David T. Johnson and Franklin E. Zimring
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- May 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780195337402
- eISBN:
- 9780199868674
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195337402.003.0003
- Subject:
- Political Science, Comparative Politics
This chapter traces the development of Japanese death penalty policy in order to arrive at a historically informed understanding of how contemporary policy-makers came to believe that at least one ...
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This chapter traces the development of Japanese death penalty policy in order to arrive at a historically informed understanding of how contemporary policy-makers came to believe that at least one execution should occur each year, and in order to discern why conflict persists around the issue of executions. The first half of the chapter describes and explains key capital punishment developments during four periods of Japanese history: the de facto abolition of the death penalty in premodern Japan; the dramatic decline of executions during the Meiji restoration of the late 19th century; the retention of capital punishment during the American-led occupation of Japan after the Pacific war; and the steady decrease in executions in the first four decades following the occupation. The chapter's fifth section shows that change is ongoing by examining the causes and consequences of the resurgence of capital punishment since the Aum Shinrikyo gas attacks of 1995. The two concluding sections identify lessons from Japanese history and explore alternative futures of the death penalty in Asia's most developed nation.Less
This chapter traces the development of Japanese death penalty policy in order to arrive at a historically informed understanding of how contemporary policy-makers came to believe that at least one execution should occur each year, and in order to discern why conflict persists around the issue of executions. The first half of the chapter describes and explains key capital punishment developments during four periods of Japanese history: the de facto abolition of the death penalty in premodern Japan; the dramatic decline of executions during the Meiji restoration of the late 19th century; the retention of capital punishment during the American-led occupation of Japan after the Pacific war; and the steady decrease in executions in the first four decades following the occupation. The chapter's fifth section shows that change is ongoing by examining the causes and consequences of the resurgence of capital punishment since the Aum Shinrikyo gas attacks of 1995. The two concluding sections identify lessons from Japanese history and explore alternative futures of the death penalty in Asia's most developed nation.
Scott O’Bryan
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824832827
- eISBN:
- 9780824870621
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824832827.003.0001
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
This chapter examines the concerted efforts by former wartime planners to resuscitate and redeem the ideal of planning in postwar Japan. It begins with a discussion of planning dilemmas faced by ...
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This chapter examines the concerted efforts by former wartime planners to resuscitate and redeem the ideal of planning in postwar Japan. It begins with a discussion of planning dilemmas faced by individuals in and around the bureaucracy as they began to set their sights on the postwar economy. It then considers the principles of planning laid out by the Special Survey Committee that self-consciously recast planning in terms of a new democratic and scientific humanism, and specifically as science “without compulsion.” It also discusses the efforts of Inaba Hidezō to mobilize the ideal of humanistic technocracy to articulate a new vision of planning deemed more appropriate to a “new,” open Japan.Less
This chapter examines the concerted efforts by former wartime planners to resuscitate and redeem the ideal of planning in postwar Japan. It begins with a discussion of planning dilemmas faced by individuals in and around the bureaucracy as they began to set their sights on the postwar economy. It then considers the principles of planning laid out by the Special Survey Committee that self-consciously recast planning in terms of a new democratic and scientific humanism, and specifically as science “without compulsion.” It also discusses the efforts of Inaba Hidezō to mobilize the ideal of humanistic technocracy to articulate a new vision of planning deemed more appropriate to a “new,” open Japan.
Scott O’Bryan
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824832827
- eISBN:
- 9780824870621
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824832827.003.0002
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
This chapter examines the significant changes that were at work within the discipline of economics around the world during the mid-twentieth century and how these new lines of theoretical and ...
