Author: David Chiavacci Publisher: Routledge ISBN: 1351608134 Category : Social Science Languages : en Pages : 312
Book Description
This book explores social movements and political activism in contemporary Japan, arguing that the 2011 Fukushima nuclear accident marks a decisive moment, which has led to an unprecedented resurgence in social and protest movements and inaugurated a new era of civic engagement. Offering fresh perspectives on both older and more current forms of activism in Japan, together with studies of specific movements that developed after Fukushima, this volume tackles questions of emerging and persistent structural challenges that activists face in contemporary Japan. With attention to the question of where the new sense of contention in Japan has emerged from and how the newly developing movements have been shaped by the neo-conservative policies of the Japanese government, the authors ask how the Japanese experience adds to our understanding of how social movements work, and whether it might challenge prevailing theoretical frameworks.
Author: Kiyoteru Tsutsui Publisher: Oxford University Press ISBN: 0190853123 Category : Social Science Languages : en Pages : 328
Book Description
Winner of the American Sociological Association's 2019 Asia and Asian American Section Book Award Winner of the American Sociological Association's 2019 Political Sociology Section Distinguished Contribution to Scholarship Book Award Since the late 1970s, the three most salient minority groups in Japan - the politically dormant Ainu, the active but unsuccessful Koreans, and the former outcaste group of Burakumin - have all expanded their activism despite the unfavorable domestic political environment. In Rights Make Might, Kiyoteru Tsutsui examines why, and finds an answer in the galvanizing effects of global human rights on local social movements. Tsutsui chronicles the transformative impact of global human rights ideas and institutions on minority activists, which changed their understandings about their standing in Japanese society and propelled them to new international venues for political claim making. The global forces also changed the public perception and political calculus in Japan over time, catalyzing substantial gains for their movements. Having benefited from global human rights, all three groups repaid their debt by contributing to the consolidation and expansion of human rights principles and instruments outside of Japan. Drawing on interviews and archival data, Rights Make Might offers a rich historical comparative analysis of the relationship between international human rights and local politics that contributes to our understanding of international norms and institutions, social movements, human rights, ethnoracial politics, and Japanese society.
Author: Azumi Tamura Publisher: Routledge ISBN: 1351654063 Category : Political Science Languages : en Pages : 358
Book Description
Political disillusionment is widespread in contemporary society. In Japan, the search for the ‘outside’ of a stagnant reality sometimes leads marginalised young people to a disastrous image of social change. The Fukushima nuclear disaster was the realisation of such an image, triggering the largest wave of activism since the 1960s. The disaster revealed the interconnected nature of contemporary society. The protesters regretted that their past indifference to politics prefigured such a catastrophe and became motivated to protest in the streets. They did not share any totalising ideology or predetermined collective identity. Instead, the activism provided a space for each body to encounter others who forced them to feel and think, which also introduced an ethical dimension to their politics. In this book, Azumi Tamura proposes a concept of politics as a series of endless experiments based on creative responses to unexpected forces. Instead of searching for a transcendental reference for politics, she investigates an immanent force within individuals that motivates them to become involved in political action. Referencing Deleuzian philosophy, Tamura provides a different epistemological and ontological approach to the social movement studies. She suggests social movements themselves generate knowledge about how one may live better in a complex society and where our lives are exposed to uncertainty. This knowledge is neither empirical knowledge, nor normative political theory of ‘how we should live’. Instead, social movements bring affective knowledge into politics as they offer a space for experimenting with ‘how we might live.’ The encounter with such knowledge galvanizes our desire for ‘how we want to live’ and encourages new experiments.
Author: A. A. Choudry Publisher: University of Toronto Press ISBN: 1442607904 Category : Biography & Autobiography Languages : en Pages : 217
Book Description
Learning Activism is designed to encourage a deeper engagement with the intellectual life of activists who organize for social, political, and ecological justice.
