In an attempt to internationalize higher education to keep up with global standards, in 2014, Japanese policymakers launched their most significant program yet, the "Top Global University Project" (TGUP). In the following, the number of Japanese students spending part of their studies abroad significantly increased. However, funding was provided to very few selected universities (37 of 781 universities in 2014) implying that opportunities to study abroad differ notably across TGUP and non-TGUP funded universities and hence major differences in participation rates across these universities are likely. Furthermore, past research showed that students from families with advantaged socioeconomic status (SES) are generally more likely to study abroad than lower-SES students in numerous countries including Japan. It remains unclear whether the implementation of state programs such as TGUP may reduce social inequalities or exacerbate them. We examine both issues using data from three iterations of the largely unexploited Japan Campus Life Data (N = 41 654 students nested in N = 51 universities). Results from our multi-level trend analysis indicate that (1) TGUP funded universities show higher study abroad participation among its students, but no steeper growth rates than universities without TGUP funding; and (2) the SES-gap in the likelihood of studying abroad of students at TGUP universities significantly increased from 2013 to 2017. Our results indicate that the TGUP falls short of expectations in terms of growth in study abroad participation, while at the same time horizontal inequalities in study abroad seem to have widened at TGUP-funded universities.
This paper focuses on the concept of urban solidarity as civic activism and suggests ways of thinking about it in relation to the material and social infrastructures of the city, based on fieldwork in Japan. The paper first summarizes the literature on urban solidarity and other related concepts as alternatives to capitalist urban development and austerity urbanism, and examines the development of civil society in Japan and its different trajectory from other developed countries. It then seeks to answer the question of when urban solidarity, as exemplified by the efforts of Japanese women social entrepreneurs who have been studied through participant observation since 2013 and through twenty in-depth interviews conducted in Saitama, Osaka, and Tokyo in the spring of 2023, is likely to emerge. The study's findings are interpreted through the lens of the material and social infrastructures of urban solidarity. The study concludes that social entrepreneurs concerned with the growing social problems of Japanese society continue their determined efforts against the individualization or loneliness of urban life and the privatization of urban spaces, despite the hardening of conditions and challenges in terms of access to the physical and social infrastructures that are fundamental to the materialities and relations of urban solidarity. Women-led urban solidarity in postrecession Japan, as explored in this paper, emerges in multiple forms in a different context from the postcrisis and migratory urban environments in the Western examples, making it an interesting case to explore in more detail.
This paper takes an in-depth look into Taiwan's Bluebird Movement, a social movement that emerged in May 2024. The participants of this movement inherited many of the everyday methods utilized by the Sunflower Movement that happened in 2014. This study examines how the younger generation leverages the fan cultures they engage with and adapts them for practical applications within the Bluebird Movement. It has been observed that Taiwan's younger generation tends to view 'political activities' and 'daily activities' as equally important events, to such a degree that they would apply things seemingly ordinary in their fandom to political activities and thus break through established social norms. It was also observed that Taiwan's younger generation altered the fan culture they have adopted into their daily lives and strategically applied it to the social movement in which they participate. Furthermore, they would also extend the dedication they practice daily within their fandom toward the social movement. This paper concludes that, for young people in Taiwan, the practices associated with their interests and their political aspirations exist in a coexistent and circular relationship.
This study aims to examine nation-ness in nation-branding policy discourse. This case study deals with South Korea's nation branding from 2008, particularly through the trajectory of K-pop. The act of branding a nation ultimately results in the construction of a new form of "nation-ness as a product" and it provides economic benefits. It is so attractive for a government. However, at the same time, it is so hard to succeed. The nation-ness sometimes can be a reason not to consume. Nation branding, therefore, requires sensitive control of the relationship between culture and nation. While associating cultural attractions with the nation, one should not give too much nation-ness to culture. This study examines policy discourses in South Korean political documents regarding the relationship between K-pop and the nation. The survey revealed the following findings: Even though nation branding is a policy for making nation-ness an object of consumption, K-pop and the Korean Wave were disconnected from the policy discourse of South Korea. There are three reasons for this finding: the arms-length principle, economic perspective, and moving up the pecking order.
