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Taiwan’s Intra-Asian Trade and Migration in the 1930s

Received: 18 January 2019    Accepted: 17 January 2020    Published: 18 February 2020
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Abstract

Since the start of the 21st Century, trading relations among the East Asian countries have been and need to be strongly reinforced. By reviewing intra-Asian economic relations in the 1930s, we could see assets and load left by history to the present world. In the 1930s, Taiwan was ruled by Japan. By contrast with Hori Kazuo, a professor of Kyoto University to have touched upon the intra-Asian trade of this decade focusing upon Japan, this study depicts the intra-Asian trade and migration of this decade by focusing upon Taiwan. This paper obtains the following findings: 1. In the 1930s, Taiwan’s trade with the Northeast Asia had been vividly increased. The increase rate of trade between Taiwan and Manchukuo as well as Korea was greater than that between Taiwan and the Japan proper. Migration between Taiwan and all Asian areas in this period was in general increased, in which that to China increased most. All these increases had been made possible by the rise of Asia-Pacific navigation relative to the Asia-European navigation. 2. In this expansion of intra-Asian trade and migration, the national boundary with all these various areas for Taiwan was clearly observed rather than imagined. For example, following the treaty between Japan and Korea signed in 1910, the relation between Taiwan and Korea turned more and more from being international into being domestic. When Taiwanese products, deemed as Japanese products, were rejected in the Southeast Asia and welcome in Manchukuo and other newly Japanese conquered Chinese mainland, Taiwanese vested interest was more and more intertwined with the Japanese empire which climaxed its war victory in China by conquering Wuchang and Hankou in 1938. By contrast with the mostly labor population among immigrants from other Asian areas to Taiwan, many of the emigrants from Taiwan to these areas were rich merchants.

DOI 10.11648/j.history.20200801.13
Published in History Research (Volume 8, Issue 1, June 2020)
Page(s) 19-32
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This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, provided the original work is properly cited.

Copyright

Copyright © The Author(s), 2024. Published by Science Publishing Group

Keywords

Merits and Demerits of Colonization, Japanese Empire and China, Relations Among Colonies, Asia-Pacific, Peace and War in the 1930s

References
[1] http://www.jetro.go.jp/jpn/stats/data/pdf/trade2005.pdf.
[2] Hori Kazuo, 'Sen kan ki higashi Ajia ni okeru kōgyō teki bungyō: seisan zai bōeki no bunseki o tsūjite' (Division of labor in East Asian industry in the interwar period: an analysis of production and trade), in Nakamura Satoru ed., Higashi Ajia kindai keizai no keizei to hatten- Higashiajia shihon shugi keizeishi (The formation and development of East Asian modern economy: a history of the formation of the East Asian capitalism) 1 (Tōkyō: Nihon Hyōronsha, 2005), Section 5, pp. 117-143; Hori Kazuo, Ryō taizenkanki Nihon teikoku no keizaiteki henʼyō: sekai shijō niokeru ichi (Transformation of the Japanese empire's economy in the interwar period: position in world markets), in Nakamura Satoru ed., Kindai higashi Ajia keizai no shiteki kōzō- Higashi Ajia shihon shugi keizieshi (The historical structure of modern East Asian economy: a history of the formation of the East Asian capitalism) 3 (Tōkyō: Nihon Hyōronsha, 2007), Section 4, pp. 153-180.
[3] Xu Shirong, 'Guanshui yu liang'an maoyi, 1895-1945' (Customs duties and trade across the Taiwan Straits, 1895- 1945) (Taipei: National Taiwan Normal University, doctoral thesis, 2005), pp. 16-18.
[4] Lin Man Houng, “Sen kyuhyaku sanju nendai Taiwan no Ajia chiikinai ni okeru bōeki to imin (Taiwan's intra-Asian trade and migration in the 1930s), Iwanami kōza higashi Ajia kingendai tsūshi (Iwanami lectures on modern and contemporary East Asian history) (10 vols. Separate volume 1) Vol. 5: Shinchitsujo no mosaku: 1930-nendai (Searching for a new order: the 1930s) (Iwanami Shoten, 2011), pp. 151-172. This author thanks Dr. David William Bowles’ preliminary translation helps for this papers.
