Sites of Japan’s Meiji Industrial Revolution: Iron and Steel, Shipbuilding and Coal Mining

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Sites of Japan’s Meiji Industrial Revolution: A Testimony to Successful Western Technology Transfer

The Sites of Japan’s Meiji Industrial Revolution: Iron and Steel, Shipbuilding, and Coal Mining, inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2015, stand as a significant testament to Japan’s rapid industrialization during the latter half of the 19th century and the early 20th century. Comprising twenty-three component parts primarily situated in the southwestern region of Japan, these sites offer a unique insight into the process by which Japan sought technological advancements from Europe and America, adapting them to meet its own cultural and societal needs.

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UNESCO Description of the World Heritage Site

The site encompasses a series of twenty three component parts, mainly located in the southwest of Japan. It bears testimony to the rapid industrialization of the country from the middle of the 19^th century to the early 20^th century, through the development of the iron and steel industry, shipbuilding and coal mining. The site illustrates the process by which feudal Japan sought technology transfer from Europe and America from the middle of the 19^th century and how this technology was adapted to the country’s needs and social traditions. The site testifies to what is considered to be the first successful transfer of Western industrialization to a non-Western nation.

UNESCO Justification of the World Heritage Site

Criterion (ii): The Sites of Japan’s Meiji Industrial Revolution illustrate the process by which feudal Japan sought technology transfer from Western Europe and America from the middle of the 19th century and how this technology was adopted and progressively adapted to satisfy specific domestic needs and social traditions, thus enabling Japan to become a world-ranking industrial nation by the early 20th century. The sites collectively represents an exceptional interchange of industrial ideas, know-how and equipment, that resulted, within a short space of time, in an unprecedented emergence of autonomous industrial development in the field of heavy industry which had profound impact on East Asia.

Criterion (iv): The technological ensemble of key industrial sites of iron and steel, shipbuilding and coal mining is testimony to Japan’s unique achievement in world history as the first non-Western country to successfully industrialize. Viewed as an Asian cultural response to Western industrial values, the ensemble is an outstanding technological ensemble of industrial sites that reflected the rapid and distinctive industrialisation of Japan based on local innovation and adaptation of Western technology.

Encyclopedia Record: Sites of Japan's Meiji Industrial Revolution: Iron and Steel, Shipbuilding and Coal Mining

Sites of Japan's Meiji Industrial Revolution: Iron and Steel, Shipbuilding and Coal Mining are a group of historic sites that played an important part in the industrialization of Japan in the Bakumatsu and Meiji periods (1850s–1910), and are part of the industrial heritage of Japan. In 2009 the monuments were submitted jointly for inscription on the UNESCO World Heritage List under criteria ii, iii, and iv. The sites were accepted at the 39th UNESCO World Heritage session, under the condition to take measures "that allow an understanding that there were a large number of Koreans and others who were brought against their will and forced to work under harsh conditions ...", and again, such measures have yet to be implemented.

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