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This chapter examines the significant changes that were at work within the discipline of economics around the world during the mid-twentieth century and how these new lines of theoretical and methodological inquiry affected Japanese social-scientific thought. More specifically, it considers the rise of a host of statistical epistemologies that formed the basis of the accounting conventions out of which was produced the statistic of Gross National Product (GNP). The chapter first provides an overview of the empirical revolution in twentieth-century economic knowledge, with particular emphasis on the macroeconomic measures of national income and GNP as the linchpins in the complex of statistics reshaping the discipline of economics after World War II. It then discusses the factors that propelled national accounting into the policy arenas of Japan and other industrial powers, along with the creation of a task force headed by Stuart A. Rice to guide reform of Japan’s statistical system. It also describes the emergence of macroeconomic statistics such as national income accounting as governing analytical tools within the new statistical infrastructure in postwar Japan.Less
This chapter examines the significant changes that were at work within the discipline of economics around the world during the mid-twentieth century and how these new lines of theoretical and methodological inquiry affected Japanese social-scientific thought. More specifically, it considers the rise of a host of statistical epistemologies that formed the basis of the accounting conventions out of which was produced the statistic of Gross National Product (GNP). The chapter first provides an overview of the empirical revolution in twentieth-century economic knowledge, with particular emphasis on the macroeconomic measures of national income and GNP as the linchpins in the complex of statistics reshaping the discipline of economics after World War II. It then discusses the factors that propelled national accounting into the policy arenas of Japan and other industrial powers, along with the creation of a task force headed by Stuart A. Rice to guide reform of Japan’s statistical system. It also describes the emergence of macroeconomic statistics such as national income accounting as governing analytical tools within the new statistical infrastructure in postwar Japan.
Scott O’Bryan
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824832827
- eISBN:
- 9780824870621
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824832827.003.0005
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
This chapter examines the ways in which public economists leveraged the postwar ideal of full employment to argue that a macroeconomic focus on rapid domestic growth could finally overcome structural ...
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This chapter examines the ways in which public economists leveraged the postwar ideal of full employment to argue that a macroeconomic focus on rapid domestic growth could finally overcome structural inequality and what they believed to be Japan’s age-old population problem. The perceived dilemma of “surplus population” had long vexed national leaders and ideologues during the modern period. In postwar Japan, public economists sought to address this “population problem” using assumptions and concepts taken from the new economics by calling for a more expansive goal of rapid “economic growth.” This chapter first considers the idea that a national mobilization for macroeconomic growth could serve as an internal postwar solution to the perennial national problems of population, unemployment, and “backwardness.” It then discusses the suggestion that new kinds of private consumption might also have their place in the Japanese economy of growth, based on a vision of progress in which consumers would play a new role in ensuring national economic welfare.Less
This chapter examines the ways in which public economists leveraged the postwar ideal of full employment to argue that a macroeconomic focus on rapid domestic growth could finally overcome structural inequality and what they believed to be Japan’s age-old population problem. The perceived dilemma of “surplus population” had long vexed national leaders and ideologues during the modern period. In postwar Japan, public economists sought to address this “population problem” using assumptions and concepts taken from the new economics by calling for a more expansive goal of rapid “economic growth.” This chapter first considers the idea that a national mobilization for macroeconomic growth could serve as an internal postwar solution to the perennial national problems of population, unemployment, and “backwardness.” It then discusses the suggestion that new kinds of private consumption might also have their place in the Japanese economy of growth, based on a vision of progress in which consumers would play a new role in ensuring national economic welfare.
Scott O’Bryan
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824832827
- eISBN:
- 9780824870621
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824832827.003.0007
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
This book explores the formative years of growth as an idea that redefined national conceptions of purpose and prosperity in postwar Japan. It considers the ways in which growth as theory and ...
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This book explores the formative years of growth as an idea that redefined national conceptions of purpose and prosperity in postwar Japan. It considers the ways in which growth as theory and practice emerged in the specific context of Japanese capitalism alongside rapid economic expansion itself during the first decade and a half after World War II. It links the preoccupation with high growth of the postwar years in Japan to the twentieth-century rise of growth both as an object of social scientific knowledge and as an analytical paradigm that came to govern political-economic practices in nations around the world. The discusses the ways in which changes in social science contributed to Japanese forms of postwar growthism; the political harnessing of the growthist ideal to articulate a domestic vision of national postwar purpose; and efforts made by growth publicists to expand Japanese notions about what level of material and social prosperity the nation might be able to achieve in a reshaped postwar world.Less
This book explores the formative years of growth as an idea that redefined national conceptions of purpose and prosperity in postwar Japan. It considers the ways in which growth as theory and practice emerged in the specific context of Japanese capitalism alongside rapid economic expansion itself during the first decade and a half after World War II. It links the preoccupation with high growth of the postwar years in Japan to the twentieth-century rise of growth both as an object of social scientific knowledge and as an analytical paradigm that came to govern political-economic practices in nations around the world. The discusses the ways in which changes in social science contributed to Japanese forms of postwar growthism; the political harnessing of the growthist ideal to articulate a domestic vision of national postwar purpose; and efforts made by growth publicists to expand Japanese notions about what level of material and social prosperity the nation might be able to achieve in a reshaped postwar world.