[5] Man-houng Lin, “Taiwan, Hong Kong, and the Pacific, 1895-1945,” Modern Asian Studies, vol. 44, no. 5 (September, 2009), pp. 1053-1080.
[6] ‘Xian shen zhishu yingxiang (The effects of the direct ginseng trade), ‘Taiwan nichinichi shinpō, July 25, Taishō 3.
[7] Taiwan Sōtokufu zaimukyoku (Bureau of Finance, Taiwan General-Government), Taishō 7 Taiwan bōeki gairan (Overview of Taiwan's Economy, 1918) (Taipei: Taiwan Sōtokufu zaimukyoku zeimuka, 1921), p. 267.
[8] Taiwan Sōtoku Kanbō Bunshoka, Taiwan Sotokufu Dai hachi tōkei sho (Meiji 37) (Eighth statistics collection of the Taiwan General-Government) (Taipei: Taiwan Sotokufu, 1906), pp. 503, 564-565, 675.
[9] Taiwan Sōtokufu zaimukyoku (Bureau of Finance, Taiwan General-Government), Meiji 44 Taiwan bōeki gairan (Outline of Taiwan's trade, 1911) (Taipei: Taiwan Sōtokufu zaimukyoku, 1914), p. 258.
[10] Taiwan Sōtokufu gōbun ruisan (Documents of the Taiwan General-Government), vol. 46-5307-4-8, Finance section 4, Imports and exports), October Meiji 43, p. 21, September 10, Meiji 43: Head of Customs Sekurai Tetsutarō 1) Goods transported to Korea are to be managed as export goods; 2) Fishing boats travelling between Taiwan and Korea are to be dealt with as before; 3) according to article three of the Declaration of the Annexation of Korea, treaty countries may not carry out coastal trade between Korean and Japanese ports. On p. 24, September 13, Meiji 43 Acting Head of Customs Fuse Kentarō: items traded from this island to Korea fall under the rules for exports, and need to pay export duty, following number eighty-two of the regulations of Meiji 23.
[11] ‘Hontō oyobi Chōsen kankei (The relation between this island and Korea),’ Taiwan nichinichi shinpō, September 7, Meiji 43 (September 7, 1910)
[12] Taiwan Sōtokufu gōbun ruisan, vol. 49-1815-13- 8, Finance, part 4, Imports and exports, Meiji 44. p. 206, Korea.
[13] Taiwan Sōtokufu gōbun ruisan, vol. 53- 6559- 9-8, Finance, part 4, Imports and exports, no. 3826, Taishō 7, p. 39, Chōsen seisan buppin no inyūzei menjo ni kansuru ken (The document on the exempt of internal import taxes for imported goods from Korea), no. 1469.
[14] Taiwan sotokufu gobun ruisan, vol. 64 (volume 63062, document 11, section 8, Finance, part 1, Imports and exports, no. 5873), p. 268, November Taishō 9 'Taiwan yori Chōsen ni ishutsu suru buppin no ni kannai kokuzei suru ken', Government Order no. 311 (August 25, Taishō 9 according to Law 51, Taishō 9 stated that goods transported from Japan, Taiwan and Sakalin to Korea were not to be charged internal taxes).
[15] Taiwan sotokufu gobun ruisan, vol. 64 (volume 63062, document 11, section 8, Finance, part 1, Imports and exports, no. 5873), pp. 326, 333: according to government order no. 168 on preventing shipping between Taiwan, Japan, Sakhalin, and Korea, the previous law no. 312, of August in Meiji 43, treating shipping between Korea and Taiwan as foreign trade, was annulled on September 28, Taishō 9.
[16] Ariya Shōichi, Taiwan kaiunshi (History of Taiwanese maritime trade) (Gaoxiong: Kabushiki kaisha kaiun bōeki shinbun Taiwan shisha, 1942), p. 153.
