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Columbia Studies in International and Global History
The Company and the Shogun: The Dutch Encounter with Tokugawa Japan
The Dutch East India Company was a hybrid organization combining the characteristics of both corporation and state that attempted to thrust itself aggressively into an Asian political order in which it possessed no obvious place and was transformed in the process.
This study focuses on the company's clashes with Tokugawa Japan over diplomacy, violence, and sovereignty. In each encounter the Dutch were forced to retreat, compelled to abandon their claims to sovereign powers, and to refashion themselves again and again―from subjects of a fictive king to loyal vassals of the shogun, from aggressive pirates to meek merchants, and from insistent defenders of colonial sovereignty to legal subjects of the Tokugawa state. Within the confines of these conflicts, the terms of the relationship between the company and the shogun first took shape and were subsequently set into what would become their permanent form.
The first book to treat the Dutch East India Company in Japan as something more than just a commercial organization, The Company and the Shogun presents new perspective on one of the most important, long-lasting relationships to develop between an Asian state and a European overseas enterprise.
This study focuses on the company's clashes with Tokugawa Japan over diplomacy, violence, and sovereignty. In each encounter the Dutch were forced to retreat, compelled to abandon their claims to sovereign powers, and to refashion themselves again and again―from subjects of a fictive king to loyal vassals of the shogun, from aggressive pirates to meek merchants, and from insistent defenders of colonial sovereignty to legal subjects of the Tokugawa state. Within the confines of these conflicts, the terms of the relationship between the company and the shogun first took shape and were subsequently set into what would become their permanent form.
The first book to treat the Dutch East India Company in Japan as something more than just a commercial organization, The Company and the Shogun presents new perspective on one of the most important, long-lasting relationships to develop between an Asian state and a European overseas enterprise.
352 pages, Paperback
First published December 1, 2013
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
September 21, 2020
如果用一句話來形容，本書的標題可以寫成《荷蘭東印度公司在德川日本的吃鱉史》。（當然，這個中譯本標題旁的小字「……台灣如何織入全球的網」一句只是宣傳用語，完全不合本書的內容……）