The global spread of COVID-19 has significantly affected cultural participation worldwide, including in cities and countries in East Asia. Scholars have observed that cultural activities and events transitioned online due to policy responses, such as lockdowns and other measures that restricted mobility. However, relatively little attention has been paid to face-to-face cultural activities and events held in physical spaces during the pandemic. Tokyo occupies a distinctive position for examining on-site gatherings in place for cultural participation, as its infection control measures are less stringent compared with other East Asian cities. This study investigated individuals' cultural participation in physical cultural event spaces in Tokyo during the pandemic. Data were collected through an online questionnaire survey targeting users of various cultural event spaces, including theaters, small theaters, concert/music halls, nightclubs, music venues, and doujin events. The analysis revealed four participation patterns: continuous participation, corona non-participation, gradually increasing participation, and new participation, and identified the social factors influencing these patterns. Although cultural participation in physical venues was reduced owing to the risk of infection, this study found that the genres of cultural activities, attachment to places, and social ties contributed to the diversity of participation patterns. These findings suggest that while cultural participation has diminished for some respondents, it was also sustained in varied ways.
In this study, we examine the relationship between young people's musical tastes and demographic variables using data from an international comparative survey of Japan, South Korea, and the United States (US). A feature of this study is the analysis of the characteristics of cultural omnivorousness in each country and the factors that determine it. Most studies of cultural omnivorousness have focused on the West. This study's analysis of Japan and South Korea provides valuable insights. The results show that, first, the symbolic boundary separating omnivores from univores in each country is rock and urban in Japan, anime songs and rock in South Korea, and anime songs and K-pop in the US. In general, there is a preference for genres that are removed from the musical culture of one's own country; when this is the case, omnivorousness has an affinity with a cosmopolitan orientation. Second, in Japan, South Korea, and the US, people who like a wide variety of music genres tend to be more confident in their own musical tastes. This suggests that omnivores are not culturally tolerant. In other words, the omnivore selects music with a distinctive aesthetic sense that seems to be consistent with the characteristics of emerging cultural capital. Third, in terms of the factors that define cultural omnivorousness, socioeconomic factors such as father's educational background and living arrangements have an influence in South Korea and the US, but no such influence is confirmed in Japan. This trend may be specific to young people in Japan.
The relationships between youth culture and social transitions are examined through a Bourdieusian analysis of musical culture and inequality in contemporary Japan. Employing Bourdieu's concepts of habitus, capital, field, and space, the traditional divide between youth cultural studies and transition research is addressed. Using mixed methods and combining multiple correspondence analysis (MCA) of the survey data ( n = 1425) and in‐depth interviews ( n = 42), this study examines how cultural practices in music intersect with career trajectories and social positions. The MCA reveals that musical knowledge correlates with high social status indicators such as better educational attainment and household income, while participation correlates with educational attainment. Young people occupy a lower social position; however, their active concert attendance patterns minimize status distinctions along the axis of musical participation. Through interview analysis, three key relationships between youth culture and transitions are identified: deep artistic engagement leading to arts‐related career choices, common habitus manifesting in both artistic perception and professional expertise, and the important role of song lyrics in helping young people cope with adversities during transitions. The findings show that habitus mediates between cultural practices and social trajectories, offering a theoretical bridge between studies on youth culture and transition research. Musical preferences and engagement patterns vary by generation, but the influence of music transcends age groups, influencing those who engage with it frequently. This research contributes to both youth studies and cultural sociology, as Bourdieu's theoretical framework provides understanding of the complex relationship between cultural practices and social inequality in Japan.
