In the name of the Kyōhō Reforms, "Kyōhō" refers to the nengō after Shōtoku and before Genbun. In other words, the Kyōhō Reforms occurred during Kyōhō, a period from July 1716 through April 1736 within the larger Edo period. The reforms overlapped somewhat into the next era, which was proclaimed in the year Kyōhō 21 on the 21st day of the 4th month to mark the enthronement of Emperor Sakuramachi.
Purpose of the reforms
The reforms were aimed at making the Tokugawa shogunate financially solvent, and to some degree, to improve its political and social security. Because of the tensions between Confucian ideology and the economic reality of Tokugawa Japan, Yoshimune found it necessary to shelve certain Confucian principles that were hampering his reform process. The Kyōhō Reforms included an emphasis on frugality, as well as the formation of merchant guilds that allowed greater control and taxation. The ban on Western books was lifted to encourage the import of Western knowledge and technology. The alternate attendance rules were relaxed. This policy was a burden on daimyōs, due to the cost of maintaining two households and moving people and goods between them, while maintaining a show of status and defending their lands when they were absent. The Kyōhō Reforms relieved this burden somewhat in an effort to gain support for the shogunate from the daimyōs.
Chronology
The shogunate's interventions were only partly successful. Intervening factors like famine, floods and other disasters exacerbated some of the conditions which the shōgun intended to ameliorate.
1730 : The Tokugawa shogunate officially recognizes the Dojima Rice Market in Osaka; and bakufu supervisors are appointed to monitor the market and to collect taxes. The transactions relating to rice exchanges developed into securities exchanges, used primarily for transactions in public securities. The development of improved agriculture production caused the price of rice to fall in mid-Kyōhō.
August 3, 1730 : A fire broke out in Muromachi and 3,790 houses were burnt. Over 30,000 looms in Nishi-jin were destroyed. The bakufu distributed rice.
1732 : The Kyōhō famine was the consequence after swarms of locusts devastated crops in agricultural communities around the inland sea.
