Education in the Bakumatsu Japan (1853-1912)

During the last years of the Tokugawa bakufu, Japan appeared to
be a country in which the feudal structure, already in agony, was no longer
able to sustain the evolutionary process of the society, a process urged
both from outside and from inside. The following Meiji government, under
the motto of fukoku-kyōhei (“Enrich the country, strengthen the military”),
implemented fundamental reforms of the political, economic, and social
institutions of the country. The educational system played a fundamental
role during the years of the Bakumatsu (the transition period between the
Tokugawa and the Meiji period).