Category Archives: International Soc

Country’s status and culture

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by Rina Terasaki

In this globalized time, I often happen to see foreign cultures in Japan. Also, Japan expresses many of its traditional and pop ‘culture’ to the world at the same time. It is interesting that ‘only’ culture, but it has relation with its home country’s governance.

I have heard of such insistence in a book written by a Japanese author: ‘When a country is developed enough, the culture of the country would be able to be recognized.’ It means when people see culture (including; music, arts, dramas) of different country, they firstly tend to see its background’s status. If the status is high enough, in other words the economy is at high level, finally it can be recognized. For example, Korean movies and music were not familiar to Japanese people several decades ago, but with growth of Korean economy, those movies and K-pop music started to be recognized by Japanese people and even spread around the world. It does not only simply mean Japanese people recognized the K-pop music and Korean movies, but also means they recognized ‘Korea’ nation itself as well-developed.

In globalized society, a large number of information swirling around us. In such situation, media takes a big role to give various impressions in people’s mind. Therefore, media are used to export ideas in this way. Some say behind K-pop’s popularity there is strategy of the government. Korean Deputy Foreign Minister included additional about five billion Korean won for cultural exchange in this September, and it is said most of it is going to be spent for K-pop market. It is thought that attracts of culture can make the country itself effective for foreign diplomacy.

It seems like a new way of diplomacy, however, Japanese government in colonial age used the same way to stand its status ahead western powerful countries. For example, Ukiyoe (art), Kabuki, Sumo and other ‘traditional’ Japanese culture were exported abroad in this period and it made an effort to express ‘Japan’ to western life and to insist existence of Japan as a ‘nation.’

As I mentioned, it can be said that image of culture are strongly connected to country’s diplomatic achievement. Also, media takes its part to spread cultural information much easily that brings people many positive images of the country.

Resources:

http://japanese.joins.com/article/266/160266.html

岩渕功一『越える文化・交錯する境界』2004，山川出版社

Global market

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by Sian Taylor

In my last blog post I would like to examine once again the Global Market and what it is doing to people. Initially I would like to refresh the arguments of these new influences from the Western world in India and what this is doing to arranged marriages. In a second moment I would like to talk about what marketing is doing in Asia and the developing countries and the absurdity of what companies are trying to sell to people.

By broadcasting American and European films and series in India, the 20% of the upper class and middle class, either try to westernise themselves as much as possible in the first case, or would like to follow the western lifestyle, but don’t have the money to do so.

By watching these kind of television programs, women want to copy what their idols do, and marry for love, but unfortunately, in most cases, they won’t be able to do so and they will probably live in dissatisfaction.

But what to do? The answer is not simple: On one hand people western people look at the arranged marriages as something barbaric and feel that they should help India to become more Westernised and “civilized”. On the other, this globalization and this will to copy globalised countries is bringing India many problems. Women want to be like the western women, free to do what they want, men want to continue with the traditions and think of the western culture as something that brings disruption and un-harmony.

India is trying to adopt globalization to try to improve its level of poverty, but I think it’s just the wrong way to act about things. Trying to change India into another copy of America and Europe, is just really the wrong way to try to resolve issues, that will bring many other, more complicated issues. By trying to make Indian women become American, in order to improve their lifestyles, will just bring many marriage disruptions and tensions in the society.

Related to this is the globalist marketing that is creating in people problems and dissatisfaction with themselves, and the need to spend loads of money to look like a western person. Girls all over Asia put their bodies through traumatising experiences in order to look thinner, with bigger eyes, bigger breasts etc, to look like something that they will never look like, and that, to tell the truth is neither pretty or sexy, but, in most cases, just artificial and fake.

Finally the most shocking example of how global marketing is playing with people’s minds, I think is the skin lightening and darkening creams. More and more common in Asia, are these lightening creams, because it is thought that the lighter the skin is, the more beautiful and successful you become. The “funny” thing is though, that in Europe and America, it’s exactly the opposite!

