITION 25I
available, and that money had also to cover funding requests from
researchers in private institutions.73 This was predictable, since the
research community had grown substantially. In 1913, there were only
99 professionally active men with degrees in basic science; but by 1920,
there were 165 in this group. The constraints imposed on Japan by the
war created both more need for research and powerful incentives to do
it, yet institutional support for research activities could hardly keep up
with either.
Evaluation was also complicated by factions, at least in the medical
community. Charges and countercharges between the Kitasato group
and Tokyo University's medical faculty had intensified after the labora
tory transfer, and they had their effect on research. In July 1915 Nagayo
Matard wrote in his diary of his concern for the reputation of the In
stitute of Infectious Diseases in the light of its numerous problems. "I
do not want the institute to be simply a place for manufacturing serums.
We must be more active in scientific research."74 The topic he selected
for reputation enhancement turned out to be tsutsugamushi disease.
Because this disease had engaged the attention of numerous re
searchers over a forty-year period, competition was intense.75 For ex
ample, Nagayo and Kawamura disagreed on the number of insect vec
tor types and on animal transmissibility, while Ogata and Kawamura
disagreed completely on effective prophylaxis. On the other hand, Ka
wamura's ideas about tsutsugamushi disease were much closer to those
of Miyajima,76 so that Kawamura could be linked to the "Kitasato fac
tion" and benefit from the support of its members.77
But the Ministry of Education faced one other problem in allocating
grants for which it alone was responsible. After Mano Bunji, a me
chanical engineer, left the ministry for the presidency of Kyushu Uni
versity in the fall of 1913, there were no longer any technical people in
the top ranks of education bureaucrats. This might not have mattered
in some situations, but the ministry was becoming self-contained.
Once-intimate ties with Tokyo University were becoming more formal,
and growing criticisms from professors in law at Kyoto University had
created some longer-term tensions.78 Whatever the proximate cause
of the pattern may have been, the ministry undertook to distribute the
grants with very little outside assistance.
Problems caused by ignorance at the ministry were not so clear at the
outset Following the Diet's approval in April 1918 of the Science Re
search Grants Program, the ministry asked all the institutions under its
control to provide it with certain information. Who were the most active
researchers? What topics were they investigating? What kind of ex
penses did they expect to incur during the next twelve-month period?79
In response to these questions, Kyoto University's faculty senate con
vened on April 25 to prepare its responses. Professors from the faculties

of science, medicine, and engineering decided on a list of twenty-two
projects with a total three-year budget of 90,000 yen. Three projects
had priority: Kuhara Mitsuru's work in organic chemistry, Tanabe
Sakuo's investigation of seismological waves, and Adachi Buntaro's his
tological studies of human bones.80 Yet when the awards were an
nounced about nine weeks later, not one of these three was included.81
The 113 awards conferred in 1919 also show signs, if not of incom
petence, at least of inconsistency. As we have seen, there was consid
erable interest in Japan in all aspects of chemical research. According
ly, Matsuura, chief of the Bureau of Professional Education, stated on
October 25, 1918, that chemistry would be assigned top priority in the
1919 competition.82 When the awards were announced, on June 28,
1919, this intention was shown to be unrealized. The list of awards for
1919 gives details about budget 81 By determining the specialties of
the various researchers and knowing the money each was awarded,
one can calculate the funding by disciplines. Medicine received the
biggest share, with 46,850 yen or 32 percent of all the money allocated
(144,580 yen). Chemistry was second with 43,000 yen (30 percent).84
Physics (also including civil, mechanical, and electrical engineering,
as well as naval architecture) at 24,400 yen (17 percent) was a distant
third.85 Biology (botany, zoology, genetics, and entomology) received
15,500 yen (11 percent) in grants. Agriculture (defined here as agron
omy, veterinary medicine, forestry, ichthyology, and plant pathology)
was awarded 9,830 yen or 7 percent; and most of the remaining 5,000
yen was awarded for projects in dentistry.86
Inability to follow its own professed guidelines for 1919, the hasty
addition of Kawamura and Ogata to the list of 1918 grant recipients, and
the denial of funding to all three of Kyoto University's priority projects
as defined by their academic peers is an indication that the Ministry of
Education was not following the most rational procedure in administer
ing its program for scientific research. This was argued at the time as
well. Ikaijiho, in an August 1920 review of the first three grant years,
took the ministry to task. The research grants program lacked clear
objectives and standards. The ministry was "just giving out little pieces
of the pie with no real policy." Distribution of funds was illogical. Recip
ients had recently been told that their funds would be terminated "until
further notice," since different procedures might soon be adopted. Fa
voritism was evident—unspecified "private elements" had affected se
lection. Ministry officials were unqualified for their role. "There is a
certain amount of talent within the Ministry of Education," the writer of
the essay was willing to concede. "But no one there is too well informed
about the academic community's [internal] affairs." Worst of all, the
ministry opposed a real screening committee, simply asking the opin

ions of a few Tokyo professors. Such deficiencies, according to the
journal, "invite our criticism of irregular actions!"87
The program was still a success, however. All grant recipients were
formally qualified. About 80 percent already had the doctorate, and all
but two held a teaching position. One of the two who was not a pro
fessor—Tanaka Keisuke—was a physician on the staff of the Yokote
Hospital (Akita Prefecture). But he already had his doctor's degree and
had pioneered in the study of tsutsugamushi disease.88 The other case,
that of Takagi Yoshiyuki, shows the ministry's intention to support
individuals. Takagi was a clinical physician one year from his doctorate
when he received his award (2,500 yen forresearchon rabies at Kyoto
University, where he took his M.D.) in 1919.89
Just as its sponsors intended, the Science Research Grants Program
aided contributions to knowledge in several different fields. The 4,500
yen awarded to Nagayo MatarO's research team, though controversial,
nevertheless aided confirmation of the tsutsugamushi pathogen.90
Yamagiwa Katsusaburo, who received one of the 1918 grants and won a
renewal in 1919, wrote a paper on artificial inducement of tumors that
was later recognized as one of the cornerstones of modern-day cancer
research.91 The physical chemist Tawara Kuniichu, who received the
largest grant (5,000 yen) in 1919, used his funds for chemical and other
scientific studies of classical Japanese swords.92 This work, for which
he received the Imperial Academy of Sciences Prize in 1921, may later
have contributed to specialty steels in Japan.93 Yagi Hidetsugu, pro
fessor of electrical engineering at Tohoku University, received a grant
in 1919 that he used in part to develop what is still the world's most
widely used antenna for short-wave and television reception.94 Finally,
in 1919 Yasui Kono became thefirstJapanese woman to win recogni
tion as a contributor to science by receiving a grant in plant cytology.95
Any one of these projects would have justified creation of the Ministry
of Education's Science Research Grants Program. But these five made
it a historical landmark.
The problems that cropped up in administering these grants were
not unique to Japan, as must be stressed. Competitive research grants
were a new phenomenon even in countries that supported science
strongly. Italy and the United States began giving grants in the present-
day sense only at the end of World War I. 96 In Germany they were also
new to the scene. The German experience is particularly illuminating
when seen from the Japanese vantage point Competitive grants for
scientific research began in 1914, but the way they were administered
left much to be desired by today's standards. During the second decade
of this century, they were entirely controlled by individual scientists
directing the KWG laboratories (see chapter 4). Albert Einstein, for
example, dispensed funds for research in physics by consulting only his
assistant director, Max von Laue, and this was a typical pattern.97 Other
small groups were awarding funds, too, but not byrigorousscreening.98
Explicit peer review came only in 1920 with establishment of the
Notgemeinschaft der Deutschen Wissenschaften."
Establishment of the National Research Council

Establishment of the National Research Council (Gakujutsu Kenkyu
Kaigi) or NRC in 1920 best exemplified the growing independence of
Japanese science in a period of major transition. On one level, the NRC
gave the scientific community an institutional focus that the Imperial
Academy had not managed to provide. Through ninety-four members,
representing all fields of study, the council in the interwar period en
hanced public awareness of research activities, facilitated the building
of several new laboratories and programs, and promoted recognition of
Japanese achievements in science worldwide. Io °
On another level, the council's establishment helped liberate Japa
nese science from its obsession with Germany. The NRC was created as
an affiliate of the International Research Council (IRC). Since this
agency had been founded as a device for isolating German science,
members of the Japanese scientific community were obliged to evaluate
carefully their place in the international community of science. Their
efforts were painful but also therapeutic, since out of them came both
greater self-confidence and greater objectivity in judging themselves
and the West
The NRC and its IRC parent were products of the war. Though
designed to enhance cooperation among nations in science, they were
also founded with the aim of excluding the former Central Powers. In
early April 1918, while the war was still going on in Europe, an invita
tion to attend the initial organizing meetings reached the Imperial
Academy of Sciences in Tokyo. The invitation was accepted at once,
and the academy voted to send Sakurai Joji and Tanakadate Aikitsu,
professors respectively of chemistry and physics at Tokyo University, as
delegates to the meeting in London.101 Their selection had much to
recommend it Sakurai at the time was dean of Tokyo's faculty of sci
ence and chairman of the academy's division 2 for technical fields, and
Tanakadate, with his geophysical research in the late nineteenth cen
tury, had done exactly the kind of work the meetings wanted to restore.
Because Sakurai had studied with Williamson at London and Tanaka
date with Kelvin at Glasgow both were fluent in English.102 Two other
facts are important Sakurai was very pro-British and somewhat anti-
German. He was also strongly inclined to stress the weaknesses of
Japanese science and overlook its accomplishments.
Sakurai's convictions were very deep-seated. Unlike most Japanese
scientists, who had studied in Germany, Sakurai was British-educated
and admired British culture. He dressed like an English gentleman and
was fond of English theater and literature,103 and he had some dislike
for the Germans. In 1885 he had forced a fellow chemist, Nagai
Nagayoshi, out of Tokyo's faculty of science partly because Nagai was a
pupil of the German chemist August von Hofmann, who had previously
been a rival to his own teacher, Williamson.104 Sakurai's career had
given him little satisfaction. He had held a number of administrative
posts but published only twenty-eight papers. Several of his papers
were important, but their number—in his view, small—distressed him
considerably.105 As a result, he tended in general to view the work of his
colleagues through a lens that was highly distorted.
Tanakadate's position was considerably different His memoirs show
that he enjoyed his work. He was not on Nagaoka's level as a physicist,
but he did publish firry-seven papers. He also traveled extensively,
taught students effectively, and played important roles in Japanese
aviation research on the intellectual and institutional levels. Tanaka
date had spent several years in Britain as a young physics student, but
he was a genial man with acquaintances on both sides of the European
conflict 106 He was at first opposed to the German exclusion from the
IRC and argued with Sakurai about it. "War is war, but science is
different I see no problem in associating with German scientists."
Sakurai, however, insisted on the need for Japan to follow British opin
ion on the issue. According to another Japanese physicist who had
traveled with the two to London, their debate continued from the hotel
where they stayed to the site of the conference.l07
The conference was held at the Royal Society and produced the ex
pected results. Germany and its Central Power allies, Austria-Hungary and
Bulgaria, were excluded from cooperation in science. To Sakurai and other
delegates the reasons were obvious. The Central Powers," he wrote,
"placed no restrictions on their (wartime] atrocities" and had "broken the
laws of civilized [nations]." Scientific contacts with such nations as these
"would lack any value whatever."108 But since international cooperation
was clearly essential, several additional steps had to be taken. Delegates
voted to withdraw from the prewar Association of Science Academies,
since the Central Powers belonged to this group. In its place would arise a
new central structure called the International Research Council. The IRC
would establish "unions"forthe variousfieldsof technical research. Each
nation's science academy would contribute members to the technical
unions, and each delegation would urge its government to create an IRC
affiliate in theformof a National Research CounciL109
None of these motions was particularly surprising. The conference
was confined to eight Allied nations and convened at a critical time. An
Allied victory was near but not achieved, and feelings of revenge were
intense.' 10 Delegatesfromthe U.S. and Britain had already worked out
many details of the proposed new structures before the meetings be
gan. 111 Even so, not all went smoothly, since opinions varied. French
and Belgian delegates, representing the nations that had suffered most,
apparently intended to shun their wartime antagonists indefinitely.
Other delegates seemed to feel that reconciliation might eventually be
possible.112 The idea of individual NRC's (which the U.S. proposed)
was at first a source of contention. By his own telling, Sakurai was
himself a leading conciliator. With the aim of achieving at least surface
unanimity, he induced Tanakadate to support German exclusion, and
then, after securing American understanding, proposed that IRC affil
iation for various countries be permitted through either the proposed
new NRC or an existing academy of science.! 13
At a meeting in Paris six weeks later (November 26-29), work con
tinued. Delegates, this timefromeleven nations, voted unanimously to
establish a temporary IRC. A powerful steering committee, with mem
bers from France, Britain, Italy, Belgium, and the U.S., was created.
Delegates entrusted to it the tasks of evaluating proposals for scientific
unions, selecting their members, and convening all subsequent meet
ings. One issue remained controversial: admission of neutral countries.
And the issue of membership for antagonists continued to loom. Britain,
the U.S., and Sakurai for Japan wanted offers of membership to be
made only with a two-thirds majority in favor, but a harder line pre
vailed, and a three-quarters vote was required.!14
This setback in Paris did nothing to lessen the influence of Sakurai at
home. While Tanakadate remained in Europe on other academic busi
ness, Sakurai returned to Japan in January 1919 and immediately set
about organizing a National Research CounciL He was so committed to
the NRC concept that almost any tactic seemed acceptable.115 Sakurai
willfully misrepresented facts, gave evasive or misleading answers to
critical questionsfromJapanese colleagues, and seems to have stacked
the NRC organizing committee to produce the desired result Ultimate
ly, on December 11, 1920, it all blew up in his face. But by then this
mattered very little, since the NRC had become a reality.
Planning the NRC took considerable time. Sakurai gave the Imperial
Academy of Sciences a detailed report on the London and Paris meet
ings on February 25,1919, but he did not formally propose the NRC for
another three months (May 12). His February report was published, so
we know what he told the academy. He gave information on the coun
tries and delegates, on the proposed IRC, on the various unions, and on
national representation—that is, the NRC. He held nothing back in
regard to German exclusion. This was not his first report on the subject
Immediately following the London meeting, he had cabled details to
Tokyo and sought approval to represent the academy in Paris.! 16 Mem
bers of the academy, then, could hardly be surprised when they learned
of the German exclusion. Some scientists were clearly unhappy, and
Sakurai encountered criticism as soon as he returned to Japan. "Why
had I not spoken up for the Central Powers? Why had I not opposed the
exclusion?" he wrote some twenty years later. He claims, however, to
have paid it no heed, since it came from a 'Very small part of our
scientific community." "I had not anticipated the criticism, and it was
totally incomprehensible to me."117
These claims were at best disingenuous. His own fellow-delegate,
Tanakadate, had already argued against German exclusion, and in July
1919 would support German membership at an IRC meeting in
Brussels.!1S Indications that exclusion of Germany was unpopular with
the majority of Japanese scientists are strong.!19 What is true, however,
is that most scientists—especially those belonging to the Imperial
Academy, which had sponsored his trip—were willing to avoid the issue
for several reasons. Japan was a prominent member of the Allied
Powers, so vigorous support for Germany might offend the Japanese
government Many scientists were undoubtedly flattered by their inclu
sion in what looked like a major new venture in science. But the strong
est reason to keep quiet was their commitment to the NRC concept
Sakurai Joji had the vision, the control of information, the connections,
and the administrative skills to make the NRC a reality. Very few sci
entists actively opposed him until their opposition was politically
innocuous.
Once Sakurai had firm plans, the establishment process acceler
ated. He submitted his blueprint for the NRC to the Imperial Academy
on May 12, 1919, and the members raised quite a few questions.
Nagaoka Hantaro was skeptical of Sakurai's proposal to name some
corporate executives to the proposed NRC, on the grounds that indus
try would not benefit from its projects directly. Other members asked
about the NRC's relationship to the academy and government bureau
cracy, as well as about its mission. To these questions Sakurai replied
that industrial-sector representation might promote science applica
tions, that the academy would serve as the NRC's sponsor, and that
rapid progress in planning might secure attachment of the NRC to the
office of the prime minister. There was also a question about budget
258 THE RESEARCH SYSTEM IN AN ACE OF TRANSITION
How much money would the NRC need? To this query Sakurai gave
an answer that was either shortsighted or deliberately misleading:
money was not a problem, since the NRC would "not need a very large
budget"120 All of these answers later proved wrong. No corporate ex
ecutives became members of the NRC when the organization was fi
nally constituted.121 The NRC was attached to the Ministry of Educa
tion, not the office of the prime minister.122 And the budget which
Sakurai requested on October 15, 1919, was for a very large sum—
380,000 yen. 123
The May 12 meeting resulted in formation of an organizing commit
tee. The academy's president, Hozumi Nobushige, a lawyer from Divi
sion 1, named a sixteen-man committee, fourteen scientists from Divi
sion 2 and two humanists from Division 1. The chairman (mathe
matician Fujisawa Rikitard) was from Tokyo University's faculty of
science. Despite Hozumi's formal role, it is more than probable that
Sakurai influenced the committee's composition. There was no open
discussion of who the members should be, Sakurai was named the
executive secretary, and the membership was not representative of the
larger scientific community. A majority (eight of fourteen) of its scien
tist members had studied abroad in countries other than Germany.124
Only one member came from medicine, despite its large role in Japa
nese research, and his appointment is curious. Ozawa Kenji had earlier
been dean of Tokyo University's faculty of medicine, and in that sense
he was quite well qualified. But he was considered an antagonist by
Kitasato, the country's foremost researcher and a known admirer of
Germany.125 Ozawa's training in Europe was unusual for a Japanese
medical professor. He had studied at the University of Strasbourg from
1872 to 1875, took his M.D. there in 1875, and later worked at
Strasbourg between 1879 and 1883.126 Ozawa's exact views on World
War I are unknown, but his background arouses suspicion. Quite apart
from the war's effect on the Strasbourg region and how he may have
seen this, the university was in some respects French in the period
when Ozawa trained there.127
Following the committee's deliberations in May, Sakurai in early
June began a campaign to sell the NRC concept to a larger public of
scientists, intellectuals, and government officials. Publishing articles in
intellectual journals was one of his strategies. In a June 5 essay, Sakurai
listed a number of Japanese laboratories by name—the Institute of
Infectious Diseases was one—and claimed there had been "no unity [or
liaison] among them at all." As a result, "They have, in relative terms,
wasted both time and effort while failing to produce any major re
sults."128 In another essay he stressed the need for Japanese industry to
support "pure chemistry" more vigorously. World War I, after all, had
shown that all the new war-related discoveries or inventions had come
from university professors, not applied scientists in industry.129 Estab
lishment of a Japanese research council would correct such deficien
cies by promoting liaison among laboratories and between science and
society, besides strengthening the ties of Japanese science with re
search in the West l 3 0
His other strategy was to meet with officials. On June 17 the acade
my's proposal for the NRC was formally presented to Prime Minister
Hara Kei and the minister of education, Nakahashi Tokugoro. This
document, though drafted by an academy lawyer, reflected Sakurai's
views.131 Once again he expounded his characteristic themes. The
country had built a number of research facilities, but there was little
liaison among them, with 'few results forthcoming as yet" 132 Thus,
creation of an NRC was urgently needed. To sell his argument, Sakurai
met several times during June and July with Prime Minister Hara,
Education Minister Nakahashi, Vice Minister Minami Hiroshi, and
Matsuura Chinjiro, chief of the Bureau of Professional Education. He
gave them "detailed explanations and won their support"133 Following
these meetings, Sakurai was confident enough of success to predict on
July 15 that the NRC would be established "before the end of the
year."134
It certainly looked that way for a time. In early October the Ministry
of Education approved plans for the NRC. Under the arrangements
drawn up, the NRC was to have administrative and professional divi
sions, between seventy and one hundred members, a total of seven
technical unions, formal liaison with the IRC, and a small permanent
committee to handle communications with communities of scientists
abroad. To assure that its functions could be carried out smoothly, a
budget of 380,000 yen was under consideration. Most of the money
would go for overseas travel and various forms of professional commu
nication. 135 It is not clear whether the budget request caused conster
nation or not Sakurai called attention in the published report to the fact
that geographically, Japan was "stuck off in one comer of the Orient"
and asserted that this had "caused much inconvenience for [scientific]
research."136
After this highly auspicious beginning, the cause of the NRC stalled,
though not through the Diet's inaction. That institution readily ap
proved the NRC proposal in midautumn with little discussion, leaving
all the major provisions intact—including the budget But even after
this, there was no NRC in Japan. Sakurai, in fact, showed some concern
for the loss of momentum on December 12 when he reported to the
Imperial Academy. "Japan," he said, "has not yet joined the IRC as I
had hoped. It is soil under discussion in the government. Once our
NRC is established, it can be our affiliating agency. Until then, the

academy must fill this role temporarily."137
Delay was a product of reactions in Germany and the anxieties this
aroused in Japan about the prospects for overseas study. The Versailles
Conference had taken place during the first half of 1919, but the Ger
man government did not accept the treaty until October 13 of that
year.138 The first reports of hostile reaction in Germany, both to Japan's
involvement in the Versailles Conference and to its part in the IRC
votes, did not reach Japan until a few weeks after that date. T. Axenfeld,
professor of ophthalmology at the University of Freiburg, wrote angrily
of both to a former Japanese pupil. "German scientists/1 he reminded
hisfriend,"gave special help in their laboratories to Japanese in particu
lar. Thus we are awaiting some gesture or explanation for the illegal
treatment of Germany, especially the Japanese delegates' acceptance of
the decision to boycott science in Germany." In late December Tokyo
newspapers were carrying reports that German universities and labora
tories were refusing to admit Japanese, with some even suggesting that
entering Germany at all was forbidden.139 And on February 15,1920, a
particularly alarming report was published in an education journal
This report claimed that a conference of German academics had decid
ed to reject all foreign students from Allied countries and forbid the
export of German scientific publications. The report specified certain
decisions of the U.S. government as the motive behind the new policy
but asserted that Japan would become one of the main victims. 14°
Reports of this kind were clearly alarming, but few in the govern
ment would admit it Officials at first pretended nothing was wrong.
"Bureaucratic authorities, when asked about the [German reaction], all
say the same thing," noted one medical journal in the middle of Janu
ary, "namely, that they pay no attention to reports in the press."141
Later in the year they were only somewhat less cautious. In September
Vice Minister Minami claimed that only in Munich were Japanese actu
ally barred.142 Bureau Chief Matsuura insisted that, after all, "every
country" was creating its own NRC. 143 These less guarded comments
reflected new information. In early August 1920 a new German envoy,
Wilhelm Solf, arrived in Tokyo and told the Ministry of Foreign Affairs
that Germany would accept "large numbers of Japanese foreign stu
dents." On August 19 the Japanese charge d'affaires in Berlin cabled a
lengthy and reassuringreporton the German situation to superiors in
Tokyo.144 For thesereasons,the cabinetfinallyapproved establishment
of the NRC on August 17 and allowed its promulgation on August
26. 145
But not all the action took place* in the government The scientific
community had been alarmed for months and in various ways had tried
to mollify the Germans. In late December 1919 and early January 1920
THE RESEARCH SYSTEM IN AN ACE OF TRANSITION 261
Miyashita Sosuke of the Osaka Medical College wrote to Axenfeld with

assurances of goodwilL14€ Tokyo University biologist Ishikawa Chiyo
matsu sent laboratory animals to a colleague in Berlin to replace those
stolen by Germans needing food.147 Other Japanese professors sent
private messages to colleagues, and at least two made large cash dona
tions to feed the hungry in Munich.148 It was Kitasato's gesture, how
ever, that attracted the most attention. In June 1920 he wrote Robert
Koch's widow a lengthy statement of Japanese goodwill and enclosed a
photograph of the Shinto service conducted at his laboratory on May 27
in memory of her husband's career. The letter, written in German,
promptly appeared in a German medical journal and elicited favorable
comment from all over Germany.149
Kitasato's message is worthy of attention as a typical statement of
scientists' views. He called the war a mere "political conflict" that in no
way reflected any popular enmity. For Japanese in general it was "di
vorced from individuals." Japanese scientists continued to hold the
same feelings of esteem for their German teachers that they had before
the war. His letter makes no mention of the IRC exclusion or any part
that his own colleagues may have had in its making. In fact, the only
comment in it with political implications is a criticism of the peace
treaty's attempt to "perpetuate enmity," which he contrasted unfavor
ably with the Confucian moral concepts in which Japanese like him had
been reared.150
This kind of vague but high-toned apolitical stance was widespread
among Japanese scientists. Many commentators in the professional
press did link scattered acts of German ill will to the London conference
vote and the Japanese scientists' role in it Tawara Teijird, for example,
criticized Sakurai and Tanakadate for "confusing the role of the scien
tist with that of the diplomat" and of "deferring to the vulgar opinions of
the Powers."151 But most of the commentary was not for attribution. An
unsigned essay in another journal accused the Japanese delegates to
the London conference of 'Ignorance and lack of discernment" and of
"licking the boots" of the other scientists present 152 Most scientists'
responses ignored the IRC. Before December 1920 there appears to
have been only one public statement by a Japanese scientist seeking to
reassure Germans by attacking the IRC, and the circumstances in that
case were unusual. The scientist concerned, pharmacological chemist
Keimatsu Katsuzaemon, was in Berlin at the time and probably felt that
failure to act would cost him access to needed information. As a result,
he and about thirty other resident Japanese sent a cable and a letter to
the Imperial Academy in Tokyo, protesting Germany's exclusion from
the IRC network.153 The Japanese government acknowledged their
action, but the academy ignored it completely.154
December 11,1920, marked the end of such innocence, real or con
262 THE RESEARCH SYSTEM IN AN ACE OF TRANSITION
trived. At the formal inauguration of the new NRC, a heated debate

broke out on the issue of German exclusion, when presiding officer
Furuichi Koi called for discussion of any "other business." Inoue Jin
kichi, professor of chemical engineering at Tohoku University, raised
the issue first He called exclusion very unfortunate and insisted that
any revival of cooperative work in science would have to include Ger
many and Austria. Nagayo Mataro, professor of pathology at Tokyo
University, attacked not only the policy of exclusion but the motives of
those who defended it. Defenders, he suggested, had acted in the belief
that opposition was impossible for Japan "because of its present posi
tion," and he attributed to them a belief that support for the views of
Britain and France was really a moderate position. Calling this view an
"insult to the entire scientific community," Nagayo moved that the
NRC demand "immediate termination" of the Central Powers boycott
and pressure the IRC to this end. 155
Nagayo's proposal was naturally controversial Two chemists (Ma
jima Toshiyuki and Katayama Masao) and one physicist (Tamaru Taku
ro) from Tokyo University rose to support him, and indications were
that many felt the same. But not all present would agree to the motion.
One senior member of the Imperial Academy conceded that his earlier
support of German exclusion was probably wrong, but he said the acad
emy should take up the problem. Sakurai Joji announced that he was
flatly opposed even to discussion of the issue. Debate, however, in no
way subsided until Furuichi called an hour's intermission. Following
the cooling-off period, the NRC resumed its discussion and finally ap
proved a watered-down version: "The National Research Council of
Japan," it said, "expresses to the International Research Council the
desire that all civilized nations participate freely [in IRC projects]."
Even though the council meant "all" to include Germany and the other
Central Powers, the force of the statement was considerably diluted.156
Several reasons were behind the NRC's hedging. After all, German
exclusion, as one scientist put it, was a "limited, conditional thing."
The London conference had occurred while the war was still on, and
its exclusionary policy could not be permanent Restoration of peace
offered the chance for a revival of the prewar Association of Science
Academies, in which Germany was naturally included.157 Others felt
that Japanese scientists could in any case have done little to defend the
interests of Germany. "The British, French, and American delegates
were acting very self-righteously at the London meeting with no Ger
mans present," another commentator wrote. "It is not difficult to imag
ine that [Sakurai and Tanakadate] would have been ignored com
pletely [had they spoken up for Germany]."158 There is some evidence
that this cynical view was correct When Tanakadate attended the July
1919 IRC meeting in Brussels, he did speak up for German involve

ment and become the target of several snide comments from Euro
pean delegates.! ^
Sakurai and others lacked confidence in their professional achieve
ments as scientists, and Sakurai's adherence to the exclusion of Ger
many and willingness to defend it were not just a product of his training
in Britain and admiration for British culture and manners. He was both
highly deferential to authority and aggressively critical of Japanese sci
ence. In 1881 he had reluctantly abandoned his promising research
career in London to take a chemistry lectureship at Tokyo University
when President Katd insisted he do so. In only two years he advanced to
full professor and then was invested with administrative duties. While
he clearly regretted this turn of events, deference to authority came
naturally to him. l 6 ° In 1913, when Yamakawa Kenjiro was under sus
picion in the Ministry of Education and his appointment for a presiden
tial term was held up, Sakurai Joji was installed in his place precisely
because he was considered more pliable.161
This combination of deference to authority and low self-image as a
research scientist affected his behavior in London. When Nagayo
Mataro approached Sakurai during the intermission of the NRC meet
ing, he asked him to explain his support for German exclusion. Sakurai
exploded with a burst of indignation: "Do you people not know where
we stand [in science]? Think about it! What have Japanese contributed
to science so far? Our accomplishments simply do not permit us to
discuss such important matters as this on an equal basis with (scientists
from] advanced countries!"162 Nagayo was a confident man with a
different point of view. He told Sakurai he was mistaken and insisted
that Japanese achievements had been materially aided by the Ger
mans—however one chose to evaluate them. "Our scientists continued
to read German books even while [the countries] were at war," he noted.
"The appearance of exclusion will not change this at all." Sakurai was
unconvinced but qualified his views the following day when Nagayo
came to his home. "I do think that Japan, both in name and in fact, will
eventually catch up with the top-ranking countries in politics, diplo
macy, and science."163 This judgment, at least, would be proven
correct
CHAPTER NINE
SCIENCE AND SOCIETY:

A RETROSPECTIVE
Building a tradition of scientific research required Japan to borrow

effectively from Western traditions and manage its own simul
taneously. There were plausible strategies for solving most problems
and numerous pitfalls en route. Rigid adherence to any single model
could have been disastrous, or at least prejudicial European science
had arisen much earlier and under much different conditions from
those in Japan. Japan lacked Europe's resources, and European ac
tivities were closely linked in a synergistic system of enormous vitality.
Yet the builders of research made surprisingly few errors. They investi
gated numerous models, debated every option, and in a great many
cases made reasonable decisions. Their achievements were significant
Every major option had well-placed supporters with political influence.
Japanese scientists' greater achievement was to manage the past, a
past that was fraught with ambiguities. The Tokugawa government
was scarcely dedicated to growth in science, but some functionaries
had been interested in it. Tokugawa custom discouraged innovation,
even though innovation occasionally took place. The society experi
enced a rebirth of learning, though none of it led to modern science
directly. A mathematical tradition of enormous creativity reached a
point of stagnation in the eighteenth century. Medical doctors could
carry on freely; most other fields were restricted by government.
Tokugawa patterns offered complicated choices, values, and pro
nounced inclinations to be bent, exploited, or simply set aside if a tradi
tion of research were to arise and flourish.
Consider the formation of the research community, where Western
influence was fundamental. The abolition of inherited status in the
1870s made it easier to combine mathematics with a knowledge of
physics and was clearly inspired by European precedents. Compulsory
schooling allowed more Japanese the choice of careers in the sciences
and was also based on European models. Opportunities for Japanese to
study in Europe inspired their development of research traditions, stim
ulated formation of professional roles, encouraged commitment to val
ues and norms, and shaped the establishment of modern research. Role
264
SCIENCE AND SOCIETY: A RETROSPECTIVE 265
formation was particularly complicated. It showed some clear Western

influence: the combination of teaching and academic research to form
the role of professor, the norm of publication and rejection of secrecy,
and the restrictions imposed on clinical practice by university pro
fessors of basic medicine. In other respects it was highly distinctive.
Researchers shared membership in professional organizations with col
leagues in clinical practice. Ordinary clinicians with the proper connec
tions could carry on research at imperial universities. University pro
fessors in all technical fields engaged in consulting or supplementary
work
The scientific community of Meiji Japan was in many respects
formed by tendencies inherited from the Tokugawa period. Most early
scientists came from the samurai, a small minority (6-7 percent) of
total population. Samurai interest in engineering and science developed
initially through subtle encouragement from the Tokugawa govern
ment and was further stimulated by Western military pressure. But
samurai dominance in the Meiji years was particularly due to educa
tional patterns of the Tokugawa period. Samurai were more likely to
receive an education than any other members of the Japanese popula
tion. Their socialization produced a kind of "need achievement," which
drives some men to outdo others. Their attitudes toward schooling were
also distinctive. In particular, they had greater endurance of educa
tional hardships, since schooling was the key to reviving family for
tunes. The curriculum assisted recruitment to science. Compared to
the schooling commoners received, it was philosophical and not closely
tied to job performance, and it stressed comprehension of knowledge,
not mere mastery of particular specialties.
Tokugawa patterns were helpful in other ways. Most Meiji scientists
had fathers with significant connections (at least) to a Tokugawa intel
lectual—Confucian scholar, wasan mathematician, scholar of Dutch
studies, or most important, Chinese-style doctor. Meiji scientists came
from areas of the country where schools had a long history. The scien
tists' choices of specialtiesreflectedthe past, medicine being most pop
ular. By 1868 medicine in particular was well positioned for an influx of
talent because of its substantial earlier development, whereas the phys
ical sciences had ground to make up because of Tokugawa restrictions.
Scholarly conduct was also affected by the Tokugawa legacy. Tend
ing to characterize all technical disciplines in Meiji Japan was an inti
macy between mentors and pupils. This included both patronage with
respect to employinent and also professional nourishment But the dis
ciplines differed in other ways. The Tokugawa influence was strongest
in medicine and, in some respects, botany. Since medical institutions
were not deemed a threat to traditional morality, they had operated
266 SCIENCE AND SOCIETY: A RETROSPECTIVE
fineely with official approval. Harmful factionalism and entrenched op

position to new ideas had certainly existed in the Tokugawa period, but
Tokugawa medicine was more than a chronological precursor to the
modem tradition of scientific research. Medical specialists in Toku
gawa Japan were already accustomed to open debate and public scru
tiny of professional issues. Tokugawa botanists had formed an intellec
tual society in the Owari region about 1800. Both groups generally
publicized their findings. In mathematics, by contrast, the legacy was
weak. Tokugawa mathematicians found it difficult to change, so Meiji
mathematics was radically reorganized. New kinds of men were re
cruited to the field, and theirrolein society was sharply redefined. The
physical sciences were institutionally more backward. They were not
disciplines at all in the Tokugawa period, having little autonomy, no
organizations, a politically high profile, and low self-awareness. There
was relatively little factionalism, but neither was there very much open,
public criticism. This circumstance substantially accounts for the tardy
appearance of such patterns among them.
Institution building, like community formation, showed a sensitive
blending of foreign and local influence. Agricultural experiment sta
tions were based on American models. Kato Hiroyuki sold the idea of the
comprehensive university almost entirely on the basis of European pre
cedents. Hasegawa Tai, Inoue Kowashi, Toyama Shoichi, and Tak
ayama Jintaro cited institutions in Europe to buttress their proposals.
Kitasato constantly invoked the career of Robert Koch as a means of
justifying a particular schema for organizing research. Makino No
buakt as minister of education, in 1906 used arguments and prece
dentsfromEuropean experience to force the creation of a science acad
emy. But particular precedents were alsorejected.Government officials
and most scientists opposed privatdozenten, the one-chair rule, free
migration of students, rapidrotationof university administrators, and
second-class housing for engineering and agriculture, despite ceaseless
appealsfromeducators infatuated with practices in Germany and politi
cians who wished to save money.
Partly this was because Tokugawa institutions were poorly devel
oped, offering no good model to imitate. Scientists and certain edu
cators wanted rapid expansion in research infrastructure, while the
politicians and bureaucrats who favored this at all wanted to do it cheap
ly. The political tug-of-war ensured that there would be neither a
one-chair rule nor student migration. General backwardness killed pri
vatdozenten. Few Tokugawa institutions were congenial to modern
science. The Bansho Wage Goyo and the Office of Astronomy were
supposed to translate documents and restrict their access to govern
ment officials, not add to knowledge and publicize it widely. Thus few
Meiji institutions had historical origins in the Tokugawa period. But

this does not mean there was no continuity. State institutions were
prominent in the Meiji period because of their prominence in the
Tokugawa period. Such institutions were combined with others to form
Tokyo University in 1877, while the Osaka Kyuri Jo, Nagasaki Igaku
Denshu Jo, Tekitekisayuku, and Shirandd made important contribu
tions through the early training they offered Meiji scientists.
Institutional continuity was most evident in medicine. Medical aca
demies established by daimyo were the scientific movement's most
active leaders in the Tokugawa period, and the later establishment of
programs at Tokyo University shows a perceived continuity in this area.
Tokyo's modem medical school could use the facilities of its Tokugawa
predecessor (the Igakkd), but it was deemed inappropriate for the basic
sciences to be housed in the facilities of the Kaisei Gakko, which was
closed down. Continuity was more than just perceived. Medicine's
strength enabled Kitasato to mobilize resources for fundamentally new
research in a manner and on a scale inconceivable in other disciplines.
Agricultural chemist Kozai Yoshinao showed political abilities in a non
medical field, but his institutional accomplishments were considerably
less. Medicine was so securely established that its spokesmen could
usually prevail in a conflict Hasegawa Tai managed to cut applied
chemistry to the benefit of biochemistry in 1893. He and Kitasato to
gether defeated the ltd cabinet and won public funding for a private
medical laboratory. Kyushu University got Ministry of Education sup
port for its faculty of medicine in 1901 despite the cheaper cost and
greater need for a faculty of engineering or science at Tdhoku.
Kitasato's Institute of Infectious Diseases got brand-new facilities in
1905, when budgets were cut for other scholarly programs because of
the war with Russia.
The Tokugawa legacy affected the building of research institutions
in its ability to promote competition. Regional competition among
daimyo had encouraged school building in the Tokugawa period, while
Alternate Attendance diffused innovations. After the Restoration, this
legacy affected scientific institutions by constraining attempts to con
centrate resources and instead offering precedents for their dispersion
nationwide. Providing educational opportunities was attractive politi
cally. Once the commitment was made to build Kyoto University, the
door was open to others of its kind. Few regions got them before World
War I, but every region wanted an imperial university and could use
local subsidies and political maneuvering to make its views felt in the
bureaucracy and the Diet Competition assured momentum. If Tokyo
had something, Kyoto had to have it And if Kyushu were successful,
Tdhoku must be, too. It is hardly surprising that Japanese officials in the
Diet and the government strongly supported academic competition.

