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CONTENTS
Vol. 12, No. 1: JanuaryMarch 1980
Maria Mies- Capitalist Development and Subsistence Reproduction:
Rural Women in India
Gail Omvedt - Adivasis, Culture, and Modes of Production in India
Mark Juergensmeyer - What if the Untouchables Dont Believe in
Untouchability?
Doranne Jacobson - Tea and Insults: Untouchability in Eastern India
/ A Review Essay
Bernard Bernier - The Japanese Peasantry and Economic Growth
Since the Land Reform of 1946-47
Herbert P. Bix - Japan at the End of the Seventies: The Treatment of
the Political in Recent Japanology
Daizen Victoria - Japanese Corporate Zen
Stephen Salaff - Medical Care for Atomic Bomb Victims in the
United States
BCAS/Critical AsianStudies
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CCAS Statement of Purpose
Critical Asian Studies continues to be inspired by the statement of purpose
formulated in 1969 by its parent organization, the Committee of Concerned
Asian Scholars (CCAS). CCAS ceased to exist as an organization in 1979,
but the BCAS board decided in 1993 that the CCAS Statement of Purpose
should be published in our journal at least once a year.
We first came together in opposition to the brutal aggression of
the United States in Vietnam and to the complicity or silence of
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concerned about the present unwillingness of specialists to speak
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suring American domination of much of Asia. We reject the le-
gitimacy of this aim, and attempt to change this policy. We
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The Committee of Concerned Asian Scholars seeks to develop a
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and their efforts to maintain cultural integrity and to confront
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CCAS wishes to create alternatives to the prevailing trends in
scholarship on Asia, which too often spring from a parochial
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communications network for both Asian and Western scholars, a
provider of central resources for local chapters, and a commu-
nity for the development of anti-imperialist research.
Passed, 2830 March 1969
Boston, Massachusetts
Vol. 12, No.1 / Jan.-Mar., 1980
Contents
Maria Mies 2 Capitalist Development and Subsistence
Reproduction; Rural Women in India
Gail Omvedt 15 Adivasis, Culture and Modes
of Production in India
Mark Juergensmeyer 23 What If the Untouchables
Don't Believe in Untouchability?
Doranne Jacobson 29 Tea and Insults
Untouchabiiity in Eastern Iridia .
Bernard Bernier 40 The Japanese Peasantry and'Economic Growth
Since the Land Reform 0(1946-47'"
". I I
Herbert P. Bix 53 Japan Atthe End of the "
The Treatment of the Political'in'Recent Japanology
Daizen Victoria 61 Japanese Corporate Zen
Stephen Salaff 69 Medical Care for Atomic Bomb
Victims in the United States
Correspondence
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Contributors
Bernard the Department of
the University of Montreal, Canada.
Herbert Bix lives and teru;hes in Tokyo, Japan.
Doranne Jacobson is a Research Associate at Columbia Uni
versity, New York.
Mark Juergensmeyer is Associate Director 0 r the Center for
Ethies and Social Policy, Graduate Theological tJ nion, Berkdt'Y,
California.
Maria Mies is organizing a program on Women and Develop
ment at the Institute of Social Studies, the Hague, the
Netherlands.
Gail Omvedt lives and writes in Maharashtra, India.
Stephen Salaff is 'mathematician and writer in Toronto
C.anada. . " " '
Daizen Victoria, a graduate student in Oriental Languages at
UCLA, is a Buddhist priest in the Soto Zen tradition.
Capitalist Development and Subsistence
Reproduction; Rural Women in India
by Maria Mies*
All economic systems, modes of production, and all hu
man history presuppose two types of basic human activities:
production of the means of subsistence and production of new
life or procreation. The first is necessary to satisfy basic human
needs and to sustain life, the second to ensure the continuation
of society from generation to generation. Engels correctly called
both types of human activity production and stated that the
institutions of a particular society or of a particular epoch are
detennined by the organization and the development of these
two types of production. 1 As production of the means of subsis
tence is dependent on human cooperation in labor, so too pro
duction of new life or procreation is dependent on the coopera
tion of women and men in the sexual act. Both processes are
closely interlinked, and as Marx noted, in both processes people
enter into a double relationship.
The production of life, both of one's own in labour and of
fresh life in procreation, now appears as a double relation
ship: on the one hand as a natural, on the other as a social
relationship. By social. we understand the cooperation of
several individuals no matter under what conditions, in what
manner and to what end. It follows that a certain mode of
production, or industrial stage, is always combined with a
certain mode of cooperation, or social stage, and this mode
ofcooperation is itself a productive force. 2
Insofar as the production of human life and of living
working capacity is the necessary precondition of all modes and
fonns of production, we shall call this the subsistence produc
tion and reproduction. In the sphere of use-value production the
distinction between subsistence production and reproduction
has little analytical value as both processes are hardly separated
from each other. Therefore, in the following I use the term
re-production to denote the continuum between the two proc
esses. Subsistence reproduction thus defined involves a variety
of human activities ranging from pregnancy, the birth of
children, to production, processing and preparation of food,
clothing, making of a home, cleaning, as well as the satisfaction
* This article is a revised edition of a paper presented at a conference on
Subsistence Reproduction at the Center for Development Studies and Planning,
the University of Bielefeld, West Gennany. in April 1978.
Day-laborer carrying mud for use as
mortar. Photo by Doranne Jacobson.
of emotional and sexual needs. In all this activity human energy
is spent to transfonn "nature" into human life. Therefore, I
shall call this activity subsistence work. Most of this work is
done by women.
Under capitalism the two processes invol ved in subsistence
reproduction are not only being transfonned and redefined, but
they are increasingly separated from each other. The production
of new life through the cooperation of men and women in the
sexual act, fonneriy an important social act, is now relegated to
the sphere of nature or called "biological reproduction." And
the day-to-day restoration of the laborers whose energies have
been consumed in the capitalist production process is defined as
reproduction of the labor force. The capitalist is interested only
in the latter, not in the laborer as a living human being, but the
labor force can be extracted only from living (strong, healthy,
etc.) human beings.
Capitalism has brought about another fundamental
structural separation and redefinition: that between production
and reproduction. The tenn production is now reserved for the
2
production of exchange values only, which becomes the domi
nant type of production. The tenn reproduction is used to denote
two related processes: (I) the reproduction of the capitalist
production cycle over time or extended reproduction or accumu
lation. This process has also been called system reproduction
and (2) the reproduction ofthe labor force, as mentioned above.
The first process has been analyzed by Marx in Capital. Volume
II, Chapter 21.3 The analysis of the second, however, was taken
up more recently, partly in connection with the international
debate on housework which was initiated by the women's
movement. Before we tum to the further theoretical implica
tions of this debate, let us first have a look at the subsistence
reproducers.
Subsistence re-production covers a wider range of human
activity than unpaid household work in the capitalist centers.
Statistically housewives in the capitalist centers fonn only a
small percentage of the world's subsistence producers. The
majority of these subsistence producers are small peasants and
artisans, both men and women, living in the capitalist
peripheries in Asia, Africa and Latin America. My hypothesis is
that capital accumulation, particularly in its present phase,
creates an ever-increasing mass of relative surplus population
who will not be absorbed into the fonnal wage-labor pool, who
will remain structurally non-wage laborers, and who have to
produce their own survival in various fonns of subsistence
production. These subsistence producers constitute a pool of
marginalized people.
The concept of marginality and marginalization was de
veloped in the sixties and seventies in Latin America in the
context of the dependency theory.
4
In contrast to the definition
of an industrial reserve army as the production by capitalism ofa
relative surplus population to keep wages low, several authors
have defined the large masses of pauperized peasants and urban
poor in peripheral countries as marginalized or a marginalized
pool. 5 Capitalist development in these countries will not lead to
an absorption of these masses into wage labor proper. They are
neither needed to keep the wages of other workers low nor is
there a chance that further development will lead to their pro
letarianization. Hobsbawm attributes this inability ofdependent
capitalism to transfonn pauperized peasants into industrial pro
letarians to the capital intensive, labor-saving technology used
in peripheral countries in contrast to the much simpler technol
ogy prevalent in 19th century European industry which could
absorb large masses of pauperized peasants.
Whereas these authors see marginalization as an inherent
structural element of dependent capitalism, Bennholt
Thomsen, developing further the analysis of Kowarick,
6
sees
pauperization or marginalization as an integral part of the
capitalist mode of production proper. According to her, the
production of marginalized masses who are not able to sell the.ir
labor power and therefore have to develop a number of fonns of
subsistence re-production are not an aberration of the capitalist
accumulation process which will disappear with' 'full-fledged"
capitalism, but are a necessary precondition and result of this
mode of production. The contradictory development of
capitalism leads at the same time to a generalization of wage
labor and to the generalization of non-wage labor. In the
capitalist centers this generalized non-wage labor is mainly
found in the fonn of housework.
