ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to link economic ideas between early modern and modern Japan by focusing on Tameyuki Amano (1861–1938), the first Japanese modern economist, and Sontoku Ninomiya (1787–1856). In 1886, by publishing his Theory of Political Economy in his own language, Amano established economic science in Japan. Korekiyo Takahashi (1854–1936) and Tanzan Ishibashi (1884–1973) were known as the “Japanese Keynes” because as early as 1929 and 1931 respectively, they both used Keynesian analytical concepts such as “multiplier analysis” and “the paradox of saving.” At the end of World War II, Ishibashi’s expansionist policy for the reconstruction of Japan’s economy, which he considered Keynesian, was vehemently criticized by expert American economists such as Martin Bronfenbrenner and Joseph Dodge.