Given a history of daimyo domains that competed in school building for
reasons of prestige, they had every reason to build new universities and
expand the ones that they had.
The physical sciences, because of their putative links to Catholicism,
had been severely restricted and were dependent for support on the
government. This is one major reason that so many Meiji physicists-
were officials' sons. Restoration leadership ended the restrictions, but
the pattern of dependence lasted for years. Kyoto University had consid
erable difficulty starting a program in physical science, and Kyushu
University did not have one. The Industrial Experiment Laboratory was
poorly supported by government and business. Physicists and chemists
in academic life had finally to appeal for outside support because gov
ernment support was so very inadequate. Such problems derived from
the Tokugawa legacy. Vice Minister Makino even cited Tokugawa pre
cedent to explain problems at Kyoto. >
Officials' tendency to seek control of successful institutions was well
established before 1868 and persisted beyond the Meiji years. Linger
ing beliefs about state control of scholarship in part lay behind the
Ministry of Educations efforts to close Hasegawa Tai's Zaisei Gakusha
medical academy, Watanabe Kdki's campaign against Kitasato's labora
tory, the 1914 seizure of the same laboratory, the pre-1918 refusal to
grant formal equality with the imperial universities to Keio, Waseda,
and Doshisha, and official resentment at these institutions for daring to
offer technical programs. The seizure of the Institute of Infectious
Diseases is particularly revealing. Here was a scientist of international
reputation with epochal achievements in research to his credit He
materially raised the standards of Japan's public health and worked
indefatigably on behalf of basic science. Unfortunately his politicking,
which was rooted in professional convictions, offended the views of
powerful officials and caused his eventual undoing.
Kitasato's fate calls sharply into focus another negative aspect of the
Tokugawa legacy, namely, the treatment of scientists by Japanese offi
cials. The Tokugawa state had instituted and the Meiji state continued
(after a period of experimentation) strict subordination of technical
experts to putative bureaucratic generalists. For this reason Kitasato
never held a major official post (his power was de facto, not de jure). But
Japan's science management was not so unusual, for Germany, Britain,
and France had similar systems. Technical specialists were almost
everywhere subordinated to legally trained generalists.2 Japan's offi
cials were recruitedfroma broad social base and were competent by the
standards of the day.3 Turning over full authority on pertinent issues
exclusively to members of the technical community would have been
neither desirable nor politically possible. Agricultural chemist Kozai

Yoshinao's advocacy of unproductive spending in animal husbandry
shows this too welL The only scientist (Kikuchi Dairoku) who ever had
a grip on formal power (as minister of education) could not use it in
science's or his country's best interests because of his sometimes archa
ic and eccentric views.
One might argue that, except for Kitasato, very few scientists had
problems with the government Chemist Nagai Nagayoshi had free
access to top officials. So did medical researchers Takagi Kanehiro,
Aoyama Tanemichi and even (for about twenty years) Kitasato
Shibasaburo; agricultural chemists Sakd Jomei and Kozai Yoshinao,
physicist Yamakawa Kenjiro, mathematician Kikuchi Dairoku, and
various other members of the scientific community. Even in the wake of
the civil service changes, the Diet offered a channel for certain kinds of
access, and consultations with bureaucrats took place regularly. Mori
Arinori met with professors in his office at the Ministry of Education, as
did his successors and the bureau chiefs under them. Professors were
consulted about chairs to be established, and Tokyo University scien
tists planned the Tohoku faculty of science.
But there were serious problems with the management of science.
Tokugawa traditions, reinforced by German influence, produced an
autocratic government slow to sanction autonomy or forthright politick
ing by scientists and professors. Some technical specialists lost access
to the uppermost levels of policy-making men. The most serious prob
lem, however, was the inability of administrators trained exclusively in
law to communicate with scientists and technical experts. Physicist
Nakamura Yaroku was fired from the Ministry of Agriculture and Com
merce because he protested his exclusion from management Forestry
professor and bureau expert Shiga Taizan met with incomprehension
from colleagues whose training was only in law. Oka Makoto, chief of
the Bureau of Industry, and chemist Takayama Jintaro found it difficult
to agree on suitable programs for the Industrial Experiment Laboratory.
The physicist Yamakawa Kenjiro rightly attacked the legally trained
officials of the Ministry of Finance for their egregious ignorance of
science.
Ignorance of science became pervasive in the uppermost strata of the
Japanese government In the early years of the Meiji period, technical
experts supervised technical programs. But with civil service reform in
the late 1880s—and probably complacency in later years—this flexibil
ity of management gradually disappeared. The Ministry of Agriculture
and Commerce and the Ministry of Finance were the worst, but the
patterns that made them bad were widespread. It is particularly striking
that the Ministry of Home Affairs and the Ministry of Education, which
27O SCIENCE AND SOCIETY: A RETROSPECTIVE
had been more open to the technical community, eventually went the
way of the rest of the government, putting "lawyers" in charge of the
management of science.
Dominance by "lawyers" with no technical knowledge was a major
cause of wrong decisions. The Ministry of Finance rejected the elec
trical engineers' plan to standardize frequencies of electrical power
transmission. Legally trained chiefs of the Bureau of Agriculture cut
already modest funding for sericulture research, ignored warnings
about foreign research on synthetic fibers, squandered large sums on
animal husbandry programs, and wasted scarce talent at the downtown
bureau headquarters, which they should have deployed at the (subur
ban) Nishigahara station. Even medical research was finally disrupted
(by the Ministry of Education) when the lawyer-administrator Ichiki
Kitokuro managed to seize the Institute of Infectious Diseases. Par
ticipation by technical men at the bureau chief level produced better
results. Metallurgist Watanabe Wataru, as chief of the Bureau of Mines,
helped establish the Industrial Experiment Laboratory, and agri
cultural chemist Sako Jdmei, agriculture bureau chief, assigned more
technical experts toresearchfunctions at the Nishigahara station and
fewer to administrative tasks.
Japan's management of science could certainly have been better.
Some requirement of probationary service for administrators could have
been imposed. Mathematics and science could have been incorporated
into the training for higher civil servants; instead their place was dimin
ished. University matriculants for law and humanities did not study
mathematics or science after age seventeen, and the classroom time
given these subjects was cut in 1900.4 The government could have
followed the practice of some private businesses, which appointed en
gineers to senior management posts to maximize the effects of scarce
technical talent 5 Failure to do this was particularly ironic in view of the
policies of the early Meiji years, when technical men held such posts in
areas of the government where their knowledge was needed!
Naturally the system encountered opposition. Educator Fukuzawa
Yukichi in 1898 called public attention to officialdom's ignorance of
science. Scientists made much the same point.6 In Germany a group of
engineers began to protest their exclusionfrommanagement in 1910.7
In Japan Yamakawa Kenjiro in 1911 attacked the arrogant practices of
the Ministry of Finance. Officials like Mori Arinori and Kubota Yuzuru,
who made life difficult for scientists, met vigorous opposition from the
scientific community. Some technical men abandoned government ser
vice, though others shared discontents only with friends.8
World War I focused attention on the scientific community. Mem
bers were charged with neglecting research, now seen as vital to the
SCIENCE AND SOCIETY: A RETROSPECTIVE 2J1
national interest The standard allegation was that the legacy of

Tokugawa feudalism had led university professors to compromise re
search through their neglect of norms of criticism and discussion, their
tendency toward favoritism in academic appointments, and their re
fusal to recognize the public nature of science. Actual behavior in the
scientific community was both more subtle and more faithful to the
spirit and essence of the researcher role. Japanese scientists could be,
and generally were, faithful to the imperatives of scientific criticism
even as they tried to be loyal to mentors. Their recruitment procedures
in academic life were by no means indifferent to merit And there was
recognition of science's public nature.
Two particular aspects of the Tokugawa legacy were favorable to
science at this level. Market demand, as in medicine, had aroused an
interest in new techniques and ideas, while the pyramidal structure of
the government and society had stimulated competitive pressures.
These forces operated freely once feudalism ended, and one obvious
result in the scientific community was the emergence of factions. The
real issue is how one should see them. If, as alleged, the factions re
pressed free discussion, made criticism impossible, hoarded all re
sources, and were totally self-centered, the scientific enterprise in its
modem Western form could scarcely have existed in Japanese society
at all.
This portrait however, is largely factitious. For one thing, the system
rewarded "merit" though sometimes in frozen forms. One could not
obtain a professorship by accident of birth. Strong performance in pub
lications and degrees was essential to success. Family ties, usually of
the father-in-law-son-in-law variety, could assist one's appointment
but not if one were without "merit." Such familial ties would not be
established if "merit" were absent in thefirstplace. Achievement was a
condition of ascription, not ascription a condition of achievement
Nor were most scientists intolerant of dissent The typical scientist of
the Meiji period showed active concern for younger men under him,
striving to elicit their enthusiasm for research by deliberate strategies—
storytelling, discussion, eating, and drinking. In these settings, at least
reserve was cast aside and an atmosphere of openness generally
maintained.
Hie impact of factionalism on cooperation and sharing is a more
difficult issue. There is little doubt but that Japanese society was prone
to factionalism, or that such factions could duplicate effort waste re
sources, and generate emotional strife.9 But to say only this gives an
unbalanced view. The extreme self-centeredness that factions could
display was not endemic or inherent in the culture; it could be traced to
cyclical patterns in the academic market for employment Factions
stimulated intense competition, and competition is essential to develop

ment in science. One historian of medicine has argued that the rivalry
between the faculty of medicine at Tokyo University and Kitasato's
Institute of Infectious Diseases had a beneficial impact on Japanese
medicine. "Competition between institute and university contributed
greatly to bacteriology in Japan and helped raise its work to interna
tional standards."10 This outcome did not result simply from Tokugawa
practices, but their longer term legacy encouraged it
World War I solved a number of problems that scientists had long

had to face. Major new research facilities were built and some old ones
improved. The number of positions for scientists increased, though not
always in line with supply. Several fields of study that were new to
Japan—genetics, aeronautics, some areas of applied chemistry—won
greater recognition and financial support. Private business began to
fund research directly. A new imperial university was built in Hokkaido.
The Ministry of Education's Science Research Grants Program made its
appearance in 1918 and the National Research Council in 1920.
Improvements in the treatment of at least some of the scientists also
came with the war. Physicists and chemists in academic life could now
function politically on something like the level that had historically
been possible for their colleagues in medicine. They could play off one
agency against another, appeal for support to nongovernmental
sources, and hope to contain well-entrenched opposition when the
stakes were sufficiently high. These new abilities help explain some
important foundations: the Research Institute for Physics and Chem
istry, the Institute for Aeronautics, and the Institute for Metals at
Tohoku University.
Wartime conditions had less impact on other important problems.
Patent laws were improved, but not as much as they needed to be.
Aspiring inventors in the corporate sector were still not protected
enough. The patent office staff had inadequate funding, and the laws
were too lax. Moreover, some elements of the business community were
not wholly willing to change. Exploitation of foreign technology seemed
more attractive than research to some, and the suspicion still lingered
that patterns of dependence could be reinstated once the war was over.
Hie war had a negative impact in medicine. By stimulating the idea of
research independence, it led the Okuma cabinet astray. Kitasato's
institute was seized by his enemies, and problems quickly followed.
Serum and vaccine quality fell along with the income they generated.
There was arisein the death rate from contagious diseases that should
have been avoidable. Medicine's most effective champion of basic re
search was removed from a post of great influence, and the cause of
medical research became more politicized and divided than ever. Some
of this was due to widespread perceptions of Tokyo University. While
officials praised it highly, others attacked it as a bastion of sloth and
complacency. Some of the criticism was unfair, but it had its effects
nonetheless. Mandatory retirement for university professors at the age
of sixty was instituted in 1920 and persists to this day. University fund
ing, especially for Tokyo, did not rise with need, and the university's
erstwhile patron, the Ministry of Education, lost much of its political
capital. Unfortunately, a ministerial staff (in Agriculture and Com
merce) with even less talent and a narrower perspective assumed a
more prominent role.
Another result of World War I was to force Japanese scientists to
evaluate themselves and their contributions to science. There was the
question, for one thing, of overseas study and the directions it should
take in the future. By siding with the Allies over the IRC, Japan opened
itself up to retaliation from Germany, and even though responses from
Germany were muted, scientists and officials in Tokyo worried. As early
as January 1920 the Ministry of Education was rethinking foreign
study- Trips for "observation' were going to become rare: "study" was
to be the principal objective. The ministry might subsidize study in
Japan at places other than one's home institution.!' In midsummer
1920 it was announced that at least some ryugaku students in medicine
would spend time in Britain and the U.S. as well as in Germany,12 and
in late September Ikai jihd declared that the ministry had made a
confidential decision to "abandon the earlier bias toward Germany."
The government's view of world trends in science would probably lead
to an Anglo-American bias.13 Whatever the truth of the reports, the
ryugaku program definitely changed. The country's leading physicist,
Nagaoka Hantaro, who had himself studied in Austria and Germany,
began sending physics students to Britain, the U.S., and Denmark.14
The 130 foreign students dispatched by the ministry in 1921 were
reportedly bound for many different countries.15
Another basic issue had to do with self-image. Kitasato Shibasaburo,
as confident as ever, proposed that Japan try to bring Germans there,16
and some Japanese scientists shared his views. One took umbrage at
the suggestion of some Czech scientists that Japanese abandon Ger
many in favor of Prague as an appropriate place for overseas study. This
implied that Japanese scientists could do no good work without travel
ing abroad! And why, after all, pay special court to Germany? "Is there
something unusual about our situation?"17 Sakurai Joji thought that
there was. According to him, Japanese scientists had not accomplished
much. They duplicated work, hoarded information, and wasted time
and resources.18
Sakurai was biased and essentially wrong. Kitasato's work on tet

anus, which led to the discovery of natural immunity, was a major
advance in medicine. Takamine Jokichi's discovery of adrenalin was an
important step in hormone research even though the discoverer misper
ceived its implications. Of course, Sakurai could discount these pro
jects: the work was done abroad, the first was collaborative (with Emil
von Behring), and the second was not elaborated fully. But other re
search, done on Japanese soil, was also worthy of mention. Shiga
Kiyoshi in 1897 discovered the dysentery bacillus that bears his name.
Nagaoka Hantaro developed a useful—if ultimately imperfect—model
of the atomic nucleus. Sakurai himself developed a new technique for
determining the boiling points of substances in solution. Most impor
tant, Yamagiwa Katsusaburo showed that tumors could be produced in
laboratory animals by applying coal tar to their skins.
Nor was it accurate to charge Japanese scientists with duplicating
work and hoarding resources. There was some failure to share informa
tion among researchers seeking the cause of tsutsugamushi disease,
and in that area efforts were duplicated. Cooperation and sharing seem
to have declined in medicine after 1900 because of the tougher academ
ic job market, but several other facts must be taken into account As in
the case of tsutsugamushi research, investigators read each other's
work and enjoyed full access to published information,19 and scientists
in a competitive situation are never prone to divulge unpublished mate
rial to competitors who might try to "scoop" them for credit.20
Sakurai's judgment also ignored the development of scientific so
cieties. These societies discussed major issues and shared information
across institutional boundaries. Their membership lists included people
from many subspecialties, for example, agricultural chemistry, phar
macological chemistry, and so-called basic chemistry, in the case of the
Tokyo Chemical Society. Not all their members were professional aca
demics.21 Most societies were concentrated in Tokyo, and in that sense
their value was localized, but scientists outside the capital city (as in
Sendai, the home of Tohoku University) formed their own local groups
before World War I as a way to gain access to new information.
Sakurai was correct in stating that Japanese science faced difficul
ties. The physical sciences were not well funded before 1914 or even
1920. Manpower, resources, and action were in medicine; other fields
got what was left His emphasis on the country's isolation was well
placed Japan was geographically removed from other centers of sci
ence, and this clearly caused problems. Makino Nobuaki noted in 1897
that Japanese scientists who had returned from Europe often fell be
hind in research because they lacked adequate opportunities for tech
nical discussion. Sakurai in 1919 justified creation of the National Re
search Council by noting that Japan was "stuck off in one corner of the
Orient" and said this had "caused. . . inconvenience for scientific re
search." A Tokyo professor of physical chemistry, Mizushima San'i
chiro, later wrote that European scientists of Sakurai's era could easily
get in touch with colleagues abroad, but that scientists in Japan were
handicapped. Travel cost money and time, and chances for discussions
with foreign colleagues were rare. Access to foreign journals was abso
lutely crucial, but delivery of the journals left much to be desired. They
were usually well behind the forefront of research by the time they
arrived, sometimes by as much as two or three years.22
Japan's isolation was both cultural and geographic. Since few if any
foreigners—and essentially no scientists—spoke or read Japanese, one
had always to consider how best to communicate. Foreign study gave
scientists a mastery of languages as well as of technical specialties, but
language facility did not solve all problems. To create and maintain a
community at home, one had to share findings with colleagues. Most
scientific publications and papers by Japanese authors (including pa
pers at meetings) were written or delivered in Japanese, not in German,
English, or French.23 Between the world wars the problem of language
attracted more attention from scientists. Sakurai and others spoke and
wrote of it often. The National Research Council undertook to address
it 2 4 No solution was found then, nor has one been found since,25
underscoring the conviction that the greatest single problem confront
ing Japanese scientists was their continuing isolation from the world
science community.
In view of the difficulties, the scientists of Japan did quite well.
Medicine, in particular, wasremarkablystrong. In 1919 Kyoto Univer
sity microbiologist Matsushita Teiji wrote, "Japanese medicine at pre
sent is not inferior to that of the West and can certainly stand com
parison with American medicine."26 Another observer wrote at this
time: "Japanese science is already distinguished. It is not yet on the
highest [world] level, but is relatively good and [now] more indepen
dent It continues to require some outside assistance and must dili
gently collect information abroad."27 In this respect we can hardly say
that Japanese science stands alone.
EPILOGUE
Decades have passed since Japanese science faced up to the challenges

of World War I. Years of forward movement have alternated with peri
ods of stagnation or destruction, but in general progress has been strik
ing. Japan's research expenditures as a percentage of GNP now match
or exceed those of other major countries. Japanese scientists regularly
publish in every major field and are increasingly seen as leading in
some. l Advanced communications and sophisticated technology have
partially reduced isolation in science. Even the elusive Nobel Prize is
more frequently awarded to Japanese researchers.2 Nevertheless, an
impression that something is seriously wrong remains. Questions con
tinue to be raised about the fundamental character of the research
enterprise, whether basic research is not neglected in favor of a stress
on applied research, or whether too much work is done byfirmsand too
little work in Japan's universities. There is still the same tension be
tween the needs of the group and the wishes of individuals that existed
in the period discussed in this book and the samefixationwith interna
tional standards of research creativity and whether, if at all, Japan's
system can meet them. One sometimes has the feeling that nothing has
changed!
Such perceptions may reflect a limited sense of the past In the wake
of major gains during World War I, expectations rose in the 1920s but
were quickly reined in by financial realities. Commitments to the Re
search Institute for Physics and Chemistry were not in every case hon
ored, and the laboratory was slow in opening.3 Some privatefirmsbuilt
laboratories of their own. Keio and Waseda universities established
graduate programs in medicine and engineering. The National Re
search Council sponsored large group projects in tropical medicine,
geophysics, and several otherfields.But thefirstten years after the war
were not very promising in the imperial universities, where only in
biology was there much growth.4 The 1930s were better, as science
became the object of several new initiatives. New imperial universities
were built at Osaka (1930) and Nagoya (1939), while a faculty of sci
ence was added at Kyushu (also in 1939). Major changes were not
confined to the campus—the Japan Society for the Advancement of
Science (Nihon Gakujutsu Shink6 Kai, or Gakushin) made its ap
pearance in 1932. Though a product of the Depression and Japan's
seizure of Manchuria, the enthusiasm for it and the funding it attracted
showed several kinds of interests at work.
276
EPILOGUE 277
Gakushin began with a report on the state of Japan's research facili

ties submitted to the cabinet in March 1930. The report documented
the relative stagnation of scientific infrastructure and research funding
typical of the 1920s and insisted on the need to reverse this direction.
Prime Minister Wakatsuki Reijiro favored retrenchment in science be
cause of his background in law and finance and the difficulties of man
aging a depressed economy. But the vigorous commitment to Man
churian development, his departure from office, and voices critical of
academic science eventually produced a more favorable response. The
military establishment in Manchuria wanted to promote certain large-
scale projects in technical research, and a number of professors had
come to the view that universities lacked a strong research environ
ment. The Japan Society for the Advancement of Science addressed
these concerns by promoting team research for a number of projects,
particularly relating to armaments and energy.5
World War II gave the research establishment more opportunities,
but a lack of foreign assistance and substantial isolation made pressures'
much greater and constraints more severe. Two scientific organizations
were particularly important in enabling Japan to prosecute the war. The
National Research Council was responsible for organizing and coords
nating war-related research,6 and the Research Institute for Physics
and Chemistry took on special projects not envisioned by its founders.
This case is particularly instructive. The institute could not function
solely as a research enterprise because of the lack of funding. By the late
1920s it had already been obliged to develop and sell patented tech
nology and in some cases to manufacture products growing out of its
research. In this it had some success, and by 1939 it was a business
conglomerate.7 In such a situation its fate was predictable. Research
projects became heavily oriented toward work with expected military,
applications. Its factories produced such strategic items as piston rings
for military aircraft8 A basic science program, as in nuclear physics
under Nishina Yoshio was, however, retained.
Military defeat in 1945 led to Occupation reforms in the research
establishment The National Research Council was disbanded. The
Research Institute for Physics and Chemistry was legally dismem
bered. An organization called the Science Council of Japan was created
in the place of the Imperial Academy. A component of the Occupa
tion called the Economic and Scientific Section, Scientific and Tech
nical Division, was the principal agency in charge. In this context an
American physicist named H. C. Kelly played a role far too large for
his age (he was born in 1908) or experience (war-related research at
MIT).9
Some look on Kelly's approach to reform in science as a reflection of
New Deal philosophy. He believed, for example, in radical change,
278 EPILOGUE
without much regard for existing institutions. When Japanese mem

bers of a science advisory group—whose formation was partly insti
gated by Kelly—urged caution in abolishing the Imperial Academy, the
American scientist insisted, telling the group they were "going to make
history." Kelly also wanted scientists to solve society's problems. In one
revealing exchange with the academy's president, Nagaoka Hantard,
he attacked the 'Individualistic attitude'* of basic science researchers
and insisted that members of the scientific community consider their
responsibilities to all mankind. Another fact that was equally important
in the longer run was that Kelly was a proponent of applied research.
He wanted the Occupation to "encourage only those research pro
grams which are directed toward improvement of Japan's economy"
and went so far as to call basic research a luxury in the light of existing
conditions.10
Not all scientists agreed with Kelly's outlook, but a good number did,
and some were very radical. One scientist named Watanabe Satoshi is
known to have influenced Kelly's thinking with his bitter attacks on the
Ministry of Education, Tokyo University, and other pillars of the sci
ence establishment11 In 1946 the Japan Communist Party, with the
open support of a number of scientists, published a famous thesis crit
icizing "feudal remnants" in science.12 In 1947 the influential physicist
Fujioka Yoshio launched a broadside against the prominence of fac
tions in academic life and was publicly applauded by another well
known physicist (Sakata Shoichi).13 The earlier pattern of militarism
and the wartime experience, to say nothing of the American Occupa
tion, had radicalized elements of the scientific community and helped
to create a self-critical environment
These same general trends helped intensify a split between academ
ic scientists, the government, and business. Many scientists, embar
rassed by their former acquiescence in militarism, supported the leftist
League of Democratic Scientists (Minshushugi Kagakusha Kyokai,
created in 1946), while control of the government remained largely in
the hands of conservative politicians sympathetic to business.14 This
pattern of estrangement affected research. Following President Dwight
Eisenhower's "Atoms for Peace" address to the United Nations General
Assembly in December 1953, business and political circles in Japan
became captivated by the notion that atomic power offered the solution
to Japan's energy problems and decided to import nuclear reactors from
Britain. Prominent members of the scientific community—Fujioka
Yoshio, Sakata Shoichi, and especially the 1949 Nobel laureate in phys
ics, Yukawa Hideki—cautioned against this excessive optimism and
reminded all concerned of the pitfalls. They emphasized that atomic
energy was not at that time a proven technology and that to import it
EPILOGUE 279
successfully would require more research, a point widely accepted in

Europe even among groups planning the sale. But political and busi
ness leaders had their own point of view. They rejected further re
search, saying the technology was safe and dismissing the scientists'
views as self-interested and alarmist The results were an inefficient
industry and power plant breakdowns through the 1970s.15
Apart from the difference in political perspective between scientists,
politicians, and the business community, three other factors contrib
uted to this unhappy state. One was the traditional belief in Japan that
the most important innovations and technical advances nearly always
originated in some other country. There was a "deeply engrained Japa
nese belief that what had been "proven* abroad should be imported
[directly] rather than developed domestically." Another factor was the
basic inability of government officials to understand the limits of reactor
technology. "After all. most of them had majored in law in college, not in
engineering or physics." The period in which nuclear reactors were
imported corresponded to a time of rapid economic growth. T h e period
of 'massive' importation of power reactors started with the government
of Ikeda Hayato (prime minister 1961-64) and continued through the
government of Sato Eisaku (prime minister 1964-69) who largely
maintained the same [high-growth] policy."16
During the past twenty-five years there has been more recognition of
basic research, as well as an emphasis on large-scale projects, many
(but not all) energy-related. October 1965, when Tomonaga Shin'ichiro
won the Nobel Prize in physics, marked one turning point 17 But the
principal event shaping research priorities was the October oil-price
hike of 1973. Following the quadrupling of oil prices by the Organiza
tion of Petroleum Exporting Countries, Japan responded by dramat
ically expanding its research budget, in some areas by as much as 400
percent 18 This expansion showed a feature of the Japanese system
strikingly different from the West While half the research done in
Europe and America is funded by government (especially for military
projects, in the case of the U.S.). an equal percentage of Japanese
research is conducted by firms for private-sector use. Only 8 percent or
so is based in universities, with military research getting far less (0.7
percent).19
Most recently there has been controversy among scientists in Japan
centering less on the structure of research priorities and more on the
mechanisms for funding research. Tonegawa Susumu, an MIT biolo
gist and 1987 Nobel laureate in medicine who is also a Japanese citizen,
has argued that he might not have been able to carry out his prize
winning research on antibody production had he remained in Japan
after 1963. (Most of his work was done in Switzerland.) The reason, he
28O EPILOGUE
suggests, is that young Japanese scientists in the postwar period have

often had difficulty finding money for research because government
agencies and academic institutions have usually awarded lump sums to
senior scientists, who direct them to favorites. This has too often meant
that relatively few resources reach the bottom level of the research
community, at least in Japan's universities.20 In fact, three prominent
features of the research funding system could conceivably have caused
problems for a talented young scientist: (1) the system tended to allo
cate funds to particular specialties according to the specialty's prior
funding level; (2) a disproportionate amount of research funds went to
the more prominent or famous scientists; and (3) there was at times a
tendency among principal investigators heading large research
teams—particularly in medicine—to allocate funds equally among
team members without much regard for differing needs.21
But to say this much and look no further gives a distorted perspective.
The government (in this case, the Ministry of Education) did stress
prior funding levels more than the content of actual proposals, but this
was mostly in the period from 1949 to 1966. This priority was set up
following extensive consultations with the Japan Society for the Ad
vancement of Science, operated at the highest levels of classification—
engineering, say, as compared to basic science—and had relatively
little influence on individual grants. Revisions of the basic algorithm for
calculating science funding (the "Fujioka Formula ; in 1967 and 1981
seem to have decreased the importance of the prior funding record.
Charges of preferential funding for the prominent and famous can also
be qualified. Such a pattern was more common during the first two
decades after the war, when money for research was particularly scarce
and peer review panelists were often concerned for young, vulnerable
proteges of established researchers. The gradual establishment of two-
phase reviewing has allowed some adjustments in the system. With
second-phase reviewers representing fields ancillary to the applicant's,
funding requests from unpatronized younger scientists have come to
enjoy greater success.22 With Japanese science in a period of youth,
greater success will characterize its future, too.
NOTES
Chapter One: The Social Formation of Japanese Science
1. Tamura Masao, ed, Nikon igaku hyaku nen ski (Tokyo: Rinsho Igaku
Sha, 1957), p. 4.
2. Tetsu H iroshige, "Social Conditions for the Researches of N uclear Physics
in Pre-War Japan," Japanese Studies in the History of Science 2 (1963) 84.
3. Otsuki Shoichiro. Nojima Tokukichi. and Maki Jiro. "Ninon ni okeru ka
gaku, gijutsu tokagakusha," in Sakata Shdichi, ed.. Kagaku gijutsu togendai,
Iwanami kdza, vol. 2 (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1963):310.
4. Sakata Shdichi, "Kenkyu to soshiki," Shizen (September 1947;, pp. 10
13.
5. Otsuki, Nojima, and Maki (n. 3 above), pp. 292. 287-88.
6. The chemist Sakurai Joji wrote in his memoirs that scientists were unable
to influence government policies, "even when we joined all our forces to
gether." See Sakurai Joji, Omoide no kazukazu (Tokyo: Herald Sha. 1940). p.
113.
7. Yuasa Mitsutomo. Kagaku ski (Tokyo: Toyo Keizai Shimpo Sha. 1961).
pp. 228. 282.
8. Sakata (n. 4 above), p. 10.
9. See. for example, Sylvan E. Moolton, "Ninon ni okeru igaku kyoiku kaizen
an," Nikon iji shimpo, no. 1191 (21 July 1946)3-10; and W H Leonard and
Harry C. Kelly, "Scientific Research and Technical Competence in Relation to
Resource Utilization," in Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers (SCAP),
ed., Japanese Natural Resources (Tokyo: CHQ, SCAP, 1948).
10. Robert Jastrow, "Science and the American Dream." Science Digest 91 /3
(March 1983): 48.
11. Quoted in "Electronics Research: A Quest for Global Leadership,"
Business Week (December 14, 1981), p. 29.
12. Frederic Golden, "Science: Closing the Gap with the West," Time 122/5
(August 1, 1983):56. Reported by Thomas Levenson.
13. Toshio Yukuta et al. "Science Discovery in Japan: Dawn of a New Era,"
Science 85 6/6 (July/August 1985), special advertising section, last page of
unpaginated text This report, prepared by the Stanford Research Institute, is
one of the most informative discussions in English of the history and current
status of Japanese science.
14. Esaki (Esaki Reona, in Japanese) in 1973 shared the Nobel Prize for
Physics (with Brian Josephson) for work on the tunnel diode.
15. Leo Esaki and Hajime Karatsu, "Shortcomings in Japan's R & D Ap
proach," Japan Echo 10 (Special Issue) (1983):28.
281
282 NOTES TO PAGES 2-3
16. Leo Esaki, "American Individualism vs. Japanese Groupism," IHJ (Inter
national House of Japan} Bulletin 2/3 (Summer 1982):3.
17. Charles Otis Whitman, Zoology in the University ofTokio (Yokohama:
Japan Gazette, 1881), pp. 3-4. Whitman taught zoology at Tokyo University in
the late 1870s.
18. Sata Yoshihiko, "Bydri kyoshitsu no sdritsu jidai: Miura-sensei no moto
ni manabishi koro," in Nagayo Matard, ed., Tokyo Teikoku Daigaku Bydrigaku
Kyoshitsu goju nen shi, 2 (Tokyo: Tdky6Teikoku Daigaku Igaku Bu, Bydrigaku
Kyoshitsu Goju Shu nen fdnen Kai, 1939), pp. 22-23.
19. See, for example: "Ibatsu to wa nan da?" Kdshu iji 2/3 (1898): 154-57;
Takebayashi Ko (pseudonym), "Ibatsu to wa nan da to wa nan da?" Ikai jih6
(hereafter U), no. 220 (August 20, 1898):574; "Kitasato Shibasaburo hyoron,"
Taiyd 6/3 (March 1902):26-28, (apparently written by Nakahama Toichiro).
20. Dai Ninon Bummei KyOkai, ed.. Ninon no kagaku kai (Tokyo: Dai Ninon
Bummei Ky6kai, 1917), p. 18. This publication was partly compiled by Okuma
Shigenobu, prime minister in 1914-16.
21. See, for instance: Goto Takeshi, "Urusaki hitobito," pt. 2, IJ, no. 1738
(November 26,1928)2291-92; MoritoTatsuo. Kagaku kenkyujo ron (Tokyo:
Kurita Shobo, 1939); and Sakurai (n. 6 above), p. 62. Morito servedforatimeas
minister of education during the late 1940s.
22. There are many examples of this view: Erich Fromm, Escape from Free
dom (New York: Avon Books, 1965), pp. 57-58; Joseph Needham. The Grand
Titration: Science and Society in East and West (Toronto: University of Toron
to Press, 1969), p. 40; and Thorstein Veblen, T h e Opportunity ofJapan,' in
Essays in Our Changing Order (New York: Viking. 1934). pp. 248-66.
23. Charles C. Gillispie. "The Encyclopedic and the Jacobin Philosophy of
Science," in Marshall M. Clagett, ed.. Critical Problems in the History of Sci
ence {Madison. University of Wisconsin Press. 1969), p. 269.
24. Joseph Ben-David, "The Scientific Role: The Conditions of Its Establish
ment in Europe," Minerva 4/1 (Autumn 1965): 15-54; idem, "Scientific
Growth: A Sociological View," Minerva 2/4 (Summer 1964):455-76; Jacques
Barzun, The House ofIntellect (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1959), p. 10; and
Gertrude Lenzer, ed., Auguste Comte and Positivism: The Essential Writings
(New York: Harper Torchbooks. 1970), p. 451.
25. The precise form of these questions was suggested to me by Arthur L.
Stinchcombe's review of a book by Robert E. Cote. For the text of the review, see
The American Journal of Sociology 86/5 (1981): 1155-58.
26. Rupert Hall represents the older view of the history of science. See his
book, The Scientific Revolution, 1500-1800: The Formation of the Modern
Scientific Attitude, 2d ed. (Boston: Beacon Press, 1964), pp. 145-59. Robin
Horton's work exemplifies the newer perspective. See "African Traditional
Thought and Western Science," in Bryan R. Wilson, ed., Rationality (New
York: Harper & Row, 1970), pp. 131-71; and idem, "Levy-Bruhl, Durkheim
and the Scientific Revolution," in Robin Horton and Ruth Finnegan, eds.,
Modes ofThought: Essays on Thinking in Western and Non-Western Societies
(London: Faber & Faber, 1973), pp. 249-305. So far as Japan is concerned, my
NOTES TO PAGES 3-4 283
own perspective is close to that of Nakayama Shigeru, who believes that the
emphasis in Meiji Japan on institution building is a model for historians of the
period. For an explanation in English, see his essay, "A History of Universities:
An Overview," in Shigeru Nakayama, David L. Swain, and Eri Yagi, eds..
Science and Society in Modern Japan: Selected Historical Sources (Cambridge:
MIT Press, 1974), pp. 72-80.
27. Albert M. Craig, "Science and Confucianism in Tokugawa Japan," in
Marius B. Jansen, ed, Changing Japanese Attitudes toward Modernization
(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1967), pp. 149-50. See also Tetsuo
Najita, "Intellectual Change in Early Eighteenth-Century Tokugawa Confu
cianism," Journal of Asian Studies 34/4 (August 1975)931-44
28. Craig (pp. 149-50) has made this point. So has the Japanese physicist
Kuwaki Ayao. See his essay. "Physical Sciences in Japan," in (Japan*s| National
Research Council, ed. Scientific Japan: Past and Present (Kyoto: Maruzen.
1926), esp. p. 250.
29. See Otsuki, Nojima, and Maki (n. 3 above), p. 283. Many Japanese writ
ers claim that Japanese culture and society have refused to adopt a Western-
style rationality. Representatives of this view are Yukawa Hideki, Nobel laure
ate in physics (1949). and the historical linguist Nakamura Hajime. See
Yukawa's essay, "Modem Trend of Western Civilization and Cultural Pecu
liarities in Japan," in Charles A. Moore, ed.. The Japanese Mind (Honolulu.
East-West Center, 1967), pp. 54-55. For Nakamura's views, see The Ways of
Thinking of Eastern Peoples, trans. Philip P Wiener (Honolulu: East-West
Center, 1964), pp. 531-76. Other observers, however, would say that this is
nothing more than a conspicuous example of Nihonjinron. On this subject, see
Peter Dale, The Myth of Japanese Uniqueness (New York: SL Martin's Press,
1986).
30. Yuasa (n. 7 above), p. 282.
31. See Shigeru Nakayama, Academic and Scientific Traditions in China,
Japan, and the West, trans. Jerry Dusenbury (Tokyo: University of Tokyo Press.
1984), pp. 203. 210-12. 220.
32. Shigeru Nakayama, "Science and Technology in Modem Japanese De
velopment," in William Beranek and Gustav Ranis, eds.. Science, Technology
and Economic Growth (New York: Praeger, 1978), p. 203.
33. Nakayama (n. 31 above), pp. 210-11.
34. Yoshida Mitsukuni, "Meiji no kagakushatachi," Jimbun gakuho 24
(March 1967):230. Similarly, Nakayama wrote: "In giving priority to the con
struction of an institutional system within which to transplant Western para
digms, Meiji Japan paid more attention to the configuration and format of learn
ing than to its content. Scholars troubled themselves little over how new
scholarly paradigms were being bom" (Nakayama, pp. 210-11).
35. Shigeru Nakayama, "Japanese Scientific Thought." in Charles C.
Gillispie, ed, Dictionary of Scientific Biography 15, suppL 1 (New York:
Charles Scribner's Sons. 1978), pp. 737, 741-42.
36. Fukuchi Shigetaka, Shizoku to samurai ishiki (Tokyo: Shunjusha,
1956), p. 249.
37. Nakayama (n. 31 above), p. 208.

39. Kamata Eikichi, president of Keio University in the early part of this
century, wrote a remarkable essay on factions in Japanese academic life in
which he argued that they have certain positive features—promotion of com
petition and stimulation of individual effort, in particular. The anthropologist
Ishino Iwao has expressed a similar view about factions in Japanese society
generally. See Kamata Eikichi, "Gakubatsu 6i ni kangei subeshi," in Kamata
Eikichi zenshu, 2 (Tokyo: Kamata Eikichi-Sensei Denki Oyobi Zenshu Kankd
Kai, 1934):507; and Iwao Ishino, "The Oyabun-Kobun A Japanese Kinship
Institution," American Anthropologist 55/1 (1953):705.
40. One commentator described the award to Fibiger as a "goof by the
(Nobel) committee." noting that he drew incorrect conclusions from the re
search that he did on cancer. By contrast, a 1930 obituary essay in The Lancet,
Britain's leading medical journal, stated that it was "impossibletoover-estimate
the importance of Yamagiwa s discovery for the study of cancer." See David
Wallechinsky and Irving Wallace, eds.. The People's Almanac (Garden City,
NY.: Doubleday & Company. 1975), p. 1118. and W. Cramer. "The Late Pro
fessor Yamagiwa." The Lancet 218 (May 24. 1930): 1155.
41. Sakata did his work at the Research Institute for Physics and Chemistry
in Tokyo and in the physics department of the University of Nagoya. Esaki did
his work at Sony Laboratories in Tokyo.
42. See Joseph Ben-David. The Scientist's Role in Society (Englewood Cliffs.
N.J : Prentice- Hall 1971), p. 21. Nakayama has implicitly argued that a similar
bias exists in Thomas Kuhn's approach to the history of science. For Kuhn's
view, see Thomas S. Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1962), and for Nakayama's view, "A History of
Universities" (n. 26 above), pp. 73-74.
43. In the late 1920s, Nishina Yoshio returned from Niels Bohr's laboratory
in Copenhagen and began work in particle physics, which became a dis
tinguished tradition in Japan. For details see Laurie M. Brown, M. Konuma, and
Z. Maki, Particle Physics in Japan, 1930-1950, 3 vois. (Kyoto: Research In
stitute for Fundamental Physics of Kyoto University, 1980).
Chapter Two: Science and Society in the Tokugawa Period
1. Shigeru Nakayama (ch. 1, n. 35), "Japanese Scientific Thought," p. 755.

See also p. 734: "The Japanese did not believe prior to the twentieth century,
that they could contribute to universal systems of knowledge."
2. Kanamaru Yoshio has made the point that the generation of Kato
Hiroyuki, a leading Meiji educator, was virtually thefirstin Japan to "decide on
their career specialty accordingtowhat they themselves liked." Before this one
simply inherited the family occupation. See his article, "Meiji ki ni okeru seiyo
kagaku no yunyu ni tsuite, shizoku no hatashita yakuwari o chushin to shite no
shiten settei no tame ni," Komazawa Shakaigaku Kenkyu, no. 4 (1972):58.
N O T E S TO P A G E S 1 1 - 1 4 285
3. See Nakayama (n. 1 above), pp. 746-47 on the question of professions in

the Tokugawa period.
4. Ronald P. Dore, Education in Tokugawa Japan (Berkeley and Los An
geles: University of California Press, 1965), pp. 14-15.
5. Donald Keene, The Japanese Discovery of Europe, 1720-1830, rev. ed.
(Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1969), p. 79.
6. John Whitney Hall, T h e Confucian Teacher in Tokugawa Japan," in
David S. Nivison and Arthur R. Wright, eds., Confucianism in Action (Stanford:
Stanford University Press. 1959), p. 287.
7. Maruyama Masao, "Fukuzawa Yukichi no jukyO hihan," in TOkyd
Teikoku Daigaku, ed. T6ky6 Teikoku Daigaku gakujutsu taikan. Hdgakubu
htizaigakubu (Tokyo: Tokyo Teikoku Daigaku, 1942). p. 415.
8. On salaries, see Hall (n. 6 above), pp. 277-79.
9. Dore (n. 4 above), p. 115. There was naturally some variation.
10. Shigem Nakayama, A History ofJapanese Astronomy (Cambridge: Har
vard University Press. 1969). p. 155.
11. Yamasaki Masatada, Higo iiku shi (Kumamoto: Chinzei Ikai Jihd Sha,
1929), p. 261. Yamasaki does not say that any physician actually received 5.000
koku, only that it was possible.
12. Cited in Nagai Tamotsu. Takagi Kanehiro den (Tokyo. TOkyd Jikei Kai
Ika Daigaku Soritsu Hachijugo Nen Kinen Jigy6 linkai. 1967). p 54.
14. Dore (n. 4 above), pp. 117-18.
15. Robert N. Bellah. "Intellectual and Society in Japan," paper prepared for
the Van Leer Conference on Tradition and Change (Jerusalem. March 1971),
pp.9, 11.
16. Nagai (n. 12 above), p. 38.
17. Grant K. Goodman, The Dutch Impact on Japan (Leiden: E.J. Brill,
1967), pp. 109. 99.
18. Dore (n 4 above), pp. 119-20.

19. Tadashi Yoshida, The Rangaku ofShizuki Tadao. The Introduction of
Western Science in Tokugaiva Japan (Ann Arbor: University Microfilms, 1974).
p. 73. See Yoshida's discussion of the Nagasaki interpreters in general.
21. R. H. Knapp and H. B. Goodrich, Origins of American Scientists
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1952), pp. 16-17.
22. Muramatsu Teijiro, Industrial Technology in Japan: A Historical Re
view (Tokyo: Hitachi Ltd., 1968), pp. 159, 22-26.
23. Ishikawa Matsutard, "Kinsei buke no kydiku, shomin no kyoiku," in
Umene Satom, ed, Ninon kyoiku shi (Tokyo: Kodansha, 1976), p. 156.
25. Goodman (n. 17 above), p. 96.
26. John Z. Bowers, Western Medical Pioneers in Feudal Japan (Baltimore:
Johns Hopkins University Press, 1970), pp. 10-18, 30.
27. Goodman (n. 17 above), pp. 88-89.
28. Ranzaburo Otori, 'The Acceptance of Western Medicine in Japan,"
Monumenta Nipponica 19/3-4 (Autumn 1964):31.
29. Sawako Ariyoshi, The Doctor's Wife, trans. Wakako Hironaka and Ann
Siller Kostant (Tokyo: Kodansha, 1978), pp. v-vt
30. Terashima Masashi, Nihon kagaku hattatsu shi (Tokyo: Keibunsha,
1937), pp. 127-28.
31. Bowers (n. 26 above), pp. 103-30.

32. Goodman (n. 17 above), p. 202, and Terashima (n. 30 above), p. 126.
35. Terashima (n. 30 above), pp. 118. 162-63; Goodman (n. 17 above), p.
134.
36. Terashima (n. 30 above), pp. 155-56. and Goodman (n. 17 above), p.
159.
38. Muramatsu (n. 22 above), p. 22.
40. Yoshio Mikami, The Development of Mathematics in China and Japan
(New York: Chelsea Publishing. 1913), p. 174.
41. See Nakayama (n. 10 above), pp. 88-94. and ltd Shuntard, "The Intro
duction of Western Cosmology in Seventeenth Century Japan: The Case of
Christovao Ferreira (1580-1652)." The Japan Foundation Newsletter 14/1
(May 1986): 1-9.
42. Nakayama (n. 10 above), pp 119. 120. 137-39.
43. Ibid., pp. 166. 194.
44. Ibid., p. 177.
45. Ibid., p. 178.
46. Terashima (n 30 above), pp 147-48.
48. Yoshida(n. 19 above), p. 67.
49. See biographical sketches in Dai Jimmei Jiten Henshu Bu, ed, Daijim
meijiten, 10 vols. (Tokyo: Heibonsha, 1957).
50. Mikami (n. 40 above), p. 302.
51. Oya Shin'ichi, personal communication (November 2,1976). See James
R. Bartholomew, "Why Was There No Scientific Revolution in Tokugawa Ja
pan?" Japanese Studies in the History of Science, no. 15 (1976): 123.
52. Sato Shosuke, 'Tembd: Yogaku shi," Kagaku Shi Kenkyu, 2d ser, 10, no.
97 (Spring 1971): 1-6.
53. Takahashi Shin'ichi, Yogaku ron (Tokyo: Mikasa Shobd, 1939), p. 181.
54. Cited in Kanamaru (n. 2 above), p. 53.
55. QuotedfromBairi yoko in ibid., p. 58.
56. For details, see Yoshida (n. 19 above), pp. 62-75.
57. Terashima (n. 30 above), p. 77.
58. Goodman (n. 17 above), pp. 52,65.
59. Ibid, p. 41, and Nakayama (n. 10 above), p. 165.
60. See Dore (n. 4 above), p. 71.
61. Ibid, pp. 160-61, 224-26, 322.
62. Quoted in Fukuchi Shigetaka, Shizoku to samurai ishiki (Tokyo: Shun
jusha, 1956), pp. 235-36.
63. Ibid, p. 230.
64. Johannes Hirschmeier, The Origins ofEntrepreneurship in Meiji Japan

(Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1967), p. 61.
65. Dore (n. 4 above), pp. 302-03.
66. Robert N. Bellah, Tokugawa Religion (Glencoe, I1L: Free Press, 1957).
See also Dore (n. 4 above), p. 212.
67. Fukuchi (n. 62 above), p. 235.
68. Ibid., pp. 229-30.
69. Dore (n. 4 above), p. 31.
70. Ishikawa (n. 23 above), p. 106.
71. Thomas C. Smith, The Agrarian Origins of Modern Japan (Stanford:
Stanford University Press. 1959), p. 111.
72. Yoshio Mikami and David Eugene Smith. A History ofJapanese Mathe
matics (Chicago: Open Court Publishing. 1914). pp. 207-08.
73. See Dore (n. 4 above), pp. 147. 47.
74. Kozo Yamamura, A Study of Samurai Income and Entrepreneurship
(Cambridge: Harvard University Press. 1974). p. 46.
75. Cited in Nakayama (n. 10 above), p. 160.
76. Quoted in Nakayama Shigeru, "'Shushin, seika, chikoku heitenka' to
kagaku," Butsurigaku shi kenkyu 2/3 (1963): 157.
77. Hanami Sakumi. Danshaku Yamakawa-senset den (Tokyo: Ko Dan
shaku Yamakawa-Sensei Kinen Kai. 1939). pp. 24-25.
79. Ibid. p. 753.
80. Bartholomew (n. 51 above), p. 124.
81. Ogura Kinnosuke. Sugaku shi kenkyu (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1935).
pp. 245. 242, 246.
82. Dore (n. 4 above), pp. 147. 205.
83. Ogura (n. 81 above), p. 235.
85. Mikami (n. 40 above), pp. 301-02.
86. Nakayama Shigeru, Rekishi to shite no gakumon (Tokyo: Chud Kd-ron
Sha, 1974), p. 96. See also the English-language version published as Academic
and Scientific Traditions in China, Japan and the West.
87. Dore (n. 4 above), pp. 17-18.
88. Ibid, p. 71. See also Ishikawa (n. 23 above), pp. 142-43; Dore (n. 4
above), pp. 24-25,44, 71; and Yamasaki (n. 11 above), p. 8.
89. Ishikawa (n. 23 above), p. 154; Nakayama (n. 10 above), p. 189.
90. Yamasaki (n. 11 above), pp. 35, 33.
91. For a discussion of the Saishunkan's program, see ibid., pp. 11, 35.
92. Yoshio Kanamaru, The Development of a Scientific Community in Pre-
Modern Japan (Ann Arbor: University Microfilms, 1980) pp. 44-50. 69.
93. Dore (n. 4 above), p. 208.
94. Frederick G. NoteheJfer, American Samurai: Captain L. L. Janes and
Japan (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1985), p. 134.
95. Yamasaki (n. 11 above), pp. 288-90,333-34; 295; and Irwin Scheiner,
Christian Converts and Social Protest in Meiji Japan (Berkeley: University of
California Press, 1970), pp. 72, 76-77.
96. Yoshida (n. 19 above), p. 10.
97. Dare (n. 4 above), p. 164.

