After the national humiliation and subsequent economic turmoil caused by opening Japan to more foreign trade, the Bakufu desperately tried to regain a position of national authority. This culminated in the Ansei Purge initiated by the chief elder Ii Naosuke. However, the shogunate’s tough actions would bring significant unexpected consequences.
Throughout the 1840s, various groups sought to find solutions to repeated violations of sakoku and questioned the ability of the shogunate to practically defend the country if there was an actual invasion. Many came to very different conclusions.
The Sakoku isolation policies were meant to keep the Japanese government insulated from dangerous foreign influence. However, its tendency toward restriction and xenophobia could not be easily balanced with the Bakufu’s desire to continue governing the nation.
The forced isolation of the Edo Period was part of a larger strategy by the Bakufu to ensure the removal of any possible rivals. However, Japan greatly benefited from foreign import and foreign learning, in spite of the shogunate’s insistence that the nation needed no such outside interference.
The reign of Tokugawa Iemitsu proved to be a stabilizing force in Japanese politics, as he defined the duties of the various office-holders throughout the Bakufu which helped make the Edo Shogunate the longest-lasting samurai government in Japanese history.
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