Pre-modern Japan
Until the Meiji Restoration, Japanese people were subject to both the local authority of the daimyō and the national authority of the Tokugawa shogunate, who pledged allegiance to the Emperor. A concrete example of the shogun acting directly on Japanese people as a nationality would be blanket recall of Japanese people from all other nations during the sakoku period, which resulted in the end of communities like Nihonmachi in Vietnam.
The idea of Japan as a nation was a topic for scholarly inquiry during much of the Edo period. For example, Sangoku Tsūran Zusetsu (三国通覧図説, An Illustrated Description of Three Countries?) by Hayashi Shihei (1738–93). This book, which was published in Japan in 1785, deals with Chosen (Korea) and the kingdom of Ryukyu (Okinawa) and Ezo (Hokkaido). The widely distributed Nihon Ōdai Ichiran by Hayashi Gahō (1618–1688) identifies and describes a number of Goryeo and Joseon missions to Japan as well as Japanese missions to Imperial China.
Scholarly formulations of Japanese nationhood—notably those of the kokugaku school and late Mito school—exerted considerable influence on both Japanese nationalism and the practice of Japanese nationality in the Meiji period.
Read more about this topic: History Of Japanese Nationality
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