Economic and Demographic Change in Preindustrial Japan, 1600-1868

According to the Marxist interpretation still dominant in Japanese studies, the last century and a half of the Tokugawa period was a time of economic and demographic stagnation. Professors Hanley and Yamamura argue that a more satisfactory explanation can be provided within the framework of modem economic theory, and they advance and test three important new hypotheses in this book.The authors sug...