Rokugan Local Governance:
Samurai Economics
When discussing Economics in Rokugan, particularly the Economics of the Family, we are give a few primary pieces of information:
However, in this world, as in any other, samurai must acquire goods and services for themselves and their households, even if it is not and should not be a major pursuit of players. The rice must be grown to pay the taxes that become the way the needs of the samurai are met, and goods and services must exchange hands for everyone except those with sufficient retainers to do the task for them.
Resources
Those interested in this topic might believe that the book A Merchant's Guide to Rokugan might provide a valuable resource. However, that is the Kolat sourcebook and has no useful information about samurai demographics and economics. However, others have developed some excellent resources you can dig into. I will only touch on these topics briefly.
Demographics of Rokugan
Rokugani Economics
Samurai Economics
Not all these articles agree, but there is much useful information there I will not try to duplicate. I will, however, pick out a few specific points.
Demographics
Samurai are supported primarily by their Daimyo, and the Daimyo is supported primarily through the taxes placed upon their heimen. It takes the labor of 14-18 heimin to produce enough rice to support one samurai. That means it would take a village of about 100 people to support a single samurai household, especially considering some village members will not be productive members of society. In addition, a samurai family may certainly have members that are not in a productive role for their Lord, such as children and the extremely elderly.
Given the numbers involved, in general a Daimyo, while he will see his bushi well-supplied, will not have the wealth to provide for a large family and large number of servants for each bushi samurai in his armies. A bushi would be supplied enough to bring home and support their household over the winter if they were diligent, but most of the rank and file will certainly want to supplement their income in any way they can.
I have a more in depth exploration of the size of Rokugan and its potential demographics HERE.
Taxes
The currency of taxes is rice. A village's rice crop is collected by the local samurai in charge of a village. Part goes to the samurai's household as their entitlement, while the rest is passed on as tax to the district governor or local daimyo. The local daimyo pays their household and retainers from that tax, and passes the rest as tax to the family daimyo, then the clan daimyo, and so on to the Emperor.
When villages do not grow rice, they can trade for it, or offer metals, jade, or other trade goods in a rate of exchange for rice determined by the Imperial bureaucracy. However, rice is the standard, which is a source of considerable political power for major rice-growing areas such as those held by the Crane clan.
While the heimin who grow the rice generally themselves live off of other crops, they can earn rice through trade or service to the local samurai household. Most hiemin families work in the paddies during planting and harvest, but spend the rest of the year in other tasks, such as growing crops for themselves, smithing, basket-weaving, pottery, sewing, doing chores for the samurai household, and so on to supplement their personal income.
Trade and Barter
Commerce is not considered an honorable skill, and no samurai, save perhaps the Yasuki would consider haggling at the market like a fishmonger. However, samurai still have to exchange their earnings from their lord, or their own creative endeavors, for goods for themselves and their households.
Here are some of the many ways that a samurai in Rokugan may do so.
This system of payment and barter relies on the honor of the samurai to pay an appropriate return to the value of the good or service offered. Samurai are called to be compassionate and honest, and they have a duty to their lands. However, greed is always a vice to which even samurai succumb. In Rokugan, when the lands are being properly managed, such vice will have consequences that encourage honesty among even the greediest samurai.
This last is an important point. Oppressive village magistrates and local lords do happen often. It is difficult for people to pick up and move away from a home they have always known for an uncertain future elsewhere. In particular in situations other than farming, such as in a mining town, it is easier to control and constrain the population and not allow them to escape. In times of war, the outside world is often so dangerous that heimin do not dare to leave, giving their local lords more freedom to abuse the peasantry. It is in situations where a lord makes things unbearable, and the people lack the ability to slip away, that peasant rebellions have been known to occur.
However, under normal circumstances, there is nothing requiring the heimin to remain in a specific village. To the daimyo, it does not matter if the income generated by that heimin came from one village or another. Much of Rokugan is wilderness, up to 70%. There is a lot of space around other villages to set up new fields. A bad sonchou or magistrate will find his heimin slip away, meaning they are unable to put in or harvest as much rice. The village's wealth will be reduced while villages with good magistrates who govern well will grow as heimin join. This is a powerful motivator to keep local magistrates honest.