With the further development of labor-saving technology,
the marginal pool of non-wage laborers who simply have to
produce their subsistence is also growing in the capitalist
centers. This does not mean that they are "outside" capitalism.
According to Bennholt-Thomsen, their subsistence re
production, including that of housewives, is subsumed under
capital accumulation.
Although capital "does not take full responsibility" for the
reproduction of these marginalized people and "defines them
back into nature" -where they are apparently reproducing
themselves "naturally"-it still taps their living labor power
and integrates their products into a global accumulation proc
ess.
7
Whereas housewives in the capitalist centers are workers
separated from any means of production, subsistence repro
ducers in the capitalist periphery often still control some mar
ginal means of production: land, tools, skills. This also applies
to women who often perfonn the bulk of agricultural work in
addition to their household work. 8
Capitalist Penetration in India and
Its Impact on Women
At 264 million, India's female population is one of the
largest in the world. About 80 percent of this population live in
rural areas, producing mostly in the subsistence sector.
9
The
participation of women in the rural economy varies widely
An analysis of the sex ratio in the Indian situation
reveals that there has been a steady decline in the
proportion ofwomen to men since the beginning of the
20th century. This period has also seen the penetration
of capitalist relations in the economy, especially in the
agricultural sector. My contention is that the nature of
capitalist penetration played a significant role in the
physical reduction of women.
according to the specific fonn of subsistence production: they
include tribal gatherers and hunters, slash and bum cultivators,
settled peasants with plough cultivation, small proprietors, ten
ants or agricultural laborers without land, subsistence artisans,
those engaged in household industries, and peddlers. No
systematic research has been done as yet on the basic features of
women's participation in this sector, or on the effects of
capitalist development on their work and living conditions. But
there is enough quantitative and qualitative data available to
serve as a base for an analysis of the trends affecting women's
lives under the impact of capitalist development. The following
analysis is based on statistical data available from studies car
ried out between 1974 and 1978, and from qualitative observa
tions which I carried out in some limited areas, mainly Andhra
Pradesh, between the years 1977 and 1978.
Before the International Women's Year (1975), the Indian
government set up a committee to investigate various aspects of
the status of women. This Committee on the Status of Women in
India (CSWI) based its inquiry on the statistical material avail
able in the decennial Census reports-the last being the 1971
Census-the National Sample Surveys and other official
statistical material, as well as on field studies in all states of the
country. In December 1974 the CSWI presented its report. The
3
picture that emerged from its 480 pages was gloomy, and
understandably the government was not very eager to give this
report wide pUblicity. These findings have been consistent with
those of the demographer Asok Mitra who writes:
Accelerating a trend which started in the last century. the last
thirty years after Independence reduced Indian womanhood
more and more to an expendable commodity: expendable,
demographically as well as. economically. Demographi
cally. the female is being reduced more and more mainly to a
productive function. to be expendable as soon as this demand
is fulfilled. Economically. she is being inexorably squeezed
out of the productive sphere and reduced to a unit of con
sumption and therefore less socially desirable. The two
streams ofdeterioration are two sides ofthe same coin. 1()
This deterioration extends into all spheres of women's life,
and can be documented by analyzing a number of mortality
rates, health and nutritional standards, employment and educa
tion, as well as their political representation. Rural women and
poor urban women-the vast majority of Indian women-are
the worst hit by this trend. In the following analysis I will focus
on two aspects of this trend, the sex ratio and the employment
situation.
The Sex Ratio
An analysis of the sex ratio in the Indian situation reveals
that there has been a steady decline in the proportion of women
to men since the beginning of the 20th century. This period has
also seen the penetration of capitalist relations in the economy,
especially in the agricultural sector. My contention is that the
nature of capitalist penetration played a significant role in the
physical reduction of women. We shall try to illustrate this by
considering the case in the All-India situation and then looking
at some case studies.
The figures in Tables I and 2 show two important features
of the sex ratio. First. the ratio of female to male population in
India has been low for a long time, and secondly, this ratio has
been declining since 191 I, registering the steepest fall between
196 1 and 197 I. Asok Mitra has found that Indian female babies
and girls (ages 0-9 years) have a much higher mortality rate than
boys. and that this rate has gone up consistently between 1941
and 197 I. This period also witnessed the increased mortality
rate of women as compared to men in the other age groups,
particularly in the age group between 20 and 45 years. A similar
bleak picture emerges from an analysis of the maternal mortality
rate. In rural India it was 573 per 10.000 live births in 1968,
whereas in the U.S.A. it was 32 (1965). in the U.K. 29 (1968),
Hong Kong 44 ( 1966), Malaysia 200 (1965) and Sri Lanka 300
(1968).11
The growing mortality rate of female women and children
cannot be explained by the "usual" neglect of females in the
patriarchal Indian society. We have to ask further why this
neglect is growing or intensifying. One concrete expression
may be found in the differential health treatment and nutritional
standards of females and males. In a health survey carried out in
1957 in six rural communities it was found that 730 girls and 513
boys were ailing in the age group below IS. Whereas a doctor
was consulted for 50.1 percent of the males. this was the case for
only 25.4 percent of the females. 12 Moreover, when girls or
women became ill, they generally received free. traditional or
no treatment. The high mortality rate of women and girls is also
connected closely with malnutrition. Seventy percent of preg
nant women suffer from anemia. 13 It may appear strange that
those who prepare food are getting less food than those whom
they feed. but in a typical Indian household women give food
first to the men and the children, and usually eat what is left
over. However, the growing deficit of women vis-a-vis men.
their growing mortality rate. their deteriorating health and nutri
tional standards cannot be explained only by referring to a sexist
ideology or the current family structure. Both factors were no
less dominant in earlier years. What needs to be explained is the
relationship between the declining sex-ratio and the develop
ment processes that have taken place in India.
There seems to be a close connection between the employ
ment of women in production and their proportion in the total
population. This pattern is further corroborated if one compares
the population with the employment trends. Women seem to be
increasingly losing ground in both since 1911 (refer to Table 2).
Thus the Indian Council of Social Science Research (ICSSR)
brochure. "Critical Issues on the Status of Women... states:
In the 40 years between 1911 and 1951, the gap between men
and women in the population increased by 27 percent. Dur
ing the same period. women's proportion to the total work
force declined from 525 per /000 males (1911) to 408 per
/000 males ( 1951). In the 20 years between 1951 and 1971,
the gap between men and women in the population rose from
8.9 million to 19.9 million. In the same period the number of
women workers in agriculture declined from 31 to 25 mil
lion, while [the number] ofmen increased by 34.3 million. In
the non-agricultural sector, women workers declined from
9.3 to 6.2 million, while men increased from 32.8 to 48.4
million. The total number of men workers increased by 27
percent while women suffered a decline of 12 percent
reducing their ratio in the work-force to 2/0 per 1000 men.
14
These figures are indisputable evidence of a growing disparity
between the sexes. both with regard to their chances for physical
survival and employment. A closer analysis offemale work
participation will show how. women in the rural sector are
affected by these trends.
Women's Employment in the Rural Sector
Tables 2 and 5 show that women have lost ground in all indust
rial categories where they had been employed since 1911 and
that the sharpest decline was between 196 I and 1971. Eighty
percent of female workers are employed in the rural sector. The
most dramatic decline in female employment has been in the
secondary sector. i.e. the industries. in trade and in com
merce-sectors which had worked along capitalist lines since
the colonial period. But between 1961 and 1971 this trend could
also be observed in their traditional agricultural occupations,
and household industries (see Tables 3 and 4).
Yet as Table 6 indicates, this process is not accompanied in
the same proportion by growing proletarianization. Whereas the
number of female cultivators dropped by 52 percent, the number
of male cultivators increased by 6 percent. This is a clear
indication of the fact that women are losing control over land as
a means of production, i.e. they are gradually becoming paup
erized. Similarly, the female agricultural laborers increased by
43 percent whereas the male agricultural workers increased by
more than double that rate (88 percent); women are also not
becoming proletarianized at the same rate as men.
4
TABLE 3
Important Manufacturing Activities in which
the Ratio of Female-to-Male Workers has
shown Long-Term Decline
1911-1961
Manufacturing Female Workers per 1000 Male Workers
Activities
TABLE 1 1911 1921 1931 1951 1961
Sex Ratio in States, 1921-71
Processing of Foodgrains 12,075 7.779 7.065 1,520 331
(Females per 1000 Males)
Bread and other bakery
products 1,644 1.466 1,662 447 64
State 1921 1931 1941 1951 1961 1971
Production of vegetable oils 688 656 595 347 458
Nets. ropes. cordage, etc. 1,962 1.295 1.236
Andrha 993 987 980 986 981 977
Footwear and their repair 232 201 141 88 81
Assam 908 886 886 877 876 901
Earthenware and pottery
Bihar 1016 994 996 990 994 956
making 572 540 490 402 507
Gujrat 944 945 941 952 940 936
Jammu & Kashmir 870 865 869 873 878 882
SOI/rce: J.P. Ambannavar. Demography Illdill. 4 (2). December 11J75. p. 353.