Scott O’Bryan
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824832827
- eISBN:
- 9780824870621
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824832827.003.0003
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
This chapter examines changes within economic knowledge that supported an increasing macroeconomic focus on growth in postwar Japan, with particular emphasis on the ideals of new economics and ...
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This chapter examines changes within economic knowledge that supported an increasing macroeconomic focus on growth in postwar Japan, with particular emphasis on the ideals of new economics and prosperity economy. Japanese analysts and reformers articulated a future vision of reconstruction in terms of humanistic technocracy based on the longer history of modern Japanese development. In this retrospective analysis of the road to war, emphasis was placed on the structural defects of the political economy, drawing heavily on Marxist debates dating from the 1920s on the so-called crisis of development of Japanese capitalism. This chapter first considers the rhetoric of full employment that accompanied the rising status of John Maynard Keynes’s ideas before discussing the “revolutionary” rise of Keynesianism within so-called kinkei, or modern economics, thought in postwar Japan. It also explores the connection between the ideal of planning and a range of welfare goals as they came to be articulated in diagnoses of Japanese capitalism after the war.Less
This chapter examines changes within economic knowledge that supported an increasing macroeconomic focus on growth in postwar Japan, with particular emphasis on the ideals of new economics and prosperity economy. Japanese analysts and reformers articulated a future vision of reconstruction in terms of humanistic technocracy based on the longer history of modern Japanese development. In this retrospective analysis of the road to war, emphasis was placed on the structural defects of the political economy, drawing heavily on Marxist debates dating from the 1920s on the so-called crisis of development of Japanese capitalism. This chapter first considers the rhetoric of full employment that accompanied the rising status of John Maynard Keynes’s ideas before discussing the “revolutionary” rise of Keynesianism within so-called kinkei, or modern economics, thought in postwar Japan. It also explores the connection between the ideal of planning and a range of welfare goals as they came to be articulated in diagnoses of Japanese capitalism after the war.
Mark Metzler
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- August 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780801451799
- eISBN:
- 9780801467912
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9780801451799.001.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, Asian Politics
Joseph Schumpeter's conceptions of entrepreneurship, innovation, and creative destruction have been hugely influential. He pioneered the study of economic development and of technological paradigm ...
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Joseph Schumpeter's conceptions of entrepreneurship, innovation, and creative destruction have been hugely influential. He pioneered the study of economic development and of technological paradigm shifts and was a forerunner of the emerging field of evolutionary economics. He is not thought of as a theorist of credit-supercharged high-speed growth, but this is what he became in postwar Japan. As this book shows, economists and planners in postwar Japan seized upon Schumpeter's ideas and put them directly to work. The inflationary creation of credit, as theorized by Schumpeter, was a vital but mostly unrecognized aspect of the successful stabilization of Japanese capitalism after World War II and was integral to Japan's postwar success. It also helps to explain Japan's bubble, and the global bubbles that have followed it. The heterodox analysis presented in the book goes beyond the economic history of postwar Japan; it opens up a new view of the core circuits of modern capital in general.Less
Joseph Schumpeter's conceptions of entrepreneurship, innovation, and creative destruction have been hugely influential. He pioneered the study of economic development and of technological paradigm shifts and was a forerunner of the emerging field of evolutionary economics. He is not thought of as a theorist of credit-supercharged high-speed growth, but this is what he became in postwar Japan. As this book shows, economists and planners in postwar Japan seized upon Schumpeter's ideas and put them directly to work. The inflationary creation of credit, as theorized by Schumpeter, was a vital but mostly unrecognized aspect of the successful stabilization of Japanese capitalism after World War II and was integral to Japan's postwar success. It also helps to explain Japan's bubble, and the global bubbles that have followed it. The heterodox analysis presented in the book goes beyond the economic history of postwar Japan; it opens up a new view of the core circuits of modern capital in general.
Kumiko Nemoto
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- January 2017
- ISBN:
- 9781501702488
- eISBN:
- 9781501706219
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9781501702488.003.0002
- Subject:
- Sociology, Occupations, Professions, and Work
This chapter places the absence of women in high positions in Japanese companies in the context of Japan's coordinated capitalism by looking at state–business–labor relations, corporate governance, ...
