Main Body
Yanaihara Tadao: A Christian Against the Establishment
In which the author describes the remarkable career of a prominent economist and Christian whose convictions led him to oppose Japanese imperialism and colonialism. The author treats briefly Yanaihara’s student days (and romantic entanglement with another prominent figure in this tale) and his hair-raising encounter with “bandits” in Manchuria. Yanaihara’s reading of the Manchurian Incident differed sharply from that of Hijikata Seibi, his future antagonist. This background sets the stage for the author’s subsequent account (in Chapter 3) of Yanaihara’s expulsion from Tōdai.
The Man Appointed Assistant Professor on the Basis of One Letter
Let me introduce Yanaihara Tadao. The Tōdai Faculty of Economics was founded in 1919 and included a chair in colonial policy. Its first occupant was Nitobe Inazō (1862-1933), economist and ethicist and educator and Christian, who had lectured on colonies at the professional schools that later merged to become Tōdai. After studying at Sapporo Agricultural College, Nitobe studied economics at Johns Hopkins University in the U. S. Then, as brain trust for Gotō Shimpei, chief of the civil government section of Japan’s colonial administration in Taiwan, he was involved in policy across the board. He himself became chief of the Sugar Bureau and worked to expand Taiwan’s sugar production. That and other accomplishments gave him rich practical experience and made him ideally suited to teach colonial policy. But the next year, 1920, he was appointed to the very important post of Under Secretary General of the League of Nations, a first for a Japanese. He resigned from Tōdai and left for Geneva.
To succeed Nitobe in the chair in colonial policy, the Faculty of Economics chose Yanaihara, a 1917 graduate in political science. After graduating from Tōdai, Yanaihara had entered the Sumitomo home office and then been assigned to the Besshi Mine in Shikoku. At First Higher and then at Tōdai, he had been a disciple of Nitobe, and from his student days he had been interested in the colonies; after graduating, he intended to become a hands-on colonial administrator. His first choice was Korea, but personal reasons led him to sign on for a while with Sumitomo. From First Higher School days, he had been close to Maide Chōgorō, who had become an assistant professor of the Faculty of Economics at the time of its founding, and the negotiations to hire Yanaihara bore fruit quickly. But the way the decision was reached was quite informal. In Speaking of Myself, Yanaihara gives this account:[1] “Nitobe had gone to Geneva for the League of Nations, and the Tōdai chair in colonial policy was vacant. The Tōdai Faculty of Economics looked for his successor, and it became a matter of ‘How about Yanaihara? He’s a disciple of Nitobe—how about it?’ At the time, it took serious work if you wanted to become a university professor—writing up research, and the like. At the time I’d writ