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Henry George on Two Continents: A Comparative Study in the Diffusion of Ideas

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 June 2009

Harold Schiffrin  and
Pow-Key Sohn
Harold Schiffrin
Affiliation:
Hebrew University, Jerusalem
Pow-Key Sohn
Affiliation:
Seoul National University, Korea
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Extract

The impact of Henry George's land value taxation theory was nothing less than global in scope, and his epochal Progress and Poverty – first published in 1879 – gained wider fame than any other political or socio-economic treatise emanating from an American pen. While George's doctrine was essentially a product of of his experience in California during the land-grabbing 60's and 70's, the most pervasive influence of the San Francisco sage was not manifested at home, but in Europe, Australasia and other distant places.

It is with some aspects of this remarkable diffusion of Georgeism during the latter part of the 19th century that this study is concerned. In particular, we would like to examine the circumstances under which this ideological stimulus was transmitted and received in such divergent settings as England, China and Japan. First we will trace the history of the Georgeist influence in each of these countries and then compare their respective patterns of development.

Type
Articles
Information
Comparative Studies in Society and History , Volume 2 , Issue 1 , October 1959 , pp. 85 - 109
Copyright
Copyright © Society for the Comparative Study of Society and History 1959

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References

1 From a letter to Hamlin Garland in 1904. Excerpts quoted from Barker, Charles A., Henry George (New York, 1955), pp. 375–76.Google Scholar

2 Barker, op. cit., p. 412.

3 “The idea of a natural right to the land and of a common interest in it is the instinctive possession of every nation. But in England the feeling seems more general than elsewhere, because, possibly, of the number of large proprietors and of the serious abuses to which the system has given rise.” Gide, Charles and Rist, Charles, A History of Economic Doctrines (London, 1932), p. 559.Google Scholar

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37 Motora, an American-trained psychologist, received a Ph.D. at Johns Hopkins and became acquainted with Georgeism during his stay in the United States.

38 Kyokuzan, Ishikawa and Shuzui, Kotoku (editors), “Shakai mondai Zatsusan”, Meiji Bunka Zenshu (Tokyo, 1929) p. 475.Google Scholar See also Hatano, op. cit., p. 488.

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49 Ibid., I, No. 3, p. 59.

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51 Nishikawa was a socialist who collaborated with the famous radical leader Katayama Sen in publishing Rodo Sekai.

52 Miller, Joseph D., Single Tax Year Book (New York, 1917), p. 193.Google Scholar

53 Kata Tetsuji calls attention to the analogous role of Georgeism as a transitional development in Britain and Japan; op. cit., p. 194.

54 Scalapino points out that “the legacy of military ethics, the obstacles to legal reform, the lack of understanding of democratic theory, and the absence of conditions that would allow liberal theory to be translated immediately into practice – all combined to encourage the use of force”, op. cit., pp. 316–317.

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56 Ibid.

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59 See Schiffrin, Harold, “Sun Yat-sen's Early Land Policy”, The Journal of Asian Studies, XVI, No. 4 (08, 1957)Google Scholar, for a fuller discussion of the Georgeist influence upon Sun.

60 See Hatano, op. cit.

61 Schiffrin, op. cit., pp. 558, 560.

62 Ibid., p. 554.

63 Ibid.

64 In 1907 a T'ung Meng Hui faction opposing the “Equalization of land rights” slogan formed a new organization, the Kung-chin Hui, which cooperated with Sun in all other respects. Landowning supporters of the revolution in the Yangtze valley apparently led this faction. See Tzu-yu, Feng, Ko-ming i-shih, rev. ed., I (Shanghai, 1947), pp. 248–252.Google Scholar

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70 Free China Weekly (Chinese News Service, New York, 02 7, 1956).Google Scholar

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