When discussing Economics in Rokugan, particularly the Economics of the Family, we are give a few primary pieces of information:
- That all the needs of a samurai are provided by their Lord or Daimyo
- That the basic unit of currency is the Koku, which is the equivalent of one years supply of rice for a heimin
- That it is not honorable for a samurai to discuss commerce.
However, in this world, as in any other, samurai must acquire goods and services for themselves and their households, even if it is not and should not be a major pursuit of players. The rice must be grown to pay the taxes that become the way the needs of the samurai are met, and goods and services must exchange hands for everyone except those with sufficient retainers to do the task for them.
Resources
Those interested in this topic might believe that the book A Merchant's Guide to Rokugan might provide a valuable resource. However, that is the Kolat sourcebook and has no useful information about samurai demographics and economics. However, others have developed some excellent resources you can dig into. I will only touch on these topics briefly.
Demographics of Rokugan
Rokugani Economics
Samurai Economics
Not all these articles agree, but there is much useful information there I will not try to duplicate. I will, however, pick out a few specific points.
Demographics
Samurai are supported primarily by their Daimyo, and the Daimyo is supported primarily through the taxes placed upon their heimen. It takes the labor of 14-18 heimin to produce enough rice to support one samurai. That means it would take a village of about 100 people to support a single samurai household, especially considering some village members will not be productive members of society. In addition, a samurai family may certainly have members that are not in a productive role for their Lord, such as children and the extremely elderly.
Given the numbers involved, in general a Daimyo, while he will see his bushi well-supplied, will not have the wealth to provide for a large family and large number of servants for each bushi samurai in his armies. A bushi would be supplied enough to bring home and support their household over the winter if they were diligent, but most of the rank and file will certainly want to supplement their income in any way they can.
I have a more in depth exploration of the size of Rokugan and its potential demographics HERE.
Taxes
The currency of taxes is rice. A village's rice crop is collected by the local samurai in charge of a village. Part goes to the samurai's household as their entitlement, while the rest is passed on as tax to the district governor or local daimyo. The local daimyo pays their household and retainers from that tax, and passes the rest as tax to the family daimyo, then the clan daimyo, and so on to the Emperor.
When villages do not grow rice, they can trade for it, or offer metals, jade, or other trade goods in a rate of exchange for rice determined by the Imperial bureaucracy. However, rice is the standard, which is a source of considerable political power for major rice-growing areas such as those held by the Crane clan.
While the heimin who grow the rice generally themselves live off of other crops, they can earn rice through trade or service to the local samurai household. Most hiemin families work in the paddies during planting and harvest, but spend the rest of the year in other tasks, such as growing crops for themselves, smithing, basket-weaving, pottery, sewing, doing chores for the samurai household, and so on to supplement their personal income.
Trade and Barter
Commerce is not considered an honorable skill, and no samurai, save perhaps the Yasuki would consider haggling at the market like a fishmonger. However, samurai still have to exchange their earnings from their lord, or their own creative endeavors, for goods for themselves and their households.
Here are some of the many ways that a samurai in Rokugan may do so.
- Trust the task to an honorable heimin. There is no dishonor in passing a koku or two to a trusted heimin servant to go haggle for a good or service. The simple order of "Get this item for me" should suffice for any purchase.
- Order a heimin shopkeeper to give it to you. If a shopkeeper serves in the same clan lands as the samurai, asking a shopkeeper for a good is a legitimate way of acquiring an item. The shopkeeper would then note who the item was given to and that amount would be reflected back in a reduction of the taxes paid to the daimyo at the end of the harvest season, or for reimbursement from the daimyo's karo. However, there are consequences for greed and abuse in such a system, which will be described later. If the samurai demands an item in the lands of another clan, the shopkeeper will usually surrender the good anyway, but such an act would see a prompt request from the local magistrate to investigate and remove the offending samurai...or offer a worse consequence.