People spend more and more money on these fake tan, darkening skin products, to look more beautiful. I think this should really make us think about what we are doing to ourselves, and start to think with our own minds, instead of what people want to make us think.

There are many different types of beauty, at least one for every different person in the world, so trying to all become the same person, appears to be the wrong way to go about things.

Media and Gender: Do Japanese TV Commercials Deepen Gender Gap?

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by Sanae Tanaka

On Japanese TV, you see a lot of advertisement commercials for alcohol, such as beers, whiskey and non-alcoholic drinks. In these TV commercials, mostly beautiful women are holding the product and smiling to the camera. This is something very “traditional” to use woman as a symbolic character in alcohol advertisement, because advertisement itself is often targeting male consumers. For example, every year, many Japanese alcohol companies have competition for “Campaign girl of the year” and recruit young girls as a “campaign girl”. In the poster and advertisement of the “campaign girl”, the girl is always wearing bikini or sexy dress and the advertisement is spreading and will be posted all over the pubs and bars in Japan every year.

It is obvious that women have been “sexual object” as a product for men in Japan. Beautiful women wearing sexy clothes and holding alcohol is very male domineering and happened to be good tool to selling these products. However the problem is that alcohol advertisements have not changed so much for long time. There are more feminism movements than before in Japan and they have become popular. However, although feminism and post-feminism ideas have become gradually known to Japanese, the way of advertising men targeted products have not changed their idea. That men dominate women socially, culturally, traditionally and sometimes as sexual objects is the reality of Japanese media.

It is obvious that in Japan, even in the media field, male dominant situations still strongly exist and the ideal women’s role is still being men’s dream. Women are still being sexual object for men and even for commercial as a product. Strong women are only accepted for women itself, and men’s idea towards women have not changed much. Because we see the media all around us everywhere, we can say that it has strong impact on our idea.

To change the present gender stereotype situation, the role of media is necessary, however, to change the gender stereotype is not only a problem with media, but the things that consist media, such as culture, history, tradition, morals and national identity, are very significant and cannot be ignored and should be considered carefully.

References

van Zoonen, Liesbet (1994) Feminist Media Studies. London: Sage.

Dow, B.J. and Wood, J.T. (eds.) (2006) The SAGE handbook of Gender and Communication. Thousand Oaks, Calif.: Sage Publications. Parts: Evolution of Gender and Communication Research, Feminism and/in Mass Media

Hausman, R, K Tyson, and S Zahidi. World economic forum. Gender Gap Report 2010. Geneva: World Economic Forum, 2010. Web. http://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_GenderGap_Report_2010.pdf.

Individual Responsibility and Inequality

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by Ryo Tanaka

Inequality has always been one of the common issues in many aspects of society, such as labor market and education. Here I define inequality as the situation in which an individual or a group of people is socially or economically disadvantaged for factors he/she is not responsible for. The idea that inequality should be reduced is based on humanitarianism that suggests “those who have suffered through no fault of their own should be helped” (Aguirre & Tuner, 2011, p. 55). But depending on what kind of inequality to look at, equalization could not contribute to growth. To take income inequality as an example, Kenworthy (2007) argues that “the smaller the income share of the rich (i.e., the less inequality), the less investment there is” (p. 29). The wealthy are expected to invest much of their money to accelerate capitalist economy. Otherwise, widened income gaps “may weaken consumer demand”, reduce “employee motivation and work place cooperation”, and “reduce the share of the population that is able to invest in higher education” (p. 29). Therefore, a certain degree of inequality should be kept to maintain economic well-being.

Now the question is how much (or what kind of) inequality should be kept to encourage people’s consumption, sustain people’s motivation to work, ensure opportunities to go on to higher education, and ultimately achieve the society that satisfies everyone’s will? At the same time, another big question is what should be equated? As mentioned above, income inequality should not be completely equalized because equal distribution of wealth is too egalitarian to encourage further economic growth. In order that individuals get higher standards of living and the whole society grows economically, individuals should be responsible for their own effort and every outcome of their effort. In this sense, they are even responsible for inequality of income.

