Uesugi Harunori
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Uesugi Harunori (上杉 治憲; 1751 - 1822) was a Japanese daimyo, the 9th head of the Yonezawa domain (today's Yonezawa, Yamagata and Okitama region). Born in Edo, he was the second son of a daimyo of the Akizuki clan, who controlled part of Hyuga province. His mother was a granddaughter of the fourth head of Yonezawa. His childhood names were "Matsusaburō" (松三郎) and "Naomatsu" (直松). He was adopted by Uesugi Shigesada, then daimyo of Yonezawa, and in 1767 he succeeded Shigesada. After retirement, he adopted the gō, or pen name, Yozan (鷹山).
Today, he is best remembered for his financial reforms, and he is often cited as an example of a good governor of a domain. Yonezawa had been in debt for roughly a hundred years when Harunori took over; Shigesada even considered returning the domain to the shogunate, as a last resort. However, he was convinced by his father-in-law, the daimyo of Owari province, to instead resign as daimyo; it was under these conditions that Harunori came to be daimyo of Yonezawa. He introduced strict disciplinary measures, and ordered the execution of several karō (advisors) who opposed his plans. As a result of various measures he took, Yonezawa became fairly prosperous, and did not suffer much from the famine which swept Japan in the Tenmei era (1781-9). In 1830, less than a decade after Harunori's death, Yonezawa was officially declared by the shogunate to be a paragon of a well-governed domain.
He revealed his views on governance and the role of a feudal lord in a letter to his son Norihiro:
The state (国家, kokka) is inherited from one's ancestors and passed on to one's descendants; it should not be administered selfishly.
The people belong to the state; they should not be administered selfishly.
The lord exists for the sake of the state and the people: the state and the people do not exist for the sake of the lord.[1]
[edit] References
- ^ Mark Ravina (1995). “State-Building and Political Economy in Early-Modern Japan,” Journal of Asian Studies 54.4.
- Frederic, Louis (2002). "Japan Encyclopedia." Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press.
- Sansom, George (1963). "A History of Japan: 1615-1867." Stanford, California: Stanford University Press.
