There are three reasons given by the IB for this question to be answered. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The decline of the Tokugawa Shogunate.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Stagnation and demands for rapid modernisation.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Influence of the US and European countries.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n The decline of the Tokugawa Shogunate.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n There are arguably two perspectives to this. The first is that it was the Western influence (external) and the second was that it was the internal collapse of the country. We’ll begin with the latter…<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Internal Collapse<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n The famous economist Adam Smith argued that a ‘stationary state’. In his 1776 book, the Wealth of Nations, he argued that <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIn a country too, where, though the rich or the owners of large capitals (money<\/em>) enjoy a good deal of security, the poor or the owners of small capitals only <\/em>enjoy scarce, which can<\/em> be pillaged and plundered at any time… In every different branch, the oppression of the poor must establish the monopoly of the rich, who, by engrossing the whole trade to themselves, will be able to make very large profits.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n Niall Ferguson. The Great Degeneration.<\/em> Penguin, 2014, p.8 Answer the following questions from the video below:<\/p>\n\n\n\n (clipped from Emperor Meiji & the Meiji Restoration Documentary<\/a> :<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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