99. Ibid, pp. 120-21.
100. Kanamam (n. 92 above), p. 382. See also Otani RyOkichi, A Brief Ac
count of the Life and Work ofTadataka Ino. Proceedings of the Imperial Acade
my of Sciences 1 (Tokyo, 1912): 176-80.
101. Masayoshi Sugimotoand David L. Swain, Science and Cultu re in Tradi
tional Japan, A.D. 600-1854 (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1978), pp. 298-300.
102. Yamasaki (n. 11 above), pp. 31,32; Sugimotoand Swain (n. 101 above),
pp. 302-03.
103. See Kanamam (n. 92 above), pp. 33-36,148. Sugimoto and Swain (n.
101 above), pp. 396-98. and Yoshida (n 19 above), p. 7.
104. Yoshida (n. 19 above), p. 7, and Kanamaru (n. 92 above), p. 403. Kana
mam even argues that the linguistic skills of the staff led them away from
scientific interests and "perverted" the scientific movement.
105. The Bansho Shirabesho (Institute for investigating barbarian books)
was renamed Yosho Shirabesho (Institute for investigating Western books) in
1862 and Kaiseisho (I nstitu te for cultivation and development) in 1863. Follow
ing the Restoration in 1868, there were other name changes before it emerged
(with several new components) as Tokyo University in 1877. See Kanamaru (n.
92 above), p. 33. For a summary of post-Restoration developments, see Henry
DeWitt Smith II. Japan's First Student Radicals (Cambridge. Harvard Univer
sity Press, 1972). pp. 4-8.
106. Sugimoto and Swain (n. 101 above), pp. 396-98.
107. Kanamam (n. 92 above), p. 191.
108. Dore (n. 4 above), p. 169.
109. Yagi En, Itakura Kiyonobu, and Kimura Tosaku, Nagaoka Hantaro den
(Tokyo: Asahi Shimbun Sha, 1973), pp. 51-52.
110. Nakayama (n. 1 above), p. 740. See also Bowers (n. 26 above), p. 143.
111. Sugimoto and Swain (n. 101 above), pp. 377-78, and Bowers (n. 26
above), pp. 25-26.
112. Kanamam (n. 92 above), pp. 31-32.
113. Bowers (n. 26 above), p. 9. For useful background information on Sie
boW's education and career, see ibid., pp. 102-09. For his role in the populariza
tion of the Linnaean botanical scheme, see Sugimoto Isao, ltd Keisuke (Tokyo:
Yoshikawa Kobunkan, 1960). pp. 43-68.
114. Sugimoto and Swain (n. 101 above), pp. 334. 338-44.
115. John Z. Bowers, When the Twain Meet: The Rise ofWestern Medicine in
Japan (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1980), pp. 10,30. The
school was called the Seitokukan from 1862.
116. Sugawara Kunika, "Meiji shoki no kagaku," Kagaku kyoiku 22/'4
(1974):247-54.
117. Bowers (n. 115 above), pp. 30-33.
118. Sugawara (n. 116 above), p. 249; Yagi, Itakura, and Kimura (n. 109
above), pp. 26-28, 52-54.
119. Yagi, Itakura, and Kimura (n. 109 above), pp. 52, 26. Regarding
Nagaoka, see pp. 26-27. Takamine's association with this school is discussed
by Shiobara Matasaku, Takamine hakushi (Tokyo: Shiobara Matasaku, 1926),

pp. 9-10.
120. Nagai (n 12 above), pp. 72-75. 85.
122. Dore (n. 4 above), pp. 265-66. See also Sugimoto and Swain (n. 101
above), p. 334.
123. Of the twenty-three medical academies founded in the Tokugawa peri
od, eleven were established by the shogunate or various daimyo and twelve by
private groups. For details, see Bowers (n. 26 above), pp. 93-94.
124. Sugimoto and Swain (n. 101 above), p. 334.
125. Kanamaru (n. 92 above), p. 31.
126. Bowers (n. 26 above), pp. 94, 98.
127. Fukuzawa Yukichi, The Autobiography ofYukichi Fukuzawa, trans.
Eiichi Kiyooka (New York: Columbia University Press. 1966). pp. 72. 80-81.
334.
128. For information on functions, see Kanamaru (n. 92 above), pp. 291.
400-03.
129. Nagayo Sensai, Shokd shishi. 2 (Tokyo: Nagayo Shokichi. 1902). 178.
130. Yoshida (n 19 above), p 5.
131. Yagt Itakura, and Kimura (n. 109 above), p. 51.
132. Kanamaru (n. 92 above), p. 172. "Only the government could utilize
this [translation and research] ability to its maximum extent"
133. Yoshida (n. 19 above), pp 14-16.
135. The exceptions were primarily (but not exclusively) the shogunate in
stitutions that developed into Tokyo University. See chapter 4 for details.
136. Quoted in Maruyama (n. 7 above), p. 415.
137. Quoted in Dore (n. 4 above), p. 168.
138. Itakura Kiyonobu. "Watanabe Bin to Misawa Katsue." Kasetsu jikken
jugyo kenkyu 8 (1975)21-48.
139. Itakura Kiyonobu, private communication, December 13. 1976.
140. Mikami (n. 40 above), pp. 303-04.
142. Dore (n. 4 above), pp. 164-65.
143. Quoted in Maruyama (n. 7 above), pp. 410-11.
144. Hall (n. 6 above), pp. 287, 291-92.
145. On the subject of bureaucratic generalists and specialists in East Asian
political systems, see Nakayama (n. 86 above), p. 70, and Nathan Sivin, "How
Does Science Begin?" Technology Review 71/3 (January 1969) 63.
147. Endo Toshisada, Zoshu Nihon sugaku shi (Tokyo: Koseisha Koseikaku,
1960), pp. 64-65.
149. In addition to thefivedomains—Aizu, Satsuma, Sendai, Kyoto, and the
shogunal territories—the Mishima and Ise shrines were also authorized to
produce calendars. Oya Shin'ichi, private communication, November 2,1976.
150. Dore (IL 4 above), pp. 16-17, 5.
2go NOTES TO PACES 36-41

152. Mikami (n. 40 above), p. 180.
153. Ibid., p. 183.
154. Yamasaki (n. 11 above), pp. 270,276-77. See also Done (n. 4 above), p.
44.
155. Goodman Cn. 17 above), pp. 94-95.
156. Ibid., pp. 191-92.
157. Nakayama(n. 10 above), pp. 168-69.
159. Ibid., p. 65. and Nakayama (n. 10 above), p. 171.
160. Goodman (n. 17 above), pp. 79-85.
161. Ishikawa (n. 23 above), pp. 135-36.
162. Terashima (n. 30 above), pp. 110-11.
164. Dore (n. 4 above), p. 30.
165. Yoshida (n. 19 above), p. 8.
166. Edward Seidensticker described his feelings about Tokugawa Japan
this way: T h e Tokugawa period is somehow dark and menacing. Too many
gifted people were squelched, and whether gifted or not, I always have the
feeling about Edo (its capital] that, had I been there. I would have been among
the squelched ones " See Low City, High City (New York: Alfred A Knopf.
1983). p. vii.
168. See in particular Donald Keene's (n. 5 above) excellent account of the
"Siebold Affair," pp. 138-55.
169. Otsuki Nyoden, Shisen yogaku nempyo, 2d ed. (Tokyo: Hakurinsha
Shoten. 1963), entry for 1829.
171. Satd Shosuke, Taigai kankei no kiki to yogaku." in Sugimoto Isao, ed.,
Kagaku shi, Taikei Ninon shi sosho 19 (Tokyo: Yamakawa Shuppan Sha,
1967), p. 322.
173. Watanabe Kazan, "Shoko seiyo jijd sho." and "Saikd seiyd jijo sho," in
Sato Shosuke et aL, eds., Nikon shiso taikei 55: Watanabe Kazan, Takano
Choei, Sakuma Shozan, Yokoi Shonan, Hashimoto Sanai (Tokyo: Iwanami
Shoten, 1974), pp. 49, 62.
175. Nagai (n. 12 above), pp. 8-10.
176. Ogura (n. 81 above), p. 241.
177. Ibid., p. 244, and Meiji Shi Koza Kanko Kai, ed., Meiji kagaku shi
(Tokyo: Ninon Bungaku Sha, 1931), p. 10.
178. Minoru Watanabe, "Japanese Students Abroad and the Acquisition of
Scientific and Technical Knowledge," Journal of World History 9/2
(1965):264-65.
179. Quoted in Yagi, Itakura, and Kimura (n. 109 above), p. 52.
180. Dore (n. 4 above), p. 167.
181. Nakayama Shigeru, private communication, November 2, 1976. For
NOTES TO PAGES 41-44 2gi
information on the Oranda Fusetsugaki, see Sato (n. 171 above), pp. 291-92,
and Satd Shdsuke, "Rangaku bokkd no sho zentei," in Sugimoto, ed. (n. 171
above), p. 218.
182. Robert A. Nisbet, The Quest for Community (New York: Oxford Univer
sity Press, 1969), pp. 225-47.
183. Watanabe (n. 178 above), pp. 257-59.
184. J. Harris and W. H. Brock, "From Giessen to Gower Street: Towards a
Biography of Alexander William Williamson (1824-1904)," Annals of Science
31/2 (1974): 123. Williamson took charge of these men while they were study
ing in London.
186. Mikami and Smith (n. 72 above), p. 188.
187. Even during the last years of the Tokugawa era, it is argued that instruc
tion was "hampered by the feudalistic status system" at the Numazu military
academy, which taught science and mathematics. See Fujii Shoichiri.
"Numazu Heigakkd to sono Nihon kindai sokuchi jigyd e no eikyo ru tsuite,"
Kagaku shi kenkyu 51 (Autumn 1959):3. However, the author presents no
direct evidence to prove this.
188. Dore (n. 4 above), p. 52.
189. Ibid., p. 83.
190. Ibid., p. 183.
191. Quoted in Miyajima Mikinosuke. Kttasato Shibasaburo den (Tokyo:
Iwanami Shoten, 1931). pp. 198-99. Kitasato's remarks were delivered at a
memorial lectureforhis teacher Robert Koch on December 11.1917. and were
originally printed in "Koch-sensei kinen koen kai," IJ, no. 1225 (December 15.
1917):2184.
192. Dore (n. 4 above), p. 141. Dore also cites the example of one domain
school where the instructor arranged in advance for six students to raise ques
tions. No one else was allowed to do so.
193. Ibid., pp. 50-52, 83, 150. The specific reference is to archery. The
author also compares mathematics to military arts like archery.
194. Ibid., p. 88. See also Otani (n. 100 above), pp. 185-86, 190.
195. Dore (n. 4 above), p. 183.
196. Yoshiharu Scott Matsumoto, "Contemporary Japan: The Individual and
the Group," Transactions of the American Philosophical Society 50/1 (January
1960):35.
197. Dore (n. 4 above), p. 53. The author's apparent reference is to the
absence of anatomical dissections prior to the mid-eighteenth century.
198. Ogura (n. 81 above), p. 238.
199. Yoshida Mitsukuni, "Meiji no kagaku shatachi," Jimbun gakuho 24
(March 1967):230.
200. For astronomy, see Sugimoto and Swain (n. 101 above), p. 199. For
medicine, see Bowers (n. 26 above), p. 8.
202. Dore (n. 4 above), pp. 312-13.
204. Yagi, Itakura, and Kimura (n. 109 above), p. 50.
NOTES TO PAGES 44-49

206. Endd (n. 147 above), p. 65.
207. Sakurai Jdji, Mathematico-Physical Science in Japan," in Okuma
Shigenobu, ed.. Fifty Years of New Japan, 2 (London: Smith, Elder & Co.,
1910):247.
208. Sugimoto and Swain (n. 101 above), pp. 374, 380-82.
209. John D. Bemal, The Social Function ofScience (New York: Macmillan,
1939), p. 80.
211. David Chibbett, The History of Japanese Printing and Book Illustra
tion (Tokyo: Kodansha International, 1977), p. 74.1 am indebted to Maureen H.
Donovan for calling my attention to this book.
212. Sakurai (n. 207 above), p. 243.
213. On idai, see Muramatsu (n. 22 above), pp. 22-26.
214. Mikami and Smith (n. 72 above), p. 188.
215. Ogura (n. 81 above), pp. 236-37.
216. Otani (n. 99 above), pp. 185-86. 190.
219. Dore (n. 4 above), p. 209. See also Thomas C. Smith, "Merit* as Ide
ology in the Tokugawa Period," in R. P Dore, ed. Aspects of Social Change in
Modern Japan (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1967), p. 73.
220. Smith (n. 219 above), pp. 85-88.
222. Michael Yoshino, Japan's Managerial Ideology (Cambridge: Harvard
University Press, 1968), p. 50.
223. Dore (n. 4 above), p. 156.
224. Kanamaru (n. 92 above), pp. 247-48, 231.
226. Ogura (n. 81 above), pp. 238, 240-41.
Chapter Three: Formation of the Meiji Scientific Community

1. J. M. Cattell and Dean R. Brimhall, eds., American Men ofScience, 3d ed.
(Garrison, N.Y.: Science Press, 1921), p. 787.
2. Marquis de Condorcet, Outlines of an Historical View of the Progress of
the Human Mind, quoted in Keith Michael Baker, Condorcet: From Natural
Philosophy to Social Mathematics (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1975), p. 176, and Jean Dessau, "Social Factors Affecting Science and Tech
nology in Asia," Impact of Science on Society 19/1 (1969): 14.
3. C. Emest Dawn, From Ottomanism to Arabism: Essays on the Origins of
Arab Nationalism (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1973), pp. 197-98, and
Joseph Gusfield, "Educational Institutions in the Process of Economic and
National Development," Journal of Asian and African Studies 1/2 (April
1966): 143.
4. Morroe Berger. The Arab World Today (New York: Doubleday. 1962), pp.
NOTES TO PAGES 49-51 2Q3
385-86, and Seymour M. Upset and Reinhard Bendix, Social Mobility in In
dustrial Society (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press,
1959), pp. 57-64.
5. Joseph Ben-David, The Scientist's Role in Society (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.:
Prentice-Hall 1971), p. 21.
6. Shugiin Jimukyoku, Teikoku Gikai Shugiin linkai giroku (hereafter
TGS/G), "Dai go-ka dai-ichi gd," House of Representatives Budget Commit
tee, 5th Diet, December 8, 1893. p. 20.
7. Ibid., p. 3.
8. Fukuzawa Yukichi, The Autobiography ofYukichi Fukuzawa, p. 92.
9. Masayoshi Sugimoto and David L. Swain, Science and Culture in Tradi
tional Japan, AD. 600-1854, p. 348.
10. Kenkichiro Koizumi, "The Emergence of Japan's First Physicists, 1868
1900," in Russell McCormmach, ed.. Historical Studies in the Physical Sci
ences, 6 (Princeton: Princeton University Press. 1975): 17.
11. Shigeru Nakayama, "Japanese Scientific Thought," in Charles C.
Gillispie, ed., Dictionary of Scientific Biography, 15/1 743.
12. Tominari Kimahei, Gendai Nihon kagaku shi (Tokyo: Mikasa Shobd,
1941), pp. 58-59.
13. Mitsutomo Yuasa. "The Scientific Revolution and the Age of Tech
nology." Journal of World History 9/2 (1965): 187-207.
14. Fukuchi Shigetaka, Shizoku to samurai ishikt.
15. Yuasa Mitsutomo, Kagaku shi, p. 161.
16. See the discussion of the proposed hakushi degree system which took
place between Mori Arinori and the members of the Tokyo Academy of Science
on October 15, 1885. The text is reprinted in Nihon Gakushiin. ed., Nihon
Gakushiin hachiju nen shi, shiryo J (Tokyo: Nihon Gakushiin, 1962):304-08.
17. The debate conducted by the Tokyo academy on October 15, 1885. es
pecially exchanges between Kato Hiroyuki and Mori Arinori, reveals that the
degree categories were supposed to correspond closely to the academic pro
grams at Tokyo University. See ibid., p. 308.
18. Mori insisted (more or less correctly) that no other country had a system
of degrees quite like the Japanese. See his remarks on this question made on
May 7, 1888, when he presided over the first conferrals. Mori Arinori, "Mom
busho no gakui juyoshiki ni okeru enzetsu," in Mori Arinori zenshu, 1 (Tokyo:
Senbundo, 1972):618-19.
19. As a category, scientist had the connotation of "eccentric" or "odd," while
hakushi (doctorate holder) connoted status or prestige. In 1891 Tokutomi Sohd
characterized the awarding of new doctorates by the Ministry of Education as a
"singularly auspicious event for the nation." Ishikawa Teijird, biographer of
physicist Honda Kdtaro, describes the fuss that residents of Honda's native
village made over his reception of the doctorate in 1903, noting that the degree
had "tremendous prestige among ordinary people." On August 22, 1914, Ikai
jiho stated flatly: "An unwritten law holds that if a man has not. . . secured a
doctorate, he cannot become a university professor." And consider the following
report about the fate of one in academic life who failed to obtain the doctorate.
Shortly before World War I, Hashimoto Sessai, assistant professor of internal
medicine at Tokyo University (1899-1914), published a Japanese-language

textbook in his field. On being shown a copy by a student. Dean Aoyama Tan
emichi angrily grabbed the book and threw it out a second-story window, ex
claiming: There is no need for you to study German if people are going to write
trash like this!" Arai Tsuneo, one of three writers reporting on this event, then
relates: "Professor Hashimoto was at that time an assistant professor lecturing
on diagnostics. But in the end he was unable to obtain his degree (D.Sc.Med.]
and was immediately obliged to leave the university." See the following sources
for details on public attitudes toward the doctorate and its importance in Meiji
academic life: Tokutomi Sohd, "Hakushi seizo," Kokumin no tomo, no. 127
(August 13, 1891): 159; Ishikawa Te^jirO, Honda Kdtard den (Tokyo: Nikkan
Kdgyd Shimbun Sha, 1964). p. 116; "Kore zekkd no kikai ka?" IJ, no. 1052
(August 22, 1914): 1481; and Arai Tsuneo, Tanemichi sumbyd," in Kumagai
Kenji, ed., Omoide no Aoyama Tanemichi-sensei (Tokyo: Aoyama-Sensei Tanjd
Hyakunen Sai Jumbi Iinkai. 1959). p. 142.
20. Mitamura Makujird, Tanemichi no sekai ddtoku." in Kumagai (n. 19
above), p. 163. Mitamura. who served as assistant professor and then professor
of pathology at Tokyo University between 1920 and 1946, made this remark in
the 1950s. Almost certainly he was referring to the interwar period rather than
to the half-century which preceded it, the focus of concern here. In the interwar
period the truly dramatic increase in the number and percentage of doctorates
awarded in medicine, as opposed to doctorates in other fields, took place. For
details, see Iseki Kurd, ed., Dai Nikon hakushi roku, 3 (Tokyo: Hattensha,
1930). I wish to thank Harry Bang of Ball State University for bringing this issue
to my attention.
21. No women received the doctorate in a technicalfielduntil after 1920. For
details see Nagashima Yuzuru, Onna hakushi retsu den (Tokyo: Kagaku
Chishiki Fukyu Kai, 1937).
22. Other sources useful in compiling these data were the following official
histories of the imperial universities: Tdkyd Teikoku Daigaku, Tokyo Teikoku
Daigaku goju nen shi, 2 vols. (Tokyo: Tdkyd Teikoku Daigaku, 1932 (hereafter
TTDGNS]); Kyoto Teikoku Daigaku, Kyoto Teikoku Daigaku shi (Kyoto.
Kyoto Teikoku Daigaku, 1943); Kyoto Daigaku, Kyoto Daigaku nanaju nen
shi (Kyoto: Kyoto Daigaku, 1967); Tdhoku Daigaku, Tohoku Daigaku goju
nen ski, 2 vols. (Sendai: Tohoku Daigaku, 1960); Kyushu Daigaku, Kyushu
Daigaku goju nen shit 3 vols. (Fukuoka: Kyushu Daigaku Sdritsu Goju Shun-
en Kinen Kai, 1967); and Hokkaidd Daigaku, Hokkaidd Daigaku soki hachiju
nen shi (Sapporo: Hokkaidd Daigaku, 1965). It should be noted, however, that
these figures are only close approximations; the figures for Kyoto, in particu
lar, are far from complete.
23. Fukuchi Shigetaka, for example, wrote: "Thefirstfieldof Japanese sci
ence to attain worldwide levels of performance after the Meiji Restoration was
medicine. This was because it had a longer tradition than other sciences"
Fukuchi (n. 14 above), p. 249. See also Nakayama (n. 11 above), pp. 728-58.
24. For details on the American case, see R. H. Knapp and H. B. Goodrich,
Origins of American Scientists, pp. 16-'17.
25. Population figures are from Otsuka Takematsu, ed., Hansei ichiran, 2
vols. (Tokyo: Nihon Shiseki Kydkai, 1928-29), and Irene Taeuber, The Popula
tion of Japan (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1954).
26. Motoyama Yukihiko, "The Education Policy of Fukui and William Eliot
Griffis," in Ardath W. Burks, ed.. The Modernizers: Overseas Students, Foreign
Employees, andMeiji Japan (Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1985), pp. 265
300.
27. Ivan Hall, Mori Arinori (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1973),
pp. 32-46.
28. Anne Roe, The Making of a Scientist (New York: Dodd Mead, 1952), pp.
80-86.
29. Nagai Tamotsu, Takagi Kanehiro den, p. 184.
30. Miyajima Mikinosuke, Kitasato Shibasaburd den. pp. 5-15.
31. Fukuda Reiju, Kitasato Shibasaburd hakushi (Kumamoto Yuko Jiron
Sha, 1963). pp. 1-7.
32. Ibid., p. 3.
33. Irwin Scheiner. Christian Converts and Social Protest in Meiji Japan,
pp. 71-72.
34. Yamasaki Masatada, Higo iiku shi, pp 296. 333-34.
35. Nagai (n. 29 above), pp. 38. 17-18.
36. Gustav Eckstein, Noguchi (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1931), pp. 27
28. See also Isabel R Plesset, Noguchi and His Patrons (Rutherford. N.J.
Fairieigh Dickinson University Press. 1980), pp 53-105.
37. Sugimoto Isao, ltd Keisuke, pp. 7-10, 42-45.
38. Sugiura Kotaro. "Ueda Kazutoshi hakushi tsuitd ki," Kokkan 52 (Oc
tober 1938): 12.
39. TGS1G (n. 6 above), p. 3.
40. Terashima Masashi, Sekaiteki na Nihon kagakusha (Tokyo: Izumi
Shobo, 1944), pp. 162-63.
41. For information on the status of chemistry in Europe and America at the
time, see D. S. L. Cardwell, The Organisation ofScience in England (London:
Wm. Heinemann, 1957).
42. Yoshida Mitsukuni, "Meyi no kagakushatachi," Jimbun gakuho 24
(March 1967):230-61.
43. Shiobara Matasaku, Takamine hakushi, pp. 1-10.
44. Majima Toshiyuki-Sensei Ikoshu Kanko Iinkai, ed, Majima Toshiyuki
sensei, iko to tsuioku (Tokyo: Majima Toshiyuki-Sensei Ikoshu Kanko Iinkai,
1970), p. 7.
45. Tanaka Minoru, Nihon no kagaku to Shibata Yuji (Tokyo: Dai Nihon
Tosho, 1975), pp. 17-24.
46. Nagai's rather was interested in materia medica, as was Nagai In the
1880s the son isolated ephedrine in a pure form from the Chinese herb ma
huang. It was the "first natural sympathomimedc amine to make its appearance
in history" and is used in Western and Oriental medicine alike. See Kanao Seizo,
Nagai Nagayoshi den (Tokyo: Nihon Yakugakkai, 1960), p. 443.
47. Sakurai Joji, Omoide no kazukazu, p. 2.
48. Quoted in Ishikawa (n. 19 above), p. 56.
49. Hanami Sakumi, Danshaku Yamakawa-sensei den, pp. 52-70. Spen
296 NOTES TO PACES 62-67
cer's article was entitled "The Study of Sociology,' and it appeared in several
successive issues of Popular Science Monthly, ed. E. R. Youmans, in 1872 and
1873.
50. Hanami (n. 49 above), pp. 69-70.
51. Nakayama Shigeru (ch. 2, n. 76), *'Shushin. seika, chlkoku heitenka' to
kagaku." p. 162.
52. Nakamura Seiji, Tanakadate Aikitsu-sensei (Tokyo: Obun Shorin,
1943), pp. 1-3,39-40.
54. Nagaoka was actually best known in Japan as an experimental physicist,
despite his well-known work on modeling the atom.
55. Yagi En, Itakura Kiyonobu, and Kimura Tosaku, Nagaoka Hantard den,
pp. 13-17.
56. Nagaoka Hantard. "Butsurigaku senkd o kimeru toki no nay ami," re
printed in Nihon Kagaku Shi Gakkai, ed.. Nikon kagaku gijutsu ski taikei
(hereafter NKGST). 8/1 (Tokyo: Nihon Kagaku Shi Gakkai, 1964):398-99
57. Ishikawa (n. 19 above), pp. 17, 29, 56-57.
58. Hazel L Jones. Live Machines: Hired Foreigners and Meiji Japan
(Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1980). p. 13.
59. Ogata Hiroyasu. Seiyokyoiku inyu no hdto (Tokyo: Kodansha, 1961), pp.
79-80. 88-89. 94.
60. Letter of Jury 2. 1875, reprinted in Kanao (n. 46 above), p. 109.
61. Cited in Jones (n. 58 above), p. 86.
62. TGSIG. Cf. "Shugiin yosan iinkai sokkiroku dai-juhachi go," House of
Representatives Budget Committee, 3d Diet, March 15, 1892, p. 5.
63. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-ichi ka dai-san gd," House of Representatives Budget
Committee, 10th Diet, January 27, 1897. p. 43.
64. Jones (n. 58 above), pp. 74, 75.
65. John Z. Bowers, When the Twain Meet. The Rise of Western Medicine in
Japan, pp. 89-99. 98.
66. Ibid., p. 64.
67. Noboru Umetani, The Role of Foreign Employees in the Meiji Era in
Japan (Tokyo: Institute of Developing Economies, 1971), pp. 64—67.
68. Nakamura (n. 52 above), p. 67.
69. J. Harris and W. H. Brock (ch. 2, n. 184), "From Giessen to Gower Street:
Towards a Biography of Alexander William Williamson (1824-1904)" pp. 124
25, and Ishikawa (n. 19 above), pp. 61-62.
70. Nakamura (n. 52 above), pp. 47-50.
71. Tokyo Teikoku Daigaku, Tokyo Teikoku Daigaku gakujutsu taikan: Ji
shin Kenkyu Jo, Tokyo Temmon Dai, Rigaku Bu (Tokyo: Tokyo Teikoku
Daigaku, 1942), pp. 139-44.
72. Umetani (n. 67 above), pp. 59-60.
73. Janet Hunter, "The Development of Technical Education in Japan: For
eign Teachers at the Imperial College of Engineering, 1872-1885," un
published paper, University of Sheffield, 1971, pp. 15-16, 39-41.
74. Jones (n. 58 above), p. 75.
76. Bowers (n. 65 above), pp. 98, 82, 86-89.
77. Ibid, p. 99.

78. T0ky6 Teikoku Daigaku, Tokyd Teikoku Daigaku gakujutsu taikan:
Ndgaku Bu, Densembyd Kenkyu Jo, Igaku Bu (Tokyo: Tdkyd Teikoku Daigaku,
1942), pp. 33-34.
79. Uzaki Kumakichi, Aoyama Tanemichi (Tokyo: Aoyama Naika Doso Kai,
1930), pp. 42-43, and Nakamura (n. 52 above), p. 71. Ewing did not graduate
from Glasgow but did have close ties with Kelvin, who was there.
80. See the discussion in Bowers (n. 65 above), pp. 47-48.
81. Tanaka (n. 45 above), pp. 71-75.
82. Yagi, Itakura, and Kimura (n 55 above), pp. 114-15.
83. The foreign professors' relative lack of influence on the development of
particular lines of research by the Japanese may have been a function of the
students' relative youth or of the relatively poor state of research facilities in
Japan. There were, however, exceptions. Cargiil G. Knott, for example, insti
gated Nagaoka Hantaro's initial work on magnetostriction, which Nagaoka
continued in Europe. See Yagi, Itakura, and Kimura (n. 55 above), pp. 177-78,
for details.
84. NKGSTBn (n. 56 above):352-53.
85. TGS1G (n. 63 above), p. 43.
86. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-ichi ka dai-san gd." House of Representatives Budget
Committee. 13th Diet, December 13. 1898, p. 30.
87. TGSIG Cf. "Yosan iin dai-ichi bunkakai (Naimushd. Mombusho jokan)
kaigiroku (sokki) dai-go kai," House of Representatives Budget Committee,
16th Diet, December 20, 1901, p. 61.
88. Minoru Watanabe (ch. 2. n. 178). "Japanese Students Abroad and the
Acquisition of Scientific and Technical Knowledge." pp. 266-68.
89. TGSIG (n. 87 above), p. 61. Testimony of Ueda Kazutoshi, chief of the
Bureau of Professional Education.
90. Among (he ministries involved were Home Affairs. Education, War,
Navy, Justice, and Foreign Affairs. Control over all students studying abroad
was an enduring goal of the Ministry of Education, toward which the ministry
progressed without wholly achieving it
91. Sato Kenzo, Kokuritsu daigaku zaisei seido shiko (Tokyo: Dai-ichi Hdki,
1964), p. 381.
92. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-ichi ka dai-ni gd," House of Representatives Budget
Committee, 12th Diet, May 25. 1898, pp. 11-15.
93. TGSIG (n. 87 above), p. 61.
94. "Kore zekkd no kikai ka?" IJ, no. 1052 (August 22, 1914)1481
95. "Ryflgaku o haiseyd," IJ, no. 925 (March 16, 1912):436.
96. Miura Norihiko, ed, Ichi igakusha no seikatsu o meguru kaiso: Meiyo
Kyoju Miura Kinnosuke no shogai (Tokyo: Ishiyaku Shuppan, 1955), p. 38.
97. Miyajima (n. 30 above), pp. 33-34.
98. Nagayo Hakushi Kinen Kai, ed., Nagayo Mataro den (Tokyo: Nagayo
Hakushi Kinen Kai, 1944), p. 117. Uzaki Kumakichi states that around 1883
the Ministry of Education was giving each ryugakusei 1,800 yen per year, paid
through the Japanese embassy in the particular country. See Uzaki (n. 79
above), p. 54.
100. Uzaki (n. 79 above), p. 54.

101. Miyajima (n. 30 above), p. 37. Although Miyajima's account suggests
that his detachment resulted from dedication to work, Takagi Tomoeda states
that his annual stipendfromthe Ministry of Home Affairs was only 600 yen. See
Takagi, "Henrin no ni, san," in Miyajima (n. 30 above), p. 263.
102. Kanao (n. 46 above), pp. 101-02, and Ishikawa (n. 19 above), pp. 144
45.
103. TGS1G (n. 63 above), p. 38.
104. TGSIG (n. 92 above), p. 11.
105. Ibid, pp. 12-13.
106. One or two spent some time in China. Other countries may have been
visited for professional purposes without being noted in biographical sketches.
107. Ben-David (n. 5 above), p. 189. Based on a list of medical discoveries in
Fielding H. Garrison. An Introduction to the History ofMedicine, 4th ed. (Phil
adelphia: D.B. Saunders. 1929).
108. Ben-David (n. 5 above), p. 189, and Joseph Ben-David and Awraham
Zloczower. "Universities and Academic Systems in Modem Societies."
Archives europeennes de sociologie 3/1 (1962):56.
109. Jones (n. 58 above), p. 114.
110. Tanaka (n. 45 above), pp. 83-130.
111. Harris and Brock (n. 69 above), p. 126.
112. Tanaka (n. 45 above), p. 131.
113. Kanao (n. 46 above), pp. 101-02.
114. Hanami (n. 49 above), pp. 77-79.
115. Miyajima (n. 30 above), pp 39-40.
116. Ibid, pp. 40-41.
117. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-yon kai Teikoku Gikai Shugiin yosan iinkai sokkiroku,"
House of Representatives Budget Committee, 4th Diet, December 9,1892, p. 3.
118. Yagi, Itakura, and Kimura (n. 55 above), pp. 165, 177-78, 170.
119. TGSIG (n. 117 above), p. 3.
120. TGSIG (n. 92 above), p. 15.
122. Miyajima (n. 30 above), p. 43.
124. Kanao (n. 46 above), pp. 113-14, 122-23, 103-06.
125. G A. Tammann, "Gustav Tammann," in Gillispie, ed. (n. 11 above),
13:242.
127. Tetsu Hiroshige, "Ishiwara Jun," in Gillispie, ed. (n. 11 above), 6:26
27.
128. Kanao (n. 46 above), p. 443.
129. Nakamura (n. 52 above), pp. 87-200, and Jed Z Buchwald, "Sir
William Thomson, Baron Kelvin of Largs," in Gillispie, ed. (n. 11 above),
13:374-87.
131. Gloria Robinson, "August Friedrich Leopold Weismann," in Gillispie,
ed. (n. 11 above), 14:235.
132. Victor Robinson, Pathfinders in Medicine (New York: Medical Life

Press, 1929). p. 743. Robinson wrote: "Koch's pupils were not limited to his
country or race, and perhaps no disciple gave him sincerer gratification than
Kitasato, who brought Koch's technique to Japan."
133. Kitajima Ta'ichi, Kitajima Ta'ichijiden (Tokyo: Kitajima-Sensei Kinen
JigyO Kai, 1955), p. 37.
134. Nagaoka stated that Helmholtz stuttered and would become flustered
during his lectures. The Japanese physicist also complained that Helmholtz
was never accessible. Planck he criticized for simply reading aloud Gustav
KirchofFs lecture notes, which Nagaoka had already taken down from another
course. See Yagi, Itakura, and Kimura (n. 55 above), pp. 171-73. Helmholtz
was in the last year of his life and Planck in his first year of teaching at Berlin
when Nagaoka knew them. His overall evaluation of both men was much more
favorable.
135. Ogata Norio, "Ogata Masanori ryaku den," Igaku shi kenkyu, no. 8
(1963):40-44.
136. Tanaka (n. 45 above), pp. 93-130.
137. Ibid., pp. 131-377; George B. Kauffinan. "Alfred Werner." in Gillispie.
ed. (n. 11 above), 14:264-66; Sheldon J Kopperl. "Georges Urbain." in
Gillispie, ed, 13:546.
138. Sakurai (n. 47 above), passim, and W. H Brock. "Alexander William
Williamson," in Gillispie. ed. (n. 11 above). 14 394-95.
139. Nakamura (n. 52 above), passim, and Buchwald (n. 129 above), pp.
374-87.
140. Ishikawa (n. 19 above), passim, and G. A. Tammann (n. 125 above), pp.
242-44.
141. Kanao (n. 46 above), passim, and W. H. Brock, "August Wilhelm von
Hofrnann," in GUhspie. ed. (n. 11 above). 6:461-63.
142. Miyajima (n. 30 above), passim, and Claude Dolman, "Heinnch HCT
mann Robert Koch," in Gillispie, ed (n. 11 above), 7:420-30.
143. Kanao (n. 46 above), front cover. Wilhelm was Hofmann's middle
name.
144. Ishihara Jun, Shisaku no tebukuro (Tokyo: Ishihara Jun, 1942), pp.
147-48.
145. Ishikawa (n. 19 above), pp. 180-83. and Tammann (n 125 above), p.
244.
146. Sakurai (n. 47 above), passim, and Brock (n. 138 above), p. 394.
148. Quoted in Miyajima (n. 30 above), p. 196.
149. Kitasato Zenjiro (son of Kitasato Shibasaburo), personal communica
tion, September5. 1972.
150. Kitasato Shibasaburo, "Koch-sensei kinen koen kai," IJ, no. 1225 (De
cember 15. 1917):2184.
151. Idem, "Koonshi Robert Koch-sensei otoburaxi" Saikingaku zasshi, no.
176 (June 10, 1910):2.
152. Kitajima (n. 133 above), p. 37.
153. Nagayo Hakushi Kinen Kai (n. 98 above), p. 115.
3OO NOTES TO PAGES 76-81
154. Tanaka (n. 45 above), p. 104.

156. Mitamura (n. 20 above), p. 164.
157. Tanaka (n. 45 above), pp. 119-20.
158. Jacques R. Levy. Francois FeUx Tlsserand," in Gillispie, ed. (n. 11
above), 13:423.
159. Tanaka (n. 45 above), pp. 119-20.
160. Brock (n. 138 above), p. 394.
163. John B. Blake. "Scientific Institutions since the Renaissance: Their
Role in Medical Research," Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society
101/1 (February 1957):51-52.
164. G. Schwarzenbach. "Alfred Werner and His Accomplishments," in
Fasciculus Extraordinarius Alfred Werner, 1866-1919 (Basel: Veriag
Helvetica Chimica Acta, 1967), p. 41.
165. Tanaka (n. 45 above), p. 104.
166. Ben-David and Zloczower (n. 108 above), pp. 45-85.
167. John Theodore Merz, A History ofEuropean Thought in the Nineteenth
Century, 1 (London: Wm. Blackwood and Sons, 1923)211-15.
168. Ibid. p. 215.
169. Nagai (n. 29 above), p. 25.
170. Robert R. Williams. Toward the Conquest ofBeriberi (Cambridge: Har
vard University Press, 1961), pp. 20-24. 19. 35.
171. Ibid., p. 20.
172. Gerald L. Geison, Michael Foster and the Cambridge School of Phys
iology: The Scientific Enterprise in Late Victorian Society (Princeton: Prince
ton University Press, 1978). pp. 24-31. 158-59. 329.
173. Kitasato Shibasaburo, Ogata Masanori, Yamagiwa Katsusaburd. Miura
Moriharu, and Shiga Kiyoshi, among others, were all trained in Germany after
their graduation from Tokyo University.
174 Tanaka (n. 45 above), pp. 63-64.
175. Kanao (n. 46 above), p. 457.
176. James R. Partington, A History of Chemistry, 4 (London: Macmillan,
1964): 432. I am indebted to June Z. Fullmer for this reference.
177. Brock (n. 138 above), pp. 394-95, (n. 141 above), pp. 461-62.
178. Partington (n. 176 above), p. 446.
179. Brock (n. 138 above), p. 394.
180. Kanao (n. 46 above), pp. 88-90.
181. Williams (n. 170 above), pp. 14-15.
182. James R. Bartholomew, The Acculturation of Science in Japan:
Kitasato Shibasaburo and the Japanese Bacteriological Community, 1885
1920 (Ann Arbor: University Microfilms, 1972), pp. 163-70.
183. Miyajima (n. 30 above), p. 176, and Mori Rintard, "Tdkei ni tsuite no
bunso," Tokyo iji shtnshi, no. 562 (June.8, 1889):2.
184. Joseph Ben-David, "Roles and Innovations in Medicine," American
Journal of Sociology 65/6 (1960): 561-62.
NOTES TO PAGES 82-84 3OI
185. Garrison (n. 107 above), pp. 581-82.

186. Dolman (n. 142 above), p. 426.
187. The two colleagues were Carl Gerhardt and Ernst von Bergmann. For
details see Kitasato's letter to Hasegawa Tai, read into the proceedings of the
Imperial Japanese Diet: Dai Ninon Teikoku Gikai Shi Kankd Kai. ed.Dai Nihon
Teikoku Gikai shi, 2 (hereafter DNTGS) (Tokyo: Dai Nihon Teikoku Gikai Shi
Kankd Kai, 1926-30). Cf. "Yosan sainyu saishutsu so yosan an Mombushd
jokan," House of Representatives. 4th Diet. January 11. 1893. pp. 760-63.
188. Dolman (n. 142 above), p. 426.
189. Sata Yoshihiko. "Kaigai ryugakusei no zento." IJ, no. 1057 (September
26. 1914): 1632; Tomen no shomondai: Gakujutsu no dokuritsu mondai,"
ibid, p. 1638
190. "RyQgaku o haiseyo" (n. 95 above), p. 436.
191 Ibid. pp. 436-37.
192. "Iwayuru igaku no hattatsu to ryugaku." I], no. 1042 (June 13.
1914): 1046.
193. Sata (n. 189 above), p. 1632.

