AHC: Industrialize Japan

yes, I know Japan was industrialized during the Meiji Ishin. But I'm talking about industrialization that is comparable to the Western World.
Look at this graph. Maybe Japan can at least be up to about Spain or Italy by 1900? This would make Japan much more a major player in the global world than IOTL.
NOTE: this is an svg file. I don't know whether it will appear properly on every operating system.

512px-Maddison_GDP_per_capita_1500-1950.svg.png
 
What are the dollar signs supposed to mean? I know it was at least equal to Italy by 1940, but that graph shows Italy as twice as great.
 

Delvestius

Banned
First off, the Tokugawa Shogunate can't be isolationist. In fact, for the scenario it might be beneficial for them to actively welcome the Dutch and Portuguese, as opposed to being only limited trade partners. Envoys to Ming/Qing China could enhance scientific understanding. I cannot think of a situation in which they come up with steam power on their own, though early adoption of it in the late eighteenth/early nineteenth centuries isn't impossible.

Now, to match the level of Britain or Germany? Probably not gonna happen, Japan is a comparatively resource poor nation without the Iron/Coal reserves of other nations. Not to mention their lagging in Urbanization, though again, Western influences in politics and economics might speed up the process.
 
What are the dollar signs supposed to mean? I know it was at least equal to Italy by 1940, but that graph shows Italy as twice as great.
"The graph shows the gross domestic product (at purchasing power parity) per capita between 1500 and 1950 in 1990 International dollars for selected nations."
 
First off, the Tokugawa Shogunate can't be isolationist. In fact, for the scenario it might be beneficial for them to actively welcome the Dutch and Portuguese, as opposed to being only limited trade partners. Envoys to Ming/Qing China could enhance scientific understanding. I cannot think of a situation in which they come up with steam power on their own, though early adoption of it in the late eighteenth/early nineteenth centuries isn't impossible.

Now, to match the level of Britain or Germany? Probably not gonna happen, Japan is a comparatively resource poor nation without the Iron/Coal reserves of other nations. Not to mention their lagging in Urbanization, though again, Western influences in politics and economics might speed up the process.
What, do you think, could spur an earlier industrialization/modernization process to begin in Japan? adopting the steam engine and such?
 
"The graph shows the gross domestic product (at purchasing power parity) per capita between 1500 and 1950 in 1990 International dollars for selected nations."
GDP is not equal to industrialisation. Moving healthcare from the home to hospitals is a major boost in GDP for any country, but it doesn't affect industry except indirectly.
 

Delvestius

Banned
What, do you think, could spur an earlier industrialization/modernization process to begin in Japan? adopting the steam engine and such?

Water-mills and advances in textile production and agricultural invention is where to start, and this is completely doable given the conditions I provided. Adopting the steam engine is the next step, you need to have the cottage industry base first.
 
Water-mills and advances in textile production and agricultural invention is where to start, and this is completely doable given the conditions I provided. Adopting the steam engine is the next step, you need to have the cottage industry base first.
have you heard about the French Encyclopedie? what if the Japanese somehow got their hands on the book and started technological advancements from there?
 

Delvestius

Banned
have you heard about the French Encyclopedie? what if the Japanese somehow got their hands on the book and started technological advancements from there?

Diderot's thing? I'm not sure how technically descriptive the book got besides general explanations, but maybe..? Now if they actually had a steam engine example they might be able to reverse engineer it, but I dunno who would bring one over. Perhaps the Shogun could commission a trade envoy ordering them to get their hands on one?
 
Water-mills and advances in textile production and agricultural invention is where to start, and this is completely doable given the conditions I provided. Adopting the steam engine is the next step, you need to have the cottage industry base first.

I would think steam engines are what you need cottage industry for least in that equation.
 

Delvestius

Banned
I would think steam engines are what you need cottage industry for least in that equation.

Huh? No, historically the agricultural/cottage revolution comes before steam industry.. Are you saying that it should be the opposite in terms of Japan? Which, wouldn't really make much sense.
 

katchen

Banned
Japan needs Sakhalin and it's coal from 1850 on at the very least. Just a forcible opening to the outside world and an end to the Tokugawa Shogunate a few decades earlier, say in the 1800s or 1810s at the hands of Raffles that the British Parliament could not or would not follow up with a permanent conquest could make a big difference. Perhaps Raffles would be satisfied with, say, Sakeshima Gunto (the southernmost Ryukyu Islands ) as an East Pacific counterpart to Singapore and jumping off point to Taiwan and China.
If Imperial Restoration and a modern state started, say in 1820, Japan would be modernizing and industrializing at a time when the European nations had much less strength in the Pacific. Japan would be in a position to take much of Manchuria that is largely empty of settlers and take over the Amur Basin which leads to the iron and coal of Culman and Aldan (which is just over the Russian border, but not in an area that Russia has settled at that time). The Amur and Sungari could be accessed via steamboats.
With those kinds of resources, Japan would the mineral resources needed for its industrial base even without further conquests--which would likely come from Russia. And in the EARLY 19th Century, Japan would likely have free rein in the islands of the Pacific, including Hawaii, as well, as long as they did not get too close to British Australia or New Zealand.
So the Japanese wouldn't have to avoid their seclusion policy of the 17th Century to industrialize. They just needed to abandon it a few decades sooner than they did. IOTL. And a TL in which they do would be an interesting TL indeed.
 
Japan needs Sakhalin and it's coal from 1850 on at the very least. Just a forcible opening to the outside world and an end to the Tokugawa Shogunate a few decades earlier, say in the 1800s or 1810s at the hands of Raffles that the British Parliament could not or would not follow up with a permanent conquest could make a big difference. Perhaps Raffles would be satisfied with, say, Sakeshima Gunto (the southernmost Ryukyu Islands ) as an East Pacific counterpart to Singapore and jumping off point to Taiwan and China.
If Imperial Restoration and a modern state started, say in 1820, Japan would be modernizing and industrializing at a time when the European nations had much less strength in the Pacific. Japan would be in a position to take much of Manchuria that is largely empty of settlers and take over the Amur Basin which leads to the iron and coal of Culman and Aldan (which is just over the Russian border, but not in an area that Russia has settled at that time). The Amur and Sungari could be accessed via steamboats.
With those kinds of resources, Japan would the mineral resources needed for its industrial base even without further conquests--which would likely come from Russia. And in the EARLY 19th Century, Japan would likely have free rein in the islands of the Pacific, including Hawaii, as well, as long as they did not get too close to British Australia or New Zealand.
So the Japanese wouldn't have to avoid their seclusion policy of the 17th Century to industrialize. They just needed to abandon it a few decades sooner than they did. IOTL. And a TL in which they do would be an interesting TL indeed.
Could the same be said for Korea?
They had an even larger coal reserve than Japan, Japan's power can be kept in check with internal conflict (multiple shogunates? shogunate vs. emperor?), Korea probably has the navigational development on par with Japan by 1800 since Japan has its exclusion policy.
An "opening-up" can be arranged for Korea quite easily. In that premise, could Korea become industrialized quickly?
 
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