Feminization of Heading-to-Tokyo Migration and Downtown Living:

Utilizing the Concept of Spatial Organization of Life and Neoliberal Motherhood

Abstract

    By introducing the concepts of spatial organization of life and neoliberal motherhood, this paper examines the relationship between changes in married women's mindset and behavior, and the feminization of heading-to-Tokyo migration and downtown living.
    As economic growth rates stagnate and commonization of dual-earner couples, the spatial organization of life changes from an elongated one which is based on separation of workplace and residence and gender divisions of labor within household to a more compact one. Furthermore, women who have internalized the neoliberal motherhood that requests them to balance work and better child rearing would quest for more compact spatial organization of their lives in order to achieve both.
    Based on this hypothesis, this paper analyzes time budget and household expenditures with a focus on childcare. An analysis of time spent for child rearing reveals that married women living in large cities spend more time caring for children. Regarding household expenditures, households living in Tokyo's central area intensively invest their children's education, compressing their lives in time and space by paying high housing costs and using housekeeping services.
    Surely, only a limited number of women in the high-income bracket are able to realize the compact spatial organization of living in the city center and accomplish neoliberal motherhood. This may deepen the class differentiation between metropolitan areas and rural areas, and between the city center and the suburbs, and may lead to class fixation through generational reproduction. Furthermore, if many women have no choice but to abandon the norm of neoliberal motherhood, the trend toward later marriages, fewer people getting married, and fewer birthrates will be accelerated.