ABSTRACT
No matter how much attention governments paid to the countryside in the 1930s, the towns and cities could not be ignored, in terms either of demographics or of politics. In 1930, nearly a third of the Japanese population lived in cities of 30,000 people or more, and by 1935, thirty-four cities had populations of over 100,000.1 Manufacturing, commerce and transportation together were beginning to challenge agriculture as employers, accounting for 40 per cent of the total workforce, including a large number of women, who made up almost half the employees in the manufacturing sector in 1930, largely thanks to their predominance in textile production. Politically, the importance of business as a whole was growing. Big business, of course, had long exerted crucial influence on Japanese governments and the making of policy, a point which was constantly reiterated by those seeking radical reform of the status quo during the early 1930s, while ‘the problem of small and medium enterprises’ (chu¯sho¯ sho¯ko¯gyo¯ mondai, chu¯sho¯ sangyo¯sha mondai) was placed firmly on the political agenda in this period.2 Urban business and urban workers, therefore, were significant and often vocal groups in the economic, political and social landscape of the early 1930s.
