Can Cool Japan save Post‐Disaster Japan? On the Possibilities and Impossibilities of a Cool Japanology

This article considers Cool Japan in light of catastrophe, first theoretically through a phenomenological analysis of Cool Japan and Cool Japanology, suggesting that the study of Cool Japan itself is way of uncooling the object of inquiry, itself a reaction to the apocalyptic realities of everyday life since the dawn of the modern world. The article finishes with a sociological reflection on current events through a détourner of the sekai kei genre in Summer Wars' inclusion of two sociological types in its rendition of catastrophe. This article then is intended as a preliminary step to understanding the specificity and commonalities of Japanese cool power through an understanding of the phenomenon of cool and the contents to which cool often refers.     

Visit to Japan

BETWEEN November 8 to 17, 1995, the Chinese women's delegation, led by Ms. Kang Ling, member of the Secretariat of the All-China Women's Federation (ACWF), visited Gunma Prefecture, Japan, with short stays in Tokyo, Kyoto and Osaka. The visit was at the invitation of the Gunma Prefectural Government and was the twelfth women's delegation to make the journey since the friendly contacts were established between the ACWF and Gunma Prefecture.     

Gender and Value Orientations—What’s the Difference!? The Case of Japan and the United States

This paper analyzes gendered social identity in Japan and the United States, countries with comparable postindustrial economic systems but distinct cultural traditions. Using national surveys (1995), we find gender differences in value orientations to be neither systematic nor consistent. They often disappeared after controlling for demographic and human-capital variables, though not so often for Japan. Other variables proved more important predictors of values than gender, although in different ways in Japan and the United States. We conclude by reassessing the use of the term gender in social research and the cultural meaning of gender relations by addressing the feminist concerns with issues of gender location.

Notes on a Trip to Japan

"WHAT'S your impression of Japan? How has it advanced?" I was repeatedly asked the same questions by my friends and colleagues after I returned to Beijing. As a neighboring country of China and a world economic superpower, Japan is still a remote and unfamiliar place to most Chinese. In November of 1996, I was invited by the Japanese government to participate in the Asian-Pacific Journalist's Seminar on Women and Media. My one-week schedule     

Formulating Japan’s UNSCR 1325 national action plan and forgetting the “comfort women”

ABSTRACT

In September 2015, the Japanese government announced its first national action plan (NAP) to implement UN Security Council Resolution 1325, just ten days after forcefully legislating controversial security bills that would effectively lift the constitutional restrictions on overseas exercise of military force. Why did the conservative administration embrace Resolution 1325 while propelling militarization? This paper examines the formulation process of Japan’s NAP, focusing on gendered struggle over remilitarization and war memory, especially that of the “comfort women,” or Japanese imperial military sexual slavery during World War II. I will examine how post–Cold War remilitarization in Japan was closely intertwined with the struggle over war memory and the gender order of the nation, and how the conservative administration embraced international gender equality norms in an attempt to identify itself as a powerful liberal democracy engaged in maintaining the international security order, and to erase the memory of imperial military sexual violence in the past. By doing so, I attempt to critically reconsider the framework of the UN Women, Peace and Security agenda, which constructs powerful developed nations “not in conflict” as innocent supporters of women in conflict zones.     

Does ethnic origin determine integration success? A comparison of immigration policies in Germany and Japan

The paper analyzes public policy and public opinion responses toward immigrants in Germany and Japan, two countries whose immigration policies have relied on blood purity (jus sanguinis). The paper retraces the rationale for jus sanguinis and contends that it was adopted at the turn of the century in both countries out of political convenience. The principles and goals of immigration policies are compared cautioning that better principles must not mean better outcomes.

It is reiterated that Germany has made a politically motivated move away from the ethnic monocultural concept, whereas Japan still hangs on more or less to the old model of silent and subtle assimilation. The more dissuasive Japanese model of tight immigration control, deportation and monocultural assimilation isthen compared to the more permissive German immigration model. A comparison of identity discourses in the form of Japanese Nihonjinron and German Leitkultur shows that both countries struggle with identifying and asserting their core values and that this has a negative impact on integration issues. The paper concludes that Germany has failed to bear the full consequences of its ambitious plans by taking into account the values, beliefs and worldviews of its immigrants, whereas Japan continues to treat immigrants as temporary guests denying any need for long-term integration.     

Traditional or Economic Values? Analyzing Absentee Landowner Attitudes Amid Social and Agricultural Transformation in Japan

Agricultural landownership in Japan has changed drastically over the last century due to post-World War II land reforms and cultural, political, and economic shifts in the subsequent decades. Initial land reform shifted the concentrated ownership of land from the wealthy to small-scale farmers. But as Japan industrialized and became more urban-centered, a substantial amount of rural land has been left abandoned or unmanaged by descendants of those farmers. This paper analyzes the attitudes of absentee agricultural landowners in Japan to better understand the prevalence of economically rational versus traditional attitudes toward land ownership. We draw on the rural sociological literature on place attachment to hypothesize why some absentee landowners feel a strong tie to the land of their ancestors, while others would be willing to sell for a reasonable price. We use unique survey data obtained from 466 absentee agricultural landowners in Japan. Logistic regression results indicate that attachment to place, gender, age, educational attainment, and usage of land is significant predictors of whether landowners hold traditional, rather than economic, values. We discuss the implications of these findings for the future of sustainable agricultural land management in Japan.     