Kerala 1011 1022 1027 1028 1022 1019
Madhya Pradesh 974 973 970 967 953 943
Maharashtra 950 947 949 941 936 932 TABLE 4
Mysore 969 965 960 966 959 959
Decline in Women Participation Rate in Rural India
Orissa 1086 1067 1053 1022 1001 989
Age 15-59. 1961-1971
Punjab 821 830 850 858 864 874
Rajasthan 896 907 906 921 908 919
W.P.R. W.P.R.
Tamilnadu 1029 1027 1012 1007 992 979
1961 1971
Uttar Pradesh 909 904 907 910 909 883
West Bengal 905 890 852 865 878 892
Cultivator 30.02 7.13
Agricultural Labor 12.60 11.80
All-India 955 955 947 941 930
Plantations, etc. 0.92 0.58
Source of tables t. 2. 3 and 4: '"Critical Issues on the Status of Women.
Household industry 3.42 0.77
Employment. Health. Education Priorities for Action." by Indian Council of Manufacturing 0.37 0.34
Social Sciences Research. Advisory Committee on Women's Studies. New
Construction 0.13 0.09
Delhi 1977.
Trade & Commerce 0.51 0.22
Other Services 2.70 0.77
SOI/rce: Asok Mitra. The Statl/S olWomell: Employment lind Literacy
Only Transport improved slightly from 0.02 to 0.03.
TABLES
Distribution of Female Workers by Broad Industrial Categories, 1911-1971
(in thousands)
III mining, V
Total Total II quarrying, Iive- IV manufacturing
Year female number of Cultivators Agricultural stock, forestry, household other than
population female workers laborers fishing, hunt- industry household
ing, plantation industry
1911 123,898 41.802 18,090 12,808 1,452 4,391
1921 122,749 60,085 20,276 10,003 1,431 3,689
1931 146,075 37,600 12,180 14,997 1,575 3,281
1951* 173,549 40.539 13,368 12,694 1,357 2,906
1961 212,467 59,402 33,103 14,171 1.187 4,665 789
1971 (P) 263.900 31,298 9,266 15,794 907 1,331 865
table 5 continues
TABLE 2
Females per thousand Males of Total Population, All India
Workers in Each Industrial Category and Non-Workers 1901-71
Total
Work-
In
ers Non-
Year Popu- Primary Sector Secondary Sector Tertiary Sector Year
Workers
lation
(I-IX) II I-II III 1+ IV V VI IV+ VII V III IX VII + X
11+ V+ V/II+
1/1 VI IX
1901 972 504 431 1051 540 335 (639)* 53.J 553 400 5.J3 405 65 325 350 1,707 1901
1911 964 525 427 1054 567 337 (500) 560 574 336 548 513 62 371 390 1,676 1911
1921 955 516 463 952 557 372 (562) 545 508 412 501 479 65 357 379 1,629 1921
1931 955 453 189 1006 476 337(396) 466 440 303 .J2J 396 41 484 410 1,656 1931
1951 947 408 357 857 469 491(434) 470 288 248 291 187 61 332 257 1,580 1951
1961 941 460 498 819 565 297- 552 663 110 134 3.J8 119 22 187 210 1,581 1961
1971 930 210 135 498 149 210 (155) 2.J8 265 88 101 I-n 59 34 165 108 1,726 1971
The industrial categories arc: I. Cultivators: II, Agricultural Laborers: III. Livestock. Forestry. Fishing. Hunting & Plantation Orchards & allied activities: IV.
Mining and V. Manufacturing processes. (a) Household Industry. (b) Othcr than Household Industry: VI. Construction: VII. Trade and Commerce;
VIII Transport Storages and Communications: IX. Other Services: X. Non-Workers.
,. The parenthetical figures are for "Mining and Quarrying."
TABLE 6
Employment in 1961 and 1971
Using Adjusted* Census Figures
Cultivators Males Females
1961 1971 1961 1971
Cultivators 66,465 70,005 33,156 15,976
Agric-laborers 17,324 32,535 14,198 20,272
Other Workers 45,382 49,876 12,151 8,343
Total Workers 129,171 152,531 59,505 44,591
Non workers 96,975 131,531 153,286 219,412
Total Population 226,146 283,937 212,791 264,013
Source: Gail Omvedt: "Women and Rural Revolt in India." based on 1971
Census figures) in Social Scielilisl, Trivandrum. October 1977.
"These figures are adjusted. The ligures in Table 5 are not adjusted.
TABLE 5 (continued)
VIII transport,
VI VII trade storage & IX Total of I & II Total of III & IX Year
construction & commerce communication other service (ag. sec) (non-ag. sec)
294 1,266 79 2,422 30,898 (73.9) 10,904 (26.1) 1911
189 2,IX9 67 2,151 30,279 (75.5) 9,816 (24.5) 1921
291 1,914 49 3,313 27,177 (72.3) 10,423 (27.7) 1931
191 1.153 123 3,647 31,062 (76.8) 9,377 (23.2) 1951*
243 XIS 65 4,364 47,274 (79.6) 12,128 (20A) 1961
204 556 146 2,229 25,060 (80. I) 6,238 (19.9) 1971 (P)
Source. COI'I. (11/11(//(/: Tml'ilrd, Djl/ulitl'
"'Figures do not Include JamTllU and Kashmir
(p) Provisional The figures arc hased on one percent sampling.
More revealing still is the data in Table 2. Whereas until
1961 the proportion of women among cultivators had been
between 289-498 per 1000 men (with the exception of 1931),
this ratio fell steeply between 1961 and 1971 to a mere 135
women to 1000 men. Similarly, the female ratio among ag
ricultural laborers had been relatively stable since 190 I, but
between 1961 and 197 I it dropped from 8 19 women per 1000
men to 498 women per 1000 men, a decline ofabout 40 percent.
what happened between 1961 and 1971 can be seen as the
accentuation of a long-term tendency towards both proletariani
zation and marginalization. IS The tendency towards proletar
ianization is revealed in the fact that the percentage of ag
ricultural laborers to total workers in agriculture rose from
24.04 to 38.04 percent, while the percentage of workers to the
total population declined from 49.73 to 35.95 percent. When
analyzing the development of work-participation since 190 1,
Asok Mitra remarks that there has:
practically been no transfer from agriculture to non-agricul
ture . .. The primary sector has heldfirm, almost unchanged.
providing the great bulk of employment. It also shows dis
tressingly enough how little manufacturing. including house
hold industry, has been gaining since 1901 despite the steady
rise in industrial production. demonstrating that the dis
placement ofhuman labor has been occurring with the rise in
production along with a possible distortion in the production
ofwage goods. 16
The fact that more than 50 percent of all female workers in
1971 are agricultural laborers 18 does not contradict this state
ment. Every observer ofIndian villages knows that the status of
the agricuiturallaborer itself is a marginal one. She/he is neither
a "free" wage laborer nor does she/he have the "security" of a
feudal serf. What is more important, she/he is a wage laborer
onl y for a limited time of the year, and this time is shrinking due
to the introduction of new technology. Nevertheless, these
laborers are not "free" to leave the land and become prole
tarians in the classical sense.
The polarization between men and women in rural India
becomes more evident if one considers that, even as wage
earners, women generally get one third less than the male
agricultural laborer. Thus Pandey observed that in 1975 women
in agriCUlture got only 68.8 percent of the earnings that males
received. 19
Pauperization and Marginalization:
the Case of Tribal Women in Andhra Pradesh
So far the analysis has focused on the all-India trend of
increasing pauperization and marginalization of women in the
subsistence sector. In order to understand more concretely how
these processes take place, it is necessary to supplement the
quantitative analysis with at least some evidence of a qualitative
nature. I recorded the following examples in 1977 in Andhra
Pradesh when I had an opportunity to visit two tribal areas, 20 the
Visakhapatnam Tribal Agency Area, and the West Godavari
Tribal Agency Area. It had been the strategic policy of the
British colonial administraion to keep the tribal belts isolated as
buffer zones and to prohibit non-tribals from entering these
areas as moneylenders, traders and land speculators. These
areas were controlled mainly by the forest department.
Although these areas were never sealed off totally, the
tribes which I saw were still following partly a traditional mode
of subsistence production in its' 'pure" form:
- Hunting and gathering (men doing the hunting, women
the gathering) supplemented by slash and bum-cultiva
tion, called podu in this area;
- A concept of "territory" rather than individual land own
ership;
- Little or no vertical stratification of the society;
- Sexual division of labor unaccompanied by social asym
metry; women enjoy both more freedom and power than
Hindu women and a higher rate of participation in the
productive process;
- Absence of "puritanical" Hindu concepts and morality
regarding drinking, dancing, eating of meat, sexuality;
- Absence of the work ethic; tribals work only as much as
they need for their subsistence;
- Absence of ' 'overpopulation"; zero population growth;
- Absence of poverty, of orphans, of destitute women, etc.
