This paper raises questions about the relation between societal crisis and sociological theory. After March 2011, Japan has been severely affected by the East Japan Disasters (earthquake, tsunami and nuclear disasters). How could and should sociological theory in Japan respond to such crises? To answer this question, this paper relies on the concept of self-description in Niklas Luhmann’s sociological systems theory. This concept implies that all descriptions of society are constructed by society itself. Therefore, the crisis of society is also regarded as one of selfdescription. Based on this idea, this paper seeks to reflect on sociological theories especially those within Japan.
The conclusions are as follows: First, we can understand sociological theory as a part of society that reflects the self-descriptions of that society. Sociology has been created and motivated by the notion that society has been in crisis. If sociological theory said nothing about the crisis of society, it would also be in crisis. The title of this paper implies such double meaning. Second, the lack of sociological theory in society would reflect the crisis of society itself. Therefore, sociological theory should not suggest policies but merely reflect on the self-descriptions of society and seek to further develop sociological theory itself. Additionally, concerning sociological theory within Japan in particular, it should not be closed domestically but be open to the global arena of sociological theory in a manner that goes beyond the simple import and export of ideas.

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This paper examines the possibility of a sociological description of the Tohoku-Pacific Ocean Earthquake from the viewpoint of social system theory. Ulrich Beck’s “Risk Society” was published in 1986, the year of Chernobyl catastrophe, the Challenger accident and the pollution of the Rhine River. Since then sociological or (social) psychological risk research has had a great impact on discourse concerning risk. But in 1990s numerous technical analysts have moderated the impact of these sociological and psychological risk theories. Presumably this process will be repeated in Japan. It is necessary to note this process of change in disaster risk discourse from 1986 to 1990s. In sections 2 and 3 we will examine the possibility of a sociological description of “3.11” and discuss whether the concept of “systemic-risk” that had been originally applied to the problems of financial affairs is helpful in macroscopic description about this catastrophe. But the systemic risk also contains the complex process of “risk transformation”. This concept was introduced in the social system theory of Niklas Luhmann and contributes to the analysis of the dynamic process of systemic risk, namely the transformation or “construction” of risk by one (social) system that operates according to its own communicative logic. This can create a new type of risk for other social systems or local communities. Finally, I consider the task of the sociological theoretical research that should be based on second-order observation (an observation of an observer as such) even in the era of “crisis”.

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It is often stated that ‘crisis’ serves as a chance for social change. This ‘crisis-chance’ theorem is a favored and often repeated notion of market fundamentalists or developmentalists. However, it is not productive to just criticize the ideological nature of the theorem. There is a positive side to ‘crisis’ as a chance out of which there may emerge new relations among unknown persons in the unknown situation as R. Solnit has pointed out.
This paper explains J. Habermas’s theory of modern society as a critical and reflexive attempt to formulate such a ‘crisis-chance’ theorem. Although Ch. Mouffe observed critically Habermas’s theory was so unpolitical that it overestimated people’s mutual understanding and agreement as a solution to the ‘crisis’ of the society, Habermas is more than a vulgar modernist. His communication theory does not underestimate non-knowing and disagreement. And his conception of ‘the unfinished project’ emphasizes the openness of the modern society towards the unknown. The modern society that includes constitutionalism as a core also has illegal elements as driving forces for self-change. According to Habermas, ‘crisis’ is a moment in which the deficiencies of the current legal system becomes important and is a chance for the people defined as illegal to define the unknown in the current legal system.
The “disaster utopia” that Solnit postulates appears to be based on a part of Habermas’s understanding of the modern society. It seems to be a space in which the illegality of the illegal minority is the most relativized and the arena in which the discursive possibility of agreement with the majority is opened.

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Neoliberalism in our everyday life tends to be understood in terms of social management but this perspective tends to close off consideration of the internalization of the specific ideology. This paper attempts to elucidate the essential character of neoliberalism by returning to the internal logic of neoliberal economics. We argue that neoliberalism means “the segmentation of the world by using the framework of the market”. We posit that the formation of the neoliberal actor is not in the moment that “we are governed” but in the moment that “we govern”. By recounting the “re-entry of the market into the framework of government strategy” it reconstructs the problematic applied to the study of the formation of neoliberal actors.

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This essay discusses the epistemology and methodology to understand the body sociologically. As the nucleus of this examination, I use Loïc Wacquant’s “carnal sociology”. “Carnal sociology” is Wacquant’s realization of his master Pierre Bourdieu’s “reflexive sociology” and was proposed as a rethinking of sociological epistemology and methodology. The characteristic of carnal sociology is not only the sociology of the body but also the “sociology from the body”. “Sociology from the body” means that the body of the sociologist is a means for researching the social body. However, Wacquant does not adequately consider how the body is reflected in fieldwork. In this context, I examine the “somaesthetics” that Richard Shusterman advocates. He postulates “somatic reflection” that does not fit the scheme of “reflective-unreflective” and attempts to show the possibilities of this “somatic reflection.” In conclusion I assert sociologist must embody “somatic-sociological reflection.”

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It is necessary that lay people impute or ascribe ‘vocabularies of motive’ to the sudden death represented for categorizing as suicide. However, researchers turned away from this issue after Durkheim denied the validity of such investigation in his Suicide. In contrast, Douglas, who sharply criticized Durkheim’s Suicide, has proposed an alternative program for studying motivations of suicide. Nevertheless, his program has had some fatal issues; it has only respected and studied victims’ inner motivations to suicide while neglecting difficult issues association with ‘emotionalism’. In contrast, Atkinson’s program using proto-membership categorization analysis for imputing or ascribing vocabularies of motive to suicide has produced an enormous stride in understanding. Future studies seeking to impute or ascribe vocabularies of motive to suicide should follow membership categorization analysis especially the concept of ‘predicates’.

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Natsume Soseki who is well known as a novelist was also the prominent intellectual. Although he reflected on “Civilization and Enlightenment” his criticism has not been previously been dealt with in terms of sociology. The purpose of this paper is to reconsider Soseki’s ethical individualism in terms of sociology. He recognized that the growth of individualism was an inevitable concomitant of the expansion of the division of labour. But, “the struggle for survival” in the economic world turned individuals into the “selfish” and the “enervated”. Soseki’s formation of “ethical individualism” was an attempt to reconcile “individualism” with “public morality”. Comparing Soseki’s thought to that of Emile Durkheim we can see that Soseki’s “ethical individualism” was a pioneering attempt at a social philosophy for modern Japan.

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The purpose of the study is to show the meaning of the conflict inside the women’s movement over the amendment of the Labour Standards Law in 1970-80s Japan. This is discussed in terms of the pitfalls inherent in coexistence of “protection” and “equality”. From 1978 to 1985, there were two currents in Japanese women’s movement. One sought both the “protection of female workers” and “sexual equality in employment” while the other refused both. The debate was confrontational. The points of confrontation were (1) the recognition of class difference between female workers and (2) the degree of criticism with respect to the disposition to which legislation represented the logic of the government and the business world. The result of movement that sought sexual equality in employment appeared as the Equal Employment Opportunity Law in 1985. It disappointed most women who had been involved with the movement. The analysis of the background of the 1985 law is the base for a discussion of current thinking about how the movement should be continued in the context of contemporary labor conditions.

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