Baron was an academic and politician of the

Meiji period The was an era of Japanese history that extended from October 23, 1868, to July 30, 1912. The Meiji era was the first half of the Empire of Japan, when the Japanese people moved from being an isolated feudal society at risk of colonizatio ...

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

Biography

Katō was born on August 5, 1836, to a ''

samurai The samurai () were members of the warrior class in Japan. They were originally provincial warriors who came from wealthy landowning families who could afford to train their men to be mounted archers. In the 8th century AD, the imperial court d ...

'' family in Izushi domain,

Tajima Province was a Provinces of Japan, province of Japan in the area of northern Hyōgo Prefecture. Tajima bordered on Tango Province, Tango and Tanba Province, Tanba to the east, Harima Province, Harima to the south, and Inaba Province, Inaba to the west. ...

(present day

Hyōgo Prefecture is a Prefectures of Japan, prefecture of Japan located in the Kansai region of Honshu. Hyōgo Prefecture has a population of 5,469,762 () and a geographic area of . Hyōgo Prefecture borders Kyoto Prefecture to the east, Osaka Prefecture to th ...

), and studied military science under Sakuma Shōzan and ''

rangaku ''Rangaku'' (Kyūjitai: , ), and by extension , is a body of knowledge developed by Japan through its contacts with the Dutch enclave of Dejima, which allowed Japan to keep abreast of Western technology and medicine in the period when the countr ...

'' under Oki Nakamasu in

Edo Edo (), also romanized as Jedo, Yedo or Yeddo, is the former name of Tokyo. Edo, formerly a (castle town) centered on Edo Castle located in Musashi Province, became the '' de facto'' capital of Japan from 1603 as the seat of the Tokugawa shogu ...

. As an instructor at the

Tokugawa bakufu The Tokugawa shogunate, also known as the was the military government of Japan during the Edo period from 1603 to 1868. The Tokugawa shogunate was established by Tokugawa Ieyasu after victory at the Battle of Sekigahara, ending the civil wars ...

's '' Bansho Shirabesho'' institute for researching Western science and technology from 1860 to 1868, he was one of the first Japanese to study

German language German (, ) is a West Germanic language in the Indo-European language family, mainly spoken in Western Europe, Western and Central Europe. It is the majority and Official language, official (or co-official) language in Germany, Austria, Switze ...

and

German philosophy German philosophy, meaning philosophy in the German language or philosophy by German people, in its diversity, is fundamental for both the analytic and continental traditions. It covers figures such as Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, Immanuel Kant, ...

. After the

Meiji Restoration The , referred to at the time as the , and also known as the Meiji Renovation, Revolution, Regeneration, Reform, or Renewal, was a political event that restored Imperial House of Japan, imperial rule to Japan in 1868 under Emperor Meiji. Althoug ...

, Katō wrote numerous theses recommending Japanese adoption of Western forms of government, especially that of a

constitutional monarchy Constitutional monarchy, also known as limited monarchy, parliamentary monarchy or democratic monarchy, is a form of monarchy in which the monarch exercises their authority in accordance with a constitution and is not alone in making decisions. ...

with a

national assembly In politics, a national assembly is either a unicameral legislature, the lower house of a bicameral legislature, or both houses of a bicameral legislature together. In the English language it generally means "an assembly composed of the repr ...

based on

representative democracy Representative democracy, also known as indirect democracy or electoral democracy, is a type of democracy where elected delegates represent a group of people, in contrast to direct democracy. Nearly all modern Western-style democracies func ...

. He joined the ''

Rikken Seiyūkai The was one of the main political party, political parties in the pre-war Empire of Japan. It was also known simply as the ''Seiyūkai''. Founded on September 15, 1900, by Itō Hirobumi,David S. Spencer, "Some Thoughts on the Political Devel ...

political party A political party is an organization that coordinates candidates to compete in a particular area's elections. It is common for the members of a party to hold similar ideas about politics, and parties may promote specific political ideology, ...

, and was also a founding member of the''

Meirokusha The was an intellectual society in Meiji period Japan that published social-criticism journal . Proposed by statesman Mori Arinori in 1873 (six years after the Meiji Restoration) and officially formed on 1 February 1874, the Meirokusha was int ...

'' intellectual society organized by Mori Arinori. A strong believer in

social Darwinism Charles Darwin, after whom social Darwinism is named Social Darwinism is a body of pseudoscientific theories and societal practices that purport to apply biological concepts of natural selection and survival of the fittest to sociology, economi ...