Since Independence, particularly after 1960, it has been
the policy of the Indian government to integrate the tribals or
girijans (hill people) into the so-called national mainstream.
This policy, carried out mainly by the Tribal Welfare Depart-
The integration of subsistence production and
subsistence reproducers into the process of capital
accumulation is not a peaceful affair, but is accom
panied by violence, compulsion and extra-economic
coercion, all of which go towards greater extraction of
surplus labor from the producers. Very often this
violence has a distinct sexual dimension.
ment, would wean the tribals away from podu cultivation, thus
getting control over the rich mineral and other resources in the
hill areas. It would also de-populate the forest over one or two
generations and resettle the tribals outside the forest, establish a
cash economy among them, and establish individual ownership
of the land and a capitalist market system. Finally it would break
up the social cohesion of the tribes by putting the tribal children
into boarding schools (ashram schools) where they will be
subjected to a process of Hinduization by non-tribal teachers
and taught them to give up their "bad" tribal habits. 21 In my
1977 visit I noted the following developments:
(A) Rapid Deterioration ofthe Ecology
The prohibition ofpodu cultivation and the establishment of
a market economy and of cash-crop cultivation of coffee, or
anges, pharmaceutical plants, ground nuts, tobacco, etc., have
driven the tribals further up into the hills. Ironically, they have
to continue podu cultivation because the government gives
neither adequate land or work to all tribals, nor sufficient wages
or prices for their products. Thus the ecological balance which
the tribals used to maintain is being destroyed. The hills are
7
barren and rainfall has decreased by 10-15 inches in the last few
years. Afforestation done by the government only serves the
government-controlled development projects like coffee or teak
plantations or other cash crops raised mainly for export.
(B) Growing dependence on the fluctuations
ofthe National and International Market
Apart from coffee plantations, the Integrated Tribal De
velopment Agency (IIDA) distributed some acres of land for
coffee cultivation to some tribals. (In one village 30 families got
1-2 acres of land; 30 families did not not get land.) These small
tribal holdings are seriously affected by all fluctuations of the
international coffee price.
(C) Break-up ofthe tribes into classes (differentiation)
The authorities have created a landed/landless distribution,
giving individual grants of land, cattle, sheep, sewing ma
chines, coffee, seeds, fertilizers, etc., to some tribals but not to
all.
(D) Land alienation
In most tribal areas all the fertile land has been alienated by
non-tribal immigrants. In one area which I visited in 1978, these
non-tribals had established themsel ves as a new landed class and
the tribals had become their share croppers or agricultural labor
ers. These non-tribals produced Virginia tobacco for export (to
Russia, USA, Europe) and chillies for the home market.
(E) Growing dependence on government
or other welfare agencies
The old tribal autonomy is being destroyed.
Making oidis on a piecework oasiti (J aeobson)
(F) Growing dependence on external produced items
In many villages rice has replaced millet as the staple food.
But rice is not produced by the podu cultivator. It is usually
supplied by the non-tribal traders or landholders who give rice
as wages for labor.
(G) Growing inequality between men and women
with greater pauperization ofwomen
The penetration of capitalism has often witnessed the re
moval of women from their means of production and from their
productive functions. It has further brought about a change in
the sexual division of labor to their disadvantage. This can be
illustrated by the following two cases.
I. In the traditional tribal economy in West Godavari,
producers had control over the marketing of their product which
they would exchange at the market place. But wherever depots
for the collection of the tribal products have been established by
the Girijan Cooperative Corporation, the marketing function
has been taken over by non-tribal men and the marketing role of
the women has been undermined. A few sewing machines have
also been given to them by the Mahila Mandals (womens' clubs)
but they produce items which they never use and the marketing
is done by non-tribal men.
2. Introduction of new technologies has also adversely
affected the tribal women. One of the methods to' 'integrate the
tribals into the national mainstream" is to settle them on the
plains, on unreclaimed land in special colonies. In one such
colony in West Godavari one of the new technologies intro
duced was seri-culture. But the training in this new technology
(which in China and Bengal had been a traditional women's
domain) was imparted only to men. As the women had been
removed from the forest which provided the raw material for
their earlier production (baskets, mats, etc.) they were left with
nothing to produce in the colony. Even occasional seasonal
work did not give them economic independence and the entire
nature of the .. integration" I'rocess left them dependent on the
men in the colony. 22
Production for the World Market:
A Houselndustry and Marginalization
The following example, recorded in 1977, shows how
women in house industries are being exploited in export
oriented production. In the villages around Narsapur, West
Godavari district. Andhra Pradesh, about 150,000 women are
engaged in the crochet lace industry. This industry-or rather
the crocheting-was introduced by missionaries around 1860.
They encouraged the local women to earn their livelihood by
this new skill. In 1900 the lace goods began to be exported and
there are now more than 50 such lace exporters or manufactur
ers, as they call themselves, in Narsapur. By 1970 they exported
between $1 and $1 'h million worth of lace goods every year to
Australia, West Germany, Italy, Denmark, Sweden, Britain
and the U.S.A. By 1976-77 the export had gone up to $5 million
and in 1977-78 it was $8 million. Another $1-2 million worth of
lace goods are being sold in the big cities of India (1977-78).23
This industry is a classical case of the putting-out system.
The crocheting is entirely done as a house industry by girls and
women of all ages. These women are mainly the daughters and
wives of agricultural laborers and poor peasants who have lost
their land in the last ten years in the course of the Green
8
Revolution. Lace making is a means by which they try to
supplement the insufficient income of their husbands and hence
they fall into the category of subsistence producers as discussed
earlier. Three companies supply the thread to three stockists in
the region. These thread stockists hold a monopoly over the
supply in the region. The exporters buy the thread from these
stockists who themselves have become big exporters in the
course of the last years. The exporters give this raw material to
the middlemen/agents who then take the thread to the lace
makers, pay the wages to them (half the amount of wages is
advanced by the exporters and the other half is invested by the
agents), and they also collect the lace goods: table cloths.
luncheon sets, lace shirts and dresses etc.-all materials which
have become fashionable in Western boutiques. The middlemen
are employed full time. The women artisans, who earn less than
I rupee per day, * are paid piece-work rates. For lace made of
2,000 meters of thread they get Rs.4. -. One woman usually
needs a week to finish 2,OOOms. This means she earns Rs.4.
per week. Her daily earnings come to Rs. 0.56 on average. (The
women also work on Sundays and don't have any leisure time or
holidays.) This is less than one third of the minimum wage fixed
for female agricultural workers. 24
It is estimated that 95 percent of the foreign exchange
earnings from the export of handicrafts of the State of Andhra
Pradesh are earned by these women. The government has intro
duced a quality marking office in 1960. The officer in charge of
this office controls the quality of the lace made by the women
he is a man, of course-and he rejects bad or dirty lace goods.
The women start crocheting as little girls and continue to do so
until they are old and blind. They receive from the middlemen
one pattern or design which they are supposed to crochet, often
throughout their entire life. The women have no organization
Hi!oo approximately equal to $1
He's got the
world on
a string
whatsoever, and they complained immediately to me about how
they are being exploited by the male exporters who live in big
bungalows. The exporters, in tum, said that their business was
prospering and that they had not been affected by the crisis in the
textile industry in the I 970s . In the chain of accumulation the
exporters may invest their profits in other lucrative projects like
land, tractors, taxis or cinema houses.
Consequences for Women
Although we need a much broader and deeper study of the
present processes affecting rural subsistence reproducers, the
above analysis of available data permits the formulation of a
thesis: namely, that capitalist penetration leads to the pauperi
zation and marginalization of large masses of subsistence re
producers in India, the capitalist periphery, and secondly, that
women are more affected by these processes than men, who
may still be partly absorbed into the actual wage labor force.
Women in India, in particular, seem to face the following
consequences.
1.
Capitalist penetration into the rural areas leads to the grad
ual erosion of the material base of women's subsistence re
production. Although they may produce for a world-wide capit
alist market, the form of production al1d the organization of
production usually remain the same as it had been for producing
use values. They don't need any constant capital except for the
yarn. They don't need machinery or factories or sophisticated
technology. In other words, capitalist accumulation can take
place even when the organization of work is not changed. These
forms are mainly private. On the other hand, the women remain
IImlill, Oclober II'!. ]'J7S
His is nt>t.n iSO'Bred example. We h,.. heipN
many ptlople lik. him. Sm,lI.ntrepren.urs ,nd
would be entrapreneurs who lacked on, vitll
the opportuniry to mske (JOOd. W.
the encouragement. guld,nce Ind..where nee.sury.
rho re,,,,, orders. We mBde no compromi,. on quBliry.
w. "II.,. '1M, '.,..1".",,,.,.
'.."oM/blll', 10 rlN &/l1li11 M4tl", ",'on,
TINt I"Mt,'oI .,.wthI,.. IIOt with the ,.,..
.,,,,,.1/ NC'''' """r.'". /" "0/.,10". M
t ...',..,. I" pM't,..,.hlll Mil I" 1M,,,..,,,.
