Japan

F

Social Structure

A largely homogeneous society, Japan does not exhibit the deep ethnic, religious, and class divisions that characterize many countries. The gaps between rich and poor are not as glaring in Japan as they are in many countries, and a remarkable 90 percent or more of Japanese people consider themselves middle class. This contrasts with most of Japan’s previous recorded history, when profound social and economic distinctions were maintained between Japan’s aristocracy and its commoners. Two periods of social upheaval in the modern era did much to soften these class divisions. The first was the push for modernization under the Meiji government at the end of the 19th century; the second was the period of Allied occupation after World War II. Among the most profound of the transformations that took place in the modern era was the empowerment of individuals rather than extended families and family lines as the fundamental units of society. As a result of this change, Japanese men and women experienced greater freedom in making personal decisions, such as choosing a spouse or career.

Nevertheless, some significant social differences do exist in Japan, as evidenced by the discrimination in employment, education, and marriage faced by the country’s Korean minority and by its burakumin. Burakumin means “hamlet people,” a name that refers to the segregated villages these people lived in during Japan’s feudal era. Burakumin are indistinguishable from Japanese racially or culturally, and today they generally intermingle with the rest of the population. However, for centuries they were treated as a separate population because they worked in occupations that were considered unclean, such as disposing of the dead and slaughtering animals. Despite laws to the contrary, their descendants still suffer discrimination in Japan. The number of burakumin is thought to be about 3 million, or about 2 percent of the national population. They are scattered in various parts of the country, usually in discrete communities, with the largest concentrations living in the urban area encompassing Ōsaka, Kōbe, and Kyōto.

Despite the shift toward individual empowerment, Japanese society remains significantly group-oriented compared to societies in the West. Japanese children learn group consciousness at an early age within the family, the basic group of society. Membership in groups expands with age to include the individual’s class in school, neighborhood, extracurricular clubs during senior high school and college, and, upon entering adulthood, the workplace. All along, the individual is taught to be dedicated to the group, to forgo personal gain for the benefit of the group as a whole, and to value group harmony. At the highest level, the Japanese nation as a whole may be thought of as a group to which its citizens belong and have obligations. The form of character building that instills these values is called seishin shūyō.

Most groups are structured hierarchically. Individual members have a designated rank within the group and responsibilities based on their position. Seniority has traditionally been the main qualification for higher rank, and socialization of young people in Japan emphasizes respect and deference to one’s seniors.

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G

Way of Life

Historically, most Japanese people lived in agricultural villages or small fishing settlements along the coast. Now, most of the population resides in metropolitan areas. Japan’s agricultural population, which has been declining since the 1950s, constituted only about 5 percent of the total population in the early 2000s. A disproportionate fraction of the population that has remained to live and work in Japan’s agricultural areas is elderly because the majority of migrants to cities are young.

Everyday life for most urban Japanese involves work in an office, store, factory, or other segment of the metropolitan economy. Daily commutes by bus, train, or subway are typically long, particularly in Tokyo. The commute is also extraordinarily crowded. During rush hours, some commuter lines employ “pushers” to shove riders into jam-packed train or subway cars before the doors slide closed.

Most houses and apartments are small in comparison to those in many other developed countries because of the country’s high population density and costly land. Nevertheless, many Japanese enjoy a high standard of living and comforts such as the latest fashions in clothing, new appliances and electronics, and new models of automobiles. Sundays are the busiest shopping days in Japan. During the afternoon hours, department stores and shopping malls are jammed with crowds of bargain hunters. Japanese also enjoy travel and often go abroad or to popular domestic resorts during holidays. Between 1968 and 1994 the number of Japanese traveling abroad each year increased from 344,000 to 13.5 million. Among the most popular destinations are Hawaii and the West Coast of the United States, New York City, Australia, Hong Kong, and the major capitals of Europe.

Japanese life blends traditions from the past with new activities, many borrowed from other cultures. The Japanese diet, for example, emphasizes rice, seafood, and other items that have been staples in the society for centuries, but also includes international cuisine such as Italian and Chinese dishes, and American-style fast-food hamburgers and French fries. Likewise, Japanese sports fans give equal weight to sumo, Japan’s traditional style of wrestling, as to baseball, imported from the United States in the late 19th century. Contemporary weddings in Japan often combine traditional Shinto ceremonies, such as ritual exchanges of sake (rice wine), with Western-style exchanges of wedding bands. Arranged marriages, common in Japan before World War II, have declined in favor of so-called love marriages based on a couple’s mutual attraction. Nevertheless, the tradition of family involvement in selecting a mate endures, and arranged marriages still occur.

