This book focuses on urbanization as an attendant consequence of industrialization and sheds light on urban problems such as housing shortages and poverty of jobless people, and the housing and social policies implemented by central and local governments to deal with these problems. Through this book, the volume editor and authors convey the view that urbanization transformed economy and society spatially and in quality, and caused the change of central and local administration in the process of tackling various urban problems. The book features recent academic works on economic history of the city and housing, researched from an advanced perspective of comparative history in Japan. The aim of this book is to make works by Japanese scholars accessible to a wider readership throughout the world.

This edited volume includes four articles (chapters) and four book reviews originally published in Japanese and subsequently translated into English. The first chapter analyzes the characteristics of the urbanization that occurred under the land readjustment projects implemented from the Sino-Japanese War to the reforms following World War II, by focusing on the conflict between landowners and peasants in Japan. The second chapter examines the construction of urban housing following Japan's defeat in World War II, focusing on the reconstruction of war-damaged housing from the perspective of the creation and distribution of private residential space under Japan's postwar regulatory regime. The third chapter examines the adoption of communal unemployment insurance systems in Wilhelmine Germany, focusing on the Genter system, in which the municipalities paid subsidies to the trade unions that provided their out-of-work members with unemployment benefits. The last chapter investigates the accumulation of the mechanical engineering industry in Paris region during the period 19391958, focusing on the role of the subcontracting system.

Introduces recent academic works by Japanese scholars on the comparative economic history of the city and urbanization Presents recent academic works by Japanese scholars in the comparative economic history of housing problems and housing policy Translates recent academic works by Japanese scholars into English and makes them accessible to a wider readership

Inhalt
Part I Economic and Social History of Cities and Housing in Japan and Europe .- 1 Landowners and tenant farmers in the process of urban formation: a case study of Amagasaki city, Hyogo prefecture, 1937-1952(Numajiri Akinobu).- 2 Housing Reconstruction in War-Damaged CitiesThe Creation and Distribution of Living Spaces in the Late 1940s under Postwar Governmental Controls (Hiroshi Ono).- 3 Communal Unemployment Insurance in Wilhelminian Germany: A Case Study of the Greater Berlin Administration Unio(Takahito Mori).- 4 The Short-Lived Revival of the Mechanical Engineering Industry in the Paris Region 19391958 (Toshikatsu Nakajima).- Part II Book Reviews .- 5Review of Shichi Takashima, Toshi Kink no Kchi Seiri to Chiiki Shakai (Urban Development and Local Communities in Interwar Tokyo) (Akinobu Numajiri).- 6 Review of Tadashi Nakano, Tatsuyuki Karasawa, and Ichir Michishige (eds), 18 Seiki no Igirisu Toshikkan o Saguru: Toshi Runesansuron Saik (Exploring Urban Space in Eighteenth-Century England: A Reappraisal of the Urban Renaissance Debate)(Minoru Yasumoto).- 7 Review of Yoshiyuki Morishita, Kindai Cheko Jtaku Shakaishi (Czech housing policy and social history in the first half of the 20th century -- Building the first Czechoslovak Republic) (Nodoka Nagayama).- 8 Review of Nodoka Nagayama, Doitsu Jytaku Mondai no Shakai Keizaishi teki Kenky (Study on the Socio-economic History of Housing Problems in Germany) (Satoshi Baba).- Index.