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This chapter places the absence of women in high positions in Japanese companies in the context of Japan's coordinated capitalism by looking at state–business–labor relations, corporate governance, the family-and-welfare regime, and Japanese laws and courts. Focusing on the economic decline and intensified global competition in the 1990s, the chapter discusses how Japan's postwar default settings in the realms of corporate governance, the labor market, the family regime, and the legal system have changed to some degree, and recasts gender inequality in light of these changes. The chapter also compares sex-discrimination court cases in Japan and in the United States, focusing on how the US legal system has played a critical role in reducing employers' discriminatory practices in America, while in Japan, the laws and courts still tend to side with the Japanese business community and state.Less
This chapter places the absence of women in high positions in Japanese companies in the context of Japan's coordinated capitalism by looking at state–business–labor relations, corporate governance, the family-and-welfare regime, and Japanese laws and courts. Focusing on the economic decline and intensified global competition in the 1990s, the chapter discusses how Japan's postwar default settings in the realms of corporate governance, the labor market, the family regime, and the legal system have changed to some degree, and recasts gender inequality in light of these changes. The chapter also compares sex-discrimination court cases in Japan and in the United States, focusing on how the US legal system has played a critical role in reducing employers' discriminatory practices in America, while in Japan, the laws and courts still tend to side with the Japanese business community and state.
Scott O'Bryan
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824832827
- eISBN:
- 9780824870621
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824832827.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
Our narratives of postwar Japan have long been cast in terms almost synonymous with the story of rapid economic growth. This book reinterprets this through an exploration of the history of growth as ...
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Our narratives of postwar Japan have long been cast in terms almost synonymous with the story of rapid economic growth. This book reinterprets this through an exploration of the history of growth as a set of discourses by which Japanese “growth performance” as “economic miracle” came to be articulated. The book traces the history of growth as an object of social scientific knowledge and as a new analytical paradigm that came to govern the terms by which Japanese understood their national purposes and imagined a newly materialist vision of social and individual prosperity. The book presents accounts of the key role played by the ideal of full employment in national conceptions of recovery and of a new valorization of consumption in the postwar world that was taking shape. Both of these, the book argues, formed critical components in a constellation of ideas that even in the context of relative poverty and uncertainty coalesced into a powerful vision of a materially prosperous future. Even as Japan became the premier icon of the growthist ideal, neither the faith in rapid growth as a prescription for national reform nor the ascendancy of social scientific epistemologies that provided its technical support was unique to Japanese experience. The book thus helps to historicize a concept of never-ending growth that continues to undergird our most basic beliefs about the success of nations and the operations of the global economy.Less
Our narratives of postwar Japan have long been cast in terms almost synonymous with the story of rapid economic growth. This book reinterprets this through an exploration of the history of growth as a set of discourses by which Japanese “growth performance” as “economic miracle” came to be articulated. The book traces the history of growth as an object of social scientific knowledge and as a new analytical paradigm that came to govern the terms by which Japanese understood their national purposes and imagined a newly materialist vision of social and individual prosperity. The book presents accounts of the key role played by the ideal of full employment in national conceptions of recovery and of a new valorization of consumption in the postwar world that was taking shape. Both of these, the book argues, formed critical components in a constellation of ideas that even in the context of relative poverty and uncertainty coalesced into a powerful vision of a materially prosperous future. Even as Japan became the premier icon of the growthist ideal, neither the faith in rapid growth as a prescription for national reform nor the ascendancy of social scientific epistemologies that provided its technical support was unique to Japanese experience. The book thus helps to historicize a concept of never-ending growth that continues to undergird our most basic beliefs about the success of nations and the operations of the global economy.
Dayna L. Barnes
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- September 2017
- ISBN:
- 9781501703089
- eISBN:
- 9781501707841
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9781501703089.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, American History: 20th Century
The Allied occupation of Japan is remembered as the “good occupation.” An American-led coalition successfully turned a militaristic enemy into a stable and democratic ally. Of course, the story was ...
