Ohkawa and Rosovsky allege that the jump in Meiji land productivity was the result of exploitation of a large technological backlog which the Bakuhan system created in the advanced region of Tokugawa Japan, such as kinki, by blocking technological diffusion. This allegation is without factual substance—land productivity was probably the highest in the kinki region (prefectures of Kyoto, Osaka, Nara, Wakayama, Mie, Hyogo, and Shiga), but this region was the last place where farming technology could have been bottled up. The han governments could not set up effective artificial barriers there because their landholdings were so fragmented and so intermingled with others in kinki and also because technology-diffusion forces such as traffic, population density, and commercialization were so great. Therefore, it is the specialization of land and labor in order to produce certain crops for the market that was largely responsible for the high land productivity in kinki. Likewise, it is highly likely that the alleged rise in Meiji land productivity can be attributed chiefly to accelerated commercialization and specialization, brought about by the coming of railroads, the commutation of taxes, the great inflation (1877–1881), and general changes in demand. Autonomous and competitive han, driven by the necessity of meeting their increasing expenditures, expanded interregional trade and diffused, rather than obstructed, technology thus overcoming artificial and natural barriers.

The August Revolution of 1945 constituted the most important turning-point in recent Vietnamese history.It formally marked the end of French colonialism in Vietnam and the beginning of Vietnamese national independence. It also marked the end of the Confucianist-oriented monarchy and the beginning of a Communist-oriented democratic republic. Much debate has been focused on why the Communist-dominated Viet Minh Front succeeded in seizing political power in August 1945. Anti-Communist detractors have generally attributed the Viet Minh success to an historical accident, i.e., the Viet Minh happened to be on the scene as the Japanese surrendered to the Allies. The Vietnamese Communists themselves have narcisistically attributed their success to skillful leadership in organization and propaganda. Actually the August Revolution must be explained by both the “objective material conditions” of the Vietnamese society of the time and the “subjective” predisposition of the Viet Minh. In March 1945, the Japanese occupation forces had destroyed the French colonial regime in a lightning coup d'etat. The general political confusion following the coup aggravated a severe famine which then ravaged Vietnam. Of several Vietnamese political groups, the Viet Minh emerged as the only one capable of organizing the Vietnamese people through their existing “liberation Committees.” In August 1945, following the Japanese surrender, the Viet Minh quickly seized political power and has retained it since. Thus both historical fortuity and revolutionary leadership accounted for the Viet Minh success.

As historians of Southeast Asia turn to the study of rural history, they will have to resort increasingly to theoretical aids as an answer to the paucity of written records. Such theory, drawn from the other social sciences, must be shaped and tested to fit the needs of the historical discipline. For example, the work of Ester Boserup and Clifford Geertz on the relationship among population density, land usage, and socioeconomic behavior has applicability to problems of the evolution of Southeast Asian rural society under colonial impact. A comparison of Geertz' study of agricultural involution in nineteenth century Java with my own work on Pampanga Province, Philippines, provides some first steps towards a theory of rural change. Specifically, a modern cash crop economy produces more sophisticated contractual relations between tenants and landowners regardless of changes in population density per agricultural hectare. And, in the face of a scarcity of resources (e.g., land, cash, machinery, etc.) needed for modern agriculture, a given society will evolve highly complex institutions in order to share as far as possible those commodities in short supply. Specific types of institutions may develop to meet given needs, and the greater the number of shortages, the more involuted the society will become.

A unique feature of traditional Chinese law was the provision by statute that an offender who voluntarily surrendered and confessed before discovery and who made full restitution was entitled to remsision of punishment. Offenders who physically harmed their victims or offended against die state itself by commiting treason or escaping across borders were not entitled to remission, but could receive a reduction of punishment. Under the Republic this provision, known as tzu-shou, was continued in name but materially changed in substance under the influence of Western law as introduced through Japan. In general, the rewards for voluntary surrender and confession were reduced to mere reduction of punishment, but the scope was broadened to include crimes such as homicide, for which restitution was impossible. When the Chinese Communists first began developing a legal system in the 1930's, they too adopted tzu-shou. However, under them it became primarily an instrument of political control and social and ideological reform. It has remained an important aspect of Communist law even to the present though its application has ceased to have any strict legal significance.

In 1910, a group or army officers led by Tanaka Giichi founded die Imperial Military Reserve Association in order to integrate Japanese society around military values. The founders, mostly proteges of Yamagata Aritomo, die chief Meiji period spokesman for unity to increase national wealdi and power, established die organization in 1910 because the already existing unity was under attack. Labor organizations and the influx of morally degenerate and subversive Western ideas caused Tanaka to fear army-civilian alienation and national divisiveness. Thus, to achieve integration, the reserve association disseminated the “soldier's ethos,” military ideals, such as obedience, frugality, bravery, cooperation, social stratification, anti-individualism, and diligence, all unified by a belief in a divine emperor, established branches in every community, 14,000 in all, and carried out activities which reinforced both the values and local social structure. The three million volunteer members, half of whom had no military experience, achieved their leaders' goals by performing public services and patriotic activities. They demonstrated to local residents die ethos in action and benefitted the community as well. By the 1930's, bodi die organization and die members had become the backbone of rural Japan.

As happened in Tokugawa Japan and British India, China under die Ching witnessed a relative decline in fiscal importance of die land tax although its absolute amount increased substantially. Between 1753 and 1908 China's annual land tax revenue grew from 74 million to 102 million taels but its percentage contribution in die total tax revenue decreased from 73.5 to 35 percent. The reasons for its relatively lessened importance in die Ch'ing tax structure are the creation of new taxes such as die maritime customs and die likin, die lack of income- and price-elasticity in die land tax system, the defects of die fiscal administration, and a strong tradition against land tax increase. Since the same period saw a rise in general prices by 150 percent, obviously die Manchu government had not even raised enough taxes from land to offset price inflations, leaving a 40 percent increase in land acreage and a moderate improvement in land yields totally untouched. Hence, die land tax burden was not, as some asserted, oppressive in die last decades of the Ching dynasty.

A Tragic accident took the life of Richard Hugh Robinson on August 6, 1970, thereby depriving the world of one of its finest scholars of Buddhism and Indo-Asian studies. Richard's degree was in Classical Chinese, but as the years passed he became master of every canonical language of Buddhism believing as he did that a good scholar of Buddhism must know all its languages. Even beyond his linguistic abilities his scholarship was broad and deep, encompassing the most diverse subjects, and amazing to everyone. As he talked with us in conferences, meetings, classes and discussions of every kind he drew on this scholarship with telling skill, and we all remember Richard's remarkable presence among us. Now since his life was cut short at the inopportune age of forty-four all of us have experienced feelings of regret at the passing of such a scholar.