194. Mishima Shunken. "Ryugakusei tozetsu mondai, 2." I), no. 1060 (Oc
tober 17. 1914): 1748.
195. DNTGS, 4. Cf. "Gakusei chosa kai setchi ni kansuru kengi an." House of
Peers. 14th Diet. January- 31. 1900. p 111
196. Mishima (n. 194 above), p. 1749.
197. DNTGS, 9. Cf. Tokyo Teikoku Daigaku Ika Daigaku kyoju no
shokuseki ni kansum shitsumon," House of Representatives. 35th Diet. De
cember 15. 1914. pp. 960-61.
198. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-ichi ka dai-hachi go." House of Representatives Bud
get Committee. 10th Diet. March 12. 1897, p. 87.
199. Kyoju no naishoku ni tsuite," IJ, no. 1001 (August 30. 1913): 1615.
The report refers to the period in 1898 when Hamao Arata was the university
presidenL
200. See n. 92 above regarding the situation in the faculty of medicine.
During the course of this same meeting, the minister of education, Toyama
Shdichi, said of the faculty of engineering: "Salaries paid to professors in the
imperial universities are very small. Professors in the Faculty of Engineering at
Tokyo University returning from study in Europe have great difficulty continu
ing as professors for very long."
201. Ibid., p. 11.
202. DNTGS(n. 195above),p. 111.
203. Terasaki Masao, "Koto kyoiku," in Kaigo Tokiomi, ed.. Inoue Kowashi
no hf&iku seisaku (Tokyo: Tokyd Daigaku Shuppan, 1968). pp. 370-71. and
Iwasaki Jiro, Bukka no seso hyakunen (Tokyo: Yomiuri Shimbun Sha, 1982).
pp. 288-89.
204. Terasaki (n. 203 above), pp. 370-71, and TGSIG (n. 92 above), p. 12.
Oyama Kenzo, education ministry councillor, stated: "Professors are supposed
to live on the salaries they received in the past, but they cannot easily do so
Eminent hakushi at the university are being paid about 1,600 yen on the aver
age. Yet they are the top-ranking scholars in Japan!"
3O2 NOTES TO PAGES 85-88
205. See Terasaki (n. 203 above) regarding the range of payments for re
search contributions. For the situation in 1907, see "Daigaku kyoju no zohd,"
U, no. 679 (June 22, 1907):722.
206. For these and various other examples, see "Kyoju no shunyu," IJ, no.
759 (January 1, 1909):55; no 760 (January 9, 1909): 136.
207. "Kyoju noshunyu." IJ, no. 762(January23,1909):205; no. 764 (Febru
ary 6, 1909):262; no. 766 (February 20. 1909):330. The last reports on
Yamagiwa's situation.
208. "Kyoju no naishoku ni tsuite," (n. 199 above), p. 1615.
209. DNTGS(n. 195 above), p. 122.
210. DNTGS (n. 197 above), p. 969.
211. "Zoh6 mondai ni tsuite," IJ, no. 792 (August 21. 1909): 1179.
212. Kimura Tadashi, ed., Inoue Kawashi-kun kydikujigyo sho shi (Tokyo:
Kimura Tadashi, 1894), pp. 73-74. Quoted in Terasaki (n. 203 above), pp. 380
81.
213. TTDGNS, 2 (n. 22 above): 1256-57 (fold-out chart).
214. TGS1G Cf. "Daigaku tokubetsu kaikei hoan hoka ikken," House of
Representatives Budget Committee, 42d Diet, February 13,1920, p. 1. The vice
minister actually used the phrase "level of culture," but the context indicates
that he identified a high level of labor division with a high level of culture.
215. Ninon Butsuri Gakkai, ed., Nihon no butsurigaku shi, 1 (Tokyo: Tokai
Daigaku Shuppan Kai, 1978): 113. 125-26.
216. Ibid., pp. 124. 130, 126.
217 Ibid, pp. 3. 120.
218. Imoto Minoru, Nihon no kagaku: Hyakunen noayumi (Kyoto: Kagaku

Dojin, 1978). p. 27.
219. See the following sources for the names of the earliest society members:
for the Tokyo (later Japan) Chemical Society membership, see Imoto (n. 218
above), pp. 26-33; for the Tokyo Mathematical and Physical Society, see Yagi
Eri, "Nihon saisho no butsurigakushatachi, Meiji shoki no butsurigaku no
jotai" Butsurigaku shi kenkyu 1/3 (1959):237-62.
220. Yagi (n. 219 above), pp. 239-46.
221. Ibid., pp. 240-52.
222. Seen. 217above.
223. Commission on Medical Education, ed, Medical Education (New York:
Commission on Medical Education, 1932), p. 344.
224. "Ikai dantai undo shi," U, no. 1200 (June 23, 1917): 1152.
226. On the German situation, see Theodor Billroth, The Medical Sciences in
the German Universities (New York: Macmillan, 1924), p. 29, and Abraham
Flexner, Medical Education in Europe (Boston: D.B. Updike, 1912), pp. 145
66.
227. "Ikai dantai undo shi," IJ, no. 1201 (June 30, 1917): 1191.
228. "Daigaku kyoju no naishoku," Tokyo Asahi Shimbun, no. 9747 (Sep
tember 12, 1913):5.
229. Miyajima (n. 30 above), p. 111.'
230. Flexner (n. 226 above), p. 148, and idem. Medical Education (New
York: Macmillan, 1925). p. 40.
231. "Daigaku kyoju no naishoku" (n. 228 above).
Chapter Four: Laying the Institutional Foundations of Science
1. Chemist Sakurai Joji attributed this view to many contemporary officials.

See his Omoide no kazukazu, pp. 19-20.
2. Nakayama Shigeru: "Since the sciences and technology were introduced
and developed on the initiative of the Meiji government, the system naturally
showed a strong government-managed characterfromthe very beginning. Un
like the situation in Western countries in which individual scientists organized
societies for subjects which they preferred, the situation in Japan was one in
which colleges and plants were established, and technicians and scientists were
produced under government direction." See "A Century's Progress in Japan's
Science and Technology." Technical Japan 1/1 (1968) 78. See also Yuasa Mil
sutomo, Kagaku shi, pp. 228. 282.
3. The widespread but erroneous notion that German precedents were
faithfully followed in the development of Japan's universities and professions
was probably as popular in the Meiji and Taisho years as it is today. A 1915
source declared, for example: "The Japanese educational system followed the
German pattern in nearly every respect The manner of teaching, organization,
structure, and order were all in the German mold." See "Ika daigaku genj6 daha
no gi," U, no. 1076 (February 6, 1915):268-69. Nakayama Shigeru s view is
more accurate: T h e imperial university. . . turned out not to resemble the
German university terribly closely." See his Teikoku daigaku no tanjo (Tokyo.
Chud Koron Sha, 1978), p. 62.
4. Sugawara Kunika (ch. 2. n. 116). "Meiji shoki no kagaku." pp. 249-53.
5. James R Bartholomew, "Why Was There No Scientific Revolution in
Tokugawa Japan?" Japanese Studies in the History of Science, no. 15
(1976): 111-25.
6. Shigeru Nakayama, "Japanese Scientific Thought," in Gillispie, ed.,
Dictionary of Scientific Biography 15/1:742.
7. Yagi Eri, Itakura Kiyonobu. and Kimura Tdsaku, Nagaoka Hantaro den,
p. 52.
8. Miyajima Mikinosuke, Kitasato Shibasaburo den, p. 115.
11. Janet Hunter (ch. 3, n. 73), "The Development of Technical Education in
Japan," p. 12.
12. Shigeru Nakayama, "The Role Played by Universities in Scientific and
Technological Development in Japan," Cahiers d'histoire mondiale 9/2
(1965):345, and Bernhard J. Stem, T h e Role of the Universities and Scientific
Societies," in idem, ed, Historical Materials on Innovations in Higher Educa
tion (New York: Planning Project for Advanced Training in Social Research,
Columbia University, 1953), p. 122.
13. Two proposals for a comprehensive national university had developed in
the last quarter century of Tokugawa rule. One, drafted in 1842 by the astrono
mer Hoashi Banri, and a second, prepared by Old Takatd, who later became
minister of education, would have incorporated most standard subjects, includ
ing technical ones. For details, see Ishikawa Matsutard (ch. 2, n. 23), "Kinsei
buke no kyoiku, shomin no kydiku," p. 118.
14. Tdkyd Daigaku Hyakunen Shi Hensan Iinkai. Tdkyd Daigaku hyakunen
shi: Tsushi (hereafter TDHNS), 1 (Tokyo: Tdkyd Daigaku, 1984):7. See also
Michio Nagai, Higher Education in Japan, trans. Jerry Dusenbury (Tokyo:
University of Tokyo Press. 1971). p. 22.
15. TdkydTeikoku Daigaku. Tdkyd Teikoku Daigaku goju nen shi (hereafter
TTDGNS), 1 (Tokyo: Tdkyd Teikoku Daigaku. 1932): 16, 22. 121-26.
16. Ibid. pp. 55-57.69-113.
17 Quoted in TDHNS, 1:394-95. 411-13.
18. TTDGNS, 1:257, 233-34. 263, 286.

19. Terasaki Masao. Teikoku daigaku keisei ki no daigaku kan," in idem,
ed., Gakko kan no shiteki kenkyu (Tokyo: Ndma Kyoiku Kenkyu Jo, 1972), p.
204.
20. TTDGNS, 1358. 16.
21. Nakayama (n. 3 above), pp. 79-80. 78.
22. Yuasa (n. 2 above), p. 101
23. Yuasa Mitsutomo, Gendai kagaku gijutsu shi nempyd (Tokyo: San'ichi
Shobd, 1961). pp. 24-52.
24. Karasawa Tomitard. Kdshinsei: Bakumatsu Ishin hi no erito (Tokyo:
Gydset 1974), pp. 3-10.
25. Nakamura Seiji, Tanahadate Aikitsu-sensei, pp. 87-88.
26. Shigeru Nakayama, "Science and Technology in Modern Japanese De
velopment," in William Beranek and Gustav Ranis, eds., Science, Technology
and Economic Growth (New York: Praeger. 1978), p. 221.
27. Yagt Itakura, and Kimura (n. 7 above), p. 221.
28. Nakayama (n. 3 above), passim.
30. Ishikawa Teijiro, Honda Kotaro den (Tokyo: Nikkan Kdgyd Shimbun
Sha, 1964), p. 60.
31. Hanami Sakumi, Danshaku Yamakawa-sensei den, p. 85.
32. John Z. Bowers, When the Twain Meet, p. 97.
33. Charles Otis Whitman, Zoology in the University ofTokio (Yokohama:
Japan Gazette, 1881), p. 29.
34. Sakurai (n. 1 above), pp. 67,68-69.
36. Sakurai (n. 1 above), p. 70.
37. Katd Hiroyuki, "Tensoku hyakuwa," reprinted in Ninon Gakushiin, ed.,
Nikon Gakushiin hachiju nen shi (hereafter NGHNS): Shiryohen, 1 (Tokyo:
Ninon Gakushiin, 1962): 753.
NOTES TO PACES 95-101 305
38. ShQgiin Jimukyoku, Teikoku Gihai Shugiin Itnkai Giroku (hereafter

TGSIG) Cf. "Dai-go kadai-ichi go," House of Representatives Budget Commit
tee, 5th Diet, December 8, 1893, p. 20.
39. Nakayama (IL 3 above), pp. 132-33.
40. Katd (n. 37 above), p. 755.
41. Abraham Flexner, Medical Education in Europe, pp. 252-53.
42. Stem (n. 12 above), p. 122; S. Ulley, "Scientific Education and the Ecole
Polytechnique," in Stem, p. 125; and Frederic Ulge, The Break between Sci
ence and Philosophy in Germany," in Stem, p. 148.
43. Stem (n. 12 above), p. 70. and Martha Ornstein, "Universities in the
Seventeenth Century." in Stem (n. 12 above), pp. 96-101.
44. Alexander Vucinich, Science in Russian Culture, to I860 (Stanford:
Stanford University Press. 1963). pp 73-74.
45. A. Hunter Dupree, Science in the Federal Government (Cambridge Har
vard University Press, 1957). p. 148.
46. Vucinich (n. 44 above), pp. 35-65.
47. Nakamura ( a 25 above), p 91
48. Okuma, in fact, was intent on establishing technical education at
Waseda from 1882, when he first founded the school under the name Tdkyd
Semmon Gakkd. For his views on this subject, see Takagi Jun'ichi, "Rikd
Gakubu," in Waseda Hyakunen Hensan Iinkai, ed.. Waseda hyakunen (Tokyo:
Kase Kiyoo. 1979). pp. 456-60.
49. L. F Haber, The Chemical Industry during the Nineteenth Century
(London: Oxford University Press, 1958). pp. 198-204
50. Friedrich Paulsen noted that agriculture was incorporated into several of
the German universities beginning in 1906. but engineering never was. See
Paulsen, The German Universities and University Study, trans. Frank Thilly
and William H. Elwang (London: Longmans Green, 1906). The introduction of
agriculture was opposed by some professors at Tokyo University and by Inoue
Kowashi (later education minister) in 1889-90 because it was not represented
in German and most other Western universities. Professors Yokoi Tokiyoshi and
Satd Shosuke, however, successfully argued for its incorporation. See
Nakayama (n. 12 above), p. 345, and idem (n. 3 above), pp. 142-43.
51. Yuasa Mitsutomo, Kagaku goju nen (Tokyo: Jiji Tsushin Sha, 1950), p.
53, and Tominari Kimahei, Gendai Nihon kagaku shi, p. 79.
52. Hugh Borton, Japan's Modern Century (New York: Ronald Press, 1955),
pp. 198-202.
53. Dai Nihon Teikoku Gikai Shi Kanko Kai, ed, Dai Nihon Teikoku Gikai
shi (DNTGSX 3. Cf. "Fuken noji shiken jo kokko hojo hoan," House of Repre
sentatives, 9th Diet, January 18,1895, p. 441.
54. DNTGS, 3. Cf. "Fuken noji shiken jo kokko hojo hoan," House of Repre
sentatives, 9th Diet, March 18.1896, p. 1876.
55. Ibid. pp. 1873-74.
56. Ibid. pp. 1873-75.
57. "Densembyd kenkyu jo." Tokyo iji shinshi Qiereafter T7S), no. 762
(November 3, 1892):47.
58. Ibid
59. Ibid., and "Densembyd kenkyushitsu setchi no keikaku," TIS, no. 747
(July 23, 1892):39.
60. DNTGS, 2. Cf. "Yosan sainyu saishutsu s6 yosan an Mombushd jokan,"
House of Representatives, 4th Diet, January 11, 1893, pp. 760-63.
61. DNTGS, 2. Cf. Dai Nihon Shiritsu Eisei Kai setsuritsu densembyd ken
kyu jo hojd ni tsuke kengi an," House of Representatives, 4th Diet, February 23,
1893. p. 1021.
62. For Watahabe's remarks, see "Densembyd kenkyu jo ni kansuru Shiba
ku kai," Tokyd nichi nichi shimbun, no. 6453 (April 29.1893):4. For details on
the antilaboratory movement, see James Bartholomew, The Acculturation of
Science in Japan: Kitasato Shibasaburd and the Japanese Bacteriological Com
munity, 1885-1920, pp. 61-71.
64. Miyajima (n. 8 above), pp. 99-100; YanagUa Izumi, Meiji bummei shi ni
okeru Okuma Shigenobu (Tokyo: Waseda Daigaku Shuppan Bu, 1962), p. 212;
Takagi (n. 48 above), pp. 456-60; and Ueno Naozd, ed., Ddshisha hyakunen shi
(Kyoto: Ddshisha, 1979), pp. 369-91.
65. Robert M. Spaulding, Jr., Imperial Japan's Higher Civil Service Exam
inations (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1967). pp. 132-35.
66. Umezawa Hikotard, ed., Kindai mei'i ichiyu hanashi (Tokyo: Nihon Iji
Shimpd Sha, 1937), pp. 76. 373-74.
67. Terasaki (n. 19 above), p. 204.
68. Ivan Hall, Mori Arinori, pp. 347-48, and Terasaki, (n. 19 above), pp.
194-95.
69. James Bartholomew, "Japanese Modernization and the Imperial Uni
versities, 1876-1920," Journal of Asian Studies 37/2 (February 1978):251
52.
70. For a general discussion of Meiji education in English, see Herbert Pas-
sin, Society and Education in Japan (New York: Teachers College, Columbia
University, Bureau of Publications, 1965).
71. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-na kai yosan iinkai sokki giroku dai-sanjugo (sdkai),"
House of Representatives Budget Committee, 2d Diet, December 9,1891, p. 16.
Regarding Kubota's views, see Terasaki (n. 19 above), p. 253.
72. Terasaki Masao, "Meiji chuki no teikoku daigaku hihan," Daigaku shi
kenkyu tsushin, no. 5 (January 1972) 7-10.
73. DNTGS, 1. Cf. "Yosan sainyu saishutsu so yosan an, Mombushd jokan,"
House of Representatives, 2d Diet, December 23,1891, p. 1508.
74. Sato Kenzd, Kokuritsu daigaku zaisei seido shiko, p. 181.
75. Terasaki Masao, "Koto kydiku," in Kaigo Toltiomi, ed., lnoue Kowashi no
kyoiku seisaku, p. 366.
76. Ibid., p. 378.
77. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-go ka Mombushd no bu," House of Representatives
Budget Committee, 4th Diet, December 8,1892, p. 6.
78. Toyama Shoichi, briefly minister of education in 1898, favored the intro
duction of a privatdozent system in Japan. See Terasaki (n. 19 above), p. 241.
Lecture fees were recommended (though never implemented) by Minister
Kikuchi Dairoku in 1901. See "Daigaku kydju zdho mondai," IJ, no. 369 (June
29, 1901):456.
79. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-go ka dai-ichi gd," House of Representatives Budget
Committee, 5th Diet, December 8, 1893, p. 23.
80. Ibid., p. 22.
81. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-go ka Mombusho no bu," House of Representatives
Budget Committee, 4th Diet, December 9, 1892, p. 7
82. Quoted in Sugai Oden, "Jitsugyd semmon kydiku," in Motoyama
Yukihiko, ed., Teikoku Gikai to kydiku seisaku (Kyoto: Shibunkaku Shuppan,
1981), p. 300.
83. Based on information reported in W. H. Sharp, The Educational System
of Japan (Bombay: Government Central Press, 1906), p. 176, and Satd (n. 74
above), p. 183.
84. Nakayama (n. 12 above), p. 349. and Terasaki (n. 19 above), pp 229-30.
85. TGSIG. Cf. "Sdkai Kaigunshd sono ta (sdki Ndshdmushd Mombushd no
bu)," House of Representatives Budget Committee. 4th Diet. December 13,
1892, p. 16.
86. TGSIG Cf. "Dai-ichi ka dai-san go." House of Representatives Budget
Committee, 10th Diet January 27, 1897. p. 44.
87. For detailed information on the career patterns of academic engineers in
the pre-World War I era, see vol. 5 of Iseki Kurd. ed.. Dai Nikon kakushi roku.
88. Sugai (n. 82 above), p. 296.
89. Terasaki (n. 19 above), p. 235
90. Quoted in Kyoto Teikoku Daigaku. Kydto Teikoku Daigaku ski
(hereafter KTDS) (Kyoto: Kyoto Teikoku Daigaku. 1943), pp. 9-10.
93. TGSIG Cf. "Dai-ichi ka dai-san gd." House of Representatives Budget
Committee. 10th Diet, January 27. 1897, p. 43.
94. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-ni kai yosan iinkai sokki giroku dai-sanju gd (sdkai)."
House of Representatives Budget Committee, 2d Diet, December 9. 1891.
p. 13.
95. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-go ka dai-ichi gd," House of Representatives Budget
Committee, 5th Diet, December 8, 1893, pp. 21-22.
House of Representatives, 4th Diet, January 11, 1893. p. 760.
House of Representatives, 2d Diet, December 23, 1891, p. 1509.
98. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-ni kai yosan iinkai sokki giroku dai-sanju gd (sdkai),"
House of Representatives Budget Committee, 2d Diet, November 9,1891, pp.
18, 19.
99. TGSIG. Cf. "Shugiin Kyushu Tdhoku Teikoku Daigaku setchi kengi an
shinsa tokubetsu iinkai sokkiroku (dai-ichi gd)," House of Representatives Bud
get Committee, 14th Diet January 29,1900, pp. 4,2; and Sugai (n. 82 above), p.
299. Suzuki Manjird, a physician and Diet member, in comments to the House
of Representatives Budget Committee (December 9, 1893), however, rejected
the idea of agriculture and commerce faculties on grounds of alleged un
popularity. "Our policy should be to establish at leading schools those programs

which students want most"
100. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-ichi ka dai-nana go," House of Representatives Budget
101. TGSIG Cf. "Dai-ichi ka dai-ni go," House of Representatives Budget
Committee, 9th Diet, January 14, 1896, pp. 3-5.
102. Kyoto Daigaku, Kyoto Daigaku nanaju nen ski (hereafter KDNNS)
(Kyoto: Kyoto Daigaku, 1967). p. 16.
103. KDNNS, p. 17. See also TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-ichi ka dai-ichi gd," House of
Representatives Budget Committee, 9th Diet, January 14. 1896, pp. 5-10.
104. KDNNS, p. 18.
105. TGSIG Cf. "Dai-ichi ka dai-roku gd," House of Representatives Budget
106. TGSIG Cf. "Dai-ichi ka dai-hachi gd." House of Representatives Bud
get Committee. 10th Diet, March 12, 1897. p. 87.
107. TGSIG Cf. "Dai-ichi ka dai-roku go." House of Representatives Budget

Committee. 13th Diet, December 16. 1898. pp. 73. 74. 70.
108. Ibid., p. 74.
109. TGSIG Cf. "Dai-ichi ka dai-hachi gd," House of Representatives Bud
get Committee. 10th Diet, March 12, 1897. p. 88.
110. TGSIG Cf. "Dai-ichi ka dai-roku go," House of Representatives Budget
Committee. 13th Diet, December 16. 1898, p. 73.
111. Ibid., p. 74; cf. "Dai-ichi ka dai-yon gd." House of Representatives Bud
get Committee, 14th Diet, December 1,1899, pp. 44.42; "Dai-ichi ka dai-nana
gd," House of Representatives Budget Committee, 13th Diet, December 17.
1898. p. 82; "Dai-ichi ka dai-hachi gd," House of Representatives Budget Com
mittee, 10th Diet, March 12, 1897, p. 87.
112. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-ichi ka dai-san gd," House of Representatives Budget
Committee. 13th Diet, December 13, 1898. p. 29; "Dai-go ka dai-ichi gd,"
House of Representatives Budget Committee. 5th Diet, December 8,1893, pp.
3, 20, 24. "Dai-go ka Mombushd no bu," House of Representatives Budget
Committee, 4th Diet, December 8. 1892. p. 2.
113. Ibid., pp. 20-21.
114. Ibid., pp. 3-4,19-20.
115. Sugimoto Isao, ltd Keisuke, p. 355.
116. Ibid., p. 243.
117. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-go ka dai-ichi go," House of Representatives Budget
118. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-ichi rui dai-ichi gd yosan iinkai kaigiroku dai-roku kai,"
House of Representatives Budget Committee, 16th Diet, December 27,1901, p.
71.
119. Tohoku Daigaku, Tohoku Daigaku goju nen shi (hereafter TDGNS), 1
(Sendai: Tohoku Daigaku, 1960):2-4.
120. Quoted in ibid. pp. 10-11.
121. Takane's book, entitled Daigaku seido kanken, is described in an essay
by Terasaki Masao. See Terasaki (n. 72 above), pp. 10-11.
122. TGSIG. Cf. "Yosan iin dai-ichi bunkakai kaigiroku dai-rokkai," House of
Representatives Budget Committee, 15th Diet, February 1, 1901, p. 53.
NOTES TO PAGES 1)2-14 3°9
123. Cited in TDGNS, 1:64.

124. Ibid., pp. 1-4. Katd Hiroyuki and to a lesser extent Kikuchi Dairoku had
favored restrictions on access to university education, but Toyama Shdichi and
certain other ministry officials took the opposite view. See Terasaki (n. 19
above), P 229.1 cannot, however, agree with Nakayama Shigeru's view that a
preponderance of Education officials opposed university expansion (at least in
the 1880s) on the grounds that only one university was needed for what he
considers to have been Tokyo University's almost exclusive mission. Le., to
serve as a "window for importing the Western knowledgerequiredfor nation
building." See Nakayama (n. 3 above), p. 69.
125. TGSIG. Ct "Shugiin Kyushu Tohoku Teikoku Daigaku setchi kengi an
shmsatokubetsuiinkaisokkiroku (dai-ichi g6)." House of Representatives Bud
get Committee. 14th Diet, January 29. 1900. p 2.
126. TGSIG Cf. "Dai-ichi ka dai-hachi go." House of Representatives Bud
get Committee. 10th Diet, March 2. 1897. p. 87.
127. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-ichi ka dai-ichi g6." House of Representatives Budget
Committee, 10th Diet, January 27. 1897, p. 44.
128. Shioda Hiroshige, Mesu to late (Tokyo: Chogensha, 1963). p. 39. and
TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-ichi ka dai-yon gd." House of Representatives Budget Commit
tee, 14th Diet, December 1. 1899, p. 42.
129. TGSIG. Cf "Yosan iin dai-ichi bunkakai (Naimushd Mombushd jokan)
kaigiroku (sokki) dairoku kai," House of Representatives Budget Committee,
16th Diet, December 25. 1901. p. 100.
130. TGSIG. Cf. "Yosan iin dai-ichi bunkakai (Naimushd, Mombushd jokan)
16th Diet, December 20. 1901. p 58.
131. It was claimed that Hasegawa Tai paid "the most attention to the ac
tivities of the Ministry of Education of all the three hundred Diet members." See
"Hasegawa Tai-shi tai Mombushd," Kyoiku jiron, no. 278 (January 5. 1893):
25.
132. DNTGS, 2. Cf. "Yosan sainyu saishutsu sd yosan an, Mombushd jokan,"
House of Representatives, 4th Diet, January 11, 1893, pp. 759-62.
133. Kyushu Daigaku Goju Shunen Kinen Kai, ed. Kyushu Daigaku goju
nen shi (hereafter KDGNS), 1 (Fukuoka: Kyiishu Daigaku, 1967):31, and
TDGNS, l : 1 6 - i a
134. Nakayama Heyiro, ed, Nijugo nen shi: Kyushu Teikoku Daigaku Igaku
Bu (Fukuoka: Kyushu Teikoku Daigaku Igaku Bu Jimusho, 1927), pp. 1-4.
135. The Kumamoto domain's experience with school establishment in the
early 1870s provides an instructive example. The new medical academy used
the Japanese-style facilities and some of the equipment of its Tokugawa prede
cessor, whereas the new academy for Western studies (including mathematics,
physics, and chemistry) was deliberately and self-consciously housed in a West
ern-style building with entirely new equipment from America. See Yamasaki
Masatada, Higo iiku shi, p. 295. and Irwin Scheiner, Christian Converts and
Social Protest in Meiji Japan (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1970),
pp. 53-54.
136. Regarding Kikuchi's role, see Nakayama (n. 134 above), pp. 3-4. Con
cerning the consequencesforhim, see TGSIG. Cf. "Yosan iin dai-ichi bunkakai
3IO NOTES TO PAGES 114-20
(Naimushd, Mombusho jokan) kaigiroku (sokki)dai-roku kai," House of Repre

sentatives Budget Committee, 16th Diet, December 25, 1901, p. 99.
137. TDGNS, 1:16.
138. Ibid, p. 20.
139. "Kiso igaku no fushin o ika sen to sum ka?" U, no. 678 (June 15,
1907):691.
Representatives Budget Committee, 15th Diet, February 1, 1901, pp. 50-61;
"Yosan iin dai-ichi bunkakai (Naimushd, Mombushd jokan) kaigiroku (sokki)
dai-go kai," House of Representatives Budget Committee, 16th Diet, December
20, 1901, p. 72.
141. TDGNS, 1:33.
142. KDGNS, 1:32, 423, 466, 519.
143. TDGNS, 1:22,33.37.
144. Ibid., pp. 34-35, 65.
145. KDGNS, 1:422,423.
146. Yuasa (n. 51 above), p. 67, and Sakurai (n. 1 above), pp. 70-71.
147. Sakurai (n. 1 above), pp. 70-71.
148. Naikaku Insatsukyoku, Shokuinroku (hereafter Shokuinroku) (Tokyo:
Naikaku Insatsukyoku, 1912), pp. 639-40.
149. DNTGS, 8. Cf. "Gakujutsu hatsumei hyoshd ni kansuru kengi an,"
House of Representatives, 28th Diet, February 25, 1912, p. 1034.
150. NGHNS, Shirydhen: 2:283, 451-54.
151. NGHNS, 431-34, Shirydhen: 2:283. 292. Two project grants were
awarded to physicist Nagaoka Hantaro for "research on the Z factor in lati
tudinal transformations" and for "research on X-rays and their effects." The
other grant was awarded to geologist Kotd Bunjiro.
152. Kiyonobu Itakura and Eri Yagi, T h e Japanese Research System and
the Establishment of the Institute of Physical and Chemical Research," in
Shigeru Nakayama, David L. Swain, and Eri Yagi, eds., Science and Society in
Modern Japan, pp. 167-68.
154. Kikuchi Dairoku, Teikoku Gakushiin no jushdshiki," TIS, no. 1768
(May 18, 1912):39.
155. DNTGS, 4. Cf. "Gakusei chosa kai setchi ni kansuru kengi an," House of
Peers, 14th Diet, February 2, 1900, p. 120.
156. DNTGS, 4. Cf. "Chuo kogyo shiken jo setsuritsu ni kansuru kengi an,"
House of Representatives, 13th Diet, February 20, 1899, pp. 1914-15.
157. Shokuinroku, 1902, p. 667, and DNTGS, 4. Cf. "Chuo kdgyd shiken jo
setsuritsu ni kansuru kengi an," House of Representatives, 13th Diet, February
25, 1899, pp. 1986-87.
158. DNTGS, 10. Cf. "Rikagaku o kenkyu sum koeki hojin no kokko hojo ni
kansuru horitsu an," House of Representatives, 37th Diet, February 24,1916,
p. 881.
159. Osaka Yukichi, "Kagaku kogyo ni tsuite," Taiyo 16/11 (1910). Re
printed in Nihon Kagaku Shi Gakkai, ed., Nihon kagaku gijutsu shi taikei
(hereafter NKGST), 2 (Tokyo: Dai-ichi Hoki, 1961):485.
NOTES TO PAGES 120-22 3II
160. Kamoi Takeshi "KOgyO kagaku kenkyu jo setsuritsu ron," Taiyd 18/16
(1912). Reprinted in NKGST, 2:487-88.
161. Shiobara Matasaku, Takamine hakushi, pp. 49-50, 66-67.
162. Osaka (n. 159 above), pp. 483-85.
163. TGSIG. Cf. "Yosan tin dai-go bunka (NoshOmushd jokan) kaigiroku
(sokki) dai-ikkai," House of Representatives Budget Committee, 28th Diet,
January 29, 1912, p. 3.
164. TGSIG. Cf. "Yosan tin dai-go bunka (NoshOmushd jokan) kaigiroku
(sokki) dai-ikkai," House of Representatives Budget Committee, 31st Diet, Jan
uary 29, 1914, p. 1, and "Yosantindai-go bunka (Noshdmusho jokan) kaigiroku
(sokki) dai-yon kai," House of Representatives Budget Committee, 31st Diet.
February 2, 1914, p. 28.
165. TGSIG Cf. MYosantindai-go ka (Noshdmusho jokan) kaigiroku (sokki)
dai-ikkai," House of Representatives Budget Committee. 30th Diet, March 4.
1913, p. 3.
166. Shokuinroku, 1900. p. 617.
167. DNTGS, 4. Cf. "Kanritsu Noji Shiken Jo no shtfo o haishi, fukenritsu
noji shiken jo iiokokkohojdruozdka sum no ken p." House of Peers. 14th Diet.
March 3, 1899. pp. 1533-34.
168. DNTGS, 5. Cf. "Naha Konchu Kenkyu Jo kokkO hojO ni kansuru kengi
an," House of Representatives. 15th Diet. February 9, 1900. p. 653
169. DNTGS, 4. Cf. "Fuken ndji shiken jo kokko hojo hoan " House of Repre
sentatives, 13th Diet, February 6. 1899. p. 1823.
170. AndO Hirotaro, "Noji Shiken Jo no setsuritsu zengo." reprinted in
NKGST, 22:360. and TGSIG Cf. "Dai-ichi rui dai-ni gd yosan tin dai-ichi
bunkakai kaigiroku dai-ni kai." House of Representatives Budget Committee,
15th Diet, December 17. 1901. p. 18
171. Shokuinroku, 1909. 1910. pp. 684-85 and 674-75.
172. DNTGS, 4. Cf "Fuken noji shiken jo kokkd hojd hoan. House of Repre
sentatives, 13th Diet, January 18. 1899. p. 1750. My estimate of 250.000 yen
takes into account some 39.000 yen spent on the national system of experiment
stations, about 86,000 yen spent by the prefectures, and the education minis
try's funding of the Tokyo University agriculture faculty and the Sapporo Col
lege of Agriculture.
173. These ratios were obtained by dividing each nation's research expendi
tures by its total incomefromagriculture and comparing the results. The result
ing research investment ratios were .36 for Japan. .60 for France, and 1.02 for
Germany.
174. Ando Hirotaro, "Kozai-sensei o tsuioku su," in Ando Enshu, ed, Kozai
Yoshinao hakushi (Tokyo: Kozai Hakushi Denki Hensan Kai, 1937), p. 60.
175. Ibid.
176. Suzuki Umetaro, Kenkyu no kaikd (Tokyo: Kibundo Shobo, 1943), p.
246.
177. Shokuinroku, 1906, p. 61.
178. TGSIG. Cf "Dai-ichi rui dai-ni gd yosantindai-ichi bunkakai kaigiroku
dai-ni kai" House of Representatives Budget Committee, 15th Diet, December
17, 1901, pp. 16-17.
179. Aoyama Tanemichi, "Tokugakusha no shorai ikaga?" I], no. 1055 (Sep
tember 12, 1914):8.
180. See Shokuinroku for the appropriate years.
181. John B. Blake (ch. 3, n. 163), "Scientific Institutions since the Renais
sance," pp. 31-62.
183. Kitasato Shibasaburo, "Setsuritsu no shushi," TIS, no. 1900 (December
12, 1914):2648-49. and TGS1G. Cf. "Yosan iin dai-ichi bunkakai (Naimushd,
Mombushd jokan) kaigiroku (sokki) dai-rokkai," House of Representatives
Budget Committee, 15th Diet, December 25, 1901. pp. 83-88.
184. Hanami (n. 31 above), p. 280.
185. Itakura and Yagi (n. 152 above), p. 169.
186. Yanagita (n. 64 above), p. 434.
187. Cited in Itakura and Yagi (n. 152 above), p. 171. See also Shiobara (n.
161 above), pp 71-72.
188. Satd (n. 74 above), pp. 183. 293.
189. "Kydju no naishoku zehi ron, IJ, no. 1006 (October 4. 1913): 1822.
191. Tomen no shomondai: Gakujutsu no dokuritsu mondai." I], no. 1057
(September 26. 1914): 1638.
192. This is particularly remarkable considering the Ministry of Education's
solicitous attitude toward ltd Keisuke and at least occasional recognition of
botanical developments in the Tokugawa period. From the broader perspective
of academic disciplines, this fact is a little misleading. In both Tokyo and
Tohoku, chairs in botany and zoology (eight altogether) could be found in both
agriculture and science. The difference is made clear by a comparison with
chemistry, which had seven chairs in faculties of agriculture and twelve in basic
science. But biology was established only at Tokyo, with its comprehensive
programs and considerably longer history. The basic science chairs existing in
the imperial universities by 1914 are given below in tabular form.
Tokyo Kyoto Tohoku Kyushu
Mathematics 6 3 2 1
Physics* 6 4 3 1
Chemistry 4 4 3 1
Geology 4 0 2 0
Biok>gyb 5 0 0 0
Anthropology0 1 0 0 0
Sources: Tokyo Teikoku Daigaku goju nen shi; Kyoto Teikoku Daigaku shi; Kydto
Daigaku nanaju nen shi; Tohoku Daigaku goju nen shi; Kyushu Daigaku
goju nen shi.
"Includes astronomy and seismology.
b
Includes botany and zoology.
c
Refers to physical anthropology only.
Conditions in Germany help explain the situation, German science and medi
cine, despite earlier growth, had reached a plateau in the late nineteenth cen
tury. The one-chair rule had prevented the creation of new academic posts with
prospects for advancement, and the incumbent professors in many fields were
quite young. Fields of research lost momentum, some going into decline. While
this situation affected most fields, certain of them found other solutions. The
best was probably chemistry's, where intervention by business produced a new
institution, the pacesetting PTR laboratory. Nothing like this occurred in biolo
gy until 1910, when the German government committed itself to a network of
laboratories (the Kaiser Wilhelm Gesellschaft or KWG) for scientific research
that needed more resources than universities could provide. Biology got a place
in this new research system precisely because it was lagging behind. Although
the change came too late for prewar research, it did lay the foundation for later
advances.
The effects on Japan were significant indeed. Its scientists and officials were
not slavishly pro-German—the countries were on opposing sides in the war—
but Japanese kept an eye on developments in Germany. Most scientists spent
time there. Most officials admired the country. Strong affinities in jurispru
dence and public policy existed, and nearly everyone insisted on the importance
of German precedents, even when they decided to ignore them. This was the
source of the problem for biology. With little or no growth in the academic
motherland, its prospects for expansion in Japan were compromised But as
Germany benefited from KWG research, science watchers in Tokyo took note.
Thus Kyoto University got a chair in biology in 1919. Tohoku in 1923. (For
details, see: Richard B. GokJschmidt, The Golden Age ofZoology: Portraits from
Memory [Seattle: University of Washington Press. 1956). pp 3-4. 8-9. and
Awraham Zloczower. "Career Opportunities and the Growth of Scientific Dis
covery in Nineteenth Century Germany: With Special Reference to Phys
iology," master's thesis, Hebrew University. 1960; Richard B. Gokfcchmidt, In
and Out of the Ivory Tower: The Autobiography of Richard B. Goldschmidt
(Seattle: University of Washington Press. 19601, p 77; Alan Beyerchen, "On
the Stimulation of Excellence in Wilhelmian Science." in Jack Dukes and
Joachim Remak, eds.. Another Germany: A Reconsideration of the Imperial
Era [Boulder: Westview Press. 1988), pp. 139-68; and KDNNS, pp. 92-93. and
TDGNS, 1:557.)
Chapter Five: Science and the Bureaucracy
1. Jean Dessau, "Social Factors Affecting Science and Technology in Asia,"

