Choice of Technologies in the Ship-Building Industry: Modern versus Traditional

Abstract

The aim of this article is to analyse empirically the development process of the ship-building industry in Japan from the viewpoint of technology choice. As is well known, from the start of its modernization in the mid to late nineteenth century Japan experienced a rapid importation of a broad range of modern technologies from developed Western countries. In the ship-building industry, both the Tokugawa Bakufu (the feudal government) and some powerful feudal clans tried to introduce Western technologies with the intent of modernizing the industry, which had consisted of small indigenous ships (wasen) throughout the pre-modern era. After the establishment of a new government (the Meiji government) in 1868, there appeared several big new private ship-building companies in addition to the government-owned companies, all of which were equipped with modern technology. However, in spite of the gradual growth in the modern ship-building industry (modern sector) during the Meiji Era (1868–1911), the indigenous ship-building industry (traditional sector) was able to survive for a long time. Thus a history of coexisting development between modern and traditional sectors continued for more than half a century in Japan. This history is called the dualistic development of the ship-building industry.KeywordsCapital StockTraditional SectorModern SectorShip ProductionSailing ShipThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.