Author: Simon Andrew Avenell Publisher: Univ of California Press ISBN: 0520262700 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 370
Book Description
Making Japanese Citizens is an expansive history of the activists, intellectuals, and movements that played a crucial role in shaping civil society and civic thought in postwar Japan. Weaving his analysis around the concept of shimin (citizen), Simon Andrew Avenell traces the development of a new vision of citizenship based on political participation, self-reliance, popular nationalism, and commitment to daily life. This rich portrayal of activists and their ideas illuminates questions of democracy, citizenship, and political participation not only in contemporary Japan but also, more generally, in other industrialized nations. --
Author: Yoshikazu Shiobara Publisher: Routledge ISBN: 1351387871 Category : Social Science Languages : en Pages : 270
Book Description
The recent manifestation of exclusionism in Japan has emerged at a time of intensified neoliberal economic policies, increased cross-border migration brought on by globalization, the elevated threat of global terrorism, heightened tensions between East Asian states over historical and territorial conflicts, and a backlash by Japanese conservatives over perceived historical apologism. The social and political environment for minorities in Japan has shifted drastically since the 1990s, yet many studies of Japan still tend to view Japan through the dominant discourses of “ethnic homogeneity (tanitsu minzoku shakai)” and “middle-class society (so ̄churyu ̄-shakai)” which positions the exclusion of minorities as an exceptional phenomenon. While exclusionism has been recognized as a serious threat to minority groups, it has not often been considered a representative issue for the whole of Japanese society. This tendency will persist until the discourses of tanitsu minzoku shakai and so ̄churyu ̄-shakai are systematically debunked and Japan is widely recognized as both multiethnic and socio-economically stratified. Today, as with most advanced capitalist countries, serious social divides occasioned by the impacts of globalization and neoliberalism have destabilized Japanese society. This book explores not only how Japanese society is diversified and unequal, but also how diversity and inequality have caused people to divide into separate realities from which conflict and violence have emerged. It empirically examines the current situation while considering the historical development of exclusionism from the interdisciplinary viewpoints of history, policy studies, cultural studies, sociology and cultural anthropology. In addition to analyzing the realities of division and exclusionism, the authors propose theoretical alternatives to overcome such cultural and social divides.
Author: Ian Neary Publisher: John Wiley & Sons ISBN: 1509535853 Category : Political Science Languages : en Pages : 298
Book Description
Politics in Japan is undergoing a major transformation. Under the leadership of Prime Minister Abe Shinzo, the ruling Liberal Democratic Party has, since 2012, embarked upon an ambitious programme of policy reforms as well as changes to Japan’s governing structures and processes. At the heart of this policy agenda is ‘Abenomics’ – a set of measures designed to boost Japan’s flagging economy, but one which is yet to deliver on its promises. In this fully revised and updated second edition of his classic text, Ian Neary explores the dynamics of democracy in Japan, introducing the key institutions, developments and actors in its politics from the end of the Second World War to the present day. Packed with illustrative material and examples, this comprehensive study traces the continuities and the changes that are underway in five major policy areas: foreign and defence, industry, social welfare, the environment and human rights. Assuming no prior knowledge of Japan, this textbook will be an invaluable and welcome resource for all students interested in the government and politics of contemporary Japan and its international profile.
Author: Carl Cassegård Publisher: Global Oriental ISBN: 9789004245914 Category : Social Science Languages : en Pages : 289
Book Description
In Youth Movements, Trauma and Alternative Space in Contemporary Japan, the author provides a detailed study and assessment of social movements among Japanese freeters, from the pioneering groups in the late 1980s to the open protests witnessed today.
Author: David Chiavacci Publisher: ISBN: 9789463723930 Category : Protest movements Languages : en Pages : 0
Book Description
Civil Society and the State in Democratic East Asia: Between Entanglement and Contention in Post High Growth focuses on the new and diversifying interactions between civil society and the state in contemporary East Asia by including cases of entanglement and contention in the three fully consolidated democracies in the area: Japan, South Korea and Taiwan. The contributions to this book argue that all three countries have reached a new era of post high growth and mature democracy, leading to new social anxieties and increasing normative diversity, which have direct repercussions on the relationship between the state and civil society. It introduces a comparative perspective in identifying and discussing similarities and differences in East Asia based on in-depth case studies in the fields of environmental issues, national identities as well as neoliberalism and social inclusion that go beyond the classic dichotomy of state vs 'liberal' civil society.
Author: David Chiavacci
Author: Kiyoteru Tsutsui
Author: Azumi Tamura
Author: A. A. Choudry
Author: Simon Andrew Avenell
Author: Yoshikazu Shiobara
Author: Ian Neary
Author: Carl Cassegård
Author: David Chiavacci
Author: Naoto Higuchi