AIHIIII tW, mutual Ittt.,..,.
,Ituo 11_ ther .," IN,,, _
,INI"",., ,,,_,/0/,,,,... f., elN ."".t".
Developing people who hive the talent,
but lack the opportunity ...
Cc.ts
9
largely excluded from the circulation of commodites. They
receive low prices for their goods and low wages for their work.
Eventually, the family may be forced to take out loans, or to sell
their land (or they may lose it to the moneylenders). Yet often,
before the family loses the land, the women lose their own poor
belongings: gold, utensils, implements. They are still respon
sible for the satisfaction of the basic needs of the family, but
since part of their product is being extracted as surplus product
and the material base of subsistence reproduction is getting
smaller, the women have to fall back on older forms of securing
a livelihood. They gather roots and leaves from the forest,
collect firewood as fuel for themselves and for sale, walk miles
on end to fetch water, etc.
2.
There is a growing inequality and polarization between the
sexes. Capitalist penetration, far from bringing about a demo
cratization between men and women-as had been the fond
hope of so many who have seen in capitalism the midwife of
democracy and progress-has in fact introduced new elements
of patriarchalism and sexism. Although many subsistence so
cieties, in India as elsewhere, had a very clearly defined sex
specific division of labor, capitalist penetration invariably up
sets this pattern in the direction of enhancing male dominance
and power. 25
When production for exchange is introduced, men are
recruited as laborers, whereas women remain responsible for
subsistence or household production.
26
When capitalist market
relations begin to replace the old local market systems, men
push women out of the market sphere where they used to sell or
barter their products. 27 Women may still continue in some local
markets to sell vegetables, pottery or other goods which they
have produced over and above their own use, but marketing
and the profits-along capitalist lines is invariably in the hands
of men. 2g
3.
This polarization between the sexes in rural areas is not an
isolated process. It is closely related to the overall process of
class polarization taking place under the impact of capitalist
farming. Growing commercialization of agriculture, a rise in
production of cash-crops, the rise in agricultural prices, and the
introduction of new technology, all have strengthened the econ
omic position of rich famlers. This class has also benefitted
most from government expenditure on rural development and it
has largely dominated the credit institutions. Even the various
devised for the uplift of the poor and marginal peasants
eventually end up in the hands of the rural rich. On the other
hand, more and more small farmers lose their land through
[n recent years this has led to a growing number of
bonded laborers who, for the repayment of a small loan bor
rowed from their landlord or a rich peasant, are forced to work
for long periods of time.
Though no systematic study has been done yet about the
IOter-relation between class differentiation and polarization be
tween the sexes or increasing sexism, a few features of this
ongoing process can be observed in the Indian context. For
example, some of the so-called' 'backward classes" (service
castes like shepherds, potters, etc.) have been able to rise in
recent years to the status of middle peasants or even rich peas
ants. Previously their women used to do agricultural labor, but
once they have achieved a certain economic status they subject
their women to seclusion and strict patriarchal norms. The
women cease to work on the land as a sign that they are no longer
of the inferior class. They become "housewives."
Another example of the combination of class differentia
tion and polarization between the sexes is the spread of the
dowry-system (bridegroom price) even among poor peasants
and agricultural laborers. These classes did not know the dowry
before, but used to demand a nominal bride-price. This is
logical in communities where women are productive workers.
But when men of these communities migrate to the cities, or are
able to rise in economic status, they too demand dowries from
their prospective fathers-in-law. Other families, wanting to
prove their "higher" social status, begin to imitate such prac
tices. The patriarchal dowry system spreads, and the result is
that many poor peasants become indebted because they have to
take loans to marry off their daughters.
4.
The integration of subsistence production and subsistence
reproducers into the process of capital accumulation is not a
peaceful affair, but is accompanied by violence, compulsion
and extra-economic coercion, all of which go towards greater
extraction of surplus labor from the producers. Very often this
violence has a distinct sexual dimension. On the one hand there
is the "feudal" violence of the landowning classes. Rape and
sexual humiliation of tribal women and poor women peasants
are a common feature in rural India. This type of violence seems
to be increasing as former feudal landlords take to capitalist
farming.
29
But there is also the patriarchal violence of the
husband against his wife. The more women have been excluded
from the productive sphere, the more they have become depen
dent on their husband's income, the more the men seem to be
using their power to harass and beat their wives.
Capitalist penetration has added yet another dimension,
that is, the state's violence against the biological reproductive
capacities of men and women. Since capitalism is not able to
satisfy the subsistence needs of the masses of pauperized and
marginalized people in India, the masses have to depend on
procreation to safeguard their own survival. However, as has
been well-publicized, the government's neo-Malthusian popu
lation policies and sterilization programs periodically have been
enforced with coercion and direct violence. 30
5.
Another consequence of capitalist penetration in India for
women in the subsistence sector is the break-up of the traditional
family as the location for reproduction. Pauperized men migrate
to the cities and leave their wives and children back in the
countryside. Often the men find it difficult to make enough
money to send to their wives in the village. Therefore, the
women, often without any means of production, tum to beg
ging, to prostitution, or to employment for less than the min
imum wage. In any case, they become the main breadwinners of
the broken family.
10
Theoretical Implications
In attempting to understand the relationship between sub
sistence reproduction and capitalism, the classical argument has
been that the capitalist mode of production will ultimately
"free" all non-capitalist spheres and modes from their struc
tural isolation and backwardness and integrate them into one
homogeneous world system ruled by the laws of capital ac
cumulation. Thus, development of these spheres and regions is
seen as the repetition of the historic process of development
which took place in the West, starting with the take-off point of
the so-called primitive accumulation in the mercantile era. Yet.
both a look at history and at an analysis of the inherent contra
dictions of the capitalist mode of production, teach us that
"primitive accumulation" does not necessarily precede the
process of capital accumulation. Rather. it is an ongoing process
by which non-capitalist and structurally heterogeneous spheres
are being tapped for the extraction of surplus labor and surplus
product.
The recent discussion
3l
on the modes of production and on
"ongoing primitive accumulation" and the re-analysis of Rosa
Luxemburg's work (1913) on capital accumulation,32 have
gone a long way in explaining the relationship between subsis
tence re-production and capitalist accumulation. According to
Rosa Luxemburg, capitalist penetration means both the destruc
tion and the preservation of subsistence economies, or to use her
expression, of natural economies. Her argument is that capital
accumulation, i.e. the reproduction of capital, is not possible
without the existence of non-capitalist strata and regions. The
realization of surplus value is possible only if the means of
consumption and the means of production produced over and
above the requirements of the workers and the capitalists in the
capitalist centers can be sold to non-capitalist strata and coun
tries, that is to subsistence peasants and colonies. Similarly,
capital accumulation requires that the means of production be
constantly renewed and extended, even if this is not done within
the classical wage-labor capital relationship. Thirdly, the in
crease of capital accumulation is possible only with an increase
of labor power. In sum there must always be non-capitalist
spheres of production for the extension of the market, extension
of the means of production and extension of labor power.
Rosa Luxemburg thought only of peasants and colonies as
the non-capitalist strata and regions to be tapped in the process
capital accumulation. 33 C. V. Werlhof has extended her analysis
to the area of female labor both in the capitalist centers (house
work) and in the capitalist periphery. She argues that the domin
ant production relation of capitalism is not simply the relation
between wage labor and capital, but that this relation itself has a
double-faced character, one side being represented by the wage
labor relation and the other by the non-wage labor relation of
subsistence reproducer, particularly of women. Women form
the basis for the process of ongoing primitive accumulation as
the precondition for accumulation proper. 34 Primitive accumu
lation presuppose'S an ongoing process of use-value production.
and women are, according to K. Sacks, typically the producers of
use values whereas men in all class societies produce for ex
change.
3s
In the capitalist centers the household is the typical sphere
for ongoing primitive accumulation and use-value production.
As the "free" wage laborer under capitalism has been robbed of
the means of subsistence production she/he is dependent on a
Sweeper woman in Hyderabad (photo by Bilhandra Mouli.
College of Fine Arts. courtesy of Maria Mies).
I
t
I
wage for the satisfaction of her/his basic needs. The wage,
however, covers only the price of food, clothes, housing, etc.
not the work that is necessary to transform these commodities
from the wage into use values. Housework under capit
alism, therefore, means much more than what is usually termed
as reproduction of the labor force. It is in fact the ongoing
process of the production and reproduction of life which is still
the material base for the reproduction of the labor force, to be
bought and exploited in the process of capital accumulation.
Although most of this work takes place outside the market
sphere, it constitutes the hidden base on which the classical
exploitation of wage labor by capital can take place. 36 Without
the unpaid "consumption work" and "relationship work" of
millions of housewives, no laborer would be able to sell "liv
ing" labor force to the capitalist. 3
7
The labor of the housewife
has typically not been transformed into wage-labor.