[17] Taiwan Sōtokufu zaimukyoku, Taishō gannen itari go nen Taiwan bōeki gairan (Survey of Taiwanese trade, Taishō 1-5) (Taipei: Taiwan Sōtokufu zaimukyoku, zeimuka, 1918), p. 361.
[18] Man-houng Lin, “Qiaoxiang Ties versus Japanese Maritime Power: Trade between Taiwan and Manchuria, ca. 1932-1939,” in Leo Suryadinata ed., Chinese Diaspora, Since Admiral Zheng He, with Special Reference to Maritime Asia (Singapore: Chinese Heritage Center, May 2007).
[19] Taiwan's foreign exports and imports between 1906 and 1939 derived from Zhou Xianwen, Riju shiqi Taiwan zhi duiwai maoyi (Taiwan's foreign trade in the period of Japanese rule), Taiwan yinhang jikan (Quarterly of the Bank of Taiwan), vol. 9, no. 1 (Taipei: Taiwan yinhang jingji yanjiushi, 1957), p. 39, p. 50, adding the two for the total trade value. Value for trade with Japan, from the same source, pp. 39 and 50, subtracted to give a total for trade with countries other than Japan. For the total value of Taiwan's trade with northeast China see Lin Manhong, 'Taiwan yu dongbei jian de maoyi, 1932-1941' (Trade between Taiwan and northeast China, 1932-1941), Jindaishi yanjiusuo jikan (Bulletin of the Institute of Modern History, Academia Sinica), no. 24 (Taipei: Zhonyanyuan jinshisuo, June 1995), table 1.
[20] From figures in Shengjing shibao (Shenyang: Shengjing shibao yingyin zu, 1985-1988), in 141 volumes), December 5, Shōwa 8.
[21] From figures in Shengjing shibao, January 22, Shōwa 14.
[22] Zhou Xianwen, Taiwan jingji shi (Economic history of Taiwan) (Taipei: Kaiming shudian, 1980), p. 624.
[23] Figures calculated from Zhou Xianwen, Riju shidai Taiwan jingji shi (Economic history of Taiwan under Japanese rule) (Taipei: Taiwan yinhang jingji yanjiushi, 1958), pp. 137, 150, from Taiwan sheng zhujichu, Taiwan maoyi 53 nian biao (Taiwan trade statistics for the last 53 years).
[24] Taiwan keizai nenpō kankōkai (Taiwan’s annual economic report publishing committee) (ed.), Taiwan keizai nenpō (Taiwan’s annual economic report) (Tōkyō: Kokusi Nihon Kyōkai, 1941), p. 603.
[25] Ye Lizhong, 'Taiwan jingji zai Zhongguo' (The Taiwanese economy in China), Taiwan Yinhang jikan (Quarterly of the Bank of Taiwan), first issue, 1956, p. 131.
[26] Taiwan keizai nenpō kankōkai (ed.), Taiwan keizai nenpō, p. 605.
[27] Zi Gu, 'Taiwan Jingji yu Riben' (The Taiwanese economy and Japan), Taiwan Yinhang jikan (Quarterly of the Bank of Taiwan), first issue (Taipei: Taiwan yinhang jinrong yanjiu shi, 1947), pp. 137-150, 145.
[28] Dan An, 'Taiwan jingji yu nanyang' (The Taiwanese economy and Southeast Asia), Taiwan Yinhang jikan, No. 1 (Taipei: Taiwan yinhang jingji yanjiushi, 1947), p. 155.
[29] Gaimushō Tsūshōkyoku, A-moi-ko boeki solun (A glance at the trade of the Amoy port), Tsūshō isan (Tōkyō: Genshinsha, 1902), p. 347.
