Japan

Anti-Militarism: Political and Gender Dynamics of Peace Movements

Citation:

Cockburn, Cyntha. 2012. Anti-Militarism: Political and Gender Dynamics of Peace Movements. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.

Author: Cynthia Cockburn

Keywords: peace movements, women and peace, women, militarism, Japan

Annotation:

Contents

Acknowledgements                                                                                           x

Glossary of Acronyms                                                                                        xi

Introduction 1

  1. Finding a Voice: Women at Three Moments of British Peace Activism             19
  2. War Resisters and Pacifist Revolution                                                             46
  3. Legitimate Disobedience: An Anti-militarist Movement in Spain                     74                    
  4. Midlands City: Faiths and Philosophies Together for Palestine                        103
  5. Saying No to NATO: Divergent Strategies                                                       126                                        
  6. Seeing the Whole Picture: Anti-militarism in Okinawa and Japan                    152
  7. A State of Peace: Movements to Reunify and Demilitarize Korea                     180
  8. Guns and Bodies: Armed Conflict and Domestic Violence                                211
  9. Towards a Different Common Sense                                                                231

 

References                                                                                                            264

Index                                                                                                                    277

 

 

 

Topics: Gender, Women, Men, Military Forces & Armed Groups, Militarism, Peacebuilding, Peace Processes Regions: MENA, Asia, East Asia, Middle East, Europe, Northern Europe, Southern Europe Countries: Japan, Palestine / Occupied Palestinian Territories, South Korea, Spain, United Kingdom

Year: 2012

The Art of the Gut: Manhood, Power, and Ethics in Japanese Politics

Citation:

LeBlanc, Robin M. 2010. The Art of the Gut: Manhood, Power and Ethics in Japanese Politics. Berkeley: University of California Press. 

Author: Robin M. LeBlanc

Topics: Gender, Men, Masculinity/ies, Governance Regions: Asia, East Asia Countries: Japan

Year: 2010

The Impact of Japanese Corporate Transnationalism on Men’s Involvement in Family Life and Relationships

Citation:

Yasuike, Akiko. 2011. “The Impact of Japanese Corporate Transnationalism on Men’s Involvement in Family Life and Relationships.” Journal of Family Issues 32 (12): 1700–25.

Author: Akiko Yasuike

Abstract:

This study examines the ways in which Japanese corporate transnationalism affects husbands’ involvement in family life and marital relationships primarily from a perspective of wives. It is based on interviews with 22 Japanese wives and 4 husbands. Studies of Japanese corporate transnationalism treat men as mere supervisors to local workers or representatives of corporations and pay little attention to their family relations. The study found that corporate transnationalism weakens the Japanese masculine corporate culture (which creates absent husbands and fathers) and consequently provides Japanese men an opportunity to consolidate family bonds and integrate themselves into family life, though not all men take advantage of this opportunity. Inasmuch as transnational corporate families are isolated from their friends and relatives in Japan, the degree and willingness of husbands’ involvement in family life has a substantial effect on the quality of marital relationships.

Keywords: gender, family, corporate transnationalism, Japanese

Topics: Economies, Gender, Masculinity/ies, Gender Roles, Gendered Power Relations, Masculinism, Households, Multi-National Corporations Regions: Asia, East Asia Countries: Japan

Year: 2011

Economic Development Policies and Women Workers: Filipina Workers in a Japanese Transplant

Citation:

 Licuanan-Galela, Niza. 2001. “Economic Development Policies and Women Workers: Filipina Workers in a Japanese Transplant.” NWSA Journal 13 (3): 169–80.

Author: Niza Licuanan-Galela

Annotation:

Introduction: Economic globalization has resulted in the integration of economies and workers on a worldwide scale. Export industrialization is one of the key strategies that has made globalization possible; central to the success of export industrialization programs are transnational corporations (TNCs) that engage in off-shore productions. Encouraged by the economic success of export industrialization, many developing countries have anchored their development programs on this economic strategy. To secure investment in their countries, governments offer inducements that often include export processing zones (EPZ) with no-strike policies, cheap but highly- skilled labor, and tax holidays. In return, the host governments expect the TNCs to create employment opportunities, and through their investments, to boost the domestic economy.

Women are the major resources for the cheap but skilled labor force that are found in the EPZs. For example, in the Philippines, women compose more than 80 percent of workers involved in export industrialization, and have formed the backbone of the country's economy (Chant 1996; Chant and Mcllwaine 1995;Hutchinson 1992). Fuentes and Ehrenreich contend that due to both biological and social reasons, women have been heavily recruited to do the labor-intensive jobs found on global assembly lines (1983). Boserup (1970) and others (Beneria and Sen 1981; Buvinic 1976; Ward 1988) contend that economic development strategies, especially those concerned with industrial development, more often led to further marginalization of women's status. Studies on women in global assembly lines indicate that women's work experiences, especially the way they are treated in these factories, have profound effects on their perception of their status (Chant and Mcllwaine 1995;Nash andFernandez-Kelly1983; Ong 1987;Poster 1998; Tiano 1994; Ward1990; Wolf 1992).

