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Nutritional Policies and International Diplomacy

The impact of Tadasu Saiki and the Imperial State Institute of Nutrition (Tokyo, 1916-1945)

by Josep Lluis Barona Vilar (Author)
©2021 Monographs 240 Pages

Summary

This book offers a general approach to the importance of nutrition and public health policies in the process of modernisation of Japan during the interwar years. It describes the origins of scientific and technical modernisation during the Edo, Meiji, and Taisho periods, including the demographic and epidemiologic background, and the birth of a public health administration parallel to the strengthening and expansion of the Japanese empire. Special attention is given to the cultural significance of rice for the Japanese population, and its close relation to disease and nutritional deficiencies, especially beriberi.
The second part of the book is devoted to the prominent figure of Tadasu Saiki (1876-1959), founding father of Japanese nutritional science, and his initiative in creating the Imperial State Institute for Nutrition (ISIN) in Tokyo. The new institution boosted national policies and a wide international diplomacy generating great expectations in Japan and abroad. The international impact of Japanese nutritional research and dietary policies is also analysed. The book ends with an analysis of the negative consequences of the Second World War, a critical breakdown in health and nutrition among the Japanese population.

Table Of Contents

  • Cover
  • Title
  • Copyright
  • About the author
  • About the book
  • This eBook can be cited
  • Contents
  • Acknowledgements
  • 1 Nutritional policies and international diplomacy: soft power in favour of Japanese prestige
  • The roots of scientific and technical modernisation in Japan
  • The shaping of a Colonial Empire
  • 2 Demographic and epidemiologic background. The birth of a public health administration
  • The demographic and epidemiologic evolution
  • The appropriation of Western medicine
  • The birth of a public health administration
  • The Asian regional context: Japan and the Eastern Epidemiological Bureau
  • 3 Rice in Japanese culture
  • 4 Rice, diet, and the problem of beriberi
  • 5 Tadasu Saiki (1876–1959), founding father of Japanese nutritional science
  • 6 The Imperial State Institute of Nutrition (1920) in interwar years
  • The international context
  • Antecedents and foundation of the Tokyo Institute
  • 7 The international impact of Japanese nutritional policies
  • 8 The consequences of the Second World War
  • Conclusions
  • Sources and bibliography
  • Appendix. The nutrition song, by Tadasu Saiki

←4 | 5→

Josep L. Barona

Nutritional Policies and
International Diplomacy

The impact of Tadasu Saiki and the Imperial
State Institute of Nutrition (Tokyo, 1916-1945)

European Food Issues

Vol. 16

←5 | 6→

Bibliographic Information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek

The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data is available in the internet at http://dnb.d-nb.de.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

A CIP catalog record for this book has been applied for at the Library of Congress.

Cover Illustration: Portrait of Tadasu Saiki (1876–1959) Courtesy of the National Institute of Health and Nutrition (NIHN, Tokyo).

This book is a part of the research project Health Disaster and International Cooperation in Time of Crisis. Europe 1918-1945 (MINECO-HAR2017-82366-C2-1, 2018-2021) funded by the Spanish Government.

ISSN 2033-7892 • ISBN 978-2-8076-1153-5 (Print)

E-ISBN 978-2-8076-1154-2 (EPDF) • E-ISBN 978-2-8076-1155-9 (EPUB)

E-ISBN 978-2-8076-1156-6 (MOBI) • DOI 10.3726/b17854

D/2020/5678/82

This publication has been peer reviewed.

© P.I.E. Peter Lang S.A.

International Academic Publishers

Brussels, 2021

All rights reserved.

All parts of this publication are protected by copyright. Any utilisation outside the strict limits of the copyright law, without the permission of the publisher, is forbidden and liable to prosecution. This applies in particular to reproductions, translations, microfilming, and storage and processing in electronic retrieval systems.

www.peterlang.com

EUROPEAN FOOD ISSUES

Josep L. Barona is professor of history of science at the University of Valencia. His research deals with international diplomacy, public health and nutritional policies in the global context focused from a transnational perspective.

This book offers a general approach to the importance of nutrition and public health policies in the process of modernisation of Japan during the interwar years. It describes the origins of scientific and technical modernisation during the Edo, Meiji, and Taisho periods, including the demographic and epidemiologic background, and the birth of a public health administration parallel to the strengthening and expansion of the Japanese empire. Special attention is given to the cultural significance of rice for the Japanese population, and its close relation to disease and nutritional deficiencies, especially beriberi.