《公司與幕府（The Dutch Encounter with Tokugawa Japan）》是一部介紹十七世紀時代，荷蘭東印度公司在日本經營的歷史。整體說來，荷蘭人與德川政府打交道，只能說是「辛酸往肚裡吞」。除了一開始的「荷蘭國王／毛里茨親王」與「日本國王／德川家康」之間的互動尚稱順遂，接下來便發生了日本拒絕東印度公司所派遣的「外交使節」（認為巴達維雅總督的層級太低）、公司的長崎商館館長每年與地方大名一樣赴江戶進行「參勤交代」（像臣屬一樣在走廊上對著遠方房內的大將軍叩頭）、只要有人向奉行告狀則館長便必須接受調查是否進行海盜行為、最後甚至連大員長官都被「引渡」到日本接受幕府的監禁懲罰（濱田彌兵衛事件）。在稱霸了南洋諸島之後，荷蘭東印度公司往北發展則頻頻吃鱉，到了日本更是大氣都不敢吭一聲、成為德川政權底下一個忠心的臣屬。
我一直很有興趣以各種角度來檢視歷史，特別是盡可能地依照當時當地的人們思想來重新看待。本書提及日本人對於「外國」的想法，其實正是傳承自大中華的「華夷／朝貢」文化。因此當西方勢力進入東亞文明圈時，德川幕府也是將他們安放在這個「天下」的架構中的某個位置。歐洲自羅馬帝國毀滅之後，缺少了這種文明的中樞–邊疆的觀念，遍地土豪，以致於他們認定只要某個組織的武力夠強、法理邏輯（／詭辯）完整，便能夠將自身的利益放諸各地。但我們見到在近代早期（十九世紀前），除了東南亞之外，歐洲列強倒是處處碰壁，而必須與當地既有政權採取妥協與合作的方式。
不過本書作者似乎未提到，德川的「朱印狀」、「戡合貿易」，其實也是仿照明朝中國的態度來進行的。而關於荷蘭東印度公司可以決定對中國開戰（登陸澎湖蓋堡壘）、卻永遠不敢忤逆德川幕府，我覺得作者似乎未建立論述解釋其原因（或許要從貿易量或金額來評估嗎？），讓我有許多的疑問。至於大員，看來在巴達維雅的荷蘭總督心中，真的是可以割捨掉的一塊。
值得一讀的好書。
《公司與幕府（The Dutch Encounter with Tokugawa Japan）》是一部介紹十七世紀時代，荷蘭東印度公司在日本經營的歷史。整體說來，荷蘭人與德川政府打交道，只能說是「辛酸往肚裡吞」。除了一開始的「荷蘭國王／毛里茨親王」與「日本國王／德川家康」之間的互動尚稱順遂，接下來便發生了日本拒絕東印度公司所派遣的「外交使節」（認為巴達維雅總督的層級太低）、公司的長崎商館館長每年與地方大名一樣赴江戶進行「參勤交代」（像臣屬一樣在走廊上對著遠方房內的大將軍叩頭）、只要有人向奉行告狀則館長便必須接受調查是否進行海盜行為、最後甚至連大員長官都被「引渡」到日本接受幕府的監禁懲罰（濱田彌兵衛事件）。在稱霸了南洋諸島之後，荷蘭東印度公司往北發展則頻頻吃鱉，到了日本更是大氣都不敢吭一聲、成為德川政權底下一個忠心的臣屬。
我一直很有興趣以各種角度來檢視歷史，特別是盡可能地依照當時當地的人們思想來重新看待。本書提及日本人對於「外國」的想法，其實正是傳承自大中華的「華夷／朝貢」文化。因此當西方勢力進入東亞文明圈時，德川幕府也是將他們安放在這個「天下」的架構中的某個位置。歐洲自羅馬帝國毀滅之後，缺少了這種文明的中樞–邊疆的觀念，遍地土豪，以致於他們認定只要某個組織的武力夠強、法理邏輯（／詭辯）完整，便能夠將自身的利益放諸各地。但我們見到在近代早期（十九世紀前），除了東南亞之外，歐洲列強倒是處處碰壁，而必須與當地既有政權採取妥協與合作的方式。
不過本書作者似乎未提到，德川的「朱印狀」、「戡合貿易」，其實也是仿照明朝中國的態度來進行的。而關於荷蘭東印度公司可以決定對中國開戰（登陸澎湖蓋堡壘）、卻永遠不敢忤逆德川幕府，我覺得作者似乎未建立論述解釋其原因（或許要從貿易量或金額來評估嗎？），讓我有許多的疑問。至於大員，看來在巴達維雅的荷蘭總督心中，真的是可以割捨掉的一塊。
值得一讀的好書。
February 24, 2017
I must confess that I did not expect much when I saw the title, as a book invoking "shogun" would most likely treat Japan as too exotic and beyond (Western) comprehension. Yet I picked it up and shall never regret the decision.
In contrast to the symbiotic relationship often portrayed elsewhere, this book traced the turbulent beginning of the Dutch East Indies in Japan, in which prevailing European trade practices failed to assert itself over an Asia-centric diplomatic order. Each clash over issues of diplomacy, sovereignty, and violence further weakened the Dutch position, until they were no more than a vassal of the Tokugawa state, subject to such humilliation as sankin-kotai, attack on Christians, and handover of their national subject for punishment under Tokugawa law (gasp! Imagine that in the "Black Ship" era). Yet the Dutch experience in Japan was only indicative of a larger norm of "East-meet-West" in early modern Asia, until the "barbarians" succesfully reversed the situation two centuries later in Japan, China and India.