Following this analysis it may be said that capitalist pene
tration does not mean the transformation of all non-capitalist
subsistence production into capitalist production units and of the
use-value producers into "free" wage laborers. Even in the
capitalist centers such a transformation has not happened. This
preservation of non-capitalist strata and regions of subsistence
reproduction does not mean, however, that they remain unaf
fected or that they can retain control over their product and
means of production once capitalist penetration has started.
Capitalist penetration in fact, means a violent attack on these
subsistence economies and their real or formal or marginal
subsumption under capital. 38
The classical process of pauperization and proletariani
zation of subsistence producers which took place in the capital
ist center is not copied in the capitalist peripheries. The pro
letarianization of pauperized tribals, small peasants, and small
artisans is marginal because the industrial sector in the periphery
is frequently stagnant. The effect of capitalist penetration,
therefore, is a rapid deterioration of the living conditions of
these classes in general, and of the women in particular. In order
to be able to survive the women either flock to the overcrowded
cities and try to make a living in the slums with occasional jobs
as house-servants, peddlers, beggars, petty criminals, prosti
tutes, etc.; or they remain in the rural areas- and this is the
majority-and work for a wage below the subsistence level. As
agricultural laborers they move about as migrant labor, recruited
and exploited both sexually and as workers by labor contractors,
landlords, and even the police. In many countries they have
been deserted by their husbands who have migrated to the cities
in search of work and are not able or willing to send any money
back to their villages. They form an inexhaustible source of
cheap, non-capitalistically reproduced labor, which may be
tapped whenever some sporadic capitalist expansion may take
place. It is characteristic of the present phase of development
that the "formal subsumption" ofthis vast pool of marginalized
female labor under capital forms an important part of a global
capitalist strategy. 39
What Can Be Done?
It is beyond the scope of this paper to draw the necessary
strategic conclusions from the above analysis. Yet a few hints
can be given for the development of a strategy aimed at the
emancipation of subsistence reproducers.
First, if the thesis is accepted that capital accumulation,
particularly in its present phase, produces an ever-increasing
mass of marginalized population, above all of women, who
simply have to struggle for survival and that this marginal mass
forms the hidden base for extra-profits, then it is inadequate to
dismiss these subsistence reproducers as lumpen proletarians
and expect all change only from the classical wage
laborers. In view of the fact that in most peripheral countries it is
a privilege to be able to sell one's labor power in the market,40
the wage labor class may strive for economic betterment rather
than for an overthrow of the system. A unity of all exploited can
be brought about only when the classical proletarians under
stand that they themselves are continually threatened by margin
alization.
Secondly, it is equally inadequate to juxtapose mechani
cally class-contradictions and the man-woman contradiction
and to ask: What comes first, what comes second? Imposition of
capitalist production relations dOes not only lead to a deteriora
tion of women's status. The fight against sexism must, there
fore, become an integral part of any strategy aimed at eliminat
ing all class rule. To define women's emancipation only as a
tactical goal in the process of class' struggle misses the main
point.
Thirdly, if the exploitation of women's subsistence work
forms the main base on which wage exploitation can take place,
then this exploitation cannot be fought unless the sexist repro
duction relations, mainly in the family, are revolutionized. In
order to unveil the hidden character of these exploitative rela
tions it is necessary to give up thefamity as the basic unit in our
analysis and strategy. We have to ask rather what happens to
individuals-women, children and men-in the process of
capitalist penetration. Most studies of the rural class structure
are based on the household as the basic unit. The economic
status of the household, however, is usually defined by the
status of the male head, whose status is mostly higher than that
of the woman and children.
Finally, if the family is abandoned as the unit for defining
economic and political status and the analysis is done along
sex-specific lines, the relatIonship between sex- and class-pol
arization would become clearer. At the present stage of my
research, it is not possible to present enough factual evidence to
further our understanding of this relationship. Yet, the Indian
example and even some of the material presented here may give
us some clue. The social history of the caste system teaches us
that hierarchical caste divisions have been used to uphold hyper
gamous marriage relations. 41 This means that upper caste men
could always have access to lower caste or "untouchable"
women-within or without marriage-but their own women
were "protected" from the men of the lower castes. In this
non-reciprocal relationship, sanctioned by Hindu religion, low
caste women were exploited sexually and economically to en
hance the upper castes' population, and their political and eco
nomic power. Their wives were protected to guarantee that the
property thus accumulated could be inherited by the' 'real" sons
only. If we look at contemporary India and the class differentia
tions taking place under the impact of capitalism, we find
similar mechanisms at work. Whenever tribal men and women
in India are being proletarianized, i.e. recruited as laborers for
plantations, coal mines, etc., the women are not only exploited
as laborers along with their men, but caste Hindus usually make
them into prostitutes because of the freer and more egalitarian
relationship prevailing between tribal men and women. They
12
are less "protected." (The case of Santhal women in the coal
mines of Chota Nagpur is the best known example.)
In this process the relationship between tribal men and
women is also transformed. If the women want to defend them
selves against the sexual exploitation of non-tribal men, they
have to imitate the "decent" behavior of the women of the
upper castes; they have to accept patriarchal behavior patterns.
But then their husbands also may imitate the sexist behavior of
their masters or overlords. A strategic consequence of this
analysis would be to fight the sexist norms, customs and institu
tions of the dominant classes and their claim to be advanced or
progressive compared to the "backward" castes and classes. "*
Notes
I. F. Engels. "Der Ursprung der Familie. des Privateigentums und des
Staates" (1884) (Verlag Marxistische Blatter. 1969).
2. K. Marx. The German Ideology. (1844) edited by C.J. Anhur, (New
York. 1970), p. 356.
3. H.D. Evers, "Subsistence Reproduction"; Introductory paper forthe
Conference on Subsistence Reproduction in Southeast Asia, the University of
Bielefeld. West Germany. 1978. K. Marx. Capital. Volume II (London: 1974)
Chapter 21.
4. V. Bennholt-Thomsen. Marginalitat in Latin Amerika. Eine Theorie
kritic in Latinamerika. Analysen and Berichte 3. Verelendungsprozesse und
Widerstandsformen (Berlin: Olle and Wolter. 1979). (Hereafter. Bennholt
Thomsen. Marginalitat.)
5. Anibal Quijano. "Notas sobre el concepto de marginalidad social."
(CEPAL. Oct.. 1966). Jose Nun. "Superpoblacion relativa. ejercito industrial
de reserva y masa marginal." in Revista Latinaoamericana de Sociologia. No.
2, 1969. Eric Hobsbawm, "La marginalidad social en la historia de la in
dustrializacion europea," also in Revista. 1969. Fernando Henrique Cardoso.
. 'Comentario Sobre los conceptos de Sobre poblacion Relativa y Marginalidad"
in Revista latinamericana de Ciencias Sociales. Volume 1/2, 1971. pp. 57-76.
6. Lucio Kowarick. Capitalismo e Marginalidade na America Latina
(Rio de Janeiro. 1975).
7. F. Frobel. 1. Heinrichs and O. Kreye. "Die neue internationale
Arbeitsteilung: strukturelle Arbeitslosigkeit in den Industrielandern und die
Industrialisierung der Entwicklungs-Iander rororo aktuell" (Reinbek, 1977).
Maria Mies, "Social Origins of the Sexual Division of Labour"; paper given at
the Conference on Subsistence Reproduction. the University of Bielefeld, West
Germany. 1978.
8. Esther Boserup, Women's Role in Economic Development (New York:
St. Martin's Press, 1970). Meillassoux. (ed.) L'esclavage dans L'Afrique pre
coloniale (paris: Maspero. 1975). In stressing the imponance of the women in
these "economies domestiques," Meillassoux has assened that the wealth of
these societies depends on the control over additional women whose reproduc
tive functions as bearers of children are being appropriated by men. Though it is
correct that these economies are interested in the increase of laborers and
therefore need women as child-bearers. Meillassoux seems to reduce women to
their biological functions only and to underestimate their role as primary
Untouchable Sweeper caste woman making baskets for sale (Jacobson).
producers of the means of subsistence. In fact. what distinguishes women in
subsistence reproduction in the capitalist periphery from their sisters in the
capitalist centers is the fact that they are still actively involved in the production
of food. of clothes, of fetching water and fuel. of making utensils. etc.-in
short. in the production of use-values. They have not been reduced to "mere
housewi ves" dependent on the wage of the husband.
9. Government ofIndia. "Towards Equality": Report of the Committee
on the Status of Women in India. 1974.
10. Asok Mitra. "The Status of Women." in Frontier. June 18, 1977.
I I. Asok Mitra. India's Population: Aspects ofQuality and Control (New
Delhi. 1978) p. 393.
12. K. Dandekar. cited in Mitra. ibid .. 390-392.
13. ibid., 393.
14. ICSSR. "Critical Issues on the Status of Women in India" (New
Delhi: Advisory Committee on Women's Studies, 1977).
15. Gail Omvedt. "Women and Rural Revolt in India," in Social Scien
tist, Trivandrum. October-November. 1977.