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The Allied occupation of Japan is remembered as the “good occupation.” An American-led coalition successfully turned a militaristic enemy into a stable and democratic ally. Of course, the story was more complicated, but the occupation did forge one of the most enduring relationships in the postwar world. Recent events, from the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan to protests over American bases in Japan to increasingly aggressive territorial disputes between Asian nations over islands in the Pacific, have brought attention back to the subject of the occupation of Japan. This book exposes the wartime origins of occupation policy and broader plans for postwar Japan. It considers the role of presidents, bureaucrats, think tanks, the media, and Congress in policymaking. Members of these elite groups came together in an informal policy network that shaped planning. Rather than relying solely on government reports and records to understand policymaking, the book also uses letters, memoirs, diaries, and manuscripts written by policymakers to trace the rise and spread of ideas across the policy network. The book contributes a new facet to the substantial literature on the occupation, serves as a case study in foreign policy analysis, and tells a surprising new story about World War II.Less
The Allied occupation of Japan is remembered as the “good occupation.” An American-led coalition successfully turned a militaristic enemy into a stable and democratic ally. Of course, the story was more complicated, but the occupation did forge one of the most enduring relationships in the postwar world. Recent events, from the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan to protests over American bases in Japan to increasingly aggressive territorial disputes between Asian nations over islands in the Pacific, have brought attention back to the subject of the occupation of Japan. This book exposes the wartime origins of occupation policy and broader plans for postwar Japan. It considers the role of presidents, bureaucrats, think tanks, the media, and Congress in policymaking. Members of these elite groups came together in an informal policy network that shaped planning. Rather than relying solely on government reports and records to understand policymaking, the book also uses letters, memoirs, diaries, and manuscripts written by policymakers to trace the rise and spread of ideas across the policy network. The book contributes a new facet to the substantial literature on the occupation, serves as a case study in foreign policy analysis, and tells a surprising new story about World War II.
Sayuri Guthrie-Shimizu
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- July 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780807835623
- eISBN:
- 9781469601830
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of North Carolina Press
- DOI:
- 10.5149/9780807882665_guthrie-shimizu.12
- Subject:
- History, American History: 20th Century
The war in the Asia-Pacific ended on August 15, 1945, with Japan's unconditional surrender to the Allied Powers. This chapter examines the quick return of baseball to Japan after its defeat, ...
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The war in the Asia-Pacific ended on August 15, 1945, with Japan's unconditional surrender to the Allied Powers. This chapter examines the quick return of baseball to Japan after its defeat, including the return of the games' attendant institutions such as national tournaments, national governing bodies, and baseball journalism. During the seven years of the Allied occupation, Japanese professional baseball evolved into a successful commercial enterprise in a format resembling the U.S. major leagues. Following the end of Allied occupation in April 1952, baseball became a national icon of peace, democracy, and freedom and established itself as the most loved mass spectator sport in postwar Japan.Less
The war in the Asia-Pacific ended on August 15, 1945, with Japan's unconditional surrender to the Allied Powers. This chapter examines the quick return of baseball to Japan after its defeat, including the return of the games' attendant institutions such as national tournaments, national governing bodies, and baseball journalism. During the seven years of the Allied occupation, Japanese professional baseball evolved into a successful commercial enterprise in a format resembling the U.S. major leagues. Following the end of Allied occupation in April 1952, baseball became a national icon of peace, democracy, and freedom and established itself as the most loved mass spectator sport in postwar Japan.
Simon Andrew Avenell
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- March 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780520262706
- eISBN:
- 9780520947672
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520262706.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
This book is an expansive history of the activists, intellectuals, and movements that played a crucial role in shaping civil society and civic thought throughout the broad sweep of Japan's postwar ...
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This book is an expansive history of the activists, intellectuals, and movements that played a crucial role in shaping civil society and civic thought throughout the broad sweep of Japan's postwar period. Weaving the analysis around the concept of shimin (citizen), the book traces the development of a new vision of citizenship based on political participation, self-reliance, popular nationalism, and commitment to daily life. It traces civic activism through six phases: the cultural associations of the 1940s and 1950s, the massive U.S.-Japan Security Treaty protests of 1960, the anti-Vietnam War movement, the antipollution and antidevelopment protests of the 1960s and 1970s, movements for local government reform, and the rise of new civic groups from the mid-1970s. This portrayal of activists and their ideas illuminates questions of democracy, citizenship, and political participation both in contemporary Japan and in other industrialized nations more generally.Less
This book is an expansive history of the activists, intellectuals, and movements that played a crucial role in shaping civil society and civic thought throughout the broad sweep of Japan's postwar period. Weaving the analysis around the concept of shimin (citizen), the book traces the development of a new vision of citizenship based on political participation, self-reliance, popular nationalism, and commitment to daily life. It traces civic activism through six phases: the cultural associations of the 1940s and 1950s, the massive U.S.-Japan Security Treaty protests of 1960, the anti-Vietnam War movement, the antipollution and antidevelopment protests of the 1960s and 1970s, movements for local government reform, and the rise of new civic groups from the mid-1970s. This portrayal of activists and their ideas illuminates questions of democracy, citizenship, and political participation both in contemporary Japan and in other industrialized nations more generally.