Major holiday celebrations in Japan include Bon, a traditional midsummer honoring of ancestral spirits, and the New Year, when people eat special foods, visit Shinto shrines, and call on family and friends. When Japan’s cherry trees blossom, signaling the arrival of spring, people celebrate with picnics under the trees. Each year on May 5 the Japanese celebrate Children’s Day, when families with young boys fly giant carp (a symbol of success) made of cloth or paper from the roofs of their houses. Adult’s Day, on January 15, is celebrated to honor all young people who turned 20 in the past year, and Respect for the Aged Day is observed on September 15. The emperor’s birthday is also a national holiday. During Golden Week, a time in late April and early May when several holidays come together, many Japanese enjoy travel and leisure activities, such as golf, tennis, and hiking.

Japanese engage in ritual gift giving during New Year’s and at midsummer. Strong social obligations dictate who must give gifts to whom, and selecting a gift involves elaborate rules and customs about what kinds of gifts are appropriate in the precise situation. The total cost of gifts exchanged is high, causing the gift-giving tradition to become a significant financial support for Japan’s manufacturing sector, the country’s retail enterprises, and its package delivery services.

H

Social Issues

For the most part, Japan is a stable country with a high degree of domestic tranquility. Yet the country faces a number of social problems, some of them new and worsening, others long-term and slowly improving. Some of the most difficult recent troubles arose from the economic recession that began in Japan in the 1990s. Until recently, unemployment was virtually unknown in Japan to all but the oldest citizens who lived through the economic chaos of the years immediately after World War II. However, during the 1990s unemployment rose as companies and financial institutions that were once thought to be financially solid cut back on their workforces or closed altogether. Lifetime job security, once a hallmark of Japan’s economy, no longer exists in many companies, and experienced workers now find themselves competing for inferior jobs with younger people looking for entry-level positions. The younger generation in turn is finding it hard to enter the economy because jobs that were once plentiful for high school and college graduates are now in short supply.

The prolonged recession is one of the chief causes of an increase in homelessness in Japan. Tokyo and other cities have thousands of homeless people, mostly middle-aged and older men. Quite a few of them were brought to these circumstances by alcoholism or mental illness, but the number of people who are homeless because of unemployment has risen. Sometimes people who lose their jobs or suffer the failure of a business feel too ashamed to face their families in Japan’s tradition-bound society. These people exile themselves to one of the many communities of newly homeless people.

Crime is another growing problem. Although Japan is one of the safest countries in the world, Japanese are greatly concerned about recent increases in violent crime and crimes against property. Some fault the growing number of foreigners in Japan for rising crime, but most attribute the problem to the combination of economic recession and the high desirability of consumer goods among the younger generation. A particularly disturbing aspect of the problem reported widely in the Japanese media has been the large increase in prostitution among high school girls. These girls are seeking money for the latest clothing fashions, expensive concert tickets, and other desired items. Organized crime by mobsters known as yakuza continues to be a strong force in Japan, controlling prostitution, pornography, and gambling.

An important long-term social problem in Japan concerns the status of women. The Japanese constitution forbids discrimination on the basis of sex, and Japanese law affords women the same economic and social rights as men. Nevertheless, fewer women than men attend four-year universities, and in general women do not have equal access to employment opportunities and advancement within the ranks of a company or along a career path. Efforts to increase women’s opportunities have enabled more women to succeed in business or professions. However, the attitude that women should stay home to be wives and mothers remains more pervasive in Japan than in many other industrialized countries and is a roadblock to many women who opt for other challenges.

I

Social Services

Japan has a well-developed social welfare system designed to protect the quality of life of legal residents against a broad range of social and economic risks. The system has four principal components. First, through public assistance it provides a basic income for people unable to earn enough on their own for subsistence. Second, it provides citizens with social insurance in the form of health and medical coverage, unemployment compensation, and public pensions. Most social insurance programs are funded by contributions from employers and employees, as well as by subsidies from government funds. Third, the system provides social welfare services to address various special needs of the aged, the disabled, and children. And finally, it provides public health maintenance to attend to sanitation and environmental issues and to safeguard the public from infectious diseases.

The cost of social welfare has risen in Japan and accounted for nearly 20 percent of the national budget in 1995. The recession of the 1990s, which added to the number of people receiving public assistance, has posed major challenges for Japan’s welfare system. Furthermore, with the country’s rapidly aging population, providing for the needs of the elderly is becoming harder for the government. Subsidized nursing homes, regular health examinations, low-cost medical care, home care, and recreational activities at community centers are services for the elderly that may be impossible to provide in the future. The problem is made worse because the time-honored tradition of family members taking care of aged relatives is declining in Japan, putting more of the burden for care on government.

The People and Society section of this article was contributed by Roman Cybriwsky.

IV

Arts and Culture

Japanese cultural history is marked by periods of extensive borrowing from other civilizations, followed by assimilation of foreign traditions with native ones, and finally transformation of these elements into uniquely Japanese art forms. Japan borrowed primarily from China and Korea in premodern times and from the West in the modern age.

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