- Trade in goods. While commerce is looked down on, gifts, or tokens of appreciation, are clearly virtuous and expected. If I were to admire your fish, and you happened to admire my plums, then I am free to give you a gift of plums and you would of course give me a gift of fish. Barter in this fashion requires a delicate balance of understanding the needs and desires of another, but this is simple to do within the bounds of a small area with a limited number of avenues of exchange.
- Trade in services. Even samurai can volunteer for tasks if there is sufficient need, and a heimin would surely reward the samurai who did so with both reverence and gifts of appreciation. Whether chopping firewood (for the exercise), penning a message, defeating some bandits, investigating a minor mystery, carrying a warning against a rival, or offering a recommendation to a future customer, a shopkeeper can express a need that a samurai could fulfill. Should the samurai be willing to fulfill it, the shopkeeper would be happy to provide a worthy reward for their assistance from items out of their wares.
- Leave the change. This is used in areas where the shopkeepers are used to dealing in coin, such as larger cities. If you are speaking with a shopkeeper about an item, and say you want it, the shopkeeper (if accustomed to samurai ways), may insist on offering it to you as a gift. If you accept, the shopkeeper would expect that you would take the item, but happen to leave, someplace inconspicuous but nearby, the value of the item in coinage for the shopkeeper. As a sample transaction:
Innkeeper: Ah, samurai-sama! Please, welcome to my humble inn. Would you like a meal and sake tonight?
Samurai: That sounds good.
Innkeeper: These rough louts... (the innkeeper gestures at some other heimin), value my glorious cooking at 3 bu, but, please let me offer it to you, Samurai-sama, with my best wishes.
After the meal the samurai departs, leaving behind on the table at least 3 bu, and, if they value their honor as a samurai, more, to show how much more worthy they are than the heimin.
This system of payment and barter relies on the honor of the samurai to pay an appropriate return to the value of the good or service offered. Samurai are called to be compassionate and honest, and they have a duty to their lands. However, greed is always a vice to which even samurai succumb. In Rokugan, when the lands are being properly managed, such vice will have consequences that encourage honesty among even the greediest samurai.
- Samurai who order shopkeepers to give up too many of their goods without repayment, to the point where they put the daimyo or the shopkeeper's livelihood in jeopardy, may be challenged by the shopkeeper's local magistrate for their action when the shopkeeper seeks redress.
- Samurai who embezzle or otherwise claim too much of their daimyo's wealth without any individual shopkeeper being aware may be audited by the daimyo's karo and will be called to explain himself before the daimyo. Seppuku is a possible result.
- Samurai who do not leave enough payment for goods or services rendered may find themselves shut out of all the business of a district, with the shopkeepers refusing to 'be open' in order to sell goods to the cheapskate samurai.
- Samurai who overtax their heimin, leaving them without enough to eat or working them too hard, can cause the heimin to bring an appeal to that samurai's lord. If that does not work, they will find that the heimin population of their village can pick up and move away. It is extremely difficult to force any people to stay in an area of land where they are being oppressed, and in normal times, even the lowest castes can flee a truly unjust lord. The unjust lord will then have no one to put in the crops, and so lose the source of their wealth, as well as trying to explain to their clan champion's karo why his fields have stopped producing rice.
This last is an important point. Oppressive village magistrates and local lords do happen often. It is difficult for people to pick up and move away from a home they have always known for an uncertain future elsewhere. In particular in situations other than farming, such as in a mining town, it is easier to control and constrain the population and not allow them to escape. In times of war, the outside world is often so dangerous that heimin do not dare to leave, giving their local lords more freedom to abuse the peasantry. It is in situations where a lord makes things unbearable, and the people lack the ability to slip away, that peasant rebellions have been known to occur.
However, under normal circumstances, there is nothing requiring the heimin to remain in a specific village. To the daimyo, it does not matter if the income generated by that heimin came from one village or another. Much of Rokugan is wilderness, up to 70%. There is a lot of space around other villages to set up new fields. A bad sonchou or magistrate will find his heimin slip away, meaning they are unable to put in or harvest as much rice. The village's wealth will be reduced while villages with good magistrates who govern well will grow as heimin join. This is a powerful motivator to keep local magistrates honest.