The labor supply of married women and spousal tax deductions in Japan—a structural estimation

The Japanese tax system offers an opportunity to investigate the labor supply response of married women to the income tax and the intrahousehold resource allocation mechanism, since the deductible amount from the husband’s income decreases as the wife’s earnings increase. Using cross-section data, I structurally estimate the labor supply of married women under the piece-wise linear budget constraint created by the Japanese tax and social security system. I find that the wife’s labor supply response to her husband’s decreasing deduction tends to be greater than the response to her own income tax. This suggests that not only the unitary model is rejected but also that female labor is allocated inefficiently within a family. Finally, this study shows that the choice of household model affects the predicted effect of policy reform and that the currently proposed reforms will have less of an effect on the labor supply of married women than previous studies claim.

The State and the Associational Order of the Economy: The Institutionalization of Cartels and Trade Associations in 1931–45 Japan

The existing literature on the impact of the state on the associational order has emphasized the state's concern on the implications of the associational order to the public goods and the role of the associational order as a policy tool of the state. However, few studies have investigated what particular characters of the state shape the pattern of the associational order. Through a historical analysis, this study highlights three important factors related to the state that contributed to the the rise of the associational order in Japan during the Great Depression and World War II. First, the shift of the state preference from protecting the liberties of private enterprises toward maintaining political stability in economic crisis and controlling resource allocation in war was the ultimate driving force behind the rise of associational order. Second, the constitutional order of the Japanese state, which involves not only the organization, composition, powers, and limitation of the state's executive, legislative, and jurisdictional branches, but also the people's liberties defined by the constitution, was strongly influenced by the continental legal tradition. This structurally shaped the Japanese pattern of the associational order. Third, the institutionalized legal and economic beliefs of property rights provided ideological support to the rise of the associational order.     

Japan’s “New Homeless”

Since the mid-1990s, homelessness has become a major issue of public discussion in Japan, and is often viewed as a new social problem facing Japanese society. The issue of homelessness contrasts images of the absence of poverty and homelessness in postwar Japan, often explained based on the unique features of Japanese-style employment and welfare, containing poverty and unemployment. This paper contrasts these views with a perspective on the continuity ofpoverty, and homelessness in postwar Japan. Specifically, I discuss the characteristics of homelessness in Tokyo, how they relate to the structure of the economy and employment practices, and how the problems oftoday’shomeless are accommodated in the welfare system. I argue that the homeless cast light on patterns of loss of employment, housing, and means of subsistence, characteristic to Japan’s economy and welfare system, and contribute to a new understanding of the dynamics of poverty in contemporary Japan.     

Associations Between Financial Transfer from Grandparents and Family Expenditures for Children’s Precollege Education in Japan

Given higher family spending for education and the relative poverty rate in Japan, the recent (2013–2021) tax incentive for grandparents’ support for educational expenditures for children might widen opportunities offered to the younger generation. Using nationally representative data from the 2017 Keio Household Panel Survey (n?=?502) and a double-hurdle model, this paper examined the associations between grandparents’ financial contributions and family expenditures for school age children’s education, controlling for family characteristics associated with such expenditures. Although examining just the period when the tax incentive is in effect limited the ability of this study to suggest the findings were related to the incentive, overall, variations in financial support from grandparents were not associated with family expenditures for children’s educations in the multivariate model. Although there was no evidence of an educational advantage from intergenerational transfers during the observation period, financial transfers from grandparents may have served as a substitute for the overall family expenditures for children’s education, thus potentially widening the opportunity gap among children.

     

Korean students’ minority schooling experience in Japan

A qualitative study conducted in western Japan examined the perceptions of Korean students in Japanese junior high school to identify factors contributing to a consistently low high school advancement rate compared to mainstream Japanese students. Fourteen people were interviewed about their Korean students’ experiences in Japan. The findings of this study suggest that factors contributing to the low high school advancement rate among Korean students cluster around three themes: (1) discrimination experienced in society at large and at school, (2) assimilation to become more like the Japanese, and (3) inconsistent cultural and insufficient academic support given by the school and teachers. Findings from this study indicate how the power structure in a social context of schooling influences minority students’ learning and also confirmed in part Ogbu and Cummins’ theories of how power relations between the subordinated and the dominant affect minority students’ schooling experiences and learning.     