[30] See also: Man-houng Lin, “Economic Ties Between Taiwan and Mainland China, 1860-1895: Strengthening or Weakening?” in Hao Yan-p’ing and Wei Hsiu-mei ed., Tradition and Metamorphosis in Modern China, Symposium in Commemoration of Prof. Liu Kwang-Ching’s 75th birthday, pp. 1067-1089, Taipei: Institute of Modern History, Academia Sinica, 1998. Man-houng Lin and Chung-sheng Chu, comp., The Exhibition on the First Floor of the President Office: From Governor-General Office to Presidential Office: The Story of Governor-Generals. 2nd ed. Taipei: Academia Historica, 2010, p. 69.
[31] Taiwan nichinichi shinpō, April 1, Shōwa 6. Wu Wenxing, Riju shidai zai Tai Huaqiao yanjiu (Overseas Chinese on Taiwan under Japanese rule) (Taipei: Taiwan xuesheng shuju, 1991); see also discussion in Xu Xueji, 'Taiwan Zhonghua zonghuiguan chengliqian de Taiwan Huaqiao, 1895-1927' (Overseas Chinese on Taiwan before the establishment of the Chinese General Association, 1895-1927), Jindaishi yanjiusuo jikan (Bulletin for the research of modern history), no. 20, the Institute of Modern History, Academia Sinica, pp. 99-129.
[32] Taiwan Sotokufu, Taiwan jōjū kokō tōkei: Shōwa 18 (Taipei: Taiwan Sotokufu, 1944), pp. 2, 108
[33] Taiwan Sōtokufu Chōsaka, Taiwan Sōtokufu dai san jū kyū tōkei sho (Shōwa 10) (Taiwan Governor-General's Office statistics no. 39, Shōwa 10) (Taipei: Taiwan Sotokufu, 1935), p. 86-87
[34] Taiwan Sotokufu, Taiwan Sōtokufu dai yon jū roku tōkei sho (Shōwa 17) (Taiwan Governor-General's Office statistics no. 46, 1944) (Taipei: Taiwan Sotokufu, 1944), p. 60-67. See also discussion in Jin Jungwon, 'Zai zhimindi Taiwan shehui jiafengzhong de Chaoxian ren changjiye' (Standing in the Gap of Society: Korean Prostitutes in Colonial Taiwan), Taiwan shi yanjiu (Taiwan research bulletin), Zhongyang yanjiuyuan Taiwan shi yanjiusuo, vol. 17 no. 3 (September 2010), pp. 107-49.
[35] Taiwan nichinichi shinpō, June 2, Shōwa 9.
[36] After 1934, the Taiwan nichinichi shinpō mentions only the establishment of a Manchurian Consulate in Ōsaka on March 3, Shōwa 16.
[37] Taiwan Sōtokufu Sōtoku Kanbō Gaijika, Taiwan to minami Shina (Taiwan and south China), Minami Shina oyobi Nan'yō chōsa, no. 236, Taipei, 1937, p. 13.
[38] Lin Zhen, 'Kangzhan shiqi Fujian de Taiwan ji min wenti' (On Taiwanese people in Fujian during the Anti-Japanese War), Taiwan yanjiu jikan(Taiwan research bulletin), no. 2 of 44, Xiamen: Taiwan yanjiusuo, 1994, p. 71.
[39] Ogi Shusei, “Zaiko taiwan jin no kinkyō,” Taiwan jihō (Taiwan Times), Taipei: Taiwan jihō hakkōsho, May, 1938, p. 160.
[40] Shengjing shibao, 9th August Shōwa 13.
[41] Xu Xueji ed., Koushu lishi (Oral history), no. 5, Taipei: Zhongyang yanjiuyuan jindaishi yanjiusuo, 1994, p. 318.
[42] Suekichi Ihara, Seikatsujō yori mitaru Taiwan no jissai (Taiwan’s reality with the perspective of the livelihood), Taipei, 1925, p. 77-78.
[43] Yang Jiancheng, Erci dazhan Riben qitu liyong Riji Huaqiao shentou Nanyang qiaoshe miwen (The hidden story of Japan's efforts to use overseas Chinese with Japanese citizenship to infiltrate the overseas Chinese in Southeast Asia), Hongguan bao (Broad views times), January 28, 1994. Many thanks to Mr Yang for providing me with this article.
