Dear All,

What a wonderful series of incredibly insightful comments, each drawing from the particular research and/ or direct experience of the contributor. Taken together they do indicate important insights into the causes for and mechanisms behind Japan's relative lack of citizen activism and dissent about governmental environmental policies. The frequent comparison with Germany, another highly organized society but with a totally different civic culture, is especially instructive. The picture of Japanese governance practices and political culture that emerges is most fascinating. It makes me think of the work of Michel Foucault, who (referring to European examples) talked about how over the past several hundred years people have been increasingly trained to police and discipline themselves in subordination to the ruling powers of the society. Sheldon Garon details this process historically in Moulding Japanese Minds. The ministerial bureaucracies in Japan in general seem very concerned to mould a placid and obedient society using soft paternalistic tactics. These tactics are exercised through many different institutions, including socialization, education, the kisha kurabu, the sending of ministerial retirees into the governing boards. But the ministries, in conjunction with the corporate elite and the LDP (the "ruling triad") also use more hard tactics such as the destruction of leftist labor unions and refusal to cooperate with Kan Naoto and the Democratic Party during their brief leadership period. Despite all this top-down conditioning, though, the average Japanese minds have become exceedingly disillusioned with and distrustful of the national institutions such as bureaucracy, political parties and corporations-- way more distrustful than Germany, the US and other OECD countries. The World Values Survey shows this clearly. There is a lot of shikataganai and akirame, you can't fight city hall, going on. In some part of their minds, many people must feel trapped in a takotsubo octopus pot or straitjacket society , as Maruyama Masao and Matsumoto respectively say. Is manga the main outlet for suppressed anger?

Many thanks to all. Hope we continue this insightful discussion

Jeff Broadbent

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Jeffrey Broadbent
Professor
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Office phone: 612-624-1828
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Compon: Comparing Climate Change Policy Networks project website
East Asian Social Movements

On Sep 30, 2019, at 3:28 AM, SSJ-Forum Moderator <ssjmod@iss.u-tokyo.ac.jp> wrote:

From: Brigitte Steger <bs382@cam.ac.uk>

Date: 2019/09/30



Dear Peter,



thanks for initiating such a timely discussion, and thanks for all those
who contributed their insights.



I don't have an answer, but want to add a few observations.



Last autumn, I conducted interviews on gomi bunbetsu, and also on how to
avoid plastic waste, traveling from Iwate and Fukushima to several
places in Kansai and Kyushu. Also visited waste facilities, local
government meetings etc. There are huge regional differences.



One preliminary finding is that waste reduction and waste sorting (as
well as environmental protection or indeed cleaning after an event) is
very much a question of what I would call 'good citizenship'. Perhaps
this does not go well with a school strike in a country in which 100%
class attendance is important. And the association of tōkō kyohi is not
really a school strike as political action.



I also observed quite a gender difference in environmental awareness, at
least among adults. Women - who are also in charge of sorting waste -
were generally much more aware and concerned with environmental issues.
- As is well known, postwar political activism on consumer protection,
family health and environmental issues has been mostly carried by
housewives. Their struggle has been legitimized by a moral imperative to
protect children (their own). This has empowered them to speak up
against the government and corporate authorities, but at the same time
limited their influence to domestic matters. Robin LeBlanc's Bicycle
citizen, but also Morioka Rika's article 'Mother courage' (in Gill,
Steger and Slater 2013: Japan copes with calamity) on mothers in the
Fukukushima are insightful in this respect.



Perhaps children are used to rely on their mothers to fight for a
healthy environment rather than fighting for themselves.



Brigitte

Dr Brigitte Steger

Senior Lecturer in Modern Japanese Studies

Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies
University of Cambridge


Fellow and Director of Studies at Downing College


bs382@cam.ac.uk <mailto:bs382@cam.ac.uk>

On 29 Sep 2019, at 07:53, SSJ-Forum Moderator

<ssjmod@iss.u-tokyo.ac.jp <mailto:ssjmod@iss.u-tokyo.ac.jp>> wrote:

From: Sakari Mesimäki <sakari.mesimaki@gmail.com

<mailto:sakari.mesimaki@gmail.com>>

Date: 2019/09/27

Dear All,

I spent the summer months in Tokyo doing field work and interviews

for my master's thesis about how a community of young people are

trying to change what it means to talk about "politics" and "social

problems". I think my preliminary findings may provide some modest

insight as to why there is so little engagement with green politics -

or politics at all - among at least younger Japanese.

Many of my interlocutors shared Dr. Cabell's view of the influence of

education. Young people do not have a chance to discuss politics at

school, or at home, or anywhere else for that matter. They simply

memorize the facts of the political system.

Some interlocutors, who are taking an interest in politics and trying

to overcome the "taboo" on talking about it, are actually finding that

they don't quite know *how* to talk about politics! What if I disagree

with my friend? How should I handle such conflict? During the summer's

upper house elections there was a considerable "let's all talk about

politics" discourse, but also an apparent difficulty to understand

what it actually means, in practice, to "talk about politics" when you

have never done so before. I myself attended a political discussion

workshop arranged during the election period where the first rule was

that you are not allowed to express support for any particular

candidate or party!

There are a host of negative associations attached to discussion or

interest in politics or social issues. It's essentially something for

"ishikitakai" and "majime" dorks. If the political activity has any

ideological or activist flavor to it, it is also considered dangerous

and disruptive - not something for good citizens to take part in.

Interlocutors also told me of apparently popularly shared stereotypes

of the kind of person with strong political beliefs: aggressively

judgmental and incapable of cooperation.

My research focus is on a community of mostly middle-class creative

professionals who are attempting to reintegrate politics into popular

culture such as fashion and music to change the negative connotations

attached to politics into something more positive, such as "cool" and

"oshare". One example of such efforts is NEUT Magazine

(http://neutmagazine.com/) which has made this their explicit mission.

An interesting part of their brand and editorial approach is that it

is built around the idea of "neutrality". This simultaneously works to

make politics and social problems seem less divisive and approachable,

but also sustains the virtue of avoiding confrontation and conflict

which, arguably, is partly at the root of the allergy to participating

in politics in the first place. To exaggerate slightly, the most

legitimate and risk-free position continues to be not having any

position at all.

Although environmental activism was not my specific focus, I

interviewed one of the Japanese Fridays For Future activists for a

short article in Metropolis magazine

(https://metropolisjapan.com/fridays-for-future-tokyo/). He spoke a

lot about their struggle with negative stereotypes, and how they are

trying to get around these, such as by calling their action a "march"

rather than a "strike" and cultivating a positive, smiling public image.

I look forward to more perspectives on this very interesting topic!

Best regards,

Sakari Mesimäki