Hikari Hori
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- September 2018
- ISBN:
- 9781501714542
- eISBN:
- 9781501709524
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9781501714542.003.0006
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
The last chapter begins by briefly discussing postwar developments in dramatic, documentary and animated film. Discourses of nationalist and imperialist identity might no longer be overtly manifested ...
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The last chapter begins by briefly discussing postwar developments in dramatic, documentary and animated film. Discourses of nationalist and imperialist identity might no longer be overtly manifested in these genres and media in the early postwar era, but they did not dissolve with the termination of war in 1945. One of the best examples of continuity is the image of the emperor, which survived—and indeed continues today—to serve as one of the most important constituents of nation and nationalism in postwar Japanese media and visual culture. To reinforce this point, the chapter turns to the well-known double portrait of Emperor Hirohito and General Douglas MacArthur, which should be seen as a continuation of the wartime imperial portrait photograph. (120 words)Less
The last chapter begins by briefly discussing postwar developments in dramatic, documentary and animated film. Discourses of nationalist and imperialist identity might no longer be overtly manifested in these genres and media in the early postwar era, but they did not dissolve with the termination of war in 1945. One of the best examples of continuity is the image of the emperor, which survived—and indeed continues today—to serve as one of the most important constituents of nation and nationalism in postwar Japanese media and visual culture. To reinforce this point, the chapter turns to the well-known double portrait of Emperor Hirohito and General Douglas MacArthur, which should be seen as a continuation of the wartime imperial portrait photograph. (120 words)
Eiko Maruko Siniawer
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- May 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781501725845
- eISBN:
- 9781501725852
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9781501725845.003.0001
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
The Introduction suggests an expansive conception of waste which can encompass anything, material or not, which can be used and disused. Illustrating how an examination of waste can reveal what ...
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The Introduction suggests an expansive conception of waste which can encompass anything, material or not, which can be used and disused. Illustrating how an examination of waste can reveal what people find valuable and meaningful, this capacious definition of waste and its inextricability from everyday life are traced and pursued through the history of postwar Japan.Less
The Introduction suggests an expansive conception of waste which can encompass anything, material or not, which can be used and disused. Illustrating how an examination of waste can reveal what people find valuable and meaningful, this capacious definition of waste and its inextricability from everyday life are traced and pursued through the history of postwar Japan.
Steve Rabson
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824835347
- eISBN:
- 9780824871772
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824835347.003.0006
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Asian Studies
This chapter looks at the ways in which Okinawans coped with hardships arising out of Japan's surrender post-World War II and the American military occupation. By mid-August 1945, when Japan's ...
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This chapter looks at the ways in which Okinawans coped with hardships arising out of Japan's surrender post-World War II and the American military occupation. By mid-August 1945, when Japan's government leaders finally made their tragically belated decision to surrender, the occupation of Okinawa, which had started officially with the Nimitz Proclamation on April 1, was well under way. During this period, Okinawa Prefecture had lost about a third of its wartime population. Moreover, civilian communications were cut off, and many on the mainland also lost their homes in Okinawa, and even their land when the American military later seized thousands of family farms and home lots to expand existing bases and build new ones. And though evacuees from Okinawa were treated kindly in many communities where they were relocated, tensions soon arose between the evacuees and their host communities.Less
This chapter looks at the ways in which Okinawans coped with hardships arising out of Japan's surrender post-World War II and the American military occupation. By mid-August 1945, when Japan's government leaders finally made their tragically belated decision to surrender, the occupation of Okinawa, which had started officially with the Nimitz Proclamation on April 1, was well under way. During this period, Okinawa Prefecture had lost about a third of its wartime population. Moreover, civilian communications were cut off, and many on the mainland also lost their homes in Okinawa, and even their land when the American military later seized thousands of family farms and home lots to expand existing bases and build new ones. And though evacuees from Okinawa were treated kindly in many communities where they were relocated, tensions soon arose between the evacuees and their host communities.
