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영어

This paper presents a novel understanding of the peasant uprisings (hyakushō ikki) during Japan’s Tokugawa period (1603-1868) by examining their political nature. Hyakushō ikki were never anti-domain authority rebellions, as existing scholarship suggests, let alone revolutions. Rather, they were petitionary movements held to outline peasants’ demands concerning the policies of domain lords. That is, by being premised around these rulers’ legitimacy, hyakushō ikki were designed as policy protests and requests for change. This paper shows hyakushō ikki were also the political approach preferred by the rulers themselves. Officially recognised peasants—with their own harvesting lands (hon byakushō)—could participate in village administration matters, and many were involved in various village decision and management processes. In this manner, peasants routinely gained limited amounts of experience in politics by operating within the village system as a unit of rule. This substantial privilege enabled hyakushō ikki, through which peasants also placed themselves in the political world, albeit restrictedly. Rulers also achieved many of their political goals through levies, land taxes, and other fees by depending on village administrations. This environment inevitably helped peasants gain a sense of political awareness. Despite being officially prohibited from participating in institutional politics, peasants refused to accept any additional land taxes or cash payments that threatened their status as peasants. In this manner, they enforced the will of the people through hyakushō ikki, confirming and maintaining their status by protesting the policies of their rulers and requesting change. Therefore, this paper argues that hyakushō ikki were informal methods by which peasants participated in the political process (mainly the policy-making process in the bakufu and domains), by focusing on the political actions taken by peasants as well as the demands they presented to their rulers.