What are the features of the society and culture of "hybrid modern" in Japan? First, hybridism is strongly related to productivity. Second, hybrid modern in Japan has disregarded and excluded hybridity rooted in life. Third, hybrid modern in Japan must dispense with hybridism ruled by the market and the nation, and rehabilitate a hybridity that takes root in life. The conditions for solving the problem of hybrid modern in Japan are the following. (1) Hybridity must be practiced in civil society, in associations and the like. (2) Civil society is a base for federalism and regionalism in the age of globalization. (3) If the modern community and associations are fundamental to social unity, the spirit of the civil society can be found in the society and history of Japan.

View full abstract

The Hsinchu Industrial-based Science Park (HISP), an industrial infrastructure for the cultivation of domestic high-tech industries established by the Taiwanese Government in 1980, not only created a high-grade industrial cluster together with neighboring R&D institutes and universities under the patronage of the government, but also developed a close econo-social network with the world's leading technopoles, particularly Silicon Valley, through the mediation of the government. The city turned into a prominent technopole, and before long was being called the "Silicon Valley of Asia." With the rapid development of HISP, the city has experienced a wide-ranging regional restructuring. Prior to the late 1990s development was essentially "top-down" restructuring initiated by government authorities and powerful enterprises, rather than by local communities. However, recently there has been a gradual growth in activities for bottom-up restructuring initiated by local non-profit organizations in the city. As shown in the case study of such activities in this article, it is clear that the creation of a "civil society" is one of their most significant social demands. Considering present trends in Asia and especially in China's coastal region, Hsinchu's experience of industrial upgrading, globalization and regional restructuring in the last quarter century does not appear to be special. Rather, Hsinchu's experience may offer us a valuable "bridge" to an understanding of the econo-social dynamism of Asia in the 21st century.

View full abstract

In Korea, the birthrate has continued to decrease with modernization policy and economic development after the 1960s. The total fertility rate decreased to 1.08 in 2005 because birth control and marriage postponement had advanced as well after the economic crisis of 1997. As in Japan, reasons for the birthrate decrease can be found in the difficulty of caring for a child while also working, changes in marriage values, educational costs, and an unstable environment. After the economic crisis, the Korean government pushed an economic form of neo-liberalism. Social welfare was hurriedly promoted to provide a social safety net and to address the decrease in the birthrate. Under the formation of a welfare state and in a neo-liberal economy the mutually beneficial cooperation of the citizens is requested. This mutually beneficial cooperation makes the family, and the woman, often bear the load both in the office and at home. If fundamental reforms to the social structure of familism are not executed, it will be difficult to mitigate the falling birthrate. In this paper, the background to the declining birthrate is first clarified. Then, the features of the welfare state reorganization and the directivity of the birthrate decrease are verified.

View full abstract

This paper presents research on the life of Takuji Yamashita [1874-1959], a first generation Japanese American who fought in court against racial discrimination towards Japanese Americans at the beginning of the 20th century, examining the public story created through a series of events that portrayed him as a man of shinnen (perseverance) and made him a historical person. In reconstructing his life story, I focus on two kinds of narratives; those by consociates and those by contemporaries (A. Schutz). The former are people who had personal experience with Yamashita and the latter are people who lived in his time. This suggests a life story methodology whereby the life of a person who has already passed away and for whom there are no documents, is depicted through the multi-layered oral accounts of others. When thinking of "history" through oral stories, orality makes clear that the past is being historicized in the present. Historicizing someone as a historical person, is not only placing them in the context of a chronological table or an encyclopedia of history, but can be considered as a process of transmission in which contemporaries become predecessors. Furthermore, this suggests that the past is collectively historicized when collective memories are presented in an act of telling and hearing personal stories.

View full abstract

Although we have not ignored the importance of "memories of war," can we only look at the victims and survivors among the general public, setting aside the soldiers' experience? This paper tries to show the forgetfulness of post-war society that occurs between the "war memories of the soldiers" and the "war memories of the citizens." Until the end of the Asia-Pacific War in 1945, the end of one war meant the beginning of preparation for another. Then, this succession of soldiers' wartime experiences was at the forefront of society. But in post-war society in Japan, in the literal sense of word, the social position of the "war memories of the soldiers" changed from what it had been prior to World War II. In the context of the Cold War, the "war memories of the citizens" became central to the memories of war. To make the historical characteristic of "the memories of war" definite, the collective memory mediated by the nation and the mass media must be critiqued from both a methodological and a theoretical perspective. In this paper, I consider the "region" in which we remember and rethink war memories, not as an object to investigate empirically but as a framework for analysis. In order to advance my exploration, I introduce several approaches such as (1) focusing on the soldiers' experience of movement, going to war and homecoming, (2) paying attention to the relationship of the troops to their locality/community, and (3) regional identification in rosters of the war dead, in autonomy history and in war memorial monuments.