This study addresses two questions on women engaged in TNC global assembly line work.' First, what type of labor-management policies are found on global assembly lines in the Philippines? Second, how have these labor managerial policies and practices affected Filipino women workers on the global assembly line? Beyond these questions, the paper also explores the implications of these work experiences on rural women's social position in the Philippines. If global assembly-line work emerges as the most dominant form of industrial work for rural women, would it lead to the enhancement or further marginalization of women workers' status?

This research is based on a case study using in-depth interviews with Filipino women workers in a Japanese automotive, wiring-harness, assembly plant. The date provides insights on how work is engendered on the global assembly lines. It helps us understand the workplace dynamics that underlie the experiences women workers have reported in earlier research (see Chant and Mcllwaine 1995; Eviota 1992; Fuentes and Ehrenreich 1983; Grossman 1980; Ong 1987).This study also offers insights into how national development policies are transformed at the local level into labor- management policies which directly affect women's work experiences.

I argue that the working conditions in the local factories are a product of the interplay between the local culture's gender ideology and the work cultures' gender ideology. The detailed information presented here on how Japanese labor-management systems are transferred and adopted into Southeast Asian global assembly lines broadens our understanding, not only of the degree and form of transference of Japanese labor managerial practices; it also delineates the unique ways in which gender is manipulated in the work place. In global assembly lines not only are investments and technology transferred from the mother corporation to the off-shore production factories, but systems of gendered labor-management are transplanted as well.

Topics: Development, Economies, Gender, Women, Globalization, Livelihoods, Multi-National Corporations Regions: Asia, East Asia, Southeast Asia Countries: Japan, Philippines

Year: 2001

Negotiating Difference: Constructing Selves and Others in a Transnational Apparel Manufacturing Firm

Citation:

Feldman, Shelley, and Stephanie Buechler. 1998. “Negotiating Difference: Constructing Selves and Others in a Transnational Apparel Manufacturing Firm.” The Sociological Quarterly 39 (4): 623–44.

Authors: Shelley Feldman, Stephanie Buechler

Abstract:

Research on immigrant women workers in the United States and Third World women employed by multinational corporations in export-enclaves has highlighted how global movements of capital and labor are expressed in changing labor processes, working conditions, and ethnic relations in the workplace. Notably absent from this body of literature are the ways in which rural, white American women respond to the new work environments offered by direct foreign investments in the United States. Using in-depth interviews with workers and observations of the workplace and the community we explore how the Japanese purchase of an apparel manufacturing firm in upstate New York reconstituted factory floor relations. In so doing, we extend interpretations of the social construction of the labor process by recognizing the racialized and ethnicized character of rural white women. We also show how both workers and managers construct stereotypic expectations of the other that are manipulated on the shop floor in the struggle for control, recognition, and appreciation.

Topics: Economies, Ethnicity, Gender, Women, Multi-National Corporations, Race Regions: Americas, North America, Asia, East Asia Countries: Japan, United States of America

Year: 1998

Foreign Employers as Relief Routes: Women, Multinational Corporations and Managerial Careers in Japan

Citation:

Bozkurt, Ödül. 2012. “Foreign Employers as Relief Routes: Women, Multinational Corporations and Managerial Careers in Japan.” Gender, Work & Organization 19 (3): 225–53.

Author: Ödül Bozkurt

Abstract:

This article argues that multinational corporations may provide critical relief routes for women workers' progress in managerial careers in national contexts where their career paths with domestic employers remain blocked by traditional and institutional practices. It illustrates this possibility through a study of two women managers at the local head office of a foreign-owned multinational retailer in Japan and their career trajectories. The alternative career paths through foreign employers are not without their contingencies and constraints, and the article identifies the limitations of the transformative potential foreign employers could have in the larger realm of women's managerial employment in a restrictive context such as Japan. Noting that globalization incorporates different groups of workers into the global economy with different costs and rewards, the article concludes by calling for a more nuanced understanding of women's employment with multinationals and for further research that remains cognizant of the multiplicity of experiences in different contexts.

Keywords: multinational corporation, women in management, globalization, Japan

Topics: Economies, Gender, Women, Globalization, Multi-National Corporations Regions: Asia, East Asia Countries: Japan

Year: 2012

Modern Butterfly: American Perceptions of Japanese Women and their Role in International Relations, 1945–1960

Citation:

Mettler, Meghan Warner. 2014. "Modern Butterfly: American Perceptions of Japanese Women and their Role in International Relations, 1945–1960." Journal of Women's History 26 (4): 60-82.

Author: Meghan Warner Mettler

Abstract:

This article explores white Americans’ understanding of women’s rights in Japan during the U.S. post-WWII occupation (1945–1961). In contrast to many Hollywood films of the time that held up submissive Japanese women as models for their more assertive American counterparts, some U.S. women instead insisted it was Japanese women who had much to learn from them in terms of feminism. However, to do so meant looking past their own gender constraints while ignoring a rather active and robust Japanese feminist movement. As such, American women echoed imperialist assumptions that a woman’s position was inevitably worse under a backward Asian nation than in an inherently progressive Western nation. This article contributes to discussions of the role gender plays in foreign policy, as well as how efforts at feminist solidarity across international borders can be hindered by power discrepancies in terms of race and nationality.