At this point, inequality of outcomes is individuals’ responsibility. But it should be noted that they become really responsible for outcomes of their efforts as long as they are given opportunities to make efforts. For instance, if they have no access to school, simply they have no chances to make own efforts and expect responsive outcomes such as graduation degrees and other qualifications. Equal opportunities to learn should be guaranteed for everyone to allow everyone to participate in the given society.

In summary, I discussed how much individuals are responsible for their fate and the nature of inequality in relation to individual responsibility. At least they are responsible for outcomes of their effort including test scores and the amount of income. However, they become responsible only if the opportunity to make their own effort is given. By “own effort” I mean a certain amount of effort that an individual needs to make depending on his/her prospect about what he/she wants to achieve. In other words, everyone should have the right to decide how much effort he/she makes. If an institution like school controls how his/her make an effort for his/her own sake, it would manipulate the outcome of his/her effort. He/she then has no idea about how to be responsive to the outcome that does not depend on his/her own effort. Therefore, equal opportunities to make own effort are more essential than immediate financial control like redistribution of income. Inequality of outcomes is OK; inequality of opportunities is not OK.

Reference

Aguirre, A. & Turner, J. H. (2011). American Ethnicity: The Dynamics and Consequences of Discrimination (7th edition). New York: McGraw Hill.

Kenworthy, L. (2007). Is Inequality Feasible? Contexts, Vol. 6, Number 3, pp 28-32.

Environmental discrimination in Canada’s proposed oil pipeline

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by Sherry Stanczyk

The term ‘environmental inequality’ is defined as the unequal allocation of pollution across the globe that unfairly falls onto poorer communities. Take for example landfills being built close to poorer neighbourhoods, or the construction of environmentally unsustainable factories in poorer countries where environmental regulation is not as strict. I also believe that the destruction of the environment by businesses or the government at the expense of indigenous populations also falls under the category of environmental discrimination and injustice. The majority of indigenous populations still choose to live off the land, and many times the devastation of the environment comes at a cost to their livelihood and the lands that they own and live on.

This issue can be seen currently in British Columbia, Canada, where the proposal to build an oil pipeline from neighbouring province to Alberta’s oil sands is currently on the plate. The creation of the oil pipeline would bring in a large amount of money into the Canadian economy, create jobs, and strengthen trading ties with Asia. However, because a large portion of the pipeline will be built on native land, and the chance of an oil spill could destroy the habitat of fish, the construction of the pipeline has been met with protest from native groups.

Although the construction of an oil pipeline and the chances of a possible oil spill are environmental issues that affect everyone in the area, the pipeline still effects and causes the most damage to the minority group of natives more than it does the typical Canadian. If the pipeline directly affected more people, it’s very likely that there would be more opposition, and that the idea for the pipeline would maybe not have been proposed in the first place. Is it fair to sideline a minority group for the ‘greater good’ of the economy? Just like discrimination of any other nature, overlooking the rights of a group of people is unethical. Utilitarianism may seem like the better option, but it’s not necessary the best choice for the long run. One could argue that the money from made from the pipeline could go back into programs and support to the effected native populations, but there is no guarantee this payback will be sufficient or will make up for the environmental damage to their lands. Instead, we need to protect our environment and vulnerable groups of people, and look into plans that are more sustainable for the long term.

It’s good to see that the protests against the pipeline in British Columbia have been fairly successful, and others are also adding their voices to the protest alongside the native bands. As of now the whether the project will go through is still up in air, and there is a chance it may never come into action.