[44] Guo Fang, Zainichi Kakyō no aidentiti no hen'yō: Kakyō no tagenteki kyōsei (The changing identity of Chinese in Japan: their multidimensional acculturation) (Tōkyō: Tōshindō, 1999), p. 45, quoting Japanese government statistics.
[45] Lin Zhen, 'Kangzhan shiqi Fujian de Taiwan jimin wenti', p. 72.
[46] Man-houng Lin, 2019, “Culture, Market, and State Power: Taiwanese Investment in Southeast Asia, 1895-1945”, editor(s): Chi-cheung Choi, Takashi Oishi, Tomoko Shiroyama, Chinese and Indian Merchants in Modern Asia Networking Businesses and Formation of Regional Economy, pp. 258─281, Leiden: Brill..
[47] See e.g. Prasenjit Duara, Sovereignty and Authenticity: Manchukuo and the East Asian Modern (Lanham, Boulder, New York, Oxford: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 2003).
[48] Ozaki Hozuma at al, tr. Yang Yongliang, Gu Xianyong zhuan (Biography of Gu Xianyong) (Taipei: Taiwan ririxin bao, 1939; translated and reprinted Taipei Wu Sanlian jijinhui, 2007), pp. 235-277.
[49] Wang Yeh-chien, Qingdai jingjishi lunwenji: san (Collected essays on the economic history of Qing China, part three), Taipei: Daoxiang chubanshe, 2003, p. 195.
[50] Taiwan sheng wenxian weiyuanhui, Taiwan sheng tongzhi (Taiwan province gazetteer), vol. 4, Economy, Commerce, Taipei: Taiwan sheng wenxian weiyuanhui, 1971, p. 283b.
[51] Zheng Liling, Yang Lizhu, Taibei gongyesheng de huiyi (Recollections of Taipei engineering students, Taipei: National Taipei University of Technology, 2009, pp. 52, 123.
[52] Man-houng Lin, “Overseas Chinese Merchants and Multiple Nationality of: A Means for Reducing Commercial Risk,” Modern Asian Studies 35:4:985-1010, Cambridge University.
[53] Man-houng Lin, “The Power of Culture and Its Limits: Taiwanese Merchants’ Asian Commodity Flow, 1895–1945,” in Eric Tagliacozzo and Wen-Chin Chang eds., Chinese Circulations: Capital, Commodities and Networks in Southeast Asia, Durham, N. C.: Duke University Press, 2011, pp. 305-335.
[54] Taiwan Xinminbao she (eds.), Taiwan renming cidian (Dictionary of Taiwanese names), Taipei: Taiwan xinminbao she, 1937; reprinted Nihon Tosho Sentā, 1989, p. 82.
[55] Man-houng Lin, “Taiwan, Manchukuo, and the Sino-Japanese War,” Asian Social Science (Canadian Center of Science and Education,” vol. 7, no. 6, June 2011. This study shows that around four hundred people went to China to join the Revolutionary Alliance (Geming Tongmenghui), while many of the remaining twenty-to-thirty thousand Taiwanese citizens in China worked with the Japanese; I also argue that during the war, the destiny of the around five-to-six million Taiwanese were closely linked to those of Japan. See also: Man-houng Lin, “The Greater East Asia Co-prosperity Sphere’: A New Boundary for Taiwanese People and the Taiwanese Capital, 1940-1945,” Translocal Chinese: East Asian Perspective (Leiden: Brill Co.), no. 11 (Oct., 2016), pp. 175-206.
[56] Man-houng Lin, “The Survival of Economic Elites during Regime Transition: Government-Merchant Cooperation in Taiwan’s Trade with Japan, 1950-1961”, in Shigeru Akita and Nicholas J. White eds., International Order of Asia in the 1930s and 1950s: Contexts, Hypotheses and Scope, London and New York: Ashgate, 2010, pp. 275-301.