Without comparative analysis, the book might easily cater to the Nihonjinron audience, in which the Dutch's humble existence in Tokugawa Japan shall prove the uniqueness of Japanese political and diplomatic policies ("In Japan, you can never be too humble"). Too much comparative analysis, and the book might reduce the Dutch's painful encounter to some bane revisionist narrative. The author did indeed walk a fine line between expanding the intrincate theoretical model and describing an extraordinary story of "the company and the shogun".
Tl;dr: a good read. Do not be deterred by the title!
In contrast to the symbiotic relationship often portrayed elsewhere, this book traced the turbulent beginning of the Dutch East Indies in Japan, in which prevailing European trade practices failed to assert itself over an Asia-centric diplomatic order. Each clash over issues of diplomacy, sovereignty, and violence further weakened the Dutch position, until they were no more than a vassal of the Tokugawa state, subject to such humilliation as sankin-kotai, attack on Christians, and handover of their national subject for punishment under Tokugawa law (gasp! Imagine that in the "Black Ship" era). Yet the Dutch experience in Japan was only indicative of a larger norm of "East-meet-West" in early modern Asia, until the "barbarians" succesfully reversed the situation two centuries later in Japan, China and India.
Without comparative analysis, the book might easily cater to the Nihonjinron audience, in which the Dutch's humble existence in Tokugawa Japan shall prove the uniqueness of Japanese political and diplomatic policies ("In Japan, you can never be too humble"). Too much comparative analysis, and the book might reduce the Dutch's painful encounter to some bane revisionist narrative. The author did indeed walk a fine line between expanding the intrincate theoretical model and describing an extraordinary story of "the company and the shogun".
Tl;dr: a good read. Do not be deterred by the title!
December 15, 2020
這本《公司與幕府》，就是想要回答，在其他地方會燒殺擄掠的荷蘭東印度公司，為什麼遇到了日本的江戶幕府，會乖順得像隻貓咪（你要說忠犬也行），自願放棄國與國的平等外交地位，而選擇作為一個外國大名，為德川幕府效忠。甚至在德川幕府要求出兵時，主動前往鎮壓島原之亂，對同樣信仰基督宗教者開炮？
書中詳細說明了，一開始荷蘭東印度公司也想走外交路線，但因為德川幕府本身的情勢跟將軍態度也在改變，總之外交後來走不通，為了維護公司在亞洲的收入，東試西試，也只能試出自貶身分，當幕府乖順臣民的方法，解決了初期各種挫折，並獲得出島獨佔貿易權。
進一步也提到，在亞洲的海洋上，日本、海盜、對手葡萄牙的船隻，與荷蘭東印度公司的互動。並從這些故事中，以今日的主權觀念，認識當年毫無規範，只以政治經濟實力互動時，幕府的決策，是否高明。
最後的第六與第七章，詳細說明濱田彌兵衛事件的各種背景與意義，相當精彩。我個人最喜歡這兩章。
整體來說，缺點大概只有一個，就是作者的語氣還是稍微學術了點，如果你已經習慣這種寫作方式，那就沒問題了。
https://i-chentsai.innovarad.tw/2020/...
書中詳細說明了，一開始荷蘭東印度公司也想走外交路線，但因為德川幕府本身的情勢跟將軍態度也在改變，總之外交後來走不通，為了維護公司在亞洲的收入，東試西試，也只能試出自貶身分，當幕府乖順臣民的方法，解決了初期各種挫折，並獲得出島獨佔貿易權。
進一步也提到，在亞洲的海洋上，日本、海盜、對手葡萄牙的船隻，與荷蘭東印度公司的互動。並從這些故事中，以今日的主權觀念，認識當年毫無規範，只以政治經濟實力互動時，幕府的決策，是否高明。
最後的第六與第七章，詳細說明濱田彌兵衛事件的各種背景與意義，相當精彩。我個人最喜歡這兩章。
整體來說，缺點大概只有一個，就是作者的語氣還是稍微學術了點，如果你已經習慣這種寫作方式，那就沒問題了。
https://i-chentsai.innovarad.tw/2020/...