pp. 13-23, and Sir Eric Ashby, "Commentary," in A. C. Crombie, ed, Scientific
Change (London: Heinemann, 1963), pp. 724-28.
2. Yuasa Mitsutomo. Kagaku shi, pp. 228, 282.
4. Otsuki Shoichiro, Nojima Tokukichi, and Maki Jiro, "Ninon ni okeru ka
gaku, gijutsu, to kagakusha," in Sakata Shoichi, ed, Kagaku, gijutsu, to gen
dai, p. 289.
5. Quoted in Maruyama Masao, "Fukuzawa Yukichi no jukyo hihan," in
TokyO Teikoku Daigaku, ed., Tokyo Teikoku Daigaku gakujutsu taikan, Keizai
Gakubu, p. 415.
6. W. H. Leonard and Harry C. KeUy (ch. 1. n. 9), "Scientific Research and
Technical Competence in Relation to Resource Utilization," p. 514.
7. Bertrand Russell The Scientific Outlook (New York: W.W. Norton,
1962), p. 208. Russell applied this criticism to scientists in Europe as well as
Japan.
8. Thorstein Veblen (ch. 1. n. 22), 'The Opportunity of Japan," p. 251.
9. Chie Nakane, Japanese Society (Berkeley: University of California Press,
1970), p. 102.
10. See Keith Michael Baker, Condorcet: From Natural Philosophy to Social
Mathematics, p. 79, and Russell (n. 7 above), p. 99.
11. The experience of World War 11 produced, if anything, the very opposite
effect in Japan, strengthening the French Enlightenment faith in science as a
force in society. See, for example, Ninon Kyosantd Kagaku Gijutsu Bu, "Ninon
no kagaku gijutsu no kekkan to kyosanshugisha no nimmu." Zen'ex 10/11
(November 1946). Reprinted in NKGST, 5 112-17
12. Thomas C. Smith, "Merit' as Ideology in the Tokugawa Period," in
Ronald P Dore, ed.. Aspects of Social Change in Modern Japan (Princeton:
Princeton University Press. 1967), pp. 71-90.
13. Bernard Silberman, "The Bureaucratic State in Japan: The Problem of
Authority and Legitimacy," in Tetsuo Najita and J. Victor Koschmann, eds.,
Conflict in Modern Japanese History: The Neglected Tradition (Princeton:
Princeton University Press, 1982), pp. 226-37.
14. Nakayama Shi gem, Teikoku daigaku no tanjd (Tokyo: Chud Koron Sha,
1978), p. 90.
15. Robert M. Spaulding, Jr., Imperial Japan's Higher Civil Service Exam
inations, pp. 307-08, and Sir Laurence Helsby, "Recruitment to the Civil
Service," in William A. Robson, ed.. The Civil Service in Britain and France
(London: Hogarth, 1956), p. 44.
16. Spaulding (n. 15 above), p. 220.
17. On the origins of the Continental system, see C. J. Friedrich, "The Conti
nental Tradition of Training Administrators in Law and Jurisprudence,"
Journal ofModern History 11 /2 (June 1939): 129-48. On Japanese intentions,
see Nakayama (n. 14 above), pp. 89-91, and Spaulding (n. 15 above), pp. 112
13.
18. Spaulding su ggests that Meiji leaders accepted the German emphasis on
law uncritically for three reasons: (1) when Japan surveyed the field in the
1880s, the civil service seemed to be most highly developed in Germany and
freer there of nepotism, partisanship, and the spoils system they deplored; (2)
there was broad agreement between the two states on basic constitutional ide
als; and (3) Japan had inherited from the Tokugawa period a tradition of om
nicompetent samurai managers who supervised an inferior class of specialists.
If this analysis is correct—and it is certainly plausible—it would suggest that
the Tokugawa experience was ultimately decisive. See Spaulding, pp. 163-64.
Exclusion of the technically trained from higher positions on the basis of au
thoritarianism is particularly ironic when one realizes that the government
made a point of naming scientists and engineers to head imperial universities
during the interwar period and World War II precisely because they could be
counted on to avoid confrontation For background and additional details on this
question see Sassa Hiroo. Zoku jimbutsu shunju (Tokyo: Kaizosha, 1935), pp.
182-87, and James Bartholomew, "Science, Bureaucracy and Freedom in Mei-
Ji and Taisho Japan," in Najita and Koschmann (n. 13 above), pp. 295-341. For
information on the question of morale and other ill effects, see Spaukiing (n. 15
above), pp. 166-67.
19. See, for example. Shokuinroku, 1913. pp. 127 (Kitasato) and 622 (the
president of Tokyo University).
20. Calculated from information in Iseki Kurt, ed. Dai Nihon hakushi roku,
5 vote. (Tokyo: Hattensha, 1930). and Jinji Koshin Jo. ed.. Jinji koshin roku,
various editions (Tokyo: Jinji Koshin Jo).
21. Miyajima Mikinosuke. Kitasato Shibasaburd den. Nempu, p. 4. Their
marriage took place in April 1883. before Kitasato had even gone to Germany.
Baron Matsuo served as governor of the Bank of Japan from 1903 to 1911. See
Shunjiro Kurita, ed. Who's Who in Japan (Tokyo: Chuseisha, 1913). p. 517.
22. The two were Yamakawa Kenjird (physicist) and Kikuchi Dairoku
(mathematician). Their appointments were owing to their prominence as aca
demic administrators, not as scientists.
23. TGS1G.Cf. MYosaniindaig6bunka(NoshomushOjokan)kaigiroku(sok
ki) dai-ikkai," House of Representatives Budget Committee. 31 st Diet. January
29, 1914, pp. 6-7.
24. Nagai Tamotsu. Takagi Kanehiro den, pp. 93-94
25. Meiji Shi Koza Kanko Kai, ed.. Meiji kagaku shi, p. 17; Nakayama
Shigeru, "Kokka kagaku." in Sugimoto Jun. ed.. Kagaku shi, Taikei Nihon shi
sosho 19 (Tokyo: Yamakawa Shuppan Sha. 1967). pp. 365-66.
26. Kanao Seizfl, Nagai Nagayoshi den (Tokyo: Nihon Yakugakkai, 1960), p.
103.
27. Kawakami Takeshi, Gendai Nikon iryd shi (Tokyo: Keiso Shobd. 1965),
p. 108.
28. Taigakai, ed.. Naimushd shi, 1 (Tokyo: Chihd Zaimu Kyokai, 1971)1
139.
29. Ijiri Tsunekichi, ed. Rekidai kenkan roku (Tokyo: Hara Shobd, 1967).
30. For the activities of the Tokyo Hygiene Laboratory, see Naimushd Tokyo
Eisei Shiken Jo, ed, Eisei Shiken Jo enkaku shi (Tokyo: Fuji Insatsu Sha,
1937). Kitasato worked there in 1883-84, before his work in Berlin
31. Nagai (n. 24 above), pp. 185, 116, 183.
33. Tominari Kimahei, Gendai Nihon kagaku shi, pp. 37-39.
34. Hiroshige Tetsu, T h e Role of the Government in the Development of
Science," Journal of World History 9/2 (1965):322, and TGSIG. Cf. "Yosan iin
dai-go bunka (Noshomusho jokan) kaigiroku (sokki) dai-san kai," House of
Representatives Budget Committee, 31st Diet, January 31, 1914, pp. 17-24.
35. TGSIG. C£ "Yosan iin dai-go bunka (Noshornushd jokan) kaigiroku (sok
ki) dai-go kai," House of Representatives Budget Committee, 31st Diet, Febru
ary 4, 1914, pp. 33-48.
36. Tomita Tetsuo, Trie Origin of the Patent System in Japan," Japanese
Studies in the History of Science, no. 3 (1964): 114-26.
37. Tokkyd Chd, Tokkyd seido nanaju nen shi (Tokyo: Hatsumei Kydkai,
1955), pp. 3-4.
38. Tomita (n. 36 above), pp. 114-26.
39. Oguchi Yoshikatsu, "Nakamura Yaroku-sensei," in Nihon Ringyo Gyu
tsu Kydkai, ed., Ringyo senjin den (Tokyo: Nihon RingyG Gyutsu Kydkai,
1962), pp. 60-61, 38 (hereafter Ringyo senjin den).
40. Taigakai (n. 28 above), p. 139.
41. Shiobara Matasaku, Takamine hakushi, p. 31.
42. Terasaki Masao, 'Teikoku daigaku keisei ki no daigaku kan," in Terasaki
Masao, ed., Gakkd kan no shiteki kenkyu (Tokyo: Noma Kyoiku KenkyO Jo,
1972), pp. 190-92, 202-04.
45. Watanabe K6ki, "Daigaku sotsugyd shosho juyoshiki," TIS, no. 433 (July
17. 1886):970.
46. Watanabe Kdki. 'Teikoku Daigaku sotsugyd shosho juyoshiki," TIS no.
538 (July 21. 1888):24.
47. Kikuchi Dairoku. "Rigaku no setsu," Toyo gakugei zasshi (hereafter
TCZ) 2/33 (1884):75-81. Reprinted in NKGST, 2:533-34.
48. Sakurai Jdji "Rigakusha no kairaku,"TCZ5/40 (1888):437-42.
49. Quoted in Ogura Kinnosuke, Sugaku shi kenkyu, 1:252.
50. Kato argued frequently with Mori over the objectives and purpose of
university education and academic research in Japan, undoubtedly because
Kat6 adhered fully to the German ideal of "pure" research, while Mori favored
an emphasis on "practical" application. See Terasaki (n. 42 above), pp. 185
265. and Tabata Shinobu, "Kyosha no kenri no kydshd: Kaidai," in Kato
Hiroyuki, Kyosha no kenri no kyoshd (Tokyo: Nihon Hydronsha, 1942), p. 14.
Katd's work was originally published in 1893.
51. TTDGNS, 1:934-35.
53. KurasawaTakashi, Kyoiku rei no kenkyu (Tokyo: Kddansha, 1975), pp.
522-28.
54. Michio Nagai, Higher Education in Japan: Its Take-offand Crash, trans.
Jerry Dusenbury (Tokyo: University of Tokyo Press, 1971), p. 218. Hamao, in
fact, published a history of this institution. See Hamao Arata, Tokyo Kogyo
Daigaku rokuju nen shi (Tokyo: Tokyo Kogyo Daigaku, 1940).
55. Terasaki (n. 42 above), pp. 210-14.
56. See Sassa (n. 18 above), pp. 182-87.
57. Terasaki (n. 42 above), p. 212. Thirteen of the young professors were
from the college of medicine, with the other technical faculties also well repre
sented. After 1905, however, scientists were rarely at theforein movements of
this sort
58. Uzaki Kumakichi, Aoyama Tanemichi, p. 138.
59. Quoted in Terasaki (n. 42 above), p. 216.
60. R. H. P. Mason, Japan's First General Election, 1890 (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1969), pp. 131-32.
61. The contributions of Hasegawa and Nakamura in particular are dis
cussed in Irisawa Tatsukichi, "Hasegawa Tai ron," in Irisawa Naika Doso Kai,
ed, Irisawa-sensei no enzetsu to bunsho (Tokyo: Kokuseidd, 1932), p. 1150,
and Irisawa Tatsukichi, "Nakamura Yaroku shi ni atetaru mono," in ibid., pp.
1368-69. Irisawa was professor of internal medicine at Tokyo University for
most of the late Meiji and early Taishd eras.
62. Nakamura Setfi, Tanakadate Aikitsu-sensei (Tokyo: Obun Shorin,
1943), pp. 96-97.
63. Bartholomew (n. 18 above), p. 310.
64. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-san kai Teikoku Gikai Shugiin Yosan Iinkai sokkiroku
dai-nana gd (dai-yon ka)," House of Representatives Budget Committee. 4th
Diet, May 13. 1892, pp. 1-5.
65. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-go ka dai-ichi go." House of Representatives Budget
Committee, 5th Diet, December 8. 1893. p. 19.
66. TGSIG. Cf. "Yosan iin dai-ichi bunkakai (Naimusho. Mombusho jokan)
16th Diet, December 20. 1901. pp. 67-68.
67. Matsuura Chinjiro. Okada Ryohei-sensei sho den (Tokyo: Okada Ryohei-
Sensei Denki Hensan Jimusho, 1935). pp. 123-25. This group included
Watanabe K6ki. Kamata Eikichi. Takada Sanae—presidents respectively of
Tokyo, Kek>. and Waseda universities—and the former vice minister of educa
tion Tsuji Shinji
68. Yoshlkawa Akimasa. "Sotsugyosho juyoshiki no enzetsu." TIS, no. 643
(July 26, 1890):36.
69. Oki Takatd, "Oki Mombu Daijin shukuji," TIS. no 696 (August 1.
1891):36. See also Joseph Pittau. "Inoue Kowashi (1843-1895) and the Meiji
Educational System," Monumenta Nipponica 20/3-4 (1965)270-82. and
Satanji Kimmochi, "Saionji Mombu Daijin shukuji." TIS, no. 903 (July 20.
1895):38.
70. Hachisuka Mochiaki. "Koshaku Hachisuka Mombu Daijin shukuji,"
TIS, no. 1006 (July 17. 1897):33.
71. Among other evidence bearing on this question, see the essay by
Yamakawa Kenjiro entitled "Okurasho banndshugi," in Shinjo Shinzd, ed.,
Danshaku Yamakawa-sensei iko (Kyoto: Ko Yamakawa Danshaku Kinen Kai,
1937), pp. 418-19.
72. Yoshida Mitsukuni, "Meiji no kagakushatachi," Jimbun gakuho 24
(March 1967):230-61.
73. Terasaki Masao, "Meiji chuki no teikoku daigaku hihan," Daigaku shi
kenkyu tsushin, no. 5 (January 1972):7-12.
74. Takano Rokuro, Kitasato Shibasaburo (Tokyo: Ninon Shobo, 1965), p.
209. Takano does not blame Kato Hiroyuki for the decision directly. However,
Kato, who heartily disliked Kitasato, had not only motive but opportunity to
involve himself. The motive stemmedfromhis bitterness over the 1887 beriberi
controversy (see chapter 3), and the opportunity from the university president's
role in recommending students for overseas study.
75. Bartholomew (n. 18 above), pp. 322-37.
76. TGSIG. C£ "Dai-go ka dai-ichi gd," House of Representatives Budget
Committee. 5th Diet, December 8, 1893, p. 1; DNTGS, 2. Cf. "Yosan sainyu
saishutsu sd yosan an, Mombushd jokan," House of Representatives, 4th Diet,

January 11, 1893, p 764
77. "Gakusha to gyoseikan," Kydiku jiron, no. 456 (December 15, 1897):
7-8.
78. TGSIG. Cf. "Shugiin Gakusei Kaikaku Chosa Kai setchi ni kansuru kengi
an shinsa tokubetsu iinkai sokkiroku (dai-ichi gd)," House of Representatives
Budget Committee. 14th Diet, December 19, 1899. p. 5.
79. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-ichi ka dai-hachi go." House of Representatives Budget
Committee, 10th Diet, March 12, 1897, p. 86. The original group of scientists
who were members included Furuichi Koi (civil engineering), Yamakawa Ken
jiro (physics), Hamada Gentatsu (medicine), and three chemists: Kuhara Mit
suru, Matsui Naokkrhi and Nakazawa Iwata. See Shokuinroku, 1897. pp. 439
40.
80. Private communication from Uchida Tadashi of the N ational I nstitu te for
Education Research, Tokyo, November 26. 1976.
81. Hanami Sakumi, Danshaku Yamakatva-sensei den, p. 322.
82. Kyoguchi MotokichJ, Takada Sanae den (Tokyo: Waseda Daigaku Shup
panBu. 1962), p. 171.
83. TGSIG (n. 78 above), pp. 1, 6, 5.
84. Matsuura (n. 67 above), pp. 123-25.
85. Official histories of the various imperial universities were used to calcu
late the number of chairs for division among the administrations of the various
presidents. For Tokyo University see TTDGNS.
86. Terasaki Masao, "Koto kydiku,"in KaigoTokiomi, ed., Inoue Kawashi no
kydiku seisaku, p. 334.
87. In February 1919 the Imperial Universities Ordinance was revised in a
manner which bore on this issue directly. The change in procedure allowed the
University Senate (Hydgikai) consisting of the faculty deans plus two elected
professors from each faculty, and chaired by the president, to control the cre
ation of chairs at the campus leveL See Sumeragi Shidd. Daigaku seido no
kenkyu (Tokyo: Yanagihara Shoten, 1955), p. 363.
88. Terasaki (n. 86 above), p. 361. Professors were consulted informally
about the creation of new positions even in the 1880s, before there was any chair
system as such. See Mano Bunji and Nakamura Tokugord, Furuichi Koi
(Tokyo: Kitabayashi Katsuzo, 1937), pp. 221-22.
89. TGSIG (n. 79 above), p. 86. The minister of education, Toyama Shoichi,
noted that field priorities in the establishment of chairs were also at this tune
closely correlated with the selection of officially sponsored candidates for over
seas study. See TGSIG, cf. "Dai-ichi ka dai-ni go," House of Representatives
Budget Committee, 12th Diet, May 25, 1898, p. 16.
90. Ijiri (n. 29 above), pp. 713-14.
91. Ueda Kazutoshi, professor of linguistics at Tokyo University, held this
post from November 1898 through March 1902 and was especially helpful to
the scientific community. Significantly, this was precisely the period when
Kikucra" Dairoku was also president of Che university and managed to establish a
record number of new chairs in technical fields. See the analysis of Tadokoro
Yoshiharu, who was himself vice minister of education from 1916 to 1918:
"Ueda-sensei no Mombusho jidai o omou," Kokkan 45 (March 1938):68.
92. Byron K. Marshall "Professors and Pobtics: The Meiji Academic Elite,"
Journal ofJapanese Studies 3/1 (Winter 1977):71-97.
93. Shokuinroku (n. 79 above), passim.
94. "Densembyo Kenkyu Jo hojohi kafu no meireisho," TIS, no. 789 (April
23, 1893):4&
95. "Eiseikyoku to Kitasato Shi," U, no. 276 (September 16. 1899):759.
96. Kitasato Kenkyu Jo, ed.. Kitasato Kenkyu Jo goju nen shi (Tokyo:
Kitasato Kenkyu Jo, 1966), p. 4.
97. Taigakai (n. 28 above). 3:244.
98. Regarding Goto, see Nakahama ToichirO. "Kitasato Shibasaburo
hyoron," Taiyd 6/3 (March 1902). p. 27; Miyajima (n. 21 above), p. 168.
99. See, for example: Nakahama (n. 98 above), pp. 26-27. and "Ibatsu to wa
nan da?" pp. 154-57.
100. Takagi Tomoeda, "Henrin no ni. san." in Miyajima (n. 21 above), pp.
266-68.
101. Shibasaburt Kitasato. T h e Bacillus of Bubonic Plague." The Lancet 11
(1894):42S-30. See chapter 6 for additional details on the Hong Kong plague
expedition and its scientific consequences.
102. "Kitasato Aoyama Ryo-Hakushi Jchigyd kangeikai no gaikyd," TIS, no.
868 (November 17. 1894)35-36
103. DNTGS. 3. Cf. "Dai Ninon Shiritsu Eisei Kai setsuntsu Densembyd
Kenkyu Jo ni sembatsu kenkyusei o oku no kengi an. House of Representa
tives, 8th Diet, March 18. 1895. p. 919.
105. Kitasato was a dose friend of Fukuzawa Yukichi during the last ten
years of Fukuzawa's life (1892-1902) and was gready admired by Tanaka
Giichi, later prime minister. Since these men published Jiji shtmpo and Ikai
jiho, respectively. Kitasato could usually count on a sympathetic press to report
his views, though not necessarily to endorse them. See Kitajima Ta'ichi,
Kitajima Ta'ichijiden, pp. 99, 107-08.
106. Miyajima, pp. 272-73.
107. See Ijiri (n. 29 above), pp. 790-91, 798.
108. TGS1G. Cf. "Shugiin yosan iinkai sokkiroku (dai-rokka)," House of Rep
resentatives Budget Committee, 4th Diet, December 5,1892, p. 9; "Shugiin dai
ni kai yosan iinkai sokkiroku dai-yon go (dai-rokka)," House of Representatives
Budget Committee, 2d Diet, December 1,1891, p. 5; "Shugiin dai-ni kai yosan
iinkai sokkiroku dai-juyon go (dai-rokka)," House of Representatives Budget
Committee, 2d Diet, December 3, 1891, p. 6; "Shugiin dai-ni kai yosan iinkai
sokkiroku dai-juhachi go (dai-rokka)," House of Representatives Budget Com
mittee, 2d Diet, December 4,1891, p. 1; "Shugiin dai-ni kai yosan iinkai sok
kiroku dai juyon go (dai-rokka)," House of Representatives Budget Committee,
2d Diet, December 3,1891, pp. 1,3.
109. Ibid, p. 2.
110. HAL, pp. 2-5.
111. Shokuinroku, 1896, pp. 436, 467-68, and 1899, pp. 514, 549.
112. TGSIG. Cf. "Shugjin Yosan linkai sokkiroku (dai-yon ka dai-ichi gO),"
House of Representatives Budget Committee, 9th Diet, January 13, 1896, pp.
12-13.
113. DNTGS, 4. Cf. "Fuken ndji shiken jo kokko hoj6," House of Representa
tives, 13th Diet, February 6,1899, pp. 1823-24.
114. Katayama Shigeki, "Shiga Taizan-sensei," in Ringyd senjin den, pp.
94-97.
115 Ota Yujird, "Sat6 Shingord-sensei," Ringyd senjin den, pp. 469-70. See
chapter 8 for details.
116. Shokuinroku, 1897, pp. 466-68.
117. Hiroshige (n. 34 above), p. 321. Actually the same thing was true in the
United States: agricultural interests demanded government assistance, but
industrial ones made few such demands. See A. Hunter Dupree, Science in the
Federal Government, p. 271.
118. Tokyo University's president, Kikuchi Dairoku. called this fact to the
attention of the House of Peers in February 1900. See DNTGS, 4. Cf. "Gakusei
chosa kai setchi ni kansuru kengi an," House of Peers, 14th Diet, February 2,
1900. p. 120.
119. Asakura Haruhiko, Meiji kansei jiten (Tokyo: Tdkyodd Shuppan,
1969), pp. 203-04; Taigakai (n. 28 above), p. 139; and Kaneseki Yoshinoit
private communication, November 20, 1976.
120. Ijiri (n. 29 above), p. 799.
121. Taigakai (n. 28 above), p. 139. It should also be noted that the vice
minister of agriculture and commerce was Shinagawa Yajiro, friend and backer
of the prominent chemists Nagai Nagayoshi and Takamine Jokichi. It is a
certainty that Shinagawa would have favored this proposal.
122. Kdtard Mochizuki, Japan Today: A Souvenir of the Anglo-Japanese
Exhibition Held in London, 1910. (Tokyo: Liberal News Agency, 1910), p. 157.
123. DNTGS, 4. Cf. "Chuo kdgyd shiken jo setsuntsu ni kansuru kengi an,"
House of Representatives, 13th Diet, February 20, 1899, pp. 1914-15.
124. TGSIG. Cf. "Shugiin Gakusei Kaikaku Chosa Kai setchi ni kansuru
kengi an shinsa tokubetsu iinkai sokkiroku (dai-ni go)," House of Representa
tives Budget Committee, 14th Diet, January 20, 1900, p. 18.
125. "Mombusho no impishugi o nanzu," Kyoiku jiron, no. 551 (August 5,
1900):34-35.
126. DNTGS (n. 118 above), p. 124.
127. DNTGS (n. 118 above), January 31, 1900, p. 111.
128. Matsuura (n. 67 above), p. 125, and Mishima Shunken, "Ryu gakusei
tozetsu mondai II," 1J, no. 1060 (October 17, 1914): 1748.
Representatives Budget Committee, 15th Diet, February 1, 1901, pp. 52-57.
These projects included subsidization of the geologicalresearchesof Koto Bun
jirofromTokyo University, expansion of the laboratory attached to the chair of
marine engineering at Tokyo University, construction of laboratories in bio
chemistry at Tokyo and Kyoto Universities, 680 yen in new funding for the
Seismological Research Commission, and salary increases for professors.
130. DNTGS (n. 118 above), pp. 109, 112. Toyama was a staunch backer of
the privatdozent system and in 1900 published a book entitled Kydiku seido ron
expounding his ideas.
131. Hanami (n. 81 above), p. 133.
132. DNTGS (IL 118 above), p. 122.
133. This assessment of Katsura Tart conies from Nagayo Mataro, professor
of pathology at Tokyo University and university president at the beginning of
World War II. See Umezawa Hikotaro. ed. Kindai mei'i ichiyu hanashi, p. 29.
An important prize awarded to scientists was named the Katsura Prize.
134. Katsura Taro. "Dai-ikkai Ninon Rengo Igakkai keikyd." TIS, no. 1250
(April 5,1902) 22. The prime minister was not specific on this occasion, but it is
nearly certain that he was referring to factionalism among academics. See
chapter 6.
135. Mishima(n. 128 above), p. 1748
136. Dai Jimmei Jiten Henshu Bu. ed.. Dai jimmei jiten Thereafter DJJ)
(Tokyo: Heibonsha, 1957). 1-2/2:80-81
137. "Daigaku kyoju zoho mondai," I), no. 369 (June 29. 1901) 456.
139. "Kikuchi Bunsh6 no Kyushu Ika Daigaku dan." TIS, no. 1230
(November 9, 1901). p. 39. and DNTGS (n. 118 above), pp. 119-25. Then in
December Kikuchi further muddied the waters by stating that he and the gov
ernment did recognize the need for two new imperial universities—Kyushu
and Tohoku—but simply could not afford to build them {DNTGS, 5; cf. "Yosan
sainyu saishutsu so yosan an. Shihd. Mombusho jokan," House of Representa
tives, 16th Diet, December 28. 1901. pp. 1510-11).
140. TGS1G (n. 66 above), pp. 67-68.
142. Kikuchi Dairoku. Teikoku Gakushiin no jushoshiki," TIS, no. 1768
(May 18,1912):38. In reaching a judgment one must take into account the sum
of the policies Kikuchi articulated and followed during the course of his admin
istrative and professional career.
143. "Gakusha to gyoseikan" (n. 77 above), pp. 7-8.
144. Nakayama Shigeru, "Kikuchi Dairoku no Cambridge jidai ni tsuite,"
Kagakushi kenkyu, no. 65 (January-March 1963):36-37. It is worth noting
that Kikuchi, when he arrived in Cambridge at the age of seventeen, was far
younger than the average Japanese who went overseas to study. Perhaps this
made him more impressionable.
145. Although Cambridge University in the 1870s was in the throes of major
academic reform, considerable opposition remained to establishing experimen
tal science as part of the regular curriculum. Isaac Todhunter himself was part
of this opposition. James Clerk Maxwell, the physicist, once asked Todhunter if
he would like to see an experimental demonstration of conical refraction, only to
be told: "No. I have been teaching it all my life, and I do not want to have my
ideas upset" See J. G. Crowther, The Cavendish Laboratory, 1874-1974 (New
York: Science History Publications, 1975), p. 9. Todhunter made his views on
this subject known elsewhere. See Isaac Todhunter, The Conflict of Studies
and Other Essays on Subjects Connected with Education (London: Macmillan
and Co., 1873), pp. 1-32. Regarding social mobility, see p. 21, where he writes:
"We must not expect boysfromthe humbler classes to excel in the more expen
sive luxuries of education."
I am indebted to Barbara Reeves for these references to the Cambridge situa
tion and Todhunter's position in it
146. Matsuura (n. 67 above), pp. 91-92. Representative Fuji Kinsaku in
December 1901 contrasted Kikuchi unfavorably with his two predecessors as
minister of education "who were only politicians," declaring that he, as an
"educator," should have a more positive view. See TGSIG (n. 66 above), pp. 76
77.
148. Sato Kenzo, Kokuritsu daigaku zaisei seido shikd, pp. 183, 293-94.
149. Marshall (n. 92 above), pp. 71-97.
150. Mitsukuri Kakichi, professor of biology, and Aoyama Tanemichi, pro
fessor of internal medicine and dean of the faculty, took the position, "We
[professors) ought to end the (boycott] now that the minister of education's
resignation has been achieved." See Hanami (n. 81 above), pp. 143-44.
151. Sato(n. 148 above), pp. 183,293-94.
152. During the six and a half years of Hamao Arata's second presidency at
Tokyo University (December 1905-August 1912), fourteen new chairs were
established in technicalfields,with allfourtechnical faculties represented This
expansion, however, proceeded at a slower pace than the expansion during
Kikuchi Dairoku's presidency (April 1898-June 1901), and it was mostly ac
complished before 1909.
153. Makino was a believer in what contemporariesreferredto as hdka ban
noshugi. In 1897, as vice minister of education, he told the Budget Committee of
the House of Representatives: "Appointments to bureaucratic positions are
generally limited to graduates of the law faculty. Graduates in medicine, en
gineering, and science do not have the qualifications to become officials." See
TGSIG, cf. "Dai-ichi ka dai-san gd," House of Representatives Budget Commit
tee, 10th Diet, January 27, 1897, pp. 44-45.
154. Tohoku Daigaku, TDGNS, 1:27-28.
155. The members included Tanakadate Aikitsu, Fujisawa Rikitard, Sakurai
Joji, and Nagaoka Hantaro, all professors at Tokyo University. See Yuasa (n. 2
above), p. 238.
156. TDGNS (n. 154 above), 1:27-28, 34-36.
157. See chapter 4 for details.
158. "Kumakawa-hakushi Aoyama-hakushi ni kawaru," IJ, no. 1212 (Sep
tember 15, 1917): 1641.
159. Yamakawa Kenjird, "Yo wa nani o waga kyoiku kai ni okeru saidai
kyumu to shinzuru ka?" in Shinjo (n. 71 above), p. 597.
160. Omori Tozan, "Konrai shusshoku no Bunshd," Chuo koron (hereafter
CK) 28/6 (June 1913): 64.
161. DJJ, 1-2/2:614; 3-4/1:254; and 5-6/1:161-62.
162. "Okuda Bunshd ni nozomu,'* CK 28/6:70.
163. "Mombusho tokyokusha no henken," Kyoiku jiron, no. 999 (January
15, 1913):45.
164. Hanami (n. 81 above), pp. 206-07. Yamakawa also credits Makino
Nobuaki with endeavoring to assure that all theregionalimperial universities
became equal to Tokyo University in quality. See "Meiji kyoiku shi jo gen
Mombushd no zaiaku to shite tokuhitsu taishd subeki jiko." in ShinjO (n. 71
above), p. 599.
165. Sato (n. 148 above), pp. 183. 293-94.
166. Omori (n. 160 above), p. 64. and uAa Densembyo KenkyQ Jo." Kydiku
jiron, no. 1063 (October 25. 1914):47.
167. DNTGS,(n. 118 above), p. 112.
168. TGSIG (n. 64 above), p. 75.
169. Spaulding (n. 15 above), pp. 315-17. Conversely, the Ministry of Edu
cation lacked prestige because law graduates were fewer there.
170. Yamakawa Kenjiro. "Gakusei e kunji." in Shinjo(n 71 above), p. 238.
171. Shibusawa Motoji. Gqju nen kan no kaikb (Tokyo: Shibusawa-Sensei
Chosho Shuppan Jigyo Kai, 1953). pp. 205-06.
172. Yamakawa Kenjiro. "Okurasho banndshugi," in Shinjo(n. 71 above).
pp. 418-19.
173. "Okuda Bunsho to kataru." I), no. 990 (June 14. 1913): 1098-99.
174. Ibid., and Okada Tomoji, Aa Okuda-hakushi. (Tokyo: bnpakusha,
1922). p. 141.
175. Uzaki (n. 58 above), p. 83.

176. Ibid. pp. 159-60.
177. Sakai Tanihei "Genkan ban nikki," in Kumagai Kenji, ed, Omoide no
Aoyama Tanemichi-sensei (Tokyo: Aoyama-Sensei Tanjo Hyakunen Sai Jumbi
Iinkai. 1959). p. 410.
178. The correct delineation of responsibility was first established by Aki
Moto. See his article Taishd sannen no iwayuru 'Denken ikan mondai* ni
tsuite." pts. 2 and 3. Nihon ishigaku zassht 13/4 (March 1.1968): 19-40; 14/2
(July 31. 1968):18-67.
179. Uzaki (n. 58 above), pp. 84-85.
180. Kenkichiro Koizumi, T h e Emergence of Japan's First Physicists,
1868-1900." in Russell McCormmach, ed.. Historical Studies in the Physical
Sciences, 6:39-41.
181. It is not even clear which scientist outside medicine was the best known
to the general public as a scientist.
182. Iwazumi Rydji, "Gijutsukan no kakugi shusseki," in Ando Enshu, ed.,
Kozai Yoshtnao-hakushi (Tokyo: Nishigahara Kanko Kai. 1938). pp. 66-68.
183. Yuasa Mitsutomo, Kagaku gqju nen, pp. 69-70.
184. The Electrical Engineering Society (Denki Gakkai), for example, was
called an "insignificant organization." For a discussion of professional organiza
tions see ibid., pp. 66-70.
185. Quoted in Terashima Masashi, Sekaiteki na Nihon kagakusha (Tokyo:
Izumi Shobo, 1944), p. 230.
186. Aoyagi Eijt "Denki kogaku saikin no shimpo." Taiyo 18/15 (1912),
reprinted in NKGST, 2:485-87.
187. DNTGS, 8. Cf. "Kdgyd shiken jo setchi ni kansuru kengi an," House of
Representatives, 27th Diet, March 18, 1911, p. 703. Watanabe Wataru, pro
fessor of metallurgical engineering at Tokyo University and dean of the faculty

(1903-19), was very active in the promotion of the mining industry and sought
to create more extensive research facilities off-campus as well as on. See Tokyo
Teikoku Daigaku, Tokyo Teihohu Daigaku gakujutsu taikan, Kogaku-bu, Kdku
Kenkyu Jo (Tokyo: Tdkyd Teikoku Daigaku, 1942), p. 342.
188. "Eiseikyoku to Kitasato shi," IJ, no. 276 (September 16, 1899): 759.
189. "Gydsei seiri to Densembyd Kenkyu Jo." IJ, no. 473 (July 4,1903):533;
and "Densembyd Kenkyu Jo nodai-kakucho," JJ, no. 915 (January 1,1912):65.
190. Takano(n. 74 above), pp. 132-38.
192. "Fuji-Tsukuba: Kitajima to Miyamoto," IJ, no. 1014 (November 29,
1913)2168, and Izawa Takio Denki Hensan linkai, ed., Izawa Takio (Tokyo:
Haneda Shoten, 1951). p. 109.
193. Kitajima (n. 105 above), pp. 99, 107-08, 58.
194. Takano (n. 74 above), pp. 55-57, and "Dofudegaoka Y&jden," TIS, no.
819 (December 9. 1893):40-41.
195. Kubota Seitard. "Kanri Kitasato," in Miyajima, pp. 259-62.
196. "Densembyd Kenkyu Jo no dai-kakuchd" (n. 189 above), p. 65.
197. "Aoba token." IJ, no. 988 (May 31, 1913): 1032.
198. Ibid. On Uchigasaki's educational background, see Kitajima (n. 105
above), p. 107.
199. Kubota (n. 195 above), p. 261.
200. "Denken ikan no hishi,"/;, no. 1095 (June 19, 1915):9-10.
201. TGS1G Cf. "Yosan iin dai-ichi bunkakai (Naimushd, Mombushojokan)
kaigiroku (sokki) dai-ichi kai," House of Representatives Budget Committee,
15th Diet. January 25, 1901, p. 2.
202. A "bacteriologist" for my purposes is defined as a Japanese aged thirty or
above who obtained a doctorate of science in medicine with a bacteriological
specialty during the period 1888-1920. Numerical estimates invariably rest on
a judgmental factor. The primary considerations here were: attainment of skills
required to do research (hence the age factor); publication of at least one origi
nal piece of research in the field; and peer certification of competence by col
leagues at Tokyo or Kyoto. But the argument rests less on the exact number of
bacteriologists than on the statistical trend. For details see Iseki (n. 20 above)
and James R. Bartholomew, "The Japanese Scientific Community in Forma
tion, 1870-1920." in L. A. Schneider, ed, Science in Modern East Asia, 1
(Buffalo: State University of New York, 1980):62-84.
203. For details on the sentiment at Tokyo University, see Kitajima (n. 105
above), pp. 40-41. Hostilities at the Tokyo Hygiene Institute stemmedfromthe
presence of Nakahama Toichird, whose animosity is indicated by his article in
Taiyo (cf. n. 98 above).
204. Tokyo Daigaku Igaku Bu Hyakunen Shi Henshu linkai, ed., Tokyo
Daigaku Igaku Bu hyakunen shi (Tokyo: Tokyo Daigaku Shuppan Bu, 1967), p.
298, and Futaki Kenzo-Sensei Kinen Kai. ed. Futaki Kenzo-sensei (Tokyo:
Futaki Kenzo-Sensei Kinen Kai, 1969), p. 308. Futaki became deputy director
of Komagome Hospital, a Tokyo University-affiliated institution.
205. Iseki (n. 20 above), 2:218-19.
206. Mishima Shunken, "'Aoyama' to 'Kitasato/" U, no. 1063 (November 7,

1914):4-7.
207. Katd Fusazd, ed. Hakushaku Hirata Tdsuke den (Tokyo: Hirata Haku
Denki Hensan Jtanusho, 1927), pp. 28-29.34-35.
208. Ogura Kuraichi "Meiji norin kanryO no tenkei," Ndnn shunjH 2/3
(1952):32-37.
209. Spaulding (n. 15 above), pp. 166. 320. Spaulding notes that in 1910.
complaints about "dupbcative government" referred to the "pairing of legally
trained bureau chiefs with technically trained subordinates."
210. Ogura (n. 208 above), p. 35. Unfortunately for him. Sakd declined the
appointment in order to become president of the Dai Nippon Sugar Refining
Corporation, where he was drawn into a major scandal and ended by taking his
own life.
211. Asakura (n. 119 above), pp 194-95; DNTGS, 8. Cf. "Chud kogyd
shiken josetsuritsu ni kansuru kengi an." House of Representatives. 27th Diet,
March 21. 1911. p. 231; and Yuasa Mitsutomo. Gendai kagaku gijutsu shi
ntmpyd, pp. 106-07.
212. Hanami (n. 81 above), p. 412.
2 i a TGSIG. Cf. "Yosan Un daigo bunka (Noshomusho jokan) kaigiroku
(sokki) dai-san kai," House of Representatives Budget Committee. 28th Diet,
February 2, 1912. p. 14.
214. TGSIG (n. 23 above), p. 6
215. Iwazumi ( a 182 above), pp. 66-68.
216. TGSIG. Cf. "Yosan iin daigo bunka (Ndsh6musho jokan) kaigiroku
(sokki) daigo kai," House of Representatives Budget Committee. 31st Diet,
February 4, 1914. p. 47
217. TGSIG (n. 23 above), pp. 1-6.
218. Ibid., pp. 6-7, and TGSIG (n. 216 above), pp. 40-41
219. Kitasato Kenkyu Jo (n. 96 above), pp. 25-27. and Takano (n. 74 above),
p. 135.
220. Ota (n. 115 above), pp. 469-70. advances this argument "Professional
foresters developed the Metfi system offorestryadministration based on modem
scientific knowledge Subsequently, however, a belief in the superiority of
legal studies led to the creation of rigid, inflexible walls in the higher civil
service. Doors were closed Technical specialists were treated as mere
auxiliaries."
221. Nohara Tsuneo, "Watakushi no mita Takayama jochO," in Tokyo Kogyd
Shiken Jo, ed, Tokyo Kogyd Shiken Jo goju nen shi (Tokyo: Tdkyd Kdgyd
Shiken Jo, 1951), p. 579.
222. Izawa Takk) Denki Hensan Iinkai (n. 192 above), p. 109. Izawa was
inspector general in the Metropolitan Police Department of the home ministry
and assessed the situation as follows: "[Prior to its transfer to the Ministry of
Education) the Institute of Infectious Diseases was a real barrel of rotten apples.
It was supposed to be a state institution, but Dr. Kitasato had made it completely
his own property. The chief of the Bureau of Public Health, who was supposed
to supervise it, could not do anything without consulting him. Everything at the
institute was under Kitasato's control. Since things had been this way for over a
decade, one would have to say that the bureaucratic system had been disrupted.
The government decided to transfer it to the Ministry of Education because its
aims were not being realized where it was, under the Ministry of Home Affairs."
223. Silberman (n. 13 above), pp. 226-37.
224. Robert A. Nisbet, in The Quest for Community (London: Oxford Uni
versity Press, 1969), p. 270, argues that in any society autonomy demands a
"plurality of authorities."
Chapter Six: Scientific Research in Its Social Setting

1. "Ibatsu to wa nan da?" (ch. 1, n. 21), pp. 154-57.
2. "Ibatsu to wa nan da to wa nan da?* (ch. 1, n. 21), p. 574.
3. "Batsu no Ika Daigaku," pt 2, Tdkyd Asahi Shimbun (hereafter TAS),
October 29. 1914. p. 5.
4. "Gakubatsu daha no yoi ichirei/ U, no. 554 (January 28, 1905): 131.
5. Nakahama Toichiro, "Kitasato Shibasaburd hydron," Taiyd 6/3 (March
1902):27. Nakahama is not formally listed as the author of the essay in Taiyd,
but his authorship has been established by Aki Motd.
6. "Daigaku igakka no komponteki kaisei," U, no. 1047 (July 18, 1914):
1248-49.
7. TGS1G. Cf. "Yosan iinkai giroku sokki, dai-nana kai," House of Represen
tatives Budget Committee, 35th Diet, December 16,1914, p. 82. The emotional
struggle over the transfer of Kitasato's institute to the Ministry of Education
formed the context of Yagi's remarks. Although Yagi later became an ally of
Kitasato, we do not know whether these remarksreflectedKitasato's views. See
chapter 7.
8. "Daigaku igakka" (n. 6 above), pp. 1248-49.
9. San'ichird Mizushima, "A History of Physical Chemistry in Japan,"
Annual Review of Physical Chemistry 23 (1972): 7.
10. Tokutomi Sohd, "Shisd jo ni okeru Teikoku Daigaku no kanka,"
Kohumin no tamo, no. 173 (November 23, 1892): 753.
11. DNTGS, 9. Ct Tdkyd Teikoku Daigaku Ika Daigaku kydju no shokuseki
ni kansuru Wakasugi Kisaburd no shitsumon enzetsu," House of Representa
tives, 35th Diet, December 15,1914, pp. 960-61. See also ibid,'Tokyd Teikoku
Daigaku oyobi Kyoto Teikoku Daigaku rinji seifu shishutsu kin ni kansuru
hdritsuan hoka ikken, dai-yon kai," House of Representatives Budget Commit
tee, 40th Diet, February 8,1918, p. 32.
12. Kitasato Shibasaburo, "Zai Doitsu-koku Igakushi Kitasato Shibasaburd
shi shokan," Chugai iji shimpo, no. 212 (January 25, 1889): 105.
13. Kitasato Shibasaburd, "Ogata kydju zaishoku niju-go nen kinen shuk
uga kai, shukuji," Saihingaku zasshi, no. 175 (May 10, 1910):553.
14. From a letter to Hasegawa Tai, quoted by him in DNTGS, 2, "Yosan
sainyu saishutsu sd yosan an, Mombushd jokan," House of Representatives, 4th
Diet, January 11, 1893, p. 763.
15. Yuasa Mitsutomo, Kagaku gojQ nen, p. 234.
16. Compiled from the sources for table 6.1.
17. Yuasa (n. 15 above), p. 234.
18. All the men in the pioneer group of Tohoku scientists had trained at
Tokyo University. One can see what values they brought to the new institution
by examining conditions at the old one.
19. Information compiled from Iseki Kurd, ed, Dai Nikon hakushi roku,
vote. 2 and 3.
20. Hata Sahachird, "Gakusha to shite no memmoku," in Miyajima
Mikinosuke, Kitasato Skibasaburd den, p. 278.
21. Miyajima, p. 103.
22. Takahashi Isao, Shiga Kiyoshi (Tokyo: Hosei Daigaku Shuppan Kyoku.
1957). p. 114.
23. Miyajima (n. 20 above), pp. 210, 286-87.
24. Shiga Kiyoshi, Aru rd hagakusha to segare to no taiwa (Tokyo: Yomiuri
Shimbun Sha, 19S3). p. 30; and Takahashi (n. 22 above), p. 116.
25. Fukuda Retju. Kitasato Shibasaburd hakushi, p. 10.
26. Miyajima (IL 20 above), p. 232.
27. Kitajima Ta'tehi, Kitajima Ta'ichtjidm, p. 29.
29. Kitasato Kenkyu Jo, ed, Kitasato Kenkyu Jo niju-go nen shi (Tokyo:
Kitasato Kenkyu Jo. 1939). pp. 135-64.
30. TAS (n. 3 above), p. 5.
31. Iseki (n. 19 above). 2:9. 16.27, 113.46.
32. TAS (n. 3 above), p. 5.
33. Compiled from Iseki (n. 19 above).
34. Ibid, 2:13, 28,91,98
35. TAS (n. 3 above), p. 5.
36. Ibid
37. Manabe-Sensei Denki Hensan Kai, Manabe Kaiichiro (hereafter
Manabe) (Tokyo: Ninon Onsen KikO Gakkai, 1950). p. 105.
38. Arima Etfi, Tamashi ni oeru," in Kumagai Kenji, ed, Omoide no
Aoyama Tanemichi'Sensei, p. 367.
39. Arai Tsuneo, "Mikake ni yoranu shojikisha," in Kumagai (n. 38 above), p.
141.
40. "Ogata Masanori-sensei tanjd hyakunen kinen zadankai," Nihon iji
shtmp6.no. 1507 (March 14, 1955): 1013-14.
41. Iseki (n. 19 above), 5:11.
42. Tanaka Minoru, Nihon no kagaku to Shibata Yuji, pp. 17-21.
43. Nakamura Sejjt Tanakadate Aikitsu-sensei, p. 52; Yagi Eh, Itakura
Kiyonobu, and Kimura Tdsaku, Nagaoka Hantaro den, p. 102; and Ishikawa
Teiichi, Honda Kotaro den, p. 93. Nakamura and Yagi, Itakura, and Kimura do
not state outright that Tanakadate and Nagaoka graduatedfirstin their classes,
but they do mention that Tanakadate became a member of the faculty immedi
ately after graduating, while Nagaoka received a full scholarship to graduate
school as tokutaisei (roughly, "valedictorian").
44. Iseki (n. 19 above), 2:143. On biochemistry's lack of prestige, see Arima
(n. 38 above), p. 367, where the author states that Aoyama Tanemichi custom
arily advised die poorest students in the graduate program to enter the bio
chemistry section.
45. Compiled from Iseki (n. 19 above), vols. 2 and 3.

