Japan is divided into 47 administrative regions. Many regions are called “ken,” as in Saitama-ken, Chiba-ken and Kanagawa-ken, but Tokyo is called Tokyo-to, and Kyoto and Osaka are Kyouto-fu and Osaka-fu. Hokkaido is the only one that is simply Hokkaido. At present all local governments are treated equally. The reason they’re differently named has a historical background. The modernization of Japan was brought about by the Meiji Restoration, which began around 1886. Before that political power lay with the military samurai class with the shogun at the center. Before the samurai era, all of the land in Japan was regarded as the property of the Emperor and the people were children to whose care he entrusted it. Originally, the Shogun’s job was to guard the Emperor, however, as the samurai class gradually gained power, in the 12th century he seized the political reigns. In the 19th century, Japan was threatened with colonization by the West. This lead to big political reforms, overruling the Shogunate’s diplomatic policies, to restore the authority of the Emperor. This was the Meiji Restoration. The new centralized government decided to place administrative offices in different regions, so that their policies could be implemented smoothly. However, there were about 300 domains, or han, in Japan at the time. Each han was bound together by strong ties to a lord and, like a small nation, had its own system of government. If power was taken away forcibly from the han, this was expected to spark rebellions in many areas, leading to the outbreak of civil war. Backed into a corner, the government focused on the fact that most of the han had huge debts. The government came up with a plan to take on their debts, offering the lords salaried positions as governors, or granting them special status. However, the new government had no money for this whatsoever. Aware that a catastrophe was approaching, in 1871, the government took the risk of issuing an imperial order to abolish the han system. Surprisingly, all the han lords accepted this order. The authority of the Emperor was absolute. Bureaucrat SHIBUSAWA Eiichi was responsible for paying the government’s debt and solved this issue by issuing public bonds. Thus, the regime change was carried out without bloodshed. The government renamed han as ken, while Osaka, Kyoto and Tokyo inherited the “fu” designation that had been given to important areas under the direct control of the Edo shogunate. Tokyo become “Tokyo-to” in 1947, combining Tokyo-fu prefecture and Tokyo city. Because it was mainly populated by the Ainu people, Hokkaido used to be called “Ezochi,” but was renamed in 1869.