Korea/Japan or Japan/Korea? The Saga of Co‐hosting the 2002 Soccer World Cup

Since Japan's defeat and enforced withdrawal from Korea in 1945, continuing acrimony from those 35 years of Japan's unwelcome domination on the Korean Peninsula has been a thorny issue affecting full normalization of relations between the two countries. The first round of post‐war talks between Japan and South Korea remained stalled for almost half a decade, and not until 1965, after 14 years of subsequent – and painfully drawn out – negotiations were diplomatic relations finally established. Today, in spite of a gradual thawing of that very icy relationship, Korean people's bitterness over Japan's militarist past and over what they regard as insufficient apologies and reparations was always going to feature as the two nations went head to head in their bid to host the 2002 World Cup. Following FIFA's decision in 1996 that Japan and South Korea would jointly stage the cup as co‐hosts – the first time in soccer World Cup history – extant animosity became increasingly problematic as South Korea, Japan and FIFA hammered out the details. In this paper I draw upon media coverage from the mid‐1990s to the present day to discuss FIFA's historic co‐hosting decision, a judgment which, in spite of the difficulties then and now, does have the potential to make a very positive impact on both countries and greater Asia. After briefly introducing the broader sports/politics conundrum, I outline the final stages of the host‐nation selection dilemma which forced FIFA into its unprecedented joint decision, locating that process within a framework of the competitive lobbying between the two political rivals and internal demands for a change of management style within FIFA itself. I will also highlight the economic, political, historical and social ramifications of a co‐hosted soccer World Cup and attempts to deal with the issues. South Korea's desire for North Korea to participate in the tournament will also be discussed as a vehicle for encouraging stability on the Korean Peninsula and for future cooperation between Japan and South Korea on their policies towards North Korea. Although the 2002 World Cup arrangements are already firmly in place, the long‐term animosity and the continuing accusations and points‐scoring between the two host‐nations suggest that we can not yet take it for granted that the co‐hosted 2002 soccer spectacular will go according to plan.     

Why Do Temp Workers Work as Hard as They Do?: The Commitment and Suffering of Factory Temp Workers in Japan

This qualitative study on blue‐collar temporary agency workers in Japan uses participant observation and in‐depth interviews to revisit the Marxist problem of surplus appropriation; that is, why do temp workers work as hard as they do, when management has little to offer in return? Existing literature has provided two answers of “coercion” and “consent.” This study attempts to bridge the debate by employing Bourdieu and Wacquant's concepts of practical sense and illusio. Workers entering the factory as novices initially made conscious efforts to master the specific bodily schemes necessary to survive on an insecure job. It was in the process of mastering the practical knowledge of factory work that temp workers came to be taken in, and by the game. Temp workers came to experience joy in investing their mind and body in the tasks, for they saw themselves reflected in the good job they did. Yet workers were not wholehearted believers in the game; they questioned their commitment and deeply suffered from reflecting on the poor treatment they continued to receive despite their commitment.     

How Does the Restoration of Tōhoku Society Begin? Center and Periphery in the Great East Japan Earthquake

What can we learn from the Great East Japan Earthquake? In this article, I examine the effects of the overarching physical and social system that has developed in Japanese society for the last half century. I use the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant accident as an example. I will also look to the meaning of kuni (the Japanese word for country, state or nation), and emphasize the urgent need to advance sociological comparative analysis of different forms of nation, state and country in times of emergency.     

World War I,Japan’s Road to Pearl Harbor

This qualitative study investigates the perspectives of two cohorts of elementary preservice teachers on citizenship education in today's culturally and globally diverse classrooms. Both cohorts were enrolled in the same university; however, one group participated in an urban-based teacher education program designed around the needs of urban school children. While participants reported varying views of citizenship and offered diverse strategies for incorporating citizenship in the classroom, findings suggested that those participating in the urban-based cohort viewed citizenship more in terms of culture and valued promoting cultural learning and sharing in the classroom. Implications for teachers wanting to teach for cultural citizenship are discussed.     

“Pay it forward” and Altruistic Responses to Disasters in Japan: Latent Class Analysis of Support Following the 2011 Tohoku Earthquake

Since the emergence of borantia (volunteers) in 1995, Japanese society has developed disaster volunteerism to enable citizens to help one another. Survivors from areas affected by disasters over the past two decades have returned to assist survivors of the Great East Japan Earthquake (2011 Tohoku Earthquake) through volunteering. This chain of support is known as a “pay it forward” network. Using latent class analysis, this article statistically demonstrates that different patterns of support behavior appeared after the 2011 Tohoku Earthquake and that people who were supported by others following disasters were more likely to help (e.g., through volunteering, donating goods, etc.). The class characterized as “pay it forward” was found to display high-support behaviors, and this was not only explained by traditional theory (i.e., dominant status model, resource model), but also by theories related to economic status and educational background. Results indicate that developing volunteerism in Japan accelerates network support.