Yukichi Fukuzawa was a thinker, educator, and popularizer of Western culture in the late Edo and Meiji eras.
Background
Yukichi Fukuzawa was born on 10 January 1835 in Osaka. He was a son of a samurai of the domain of Nakatsu in Kyushu. His father was a man of talent and learning, but because of his relatively low social position, was unable to employ his talents to the full or to escape from poverty and hardship. This fact deeply influenced the young Yukichi and inspired in him a strong distaste for the emphasis upon birth and family background that characterized traditional Japanese society.
Education
In 1854, at the urging of his elder brother, he went to Nagasaki to pursue the study of Dutch and Dutch learning. He left Nagasaki the following year and went to Osaka where he entered a school for Dutch studies headed by Ogata Koan, a Western style physician.
Career
In 1857 he became head student of the school, and the following year, on orders from his domain, he opened a school for Dutch studies in Teppozu in the Tsukiji section of Edo, w'hich in time grew to be Keio University. Though devoting all his attention to Dutch studies, he discovered through actual contacts with Westerners that the Dutch language was not widely known or understood. In 1858 he accordingly turned his attention to English, which he studied on his own.
In 1860 he went to America in the ship Kanrin Maru as an attendant to Kimura Settsu-no-kami, official in charge of warships and head of the embassy sent by the shogunate to ratify the trade treaty between Japan and the United States. After his return to Japan, he was made an official in charge of translations pertaining to foreign affairs. In 1861 he was once again sent abroad as a member of an official mission of the shogunate, visiting France, England, Germany, Russia, and other countries. The journey gave him a first-hand knowledge of the civilization of the more advanced countries of the West and allowed him to observe their cultural and political systems.
In 1864 he advanced to a higher post in the service of the shogunate and in 1867 was once more sent to America. At this time he purchased a number of Western books, and after his return to Japan devoted himself to the study of a variety of fields of learning. In 1868 he moved his school to Shinsenza in the Shiba area and renamed it the Keio Gijuku.
In the last position he is said to have been influenced by his support of Kim Ok-kyun, a reformer and one of the founders of the Korean Independence Party, who w'as a member of the pro-Japanese faction in Korea. Yukichi’s thinking at this time is well illustrated in the Jiji Shimpo, a newspaper that he founded in 1882.
Views
After the termination of the shogunate and the founding of the Meiji government, he voluntarily took the status of a commoner and devoted his energies to the spread of Western ideas and civilization through education and the mass media. In 1869 he began a publishing venture under his own direction. In 1870 he prepared a survey of the police systems of Western countries at the request of the Tokyo prefectural government and in this connection the following year moved his school to the Mita area of Tokyo, where it remains today. In 1873 he joined with Kato Hiroyuki, Tsuda Mamichi, Nakamura Masanao, Nislii Amane, and other intellectuals in forming a society for the encouragement of Western studies known as the Meirokusha, which published a journal called Meiroku Zasshi. He also published various works of his own such as Gakumon no susume or Bum- tneiron nogairyaku in which, under the influence of British style utilitarianism, he emphasized the importance of independence, pride in self, and the promotion of measures that are of practical benefit to society. At this time the craze for Western learning and culture may be said to have reached its peak in Japan.
from 1875 on, however, when the popular rights movement came to the fore, Fukuzawa Yukichi emphasized the importance of a compromise between popular rights and the rights of the government, a position that in effect made him a critic of the popular rights movement. After the government shakeup of 1881, he advocated the enhancement of national prestige and harmonious cooperation between government officials and citizens and supported the government’s policy of expansion on the Asian mainland.