Globalization: The Regional Goldilocks Approach

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by Samuel Slaten

Globalization; it is a term thrown around loosely in today’s societies. However, when people say “globalization,” what do they actually mean? Increasing employment from foreign companies? The spread and mixture of cultures; or could it the growing interdependency between the current nation-states of the world? Well, according to an entry in the Oxford dictionary it is in a general sense, “the increasing worldwide integration of economic, cultural, political, religious, and social systems” (Black, Hashimzade, and Myles). So as one can see the term is very vague. However, due to the growing number of complications caused by this phenomenon (globalization), it is becoming increasingly important to narrow down globalization and focus on each aspect independently so we can address the unique problems each one causes. So how can one separate the positive aspects of globalization from the negative? I believe the solution comes from a popular principle known as the Goldilocks Principle. According to Bill Tierney, the Goldilocks Principle “states that something must fall within certain margins, as opposed to reaching extremes” (Tierney). Thus, in the following paper I will focus on the cultural aspect of globalization and by using the Goldilocks Principle analyze different problems associated with the mixing of cultures.

The first extreme that needs to be balanced is the degree to which cultures are introduced. Instead of replacing whole communities with new foreign strip malls or putting one culture’s products on a lower tier than another, we should slowly mix foreign cultural products with indigenous products. Building a global market which would sell imported goods along side domestic might be good way to for a community grow accustomed to the idea of foreign products without totally removing their own cultural identity. However, if the demand for slower cultural spread is too great, the possibility of censorship or negative stereotypes being implemented is ever present. Thus the idea would be to allow for a steady flow of culture yet at a pace that suits each society’s needs.

However, closely tied with culture are the social norms of a society. These can vary greatly even between regions within a country, let alone countries themselves. Take my own country for example. America has greatly different values just based on the regions one is from. For example, what may be considered normal in the western United States might be viewed entirely different in the southern or northern United States. We can see this with such topics as gun control, abortion, the environment, and much more. So if different regions can differ so greatly about their own country’s cultural norms, how can they be expected to adapt to another country’s cultural influence in the same manner as each other? Thus, I think each region (based on each country) should be balanced according to their rate of acceptation while catering to the needs of the migrant populations, who are helping to speed along this phenomenon of globalization.

However, balancing cultural globalization can at times encroach on the productiveness of the other aspects of globalization, such as the economic and social aspects. So then the problem becomes how do we balance between the difference in ideals between the categories of globalization? The answer is not easy because what might benefit one aspect might hurt another. Thus once again I believe the answer relies on regional-based analysis. Not only can we cater to a region’s cultural needs more efficiently but we can also cater to their economic situations. Just as regions have different social norms such as family values, each region has different social standings and economic situations. We can observe negative impact caused by this in India, where the standard of the economic gains are being standardized based on more prosperous cites like Bangalore while affecting the less developed cities’ cultural standards and self-identity. Here is a good example of different aspects of globalization affecting one another. This happens because instead of basing economic aspirations on the region’s cultural adaptability, people are basing it on the the more prosperous and faster growing regions which usually have a more global population than the other regions, or, in other words, are the less traditional regions.

Thus, in the end I think the best approach to cultural globalization is trying to find a balance between regions and catering to each in a different way.

References

Black, John, Nigar Hashimzade , and Gareth Myles. “Oxford Index.” http://oxfordindex.oup.com. Web. 23 Dec 2012. <http://oxfordindex.oup.com/view/10.1093/oi/authority.20110803095855259?rskey=vi9FKm&result=0&q=globalization&gt;.

Tierney, Bill. “21stcenturyscholar.” http://21stcenturyscholar.org. University of Southern California, 25 2012. Web. 23 Dec 2012. <http://21stcenturyscholar.org/2012/07/25/the-goldilocks-principle/&gt;.

Balancing justice, motivation, and inequality

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by Mao Shibata

There are many differences all around the world: female and male, and youth and elderly. All of the people have their own uniqueness or characters and these differences are necessary. However, there are many injustice differences in this global age. While only few people reap great benefits, almost others are suffering from such as famine, poor and social classes in the world and the gap between two of them get more and more wide. If we do not consider or come up with something measures, injustice differences will keep bringing serious impact on the lower people’s life and break down the economy balance.

