Servants, Shophands, and Laborers in the Cities of Tokugawa Japan

In this analysis of lower-class life in Tokugawa Japan (1603-1868), the author portrays the emergence of an urban proletariat during a time of extraordinary economic change.

With the rapid increase in urban construction and commercial activity, hired labourers came to replace the traditional workers, while in households, contracted servants supplanted hereditary workers.

The text demonstrates that in the same way that products previously restricted to use by the elite became commodities for mass consumption, labour power itself became a commodity: class relations were gradually mediated by money, and employers and employees dealt with each other on increasingly impersonal, if not hostile, terms.

Attempting to control such trends, government officials regulated workers by fixing employment seasons, limiting job tenures, setting wages, and establishing labour exchanges, licensing systems and workhouses.

The author points out many cases in which Tokugawa policies toward labour resembled those applied by early modern regimes in Europe. Based on population registers, household records, legal documents and popular literature, the book offers a social history of workers and employers alike.