[57] Anne Booth and Kent Deng, ‘Japanese Colonialism in Comparative Perspective,’ The Journal of World History, 28/1 (2017), pp. 61-98.
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    Man-houng Lin. (2020). Taiwan’s Intra-Asian Trade and Migration in the 1930s. History Research, 8(1), 19-32. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.history.20200801.13

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  • @article{10.11648/j.history.20200801.13,
      author = {Man-houng Lin},
      title = {Taiwan’s Intra-Asian Trade and Migration in the 1930s},
      journal = {History Research},
      volume = {8},
      number = {1},
      pages = {19-32},
      doi = {10.11648/j.history.20200801.13},
      url = {https://doi.org/10.11648/j.history.20200801.13},
      eprint = {https://download.sciencepg.com/pdf/10.11648.j.history.20200801.13},
      abstract = {Since the start of the 21st Century, trading relations among the East Asian countries have been and need to be strongly reinforced. By reviewing intra-Asian economic relations in the 1930s, we could see assets and load left by history to the present world. In the 1930s, Taiwan was ruled by Japan. By contrast with Hori Kazuo, a professor of Kyoto University to have touched upon the intra-Asian trade of this decade focusing upon Japan, this study depicts the intra-Asian trade and migration of this decade by focusing upon Taiwan. This paper obtains the following findings: 1. In the 1930s, Taiwan’s trade with the Northeast Asia had been vividly increased. The increase rate of trade between Taiwan and Manchukuo as well as Korea was greater than that between Taiwan and the Japan proper. Migration between Taiwan and all Asian areas in this period was in general increased, in which that to China increased most. All these increases had been made possible by the rise of Asia-Pacific navigation relative to the Asia-European navigation. 2. In this expansion of intra-Asian trade and migration, the national boundary with all these various areas for Taiwan was clearly observed rather than imagined. For example, following the treaty between Japan and Korea signed in 1910, the relation between Taiwan and Korea turned more and more from being international into being domestic. When Taiwanese products, deemed as Japanese products, were rejected in the Southeast Asia and welcome in Manchukuo and other newly Japanese conquered Chinese mainland, Taiwanese vested interest was more and more intertwined with the Japanese empire which climaxed its war victory in China by conquering Wuchang and Hankou in 1938. By contrast with the mostly labor population among immigrants from other Asian areas to Taiwan, many of the emigrants from Taiwan to these areas were rich merchants.},
     year = {2020}
    }
    

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    PY  - 2020
    N1  - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.history.20200801.13
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    AB  - Since the start of the 21st Century, trading relations among the East Asian countries have been and need to be strongly reinforced. By reviewing intra-Asian economic relations in the 1930s, we could see assets and load left by history to the present world. In the 1930s, Taiwan was ruled by Japan. By contrast with Hori Kazuo, a professor of Kyoto University to have touched upon the intra-Asian trade of this decade focusing upon Japan, this study depicts the intra-Asian trade and migration of this decade by focusing upon Taiwan. This paper obtains the following findings: 1. In the 1930s, Taiwan’s trade with the Northeast Asia had been vividly increased. The increase rate of trade between Taiwan and Manchukuo as well as Korea was greater than that between Taiwan and the Japan proper. Migration between Taiwan and all Asian areas in this period was in general increased, in which that to China increased most. All these increases had been made possible by the rise of Asia-Pacific navigation relative to the Asia-European navigation. 2. In this expansion of intra-Asian trade and migration, the national boundary with all these various areas for Taiwan was clearly observed rather than imagined. For example, following the treaty between Japan and Korea signed in 1910, the relation between Taiwan and Korea turned more and more from being international into being domestic. When Taiwanese products, deemed as Japanese products, were rejected in the Southeast Asia and welcome in Manchukuo and other newly Japanese conquered Chinese mainland, Taiwanese vested interest was more and more intertwined with the Japanese empire which climaxed its war victory in China by conquering Wuchang and Hankou in 1938. By contrast with the mostly labor population among immigrants from other Asian areas to Taiwan, many of the emigrants from Taiwan to these areas were rich merchants.
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