Shiga Public High School Entrance Examination - Social Studies cheat sheet

Japan's 47 prefectures group into 8 regions; the 5 main islands north to south are Hokkaido, Honshu, Shikoku, Kyushu, and Okinawa (the largest of the Ryukyu Islands).

Latitude controls climate: most of Japan lies in the mid-latitude westerlies zone, giving four distinct seasons; Hokkaido is subarctic (Dfa/Dfb), while Okinawa is subtropical (Cfa).

Winter: the Siberian high sends cold northwest monsoon winds; they pick up moisture over the Sea of Japan and drop heavy snow on the Japan Sea side, leaving the Pacific side dry and sunny.

Summer: the North Pacific high brings hot, humid southeast monsoon winds and the Baiu (rainy season) front in June–July; typhoons peak August–September.

Plate tectonics: Japan sits where the Pacific, Philippine Sea, North American, and Eurasian plates meet, producing subduction earthquakes, trenches, volcanoes, and tsunami risk.

Population: about 124 million, heavily concentrated on the Pacific Belt (Tokyo–Nagoya–Osaka–Fukuoka); declining birthrate and aging mean a shrinking workforce and rising dependency ratio.

Industry: the Pacific Belt concentrates heavy industry and ports; Keihin (Tokyo–Yokohama), Hanshin (Osaka–Kobe), and Chukyo (Nagoya) are the three major industrial zones.

Agriculture: small-scale, high-yield farming; rice is protected, and Japan imports much of its wheat, soybeans, and feed grain; Hokkaido leads in dairy and large-scale farming.

Map scale: a 1:25,000 topographic map shows 4 cm per 1 km on the ground; larger denominators mean smaller scale and less detail.

Jomon (c. 14,000 BCE–300 BCE): pottery-using hunter-gatherers; Yayoi (c. 300 BCE–250 CE): wet-rice agriculture, bronze and iron, and social stratification.

Kofun period (c. 250–538): keyhole-shaped burial mounds; Yamato state consolidates; Prince Shotoku's Seventeen-Article Constitution (604) and missions to Sui China.

Nara (710–794): capital at Heijo-kyo; the Ritsuryo legal code; Todai-ji and the Great Buddha; Kojiki and Nihon Shoki compiled.

Heian (794–1185): capital at Heian-kyo (Kyoto); Fujiwara regency; kokufu culture; Tale of Genji and Pillow Book; shoen estates weaken central power.

Kamakura (1185–1333): Minamoto no Yoritomo establishes the shogunate; samurai rule; the Mongol invasions (1274, 1281) are repelled with typhoon help ('kamikaze').

Muromachi (1336–1573): Ashikaga shogunate; Onin War (1467–77) begins the Sengoku era; European contact begins with the Portuguese in 1543.

Edo (1603–1868): Tokugawa shogunate at Edo; sakoku isolation policy; Genroku culture; Perry's arrival in 1853 leads to the 1868 Meiji Restoration.

Meiji (1868–1912): Charter Oath, abolition of domains (1871), conscription (1873), industrialization, and the 1889 Meiji Constitution; victories in the Sino-Japanese (1894–95) and Russo-Japanese (1904–05) wars.

Post-1945: 1947 Constitution with sovereignty of the people, fundamental human rights, and Article 9 renunciation of war; 1951 San Francisco Peace Treaty restores sovereignty in 1952.

Mesopotamia: Sumer city-states, cuneiform writing, the Code of Hammurabi (c. 1750 BCE); Egypt: Nile agriculture, hieroglyphs, pharaohs, and pyramids.

Classical Greece: Athenian democracy (Cleisthenes, Pericles); Persian Wars (490, 480 BCE); Peloponnesian War (431–404 BCE); Alexander the Great spreads Hellenism.

Rome: republic (509 BCE) to empire (27 BCE, Augustus); Pax Romana; fall of the Western Empire in 476 CE; Eastern (Byzantine) Empire lasts until 1453.