46. On the Waseda and Doshisha cases, see Yanagita Izumi, Meiji bummei
shi ni okeru Okuma Shigenobu (Tokyo, 1962), p. 212, and Ueno Naozo, ed.,
Doshisha hyakunen shi (Kyoto, 1979), pp. 369-91.
47. Iseki (n. 19 above), vol. 5. Kitao Jiro, though a physicist, received his
appointment in the faculty of agriculture.
48. Compiled from Iseki (n. 19 above).
49. Data were compiled from sources used in table 6.1.
50. These figures refer only to relatives in the academic community or the
particular disciplinary specialization, not to all relatives who might have aided a
career. We have no way of knowing if even all of the academic and disciplinary
connections appear in the reference works.
51. For Kitasato, see Iwasaki Katsumi, Kdmotojujird den (Tokyo: Nagasaki
Shoten, 1943), p. 50. Yamamoto's case is mentioned in "Batsu no Ika Daigaku,"
pt 4. TAS, November 2, 1914, p. 5. Yamagiwa is discussed in Tokyo Teikoku
Daigaku, Tdkyo Teikoku Daigaku bydrigaku kyoshitsu goju nen shi (hereafter
Byorigaku kydshitsu), 1 (Tokyo: T6ky6 Teikoku Daigaku, 1939):227, and
Nagayo's in Nagayo Hakushi Kinen Kai, ed., Nagayo Mataro den (hereafter
Nagayo) (Tokyo: Nagayo Hakushi Kinen Kai, 1944), p. 96.
52. Tdkyo Teikoku Daigaku, ed., Tokyd Teikoku Daigaku gakujutsu taikan:
Rigaku Bu, Tokyo Temmon Dai, Jishin Kenkyu Jo (Tokyo: TdkyO Teikoku
Daigaku. 1942), pp. 76-77. (Hereafter cited as Gakujutsu taikan: Rigaku Bu.)
53. Tsuruta did not publish a single physics paper after becoming full pro
fessor and took a leave of absence in 1911. See Yagi, Itakura, and Kimura (n. 43
above), p. 312.
54. Yamakawa published only three scientific papers during his career. See
Kenkichiro Koizumi, "The Emergence of Japan's First Physicists, 1868-1900,"
in Russell McCormmach, ed., Historical Studies in the Physical Sciences, 6:67.
55. Hanami Sakumi, Danshaku Yamakawa-sensei den, pp. 92-94.
56. Ibid., p. 90.
57. Koizumi (n. 54 above), p. 68.
58. Hanami (n. 55 above), p. 90.
60. Koizumi (n. 54 above), pp. 79-80.
61. Nakamura (n. 43 above), pp. 227,228, 225.
62. Ibid., pp. 92-93, 227.
63. Yagi, Itakura, and Kimura (n. 43 above), pp. 114—15.
64. Matsuzawa Takeo, Waga shi waga tomo (Tokyo: Misuzu Shobo, 1967),
pp. 178-91.
68. Yukawa Hideki, "Yobun," in Yagi, Itakura, and Kimura (n. 43 above),
fourth and fifth pages of unpaginated text.
69. Matsuzawa (n. 64 above), pp. 178-91.
70. Yagi, Itakura, and Kimura (n. 43 above), pp. 313,312, 311.
71. Ibid, pp. 382-83.
72. Originally published under the title "Oshu butsurigaku jikken jo junran
ki," in Tokyd Butsuri Gakkd zasshi, 1912-13; quoted in Yagi, Itakura, and
Kimura (n. 43 above), p. 381.
73. Yagi, Itakura, and Kimura (n. 43 above), pp. 384-85. 386. See also
Mizushima (n. 9 above), p. 7. For a discussion of Yukawa's relations with
Tamakt see Yukawa Hideki, Tabibtto (The traveler) (Singapore: World Scien
tific Publishing Co.. 1982). pp. 112, 152, 158, 163-64, 170.
74. J. Harris and W. H. Brock, "From Giessen to Gower Street: Toward a
Biography of Alexander William Williamson (1824-1904)." p. 126
75. Samejima Tsunesaburo, "Kagaku Ka, in Gakujutsu taikan: Rigaku Bu
(n. 52 above), p. 127. The study was published in 1892.
76. Tanaka (n. 42 above), pp 37.65.
77. Sarnejima (n. 75 above), pp. 122-35.
78. Ibid., p. 128. and Tanaka (n. 42 above), pp. 41-42.
79. Samejima (n. 75 above), p. 128.
80. In Tanaka (n. 42 above), p. 41
81. Shibata YQji, "Ikeda Kikunae-sensei." Kagaku 16/7 (July 1961):46
82. Ikeda had enough money to build a chemistry laboratory in his own home
after retiring so that he could continue doing research. See Samejima (n. 75
above), pp. 129-31.
83. John D. Bemal, The Social Function of Science (New York: Macmillan,
1939), p. 80.
84. Bemhard J. Stem. Social Factors in Medical Progress (New York: Co
lumbia University Press. 1927). p. 33.
85. Takott Parsons. The Social System (New York: Free Press of Glencoe,
1951), pp. 335. 340-41.432-33.
86. Bernard Barber. "Resistance by Scientists to Scientific Discovery,"
Science 134. no. 3479 (September 1. 1961)597.
87. Thomas S. Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (Chicago: Uni
versity of Chicago Press, 1962).
88. W. Cramer, T h e Late Professor Yamagiwa," The Lancet 218 (May 24,
1930): 1155, and Kanematsu Sugiura, MKatsusabur6 Yamagiwa," The Journal
of Cancer Research 14/4 (October 1930):568-69.
89. Cramer (n. 88 above), p. 1155. and H. Schuck et aL. eds.. Nobel: The Man
and His Prizes (Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1962), p. 247.
90. Tashiro Yoshinori, MKo Yamagiwa-kun o kataru," in Byorigaku hydshit
su, 2:125.
91. Nagayo (IL 51 above), p. 261.
92. Ibid,p. 121
93. MIka Daigaku genjddaha no gi,"//, no. 1076 (February 6,1915):268-69.
94. Yamagiwa Katsusaburd, "Ko Ninon Byori Gakkai meiyo kaicho Miura
Moriharu-sensei tsuitd no ji," in Byorigaku kyoshitsu, 1:208.
95. Sata Yoshihiko, "Byorigaku kyoshitsu no sotitsu jidai, Miura-sensei no
shita ni manabishi koro," in Byorigaku kyoshitsu, 2:19-20.
96. Ibid,p. 21
97. Mitamura Makujiro, quoted in Nagayo (n. 51 above), pp. 262-63.
98. Tokyo Teikoku Daigaku, Tokyo Teikoku Daigaku gakujutsu taikan:
33° NOTES TO PACES 183-89
Igaku Bu, Densembyo Kenkyujo, Ndgaku Bu (Tokyo: TdkydTeikoku Daigaku,

1942), p. 75. (Hereafter cited as Gakujutsu taikan: Igaku Bu.)
99. Nagayo (n. 51 above), pp. 162-69.
100. Ibid., pp. 261, 101. 279, 288-89.
101. Because of his stutter, the Ministry of Education initially refused to
sponsor him for overseas study. See Uzaki Kumakichi, Aoyama Tanemichi, pp.
42, 155.
102. Mitamura Makujiri, "Tanemichi no sekai ddtoku." in Kumagai (n. 38
above), pp. 165. 168-70. 397; and Sakai Tanihei, "Genkan ban nikki," in
Kumagai, p. 397.
103. Takahashi Akira, "Kanrei no shukuji." in Kumagai (n. 38 above), p.
182.
104. Imamura Yoshio, "Mangekyo," in Kumagai (n. 38 above), p. 182.
105. Fujita Shuichi, "Aoyama Tanemichi," in Umezawa Hikotaro, ed.,
Kinsei iretsu den (Tokyo: Chugai Igaku Sha, 1954), p. 274.
106. Uzaki (n. 101 above), p. 201, and Hatta Zennoshin. "Kettt sokutei
kushin," in Kumagai (n. 38 above), p. 82.
107. Mitamura (n. 102 above), pp. 150-52. 162-63.
108. Arima (n. 38 above), p. 367, states that Aoyama's internal medicine
section was thefirstchoice for manyfirst-yeargraduate students in the faculty
of medicine.
109. Arai (n. 39 above), p. 142.
110. Yamada Jiro, "Karuizawa sanso," in Kumagai (n. 38 above), pp. 347
48.
111. Uzaki (n. 101 above), p. 201.
112. This reflects the evaluation of Shiozawa Sdichi, assistant professor of
internal medicine at Tokyo University, in the 1930s. See Gakujutsu taikan:
Igaku Bu, p. 132.
113. Tohoku Daigaku, TDGNS, 1:65.
114. The other faculty, agriculture, continued to be located in Sapporofora
number of years. See ibid.
115. Sawayanagi Masataro, "Daigaku kyoju no kenshoku," in Sawayanagi
Masataro, Sawayanagi Masataro zenshu (Tokyo: Kokudosha, 1980) 10:236
37.
116. Quoted in TDGNS, 1:65-70.
117. Nobuo Kawamiya, "Kdtard Honda: Founder of the Science of Metals in
Japan," in Japanese Studies in the History of Science, no. 15 (1976): 147-56.
118. Ishikawa(n. 43 above), pp. 107,181. New Year's Day is Japan's biggest
national holiday.
119. Ibid., p. 180.
120. Ibid., p. 183.
121. Kawamiya (n. 117 above), p. 157.
125. Ibid., pp. 94-95, 215.
126. Ibid., pp. 214-15.
127. Quoted in Kawamiya (n. 117 above), p. 148.

130. Ibid., p. 149.
131. Fujita (n. 105 above), p. 274.
132. Arima (n. 38 above), p. 362.
133. Bydrigaku hydshUsu, 1:193.
134. Ezra Vogd, Japan's New Middle Class (Berkeley: University of Califor
nia Press, 1963), pp. 104-06.
135. Uzaki (n. 101 above), p. 204.

136. Japanese cultural patterns, if anything, would have encouraged open
ness and group discussion, not a closed-minded, autocratic style. See Reinhard
Bendix, "Preconditions of Development: A Comparison ofJapan and Germany,M
in R. P Dore, ed, Aspects ofSocial Change in Modern Japan (Princeton: Prince
ton University Press, 1967). p. 54.
137. Tanaka (n. 42 above), pp. 63-64.
138. Manabe, pp. 141-42. This occurred in 1916.
139. James Bartholomew. "Japanese Culture and the Problem of Modem
Science," in Arnold Thackray and E. Mendelsohn, eds.. Science and Values
(New York: Humanities Press. 1974). p. 139.
140. Mizushima (n. 9 above), p. 9. Mizushima was professor of physical
chemistry at Tokyo University for many years after World War II
141. Kubota Fujiro, "Goju nen mae no Tokyo Teikoku Daigaku byorigaku
kyoshitsu oyobi tdji no Miura kyoju," in Bydrigaku kyoshitsu, 2:10.
142. Murayama Tatsuzd. Tanemichi sumbyd," in Kumagai (n. 38 above),
pp. 215-21. The bacillus is also called Yersinia pestis.
143. Ogata Masanori, "Jiden," Eiseigaku densembydgaku zasshi 15/2 (Oc
tober 13. 1919): 132.
144. Tanaka (n. 42 above), pp. 141. 135.
146. Quoted by Miyagawa Yoneji, "Densembyo Kenkyu Jo," in Kumagai (n.
38 above), p. 322.
147. Ishihara Kikutaro in "Ogata Masanori-sensei tanjd hyakunen kinen
zadankai," Nthon iji shimpo (hereafter MS), no. 1507 (March 14,1955): 1013.
148. Nagai Tamotsu, Takagi Kanehiro den, pp. 117-18, 138.
149. Murayama Tatsuzd in NIS, no. 1507:1020.
150. Extensive newspaper coverage of controversies in Japanese medicine
began even before Kitasato's return to Japan in 1892, but they intensified after
it Murayama notes that controversies—as in 1902 in a dispute over cholera—
could actually begin in the major dailies and then move to the scientific journals
and meetings. See "Eiseigaku no reimei o kataru," NIS, no. 1956 (October 21,
1961 ):34. This trend was still visible during the controversy over influenza in
1918. when the somewhat retiring Ogata Masanori, professor of hygiene at
Tokyo University, was willing to discuss his scientific views with the popular
press as a way of redressing what he considered to have been the biased cover
age he received in 1902. See NIS, no. 1507:1013.
151. Quoted in Bydrigaku kyoshitsu, 1.239.
152. En Yagi, "On Nagaoka's Saturnian Atomic Model (1903)," Japanese

Studies in the History of Science, no. 3 (1964):30, 40-41.
153. Henri Poincare, The Value of Science, trans. G. B. Halsted (New York:
Science Press, 1907), p. 109.
154. Yagi (n. 152 above), p. 47. See also the discussion in Koizumi (n. 54
above), p. 91.
155. Tomoda Chinzo, "Sekai no naka no sekai," Tdyogakugei zasshi 22, no.
288 (September 25. 1905): 383.
156. Nagaoka Hantaro, Genshiryoku jidai no akebono (Tokyo: Asahi Shim-
bun Sha, 1951), p. 195.
157. Fushimi Kdji, "Ninon ni okeru butsurigaku no seiritsu," in Nihon But
suri Gakkai, ed.. Nihon no butsurigaku shi (Tokyo: Tdkai Daigaku Shuppan
Kai, 1978), 1:503-04.
158. Uchida Shun'ichi, "Kagaku hyakunen no kaikd to tembo," in Nihon
Kagaku Kai, ed.. Nihon no kagaku hyaku nen shi (Tokyo, 1978), pp. 24-31.
Uchida was president of the Japan Chemical Society in 1964.
159. Shibata Yuji, "Nihon Kagaku Kai hyaku nen ni chinamu kaikd to kan
sd," in Nihon no kagaku hyaku nen shi (n. 158 above), pp. 5-6.
160. Samejima (n. 75 above), pp. 122-25.
161. Shibata (n. 159 above), p. 6.
162. George Basalla, 'The Spread of Western Science." Science 156, no.
3775 (May 5. 1967):611-22. An essay by R. W. Home on the development of
physics in Australia provides a useful comparison. See "The Beginnings of an
Australian Physics Community," in Nathan Reingold and Marc Rothenberg,
eds.. Scientific Colonialism: A Cross-Cultural Comparison (Washington:
Smithsonian Institution Press. 1987), pp. 3-34.
163. Shibat (n. 159 above), pp. 5, 6, 7.
164. Nakayama Shigeru believes this made physical scientists less inclined
to take risks. See his essay "Japanese Scientific Thought" in Charles C.
Gillispie, ed.. Dictionary of Scientific Biography 15/1.
165. Tanaka (n. 42 above), p. 62.
166. Sata (n. 95 above), p. 17.
167. The eighty-six include physicists, biologists, mathematicians, geol
ogists, and chemists who had the D.Sc. degree.
168. A. Paul Hare, "A Study of Interaction and Consensus in Different Sized
Groups," American Sociological Review 17/3 (June 1952):261-67, and Robert
Freed Bales, A. Paul Hare, and Edgar Borgatta, eds.. Small Groups: Studies in
Social Interaction, 3d ed. (New York: Knopf, 1966), p. 499.
169. On conformity, see Kishida Motomi, "Iken no henka ni eikyo sum shu
dan kijun koka no kenkyu," Shinrigaku kenkyu 27/2 (August 1956): 105-10.
On talent, see Marvin E. Shaw, Group Dynamics: The Psychology of Small
Group Behavior, 2d ed. (New York: McGraw-Hill 1976), p. 235.
170. Barry E. Collins and Bertram H. Raven, "Group Structure: Attraction,
Coalitions, Communication and Power," in Gardner Lindzey and Elliot Aron
son, eds.. The Handbook ofSocial Psychology (Menlo Park, California: Addison-
Wesley, 1969), 4:125, and Kenneth L. Dion, "Cohesiveness as a Determinant of
In-Group Out-Group Bias," Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 28/2

(1973):171.
171. John James, "A Preliminary Study of the Size Determinant in Small
Group Interaction," American Sociological Review 16/4 (August 1951):475,
and Hare (n. 168 above), p. 265.
172. Ishikawa ( a 43 above), p. 93.
Chapter Seven: Science and the Crisis of World War I

1. John D. Bemal The Social Function of Science, pp. 29-30.
3. Miyagawa Yoneji, "Densembyd Kenkyu Jo." in Kumagai Kenji, ed.,
Omoide no Aoyama Tanemtcht-sensei, p. 324.
4. "Shikai genrd sempai no kekJu." IJ. no. 1056 (September 19. 1914): 1594.
5. TGSIG. Cf. "Yosan un dai-go bunka (NoshOmushO jokan) kaigiroku (sok
ki) dai-ni kai.n House of Representatives Budget Committee. 37th Diet. May 28.
1915. p. 14.
6. "Sengo keiei to iiku kikan." IJ. no 1068 (December 12. 1914):2072-73.
Not all of these men obtained doctorates. Only those who did so before 1921 are
counted in my total of 155.
7. See chapter 3 for details.
8. From statistics presented in Minoru Watanabe (ch. 2, n. 178). "Japanese
Students Abroad and the Acquisition of Scientific and Technical Knowledge."
pp. 283-85.
9. TGSIG (n. 5 above), p. 13.
10. "Shikai genro sempai no kekkT (n. 4 above), p. 1594.
11. "Ryugakusei mondai no sokumenkan," IJ, no. 1053 (August 29,
1914): 1473.
12. "Shikai genrd sempai no kekki" (n. 4 above), p. 1594
13. TGSIG Cf. "Yosan iin dai-go bunka (Noshomushd jokan) kaigiroku (sok
(d)dai-ikkai," House of Representatives Budget Committee. 37th Diet. May 27.
1915. p. 7.
14. "Batsu no Ika Daigaku," pts. 1-5, TAS, October 28. 1914. p. 5; October
29,1914. p. 5; October 30,1914, p. 5; November 2,1914, p. 5; and November 3,
1914. p. 5. For the articles' contents, see chapter 6.
15. DNTGS, 9. Cf. Tdkyd Teikoku Daigaku Ika Daigaku kyoju no shokuseki
ni kansuru Wakasugi Kisaburo no shitsumon enzetsu," House of Representa
tives, 35th Diet, December 15, 1914, pp. 960-61.
16. "Sengo keiei to iiku kikan" (n. 6 above), pp. 2072-73.
17. Mishima Shunken, "Ryugakusei tozetsu mondai (II)," IJ, no. 1060 (Oc
tober 17.1914): 1749.
18. In 1915 Japanese students tended to relocate in Britain, but from 1916
through 1919, about two-thirds studied in the U.S.
19. Mishima Shunken, "Ryugakusei tozetsu mondai (I)," IJ, no. 1059 (Oc
tober 10, 1914): 1708-09.
20. "Kore zekk6 no kikai ka?" IJ, no. 1052 (August 22, 1914): 1481.
21. Mishima(n. 19 above), p. 1708.
22. "Ryugaku no hitsuyd nashi," 1J, no. 1174 (December 23. 1916):2155.
23. L. F. Haber, "Chemical Innovation in Peace and in War," in C. G.
Bemhard, Elisabeth Crawford, and Per Sorbom, eds.. Science, Technology and
Society in the Time of Alfred Nobel (Oxford: Pergamon Press, 1982), pp. 275
78.
24. D. S. L. Cardwell, The Organisation ofScience in England, pp. 169-70.
25. Haber (n. 23 above), p. 277.
26. Regarding the situation in England and Wales, see Cardwell (n. 24
above), p. 165. So far as Japan is concerned, sixty students may be too high an
estimate when we consider that Tokyo University, with the largest programs,
had onlyfifteengraduate students in physics and chemistry (faculty of science)
and perhaps another fifteen in geology, zoology, and botany. Kyoto's program
was smaller than Tokyo's. Kyushu had no program, and at Tdhoku the numbers
could not have exceeded a dozen. See chapters 4 and 6 for additional details.
27. An English translation of the German engineers' letter to Chancellor
Theobald von Bethmann Hollweg appeared under the tide, "Science and the
Civil Service: A German Argument," The London Times Education Supple
ment, no. 84 (November 23, 1916): 1. See chapter 8.
28. "Kenkyu hiyo ni tsuite," I], no. 1062 (October 31. 1914): 1837.
29. "Bunshd no ikan mondai benkai," I), no. 1067 (December 5, 1914): 18.
30. "Okuma shushd no tenkan iken," I), no. 1063 (November 7. 1914): 10.
31. Kitajima Ta'ichi, Kitajima Ta'ichijiden, p. 42.
32. Miyajima Mikinosuke, Kitasato Shibasaburd den, p. 83.
33. Kitasato Kenkyu Jo, Kitasato Kenkyu Jo nijugo nen shi, p. 6.
34. On the institutionalizaoon of bacteriology outside Japan, see Joseph Ben-
David, "Roles and Innovations in Medicine," American Journal of Sociology
65/6 (1960):561-62; and John B. Blake (ch. 3. n. 163), "Scientific Institutions
since the Renaissance," pp. 31-62.
35. "Okuma Shushd no tenkan iken" (n. 30 above), p. 10.
36. TGS1G. Cf. "Yosan iinkai giroku sokki dai-nana kai," House of Represen
tatives Budget Committee, 35th Diet, December 16, 1914, p. 75.
37. Yamada Hiromichi, "Gun'i to shite no Ogai-sensei (Tokyo: Ikai Jihd Sha,
1934), p. 386.
38. Fear of Kitasato's political influence in the home ministry as a reason for
excluding ministry officials from the transfer planning process is strongly im
plied, though not explicitly stated, in "Denken ikan no hishi," IJ, no. 1095 (June
19, 1915):9-10.
39. "Otemachi yori Hitotsubashi e," IJ, no. 1060 (October 17, 1914): 11.
40. "Densembyd Kenkyu Jo kangae," TAS, October 15,1914, p. 3.
41. DNTGS, 9. Cf. "Densembyd Kenkyu Jo ikan ni kansuru shitsumon,"
House of Representatives, 35th Diet, December 15, 1914, pp. 961, 957, 962;
and TGSIG (n. 36 above), p. 66.
42. "Densembyo Kenkyu Jo heigd Wa fukand," TAS, October 25,1914, p. 3.
43. "Shugiin kaisan: Suisan Kdshu Jo Densembyd Kenkyu Jo," TAS,
December 27, 1914, p. 2.
44. Hara Kei, Hara Kei nikki, 4 (Tokyo: Fukumura Shuppan. 1965):58.
45. Resolutions condemning the laboratory transfer were issued by medical
societies in Tokyo and the Kansai region. For details, see "Tokyo kaigyo iga
kushi kai no ketsugibun happyd," Tokyo iji shinski (hereafter TIS), no. 1895
(November 7, 1914):40. and "Densembyd Kenkyu Jo Ucan no nariyuki," TIS,
no. 1896 (November 14. 1914):42-43.
46. Sakai Tanihet "Genkan ban nikki," in Kumagai (n. 3 above), p. 414.
47. Kitajima (n. 31 above), pp. 51-52.
48. Nagayo Hakushi Kinen Kai, ed. Nagayo Matard den, p. 152.
49. Kitasato Kenkyu Jo (n. 33 above), p. 14. and Dai Ninon Shiritsu Eisei
Kaidai-sanjuni-ji teiki sokai kyokd Raikyo." Dai Nihon Shiritsu Eisei Kai zasshi
(hereafter DNSEKZ). no. 379. pt 1 (1914): 14
50. Shokuinroku, 1899. p. 482
51. TGSIG (n. 36 above), p 81
52. MAa Densembyo Kenkyu Jo.' Ky&iku jiron (hereafter K/). no 1063 (Oc
tober 25. 1914) 47.
53. TGSIG (n. 36 above), p. 81
54. Shioda Hiroshige. Mesu to tate, p. 76.
55. TGSIG (n. 36 above), p. 81. and "Suisan ikan mondai." KJ, no. 1065
(November 15, 1914):36.
56. Ichiki Kitokuro, Ichiki-sensei kaikd roku (Tokyo: Ichiki-Sensei Tsuitd
Kai. 1954). pp. 65-66. Ichiki in his memoirs calls Kitasato "a kind of a poli
tician" and criticizes him for daring to publicize his opposition in the news
papers.
57. TGSIG (n. 36 above), pp 68-69, 73. 75
58. Izawa Takio Denki Hensan linkai, Izawa Takio, p. 109.
59. Kitasato KenkyO Jo (n. 33 above), pp. 25-27.
60. Takano Rokuro. Kitasato Shibasaburd, p. 135.
61. Ibid.pp.55-57.and"DofudegaokaYojO'en,"TIS,no.819(December9.
1893):40-41.
62. Miyajima (n. 32 above), pp. 92-93. 313; and Sato Kenzo. Kokuritsu
daigaku zaisei seido shiko, p. 293.
64. Kitajima (n. 31 above), pp. 49-50.
65. KitasatoKenkyuJo(n.33above),pp.21-24;DN7X;Sf9.Cf. "Densembyo
Kenkyu J6 seizo no diphtheria kessei ni kansuru shitsumon," House of Repre
sentatives, 36th Diet, June 2,1915, pp. 1326-32; and DNTGS, 10, cf. "Teikoku
daigaku tokubetsu kaikei ho chu kaisei horitsu an," House of Peers, 37th Diet,
February 1,1916, pp. 67-68. Losses incurred by the production of substandard
serumrequiredthe Ministry of Education to seek a compensatory special appro
priation for Tokyo University.
66. DNTGS, 10. Cf. "Teikoku daigaku tokubetsu kaikei ho chu kaisei horitsu
an," House of Peers, 36th Diet, December 16,1915, pp. 306-10; DNTGS, 9 (n.
65 above): 1330-31; and TGSIG, cf. "Dai-go mi dai-hachi-go yosan iinkai kai
giroku dai-ni kai," House of Representatives Budget Committee, 36th Diet,
December 21, 1915, p. 4.
67. Iseki Kurt, ed., Dai Nihon hakushi roku, 3:335-36; and Shugiin Jimu
kyoku, ed., Gikai seido nanajunen shi: Shugiin giin meikan, 5 (Tokyo:
Okuiashd Insatsukyoku, 1962):318.
68. Kitajima (n. 31 above), pp. 47-48; Miyajima (n. 32 above), p. 97.
69. ltd Sukehiko, the professor in question, was cited as the author of the
report by Fukuhara Ryojiro, vice minister of education and acting director of the
Institute of Infectious Diseases following the transfer. For details, see DNTGS, 9
(n. 65 above): 1330-31; and Iseki, 2 (n. 67 above):82-83.
70. The study was done at Komagome Hospital, and its results were an
nounced by Matsuura Chinjird, chief of the Bureau of Professional Education.
See TGSIG (n. 66 above), p. 4.
71. On October 12.1915, the government issued home ministry Ordinance
no. 12 governing the manufacturing of medical substances and their inspection
by the state authorities. The medical community criticized the inspection order
as an "attempt to suppress private enterprise." See Kitasato Kenkyu Jo (n. 33
above), pp. 23-24. The Ministry of Education had already given warning of its
intentions when Minister Ichiki testified before the Budget Committee of the
House of Representatives on December 16. 1914. He noted that the Kitasato
Institute's serum and vaccine sales would very likely produce a loss of income
for the Institute of Infectious Diseases and noted that the Ministry of Education
would "have to adopt measures to deal with this probable loss of income." For
details see TGSIG (n. 36 above), p. 83.
72. On the floor of the Diet Fukuhara stated: "We sought the opinions of
authorities at ten hospitals regarding the (clinical) results obtained from using
both the old and new [diphtheria] serums. They agreed that there was no dif
ference." See DNTGS, 9 (n. 65 above): 1330-31. Six months earlier, in secret
testimony before the Budget Committee, he had said: "We have appointed a
new (laboratory] director and technicians since Dr. Kitasato resigned, of course,
but they have limited ability and probably will not produce very good serums."
For details see TGSIG (n. 36 above), p. 83.
74. Yamada (n. 37 above), p. 383.
76. Tokyo Teikoku Daigaku, Tokyo Teikoku Daigaku gakujutsu taikan:
Igaku Bu, Densembyo Kenkyu Jo, Nogaku Bu, p. 446.
77. DNTGS, 9 (n. 65 above): 1329.
78. Aoyama Tanemichi, "Tokugakusha no shorai ikaga?" IJ, no. 1055 (Sep
tember 12, 1914):8.
79. Morimura Ichizaemon, quoted in Kitasato Kenkyu Jo (n. 33 above), p. 15.
80. Nagayo Hakushi Kinen Kai (n. 48 above), p. 158. The wedding took place
on November 5, 1914.
81. Mitamura Makujiro, 'Tanemichi no sekai dotoku," in Kumagai (n. 3
above), pp. 155-56.
82. Kiyoura Keigo, quoted in Miyajima (n. 32 above), p. 93.
83. "Sosenkyo go no Dai Nihon Ishi Kai," IJ, no. 1195 (May 19, 1917):922.
84. See Kikuchi's speech to the first annual meeting of the Nihon Rengo
Igakkai (Japan federation of medical societies) in "Dai-Ikkai Nihon Rengo Igak
kai keikyo," T1S, no. 1250 (April 5, 1902):21-22, where he admonishes the
members to "avoid emotional conflicts and diligently pursue research and the
exchange of scientific information "
85. Sakai (n. 46 above), p. 411.
86. "Ika daigaku genJodaha no gi,"/;, no. 1076 (February6,1916):268-69.
87. Yamakawa Kenjird, "Gakushikai sokai ni okeru enzetsu," in Shinjo Shin
z6, ed. Danshaku Yamakawa-sensei ik6, pp. 227-28.
88. Mishima Shunken. "Aoyama to Kitasato." IJ, no 1063 (November 7.
1914): 1860-61.
89. Kitasato's biographer, the bacteriologist Miyajima Mikinosuke. was one
of many contemporaries who believed that Aoyama was primarily responsible
for the laboratory transfer. See Miyajima (n. 32 above), pp. 180. 94.
90. See. for example. Kitasato Shibasaburo. "Shugiin giin kohosha to shite
ishi no funki o yokyu suru riyu."/;, no. 1187 (March 24. 1917):514-15. and
"Kitasato ontai no shutsuba." IJ, no 1189 (April 7. 1917)661
91. James R. Bartholomew. "Science. Bureaucracy, and Freedom in Me|)i
and Taisho Japan," in J. Victor Koschmann and Tetsuo Najita, eds., Conflict in
Modern Japanese History, p. 334.
92. Yanagita Izumi, Meiji bummet shi ni okeru Okuma Shigenobu, pp. 176.
218. 382-83. 437; and Okuma Shigenobu. Meiji bummei shi Jo ni okeru
Fukuzawa0," in Waseda Daigaku Henshu Bu. ed.. Okuma haku enzetsu shu
(Tokyo: Waseda Daigaku Shuppan Bu. 1907). p. 528; Okuma Shigenobu.
"Gakumon no dokurilsu to Tokyo Semmon GakkO no soritsu," in Okuma haku
enzetsu shu, p. 486; and Okuma Shigenobu. "Igakusha to seijika," U, no. 811
(January 11. 1910)3
93. "Denken ikan no hishi." IJ. no. 1095 (June 19. 1915)9.
94. "Ikai dantai undo shi." pt 20. IJ, no 1226 (December 20. 1917) 2224
95. "Denken ikan no hishi" (n. 93 above), pp. 9-10.
96. Yanagita (n. 92 above), pp. 413. 438.
97. Quoted in Uzaki Kumakkhi, Aoyama Tanemichi, p. 155.
98. Quoted in DNSEKZ < n 49 above), p. 8.
99. Yanagita (n. 92 above), p. 438.
101. Joyce C. Lebra, Okuma Shigenobu, Statesman of Meiji Japan (Can
berra: Australian National University Press, 1973). p. 146.
102. Kiyonobu Itakura and Eri Yagi, "The Japanese Research System and
the Establishment of the Institute of Physical and Chemical Research." in
Shigeru Nakayama, David L. Swain, and Eri Yagi, eds.. Science and Society in
Modern Japan, pp. 181-82.
103. Ibid., pp. 169-73.
105. Nagaoka Hantard, "Kenkyushitsu gaikan: Rikagaku Kenkyu Jo Cho
Nagaoka Kenkyushitsu," Kagaku, no. 3 (1933):31.
106. Itakura and Yagi (IL 102 above), p. 183; Hanami (n. 73 above), p. 281.
107. Quoted in Suzuki Yosei, Takamatsu hakushi to Rikagaku Kenkyu Jo,"
in Takamatsu Hakushi Shukuga Denki Kanko Kai, ed., Kogaku hakushi Taka
matsu Toyokichi den (Tokyo: Takamatsu Hakushi Shukuga Denki Kanko Kai,
1932), p. 310.
33** NOTES TO PAGES 213-17
108. Itakura and Yagi (n. 102 above), p. 183; Yuasa Mitsutamo, Kagaku shi,
pp. 233-34.
109. DNTGS, 9. Cf. "Rikagaku Kenkyu Jo setchi ni kansuru kengi an,"
House of Peers, 36th Diet, June 9, 1915, p. 1192.
110. DNTGS, 9. Cf. "Rikagaku Kenkyu Jo setchi ni kansuru kengi an,"
House of Representatives. 36th Diet, June 5,1915, p. 1398.
HI. Ibid.
112. DNTGS, 9 (n. 110 above), June 9.1915, p. 1485-86.

113. Hanami (n. 73 above), p. 281; Yanagita (n. 92 above), p. 436.
114. Sakurai (n. 2 above), pp 23-24; Itakura and Yagi (n. 102 above), p. 193.
116. Yuasa Mitsutomo, Kagaku goju nen, p. 181.
117. DNTGS, 10. Cf. "Rikagaku o kenkyu suru kdeki hdjin no kokkd hoj6 ni
kansuru hdritsuan," House of Peers, 37th Diet, February 25, 1916, p. 151.
118. DNTGS, 10. Cf. "Rikagaku o kenkyu suru kdeki hojin no kokkd hojd ni
kansuru hdritsuan." House of Representatives. 37th Diet, February 24. 1916,
pp. 879, 881.
119. DNTGS, 10 (n. 117 above): 151-52. The negative assessment came
from the former education ministry councillor Egi Kazuyuki.
120. DNTGS, 10 (n. 118 above):879.
121. DNTGS, 10(n. 117above): 152.
122. DNTGS, 10. Cf. "Rikagaku o kenkyu suru kdeki hdjin no kokkd hojd ni
kansuru horitsuan," House of Representatives, 37th Diet, Feb. 18.1916, p. 775.
123. Quoted in Sakurai (n. 2 above), pp. 23-24.
124. DNTGS, 10 (n. 117 above): 154, 152.
125. TGSIG. Cf. "Rikagaku o kenkyu suru koeki hojin no kokkd hojd ni
kansuru hdritsuan iinkai giroku (sokki) dai-san kai," House of Representatives
Budget Committee, 37th Diet, February 22,1916, pp. 18.20. These admissions
are from Matsuura Chinjird, chief of the Bureau of Professional Education, and
Otsu Jun'ichird, political councillor to the Ministry of Education.
126. TGSIG. Cf. "Rikagaku o kenkyu suru kdeki hdjin o kokkd hojd ni kan
suru horitsuan iinkai giroku (sokki) dai-ni kai," House of Representatives Bud
get Committee, 37th Diet, February 21, 1916, pp. 7-9.
127. TGSIG (n. 125 above), p. 20.
128. TGSIG (n. 126 above), p. 7.
129. "Rikagaku kaketsu," TAS, February 23, 1916, p. 3.
130. DNTGS, 10 (n. 117 above): 153.
131. Ibid., p. 152.
132. Ibid.
133. "Dakydan kaketsu," TAS, February 26,1916, p. 3.
134. TGSIG (n. 126 above), p. 8.
135. DNTGS, 10 (n. 117 above): 152.
136. Ibid.
137. Quoted in Itakura Kiyonobu and Yagi Eii, "Rikagaku Kenkyu Jo to
Ninon no kenkyu taisei," Kagakushi kenkyu 41 (January-March 1957):8.
138. "Shin naikaku to iji yosan," IJ, no. 1164 (October 14,1916): 1708.
139. Hanami (n. 73 above), pp. 231-32.
140. Itakura and Yagi (n. 92 above), p. 191

141. Nagaoka Hantaro. professor of physics, and Okochi Masatoshi, pro
fessor of ordnance engineering, had charge of physics. Chemistry was under
the supervision of Ikeda Kikunae, professor of chemistry, and Inoue Jinkichi,
professor of chemical engineering.
142. Nakamura Sejji, Tanakadate Aikitsu-sensei, p. 175.
143. Ibid.pp. 180-82.
144. Ibid., pp. 192-94; Hanami (n. 73 above), p. 314.
145. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-ichi rui dai-ni g6 yosan lin dai-ichi bunka (Gaimusho,
Shihoshd oyobi Mombusho jokan) kaigiroku (sokki) dai-yon dad," House of
Representatives Budget Committee. 37th Diet, December 22. 1915. p. 64.
146. Nakamura (n. 142 above), pp. 193-94.
147. Hanami (n. 73 above), p. 315.
148. TGSIG (n. 145 above), p. 64.
149. Hanami (n. 73 above), p. 315.
150. Ibid.
151. TGSIG Cf. "Dai-ichi rui dai-ichi go yosan iin kaigiroku dai-rujikkai,"
House of Representatives Budget Committee, 37th Diet, February 23,1916. p.
245.
152. Hanami (n. 73 above), p. 315.
153. Nakamura (n. 142 above), p 182; Hanami (n. 73 above), p 317.
154. Hanami (n. 73 above), pp 318-19.
155. DNTGS, 11 Cf Tokyo Teikoku Daigaku oyobi Kyoto Teikoku Daigaku
rinji seifu shishutsu kin kuriiri ni kansuru horitsuan." House of Representa
tives, 40th Diet, January 29. 1918. p. 225.
156. TGSIG. Cf. T6ky6 Teikoku Daigaku oyobi Kyoto Teikoku Daigaku rinji
seifu shishutsu kin ni kansuru hdritsuan hoka ikken," House of Representa
tives Budget Committee, 40th Diet, first session, January 30. 1918. p. 2.
157. TGSIG (n. 156 above), fourth session, February 8, 1918, p. 32; first
session, January 30, 1918, p. 4.
158. TGSIG (n. 156 above), second session, February 1. 1918, p. 8.
159. TGSIG (n. 156 above), first session, January 30, 1918. p. 2; fourth
session, February 8. 1918, p. 32.
160. TGSIG (n. 156 above),fourthsession, February 8. 1918, p. 32.
161. Ibid.
162. TGSIG (n. 156 above), first session, January 30, 1918. p. 2.
163. Ibid, p. 5.
164. TGSIG (n. 156 above), second session, February 1, 1918, pp. 7, 8.
165. TGSIG (n. 156 above), fourth session, February 8, 1918, p. 34; first
session, January 30.1918. p. 2; second session, February 1, 1918, p. 15.
166. TGSIG (n. 156 above), fourth session, February 8, 1918, p. 35. The
resolution was introduced by Hatoyama Ichird, who became prime minister
after World War IL
167. DNTGS, 11. Cfc T&kyd Teikoku Daigaku oyobi Kydto Teikoku Daigaku
rinji seifu shishutsu kin kuriiri ni kansuru hdritsuan," House of Representa
tives, 40th Diet. February 12,1918, p. 268.
168. Yuasa Mitsutomo, Gendai kagaku gijutsu shi nempyo, p. 123.
34° NOTES TO PAGES 223-28
169. Hanami (n. 73 above), pp. 318-19.

170. On July 2, 1917, the minister of education, Okada Ryohei, told the
Budget Committee of the House of Representatives: "Every type of industry has
shown considerable development of late. As a result, demands for technical
people have surged dramatically. In order to respond to this, we have to expand
our engineering programs at each of the (imperial] universities . . . [Among
other things) we shall establish a new chair of applied chemistry at Tdhoku
Imperial University." See TGS1G, cf. "Dai-ichi rui dai-ni go yosan iin dai-ichi
bunka kaigiroku dai-ikkai," House of Representatives Budget Committee, 39th
Diet, July 2, 1917, pp. 5-6.
171. Special budget supplements were on occasion approved. In this in
stance, the Ministry of Education requested 957,060 yenforthe purposes cited
here. Another 420,000 yen was requestedfortechnical education in the various
higher schools. Without these supplementary budgets, there could have been
little, if any, expansion. For details see ibid.
172. Tdhoku Daigaku, ed. TDGNS, 1715-23.
173. Ishikawa TetfirO, Honda Kdtard den, p. 187.
174. Ibid., p. 188.
175. Ibid, pp. 189-91.
176. Hokkaido Daigaku, ed, Hokkaido Daigaku sdki hachiju nen shi
(hereafter HDSHNS) (Sapporo: Hokkaido Daigaku. 1965). p. 123.
177. Ibid., p. 125. See also Hokkaido Daigaku, ed. Hokudai hyakunen shi
(Tokyo: Gyosei, 1980), p. 529.
178. HDSHNS, pp 123-24.
179. Ibid., p. 125.
180. TGS1G (n. 170 above), p. 6.
181. HDSHNS, pp. 124, 126.
182. Yuasa(n. 168 above), p. 121.
183. Richard B. Goldschmidt, In and Out of the Ivory Tower. See p. 110,
where the author writes: "I learned to my surprise (in eariy 1914) that the great
geneticist Toyama with whom I had corresponded was only an assistant pro
fessor and worked most of the time in a distant silkworm laboratory."
184. Yuasa (n. 168 above), p. 121.
185. TGSIG (n. 156 above).
186. DNTGS, 10 (n. 66 above):307.
187. Hanami (n. 73 above), p. 233. Hanami does not try to explain Ichiki's
motives, but he did not need to.
188. TGSIG (n. 156 above), first session, January 30,1918, p. 7.
189. Tsuchiya contended that the seroiogical chemistry chair was being es
tablished "because of enmity among the professors." See ibid., p. 5. Matsuura
Chinjird, chief of the Bureau of Professional Education, contended that its
establishment was owing to the progress of science. "Of course, seroiogical
chemistry can be seen as a division of bacteriology. But as more research is
done, it seems appropriate to the development of science that we establish a
chair in that field"
190. Yuasa (n. 168 above), pp. 114-17.
191. TGSIG. Cf. Tokyo Teikoku Daigaku oyobi Kyoto Teikoku Daigaku rinji
seifu shishutsu kin ni kansuru horitsuan hoka ni ken iin kaigiroku dai-ni kai,"
House of Representatives Budget Committee, 39th Diet, July 4, 1917. pp. 3,9.
192. TGSIG. Cf. Tokyo Teikoku Daigaku oyobi Kyoto Teikoku Daigaku rinji
seifu shishutsu kin ni kansuru horitsuan hoka ni ken iin kaigiroku dai-san
kai," House of Representatives Budget Committee. 39th Diet, July 6, 1917,
p. 15.
193. Hanami (n. 73 above), pp. 230-31.
194. TGSIG (n. 191 above), p. 3.
195. Ibid., p. 7.
196. TGSIG (n. 192 above), p. 15.
197. Ibid., p. 16.
198. TGSIG (n. 191 above), pp. 5, 9; and TGSIG (n. 192 above), p. 15.
199. TGSIG (n. 191 above), pp. 4. 5. 13.
200. TGSIG (n. 192 above), p. 16
201. TGSIG (IL 191 above), p. 6.
202. SeeShokuinroku, 1917. pp. 737-39. 746-47; 1918. pp 370-71, 374
75; Kyoto Daigaku, Kydto Daigaku nanaju nen shi, pp. 714-15; and DNTGS,
10. cf. T6kyo Teikoku Daigaku oyobi Kyoto Teikoku Daigaku rinji seifu
shishutsu kin ni kansuru horitsuan." House of Representatives. 39th Diet, July
8,1917.pp. 1219,1291. and House of Peers. 39th Diet. July 13.1917.pp 1141
42, 1163.
203. Yuasa (n. 168 above), p. 116; Ichihara Katashi, ed.. Osaka Daigaku
nijugo nen shi (Osaka: Tengyosha. 1956). pp. 227-28.
204. Miyataki Tsuneo. "Isho jdrei, jitsuyd shin'an ho seiritsu no shuhen." in
Tokkyo Cho Kogyo ShoyQken Seido Shi Kenkyu Kai. ed.. Tokkyd seido no
hassci to hensen (Tokyo: Okurashd Insatsukyoku. 1982). p. 70.
205. Yuasa (n. 168 above), pp. 118-24.
206. Jjiri TsuneJdchi, ed.. Rekidai kenkan roku, pp. 801-02.
207. TGSIG (n. 191 above), p. 11.
208. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-ru rui dai-yon g6 seigan iin dai-san bunka kaigiroku
(sokki)dai-ikkai," House of Representatives Committee on Petitions, 28th Diet,
January 31, 1912. pp. 6-7.
209. Shokuinroku, 1911. pp. 652-53; 1913, pp. 693-94; 1915, pp. 680-81;
1917, pp. 810-11; 1919. pp. 462-63.
210. TGSIG. Ct "Yosan iin dai-go bunka (Ndshdmushd jokan) kaigiroku

(sokJd) dai-ikkai," House of Representatives Budget Committee, 28th Diet,
January 29, 1912, p. 2.
211. TGSIG (n. 208 above), pp. 5, 6.
212. TGSIG. Tokkydhdchu kaisei horitsuan hokaikken iin kaigiroku dai-ni
kai" House of Representatives Budget Committee, 37th Diet, February 21,
1916, p. 3.
213. Yuasa (n. 168 above), p. 118.
214. Sakata Teiichi, "Kikai kogyo hattatsu jochd an," Kikai Gakkai shi 22,
no. 55 (December 1918):l-38. Reprinted in NKGST, 3:260-61.
215. Nakamatsu Mono, ''Jitsuyd isho hd seitei no hitsuyd," Taiyo 9/12
(1889), cited in Miyataki (n. 204 above), p. 119.
216. TGSIG. Ct "Tokkyd hd chu kaisei horitsuan hoka sanken iin kaigiroku
dai-nana kai," House of Representatives Budget Committee, 40th Diet, March

