1926 Japanese 'Shokuminchi' Map of South America (showing 'colonization')

A most curious Showa 1, or 1926, map of South America illustrating Japanese pre-war colonization. The map documents a little-known period of Japanese expansionism when the empire was attempting to use population and economic power to mirror European colonization. The map covers all of South America. Japanese immigration numbers are highlighted in red. Most impressive are the 192,823 immigrants in Brazil (São Paulo alone, illustrated via inset, had 190,896), and the 21,550 in Peru. At sea, lines illustrate shipping routes operated by the Nippon Yusen Line (red), and the Osaka Shosen Kaisha Line (blue). Critical resources are highlighted in red.

Shokuminchi - Japanese Colonization of South America

In the late 19th and early 20th century, Imperial Japan raced to catch up with European powers - and not just in terms of economy and technology. At the time, colonial holdings were in vogue, the mark of a powerful, sophisticated nation, and Japan intended to be a world power. Japanese authorities devised a scheme to leverage their enormous population and growing wealth to economically 'colonize' various parts of the world. The program was called Shokuminchi (植民地), which can be translated as 'Protectorate' but more literally 'implementation of people into new lands.' The officially sanctioned program created semi-private corporations to purchase vast swaths of land throughout South America - but most specifically in Peru and Brazil. Japanese citizens were then 'encouraged' to 'emigrate' to the new lands as quasi-colonists. The 'colonists' did not necessarily relocate of their own free will and were largely the poor, religious undesirables (Christians), second and third-born sons, and agricultural workers from southern provinces. (Most Japanese diaspora in Latin America today can trace their heritage to Okinawa.) Through Shokuminchi, Japan planned to expand its physical footprint as well as address resource concerns. Shokuminchi ultimately failed. As Japan moved increasingly onto war footing, resources became too strained to support far-flung diaspora and 'colonization' shifted into more traditional 'immigration.' To this day, Latin American Japanese communities are the largest such outside of Japan. At the time, increased Japanese influence in Latin America drew the attention of the FBI, who reproduced this very map for a confidential report in 1935. This fear came to a head during World War II (1939 - 1945) when thousands of Peruvian-Japanese were forcibly extracted and interned in camps in the United States.

Publication History and Census

The present map is dated to 1926. We are aware of a second edition issued in 1935 by Tokyo Kanda Bunmeisha (東京神田文明社). It appears this map was further reproduced by the FBI in 1935. Today, this map is very rare. We note no other examples of this dated edition. Later editions dating to 1935 appear in the National Diet Library and at the Library of Congress.