, he drew parallels a democratic government and the natural order. As a member of the '' Genroin,'' he strongly supported

Statism In political science, statism or etatism (from French, ''état'' 'state') is the doctrine that the political authority of the state is legitimate to some degree. This may include economic and social policy, especially in regard to taxation ...

, a much more authoritarian version of government against the views propounded by the

Freedom and People's Rights Movement The Freedom and People's Rights Movement (自由民権運動, ''Jiyū Minken Undō'') was a Japanese political and social movement for democracy during the Meiji era, Meiji period. It pursued the formation of an elected legislature, revision of the ...

. Katō gave lectures to the

emperor The word ''emperor'' (from , via ) can mean the male ruler of an empire. ''Empress'', the female equivalent, may indicate an emperor's wife (empress consort), mother/grandmother (empress dowager/grand empress dowager), or a woman who rules ...

each week on constitutional and international law, using translations from western texts to explain the concept of

separation of powers The separation of powers principle functionally differentiates several types of state (polity), state power (usually Legislature#Legislation, law-making, adjudication, and Executive (government)#Function, execution) and requires these operat ...

between executive, legislative and judiciary branches of government, the history of constitutions in Europe, and various forms of local administration.Keane. ''Emperor of Japan, Meiji and His World''. Pages 176-177 Katō served as superintendent of the Departments of Law, Science, and Literature of

Tokyo Imperial University The University of Tokyo (, abbreviated as in Japanese and UTokyo in English) is a public university, public research university in Bunkyō, Tokyo, Japan. Founded in 1877 as the nation's first modern university by the merger of several Edo peri ...

1877–1886, and again as president 1890–1893, and was head of the Imperial Academy 1905–1909. He was also a special adviser to the

Imperial Household Agency The (IHA) is an agency of the government of Japan in charge of state matters concerning the Imperial House of Japan, Imperial Family, and the keeping of the Privy Seal of Japan, Privy Seal and State Seal of Japan. From around the 8th century ...

. Katō was appointed a member of the House of Peers in 1890, and was ennobled with the title of ''danshaku'' (

baron Baron is a rank of nobility or title of honour, often Hereditary title, hereditary, in various European countries, either current or historical. The female equivalent is baroness. Typically, the title denotes an aristocrat who ranks higher than ...

) under the ''

kazoku The was the hereditary peerage of the Empire of Japan, which existed between 1869 and 1947. It was formed by merging the feudal lords (''Daimyo, daimyō'') and court nobles (''kuge'') into one system modelled after the British peerage. Distin ...

'' peerage system in 1900. In addition, he became a Privy Councilor. He died on February 9, 1916.

Honours

''From the corresponding article in the Japanese Wikipedia'' *Baron - 1900 *Grand Cordon of the

Order of the Sacred Treasure The is a Japanese Order (distinction), order, established on 4 January 1888 by Emperor Meiji as the Order of Meiji. Originally awarded in eight classes (from 8th to 1st, in ascending order of importance), since 2003 it has been awarded in six c ...

- December 1905. *Grand Cordon of the

Order of the Rising Sun The is a Japanese honors system, Japanese order, established in 1875 by Emperor Meiji. The Order was the first national decoration awarded by the Japanese government, created on 10 April 1875 by decree of the Council of State. The badge feat ...

- April 1906. *Grand Cordon of the

Order of the Paulownia Flowers The is an Order (decoration), order presented by the Japanese government. The award was established in 1888 during the Meiji Restoration as the highest award in the Order of the Rising Sun and has been an Order in its own right since 2003. The ...

- February 1916 (posthumous)

Notes

References

*Davis, Winston. (1996). ''The Moral and Political Naturalism of Baron Kato Hiroyuki''. Institute for East Asian Studies. . * Jansen, Marius B. (2000). ''The Making of Modern Japan.'' Cambridge:

Harvard University Press Harvard University Press (HUP) is an academic publishing house established on January 13, 1913, as a division of Harvard University. It is a member of the Association of University Presses. Its director since 2017 is George Andreou. The pres ...

.
OCLC 44090600
* Keene, Donald. (2002). ''Emperor of Japan: Meiji and His World, 1852-1912.'' New York:

Columbia University Press Columbia University Press is a university press based in New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's la ...

.
OCLC 46731178
* Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric and Käthe Roth. (2005)
''Japan encyclopedia.''
Cambridge:

.
OCLC 58053128

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kato, Hiroyuki 1836 births 1916 deaths People of the Meiji era Military personnel from Hyōgo Prefecture Kazoku Rikken Seiyūkai politicians Members of the House of Peers (Japan) Presidents of the University of Tokyo Japanese atheists