9. 1918, pp. 28-29.
217. Miyataki (n. 204 above), pp. 70-71. Miyataki writes: "Because so much
of the Japanese chemical industry was based on exploitation of confiscated
German patents, its later development was fated to proceed along the same lines
as the German chemical industry."
218. Stanley B. Hunt and Giles E. Hopkins, "Man-Made Fibres," in
Encyclopaedia Britannica, 9 (Chicago: William Benton. 1972):230-31.
219. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-ichi mi dai-roku gd yosan iin dai-go bunka
(Noshomusho jokan) kaigiroku (sokkl) dai-san kai," House of Representatives
Budget Committee, 31st Diet, January 31, 1914. p. 20.
220. Ibid.
221. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-ichi rui dai-roku g& yosan iin dai-go bunka
(Noshdmusho jokan) kaigiroku (sokki) dai-ikkai," House of Representatives
Budget Committee. 36th Diet, May 27, 1915, pp. 3-4.
222. Ibid., p. 3.
223. Ibid., pp. 8-9.
224. Asaka Shobo. ed, Gekidd no Nihon seiji shi, 2 (Tokyo: Asaka Shobo,
1979):2182.
225. TGSIG. Cf Dai-go rui dai-jQ go senryo iyakuhin seizO shorei hoan iin
kaigiroku (sokki) dai-san kai," House of Representatives Budget Committee,
36th Diet, June 2, 1915, p. 14.
226. Chikayoshi Kamatani, "The Role Played by the Industrial World in the
Progress of Japanese Science and Technology," Journal of World History 9/2
(1965):405.
227. Ibid., pp. 403-05.
228. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-ichi rui dai-roku gd yosan iin dai-go bunka
(Noshomusho jokan) kaigiroku (sokki) dai-ikkai," House of Representatives
Budget Committee. December 20,1915. p. 6. Testimony of Oka Makoto, chief of
the Bureau of Industry.
229. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-go rui dai-ju gd senryo iyakuhin seizd shorei hoan iin
kaigiroku (sokki) dai-ni kai," House of Representatives Budget Committee,
36th Diet, June 1. 1915, p. 6.
230. TGSIG (n. 225 above), p. 16.
231. Ibid., p. 15.
232. Asaka Shobo (n. 224 above), p. 2277.
233. TGSIG (n. 228 above), pp. 6-7.
234. Ibid., p. 6.
Chapter Eight: The Research System in an Age of Transition

1. Quoted in Murayama TatsuzO, "Tanemichi sumbyd," in Kumagai Kenji,
ed, Omoide no Aoyama Tanemichi-sensei, pp. 239-40.
2. The biologist Yasui Kono (1880-1971) became Japan'sfirstwoman scien
tist during the early years of the twentieth century when she received a teaching
position at the Tokyo Higher Normal School for Women and began doing re
search in the botanical laboratory of Miyake Kiichi in Tokyo University's faculty

of agriculture. Yasui published several papers and even studied abroad (chiefly
at Harvard University, 1914-16) before receiving the D.Sc. degree in 1926.
Whileretainingher post at the normal school, she became a research associate
at Tokyo University through the patronage of Fujii Kenjiro, professor of genet
ics in its faculty of science. Twenty women, including Yasui, had received
doctorates in basic science, medicine, pharmacology, or agriculture by 1937.
None had received it in any field of engineering. For details, see Nagashima
Yuzuru, Onna hakushi retsu den (Tokyo: Kagaku Chishiki Fukyu Kai, 1937),
pp. 4-19.
3. "Naishoku ka honshoku ka?" IJ, no 1309 (July 26. 1919): 1264-65.
4. TGS1G. Cf. "Daigaku tokubetsu kaikai hoan hoka ikken." House of Repre
sentatives Budget Committee. 42d Diet, February 13. 1920. p. 7.
5. DNTGS, 11 Cf. "Teikoku daigaku tokubetsu kaikei hoan hoka ikken.
House of Representatives. 42d Diet. February 17. 1920. p. 1782.
6. TGSIG. Cf. *Toky6 Teikoku Daigaku oyobi Kyoto Teikoku Daigaku rinji
seifu shishutsu kin ni kansuru horitsuan hoka ikken," House of Representa
tives Budget Committee. 40th Diet. February 4, 1918, p. 19. Testimony of
Matsuura Chinjiro, chief of the Bureau of Professional Education. With respect
to wartime inflation. Vice Minister Tadokoro Yoshiharu reported that prices in
Tokyo had risen 50 to 60 percent in the previous twelve months. See p. 22.
7. TGSIG (n. 4 above), p. 1. Testimony of Minami Hiroshi. vice minister of
education. Regarding professors' level of comfort, see Kuwaki Tsutomu,
"Omoklasu mama ni." Kagaku shi techo, no. 3 (July 1964): 1. Kuwaki was the
son of Kuwaki Ayao. professor of mechanics at Kyushu University during the
Taisho and early Showa periods. During the 1920s, his family enjoyed a "good
standard of living" and could afford to buy "more books [in Tokyo] than I can
presently imagine Unlike today (the 1960s), university professors were
rather favored."
8. TGSIG (n. 4 above), p. 9. The chief of the Bureau of Professional Educa
tion, Matsuura, elaborated on Minami's remarks: "Professor A may give the
course during the first semester, and Professor B may give the same course in
the second semester. Students can thus attend whichever of the classes they
wish." Matsuura stated further that this arrangement was already in effect in
Tokyo University's faculty of engineering.
11. DNTGS, 11. Cf. "Kagaku oyobi kogyd kyoiku ni kansuru kengi an," 40th
Diet, House of Peers, March 20, 1918, pp. 134-35.
12. DNTGS, 11. Cf. "Tokyo Teikoku Daigaku oyobi Kyoto Teikoku Daigaku
rinji seifu shishutsu kin ni kansuru horitsu an," House of Representatives, 41st
Diet, February 1 and 10, 1919, pp. 990-91, 1017-18; and Teikoku daigaku
tokubetsu kaikei ho chu kaisei horitsu an," House of Peers, 41st Diet, February
14 and March 1,1919, pp. 700-01,751-52. For developments at Kyoto Univer
sity, see Kyoto Daigaku Nanaju Nen Shi Henshu Iinkai, ed, Kyoto Daigaku
nanaju nen ski, pp. 92-93.
14. Yuasa Mitsutomo, Gendai kagaku gijutsu shi nempyo, pp. 120-26.
15. Regarding the development of this laboratory, see Taigakai, ed,
Naimushd shi, 3:230-31, and DNTGS, 11, cf. "Kokuritsu EiyO Kenkyu Jo set
suritsu ni kansuru kengi an," House of Representatives, 41 st Diet, February 20,
1919, pp. 1064-66. For information on Saiki, see Iseki Kurt, ed, Dai Nihon
hakushi roku, 2:161. Regarding Kono, see Asaka Shobo, ed., Gekido no Nihon
seiji shi, 2:1685.
16. See Suzuki Umetard, Kenkyu no kaikfi (Tokyo: Kobundo Shobo, 1943),
P 1.
17. TGSIG. Cf. 'Kokuritsu Eiyd Kenkyu Jo setsuritsu ni kansuru kengi an
iinkai giroku (sokki) dai-go kai," House of Representatives Budget Committee,
41st Diet, March 7. 1919. p. 17.
18. Vice Minister Shinno said: "The warning that (Dr. Yagi) has given us is
very appropriate. We shall certainly take his remarks into account during our
deliberations." See ibid., p. 18.
19. Yuasa (n. 14 above), pp. 118, 121, and Nakamura Sejji, Tanakadate
Aikitsu-sensei, p. 136.
20. Yuasa (n. 14 above), p. 109. See chapter 5 for further details on Katsura.
21. Sakurai J6ji, Omoide no kazukazu, p. 78.
22. "Gakujutsu kenkyu jo setchi an," KJ, no. 1268 (July 5, 1920): 17.
23. On the establishment of the research professorship, see Sumeragi Shidd,
Daigaku seido no kenkyu, pp. 361-62. and Shigeru Nakayama (ch. 4, n. 12),
T h e Role Played by Universities in Scientific and Technological Development
in Japan," p. 354.
24. Hokkaido Daigaku, Hokkaido Daigaku soki hachiju nen shi, pp. 125
26.
26. Itakura Kiyonobu, Yagi Eri, and Kimura Tosaku, Nagaoka Hantaro den,
pp. 462-65.
27. Kyushu Daigaku Soritsu Goju Shunen Kinen Kai, ed., Kyushu Daigaku
goju nen shi: Tsushi (Fukuoka: Kyushu Daigaku. 1967), pp. 424-25. This
official history blames the 1919 failure on the opposition of the Ministry of
Education. Kuwaki Tsutomu, whose father was directly concerned, claims that
the Ministry of Education supported the plan and that it was the Ministry of
Finance that opposed it. See (n. 4 above), p. 2.
28. Kyushu Daigaku Soritsu Goju Shunen Kinen Kai (n. 27 above), p. 427.
The science faculty plan was approved only after another of Kyushu physicist
Kuwaki Ayao's sons became minister of finance in 1934.
29. Yuasa (n. 14 above), p. 123.
30. On the importance of Haber's work to the German military effort, see J.G.
Crowther, The Social Relations of Science (New York, 1941), pp. 496-99.
31. Yuasa (n. 14 above), p. 123.
32. DNTGS, 11. Cf. "Kagaku kdgyd seisaku ni kansuru shitsumon," House of
Representatives, 40th Diet, March 5, 1918, pp. 433-36. The policy statement
was presented by Oka Makoto, chief of the Bureau of Industry. Oka was un
doubtedly referring to the fact that the NINR did contract research for the
chemical and nitrogen industries. On the scope of its mission, see Shokuinroku,
p. 462.
33. Yoshi Tsunimi, Japanese Business: A Research Guide with Annotated
Bibliography (New York: Praeger. 1978). p. 56.
34. Yuasa(n. 14 above), pp. 120-26.
35. "Teidai to hikoki kOza," Tdkyd Asahi Shimbun, June 2. 1915. p. 5. re
ported on the matriculation at Tokyo University of two young naval officers
intent on studying aeronautics and conducting research in that field.
37. Nakamura(n 19 above), p 199.
38. Yamakawa Kenjirt."Yo wa nani o waga kyoiku kai ni okem saidai kyumu
to shinzuru WJitsugyd no Nihon 11 /26 (December 1908). reprinted in Shin
j6 Stiinzd, ed, Danshaku Yamakawa-sensei ikd, pp. 596-97.
39. Hanami (n. 9 above), pp. 324-25. In July 1915 Kikuchi actually proposed
that all higher schools and normal schools be designated universities.
40. Nakanishi Ketyird, Waseda Daigaku hachiju nen ski (Tokyo: Waseda
Daigaku. 1962). pp. 430-32. Before World War I. Waseda's faculty of engineer
ing and science offered majors only in mechanical and mining engineering. See
pp. 122-25. 138-42.
41. For details about Keio's medical program, see Miyajima Mikinosuke.
Kitasato Shibasaburd den, pp. 99-101. 253-54. Kitasato was the first dean of
the Keto Medical School and it was because of his willingness to accept a
deanship that Keio at this time opted for a medical program instead of one in
engineering and basic science.
42. See chapter 7. n. 90. for details.
43. Nankai Yohachiro. Kdgaku hakushi Shiraishi Naoharu den (Tokyo:
Akeishi Tart, 1943). pp. 370-72. 377.
44. Hanami (n. 9 above), pp. 415-16.
45. "Seiyukai shozoku ika giin kesshin ikaga?" U, no 1284 (February 1,
1919):222-23.
46. Hanami (n. 9 above), pp. 415-16.
47. -Seryukai shozoku ika giin kesshin ikaga?" (n. 45 above), pp. 222-23.
48. See 44ScieiK* ami The Civil Service: A GemianAiû^
Times Education Supplement, no. 84 (November 23, 1916): 1.
49. Matsubara Koicht "Kagaku to bunkan," Toyogakugei zasshi 34. no. 427
(April 5. 1917):55-58.
50. Hayao Ushimaro, "Shirasawa Hakushi no kotodomo," in Nihon Ringyo
Qjutsu Kyftkai, ed, Ringyo senjin den, pp. 552-53.
51. See the discussion of this question in Robert M. Spaukbng, Jr.. Imperial
Japan's Higher Civil Service Examinations, pp. 163-78.
52. See the following essays for information on this issue: Sir Laurence
Hdsby. "Recruitment to the Civil Service," in William A. Robson, ed.. The Civil
Service in Britain and France, pp. 35-47; Leonard D. White, The British Civil
Service," in L. D. White et aL, eds.. Civil Service Abroad: Great Britain, Cana
da, France, Germany (New York: McGraw-Hill 1935), pp. 1-54; Andre
Bertrand, T h e Recruitment and Training of Higher Civil Servants in the
NOTES TO PAGES 246-51
United Kingdom and France," in Robson, pp. 170-84; and Fritz Morstein
Marx, "Civil Service in Germany," in White et aL, pp. 161-275.
54. Kyoto Teikoku Daigaku, ed, Kydto Teikoku Daigaku shi (Kyoto: Kyoto
Teikoku Daigaku, 1943), p. 910. The consultant was Kdriba Hiroshi, professor
of botany at Tdhoku University. Koriba later took the position himself.
55. Sumeragi (n. 23 above), pp. 362-68.
56. See, for example, Manabe Kaiichird, "Kdza meimoku benbd," IJ, no.
1618 (August 8,1925): 1584-85. Manabe wrote: "It must be made possible for
people like myself inside the university to influence the authorities when we feel
that the progress of science in the university requires it The present system,
under which a creative and progressive proposal can be rejected by nothing
more than the desire of government bureaucrats, is killing the university. It is
making its development impossible."
57. Ishikawa Teijtrt. Honda K6tar6 den, p. 209.
58. NGHNS, 1:433-34.
59. Sata Yoshihiko, "Kaigai ryugakusei no zentd," IJ, no. 1056 (September
26, 1914). 1632.
60. Sawayanagi Masataro. "Gakumon dokuritsu no shin undd to sono kom
pon mondai," Shin Nihon 5/2 (1915). Reprinted in NKGST, 2:562-65.
61 DNTGS, 9. Cf. 'Teikoku Gakushiin gakujutsu shdrei kin tokubetsu kai
kei hd haishi hdritsu an," House of Peers, 36th Diet, June 2, 1915, p. 1125.
62. In 1921 the combined research grants program disbursed a total of
358,443 yen. See NKGST, 3:197.
63. See Hanami (n. 9 above), pp. 323, 327.
64. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-ichi mi dai-ni gd yosan iin dai-ichi bunka (Gaimushd,
Shihdshd oyobi Mombusho jokan) kaigiroku (sokki) dai-ni kai," House of Rep
resentatives Budget Committee. 40th Diet, February 2,1918, pp. 29,24-25,36.
65. Ibid, p. 36.
66. "Kagaku kenkyu shdrei kyuhi," KJ, no. 1199 (August 5. 1918): 18.
67. Miyajima Mikinosuke, "Mombudayin Okada Rydhei kakka ni teisu ka
gaku kenkyu hojd ni kanshite," IJ, no. 1261 (August 24, 1918): 1549.
68. See "Kagaku kenkyu hojd happyo," KJ, no. 1232 (July 5, 1919): 13, 15,
where the names of Ogata and Kawamura are shown as having received grants
in 1918, even though their names do not appear on the list published by Kyoiku
jiron on August 5, 1918.
69. "Mombusho no kushin santan," IJ, no. 1263 (September 7,1918): 1634.
70. "Rikagaku shdrei hi zdgaku," KJ, no. 1207 (October 25,1918): 15. Com
parison of the sums awarded in 1918 and 1919 shows that no increase in
funding was allowed. It is virtually certain that the Ministry of Finance blocked
any increase.
71. Quoted in "Kagaku kenkyu hojd happyo" (n. 68 above), p. 16.
72. Ibid.
73. Noted in "Kagaku kenkyu shdrei kyuhi" (n. 66 above), p. 18.
74. Nagayo Hakushi Kinen Kai, ed., Nagayo Mataro den (hereafter Nagayo),
pp. 160-61.
75. For details, see Kawakami Hajime, Gendai Nihon iryo shi (Tokyo: Keisd
Shob6,1965), pp. 219-22; Joseph M. Smadel, "Scrub Typhus," in Thomas M.

Rivers, Viral and Rtckettstal Infections of Man (Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott,
1948), pp. 520-28.
76. Rinya Kawamura, Studies on Tsutsugamushi Disease (Cincinnati: Col
lege of Medicine, University of Cincinnati, 1926), pp. 133,156,178-79,208.1
am indebted to my father-in-law. Dr. Alfred M. Donovan, for calling my atten
tion to Kawamura's book.
77. Miyajima and Kawamura had both worked extensively on various as
pects of tsutsugamushi disease. Given the areas of agreement between them—
and the areas of disagreement between Kawamura and Nagayo—it is hardly
surprising that Miyajima made an issue of Kawamura's initial exclusion from
the list of 1918 grant recipients. For details, see Miyajima (n. 67 above), p. 1549,
and Kawamura (n. 76 above), pp. 133. 156. 178-79.
78. Michio Nagai, Higher Education in Japan Its Take-Offand Crash, p. 43.
79. TGSIG (n. 64 above), p 36.
80. "Kyodai shizen kagaku kenkyu." KJ, no 1190 (May 5. 1918):20
81. "Kagaku kenkyu shorei kyuhi" (n. 66 above), pp 17-18.
82. "Rikagaku shorei hi zogaku" (n. 70 above), p. 15.
83. "Kagaku kenkyu hojd happyd" (n. 68 above), pp 13-15. Grants were
generally smaller than they had been in 1918. ranging from 300 to 5.000 yen.
84. "Chemistry" here includes biochemistry, soil chemistry, chemical en
gineering, metallurgical engineering (Tawara Kuniichi's grant), and pharma
cology, as well as chemical research done in faculties of science. That Tawara's
research was heavily chemical in nature is confirmed by Mishima Tokushichi,
professor of chemical engineering at Tokyo University. See his essay 'Tawara
Kuniichi-sensei no 0-shogai," in Tawara-Sensei Kinen Shuppan linkai, ed.,
Tawara Kuniichi-sensei o shinobu (Tokyo: Tawara-Sensei Kinen Shuppan
linkai, 1959). p. 2.
85. In Japan, naval architecture and architecture in general developed strict
ly within the confines of engineering and physical science, not in the fine arts,
as in the United States, and it is therefore regarded as part of physics here.
86. Dentistry projects received 4.000 yen. I was unable to determine the
nature of some other projects to which 1,000 yen were awarded. If funding for
dentistry is added to that for medicine, medicine accounts for 33 percent of
money allocated.
87. "Kagaku kenkyu shogeki hojd shin hoshin," IJ, no. 1365 (August 21,
1920): 1281.
88. Kawakami (n. 75 above), p. 220.
89. Iseki(n. 15 above), 3:341.
90. Kawamura (n. 76 above), pp. 178-79; M. Nagayo, T. Tanuya, T.
Mitamura, and K. Sato, "On the Virus of Tsutsugamushi Disease and Its Dem
onstration by a New Method," Japanese Journal of Experimental Medicine 8
(1930):309-18.
91. Yamagiwa published on this subject between 1916 and 1923. Probably
best known to American researchers is his 1918 paper written in collaboration
with S. Ohno, "Ober das Resultat des Experimentes zur kunstlichen Erzeu
gung der Epithelialgeschwulste/' Gann: Zeitschrift fur Krebsforschung 12
34$ NOTES TO PAGES 253-56
(1918-19):3-9. Yamagiwas work continues to be cited. See C. E. Easterley,

"Cancer Link to Magnetic Field Exposure," American Journal of Epidemiology
114/2 (1981): 169-74.
92. See "Kagaku kenkyu shdrei kyuhi" (n. 66 above), p. 17; Mishima (n. 84
above), p. 2.
93. Kaya Seiji, "Choji." in Tawara-Sensei Kinen Shuppan Iinkai (n. 84
above), p. 463; Fuwa Tasuku, personal communication, 1986. Dr. Fuwa is
director of Nippon Steel's research and development laboratory.
94. Hidetsugu Yagi, "Beam Transmission of Ultra Short Waves," Proceed
ings of the Institute of Radio Engineers 16/6 (June 1928):715-41 Reprinted in
Proceedings of the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers 72/5 (May
1984):635~45.
95. Nagashima (n. 2 above), pp. 4-19.
96. Information about Italy was received from Barbara Reeves, personal
communication, January 10,1986. For the U.S., see John C. Burn ham, John E.
Sauer, and Ronald D. Gibbs. "Peer-Reviewed Grants in U.S. Trade Association
Research," Science, Technology and Human Values 12/2(Spring 1987):42-43.
97. Alan Beyerchen, personal communication, January 10, 1986. On the
powers of KWG laboratory directors in general, see Jeffrey A. Johnson, "Aca
demic Chemistry in Imperial Germany," ISIS 76. no. 284 (December
1985)521-22.
98. Such organizations would include the Helmholtz Society and the Emil
Fischer Society, both of which received funds from industry and government.
99. Beyerchen (n. 97 above).
100. Mano Bunji and Nakamura Tokugord, Furuichi Kdi (Tokyo:
Kitabayashi Katsuzd, 1937). pp. 305-13; Sakurai (n. 21 above), pp. 37-39.
Both sources give detailed (and complementary) reports on the work of the NRC
during the interwar period.
101. NGHNS, 1:359.
102. See chapter 3 for further details.
103. Nakamura (n. 19 above), pp. 146-47, and San'ichird Mizushima, "A
History of Physical Chemistry in Japan," Annual Review ofPhysical Chemistry
23 (1972):5-6. See also the account by Sakurai (n. 21 above), pp. 10-17.
104. See chapter 3fordetails.
107. Nakamura (n. 19 above), pp. 146, 147. Nakamura Seiji was the
colleague.
108. Sakurai Joji, "Rengd shokoku gakushiin daihyosha gikai tenmatsu," KJ,
no. 1231 (June 25, 1919):23.
109. Ibid, pp. 22-24.
110. A. G. Cock, "Chauvinism and Internationalism in Science: The Interna
tional Research Council, 1919-1926," Notes and Records of the Royal Society
of London 37 (1982-83):255. I am indebted to Barbara Reeves for help in
locating this essay and the one cited in n. 111.
111. NGHNS, 1:344, notes that the Royal Society had been "planning to
organize an International Research Council from early in 1918." H. Spencer
Jones credits the initiative jointly to Sir Arthur Schuster of the Royal Society and
George Ellery Hale of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences. See his essay,
"The Early History of ICSU. 1919-1946," ICSU Review of World Science 2
(I960): 169-70. The ICSU is the International Council of Scientific Unions, the
name by which the International Research Council was known from 1931.
112. Cock (n. 110 above), shows in some detail how ambivalent attitudes
toward the Central Powers' exclusion were in Britain, even in 1919. See p. 255
for attitudes in Fiance and Belgium.
114. Sakurai (n 108 above), p 24. See also Jones (n. HI above), p. 171.
115. Sakurai's devotion to the NRC and the IRC is apparent not onlyfromhis
own writings but from his positions in the two organizations. He succeeded
Furuichi Ktii as president of the NRC in 1922 and Guglielmo Marconi as vice
president of the IRC in 1937. In evaluating his motives and views, one should
keep a number of facts in mind: (1) His 1919 and 1939 reports on the London
and Paris meetings are filled with contradictions, and it strains credibility to
attribute them all to lapses of memory. Attendance at the London meeting he
describes variously as thirty delegates from ten countries (1939) and thirty-
three delegates from eight countries (1919). Countries attending reportedly
included Sweden, Norway, Denmark and the Netherlands (1939). as opposed
to the correct listings of Brazil and Serbia (1919). (He correctly noted the pres
ence of Japan, Britain. France. Italy, Belgium, and the U.S. in both accounts).
The 1939 report could not possibly have been accurate because the conference
organizers deliberately left neutral countries out of the early IRC planning. (2)
Sakurai tells us in his 1939 account that the atmosphere in London was rela
tively harmonious, whereas Nakamura Seiji (reporting for the other Japanese
delegate. Tanakadate) correctly notes that the "discussions did not go at all
smoothly.'' (3) Sakurai claims that "only a small element within our scientific
community" opposed German exclusion, which in fact was patently untrue. (4)
He says that criticism of his actions in Japan was "unanticipated," even though
the other delegate. Tanakadate. had already argued with him. (5) Sakurai told
his fellow academicians in Tokyo on May 12. 1919. that the NRC would not
need a very large budget, but then turned around and asked the government for
a budget of 380,000 yen—enough to pay the salaries of about a hundred full
professors. See text and other notes for additional documentation.
116. Sakurai (n. 108 above), pp. 23, 24.
118. Nakamura (n. 19 above), p. 150. The division of opinion over the exclu
sion of Germany between Sakurai and Tanakadate was noted even at the time.
See Tawara Teijiro, "Zai Berlin Nihonjin no giketsu," KJ, no. 1279 (October 25,
1920):23. "One [of the delegates at London (Tanakadate)] did not agree with
[German exclusion] deep down. The other [Sakurai] seems to have been an
enthusiastic supporter, to the point of making a speech in favor of it"
119. Tawara (n. 118 above), p. 24, cites the Imperial Academy's president,
Hozumi Nobushige, as saying in 1920 that exclusion of Germany "did not
represent the thinking of [most] Japanese academics." See text for other
evidence.
35O NOTES TO PAGES 258-60
120. NGHNS, 1:374.

121. See the NRC membership roster in "Gakujutsu Kenkyu Kaiin kettei,"
KJ.no. 1283 (December 5, 1920):33-34.
122. Yuasa (n. 14 above), p. 127.
123. "Gakujutsu Kenkyu Kai iyO jitsugen." KJ, no. 1242 (October 15,
124. NGHNS, 1:373-76. Of those eight, three had also spent some time in
Germany. See p. 376 for the members of the planning committee.
125. Kitasato's attitude toward Ozawa is indicated clearly in a letter he wrote
to Hasegawa Tai on December 11,1892. The letter was read into the official Diet
record by Hasegawa, and its text can be found in DNTGS, 2. Cf. "Yosan sainyu
saishutsu sd yosan an Mombushd jokan," House of Representatives, 4th Diet,
January 11,1893, p. 763. In the letter Kitasato states that Ozawa accused him of
insincerity during their negotiations about a possible Tokyo University appoint
ment for himself and insisted that he withdraw his conditions for accepting the
job.
126. Iseki (n. 15 above). 2:4-5.
127. On the cultural milieu of the University of Strasbourg, see John E.
Craig. Scholarship and Nation Building: The University of Strasbourg and
Alsatian Society (Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1984), pp. 52, 73-76,
103. 110-11.
128. Sakurai Joji, "Bankoku Gakujutsu Kenkyu Kaigi ni tsuite," KJ, no. 1229
(June 5. 1919):3-4.
129. Sakurai Jdji, "Ichi ki hyaku yd no kan art," KJ, no. 1232 (July 5,
1919):27. In making this claim, Sakurai appears to have had strictly the British
experience in mind. His assertions certainly did not describe German develop
ments accurately. The main German figure in war-related research, Fritz
Haber, was never a professor.
131 NGHNS, 1:377, and Sakurai (n. 21 above), p. 35.
132. Quoted in "Gakujutsu renmei kan yu kengi," KJ, no. 1232 (July 5,

134. Sakurai Jdji, "Gakujutsu kenkyu no renmei," KJ, no. 1233 (July 15,
1919):28.
135. "Gakujutsu Kenkyu Kai iyo jitsugen (n. 123 above), pp. 14-15.
136. Ibid., p. 15.
137. NGHNS, 1:378-79.
138. For details on the Versailles Conference and the timing of Germany's
acceptance of the treaty, see Wayne Andrews, ed., Concise Dictionary ofAmeri
can History (New York: Scribners, 1962), pp. 979-80, and William Langer,
ed. Encyclopedia of World History (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1972), p. 978.
139. Quoted in "Ryugakusei kyozetsu mondai no shingi," IJ, no. 1334 (Janu
ary 17, 1920): 118-19.
140. "Gakujutsu fusa to enjo uchikiri," KJ, no. 1254 (February 15,
1920):44-45.
141. "Ryugakusei kyozetsu mondai no shingi" (n. 139 above), p. 118.
142. Quoted in "Doitsu ryugaku to Gakushiin," KJ, no. 1275 (September 15,
1920):27.
143. Quoted in "Gakujutsu Kenkyu Kaigi kansei," KJ, no. 1274 (September
5, 1920):22.
144. "Shutsuen zai-Doku dairi taishi no koden." IJ, no. 1370 (September 25,
1920): 1454-55. This article quotes nearly the entire text of the cable.
145. NGHNS, 1:379.
146. "Ryugakusei kyozetsu mondai no shingi" (n. 139 above), pp. 118-19.
147. Richard B. GoldschmkJt, In and Out of the Ivory Tower, p. 189. Gold
schmidt was the recipient of Ishikawa's assistance.
148. "Shutsuen zai-Doku dairi taishi no koden" (n. 144 above), p 1455. The
two named here were professors Ozawa Gakutaro (Tokyo University) and Nishi
Seiho (Kyushu University).
149. For the German text of Kitasato's letter, see "Kleine Mitteilungen,"
Deutsche medizinische Wochenschrift 46/29 (15 July 1920):809-10. The Japa
nese text is reprinted in Tawara (n. 118 above), pp. 23-24. A sampling of
reactions in Germany can be found in "Koch-sensei matsun no hanky0. IJ, no.
1368 (September 11. 1920)1383.
150. Deutsche medizinische Wochenschrift (n. 149 above), p. 810. In view of
Kitasato's evident distaste for Confucianism, this comment must be seen as
political! See Miyajima (n. 41 above), pp. 5-7. on his exposure to Confucianism
as a child.
151 Tawara (n. 118 above), p. 23
152. "Shutsuen zai-Doku dairi taishi no koden" (n. 144 above), p. 1455.
153. See Tawara (n. 118 above), p. 25, for details.
154. The vice minister of education. M in ami Hiroshi, acknowledged receipt
of the cable. See "Doitsu ryugaku to Gakushiin" (n. 142 above), p. 27. However,
there is no record in NGHNS of any comment on or response to it
155. Quoted in Nagayo, p. 193. The account of the December 1920 NRC
meetings presented here is based on this text, which in turn is based on Nagayo
Mataro's diary.
156. Ibid., pp. 194-97.
157. "Shutsuen zai-Doku dairi taishi no koden" (n. 144 above), pp. 1454-55.
158. Nagayo (n. 74 above), p. 198.
159. Nakamura(iL 19 above), p. 151.
161. Yamakawa had gotten into political difficulty for defending a man ac
cused of lese majeste. His biographer, Hanami Sakumi, wrote: "Yamakawa
always stood up vigorously for his principles and did not knuckle under to
pressure. So it is not surprising that some perceived him as a man likely to keep
authority at arm's length. At any rate, Haseba [Sumitaka], as minister of educa
tion, began to have second thoughts about Yamakawa and on August 12,1912,
named Dr. Sakurai Jdji, dean of the faculty of science, acting president of Tokyo
Imperial University" (Hanami [n. 9 above)), pp. 223-24. The issue continued
into 1913 and was finally resolved with the reappointment of Yamakawa, rec
ommended strongly by Sakurai. In tryingtounderstand the way Yamakawa and
Sakurai were viewed by the ministry, it is worth recalling that Yamakawa in
1876 had angered the Japanese minister to the U.S. by refusing to return
home from foreign study when requested, whereas Sakurai had complied in
1881.
162. Nagayo (n. 74 above), p. 196.
163. Ibid., pp. 196, 198
Chapter Nine: Science and Society: A Retrospective

1. TGSIG. Cf. "Dai-ichi ka dai-hachi gd," House of Representatives Budget
Committee, 10th Diet, March 12, 1897, p. 87.
2. L. F Haber, in reference to England, writes: "In England the professional
chemist usually played a subordinate role (before World War II) and. as far as
policy-making was concerned, he was ignored." See "Chemical Innovation in
Peace and in War." in C. G. Bemhard, Elisabeth Crawford, and Per Sorbom,
eds.. Science, Technology and Society in the Time of Alfred Nobel, p. 272. Re
garding China, see Nathan Sivin. "How Does Science Begin?" Technology
Review 71/3 (January 1969) 63. where the author writes: "The distinction
between the generalist. the gentleman civil servant, qualified by his Confucian
indoctrination to speak on questions of purpose and value, and the staff expert,
who remained in the background and supplied techniques as they were asked
for. was basic in imperial China for over a millennium " On Asia in general,
see Jean Dessau, "Social Factors Affecting Science and Technology in Asia,"
Impact of Science on Society 19/1 (1969): 19: "Social structures represent
the historical product of interaction between structures of pre-industrial so
cieties and the structures imposed by industrialization The main aspect of
their influence seems to be the precedence, in the greater part of [Asia], ac
corded to administrative over technical and scientific personnel."
3. Nakayama Shigeru. Teikoku daigaku no tanjo, pp. 120-21.
4. Robert M. Spaulding, Jr., Imperial japan's Higher Civil Service Examina
tions, p. 191. Classroom time given to instruction in the sciences was reduced
because of the perceived need to make more time for foreign-language instruc
tion. See the testimony of Okada Ryohei, from the Ministry of Education, to the
Budget Committee (TGSIG, cf. "Shugiin Gakusei Kaikaku Chdsa Kai setchi ni
kansuru kengi an shinsa tokubetsu iinkai sokkiroku [dai-ni go]," House of
Representatives Budget Committee, 14th Diet, January 20, 1900, p. 7).
5. Morikawa Hidemasa, Gijutsusha: Nihon kindaika no ninaite (Tokyo: Ni
hon Keizai Shimbun Sha, 1975), pp. 123-42.
6. Fukuzawa Yukichi, "Nagayo Sensai-sensei kanreki shukuenkai no kei
kyd," TIS, no. 1069 (October 1, 1898):39.
7. Spaulding (n. 4 above), p. 165. See chapter 8 for additional details on the
conflict over this issue in Germany.
8. A professor of chemistry at Tokyo University wrote during World War I
that the exclusion of scientists and engineers from the higher civil service was
one of the "present-day evils." See Matsubara Koichi. Tekichokko zappan
(Tokyo: Kawade Shobo, 1941), pp. 578-82.
9. This was the point of Yagi Itsuro's comments to the Diet in December
1914. See TGSIG. Cf. "Yosan iinkai giroku sokki, dai-nanakai," House of Repre
sentatives Budget Committee, 35th Diet, December 16,1914, p. 82.
10. Ogata Norio. "Kitasato Shibasaburi ryaku den," Igaku shi kenkyu, no. 4
(1962):43.
11. "Ryugakusei kyozetsu mondai no shingi," U, no. 1334 (January 17,
1920): 119.
12. 'Mombusho ryugakusei nimmei." KJ, no. 1270 (July 25. 1920): 19.
13. "Shutsuen zai-Doku dairi taishi no koden," //, no. 1370 (September 25,
1920): 1454.
14. Itakura Kiyonobu, Yagi Eri, and Kimura Tosaku. Nagaoka Hantaro den,
pp. 440-41. The authors imply that the matriculation of Japanese physics stu
dents between 1918 and 1922 at Chicago, Harvard, Cornell. London, Oxford,
and Copenhagen was largely owing to the impossibility of foreign study in
"defeated Germany." Since it was possible to study in Germany during most of
this period, however, a more likely explanation is that Nagaoka felt these institu
tions offered his students the best educational and research prospects.
15. "Mombusho ryugakusei jQnana mei." KJ, no. 1275 (September 15.
1920):23-24.
16. Kitasato's views are cited in "Ryugakusei kyozetsu mondai no shingi" (n.
11 above), p. 119.
17. "Gakujutsu rusa mondai." IJ, no. 1368 (September 11. 1920): 1385.
18. Sakurai's claims to this effect were in part motivated by his desire to
justify the NRC politically. They also reflected a deep-seated conviction. See in
particular the comments he makes about his career in his memoirs (Sakurai
JOji, Omoide no kazuhazu, pp. 10-15).
19. This is particularly apparent from an examination of the bibliography in
Kawamuras book. Studies on Tsutsugamushi Disease, pp. 217-25.
20. See James D. Watson. The Double Helix (New York: Signet, 1969), for
detailed confirmation of this point
21. UchJda Shun'ichJu "Kagaku hyakunen no kaiko to tembd," in Ninon
Kagaku Kai, ed. Nikon no kagaku hyaku nen shi, pp. 24-31.
22. San'ichird Mizushima (ch. 6, n. 9), "A History of Physical Chemistry in
Japan," p. 9.
24. Ibid. pp. 37-38.
25. This problem presents itself to Western scientists today as it has histor
ically for Japanese scientists. For details see U.S. Government, 98th Congress,
2d Session, The Availability ofJapanese Scientific and Technical Information
in the United States (House of Representatives Committee on Science, Re
search and Technology, March 6-7, 1984 [Washington: U.S. Government
Printing Office, 1984]).
26. Matsushita Tejji, "Gakumon no chushin wa nani tokoro e," 1J, no. 1280
(January 1, 1919): 4-6.
27. Tawara Teijird, "Zai Berlin Nihonjin no giketsu," KJ, no. 1279 (October
25, 1920):24.
Epilogue
1. Japan has been ranked among the top three nations for fundamental con
tributions to mathematics for some time. It is now reported to have taken the
leading position in magnetics. See testimony by C. E. Johnson, Jr., on behalf'of

the Magnetics Society of America, in U.S. Government, 98th Congress, 2d
Session, The Availability of Japanese Scientific and Technical Information in
the United States, pp. 324-35.
2. Nobel prizes in science were awarded to Japanese nationals in 1949,1965,
1973, 1981, and 1987.
3. Kiyonobu Itakura and Eri Yagi, "The Japanese Research System and the
Establishment of the Institute of Physical and Chemical Research," in Shigeru
Nakayama, David L. Swain, and Eri Yagi, eds.. Science and Society in Modern
Japan, pp. 193-94.
4. Kyoto University got itsfirstchair in biology in 1919. Tdhoku University in
1923.
5. Hiroshige Tetsu, Kindai kagaku saikd (Tokyo, 1979), p. 201. and idem.
"Social Conditions for the Researches of Nuclear Physics in Pre-War Japan,"
Japanese Studies in the History of Science, no. 2 (1963):83-85.
6. Idem (ch. 5, n. 36), "The Role of the Government in the Development of
Science." pp. 320-39.
7. Itakura and Yagi (n. 3 above), pp. 195-97.
8. Michael A. Cusumano, "'Scientific Industry': Strategy, Technology, and
Management in the Riken Industrial Group, 1917 to 1945." in William Wray,
ed.. Managing Industrial Enterprise: Cases from Japan's Prewar Experience
(Cambridge: Harvard Council on East Asian Studies/Harvard University Press,
forthcoming).
9. Samuel Coleman. T h e Reorganization of Japan's Physical and Chemical
Research Institute under the Allied Occupation," unpublished paper (1987), p.
8.
10. Shigeru Nakayama, "The American Occupation and the Science Coun
cil of Japan," in Everett Mendelsohn, ed.. Transformation and Tradition in the
Sciences (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984), pp. 357-58.
11 Ibid, p. 368.
12. Ninon Kyosantd Kagaku Gijutsu Bu, "Ninon no kagaku gijutsu no kek
kan to kyosanshugisha no nimmu," Zen'ex 10/11 (November 1946), reprinted
in Ninon Kagaku Shi Gakkai, ed., Ninon kagaku gijutsu shi taikei, 5 (Tokyo:
Nihon Kagaku Shi Gakkai, 1964): 112-17
13. Fujioka Yoshio, Kagaku kyoihu ron (Tokyo: Kawade Shobo, 1947), p. 89,
and Sakata Shoichi, "Kenkyu to soshiki," Shizen (September 1947), pp. 10
13.
14. On the founding of the league, see Hiroshige Tetsu, Sengo Nihon no
kagaku undo (Tokyo: Chud Koron Sha, 1960), pp. 134-35.
15. Details can be found in Hideo Sato's seminal paper "The Politics of Tech
nology Importation in Japan: The Case of Atomic Power Reactors," pp. 7,16,22,
25,48-49. Preparedforthe Conference on Technological Innovation and Diffu
sion in Japan (sponsored by the Social Sciences Research Council), Kona,
Hawaii, February 7-11, 1978.
16. Ibid, pp. 64,49.
17. Tomonaga made an appeal for increased public spending on science
almost immediately after his Nobel Prize was announced. See "Kagaku ni motto
kokuhi o," Asahi Shimbun, October 22, 1965. p. 9.
18. Estimates based on data from the National Science Foundation and the
Japanese prime minister's office are reported in "Japan's High-Tech Chal
lenge," Newsweek, August 9, 1982, p. S3. Spending, for instance, on the space
development program in Japan tripled between 1973 and 1981. See Alun M.
Anderson. Science and Technology in Japan (London: Longman, 1984), fig.
10.2. p. 198.
19. Anderson (n. 18 above), pp. 14-16.
20. For a description of Tonegawa's views, see Stephen Kreider Yoder,
"Native Son's Nobel Award Is Japan's Loss: Scientist's Prize Points Up Re
search System's Failings," The Wall Street Journal, October 14. 1987. p. 26.
21. Hara Genkichi. Kagaku kenkyu hi: Sono naritachi to henken (Tokyo:
Kagaku Shimbun Sha. 1982). pp. 106-07. 110.113-14. A chemist by training.
Hara between 1949 and 1974 had charge of all research funds for medicine
awarded under the Science Research Grants Program of the Ministry of Educa
tion, the program first established in 1918.
22. Ibid. pp. 105-07. 116. 117
INDEX
Abe Yuji (Judo). 18 Baba Kotart (Kinko; Seito). 18

Adachl Buntaro, 252 Baba Sajuri. 30
Agricultural Experiment Station. Baelz, Erwin von. 65. 67. 182
142, 204, 227; at Tokyo. 93; at Bansha Circle Incident, 38. 39
Komaba, 99; at Nishigahara, 120 Bansho Shirabesho. 32, 38, 40, 58,
22, 143 92. 129
Aichi Keiichi, 179 Bansho Wage Goyo. 30, 266
Aida Yasuaki (Sanzaemon). 24. 42. Bauduin. A. F. 31. 32
43. 46. 47 Behring. Emil von, 5. 72, 75. 76. 77.
A^jima Kanjiro, 214 274
Akamatsu Daizaburo. 41 Beriberi. 78-79. 91. 128. 183. 185.
Akita Giichi, 48 192
Akita Yujiro (Irun. Jushichiro), 18 Beriben Research Commission, 149,
Aochi Rinsd, 14. 18. 39, 44 152, 205
Aoki Kon'yo, 18 Bethmann-HoUweg, Theobald von.
Aoki Shuzd, 65. 74. 84 245
Aoyagi E^ji. 153 Bismarck, Otto von. 131
Aoyama Tanemichi. 169. 238, 246, Brandt, Maximilian von. 65
269; overseas study of. 67. 70; Bunseki Kyuri Jo, 32,90. See also
Hong Kong expedition of, 141, Osaka Kyuri Jo
185, 191-92; as dean. 152, 192, Bureau of Agriculture: and Nagai
2947119; and transfer of Kitasato's Nagayoshi, 74; experiment sta
institute, 152. 203; as mentor, tions. 99, 121; technical men in,
172, 184-86. 190-91; and 129; lawyers in. 142-43, 270; staff
Kitasato, 191-92. 209, 210 of, 144; chiefs of, 157-60
Arai Tsuneo. 185 Bureau of Forestry, 97, 142, 143-44,
Araki Son'd (Murahkk; San'ei), 15, 160, 231, 245
18 Bureau of Industry, 142, 144-45,
Asada Goryu, 16, 29, 32, 47 160-61, 231, 234
Asakawa Norihiko, 166, 167-68 Bureau of Patents, 231-33
Aschoff, Ludwig, 183 Bureau of Professional Education,
Association for the Chemical Indus 134, 140, 147, 148, 208, 250
try, 144, 213, 233 Bureau of Public Health, 129, 140,
Association of Science Academies, 145, 154, 207; and Kitasato, 70,
255, 262 101, 140-41, 153; and Nagai, 74
Astronomical Bureau and Observato
ry. See Temmongata
Atkinson, R. W., 6s Catholicism, 34, 36, 61, 268
Axenfeld, T, 260, 261 Central Hygiene Commission, 129,
Ayrton, W. E., 65,66 153. *55» 204
357
358 INDEX
Central Meteorological Observatory, Ewing, James A., 65, 66, 67, 77,
93. 129, 137

177
Chemical Industry Study Commis
sion (CISC), 213, 236

Factions, 2, 45-46, 163, 190, 271
Chemical Society of Japan, 193-94

72, 278; in medicine, 141, 209
China, 9, 16, 21, 26,63, 221

10, 251, 266; at Tokyo University,
Civil service, 126-27, 148.154, 200,

200
269
Fermentation Laboratory, 97, 205
Committee to Investigate the Aca

Ferreira, Christovao, 15
demic System, 136. 138

Fibiger, Johannes, 5
Copernicus, 16-17
Flexner, Simon, 72
Council of State, 128-29, I 3 I

Forestry Experiment Station, 93,
137
France, 71, 77,87, 98, 121, 256,
Daikubara Gintard, 122
262. 268
DanTakuma. 173
Fresnel, Augustin Jean, 177
Darwin, Charles, 66
Fujli Kenjiro, 227, 343*12
Diet, 247, 267-68. 269; members of,
"Fujioka Formula," 280
99,113, 127. 135-36. 239, 244
Fujioka Yoshio, 278
45; and Institute of Infectious Dis
Fujisawa Rildtaro, 218, 258,
eases, 102; and science, 135-37,
32271155
231; and Bureau of Agriculture,
Fujita Magohei, 142, 143
142-43; and Industrial Experi
Fujita Sadasuke, 18, 25, 42,46, 47
ment Laboratory, 145; and In
Fujita Shiro, 143
stitute of Infectious Diseases,
Fujita Shuichi, 185
201-04; and Research Institute
Fukuhara Rydjiro, 29, 53-55, 59
for Physics and Chemistry, 213
Fukuoka Takachika (Kotei), 133,
15; and Institute for Aeronautics,
219-20; and universities, 226;

134
and NRC, 259

Fukuzawa Yukichi, 33, 62, 103,
I
Disse, Josef. 64,65, 67,182
34~35» 210-11, 270; on
Divers, Edward, 64,65, 66, 180, 181

Tokugawa legacy, 20, 21-22, 34,
Ddke Hitoshi, 158

35, 50,125; and Kitasato, 101,
Doshikai, 202, 210

i53» 207, 31971105
Doshisha, 64,103, 173, 243

Furugoori Hikozaemon, 18
Furuichi Koi, 218, 262, 3181179
Donitz, F W., 65,66-67
Furukawa Toranosuke, 114, 115,
Du Bois, Ren6, 188
118
Dyer, Henry, 65,66, 91, 128
Futaki Kenzd, 157
Egawa Hidetaisu, 39-40

Gaffky, Georg, 77
Egi Kazuyuki, 216

Gakusei edict of 1872, 92
Ehrlich, Paul, 76, 118, 209

Germany, 4, 7,65; as model, 67, 88,
Einstein, Albert, 75, 76, 179, 254

132-33, 200, 266; ryugakusei in,
Electrotechnical Laboratory, 97, 205,,

71-72,87,134, 199-200, 211,
213
273; authoritarianism in, 76-78,
Engineers' movement, 239, 245-46

269; science in, 97-98,121, 268;
Esaki, Leo (Reona), 2,6

civil service in, 126-27; a n °'
INDEX 359
World War I, 199-201; indepen

Hashimoto Sessai, 293-947119
dence from, 238, 246; research

Hata KGzan, 44
grants in, 253-54; and IRC, 254

Hata Sahachird, 118, 166
57, 260-63; engineers' protest in,

Hayakawa Kazuma, 189
270 Hayashi family, n , 12, 41
Gierke, Bernhard, 65,67 Hayashi Haruo, 117
Gotd Rishun (Godoan), 37

Hayashi Hirotaro, 240
Goto Motonosuke, 117

Hayashi Kichizaemon, 36
Goto Shimpei, 140

Hayashi Kiroku, 248
Gratama, W. K.. 31.32 Hayashi Naosuke, 249
Great Britain, 39,65. 96. 263, 268;

Hayashi Razan, 36
ryUgakusei in, 71,72, 77. 78-79.