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October 21, 2020We could treat this book as an extension for the conventional history of Dutch colonisation, but it would lessen its standpoint in expanding the political hybridity and agonism of economies. A bit repetitive but great historiography.
November 15, 2020
I'm fascinated by the moral of the story. One put on a facade out of pragmatism, and this facade limits their actions because they want to maintain it. Finally, it is no longer important if it's a facade.
December 18, 2020
Fairly informative, but can be condensed a lot. Also reinforces the erasure of Indigenous Formosans as political actors and tacitly treated their territory as terra nullius.
September 30, 2022
Fascinating, but exceedingly scholarly; unfit for public digestion.
December 23, 2022
A very enjoyable short read.
Academic enough to be taken seriously, but so well written it can be enjoyed with your morning coffee on a lazy Saturday.
Academic enough to be taken seriously, but so well written it can be enjoyed with your morning coffee on a lazy Saturday.
March 21, 2022
It is often thought that the Europeans in the 17th c. were so superior with their naval power that by using violence they could set the whole world to their hand and impose their will around the globe. This may have been true of, for example, South America in the century before that, but the European experience in Asia was dramatically different. In Asia the Europeans found old and well-established cultures (India, S.E. Asia, China, Japan) which had their own legal systems and ways of doing things.
This book focuses on the story of the Dutch East Asia Company (VOC, a hybrid organization combining the characteristics of both corporation and state) and its relationship with the Tokugawa shogunate. Over time, there were various clashes over diplomacy, sovereignty and violence - the Dutch attempts to use violence in waters ruled by Japan were systematically blocked. The author focuses on a handful of flashpoints where both came into conflict. In each such encounter, the Dutch had to retreat, abandon their claims and remake themselves - from aggressive pirates to meek merchants, and from defenders of colonial sovereignty to loyal subjects of the shogun. The Dutch were entirely encapsulated into the Japanese legal system and ended up as formal subordinates of the Tokugawa state. They had to assume an inferior position in the feudal hierarchy of Japan and were forced to behave according to Japanese laws and rules (the most normal thing of the world, we would say today, but in the colonial discourse this was seen differently).
There is however one black page in Dutch history in Japan where the VOC is somewhat exculpated by Clulow's revisionist (and undoubtedly correct) vision: the 1637 Shimabara Rebellion, when the protestant Dutch sent a ship to use its firepower to batter the walls of a sea-side castle where 40,000 Christian (catholic) rebels were desperately defending themselves from government troops (the castle fell after the Dutch had left, but all 40,000 rebels were exterminated to the last soul). This is often presented as an act of base mercantile duplicity (the Dutch just wanted to trade, no matter at what cost), but in Clulow's new perspective this now rather appears as the fulfillment of their oath as subordinates of the shogun (as a sort of "Dutch samurai"). In other words: in the Japanese system of which they had been forced to become part, they simply could not refuse.
A fascinating book, thanks to its new and extremely interesting perspective on the unexpected (and decidedly non-heroical) form European expansion did take.
This book focuses on the story of the Dutch East Asia Company (VOC, a hybrid organization combining the characteristics of both corporation and state) and its relationship with the Tokugawa shogunate. Over time, there were various clashes over diplomacy, sovereignty and violence - the Dutch attempts to use violence in waters ruled by Japan were systematically blocked. The author focuses on a handful of flashpoints where both came into conflict. In each such encounter, the Dutch had to retreat, abandon their claims and remake themselves - from aggressive pirates to meek merchants, and from defenders of colonial sovereignty to loyal subjects of the shogun. The Dutch were entirely encapsulated into the Japanese legal system and ended up as formal subordinates of the Tokugawa state. They had to assume an inferior position in the feudal hierarchy of Japan and were forced to behave according to Japanese laws and rules (the most normal thing of the world, we would say today, but in the colonial discourse this was seen differently).
