Count Gotō Shinpei (後藤 新平, 24 July 1857 – 13 April 1929) was a Japanese politician, physician and cabinet minister of the Taishō and early Shōwa period Empire of Japan.

He served as the head of civilian affairs of Japanese Taiwan, the first director of the South Manchuria Railway, the seventh mayor of Tokyo City, the first Chief Scout of Japan, the first Director-General of NHK, the third principal of Takushoku University, and in a number of cabinet posts.

Gotō was one of the most important politicians and administrators in Japanese national government during a time of modernization and reform in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

This gave Gotō the opportunity to visit Tokyo in 1871 under the auspices of Kaetsu Ujifusa, who had succeeded Yasuba Yasukazu as senior counselor of Isawa.

[6] While at the ministry, in 1890 he published his Principles of National Health (国家衛生原理) and took part in the creation of new sewage and water facilities in Tokyo.

After the war, Gotō returned to the Home Ministry, but remained involved in overseas affairs, advising the new Japanese administration on Taiwan about health issues.

[7] At the end of the war, Qing China ceded Formosa and the Pescadores (see modern-day Taiwan) to Japan via the Treaty of Shimonoseki.

[8][9] Gotō ordered a land survey and recruited Scottish engineer William Kinninmond Burton to develop an infrastructure for drinking water and sewage disposal.

As a doctor by training, Gotō believed that Taiwan must be ruled by "biological principles" (生物学の原則), i.e. that he must first understand the habits of the Taiwanese population, as well as the reasons for their existence, before creating corresponding policies.

Gotō also established the economic framework for the colony by government monopolization of sugar, salt, tobacco and camphor and also for the development of ports and railways.

The colony was economically self-supporting and by 1905 no longer required the support of the home government despite the numerous large-scale infrastructure projects being undertaken.

The Hoko system eventually became the primary method by which the Japanese authorities went about all sorts of tasks from tax collecting, to opium smoking abatement, to keeping tabs on the population.

[17] His papers are preserved at the Gotō Shinpei Memorial Museum, which is situated in his birthplace, Mizusawa City, in Iwate Prefecture.