In five pages this paper discusses the nineteenth century Japanese modernization influence of Keio University founder Fukuzawa Yukichi. One source is cited in the bibliography.
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and as such, he is frequently looked upon as having played an important role in the modernization of late 19th-century Japan. Fukuzawa Yukichi firmly believed that every man
could benefit from education. He felt that only when the Japanese people were able to stand independently would the Japanese nation be able to be free of the influence
of Western powers. HIS BELIEFS AND PHILOSOPHY While Yukichi believed in education, he believed that this education would necessarily need to be strictly controlled by the government.
Education, he felt, was not something to be given equally to all. Because of Yukichis upbringing and the society of his time, it was believed that women could not
benefit from education because of their inferiority to men and their lack of the ability to teach. He felt the most important class to educate would be that of
the samurai and wealthier merchants and farmers. These, he claimed, could all benefit from full education. Yukichi felt however that the peasant class was a potentially dangerous force.
He compared this finding as to that of Europe, whereas the peasant class, if given too thorough an education, could potentially rise in rebellion against the government forces.
This of course would serve to weaken the state, thus giving the Western nations a way to step in and take control of Japan. As he writes in his
autobiography: "In the early years of the Restoration I translated a book on the methods of bookkeeping, and I know that all the current texts follow the example of my
book. So I should know something of the practice, if not enough to be an expert. But apparently the brains of a writer of books and those of a businessman