16. Mitra. 1978. pp. 449-450.
17. The debate on the "mode of production in agriculture" in India took
place between 1969 and 1975 mainly in Economic andPolitical Weekly. but also
in Social Scientist. For a discussion of this debate see Gail Omvedt. op. cit.
18. Mitra,1978.p.441.
19. Kanti Pandey. "Unprotected Rural Workers" in Economic Times.
Aug. 24, 1975. A recent study, Bonded Labor in India, (done by the National
Labor Institute and the Gandhi Peace Movement in 1978 and edited by Sharma
Marla) has revealed that almost 5 percent of the agricultural labor force are
caught up in debt-serfdom and are not free to sell their labor in the open market.
The commercialization of agriculture seems to lead to an increase of bonded
labor: 56 percent of the bonded laborers went into bondage only in the last three
years. A bonded laborer is a cheaper and more reliable worker for a landlord or
rich peasant.
20. Tribes constitute 6.94% of the total Indian population (Statistical
Abstracts, 1976). They are the descendents of the original inhabitants of the land
who were driven into inaccessible hill tracts. They do not form part of the Hindu
Caste system.
21. For example, one ofthe"bad" habits of tribal women is not to wear
blouses, but to cover their breasts only with the loose end of their sari. In the
ashram schools all girls are to be taught to wear given to them free
by the government. As the sari blouse has become a symbol of progress among
tribal women. they need money to buy the material and to have the blouse
stitched by a tailor.
22. Another instance of marginalization of rural women was brought to
my attention in a study on the impact ofdevelopment measures on women in the
command area of the Nagarjunasagar dam. This study is being carried out by the
Administrative Staff, College of India. Since the last years of the Fourth Five
Year Plan, Command Area Development (CAD) has emerged as the leading
strategy for agricultural development in areas covered by irrigation schemes.
The objective of CAD is to "maximize the agricultural production in tons as
related to the volume of water available." S. Sarupria and K.V.S. Sastri.
"Regional Development Planning for Command Areas in Andhra Pradesh"
(Hyderabad: The Indian Institute of Economics, 1977). The emphasis is clearly
on capitalist farming. In the newly irrigated areas. cash crop production
particularly rice cultivation-was started on a large scale. Many of the small
peasants in the Nagarjunasagar area lost their land to the rapidly expanding rich
peasants who were able to get the credits and other development inputs. The
population in the irrigated areas grew faster than in the non-irrigated areas as
both the rich peasants who bought the irrigated land and agricultural laborers
have immigrated.
In one block of the Nagarjunasagar command area I was told that the men
had taken over rice transplantation which, since time immemorial, has been a
"woman's job" in the whole of India. This is the first instance I have heard in
which this pattern of division of labor between the sexes has been upset. (In
West Godavari, one of the centers of rice cultivation along capitalist lines
[tractors are much in use], women are still used for rice transplantation.) Men
have also taken over weeding which had been a "woman' s job" before. Further
changes in the sexual division of labor to the disadvantage of women may be
expected in the future.
23. It is very difficult to get exact figures on the volume of export of lace
for the exporters. Most of them deal directly with the imponing firms. The
figures cited were given by the Director of Industries. Hyderabad. They cover
those exporters who have approached the govemmentfor the export incentive of
15 percent. According to an estimate of the manager of the leading bank in
Narsapur, the expon of lace amounts to Rs. 5-10 million per year (1977-78).
24. The minimum wage for female agricultural laborers ranges between
13
Rs. 2 and Rs. 4, according to the area and the type of work.
The manufacturers contend that the women are sitting in their house and do
not want to work outside. If they , the manufacturers, were not to give the women
employment, the latter would have nothing to do. They argue further that the
women belong to castes-mainly the Kapu and the Agnikulakshatriya-who
have always kept their women in the house or under seclusion. In fact Kapu
women themselves confirm this view regarding their caste, but it is very
doubtful whether this statement is totally correct. Most of the Kapus are small
agriculturists. In the whole of Andhra Pradesh, women have had a tradition of
working in the fields and so have Kapu women in other areas. The agnikulaksh
atriyas are fishermen and traditionally in these communities women do the
selling of the fish. Now they have given up this activity and have become
"women sitting in the house."
25. Boserup. 1970. This example illustrates how capitalist accumulation
and integration of local industries into the world market finds its best precondi
tion in a situation where masses of pauperized women can (,e exploited and
where the ideology of the housewife, the "woman sitting in the house" is
propagated. The male exporters who market their products and make tremen
dous profits then appear as benefactors, "giving" work to women who would
otherwise starve. The building-up of capitalist production relations in this area
was identical with-and inseparable from-the strengthening of patriarchal and
sexist men-women relations.
26. Karen Sacks, "Engels Revisited: Women, the Organization of Pro
duction, and Private Property" in E.Z. Rosaldo and L. Lamphere (eds.),
Women, Culture and Society (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1973).
This is usually the case when poor rural men migrate to the cities in search of
jobs and leave their families behind. This process can be observed mainly in
Africa and Latin America but also in India. In some parts of South East Asia,
however (Singapore, Taiwan, South Korea, Thailand), where Free Production
Zones and World Market Factories are established, young women form up to 80
percent of the industrial labor force. The polarization of the sexes takes place in
these zones through extreme exploitation of women. It is facilitated-as in the
Narsapur case-by the diversification of the production process and the streng
thening of a patriarchal and sexist ideology. Women have to leave the job when
they get married or have children. Carmen D. Deere, "Rural Women's Subsist
ence Production in the Capitalist Periphery" in the Review ofRadical Political
Ecnomics, Volume 8, No. I, 1976. Also Frobel, Heinrichs & Kreye, 1977.
27. Technology is another field where women are losing out to men.
Whereas men and women's technology in the subsistence economy, though
different due to the traditional pattern of sexual division of labor, was mainly
used for the production of use values, the new technology which is aimed at the
production of exchange values is frequently controlled by men. Women's old
technology and skills are rendered obsolete as new, labor-saving, capital-intensive
equipment is introduced. When such technology is introduced into spheres
which were traditionally women's jobs, the women are pushed out and replaced
by men.
Due to the contradictions of the capitalist accumulation process in these
dependent economies, the replacement of "traditional" labor-intensive, low
productivity technology by capital-intensive labor-saving technology, can never
be absolute. The old technology may become obsolete, but it remains in the
hands of women who continue to use it to supplement their men's low income.
Therefore, we find the most primitive technology still being used by women
alongside highly sophisticated modem technology that is controlled by men.
This is the case, for example, in construction, in sweeping factories, and in
agriculture. In their homes women have to stick to their old ways of producing,
preserving and preparing food. The proverbial conservatism of women may
have its roots in the fact that they are excluded from the control over new
technologies which are used for exchange value production.
28. In most coastal fishermen's communities in Andhra Pradesh, the
selling offish had always been a women's job. When fish-canning factories and
freezing centers were introduced, the men began selling the fish to these centers.
A similar process could be observed in the Anand Dairy Cooperative Scheme in
Gujarat where milk and milk products were produced along capitalist lines and
marketed in the cities (Operation Flood I and II). Women, who had formerly
done not only most of the work in the feeding and milking of the buffaloes but
had also marketed the milk, are now completely out of the picture in the Anand
complex. (Cf. Rami Chabra.lndian Express, July 15, 1978.)
29. Hardly a day passes without reports on so-called atrocities against the
rural poor appearing in the newspapers. These atrocities invariably include rape
of women. Though rape is definitely on the increase, the newspaper-reading
public has become so used to these reports and so callous, that rape and sexual
violence hardly provokes any reaction.
30. Maria Mies, "'Frauen-dasubertlussige Geschlecht" and "Der Kampf
gegen die Armen"' in Mies, Daibler, v. Werlhof and Lenz (eds.) Frauen. in der
Dritten Welt, 1978.
31. In West Germany this new debate started when some women and men
linked up the Dependency Theory with the discussion on housework in capitalism.
The center for Development Studies at the University of Bielefeld has provided a
forum for this debate through a series of seminars on subsistence reproduction in
Asia, Africa and Latin America. The main participants of this debate are: C.v.
We.rlhof, Veronica Bennholt-Thomsen, T. Schiel, H.D. Evers, M. Mies, and E.
Senghaas Knobloch.
32. Amando Cordova, "Rosa Luxemburg und die Dritte Welt" in Claudio
Pozzoli (ed.), Rosa Luxemburg oder die Bestimmung des So::.ialismus (Frank
furt, 1977). Andre Gunder Frank, "On So-called Primitive Accumulation" in
Frank, World Accumulation, 1492-1789 (New York: Monthly Review Press,
1976; London: MacMillan Press, 1978). Eva Senghaas-Knobloch, "Weibliche
Arbeitskraft und gesellschaftlich Reproduktion"' in Leviathan. (4/4), 1976.
33. Rosa Luxemburg, Die Akkumulation des Kapitals (1913) (Frankfurt:
Archiv sozialistischer Literatur, 1970).