Significant health disparities exist between gay and bisexual men (GBM) and the general population in Japan and internationally. Social capital is recognized as a key factor for positive health and well-being outcomes, including HIV prevention behaviors, among GBM. However, limited research examines how the sexual orientation of alters (i.e., possessors of resources within social capital networks) impacts access to these resources. In this study, a cross-sectional online survey of 1564 gay and bisexual men in Tokyo was conducted to investigate how social capital access varies by GBM and heterosexual alters, independent of socioeconomic factors. Multivariable logistic regression indicated that access to heterosexual social capital was positively correlated with younger age, higher education, full-time employment, good self-rated health, and bisexual behavior. In contrast, gay social capital access was positively associated with being out to close friends, identifying as gay, and attending gay venues, and negatively associated with student status, living outside central Tokyo, bisexual behavior, and using gay mobile apps predominantly for sex. These findings highlight differences in the distribution and determinants of gay versus heterosexual social capital among GBM in Greater Tokyo. To close health disparities for Tokyo GBM, policy interventions should consider groups deprived of gay social capital, such as those who avoid gay venues, live outside central Tokyo, or engage in bisexual behaviors, as these individuals may benefit most from targeted support.
This book makes a significant contribution to the field of base politics in international political science, sociology, and social movement studies, employing a multifaceted approach to elucidate the role of subnational and national actors in the anti-base movement in South Korea and Japan. Base politics is a conceptual framework that explains the politics of military bases stationed in foreign countries and areas. Alexander Cooley, an influential political researcher in the field, explains when negotiations over formal military bases between the United States and other countries are likely to be stable or not. In general, consolidated democracies (in contrast with authoritarian countries and the countries in transition from authoritarian to consolidated democracies) offer the most credible environment for a base agreement, as they are more likely to honor international contracts (Cooley, 2008). While base politics research in political science has tended to focus on national actors and political elites (Bitar, 2016; Calder, 2008; Cooley, 2005, 2008; Kawana & Takahashi, 2020), a few researchers have focused on the importance of the social movement actors embedded in the political structure (Lutz, 2009; Vine, 2015; Yeo, 2011). Andrew Yeo's work (Yeo, 2011) is one of those that primarily analyzes the advocacy networks of anti-military activism and the political opportunity structure in which the activism is embedded. While situated within the field of contentious politics, as exemplified by the work of Yeo, a major feature of this book is that it is based on social movement theory and attempts to compare the framing of the discourse produced by activists within the local government context in which the respective US military bases are stationed in Japan and South Korea. The author summarized this book as essentially a qualitative comparative study, but it is outstanding for its additional quantitative examination. The book draws upon a rich array of data, including fieldwork interviews, participant observation, and protest activities, to illuminate the complex dynamics at play. In particular, it sheds light on the ways in which subnational actors, including activists, local elites, and latent supporters, interact with national actors to shape the course of the anti-base movement in these countries. As will be discussed in greater detail below, the book also advanced the social movement theory of framing by adding the concept of activists' strategic arena and agency. how activists variously take advantage of the major changes these bases go through (i.e., status quo disruptions); adopt resonant, if surprisingly mundane, movement frames (i.e., movement framing); and attract third-party support from local political elites (i.e., elite allies). Activist actions, strategies, and dilemmas in these contexts translate into fluctuating levels of oppositional mobilization across host communities. (p. 3) Methodologically, this book employs a social movement study approach to contend that, despite the prevailing skepticism among international security researchers against the effectiveness of social movements, contentious base politics represents a social force that merits attention as a factor influencing domestic and international politics. The principal actors in this context are subnational actors: (a) activists, (b) latent adherents, and (c) local political elites. Drawing on the approaches of Cynthis Gordon and James Jasper (Gordon & Jasper, 1996; Jasper, 2006), who focused on the agency and strategies of social movement actors, the author argues that focusing on the rhetoric of these subnational actors is a way to move away from an overemphasis on structuralist explanations in social movement studies (p. 12, 29). The actors assumed to be involved in base politics, including these subnational actors, are the (d) host state, the (e) basing state, and the (f) general public. It is evident that activists are already firmly opposed to US military bases for political or philosophical reasons. They dedicate considerable time and energy to organizing protests, discussing rhetorical strategies, and attempting to garner third parties' support. Latent adherents are typically individuals who are discontented but remain on the periphery of a movement. They