Osaka — Overview, History, Culture and Significance

Osaka is located in the west of the main Japanese island of Honshū at the mouth of the Yodo River, on Osaka Bay. The urban area of Osaka represents just under 12% of the area of the prefecture.

City breakdown

• On February 13, 1989, Ku Kita (27101-2) and Ōyodo (27112-8, 大淀区) were united to form the new Kita-ku.
• On the same day, the East (27105-5, 東区 Higashi-ku) and South (27110-1, 南区 Minami-ku) districts also merged to form the new Central (Chūō-ku) district.

Population development of the city

The city of Osaka was originally called Naniwa. The city was the capital of Japan as Naniwa no miyako or Naniwa-kyō (難波京, Eng. "Imperial Residence City of Naniwa") from 645 to 655 under the Kōtoku-tennō and lastly in 744 under Shōmu-tennō. However, Naniwa was probably also the seat of earlier Tennō, e.g. the Nihonshoki mentions that the Ōjin-tennō (r. 270-310) moved into the Ōsumi Palace (大隅宮, Ōsumi no miya) in Naniwa.

There have been important land and sea links between Yamato (now Nara Prefecture), Korea and China since earliest times. The former Settsu Province now forms the northern part of Osaka Prefecture with part of what is now Hyōgo Prefecture.

The Jōdo-Shinshū Buddhist religious community established its headquarters in Ishiyama (now part of Osaka) in 1496 in the heavily fortified temple of Ishiyama Hongan-ji. Oda Nobunaga began a siege of the temple in 1576 that lasted four years. The monks surrendered in 1580, the temple was completely destroyed and Toyotomi Hideyoshi built his own castle, Ōsaka Castle, on the site.

Osaka was called Ōzaka (大坂) from the Middle Ages until pre-modern times. At the beginning of the Meiji period, the city was renamed by the government to its present name Osaka. Nowadays, Osaka is the third largest Japanese city after Tokyo and Yokohama, and the most important in terms of goods economy, as the main markets for the exchange of goods are located there.

Since the Meiji Restoration, the Osaka City Prefecture (-fu) has existed as the successor to the Shōgunat administration for the city (Ōsaka-machi-bugyō), initially consisting only of the city of Osaka, but soon expanded to include areas in Settsu Province, and later Izumi, Kawachi, and Yamato provinces. The precursors of the modern city of Osaka, the four city counties/districts (-ku) of Higashi (east), Nishi (west), Kita (north), and Minami (south) were carved out of the counties (-gun) of Higashinari and Nishinari in 1878/79. When the municipal codes were modernized in 1888/89, they became the modern Ōsaka-shi, which, however, like Tokyo and Kyōto, remained without an independent municipal government until 1898 after the exemption from the municipal code (shisei tokurei) enacted at the same time, and as an immediati city was governed directly by the prefectural governor. By 1955, Higashinari and Nishinari counties had been fully incorporated into the city of Osaka, along with parts of other counties, in several stages, including a major expansion in 1925. In the 1920s, the population thus exceeded that of the city of Tokyo, and Osaka was for a time the largest city in Japan until, again in 1932, Tokyo more than doubled its population through extensive incorporations ("Greater Tokyo"). From 1922, the city of Osaka was one of the six major cities with slightly more self-government or reduced powers of intervention by the Imperial Ministry of the Interior/prefectural governor. During the occupation period, self-government was reformed as in all municipalities and prefectures, and a municipal police force (Ōsaka-shi Keishi-chō) also existed until 1954. As a "special city" (tokubetsu-shi), Ōsaka-shi was supposed to become a prefecture-independent major city, but this was never implemented; instead, it became one of the first five major cities by ordinance (seirei shitei toshi) with expanded self-government in 1956. Since a reorganization in 1989, the current 24 municipal districts exist.

During World War II, the city was bombed several times with napalm bombs by the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) between March 1945 and August 1945. The attacks destroyed about 35% of the city area and caused 12,620 deaths and 23,037 injuries. The raids burned 40 km2 of the city and left 1,134,552 people homeless (see Air Raids on Osaka).

In 2019, the G20 summit was held in Osaka. The topics discussed included the economy within the group of states.