Born to a farming-samurai family in Yuda, Nagato (Yamaguchi). Real name Yukichi, later Monta. He studied at Shoka Sonjuku and joined late-bakumatsu loyalist activism.
With Ito Hirobumi and others he secretly sailed to Britain. In London he saw Western industry and arms and shifted from expulsionism to opening and modernization. One of the Choshu Five.
He hurried home from study and handled peace talks after the allied fleet attacked Shimonoseki. Settling Choshu's crisis by diplomacy became the root of his later foreign-policy career.
After the Restoration he served the new government in finance and diplomacy. As a Choshu clique member he worked with Ito Hirobumi on building a modern state.
He joined Iwakura Tomomi's embassy to Europe and America, again studying Western institutions firsthand, and brought diplomatic experience into later reform debates.
As head of foreign affairs he led unequal-treaty revision talks, aiming to end extraterritoriality, but negotiations with the Western powers proved hard.
At the Rokumeikan, symbol of Westernization, he used balls and social diplomacy to win support for treaty revision, while critics at home called Westernization excessive.
After the Normanton Incident raised public demand for revision, Inoue's plan met nationalist and progressive opposition and he resigned as foreign minister. Revision was left to successors.
He later served as agriculture-commerce and finance minister and kept influence as a genro. Close to business, he took part in fostering modern Japanese industry.
He died in Tokyo at seventy-nine. Inoue Park marks his birthplace site in Yuda. He is remembered as a Meiji statesman of treaty revision and Westernizing diplomacy.
Iwakura TomomiItō HirobumiKomatsu Tatewaki (Kiyokado)Inoue MasaruTani Tateki
Maejima HisokaMatsukata MasayoshiEnomoto TakeakiGodai TomoatsuItagaki TaisukeTani TatekiSanjō SanetomiŌkuma Shigenobu
People of the Meiji period ・ People by period
Based on facts found in textbooks and biographies. Uncertain points are marked as such.