are key targets for activists seeking to mobilize them. It is relatively uncommon for these actors to join forces in large-scale mobilizations. These actors (i.e., activists and adherents) constitute the base opponents. Activists also sought to mobilize local elites. Although local elites have political potential that activists cannot achieve on their own, gaining their cooperation is not easy. The arguments presented in this book can be summarized as follows: (1) Base opponents leverage local community dynamics surrounding US military bases. Significant alterations to the status of military bases, including expansion, relocation, downsizing, and closure, can disrupt the established patterns of daily life in surrounding communities. Such changes can serve to mobilize opposition or, conversely, result in the demobilization of opponents. (2) The discourse of activists concerning US military bases is characterized by rhetorical pragmatism, as opposed to ideological or nationalist dogmatism. (3) The proactive stance of local political leaders serves to further intensify the anti-base movement. Furthermore, the host country government (South Korea and Japan) and the United States, as the basing state, also function as key actors in this context. It is unlikely that these national actors will directly engage with opposition groups or voice their opposition. However, they are significant actors who interact with base opposition groups and local political elites. In addition, the general public interacts with all these actors. The public's opinions sometimes influence the actions of activists, host nations, and the US military. The agency of these actors will be compared and contrasted between Japan and South Korea. Chapter 2 examines the mobilization and demobilization of anti-base movements in the areas surrounding the bases. Major changes to long-standing bases are externally imposed structural conditions that base opponents must confront. In contrast, movement framing occurs through decision-making processes that are internal to the movement. Departing from an overly structuralist account of social movement studies, the author focuses on the role of the aforementioned actors and their agency. From the perspective of focusing on the activists and their agency, the author explains the three main rhetorical approaches adopted by the activists: (1) nationalism (expressing indignation at the supposed breach of national sovereignty and ethnic unity), (2) antimilitarist pacifism (oriented ideologically), and (3) pragmatism (challenging everyday grievances such as pollution and crimes), and places them in the context of South Korean and Japanese society. The author also discusses the selection of survey cases in this chapter. Chapter 3 examines the current structural changes surrounding US military bases, such as expansion, contraction, and withdrawal, and the process by which activists seize the opportunity to develop anti-base movements through both successful and unsuccessful cases. In the base towns most significantly impacted by the base expansion, latent adherents joined forces with activists to protest the unwanted intrusion into their daily lives. The author points out that resisting the confusion surrounding the US military bases caused by the expansion is a "battle against time," emphasizing the importance of maintaining the window of opportunity for opposition by delaying the execution of the military base construction. The anti-base movement in Nago City (Okinawa, Japan) has particularly employed this tactic to an exceptional level, but in many cases, such delaying tactics can only buy time. Therefore, the author argues that the biggest challenge for activists is "to persuade latent adherents that the transition they are fighting against is not a foregone conclusion" (pp. 97–98). In Chapter 4, the author examines the discrepancies in rhetorical responses to US military bases and assesses the impact of these discrepancies on movement mobilization from the perspectives of nationalism, ideology, and pragmatism. The author's findings indicate that pragmatism tends to be more effective in mobilizing local supporters and local elites in the three aforementioned framings. This is an intriguing academic discovery of the conscious gap between what the activists themselves believe and what they say (for further insight, see Kim, 2021). Conversely, as the author argues, "parochial framing limits the discursive boundaries of anti-base activism to technical, procedural matters, and invites only incremental achievements" (p. 128). Chapter 5 examines the role of local elites in activists' search for alliances. Alliances with local elites facilitate the undertaking of actions that would otherwise be challenging to accomplish independently, such as "holding local referenda, creating administrative hurdles to base construction, and articulating their grievances in negotiations with the state" (p. 131). However, there are also cases in which local elites spearhead anti-base movements independently. Local activists typically seek to gain the attention of elites, yet the nature of the relationship between local activists and local elites can range from mutual support to mutual contempt. This has implications for the mobilization of opposition movements. In towns where protests are taking place, the base issue is so prominent that local opponents can form temporary alliances with local elites. In contrast, in towns where there has been minimal civic movement, the involvement of elites is extremely important in transforming bystanders and some opponents of the movement into unexpected protesters. In the concluding chapter, the author conceptualizes the human dilemma that is obscured by the pretexts of national security at the national level and alliance cohesion at the interstate level. The human dilemma is "of whether to confront or embrace life alongside machines and actions of war" (p. 161). Confronting the military power of the US military is surprisingly challenging in Japan and South Korea, especially because path dependency and inertia are deeply rooted in base politics at the interstate level. However, "with all the odds stacked against anti-base activists, they nonetheless seek out opportunities to build broad-based movements" (p. 161). In the conclusion of the book, the author presents a series of arguments in support of the following findings. First, activists do not miss rare opportunities to cause significant changes in the current situation of bases. Second, even as they pursue international security goals, activists tend to clearly express their dissatisfaction in everyday, ordinary language. Third, while activists build relationships with local political elites, they sometimes emerge as unexpected veto players in domestic and international base politics. In these patterns of practice, activists face dilemmas. First, encouraging latent adherents' participation may undermine activists' long-term goals. In many cases, activists use delaying tactics to slow down the current construction. In addition to the physical obstruction of the sit-in at the gate of Camp Schwab, the activists contest procedural legal and institutional issues at the expert level. However, overemphasizing these procedural issues can cause activists to lose sight of their original goal of the protest. Alternatively, there is a risk that delaying tactics will themselves be seen as a form of sham resistance to an inevitable outcome. Second, rhetorical pragmatism constrains the scope for contestation, preventing activists and local authorities from raising fundamental issues while highly mobilizing at the subnational level. Third, activists seeking to engage local elites face a common trade-off. The involvement of elites can lead to the spread of appeals to an anti-base agenda among potential supporters, which can further consolidate local advantages. At the same time, there is also the risk that the movement will become diluted and moderate. The book's contribution is its analysis of the dilemma activists face from the above-mentioned patterns of activist practice. Moreover, the cases presented in this book are also analyzed in the Appendix as a quantitative analysis of political protest events, employing a zero-inflated negative binomial regression model (ZINB). The data used for the analysis were derived from Japanese, South Korean, and English news media sources. In this analysis, the number of individuals participating in the protest activities is defined as the dependent variable, while contextual factors (new construction or expansion of existing facilities, relocation, partial return, closure), framings (nationalistic, ideological, pragmatic), and local elites are defined as explanatory variables. Additionally, trigger events, joint operations, security threats, population size, and local financial autonomy are defined as control variables. The results of the ZINB analysis indicated that the probability of protests occurring was higher when the base was expanded, when a trigger event occurred, and when an alliance with local elites was formed. Furthermore, the expansion of a base was found to have a positive effect on the number of protesters, whereas the reduction of a base had a negative effect. The pragmatic frame was identified as the sole factor that contributed to an increase in the number of participants, whereas the nationalistic and ideological frames were not found to be significant. The control variables demonstrated a positive and significant correlation with the number of protesters when joint operations were in place, when the distance from the source of the security threat was far from the protest site, and when the local finances were more independent. Incidentally, the reviewer has also conducted the research on the movement against the construction of helipads at the Northern Training Area in Takae, Higashi Village, in the northern part of Okinawa Island, which has not been fully addressed as a case study in this book (1996–to date), and the environmental movement surrounding PFAS contamination, which is and should be highly likely to be caused by US military bases (2016–to date) (Mori, 2021, 2023). The findings of this study, which demonstrate that pragmatic framing was effective in protest events that occurred between 2000 and 2015, are valid in that they can be confirmed in the cases that were conducted by the reviewer. On the other hand, while the author criticizes the "structuralist bias," the national structural variable could prove to be a significant factor for local activists' action when cases are conducted in countries other than South Korea and Japan or at different points in time. For instance, the centralized state tendency of both countries may contribute to activists seeking support from local elites rather than central elites. Another determinant is the relatively high inequality of the host country in the Japan–US and South Korea–US Status of Forces Agreements, which may be a contributing factor to the observed pattern of local activists mobilizing local elites rather than central elites (cf. Sasayama, 2019). In any case, this book makes a notable contribution to base politics and social movement studies. It does so by focusing on activists' framing process, thereby opening up the possibility of analyzing activist patterns of practice. Moreover, the book contributes to the understanding of the activists' strategies and dilemmas of anti-base movement rhetoric at the local level in Japan and South Korea. I look forward to the author's future research. Data sharing not applicable to this article as no datasets were generated or analysed during the current study.