For example, there are over 1 billion people in India. 80 percent, majorities of Indian-such as rural or urban middle class- are not affluent and they have to work as farmers, clerks, police officers, and teachers and in other mid-level civil service positions. Meanwhile, only 20 percent of affluent enjoy their life with Western life style and many of Western luxuries. According to Rawls, the reason why these injustice differences happen is that one’s life prospects are determined by their family’s assets or traits in society. That means no matter how intelligent and talented he is, he cannot get proper status or job due to insufficient income or assets of their families.

It is obvious that we should take some measures immediately, and a lot of countries have tried to balance fighting inequality with providing incentives for economic growth, however, this problem is really hard to solve since it is difficult to figure out what is fair for everyone. For instance, if he who has great skill or capacity and try and succeed but get same salary with others who do not have some special ability and not as much strive as he did, he would lose his motivation and unwilling to take part in society. It is impossible to distribute everything to everyone evenly in the world because all of us have our own differences.

Then how should we deal with injustice issues? I consider that we need a fair equality of opportunity, to bring everyone to the same starting point. People who have less well-off family are unable to get high level college degree, English-language skills, and good job so that they cannot participate in the new global economy. It is really severe and unequal situation. Opportunities should be open to all of the people. Moreover, I also believe that we should draw up a certain minimum standard that everyone can get surely and equally, and then give an additional reward depending on one’s talent and achievement. Though injustice differences are not easy to deal with it, we have to figure out fair measures to change income and economic opportunity inequalities conditions.

The world trend

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by Mayu Shibata

In the last class we watched TV commercials of cosmetics for lighter skin, which are mostly on air in darker skin nations. We simply enjoyed watching it but it meant a lot. It’s not only about western culture coming into a nation. Well, I read a book about Indian economic growth before and it tells that in India many women seek cosmetics to get lighter skin. According to the book, Indian women pay more attention than ever with the influence of TV shows and magazines and its beauty market has been expanding. Among beauty goods, cosmetics for lighter skin are selling best. As for Indian women, they have cultural and historical backgrounds that they want to get lighter skin. In early days they had the caste system and the higher caste people had lighter skin than lower castes. Their castes were decided partly on their color of skin and therefore they had dreamt of lighter skin for long. And what boosted their adoration is an influence of western TV shows and magazines.

Here’s another story in India. With the rapid economic growth more women are taking part in society. There are more career women and women students and motor scooters are popular with those women now. Honda and local company cooperated and produced motor scooters for women ‘Just for Her’, which hit the market. In India women still struggle with local custom which requires women to stay home and do all the house work. Many men even marry a woman to look after their family and home.

These two stories represent a variety of culture coming into India.

I visited Malaysia last summer to study its culture. In stores there are many cosmetics for lighter skin, American instant noodles, foreign daily products and other countries’ TV shows are on air like Chinese, Japanese and American (with Malaysian/English subtitles). I felt that they live in a much more multi-national country and so that they know about those countries and its culture very well.

It’s pretty much the same in Japan, I think. People like American music, fashion, gossips and TV shows. They know about those stuffs through media and moreover they are mostly available here in Japan, too.

I think it’s fine that another culture comes into a country because I think it has externality in an economically good meaning. In my opinion it’s a matter of people whether the other culture invade the country or not so just let it be because that’s what people want. I do concern that the world goes standardized but I’m not sure if we should avoid it even by sacrificing people’s desire, dream and consumption. I mean that’s a lot. In any way I think now we cannot totally avoid other cultures from coming into a nation.

Problems of outsourcing in India

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by Misato Okumura

There are a lot of call centers in India and many Indians are educated to speak in an American accent to talk with their clients in the United States. The call center itself belongs to IT companies in the United States but it is placed in India and Indian workers there are educated to have an American accent and playing a role of customer service as company members. This is because it is cheaper to employ Indians than employ Americans. Indian employees are well educated and they usually have IT and programming skills but they have struggled with getting job though they graduated from good school. So this sounds very nice because this creates a job in developing country.  But this causes a lot of problems. You can find problems both in India and the United States.