Religions: Judaism, Christianity (spread via the Roman Empire), Islam (founded 7th century; Five Pillars; Abbasid Golden Age), Buddhism, and Hinduism.

Middle Ages: feudalism and manors; the Crusades (1096–1291) expand trade; the Renaissance begins in Italian city-states; the printing press (Gutenberg, c. 1450).

Age of Exploration: Columbus (1492), Vasco da Gama to India (1498), Magellan's circumnavigation (1519–22); Columbian Exchange transforms diets and populations.

Revolutions: American (1776), French (1789), Industrial Revolution (Britain, late 18th century), and the Haitian Revolution; nationalism and imperialism follow.

20th century: WWI (1914–18), Russian Revolution (1917), Great Depression (1929), WWII (1939–45), the Cold War, decolonization, and the fall of the Berlin Wall (1989).

The 1947 Constitution rests on three principles: sovereignty of the people, fundamental human rights, and pacifism (Article 9).

Constitutional amendment requires a two-thirds majority in both Houses plus a majority in a national referendum (Article 96).

The Emperor is the symbol of the state; the Diet is the highest organ of state power and the sole law-making body (Article 41).

The Diet is bicameral: House of Representatives (465 members, 4-year term, can be dissolved) and House of Councillors (248 members, 6-year term, half elected every 3 years).

The Cabinet is responsible to the Diet; the Prime Minister is chosen by the Diet and appoints ministers, a majority of whom must be Diet members.

The Supreme Court is the final court and has the power of judicial review; lower courts include high, district, family, and summary courts.

Elections: universal suffrage for citizens aged 18 and over; the House of Representatives uses a mixed system of single-member districts and proportional representation.

Local autonomy: governors and mayors are directly elected; local assemblies are separate from the national Diet; residents have direct petition and recall rights.

Human rights include equality under the law, freedom of thought and conscience, and the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness (Article 13).

Scarcity forces choice; opportunity cost is the value of the next-best alternative forgone; the production possibility frontier shows trade-offs.

Demand slopes downward and supply slopes upward; equilibrium price clears the market; price ceilings cause shortages and price floors cause surpluses.

Market failure (public goods, externalities, monopoly) justifies government intervention such as regulation, taxation, and public provision.

GDP measures the market value of final goods and services produced domestically in a year; nominal GDP uses current prices, real GDP adjusts for inflation.

Inflation erodes purchasing power; central banks raise interest rates to cool inflation and lower them to stimulate spending.

Japan's economy: manufacturing and services; the Bank of Japan conducts monetary policy; fiscal policy is run by the government through spending and taxes.

International trade: comparative advantage drives specialization; tariffs and quotas restrict trade; the WTO and regional agreements (RCEP, CPTPP) liberalize it.

International organizations: UN (1945), IMF and World Bank (1944 Bretton Woods), WHO, and the OECD; Japan is a major contributor and UN member since 1956.

Exchange rates: a stronger yen makes exports costlier abroad and imports cheaper; a weaker yen does the reverse.

Read the map title, legend, scale, and orientation first; north is usually up but check the compass rose.

Contour lines connect points of equal elevation; closely spaced lines mean steep slopes; hachures or numbers indicate direction of slope.

Scale conversions: 1:50,000 means 1 cm on the map equals 500 m on the ground; 1:25,000 means 1 cm equals 250 m.

Graph types: line graphs show trends over time, bar graphs compare categories, pie charts show parts of a whole, and scatter plots show correlation.

When reading a graph, check the axes' units and the scale; a truncated y-axis can exaggerate change.

For statistics, compare per-capita or percentage figures rather than raw totals; note the base year and source.

Primary sources are contemporary documents or artifacts; secondary sources interpret them; evaluate authorship, date, purpose, and bias.

Historical chronology: use the era names and key dates to sequence events; BCE counts backward, so 500 BCE is earlier than 300 BCE.

Cross-check a claim against at least two independent sources before drawing a conclusion.