In early medieval Japan, the political constitution displays increasingly complex features: both old and new elites gather around two centers of power, the imperial court and the shogunate. At the same time, multi-layered rights over property and income develop. The proliferation of conflicts between and within these fluid figurations eventuate new forms of legal and military regulation by the ruling authorities, who are thus compelled to commit to a cycle of continual adaption. In addition to the conflict-mediating ...
Read More
In early medieval Japan, the political constitution displays increasingly complex features: both old and new elites gather around two centers of power, the imperial court and the shogunate. At the same time, multi-layered rights over property and income develop. The proliferation of conflicts between and within these fluid figurations eventuate new forms of legal and military regulation by the ruling authorities, who are thus compelled to commit to a cycle of continual adaption. In addition to the conflict-mediating functions of authority, agricultural policies on multiple levels emerge that have to take into account not only the damages incurred in the wake of military escalations, but also the fixed demands of an agriculture rooted in wet rice cultivation.
Read Less