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Daftar isi
1. Social Stratification in Contemporary Japan................................................................................................. 1

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Social Stratification in Contemporary Japan

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Abstrak (Abstract): "Social Stratification in Contemporary Japan" edited by Kenji Kosaka is reviewed.
Teks lengkap: Social Stratification in Contemporary Japan. Edited by KENJI KOSAKA. London and New York:
Kegan Paul International, 1994. xvi, 220 pp. $76.50.
This book, by a group of Japanese sociologists, makes available recent Japanese scholarship on social
stratification. Much of the discussion is based on data from the "Social Stratification and Social Mobility" (SSM)
studies, the most recent data presented being from the 1985 survey.
In the introduction, Kenji Kosaka reviews the historical background of social stratification in Japan, emphasizing
a modern "tendency toward a leveling among people and classes" (p. 10). Studies of class and stratification in
Japan date from at least the 1920s. The SSM surveys, repeated every ten years since 1955, have examined
class structure, stratification and consciousness, social mobility, and in the 1985 survey, women's status and
consciousness.
In chapter 2, Kosaka discusses the theoretical, historical and comparative frameworks of the book. The authors
address eight issues: class and status structure and distribution; class or status group relations; objective and
subjective class or status identification; how individuals are assigned to certain class or status positions; change
over time; inter- and intragenerational mobility; and problems of class or status perception. Japanese scholars
have been interested in both the universal and particularly Japanese consequences of industrialization, and
have begun co debate the nature of the transition to a "postmodern" condition.
Chapter 3, also by Kosaka, examines social inequality based on differences in income, education, wealth, and
ethnic minority status, and discusses changes over the past thirty years. Income and educational disparities are
shown to have generally decreased during the postwar era, though income disparity has recently increased.
Kosaka provides brief historical sketches of, but no real data on, inequality or discrimination among Koreans,
Ainu, Burakumin, and foreign workers. Three classification schemes are used to discuss changes in
stratification in postwar Japan.
Kazuo Seiyama examines intergenerational and intragenerational occupational mobility in chapters 4 and 5,
respectively. Intergenerational mobility reflects structural changes in the Japanese economy, and various
cleavages in the mobility structure are seen to exist. Seiyama also shows that the smaller the firm, the higher
the interfirm mobility; that the larger the company, the greater the internal mobility; and that in either large or
small firms, white-collar workers are more internally mobile than are blue-collar workers. He criticizes "dual
structure" theorists for basing their arguments on measures of "gross mobility" instead of "relative mobility."
In chapter 6, Kosaka reports on "Perceptions of Class and Status." "Distributional images" of class are shown to
vary among people with higher and lower social attributes. Kosaka also discusses the discrepancy between
government surveys and SSM data in the numbers of Japanese identifying themselves as middle class. Class is
important in considering marriage, schools, political support, and friends.
Junsuke Hara analyzes "Political Attitudes and Social Strata" in chapter 7. He suggests ideological and cultural
bases for the support of conservative or reformist parties in the early 1950s, and he provides a social and
political explanation of the collapse of support for reformist parties (chiefly the JSP) in the 1980s.
"Women's Changing Status and Status Identification" are discussed by Michiko Naoi in chapter 8. Despite
objective inequality, women tend to subjectively identify themselves toward the higher end of the social scale.
Naoi explains this in terms of "status borrowing," whereby women "judge their status on the basis of their
husband's attributes" (p. 159). This is in turn linked to Japanese women's as yet traditional ideas regarding
gender roles (pp. 159-62). Younger and more educated women, however, hold somewhat less traditional
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attitudes(p. 163).
In the conclusion, Kosaka provides a summary of the previous chapters and discusses several recent trends,
including the increase in the numbers of foreign workers and the rise in land prices during the 1980s.
My main reservations about this book ate that despite Kosaka's claim that it has been written for the general
reader (p. xii) there remain passages, indeed chapters, which are rather theoretically or methodologically
challenging or problematic, and that the discussion often tends to be of the 1985 SSM survey, not necessarily of
social stratification in Japan as such. In providing information on a range of issues and debates, however, the
book should prove a useful contribution to the literature on stratification and diversity in Japan.
JAMES E. ROBERSON Sugiyama Jogakuen University
Subjek: Nonfiction; Social conditions & trends; Culture; Social classes; History;
Lokasi: Japan
Judul: Social Stratification in Contemporary Japan
Pengarang: Roberson, James E
Judul publikasi: The Journal of Asian Studies
Volume: 55
Edisi: 3
Halaman: 733-734
Jumlah halaman: 2
Tahun publikasi: 1996
Tanggal publikasi: Aug 1996
Tahun: 1996
Penerbit: Cambridge University Press
Tempat publikasi: Ann Arbor
Negara publikasi: United Kingdom
Subjek publikasi: Social Sciences: Comprehensive Works, Political Science--International Relations, Asian
Studies, Literature
ISSN: 00219118
CODEN: JASNBR
Jenis sumber: Scholarly Journals
Bahasa publikasi: English
Jenis dokumen: Book Review-Mixed
Nomor aksesi: 03100629
ID dokumen ProQuest: 230403180
URL Dokumen: http://search.proquest.com/docview/230403180?accountid=25704
Hak cipta: Copyright Association for Asian Studies, Inc. Aug 1996
Terakhir diperbarui: 2011-08-09

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