There is however one black page in Dutch history in Japan where the VOC is somewhat exculpated by Clulow's revisionist (and undoubtedly correct) vision: the 1637 Shimabara Rebellion, when the protestant Dutch sent a ship to use its firepower to batter the walls of a sea-side castle where 40,000 Christian (catholic) rebels were desperately defending themselves from government troops (the castle fell after the Dutch had left, but all 40,000 rebels were exterminated to the last soul). This is often presented as an act of base mercantile duplicity (the Dutch just wanted to trade, no matter at what cost), but in Clulow's new perspective this now rather appears as the fulfillment of their oath as subordinates of the shogun (as a sort of "Dutch samurai"). In other words: in the Japanese system of which they had been forced to become part, they simply could not refuse.
A fascinating book, thanks to its new and extremely interesting perspective on the unexpected (and decidedly non-heroical) form European expansion did take.
June 15, 2017
https://101booksjapan.blogspot.ca/
After reading The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet this historic look at the interaction of the Dutch and Tokugawa Japan seemed like a smart follow up. Boy was I right.
No simple history of the contact between the Dutch East India Company and the supposedly closed Tokugawa shotguns, this book offers up a very different narrative of the colonial era.
Though that may be the wrong term since The Company and The Shogun shows how the Dutch only managed to hang on in 17th and 18th century Japan because they were willing to position themselves as vassals of the Japanese State. Shatters the myth of just how Europe interacted with Asia in this era.
It also shatters the myth about how closed Japan was to the world - though the years covered are pre Dejima. Plenty of nations were conducting trade with Japan.
An interesting read.
After reading The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet this historic look at the interaction of the Dutch and Tokugawa Japan seemed like a smart follow up. Boy was I right.
No simple history of the contact between the Dutch East India Company and the supposedly closed Tokugawa shotguns, this book offers up a very different narrative of the colonial era.
Though that may be the wrong term since The Company and The Shogun shows how the Dutch only managed to hang on in 17th and 18th century Japan because they were willing to position themselves as vassals of the Japanese State. Shatters the myth of just how Europe interacted with Asia in this era.
It also shatters the myth about how closed Japan was to the world - though the years covered are pre Dejima. Plenty of nations were conducting trade with Japan.
An interesting read.
January 21, 2022
The book is a well-researched look at the rather pitiful diplomatic/legal position the Dutch India Company found itself in in 17th century Japan. A number of incidents are analyzed from both Japanese and Dutch sources. For me, the book was an efficient springboard to the study of various interesting characters, and it tied together several strands of East Asian history very nicely.
The book concentrates on legal proceedings and power exchange as opposed to cultural exchange. The author spends some (perhaps too much) space explaining that the rise of European power in the Far East was much slower and more tortuous than the prevailing wisdom has it. Which is true, but he could let his research speak for itself instead.
The book concentrates on legal proceedings and power exchange as opposed to cultural exchange. The author spends some (perhaps too much) space explaining that the rise of European power in the Far East was much slower and more tortuous than the prevailing wisdom has it. Which is true, but he could let his research speak for itself instead.
September 14, 2015
Good:
* Impressive research.
Bad:
* Very repetitive and unnecessarily verbose.
* Some of the information on Japan are either inaccurate or imprecise. For example: it's written in the book that the Sengoku era ended in 1568, which is definitely not right. The book also mentions that the Japanese unifiers began clamping down on the pirates in 1580s, but that doesn't seem right considering that Oda Nobunaga, the first unifier, has no access to the western islands.
* Impressive research.
Bad:
* Very repetitive and unnecessarily verbose.
* Some of the information on Japan are either inaccurate or imprecise. For example: it's written in the book that the Sengoku era ended in 1568, which is definitely not right. The book also mentions that the Japanese unifiers began clamping down on the pirates in 1580s, but that doesn't seem right considering that Oda Nobunaga, the first unifier, has no access to the western islands.
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November 21, 2014382.09492 C6493 2014
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews