Perfectly Japanese: Making Families in an Era of Upheaval

Twentieth Century Japan: The Emergence of a World Power #14

by Merry Isaacs White

Are Japanese families in crisis? In this dynamic and substantive study, Merry Isaacs White looks back at two key moments of "family making" in the past hundred years—the Meiji era and postwar period—to see how models for the Japanese family have been constructed. The models had little to do with families of their eras and even less to do with families today, she finds. She vividly portrays the everyday reality of a range of families: young married couples who experience fleeting togetherness until the first child is born; a family separated by job shifts; a family with a grandmother as babysitter; a marriage without children.

Genres: Japan, History

265 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2002

Reviews

[Richard · Rating 3 out of 5]

White noted, as have other authors like Sharon Siever (see below), that the 'Family' with its patriarchal head and its 'good wife/wise mother' backing the father up and caring for the children was largely a creation by the Meiji leaders as a necessary state sponsored project if Japan was to ward off colonial subjegation by the West. Its goal was to join the club of other Imperial powers like England, Germany, and the USA by becoming a ‘rich nation/strong army.’ After the defeat of WWII the Japanese government, at the behest of the Occupying Americans, extolled a 'more democratic, egalitarian' family, per White. But the stay-at-home wife was then seen as the 'professional manager' of the household and the children while the father was the 'corporate warrior' working very long hours and barely seeing, let alone engaging with, the children. She then argued that economic necessity arising out of the increasing consumerism of the 1970’s and ‘80’s led to women delaying marriage and the decline of the birth rate by the late 1980's to 1.54. The recession of the 1990's further entrenched these dynamics despite attempts by the government to exhort women out of their 'selfishness' and to live up to Japan's 'beautiful family traditions.'

White's basic premise is that families in Japan have never fit these idealized notions. In descriptive, non-academic, largely quite readable prose she provides thumbnail sketches of families living in a wide array of times and places to prove her point. Claiming that this book is based on 'my research' she does not articulate who her subjects were, how she obtained information from them, etc. She also fails to clearly note exactly how and where she arrived at some of her impressions.

For example, are so many aging men/grandfathers, raised post WWII where their mothers and wives took care of them, really so willing to do the grocery shopping or other chores around the house in order to help out their wives? White opines that middle aged couples are 'ashamed' to have their aging parents live in some kind of residential facility. Where are the data to support these claims? I personally know of two families in recent years who were quite willing to and happy with the placement of their aging mothers living with dementia into residential care facilities.

White, correctly in my opinion, noted in 2002 when this book was published that during the 1990's the government had been long on criticism and exhortation to try to get families ‘to mend their ways’ but short on actual, let alone effective, policy making that might make it more likely and easier for women to marry sooner and to have more children. In fact, she described how the government gave women mixed messages about this. On the one hand, it encouraged women to engage in consumerism in order to boost the economy. On the other, it then criticized them for being 'selfish' and risking the health and welfare of their children by working. And it did nothing to ensure women made salaries equal to men.

Unfortunately, these processes have continued to be the case in the last few years with so called Abenomics, Womennomics, and Equal Pay for Equal Work policies offered by Prime Mininster Abe. Careful analyses by pundits at Japan Focus, for example, has shown that these proposals are largely sweet sounding marketing ploys that lack any real substance. Ie, Abe has not tried to alter longstanding, admittedly complex, and entrenched economic and social dynamics. In fact, if anything Abe wants to lead the country back to its glorious pre-war past when it was 'a beautiful nation.' Meanwhile, the demographic time bomb continues to tick, tick, tick.

For those who want more in-depth analysis of a smaller number of women struggling with these issues where the research methodology and conclusions are more clearly articulated I recommend the following two books: Susan Hall Vogel's The Japanese Family in Transition or Susan D Holloway's Women and family in Contemporary Japan . For those who want some more historical perspective on women in Japanese society Flowers in Salt by Sharon Sievers or Isami's House by Gail Bernstein are both highly informative and more clearly articulated than White's book.

[Craig · Rating 2 out of 5]

For a book published by an academic press, probably coulda been more academic....

First half was somewhat interesting, second half felt like a retread of the first, and the last chapter was a glorified blog post of random Japanese things she tried to attach "family" to.

[Julia Bainbridge · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of my favorite professors at BU.