Topics: Feminisms, Gender, Women, Political Participation, Race Regions: Americas, North America, Asia Countries: Japan, United States of America

Year: 2014

HUMAN TRAFFICKING AROUND THE WORLD: HIDDEN IN PLAIN SIGHT

Citation:

Hepburn, Stephanie, and Rita J. Simon. 2013. HUMAN TRAFFICKING AROUND THE WORLD: HIDDEN IN PLAIN SIGHT. New York: Columbia University Press.

Authors: Stephanie Hepburn, Rita J. Simon

Abstract:

An examination of human trafficking around the world including the following countries: United States, Japan, United Arab Emirates, Thailand, Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories, Colombia, Iraq, Syria, Canada, Italy, France, Iran, India, Niger, China, South Africa, Australia, United Kingdom, Chile, Germany, Poland, Mexico, Russia, and Brazil. (WorldCat)

Annotation:

Table of Contents:

Introduction

Part I: Work Visa Loopholes for Traffickers
1) United States
2) Japan
3) United Arab Emirates

Part II: Stateless Persons
4) Thailand
5) Israel & The Occupied Palestinian Territories

Part III: Unrest, displacement, and Who is in charge
6) Colombia
7) Iraq
8) Syria

Part IV: Conflation
9) Canada

Part V: Conflicting Agendas
10) Italy
11) France

Part VI: Gender Apartheid
12) Iran

Part VII: Social Hierarchy
13) India
14) Niger
15) China

Part VIII: Muti Murder
16) South Africa

Part IX: Hard-to-Prove Criterion and a slap on the wrist
17) Australia
18) United Kingdom
19) Chile
20) Germany

Part X: Transparent borders
21) Poland

Part XI: Fear Factor
22) Mexico

Part XII: Poverty and Economic Boom
23) Russia
24) Brazil

Conclusion

*Each Chapter follows the following format with some variations:

Introduction
As a destination
Internal trafficking
Trafficking abroad
What happens to victims after trafficking
What happens to traffickers
Internal efforts to decrease trafficking

 

Quotes:

"Devestation from a natural disaster...creates a sudden high demand for low-wage and largely unskilled labor. Disruption of the traditional labor supply leaves room for illicit contractors to move in, and new workers can be brought in unnoticed." (19)

"There continue to be more criminal convictions of sex traffickers than of forced-labor traffickers [However, this number of individuals victimized by forced labor may be increasing]." (32)

"Many experts state that the yakuza (organized crime) networks play a significant role in the smuggling and subsequent debt bondage of women--particularly women from China, Thailand, and Colombia--for forced prostitution in Japan. Determining the exact extent of yakuza involvement is difficult because of the covert nature of the sex industry. Consequently, the yakuza are able to minimize people's direct knowledge of their involvement...The yakuza networks work with organized crime groups from other nations, such as China, Russia, and Colombia." (49-50)

Topics: Economies, Gender, Women, Men, Girls, Boys, International Law, International Human Rights, Multi-National Corporations, Rights, Human Rights, Women's Rights, Sexual Violence, Sexual Exploitation and Abuse, Sexual Slavery, Trafficking, Human Trafficking, Labor Trafficking, Sex Trafficking Regions: Africa, West Africa, Americas, Central America, North America, South America, Asia, East Asia, Middle East, Southeast Asia, Europe, Central Europe, Eastern Europe, Western Europe, Oceania Countries: Australia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, China, Colombia, France, Germany, India, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Niger, Palestine / Occupied Palestinian Territories, Poland, Russian Federation, South Africa, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States of America

Year: 2013

Human Rights, the Sex Industry and Foreign Troops: Feminist Analysis of Nationalism in Japan, South Korea and the Philippines

Citation:

Zimelis, Andris. 2009. “Human Rights, the Sex Industry and Foreign Troops: Feminist Analysis of Nationalism in Japan, South Korea and the Philippines.” Cooperation and Conflict 44 (1): 51-71. 

Author: Andris Zimelis

Abstract:

This article explores the relationship between prostitution, nationalism and foreign policies using a feminist analysis framework. Although scholars have dealt with the theoretical role of women in nationalist projects, there is little work factually supporting these theories. There is also a paucity of works demonstrating the role of prostitution in national security policies. This article rectifies these shortcomings and demonstrates that, although prostitution is illegal in Japan, South Korea and the Philippines, these governments have played an active role in supporting and maintaining the prostitution industry geared at servicing US troops. The US troops, in turn, have protected the national security of each of these countries for all of the post-Second World War era. In this context, it seems clear that `national security' does not include the physical, economic, legal and social insecurity of Japanese, Korean and Filipino women despite their contribution to the most quintessential Realist policy — national security.

Topics: Feminisms, Gender, Women, Gender Analysis, Livelihoods, Sexual Livelihoods, Military Forces & Armed Groups, Nationalism, Political Participation, Rights, Human Rights, Security, Trafficking, Sex Trafficking Regions: Asia, East Asia, Southeast Asia Countries: Japan, Philippines, South Korea

Year: 2009

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