Eiko Maruko Siniawer
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- May 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781501725845
- eISBN:
- 9781501725852
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9781501725845.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
Affluence of the Heart explores the many and various ways in which waste—be it of time, stuff, money, possessions, and resources—was thought about in Japan from the immediate aftermath of devastating ...
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Affluence of the Heart explores the many and various ways in which waste—be it of time, stuff, money, possessions, and resources—was thought about in Japan from the immediate aftermath of devastating war to the early twenty-first century.It shows how questions about waste were deeply embedded in the decisions of the everyday and shaped by the central forces of postwar Japanese life from economic growth and mass consumption to material abundance and environmentalism.What endured from the late 1950s onward was a defining element of Japan’s postwar experience: the tension between the desire to achieve and defend the privileges of middle-class lifestyles made possible by affluence, and the discomfort and dissatisfaction with the logics, costs, and consequences of that very prosperity. This tension complicated the persistent search in these decades for what might be called well-being, happiness, or a good life. Affluence of the Heart is a history of how people lived—how they made sense of, gave meaning to, and found value in the acts of the everyday.Less
Affluence of the Heart explores the many and various ways in which waste—be it of time, stuff, money, possessions, and resources—was thought about in Japan from the immediate aftermath of devastating war to the early twenty-first century.It shows how questions about waste were deeply embedded in the decisions of the everyday and shaped by the central forces of postwar Japanese life from economic growth and mass consumption to material abundance and environmentalism.What endured from the late 1950s onward was a defining element of Japan’s postwar experience: the tension between the desire to achieve and defend the privileges of middle-class lifestyles made possible by affluence, and the discomfort and dissatisfaction with the logics, costs, and consequences of that very prosperity. This tension complicated the persistent search in these decades for what might be called well-being, happiness, or a good life. Affluence of the Heart is a history of how people lived—how they made sense of, gave meaning to, and found value in the acts of the everyday.
Jennifer S. Prough
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824834579
- eISBN:
- 9780824870492
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824834579.003.0002
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Asian Studies
Situating the shōjo industry firmly within the context of the publishing industry in postwar Japan, this chapter traces the history of the genre, outlining major shifts in format, industry, and ...
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Situating the shōjo industry firmly within the context of the publishing industry in postwar Japan, this chapter traces the history of the genre, outlining major shifts in format, industry, and content. Synthesizing much of the research in Japan on the history of manga, it places the development of shōjo in the postwar era in the context of economic and social shifts. It pays particular attention to the ways that the manga publishing industry developed in relation to the proliferation of the mass media (publishing boom, magazines, television, and new media). The second half of the chapter outlines the history of the postwar development of shōjo, focusing on thematic trends and aesthetic stylings that not only characterize the genre but have come to influence other types of manga and girls' media more generally.Less
Situating the shōjo industry firmly within the context of the publishing industry in postwar Japan, this chapter traces the history of the genre, outlining major shifts in format, industry, and content. Synthesizing much of the research in Japan on the history of manga, it places the development of shōjo in the postwar era in the context of economic and social shifts. It pays particular attention to the ways that the manga publishing industry developed in relation to the proliferation of the mass media (publishing boom, magazines, television, and new media). The second half of the chapter outlines the history of the postwar development of shōjo, focusing on thematic trends and aesthetic stylings that not only characterize the genre but have come to influence other types of manga and girls' media more generally.
Dayna L. Barnes
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- September 2017
- ISBN:
- 9781501703089
- eISBN:
- 9781501707841
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9781501703089.003.0001
- Subject:
- History, American History: 20th Century
This introductory chapter provides an overview of the Allied occupation of Japan. Between 1939 and 1945, American policymakers decided to reorient rather than punish postwar Japan. They hoped to ...
