<論説>明治期瀬戸内塩業者の直輸出運動とアジア : 思想の後背地としての地域 (特集 : 文明)

Abstract

本稿では、瀬戸内塩業者による直輸出運動の帰趨をアジア主義団体との関係に留意し跡づけることで、一九世紀後半における文明観流通の社会経済的背景を検討する。一八七〇年代後半に始まる運動は、当初幕末維新期以来の政治資産を用い中国輸出の実現を図った。瀬戸内塩業者は八〇年代には市場調査能力を涵養すべく興亜会を核とするアジア情報網に参入しロシア沿海州や朝鮮へ進出、次いで九〇年代には東邦協会や日清貿易研究所と接触する一方、塩業地の利益要求を議会に反映すべく近衛篤麿や東亜同文会への接近を図った。瀬戸内塩業者はその過程で九〇年代に成立した「アジア」を主体とする文明観を受容する。アジア主義と結合した文明観は日清戦勝に乗じた輸出実現を目指す運動を正当化する役割を果たした。当該期のナショナリズム運動は西洋を中心としない多文化主義的な文明観を醸成したが、通商実践の場では「アジア」への想像力を展開しえなかったのである。

This paper examines the social and economic background of the spread of the view of civilization within Japanese society in the latter half of the 19th century by situating the significance of the trends in the movement of Inland Sea salt producers giving consideration to the relationship with groups that advocated Pan-Asianism. First, by considering this process of the development of the movement in terms of the routes of Asian information, the following rough sketch is possible. In short, Inland Sea salt producers in the latter half of the 1870s made contacts with Kido Takayoshi and Õkubo Toshimichi through Mitajiri Hama that had possessed political capital since the Meiji Restoration, and responding to the Meiji government's policy of promoting industry begun at this time, they planned to implement salt exports to China. In this process, they attempted to survey the market using natives of the Inland Sea region as intermediaries. However, on the other hand, because they lacked special capabilities including language skills, the amount of information accumulated was minimal. In the 1880s when interest in Asia was rising throughout Japan given the background of increasing commercial activity with China and Korea, the Inland Sea salt producers both to obtain the foreign market information issued by government offices and attempted to foster a capacity to survey the market by participating in the Asian information network of government offices and entrepreneurs who formed the core of the Kōakai and Ajia Kyōkai. Salt export to the Korean market and the coastal provinces of Russia, which newly occupied their field of vision in this period, was spurred on by such information. Furthermore, the movement basically adhered to the policy of industrial promotion, but at the end of the 1880s when imports to Korea were thriving, table salt producing area planned to control direct exports and the local sales network exceeding the government's intention. By the 1890s, in response to the expansion of the demand for Asian information by entrepreneurs and producers, the Tōhō Kyōkai, Nisshin Boeki Kenkyūsho, and the Tōa Dōbunkai established market surveys based on specialist knowledge. The Inland Sea producers obtained information via these groups, but when the they tried to renew the move to export to China on the using the opportunity of the Sino-Japanese war, they devised a plan to approach Konoe Atsumaro, the president of the House of Peers, and use the political power of the Imperial Diet in seeking benefits for the salt producers who straddled prefectural boundaries. It was thought that Konoe as the leader of the foreign-policy hard-liners would function to represent their public opinion from a route removed from that of the political parties. Next, as regards the relationship between Pan-Asian consciousness and the view of civilization, the movement for direct export by the Inland Sea producers who planned to enter Asia for regional promotion, incurred economic damage on their trading partners beyond their field of vision. In the mid 1890s they adopted a view of civilization, which had been formed by those associated with the Tōhō Kyōkai, that saw the Orient and Asia as the center. Having implemented their policy of exports to China, the view of civilization that was linked to a Pan-Asianist conception of an East Asian order heightened the sense of cordiality with the movement in this period that required the support and provisioning by the national citizenry. Although the nationalist movement of the late 1880s and 1890s fomented multicultural ways of thinking that departed from the Western view of civilization, in the actual place where this commerce was implemented with "Asia, " the view of civilization that was engendered therein was not capable of developing the power of imagination in regard to "Asia."