経営管理と中井家帳合法 (近世と商業経営)
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概要
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The Nakai Family's book-keeping method was developed independently in Japan during the eighteenth century, without any influence from Western business administration techniques. The TANAOROSHI-MOKUROKU was the financial statement, and was composed of two segments of calculation which can be identified with the balance-sheet and income-statement of Western types of financial statements. The main components of Western double-entry book-keeping technique are the accounts in bilateral forms of plus and minus, accounts system with the balance-sheet group and incom-statement group, double entry into the left side of one account and right side of the other, trial balance checking by the principle of self-balancing, and as the integrated scheme of these basic techniques, the most important structure of closing books and double profit measurements on the balance-sheet and income-statement. Because the bilateral form of account was not developed in Japan, the Nakai Family's book-keeping method resulted in somewhat awkward. The principle and the structure of profit measurements were the same as in the West. Here, however, many books were used for component accounts. Transactions were entered doubly into two separate books. The totals of these books were transferred to corresponding accounts in the DAIFUKU-CHO, which was the main book and served as the general ledger known in Western book-keeping. By arranging and classifying these accounts into two groups of profit measurements, the above-mentioned financial statement (TANAOROSHI-CHO) was prepared. The first part of this was equivalent to a balancesheet, and the second part, to an income- statement. It is certain that Japanese merchants of the Tokugawa Era already had a concept of capitalism, because they had this complete accounting system and a principle for the measurement of profit and capital. The Modernization of Japan may truly be said to have begun in the middle of the Tokugawa Era, between 1700 and 1800. The reason for the development of such an elaborate system of book-keeping in the Nakai Family can be found in the fact that its business was decentralized. Control of the activities of its branches made this compiling of accounting data necessary. The financial reports of the branches consisted not only of the data of its own business activities, but of a consolidated account of the branches and the home office. The branches were divided into several groups, each with its own "group headquarters", and with the home office dominant at the top of the pyramid. The financial reports of all the branches were consolidated with each other, from bottom to top. A concept peculiar to the Nakai Family was the MOSHO-KIN. This is very similar to the idea of net worth or capital stock in Western accounting; it was also a complementary, inter-locking account. Some interest was charged and accumulated on the networth of the branch, annually; this functioned as a means of segregating the margin of intracompany transactions between the related branches. The interest on branch capital was set up as a goal to be reached by the branch-office manager, and it was taken as a means of judging his performance and efficiency. When profits exceeded the assessed interest, a part of the surplus was given to the branch manager, even though he was not an investor, but only an employee: it was a sort of "executive-incentive" plan. These branch managers were held responsible for the standard, estimated profit (i, e., the assessed interest), When a net loss was shown, they were not allowed to offset this loss by profits accumulated in the past, but were required to recover it by strenuous future efforts. The necessity of controlling the activities of the branches was the motivation behind the development of the Nakai Family's book-keeping system. From the books remaining now, we can learn much about business management proper to Japan in the Tokugawa Era.
- 社会経済史学会の論文
- 1966-03-31