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This introductory chapter provides an overview of the Allied occupation of Japan. Between 1939 and 1945, American policymakers decided to reorient rather than punish postwar Japan. They hoped to transform the current enemy into a “responsible” international actor through a short American-led military occupation. The political, religious, and even linguistic makeup of an ancient and deeply patriotic nation would be changed; Imperial Japan's colonial possessions would be liberated or redistributed. American intervention was expected to remake Japan into a pacifist economic power supportive of a postwar American order. However, President Franklin Roosevelt, congressmen, popular media figures, and high-level officials all opposed the plan at different points.Less
This introductory chapter provides an overview of the Allied occupation of Japan. Between 1939 and 1945, American policymakers decided to reorient rather than punish postwar Japan. They hoped to transform the current enemy into a “responsible” international actor through a short American-led military occupation. The political, religious, and even linguistic makeup of an ancient and deeply patriotic nation would be changed; Imperial Japan's colonial possessions would be liberated or redistributed. American intervention was expected to remake Japan into a pacifist economic power supportive of a postwar American order. However, President Franklin Roosevelt, congressmen, popular media figures, and high-level officials all opposed the plan at different points.
Kim Brandt
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824852801
- eISBN:
- 9780824868666
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824852801.003.0012
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Asian Studies
The years immediately after World War II witnessed a rising fascination in Japan with the possibilities for personal and social transformation afforded by civilian applications of wartime ...
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The years immediately after World War II witnessed a rising fascination in Japan with the possibilities for personal and social transformation afforded by civilian applications of wartime technologies. Elective cosmetic surgery, which adapted the methods of reconstructive plastic surgery developed in response to battlefield injuries, became enormously popular during the 1950s. Drawing upon the extensive discussions of new beauty practices in the popular press, news weeklies, and influential women’s magazines, this essay situates the 1950s “boom” in cosmetic surgery within a longer history of concern about the Japanese body in the context of a racialized international order. By seeking to remedy the inscrutability, apathy, and stupidity or even barbarity associated most notably with single-lidded eyes and “flat” faces, doctors and patients contributed to shaping and prolonging an older imperial formation that continues to exert a powerful influence to this day.Less
The years immediately after World War II witnessed a rising fascination in Japan with the possibilities for personal and social transformation afforded by civilian applications of wartime technologies. Elective cosmetic surgery, which adapted the methods of reconstructive plastic surgery developed in response to battlefield injuries, became enormously popular during the 1950s. Drawing upon the extensive discussions of new beauty practices in the popular press, news weeklies, and influential women’s magazines, this essay situates the 1950s “boom” in cosmetic surgery within a longer history of concern about the Japanese body in the context of a racialized international order. By seeking to remedy the inscrutability, apathy, and stupidity or even barbarity associated most notably with single-lidded eyes and “flat” faces, doctors and patients contributed to shaping and prolonging an older imperial formation that continues to exert a powerful influence to this day.
Christine R. Yano
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- January 2019
- ISBN:
- 9780520297722
- eISBN:
- 9780520969971
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520297722.003.0007
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
This chapter problematizes Japan’s premiere diva of popular song, Misora Hibari (1937–1989), as a child star who grows up in postwar Japan to become a transgressive diva. I ask what defines this ...
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This chapter problematizes Japan’s premiere diva of popular song, Misora Hibari (1937–1989), as a child star who grows up in postwar Japan to become a transgressive diva. I ask what defines this female child star, this singing shōjo (young female) on stage? What kinds of gendered negotiations between childhood and adulthood does the child star have to make, in what kinds of historical contexts, and to what effects? And finally, how does the shōjo—here, the child star–turned–diva—help define the period? The remnants of the child star give poignancy to her adult divahood as the Japanese public stood witness to her continual transformations. And in witnessing these transformations, I contend that Misora Hibari’s star-text enacted postwar Japan’s supra-text, with the complexities of an era and a nation.Less
This chapter problematizes Japan’s premiere diva of popular song, Misora Hibari (1937–1989), as a child star who grows up in postwar Japan to become a transgressive diva. I ask what defines this female child star, this singing shōjo (young female) on stage? What kinds of gendered negotiations between childhood and adulthood does the child star have to make, in what kinds of historical contexts, and to what effects? And finally, how does the shōjo—here, the child star–turned–diva—help define the period? The remnants of the child star give poignancy to her adult divahood as the Japanese public stood witness to her continual transformations. And in witnessing these transformations, I contend that Misora Hibari’s star-text enacted postwar Japan’s supra-text, with the complexities of an era and a nation.