View full abstract

In this paper I have considered the possibility of constructionist interviewing in researching local education. I interviewed Mr. F, a teacher who had had a long career as a fukushi kyoin in Kochi prefecture, and who had been assigned especially to tackle the problem of low attendance from 1948 until the early 1970s. I first focused on the frequency in the interview of his references to Mr. T who is famous not only as a fukushi kyoin but also as a skilled leader of the all-Japan anti-Buraku discrimination education movement. In the context of Mr. F's "narrative of honor" as the pioneer of anti-Buraku discrimination education, this frequency must be interpreted not merely as a personal evaluation or sentiment, but as a powerful voice against the "world of documents" that mediates a superficial understanding of the history of fukushi kyoin and has come to marginalize Mr. F himself. I argue that here there is the potential for constructionism in the research of local education; listening to a voice against the "world of documents," one that usually reflects the power relationship between the "center" and the local.

View full abstract

The increase in cultural diversity resulting from globalization has intensified feelings of insecurity toward difference. "The politics of insecurity," embodied in the activities of parties far on the political right, has permeated many societies. Multiculturalism cannot overcome these politics, because accenting difference too much. These social tensions resulted in riots in Northern England in 2001, the worst riots since the 1980s. After the riots, racial problems have been put back on the agenda for political and social discussion in Britain. The two reference points for this discussion have been the Cantle Report, issued by the Home Office, and the Parekh Report, issued by the Runnymede Trust. The former proposes the integration of diversity through common obligations and purposes, and the latter proposes voluntary cohesion through the recognition of difference as the vision for an ideal society. On the basis of these two visions, the measures for creating good racial relationships and social formations have been disputed. However, having paid attention to the social inclusion of people in the concept of Britishness, these arguments fail to treat the problem of the white majority's retreat from Britishness. On the one hand, the vision described in the Parekh Report, stressing diversity and the importance of multiculturalism, can potentially contribute to the politics of insecurity. On the other hand, the Cantle Report and the Community Cohesion policies which address people's insecurity, prevent the adequate promotion of accommodation into multicultural society. Because these two reports did not deal with the problems, the far right has been able to capitalize on this situation. In the face of this situation, we should recognize that the Cantle Report and the Parekh Report are complementary rather than representing an alternative by which to overcome the politics of insecurity in post-multicultural society.

View full abstract

In the 1990s, Yosuke Koto and Mikio Wakabayashi argued that maps are a medium which enables the visualization of a total image of "society" which individuals are unable to directly overlook and to share with others. However, this idea has not been further developed since then as the "sociology of maps" applied to an analysis of contemporary society. As globalization has made the "society" which surrounds individuals larger and more complicated, the lives of current individuals easily receive invisible influences from places which are not "here." Therefore, the role of maps has become newly important as a model for individuals to extend their geographical imagination, and to grasp the dimensions of and to visualize "world (global) society." Also, in local society where there has been a revival of the community in recent years, maps that rediscover the dimensions of "local society," by extending citizen's own geographical imagination locally, can be utilized for community revitalization. But now such geographical imagination has been exposed to a crisis by the transfiguration of maps, the development of electronic media, and so on. While a map can become a lead for sociological imagination by extending one's geographical imagination, maps in contemporary society can also potentially separate individuals and society by fragmenting geographical imagination and becoming invisible to "society."

View full abstract

Since 1892, the early Chicago School of sociology has been recognized as the first enterprise to institutionalize sociology in the academic world. Then, in the 1920s, it reached the golden era of urban sociological studies. We can distinguish radical shifts in the academic atmosphere in the field of sociology after that era. In the early days at the University of Chicago, Albion Small pursued sociology as a synthetic social science, as did Comte and Spencer, and William Thomas conducted research on the social psychological features of immigrants. The Chicago School of sociology built authentic, objective sociological research upon a framework derived from two books; Introduction to the Science of Sociology (1921), and The City (1925). The former provided the temporal frame by a four-phase ethnic cycle; competition, conflict, accommodation, assimilation. The latter set up a spatial framework by introducing a theory of concentric zones for urban growth and the concept of natural areas. This period witnessed the steady development of qualitative and quantitative social research practices, although they remained unarticulated. In the middle of the 20th century, Paul Lazarsfeld and Samuel Stouffer established their quantitative social psychology as the mainstream of sociological research. In the heyday of Chicago urban sociology, Burgess, as a pioneer, began to master newly invented quantitative techniques and launched his family studies that scaled marital adjustment. Although Burgess' research was inferior to Lazarsfeld's and Stouffer's, it still teaches us something valuable in the history and research of sociology. Firstly, it can be said that Burgess' use of L.L. Thurstone's attitude scales makes Burgess' scaling efforts part of G.H. Mead's social psychology lineage. Secondly, what Burgess lacked and Lazarsfeld and Stouffer had was the ability to conceive social reality ethnographically, at a level equaling the finest qualitative ethnographers.

View full abstract