 The very rapid modernization (Westernization) of the country was resulting in massive changes to Japanese culture, language, dress and society, and appeared to many samurai to be a betrayal of the "jōi" (“Expel the Barbarian”) portion of the "Sonnō jōi" justification used to overthrow the former Tokugawa shogunate.Hizen Province, with a large "samurai" population, was a center of unrest against the new government.Older "samurai" formed political groups rejecting both overseas expansionism and westernization, and calling for a return to the old feudal order.