抄録
Japan is now making the institutional transition from a single income to a dual income society. The direction of change seems to place middle-aged housewives in a situation of mounting financial risks and potential loss of legitimacy of their identity. This paper tries to describe this macro-level institutional reorganization from the everyday experiences of Japanese housewives. The target of analysis is a group of housewives working for Maple, a Japanese network business organizing 190 thousand housewives all over Japan. Although its sales volume has been declining, the number of housewives joining the business is increasing. ‘Network business’ is the Japanese term for a Multi-Level Marketing (MLM) system, which invites individuals to become sales persons without formalized employment relations and simultaneously expands its sales network by asking those individuals to invite other individuals to join the network. Maple attracts housewives who have lost self-confidence and felt ‘no future’ in their life, claiming that anyone can become another self by joining the business. Three years of field work reveals a distinctive new work style induced by ‘hitodukuri’ (literally 'making people') ideology entangled with the business interest. The paper finally identifies a sign of hope in their ambivalent work experiences characterized both by intensive and encompassing exploitation and by production of new identities.