First, problems in India are about their identity and career. Customers call the company and expect that they are going to talk with an American worker. So first thing to do for their job is learning American accent, speed of talking and expressions. Also they need to learn American culture to pretend to be American workers. They check local weather and news in the States on the internet and talk with customers there as if they were also there. They are forced to keep themselves surrounded by American culture and to make themselves think they are not Indians but Americans. So they kill their own identities to get money. This is not good but they need to do that because otherwise they can’t get money. IT companies take advantage of it because they know India have a lot of young people who have knowledge of IT are having hard time to find a job and they can hire them for very cheap. If they work for 7 hours a day, they need to be Americans for one-thirds of a day. It might make them confused.

Second, these Indian workers are doing the same thing every day. It’s just pretending and talking and it doesn’t require any professional skills. This keeps them from a professional and good job even though they graduated from good schools. And you must not forget that there are problems in the United States, too. Because they started outsourcing, a lot of Americans have lost their jobs and opportunity to get a job in their country. The last two problems about career in both countries bring inequality to our society. Japan also has this problem. We don’t have enough job spots for Japanese today but Japanese companies build their factory outside of Japan because it is cheaper. Some people say we are creating job in developing countries but we must not forget this also creates inequality.

Environment and Technology Information

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by Ayaka Nishizaki

Environment and social are mutually created and environment inequality is one of sociological aspects. I think environment is also liked to technology and information. I would like to think environmental problems from these points: The unequal limitation of access to information, ineffective use of information, and relationship between information and unclear responsibility.

During class, I learned residents of lower class neighborhoods face a variety of risks. The manufacturing jobs are often given to immigrants or poor people who don’t understand English well and don’t understand what they’re being exposed to. I think it is connected with unequal access of information between the rich and poor. The poor is limited to access information, so they can’t get enough knowledge about environment (the article of ‘connecting communities: on and off line’). Also, the lack of information will cause not only their health can be exposed to danger by toxic materials in industries, but also people take some action for the environment in a wrong way.

I learned the concept “inverted quarantine” from the reading and class. We often don’t know how much the “eco” products help the environment. I think inverted quarantines are caused by a lack of correct information. I learned environmental issues since I was an elementary school student. But I was shocked that I haven’t known the exact meaning of “eco” until I started to learn by myself. In fact “eco” is not equal to “save energy (省エネ)”, but I saw many people and TV commercials use “eco” incorrectly.

It is true that we are surrounded by a bunch of information to learn, but why does the kind of wrong actions happen? Many Japanese including me had studied global warming or depletion of ozone layer in school. I studied a lot of definitions and words about the environment. However, I wondered ‘how can I use the knowledge in daily life in order to reduce CO2 or waste?’ We have learned a lot of things like helium or CO2 are bad for the environment, but I think those knowledge is not linked to taking environmental actions. Some people would say that recently, more Japanese schools have required students to take actions for environment, but I think some actions are not contributed to environmental improvement directly. Japanese people learned how to separate trash appropriately, but how many people know separating trash (分別) doesn’t always lead to recycling, or it encourages people to increase more consumption of plastic bottles? My point is that although there are many chances to access information, we don’t choose information effectively and don’t link such information to environmental improvement.

In addition, a lot of information make responsibility for polluted environment unclear. For example, mass media criticizes the Japanese government about an accident of nuclear power plant in Fukushima. On the other hand, other people say this responsibility is TEPCO. How can we decide who will take this responsibility? If people think the bad governance was the biggest cause of the accident, they will require Japanese government to take responsibility. If the old nuclear power plant was the most cause of accidents, TEPCO which haven’t reconstructed the plant for about 40 years should take responsibility. In my opinion, through a lot of information, responsibility becomes more unclear because information diversifies people’s thoughts and ideas (as we discussed ‘what is positive side when new culture/information is brought into our country?’). If a state-level accident such as the nuclear plant is related to many actors such as government and companies involved in the case, it is difficult to clarify the responsibility because of many people’s points of view.

As I mentioned above, the environment is strongly connected with information. Environmental problems, diversification of people’s ideas help our standard of living, but on the other hand, it makes it difficult to think what the most correct choice of information for the environment is.