The second part of the book is devoted to the prominent figure of Tadasu Saiki (1876-1959), founding father of Japanese nutritional science, and his initiative in creating the Imperial State Institute for Nutrition (ISIN) in Tokyo. The new institution boosted national policies and a wide international diplomacy generating great expectations in Japan and abroad. The international impact of Japanese nutritional research and dietary policies is also analysed. The book ends with an analysis of the negative consequences of the Second World War, a critical breakdown in health and nutrition among the Japanese population.

This edition of the eBook can be cited. To enable this we have marked the start and end of a page. In cases where a word straddles a page break, the marker is placed inside the word at exactly the same position as in the physical book. This means that occasionally a word might be bifurcated by this marker.

←6 | 7→

Contents

Acknowledgements

1 Nutritional policies and international diplomacy: soft power in favour of Japanese prestige

The roots of scientific and technical modernisation in Japan

The shaping of a Colonial Empire

2 Demographic and epidemiologic background. The birth of a public health administration

The demographic and epidemiologic evolution

The appropriation of Western medicine

The birth of a public health administration

The Asian regional context: Japan and the Eastern Epidemiological Bureau

3 Rice in Japanese culture

4 Rice, diet, and the problem of beriberi

5 Tadasu Saiki (1876–1959), founding father of Japanese nutritional science

6 The Imperial State Institute of Nutrition (1920) in interwar years

The international context

Antecedents and foundation of the Tokyo Institute

7 The international impact of Japanese nutritional policies

←7 | 8→

8 The consequences of the Second World War

Conclusions

Sources and bibliography

Appendix. The nutrition song, by Tadasu Saiki

←8 | 9→

Acknowledgements

This book is a result of research mainly conducted at the League of Nations Archives and Library (Palais des Nations, Geneva, Switzerland), the Rockefeller Archive Center (Sleepy Hollow, New York, USA), the National Institute of Health and Nutrition (NIHN, Tokyo), the National Diet Library of Japan (Tokyo), and the IROAST (International Research Organization for Advanced Science and Technology, University of Kumamoto, Japan). It is the result of a research line of more than a decade on the history of nutrition in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, focused mainly from a transnational perspective. The author is grateful to all the people who facilitated the access to the holdings, suggested new sources and bibliography, and often allowed a better comprehension of the Japanese sources, context and tradition. I am particularly grateful to Jacques Oberson, archivist of the League of Nations Archives (Geneva), whose advice and suggestions were always generous and helpful. Some aspects of this book were discussed at the 2018 Amsterdam Symposium on the History of Food. I am grateful to the comments of Peter Scholliers, Vrije Universiteit Brussels, chair and discussant, a prominent specialist in food studies. The research project was presented and discussed in two research seminars held at the National Institute of Health and Nutrition (NIHN, Tokyo) in November 2018 and 2019. I would like to mercy Dr. Nobuo Nishi, Chief of the International Center for Nutrition and Information of the NIHN, and Dr. Keiichi Abe, director of the NIHN, for their support and help with the Japanese historical sources in the archives of the Institute. They always encouraged this research project and gave their generous help. Of particular value has been Miwa Yamaguchi, researcher at the NIHN, Tokyo, helping me in the search for sources and in the translation of some Japanese texts.

Hirotaka Ihara sensei, member of the International Research Organization for Advanced Science and Technology (University of Kumamoto, Japan) has been always supportive in my research and teaching activities in Japan. I want to express my sincere thanks to him and to Makoto Takafuji, for their friendly support as visiting professor ←9 | 10→during the period 2016–2021 in Kumamoto University. Thanks as well to Jean Pierre Williot, Antonella Campanini and Peter Scholliers for their editorial comments and for giving me the opportunity and privilege to publish this book in the prestigious European Food History Series of Peter Lang Publishing Group.

This book is a part of the research project Health Disaster and International Cooperation in Time of Crisis. Europe 19181945 (MINECO-HAR2017-82366-C2-1, 2018–2021) funded by the Spanish Government.

Details

Pages
240
Year
2021
ISBN (PDF)
9782807611542
ISBN (ePUB)
9782807611559
ISBN (MOBI)
9782807611566
ISBN (Softcover)
9782807611535
DOI
10.3726/b17854
Language
English
Publication date
2021 (March)
Published
Bruxelles, Berlin, Bern, New York, Oxford, Warszawa, Wien, 2021. 240 pp., 14 fig. b/w, 4 tables.

Biographical notes

Josep Lluis Barona Vilar (Author)

Josep L. Barona is professor of history of science at the University of Valencia. His research deals with international diplomacy, public health and nutritional policies in the global context focused from a transnational perspective.

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242 pages