ABSTRACT
In this chapter, I examine new liberalism in interwar Japan through the magazine, The New Liberalism (Shin Jiyushugi). The idea of new liberalism in Japan occurred in the late 1920s. It was influenced by Britain’s new liberalism, which integrated social policy into classical liberalism.
The New Liberalism was first published in July 1928 by the Association for New Liberalism (Shin Jiyushugi Kyokai) and was published monthly until 1935. This chapter especially focuses on issues published from 1931 to 1933, because these years had significant events, such as the Manchurian Incident.
Although new liberalism is an important ideology that gave rise to the welfare states in the post-war period, the characteristics of the new liberalism movement in interwar Japan are not clear even in the field of the history of Japanese economic thought. Few copies of the magazine exist today and studies of the publication have not yet been conducted. By analyzing the magazine, this chapter attempts to reveal the distinctive features of new liberalism in Japan, its aims, and the limitations of the movement.