While social scientists have increasingly focused on the relationship between fields of study and labor market outcomes, our understanding of how men and women differ in the utilization of college major skills at work and how such differences are linked to labor market outcomes remains limited. To fill this gap, I use nationally representative cross-sectional data from Japan to examine how fields that offer portable skills, which are beneficial across different employers, are related to earnings and employment likelihood. Results from ordinary least squares regression and Heckman two-stage models indicate that fields offering portable skills, such as medicine and science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM), have a positive association with earnings for both genders. Moreover, results from linear probability models suggest that law/business, medicine, and STEM have a positive relationship with employment status among women. The relationship is stronger for women than men, showing no differences between mothers with young children (0-5 years) and nonmothers. These findings indicate that acquiring portable skills through education makes women's careers more compatible with their family responsibilities. Considering the increasing salience of fields of study in the world of work, these findings provide important insights into the interplay between gender, higher education, and labor market stratification in Japan.
Although sociological neoinstitutionalist thought has made indelible imprints across the social sciences in Japan, its incorporation into Japanese sociology at large has been relatively limited, and its broader applications to analyses of global social phenomena using World Society Theory are even less prominent. To empirically gauge the emergence, growth, content evolution, and production/consumption patterns of this scholarship, sociological neoinstitutionalist works published across the 1977-2021 period by authors affiliated with Japanese institutions were manually coded for content, marquee publications/authors cited, primary author's final degree discipline, and publication's outlet field. The article briefly introduces core ideas in sociological neoinstitutionalism and World Society Theory before delving into the survey details and results, an explanation for the literature's distinctive pattern of incorporation into Japanese sociology, and concluding thoughts on its theoretical implications for Japanese sociology and beyond. The study finds that this scholarship has been produced and consumed primarily throughout-in declining order-business-related fields, education, and sociology. As its incorporation diversified in the mid-1990s, bifurcation occurred between a growing share of "middle-of-the-road" sociological neoinstitutionalist scholarship that embraced the range of ideas that broke from the "old" institutionalisms, and a small and declining share that pushed the phenomenological and social constructionist thrust of the theory to its limits and/or acknowledged the perspective's global-comparative applicability. These patterns seem to track the concomitant theoretical, substantive, and methodological inclinations within the discipline in Japan. Sociological neoinstitutionalist thought holds promise for a range of research areas interested in exploring domestic and global determinants of social change.
Japanese Journal of SociologyEarly View BOOK REVIEW Review of Schieder, Chelsea Szendi. 2021. Coed Revolution: The Female Student in the Japanese New Left. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press Robin M. LeBlanc, Corresponding Author Robin M. LeBlanc [email protected] Washington and Lee University Correspondence Email: [email protected]Search for more papers by this author Robin M. LeBlanc, Corresponding Author Robin M. LeBlanc [email protected] Washington and Lee University Correspondence Email: [email protected]Search for more papers by this author First published: 16 April 2024 https://doi.org/10.1111/ijjs.12155Read the full textAboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onEmailFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditWechat No abstract is available for this article. Early ViewOnline Version of Record before inclusion in an issue RelatedInformation