Hazama Shigetomi, 47
97, 200, 273; and IRC. 255-56,

Helmholtz. Hermann von, 75, 182
262
Hida Otokhi, 167. 208
Great Japan Hygiene Society, 101.

Higher Education Council, 137-38,
192, 204. 207

147
Great Japan Medical Society. 87-88.

Higuchi Hideo. 221
See also Japan Federation of Medi

Higuchi Gon'emon, 18
cal Societies
Hikita Naotaro. 173
Griffis. W. E., 55
Hiraga Gennai, 18. 36
Hiraoka Manjiro, 112
Haber, Fritz, 242

Hirata Tosuke, 158
Hachisuka Mochiaki, 137

Hirota KOki, 184
Haga Tamemasa, 64. 66. 180-81.

Hirota Tsukasa, 168, 204
191
Hoashi Banii 18, 3047113
Hagiwara Teisuke, 25
Hoffmann, Theodor, 66
Hamada Gentatsu, 318*179

Hormann, August von, 75, 76, 79
Hamao Arata (Shin), 85, 134, 139,

80,255
32211152
Hdjd Tokitaka, 224-25
Hanaoka SeishQ, 14
Hokkaido University. 201, 225-26,
Haneda Kiyohachi, 66
242, 272
Hantzsch, Arthur, 72
Homma Gencho, 14
Harada Toyokichi, 173-74

Honda Kotaro, 63, 179, 201, 229; as
Hara Kei (Satoshi; Takashi), 114,

student, 70, 75, 76, 172; as men
210, 259
tor, 187-91; and other scientists,
Haseba Sumitaka, 149-50

192; his Institute for Metals Re
Hasegawa Kan (Hiroshi), 47

search, 224-25; receipt of docto
Hasegawa Tai, 266; on Tokyo Acade

rate, 293m 9
my of Sciences, 95; and Kitasato,

Honda Toshiaki, 18, 37
101-02, 103,137, 141, 205, 207;

Horikiri Zenbei, 234, 235
on Tokyo University, 101-02, 104,

Hosokawa Shigekata, 27
105; and Zaisei Gakusha, 103,

Hozumi Nobushige, 258
166, 205, 268; and one-chair rule,
107, 228; in Diet, 113, 135-36.
137
Ichijima Kenkichi, 137
Hashimoto Keizaburo, 160

Ichiki Kitokuro, 85, 228; and
Hashimoto Ryu'un, 56
Kitasato, 154-55; and Institute of
INDEX
Ichiki Kitokurd (continued) 100—01; scientists at, 121, 156,

Infectious Diseases, 202-03, 2O5> 164; achievements of, 122, 167;
210, 248, 270 budget of, 122, 153, 154, 267;
Iemitsu, Shogun, 15, 35, 36 governance of, 140; denshusei at,
Ienari, Shogun, 37 141-42; Kitasato and, 142, 166
Ieyasu, Shogun, 36 68, 202; transfer of, 161, 201-06,
Igakko, 28, 56. 57. 91-92,93, 267 268, 270; serum quality at, 207
hjima Isao, 192 09
Iinuma Yokusai (Nagayori), 14 Institute of Western Studies, 40, 41
Ikeda Hayato, 279 International Council of Scientific
Ikeda Kikunae, 180, 181, 191, Unions (ICSU), 7
International Research Council
Imai IsoichirO, 142 (IRC), 254-57
Imamura Akitsune, 177 Irisawa Tatsukichi, 191
Imamura Eisei, 18 Ishigami Ryosaku, 57
Imamura Yoshk), 185 Ishiguro Tadanori, 131, 204
Imperial Academy of Sciences, 180, Ishihara Jun (Atsushi), 75. 76, 179
277. 278; prizes, 118-19,164. Ishihara KikutarO, 157
241. 253; and research. 123, 213; Ishikawa Chiyomatsu, 59, 75. 261
grants, 247-48; and NRC, 254 Ishikawa Teyirt, 178, 187, 189
61 Isokawa Ryoan, 45
Imperial College of Engineering, 66, Italy, 253, 256
9*. 94. 97. 128. 139 It6 Hirobumi, 65, 71, 99, 107, 112,
Imperial Ordinance 279, 204, 205 127; and ryugaku funding, 74,
Imperial University Ordinance, 97, 84; and Imperial College of En
133. 139 gineering, 91; and Tokyo Univer
Inada Ryukichi, 186 sity, 91, 101; and scientific
Industrial Experiment Laboratory, research, 92, 103, 128, 131, 136
160-61. 204, 268, 269; founding ltd Keisuke, 14, 58-59, n o , 129,
o£ 119-20, 132, 144-45* *7o; ex 169, 174, 31211192
pansion of, 201, 235-37; aim of, ltd Sukehiro, 3361169
213; research of, 213, 234 ltd Tokutaro, 59, 169
Ino Tadataka, 12, 29,38,4b Iwakura mission, 63, 65
Inoko Shikanosuke, 108 Iwasaki Koyata, 214, 215
Inoue Jinkichi, 171, 262, 339*1141 Izawa Takk>, 205, 32511222
Inoue Kaoru, 68, 127, 131, 140
Inoue Kowashi, 59, 85, 104-07, Janes, L. L., Captain, 28
110-11, 139, 266, 3051150 Japan Chemical Society, 86-87. See
Inoue Masaru, 41-42 also Tokyo Chemical Society
Institute for Aeronautics, 201, 210, Japan Federation of Medical So
217-23, 240, 242, 243, 272 cieties, 153. See also Great Japan
Institute for Metals Research, 224 Medical Society
25, 246, 272 Japan Society for the Advancement
Institute for Research on Nitrogen of Science (Gakushin), 276-77,
Fixation (IRNF), 240, 242 280
Institute of Infectious Diseases, 76, Japanese Society of Mechanical En
156, 204, 258, 272; founding of; gineering, 233
INDEX
Jimbo Kotora, 134-35 tion, 151; and CISC, 213; and

Jishokan, 28 expansion of higher education,
243-44; in House of Peers, 244
Kabayama Sukenori, 84, 112, 146 Kinoshita Hiroji, 108, 140
Kaisei Gakkd, 91-92, 93, 94, 267 Kinoshita Suekichi, 178
Kaiser Wilhebn Gesellschaft (KWG) Kirchhoff, Gustav Robert, 182
Laboratories, 254, 31311192 Kitajima Ta'ichi, 75, 76. 166-68,
Kamino Ryd, 104 207, 211-12
Kamiya Sadaham. 46 Kitaojiro, 87. 113
Kamoi Takeshi, 120 Kitasato Shibasaburo, 152. 267; re
Kanasugi Eigoro, 204. 211. 239 search of. 5. 77. 160. 273-74; on
Kanda Takahira (Kohei). 18. 128 Tokugawa, 42-43; early educa
Katayama Masao. 180. 262 tion. 56-57; study abroad. 70, 74,
Kat6 Hiroyuki. 133. 145, 170. 263; 137; and Koch. 72. 73, 75, 76,
and Kitasato. 81, 137; views of 80-82. 266; and Institute of In
university education. 92. 106. fectious Diseases, 100-02. 140,
134, 266, 309^1124; on Tokyo 142. 161. 201-06. 272; and Min
Academy of Sciences. 95-96; and istry of Education. 102-03, 137;
chair system. 104, 139 and Ministry of Home Affairs,
KatO Yasuhani, 174
129, 135. 153-55. 201; and Bu
Katsu Kaishu. 20
reau of Public Health, 140-41;
Katsura Tart, 84. 146-47. 151.
Hong Kong expedition, 141, 191
157-58, 241
92; and Ichiki Kitokuro. 154-55,
Kawaji Toshiakira, 40-41
205; admirers of. 156; criticism
Kawamiya Nobuo. 189
of. 163; his criticism of Japanese
Kawamoto Kdmin, 14, 30
science. 163-64; as mentor. 166
Kawamura Rinya, 249-51. 252
67; as student. 176; and influ
Kawamura Sumiyoshi. 131
enza pandemic. 192-93; and
Kawasaki Sajjird. 233
Kitasato Institute. 206-07; and
Kawashima Atsushi, 132
Seiyukat 210; and Okuma
Kaya Seyi, 187, 189
Shigenobu, 210-12; in House of
Keimatsu Katsuzaemon, 261
Peers, 244; and Ozawa Kenji,
258; and Germany, 261, 273; and
Keimeikai, 241
officials, 269
Keio, 64, 103, 173. 243. 244. 268,
276 Kitasato Institute, 206, 208, 231,

Kelly, Harry C , 12s 277-78 249
Kelvin, William Thomson, Lord, 65, Kiyoura Keigo, 209
7& 77. 9'. *77. 178. 254 Knott, C. G., 178
Kepler, Johannes, 17 Koba Sadatake, 49
Kikuchi Dairoku, 58-59; o n s t u d y Kobashi Ichita, 154
abroad, 68, 119; as president of Kobayashi Kernel (Yoshinobu), 18,
Tokyo University, 85, 106, 139 36
40, 30971124; as minister of edu Kobu Daigakko. See Imperial Col
cation, 114, 146, 147-48, 209, lege of Engineering
269; on basic science, 133; and Koch, Robert, 76, 102, 261; and
Seismological Research Commis Kitasato, 72, 73. 75. 80-81; and
sion, 136; on budget for educa tuberculin, 73, 101, 206; influ
36a INDEX
Koch, Robert (continued) Kuwaki Ayao. 179, 343*17

ence on Kitasato, 76, 82, 166, Kyoto University, 64, 123, 164, 170;
266; laboratory of, 77, 241; career founding of, 68, 98. 106-09, 267;
of. 81-82 facilities of, 113; chairs at, 150,
Kodama Gentard, 148 223, 230, 246; physical sciences
Kodama Rydtard, 229 at, 201. 268; funding for, 223-24,
Koganei Yoshikiyo, 136, 168, 204 240; and Ministry of Education,
Kdgyd Kagaku Kai See Association 251-52
for the Chemical Industry Kyushu University. 114, 164, 251;
Kdgyd Shiken Jo. See Industrial Ex founding of, 11, 115-17; medical
periment Laboratory faculty at, 113, 267; science fac
Koide Shuki (Chdjurd), 44, 46. 47 ulty at, 117, 242, 268, 276; en
Koike Yuken, 18 gineering at, 150; chairs at, 223
Koishi Genzui, 60
Komaba Agricultural College. 93, 94 Lalande. J. J. F de. 17, 24
Komatsu Sanshd. 100 Laue, Max von, 254
Komatsubara Eitard, 149-50 Lavoisier, Antoine Laurent, 33
Kdno Hironaka, 103. 215. 216, 234, League of Democratic Scientists,
23S 236-37 278
Kdno Tetsushi, 241, 248 Leonard, W. H.. 125
Kdno Togama, 132, 144 Uebig, Justus von, 80, 96
Konoe Tokumaro, 141 Lister, Joseph, 67. 182
Kdriba Hiro&hi, 3461154 Loeffler. Friedrich, 77, 81
Kotd Bunjird. 31011151, 32011129 Luther, Martin, 183
Kdtd Kyoiku Kaigi. See Higher Edu
cation Council Maeda Masana, 142
Kozai Yoshinao. 121-22, 152-53, Majima Toshiyuki (Rikd), 60, 180,
213, 267; and animal husbandry, 262
159, 160, 269 Maki Naomasa, 158
Kubota Seitard, 154 Makino Nobuaki, 268; and
Kubota Yuzuru: on naishoku, 84, ryugakusei, 68, 70, 112, 274; on
145-46; on Tokyo University, naishoku, 84; and founding of
105; and Hasegawa Tai, 113; and Kyoto University, 105-08 passim;
Committee to Investigate the Aca and Tdhoku science faculty, 114
demic System, 136; as minister of 15, 150; and Imperial Academy of
education, 146, 147-48; on edu Sciences, 117-18, 266; and pro
cation budget, 150-51; and In fessors, 139; as minister of educa
stitute of Aeronautics, 218, 219; tion, 148-49; as president of
opposed by scientists, 270 Keimeikai, 241
Kuhara Mitsuru, 180, 252, 3187179 Manabe Kaiichiro, 168, 172
Kufanus, Johan Adam, 14 Manase Gensaku, 45
Kumagai Muneo, 169, 171 Mano Bunji, 117, 170, 242, 251
Kumamoto Medical Academy. See Mansveldt, C. G. von, 56-57
Igakkd Mathematics: lack of employment
Kundt, August, 179 in, 12-13, 52; Tokugawa develop
Kunitomo Tdbei, 17 ments in, 15; samurai and com
Kurita Nobutada, 18 moners in, 18-25; publications
INDEX 363
*n. 34-3& 40; factions in, 43. 4 6 132, 233; and Forestry Experi
48; wasan, 86; and physical sci ment Station, 137; and non
ence, 90, 264; in Meiji, 266 academic laboratories, 156, 231;
Matsubara Kdichi, 180, 245 and animal husbandry, 160; role
Matsuda Masahisa. 146 of, debated, 215. 235; and IRNF,
Matsudaira Sadanobu, 37 242; engineers' movement in. 245
Matsui Naokichi, 173. 3181179 Ministry of Civil Affairs. 128
Matsukata Masayoshi, 128. 131, Ministry of Communications. 151.
134. 136. 159 204. 205. 213
Matsumoto Rydjun (Jun). 31. 40 Ministry of Education: ltd Keisuke
Matsunaga Yoshizaemon. 248 and, 58; Kitasato and, 101-02,
Matsunami Yoshimi, 245 137. 142. 161. 206-08; and chair
Matsuo Shinzen. 127 system. 104, 107, 222; scientists
Matsuoka Ryteuke, 18 in. 127; role of. 128-29. 268; and
Matsushita Teiji, 173. 244. 275 research. 132-34; and Tokyo
Matsuura Chinjiro. 208. 222. 230. University, 135. 251. 273; lawyers
250. 252. 259. 260 in. 145. 269-70; administration
Matsuzawa Takeo. 178-79 °f> '45-52: control of laboratories
Medicine. 4. 5, 274; in Tokugawa, by. 156. 204-05; and Institute of
13-14, 27-31 passim. 35. 40. 44 Infectious Diseases. 157. 201-06;
45, 265-66; as dominant field. and Research Institute for Physics
51-52, 90-96. 113. 164. 267; re and Chemistry, 215-17; and In
cruitment to. 56-58; foreign pro stitute for Aeronautics. 219. 221
fessors of, 66-67; societies for. 23; and Institute for Metals Re
87-88; in private and public sec search, 225; funding proposals,
tors, 100; at imperial universities. 242, 267. 280; and academic au
123; conservatism of. 181; pat tonomy. 246. 248; grants pro
terns of criticism in. 192-93; gram. 247-54; and overseas
growth steadying. 194-96 study, 273
Meerdervoort J. L C . Pompe van. Ministry of Finance: role of. 128
31,32.40, 55 29, 151; stinginess of, 137, 153.
Mei Wen-ting. 15 217. 225, 234; and Fermentation
Meiji Medical Association (MMA), Laboratory, 205; and Ministry of
87-88 Agriculture and Commerce, 235;
Meirokusha, 95 and NINR, 241; lawyers at, 269,
Mendel Gregor, 227 270; criticism of. 270
Mendenhall Thomas Corwin, 6 4 Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 260
65, 66, 67, 94, 177 Ministry of Home Affairs: and In
Milne, John, 65, 66 stitute of Infectious Diseases, 101,
Minami Hiroshi, 240, 259, 260 140, 203; scientists in, 127, 140
Ministry of Agriculture and Com 42; role of, 128-29, I55-5 6 . 2O 4;
merce: and Industrial Experiment and patents, 132; and Kitasato,
Laboratory, 120. 144-45, 235; I3S 153-55. 157. l 6 ° . 2 O 2 : and
scientists in, 127, 142, 157-58; Central. Meteorological Observato
creation of, 129; and research, ry, 137; and factions in medicine,
131, 204, 213, 215; lawyers in, 141, lawyers in, 145, 269-70; and
'32, 13s *45* 269; and patents, NINR, 241
3^4 INDEX
Ministry of Public Works, 128-29 Nagai Nagayoshi, 64, 269, 32091121;

Ministry of War, 81, 157 and ltd Keisuke, 58-59; back
Misaki Institute, 59, 97 ground of, 61; as ryugakusei, 70,
Mitamura Makujird, 168, 183, 184, 73, 74; and Hofmann. 75, 76; and
185 Sakurai, 79-80, 191; and Tokyo
Mitsubishi, 214, 231 University, 173, 255
Mitsui Baron, 212 Nagaoka Chisaburd, 63
Mitsukuri Kakichi, 59 Nagaoka Hantard, 255; background
Miura Baien, 18 of, 32, 63, 172; as ryugakusei, 67,
Miura Kinnosuke, 191 70. 74. 75; research of, 74, 193,
Miura Moriharu, 64, 182-83, 191, 213, 274, 31011151; and T6hoku
19a, 193 science faculty, 148-49,
Miwa Kan'khird (Koichiro), 87. 170 32211155; as mentor, 177-78,
Miyahara Jiro, 173 191, 273; and Honda Kdtaro,
Miyahara Shohei, 189 187-89; on NRC, 257; and Re
Miyajima Mikinosuke. 166-68 pas search Institute for Physics and
sim, 249, 251 Chemistry. 33971141
Miyake Kiichi, 343112 Nagasaki Igaku Denshu Jo, 32, 40.
Miyake Shu (Hiidzu), 61. 168. 172, 267
182 Nagasaki interpreters, 10, 12, 13,
Miyamoto Kyuichiro, 179 18, 21, 25. 38
Miyashita Sosuke, 261 Nagasaki Kaigun Denshu Jo, 32
Miyawaki Atsushi, 174 Nagayo Matard (Matao): as
Mizuno Tadanori, 40-41 ryugakusei, 70, 76; background
Mizushima San'ichird. 275 of, 168, 176; as mentor, 182,
Mizutani Toyobumi, 58 183-84. 191; and Institute of In
Mohnike. Otto. 31 fectious Diseases, 204, 209; and
Mori Arinori, 73, n o ; and Hakushi tsutsugamushi disease research,
degree, 51; as minister of educa 249-50. 251. 253; on IRC, 262;
tion, 133-34. 136. 269. 270 and Sakurai, 263
Mori Rintaro, 64, 168, 204, 208; Nagayo Sensai, 33, 64, 65, 128,
and Kitasato, 73, 81; and 129, 140, 168, 184
Saizawa, 157, 203 Nagayo Shdkichi, 184
Mori Shigeyoshi, 15, 18, 21 Nagoya University, 276
Mori Shikd, 18 Naha Kiyoshi, 99, 100
Morimura Ichizaemon, 101 Naishoku, 84-86, 200, 227, 230
Merrill Act, 99 Naito Shinjuku Testing Station. 93.
Morse. E. S., 64-65, 66 129, 131
Motoda Eifu, 131. 132 Nakahama Toichiro, 73, 163, 169,
Motoki Ryoei (Yoshinaga), 16-17, 32271203
37 Nakahashi Tokugord, 259
Motoori Norinaga, 12 Nakamatsu Mono, 232, 233
Mueller, Kari, 66 Nakamura Kiyoo, 87
Mukai Gensho, 15 Nakamura Seiji, 123, 177, 178, 212
Muraoka Han'ichi, 87, 177 'Nakamura Yaroku, 64, 99, 107, 132,
Murray, David, 95 136, 142, 269
Muto Kinkichi, 236-37 Nakane Genkei, 18, 37
INDEX 365
Nakanishi Fungaku, 18 Oku bo Toshimichi, 91, 128, 149,

Nakanokoji Kiyo&hi, 229 159
Nakazawa Iwata, 170, 3187179 Okuda Yoshindo (GJjin; Yoshito),
National Institute for Nutrition Re 151-56 passim, 208
search (NINR). 240-41, 246 Okuma Shigenobu: support for re
National Research Council (NRC), search, 74, 97, 112, 123, 136,
7, 238, 246, 254, 272-77 passim 161; and Aoyama, 184; and trans
Naumann, Edmund, 64 fer of Institute of Infectious Dis
Newton, Isaac. 17. 35, 41 eases, 201-04; and Kitasato, 207,
Nihon Gakujutsu Shinkokai. See 210-12; and Research Institute
Japan Society for the Advance for Physics and Chemistry, 212,
ment of Science 214. 217; and Institute for Aero
, 103 nautics, 218
NishiSeiho, 35m 148 Omura Masujiro, 47
Nishigahara Silk Experiment Sta Ono Ranzan (Motohiro), 14
tion. 97. 143. 2 7° Ono Tomogoro (Kdhan), 40
Nishikawa Joken. 18 Opium War. 24. 27. 28. 40, 53
Nishikawa Masaharu. 163. 179 Osaka Kyuri Jo, 267. See also
Nishikawa Seikyu. 18 Bunseki Kyuri Jo
Nishimura Tteato. 23 Osaka School of Chemistry, 32, 90
Nishina Yoshio, 277 Osaka University. 276
Nishitani Kinzo. 234 Osaka YQkichi 120
Nitobe Inazd. 174 Ose Hoan, 45
Nobel Prize. 5, 6. 276. 279 Oshikawa Norikichi. 232
Noguchi Hkkyo, 56-58. 63. 72 Otsuki Gentaku, 18, 30, 33. 34
Noma Itsuzo, 111 Oyama Kenzd, 70
Nomura Tokushichi, 227 Ozaki Yukio, i n . 114
NoroGenjo, 14 Ozawa Gakutard, 168. 172, 258
Noro Kageyoshi, 136 Ozawa Kenji, 64, 67, 168. 172, 258
Oda Hajime, 158 Parkes, Harry. Sir, 128

Oda Ryd. 232 Perkin, W. H., 97
Office for Transladng Dutch Books. Perry, Matthew C. 40
See Bansho Wage Goyd Pettenkofer, Max von, 72, 73, 75
Office of Astronomy. See Physical sciences: in Tokugawa, 18,
Temmongata 20, 24, 34, 46-47, 52, 265-66,
Ogata Kdan, 172 268; and mathematics, 90; re
Ogata Masanori, 75, 81, 102, 168. search institutions for, 122-23;
172* 193. 249-5 1 . 252 cooperation in, 192; employment
Ogawa Masataka, 66, 192 in, 196-98; funding for, 274
Ogyu Sorai, 12, 23 Physical Society, 86-87, 193
Okada Ry6hei, 115, 216, 218, 219, Physics: in Tokugawa, 4, 5, 14-15.
222, 228-30, 248 30—31, 32, 41, 91; recruitment
Oka Makoto, 160-61, 234, 236, 269 into, 61-63; prizes for, 164; at
Okamoto Eitard, 245 Tokyo University, 176-79; k<* o f
Oki Takatd, 136-37, 3041113 debates in, 193
Okdchi Masatoshi, 33971141 Planck, Max, 75, 181
366 INDEX
Poincare, Herat 193 in Meyi, 52-53; as chemists, 59

Popular rights movement, 99, 100, 60; as physicists, 61
101, 103, no Sapporo Agricultural College, 93,
94. " 3 . 225
Railways Research Institute, 97, Sata Yoshihiko (Aihiko), 2, 83, 84,
205 »83. 247
Rangaku, 20, 26, 30, 33, 34, 50, 57 Satd Eisaku, 279
Rankine. W. J M.. 65 SatO Shosuke, 3057150
Research Institute for Physics and Sawayanagi Masatard, 117, 186,
Chemistry, 123, 199, 201, 218, 246, 247
248, 272; founding of, 212-17; Schultze, Wilhelm, 65, 67
facilities, 242; funding for, 276; Sejjukan, 29-30
during World War II. 277 Seismological Research Commis
Roesler, Herman, 103 sion, 136, 147. 205, 320m 29
Russo-Japanese War. 114, 117, 119, Seiyo Igakusho, 30, 31
146, 218, 267 Seiyukai, 112, 203-04, 210
Rutherford, Ernest, 193 Seki School 46
Ryugaku, 67, 68-83. J46. '99> 200, Seki Takakazu, 15, 16, 18, 21, 24,
227, 273 44
Sekiya Seikei (Kiyokage), 87. 176
Saiki Nori. 241 Sericulture Institute, 159, 205, 227
Sakmji Kimmochi, 114. 154 Serological Institute, 122, 153
Saishunkan. 27. 28 Shiba Kdkan, 17
Saizawa K6zo, 157, 202-03, 208 Shiba Sankuro. 106
Sakai Tanihei, 209 Shibata Kamon, 150
Sakaki Yasusaburo, 169 Shibata Keita, 41, 172
Sakata Shoichi, 1, 6, 278 Shibata Yuji, 60-61, 67, 72-77 pas
Sakata Teiichi, 170, 233 sim, 172, 180, 192
Sakd Jomei, 157-58, 269, 270 Shibayama Gorosaku, 166
Sakuma Shozan, 15, 18 Shibukawa Harumi (Shunkai), 12,
Sakurai Joji, 170; on Tokugawa, 45; 16, 29
background of, 61, 255; as Shibukawa Kagesuke, 46, 47
ryugakusei, 73; and Williamson, Shibusawa Eiichi, 84, 214, 217
75, 76; and Nagai, 79-80, 191; Shiga Kiyoshi, 166, 167, 209, 274
on Academy of Sciences, 95, 118 Shiga Taizan, 87, 143-44, 269
19; on funding for research, 123, Shikinami Jujiro, 173
213, 217; on scientists' influence, Shimada Kichisaburd, 173
125; and basic science, 133; as Shimada Saburo, 103, 145
dean of science, 152; as mentor, Shimazu Narialtira, 55
179-80, 191; and Okuma, 214; in Shimizu Ichitard, 236
House of Peers, 244; and IRC, Shimizu Tetsukichi, 66
254-63 passim; personality of, Shimo'oka Chuji, 158, 203
263; on Japanese science, 273-75 Shinagawa Yajiro, 74, 132, 158,
Salaries, n , 64, 84-85, 121, 239 320m 21
40 Shinno Katsunosuke, 241
Samejima Tsunesaburo, 180 Shiomi Seyi, 231
Samurai, 11, 18-25, 47, 151, 265; Shiraishi Naoji, 244
INDEX 367
Shirandd, 33, 267 274, 320m 21; early training of,

Shizuki Tadao, 12, 14-15. 18, 44, 32, 60; on need for facilities, 123;
47 and Shinagawa Yajiro, 132,
Shoda Kazue, 217 320m 21; and Research Institute
Shoheikd Academy, 36, 37, 41, 9 1 - for Physics and Chemistry. 212
Takane Yoshito, 111
Shohyaku Society. 58 Takano Choei, 14, 38, 39-40, 47
Siebold, Philip Franz von, 14, 31, Takaoka Tadaichird, 230
38, 5S 58. 59 Takayama Jintaro. 144, 161, 266.
Sino-Japanese War. 99, 106, 144 269
Solf, Wilhelm, 260 Takebe Katahiro. 16
Sommerfeld. Amolf, 75, 179 Takeda Shingen, 18
Spencer, Herbert, 62 Taketomi Tokitoshi. 214, 215, 216
Stark, Johannes, 179 Tamaki Kijur6. 179
Stein, Lorenz von. 103. 133 Tamaru Takurd. 262
Stewart Balfour. 63 Tammann. Gustav. 75, 76, 179, 188
Sudd Kenzd. 163, 172-74 Tanabe Sakuo. 252
Sugawara Den. 111 Tanaka Fujimaro. 92, 95. 129
Sugita Gempaku. 14. 59 Tanaka Giichi. 153. 319m05
Sugita Genlan, 59 Tanaka Keisuke. 253
Sumitomo Kichizaemon. 118 Tanaka Minoru, 77
Sumitomo Metals, 225, 229. 231. Tanaka Shiba, 56
246 Tanaka Shdhei. 74
Suzuki Bun'ichi, 232 Tanaka Yoshk), 129
Suzuki Kizaemon, 121 Tanakadate Aikitsu, 241. 322m 55;
Suzuki Manjiri. 106, 113. 219, background of, 62, 67, 172, 255;
307-081199 as ryugakusei, 74. 87; and Kelvin.
Suzuki Tatsuo. 173 75-77; on Tokyo University, 94;
Suzuki Umeshiro. 215 as mentor, 177-78, 191; and In
Suzuki Umetaro, 61, 172 stitute for Aeronautics. 218-20;
and IRC, 254-57. 261-63
Tadokoro Yoshiharu, 222. 230 Tatebe Kenko. 18
Takada Sanae, 216, 217. 219-20. Tawara Kunuchi, 170, 192, 253
227-28, 248 Tawara Tejjiro, 261
Takagi Kanehiro. 55, 56-57. 78-79. Tea industry experiment station, 99,
129-31, 192, 269 100, 143
Takagi Tetfi, 177 Tekitekisaijuku, 33, 267
Takagi Yoshiyuki, 253 Temmongata, 13, 29, 33, 47, 92,
Takahashi Akira, 184 266
Takahashi Kageyasu (Sakuzaemon), Terada Torahiko, 179
18, 38-39 Terada Yukichi, 115
Takahashi Korekiyo, 132 Terao Hisashi, 77, 87, 133
Takahashi Yoshitokt 17, 18, 24, 46, Terauchi Yutaka, 166
47 Tiegel, Ernest, 64, 65, 67
Takamatsu Toyokiehi, 213, 217, 236 Tisserand, Francois, 77
Takami Hidemichi, 230 Toda Toranobu, 166
Takamine Jokichi. 118, 120, 132, Todhunter, Isaac, 147
368 INDEX
Tohoku University, 123-24; found 251; criticism of, 273. See also
ing of, 11, 112, 114-17, 32111131; Institute for Aeronautics
and Sapporo Agricultural College, Tomoda Chinzd, 178, 193
113, 225; science faculty, 148 Tomonaga Shin'ichiro, 170, 279
49, 150, 186, 267, 269; re Tonegawa Susumu, 279
searchers at, 164; physics labora Torii Ydz6, 39, 41
tory, 186-90; growth of, 223-24; Toyama Kametaro, 227
medical faculty, 224; genetics at, Toyama Shoichi (Masakazu), 65,
227; engineering faculty, 230, 71, 74, 139; and salaries, 84, 85;
267. See also Institute for Metals and higher education, 106-07,
Research 146, 266, 30911124
Tokugawa Yoshinu 231 Tsuboi Shindo, 33, 59, 60
Tokutomi Soh6, 163 Tsuboi Shdgord, 33, 59
Tokyo Academy of Sciences. 58, 94, Tsuchimikado Yasukuni, 47
109-11, 117-18, 129, 147, 148 Tsuchiya Seizaburo, 113, 208, 221
Tokyo Chemical Society. 86-87, 23, 228
194. 274 Tsuji Shinji, 107
Tokyo Hygiene Institute/Laboratory. Tsunayoshi, Shogun, 36
93, 129, 157. 204 Tsuruta Kenji. 176
Tokyo Mathematical and Physical Tsutsugamushi disease, 168, 183,
Society. 86. 193 191. 192. 249, 251, 253, 274
Tokyo School of Physics, 152 Tuberculin, 82, 101, 206
Tokyo University: Tokugawa institu
tions and, 31, 267; ltd Keisuke Uchida Itsumi, 18, 39-40
and, 58, 110; role in training sci Uchigasaki Tdjird. 154
entists, 63—64; foreign scientists Udagawa Genshin (Shinsai), 33
at, 64-67; medical faculty, 74. 97, Udagawa Yoan. 14, 33, 39, 55
200, 242, 267; languages used at, Ueda Kazutoshi (Mannen), 318*191
87; founding of, 91-93; science Umeno Shinkichi, 166. 167
faculty, 94, 96, 152, 267; physics Unequal Treaties, 126, 132
laboratory, 94, 176-79; facilities United States, 65, 253; ryugakusei
at, 96-97; engineering faculty, in. 71, 87, 200, 273; influence of,
97, 133; observatory, 97, 240; 241, 266; and IRC, 256, 260
Kitasato and, 101; and chair sys Urbain, Georges, 72, 75, 77
tem, 104, 107; budget for, 123,
224, 240; agriculture faculty, 133, Vaccine Station, 122, 153
152-53; chairs at, 139, 223, 226, Verbeck, Guido, 128
230; and Tomizu affair, 148; Versailles Conference, 260
Okuda Yoshindo and, 151; re Virchow, Rudolf, 182
searchers at, 156, 164-66; alumni
of, 174, 249; chemistry at, 179 Wada Yasushi (Nei), 24
81; pathology laboratory, 182-84; Wakasugi Kisaburo, 113, 163, 203
internal medicine, 184-86; In Wakatsuki Reijiro, 225, 247, 277
stitute of Infectious Diseases, Wakizaka Gydzd, 64
201-09 passim; and Doshikai, Waseda, 173, 249; engineering at,
210; and Ministry of Education, 64, 103, 276; university status,
INDEX 369
147, 268; Okuma and, 211; tech Finance, 151, 269, 270; as men
nical programs at, 243, 244, 276 tor, 177, 191; as president of
Watanabe Kanae, 58 Tokyo University, 208, 209, 217,
Watanabe Kazan, 39-40 246, 263; and Research Institute
Watanabe K&ki, 102. 133. 268 of Physics and Chemistry, 213,
Watanabe Satoshi, 278 214-15; and Institute for Aero
Watanabe Wataru, 145, 152. 170, nautics, 218-23 passim, 243; and
214, 229, 270, 323-2411187 mandatory retirement age. 240;
Weismann, August, 59, 75 on private universities, 243; on
Werner, Alfred, 72, 75-77 passim scientists' lack of influence, 244;
Wemich, A. L, 67 and Higher Education Council,
Whitman. Charles Otis. 2. 65, 9 4 318179
96. 97 Yamamoto Gombei, 131
Williamson, Alexander W.. 65, 75. Yamamoto Nagakata, 173
77. 79-80. 91. 179. 180. 254-55 Yamamoto Tatsuo. 120, 176
Willis. William, 77 Yamawaki T&yo, 14, 44. 46
Women in science. 239, 253 Yamazaki Yasunari, 44
World War I, 7, 199-201. 238. 243 Yanagita Izumi. 211
Yasui Kono. 253, 342-43112
Yagi Hidetsugu, 253 Yatabe Ryokkhi. 174
Yagi Itsurd, 113, 163. 203. 205, 241 Yogakko, 28. 57
Yamadajird. 185 Yojd'en, 207. 208
Yamada Seinen, 236 Yokoi Toshiyoshi, 305R5
Yamada Yokichi. 173 Yokota Koshi 216, 239
Yamagata Aritomo. 112, 113-14. Yokota Seinen, 218. 219
127. 204 Yokote Chiyonosuke. 157
Yamagiwa Katsusaburo, 86. 176, Yoshida Hikorokuro, 180
191. 193; research of, 5, 182, Yoshida Mitsuyoshi, 13. 15
274; funding for, 249, 253 Yoshikawa Akimasa, 129, 136
Yamaji Shuju. 18 Yoshimasu Todo, 44, 46
Yamakawa Kenjiro, 170, 173, 269; Yoshimune, Shogun, 21, 32, 37
background of, 23, 61, 63; study Yoshiue Shdichird, 203
abroad, 67. 73, 83-84, 87; and Yukawa Hideki, 178, 179, 278
naishoku, 85, 146; on research
facilities, 94, 122-23; ^ president
of Kyushu University, 117, 150; Zaisei Gakusha, 103, 163, 166, 205,
on Makino, 149; on Ministry of 268
Photo Credits
1, 2. 5,6, 15, 16, Kitasato Institute;
17, Tokyo Jikei Kai Medical College;
3, 4, 7. 9, 10, 11, 12, 13. 14,20. 21. 22, 23. Tokyo University;
19, Pharmaceutical Society of Japan;
18, Osaka University;
24, National Science Museum (Japan);
8. 25, 26, 27, 28. Mainichi Shimbun Sha;
29, Hokuseido Press;
30, The Bettmann/BBC Hulton Picture Library.
371

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THE FORMATION OF SCIENCE IN JAPAN

THE FORMATION OF SCIENCE IN JAPAN

Yale University Press

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Bartholomew. James R.. 1941­

ISBN 0-300-04261-2 Calk paper)

CHAPTER ONE The Social Formation of Japanese

CHAPTER TWO Science and Societu in the Tokuaawa

CHAPTER THREE Formation of the Meiji Scientific

CHAPTER FOUR Laying the Institutional

The Struggle to Define a Research

CHAPTER FIVE Science and the Bureaucracy 125

CHAPTER SIX Scientific Research in Its Social

Kitasato and the Institute of

CHAPTER SEVEN Science and the Crisis

Changes in the Conditions for

The Ministry of Education's Science

Research Grants Program

Establishment of the National

Illustrations follow page 124

13. Ogata Masanori

2.1. Samurai as a Percentage of All Tokugawa Scientists 19

3.1. Japanese Doctorates in Technical Fields, 1888-1920 52

3.2. Class Origins of Doctorate Recipients, 1888-1920 54

3.3. Class Origins of Chemists 60

3.4. Foreign Study Expenditures (Doctorate Recipients) 69

4.1. Imperial University Chairs and Graduates (% of Totals) 116

5.1. Educational Backgrounds of Bureau Chiefs (1872­

5.2. Bureaucratic Affiliations of Nonacademic Scientific

5.3. Post-1900 Affiliations of Nonacademic Scientific

5.4. Employment of Bacteriologists 156

5.5. Agriculture Bureau—Deployment of Experts 159

6.1. Institutional Affiliations of Research Scientists (1913) 165

6.2. Personal Connections of University Professors (%) 171

6.3. Preferential Hiring in the Imperial Universities (1877­

6.4. The Changing Academic Marketplace in Japanese

6.5. The Academic Marketplace in Physical Science 197

People have often asked how I came to be interested in Japanese sci­

Harootunian, Bernard Silberman, Byron Marshall, and the late Joseph

THE SOCIAL FORMATION OF

such claims as frequently as the Japanese of decades past. Japanese

ration (1868). The conceptual schemes of Western science at the time

growth of particular disciplines. Medical research in Japan did relatively

This often expressed itself in spending money on overseas study instead

This book takes up several themes in the formation of modern re­

eign influences. I have emphasized indigenous factors in the Japanese

SCIENCE AND SOCIETY IN

tion—cultural, linguistic, intellectual, and geographical—have yet to

Recruitment to Science in Tokugawa Japan

the money prerequisite to technical studies. Some abandoned routine

Samurai society in this period did not especially encourage interest in

There were also nonpecuniary compensations for professional ser­

Kyoto physician Yamawaki Toyo published Zoshi, a book on internal

published Rekisho shinsho (1798; published after the Restoration) or to

Motoki produced an extensive nonmathematical description of Coper­

The kinds of people who became active in the scientific movement

Mathematics ^NIL * 1680

20- Astronomy and Physical Sciences 1790

2O SCIENCE AND SOCIETY IN THE TOKUGAWA PERIOD

Bartholomew. James R.. 1941

5.1. Educational Backgrounds of Bureau Chiefs (1872

6.3. Preferential Hiring in the Imperial Universities (1877

People have often asked how I came to be interested in Japanese sci

This book takes up several themes in the formation of modern re

There were also nonpecuniary compensations for professional ser

Motoki produced an extensive nonmathematical description of Coper

expedition. Three factors may explain the tardiness of Tokugawa in

Scientific institutions in the Tokugawa period developed under di

Public institutions were certainly important for the scientific move

trenched in mathematics that it persisted well into the nineteenth cen

tion to modern Japanese science derivedfromeducation and its patron

from lack of scrutiny by peers. The work of Shizuki Tadao on Newto

Nagaoka Hantaro and Honda Kotaro came to physics by more con

Tanaka Minoru says students were reprimanded by their German pro

possibilities for effective medical intervention, and the unwelcome at

small. In thirty-eight years (1877-1914) Tokyo University had pro