34. Claudia v. Werlhof, . 'Zu den Folgen der Einbeziehung der Frauenfrage
in die Kritik der Politischen Okonomie" in Beitrage zur Feministischen Theorie
und Praxis, I, 1978.
35. Sacks, 1973.
36. v. Werlhof, 1978.
37. Batya Weinbaum and Amy Bridges, "The Other Side of the Paycheck:
Monopoly Capital and the Structure of Consumption" in Monthly Review (Vol.
28, no. 3) July-August, 1976, pp. 88-103. EliZaretzki,Capitalism, The Family
and Personal Life (New York: Harper & Row, 1973).
38. Veronica Bennholdt-Thomsen, "Probleme der Klassenananlyse des
Agrarsektors in Staaten weltmarktabhaengiger Reproduktion" in Bielefelder Stu
dien ~ u r Entwicklungssoziologie, Nr. 5: Subsistenz-produktion und Akkumula
tion, Verlag Breitenbach, Saarbruecken, 1979.lt is misleading to call these forms
of subsistence production non-capitalist (a, R. Luxemburg did) or pre-capitalist as
is often done in the discussions on the mode of production. Capital accumulation
thus takes place on the ruins of these economies. Capital has always used the same
tactics in its attack on the subsistence economies. It !irst destroys the means of
production of the producers or robs them, cheats them, etc. Then it recruits the
.. freed' , laborers as wage laborers and makes them dependent at the same time on
the commodity market for their subsistence.
39. A critique of this strategy has been made by Veronica Bennholt
Thomsen in "Investitition in die Armen: Zur Entwicklungspolitik der Welt
bank," unpublished manuscript, Bielefeld, 1978.
40. According to several informants, no one will get a job as an ordinary
factory worker in IDL Chemicals, a reputed Indian chemical concern, unless he
pays Rs. 2,000 as a bribe. Inone case agirl, who could not pay this sum, asked a
contractor to advance her this sum. Yet since she is giving all her salary to her
family she has no means to repay the loan. The contractor therefore uses her
freely as an unpaid bonded prostitute. He does not even allow her to get married
These examples show what a "privilege" it is to be able to sell one's labor
power in India.
41. One of the more well known Indian examples of the interrelation
between sexual differentiation and class differentiation is the case of the matrilineal
and polyandrous Nayars of Kerala. The Nayar men who were recruited by the
British Administration as clerks and civil servants emerged as a new class who
possessed money income whereas the large Nayar taramd-the matrilineal
joint family-had common property or land. The British interpreted the Nayar
men-women relationship as promiscuous and made the appropriate laws for
these men to bequeath the self-earned income to their own sons and not to their
sister's children as had been the rule in this matrilinear and matriolocal community.
At the same time new marriage laws were introduced which imposed
monogamy and patriarchal marriage relationships between men and women.
Underthe impact of the new concept of private property and the sexist bourgeois
ideology, these Nayar men began to be ashamed of the polyandrous marriage
relationships of their mothers and the practical absence of the concept of
fatherhood. As this new foml of patriarchalism served their own interests and
appeared with a claim to modernity and progress, the Nayar men eagerly seized
this opportunity to raise their class status. I. Karve, Kinship Organisation in
India (Bombay, 1965); K. E. Gough, "Is Family Universal7The NayarCase"
in N.W. Bell and E.F. Vogel (eds.) The Family (Glencoe, III.: The Free Press.
1960).
It would be necessary to document further the interplay between sexism
and class-formation with evidence from Africa and Latin America. At the
moment I can only advise the reader to study Meillasoux's work on slavery in
precolonial Africa and Karen Sack's "Engels Re-visited" (1973). It seems
obvious from these examples that "private property"' and a new class ofowners
of this private property was first built up through razzias which included
kidnapping of women as slaves and producers of slaves. I would argue, there
fore. that the first form of private property was not land or cattle but "private"
women-not born in the clan, but kidnapped and appropriated both as workers
and producers of workers.
14
Adivasis, Culture and Modes
of Production in India
by Gail Omvedt
I
Tribal minorities are crucial throughout Asia as bases of
rebellion in today's rebellious world. The tribal peoples
carrying on slash and bum cultivation in mountainous, jungly
border areas-were usually the last conquered by imperialist
powers and have very often been the first bases for revolutionary
communist movements. The support of national minorities was
crucial to the Chinese during the Long March; the Vietnamese
found their first guerrilla bases by integrating themselves with
the tribal minorities in the north of their country and won their
last decisive battle against the Saigon regime with Montagnards
leading the liberation troops; the Malayan Communist Party
found its longest jungle base during the period of Emergency
among the asal or "aboriginal" peoples; and today in Thailand,
Burma and elsewhere insurgent Communist movements have
their strongest bases in tribal regions. In addition, "nationalist"
movements for separation or autonomy continue to resist central
state control in areas as diverse as Burma and the Philippines,
sometimes in uneasy alliance with tribal-based Communists.
India is no different from this pattern of strong tribal support
both for various kinds of "tribal nationalist" movements and
for class warfare. The tribal peoples have a continuous history
of militant uprisings against British colonial rule, from the great
Santal revolt of 1855-57 to numerous smaller uprisings; the
Nagas and Mizos
l
on India's northeastern border have
maintained their demand for separation through varying stages
of guerrilla struggle and counterinsurgency; and long-standing
movements for an autonomous tribal state within India have
been expressed in the "lharkhand" movement among Santals,
Mundas and others in the Bihar/Madhya Pradesh/Orissa tribal
belt. Along with this, tribals have been a major base for much
Communist rural organizing. In recent years this has been most
notable in the tribal base of most CPI(ML)-led uprisings-the
most famous of these being Naxalbari and Srikakulam-but
there has also been important tribal participation in more
legalistic but still militant mass organizations, under diverse but
usually Marxist leadership and in areas as distant as Dhulia
district in Maharashtra, Dhanbad in Bihar and Tripura.
In analyzing the role of tribal peoples in revolt, geopolitical
factors are usually discussed: the tribals inhabit mountainous
border regions, never previously incorporated into the agrarian-
Eileen Whalen (ink drawing).
based kingdoms of the plains, and lacking the easy communica
tion and transport facilities that make central state control easy. I
would like to discuss here an additional, somewhat related but
different factor for India-the issue of culture.
II
The tribals' term for themselves in India is adivasi, 2 which
means' 'original inhabitant. " Implicit in this term one may find
claims either to separation or autonomy although the basic
reference is to a set of characteristics that make India a culture
area. I propose here to take the latter notion seriously. That is. it
will be argued that, contrary to the case of most other areas of
Asia, the tribals of India (except perhaps for the peoples of the
northeast frontier) have been an integral part of Indian culture
and society for thousands of years, and are not simply "exter
nal" to it.
3
Most social scientists and historians have in fact
recognized the tribal element as a crucial and continuing part of
Indian society. Thus Lannoy writes that "one of the most
conspicuous traits of Indian culture is the survival, in the midst
of both caste and urban society, of tribal pockets." And as
D. D. Kosambi has put it, "The entire course of Indian history
shows tribal elements being fused into a general society. "4
Of recent interpretations, at least by western scholars, it is
probably that of Lannoy which is the most sensitive to the role
played by tribal factors within Indian culture itself. He refers to
the tribes as the "Antipodes" and argues they have played a
crucial part in the "development of Indian culture by the very
fact of their separateness and their difference from caste soci
ety" (180). The tribals, according to him, represent not only the
"untransformed residue of the original primitive culture"
15
(179), but also, for all of Hindu/Indian culture they represent an
"emotional primitive substratum" that is also a "rejuvenating
catalyst" (169-70). "Every well documented case of a great
creative Indian personality abounds in evidence of such contact
with the nonrational culture of excluded peoples and clans"
( 171), he claims. The content of this tribal appeal and source of
energy is a more egalitarian, individualistic and erotic life in the
forest that is both threatening and yet appealing to the Hindu of
the villages, tied down by caste and dharma. 5
In common with the Hindu lower castes, the tribes emphasize
greater equality ofbehavior within the ethnic group, greater
equality ofstatus for women, more liberal relations between
the sexes (men and women work together), a more personal
relationship between husband and wife, a more "romantic"
type of courtship, love adventures and love feuds, and, as
would be expected, a greater emphasis on self-reliance in
child care. Pollution rules are far more relaxed among the
tribes than among castes. The absence ofpuritanism. frank
indulgence in pleasure. and a strong sense of corporate
identity all favour the tribal passion for music and dance
(Lannoy. 183).
Another expression of what tribal identity means to caste
Hindus, this time from south India, is given by Stephen Tyler:
The emotional ori"tmtation of the tina is betrays an essential
opposition between the hill peoples (Kuravar) and all the
others. Tamil love poetry ascribes the themes oferotic love to
the hill region. but the other regions are consistent only with
love situations involving separation. quarreling and sulk
ing . ... The masculine subject ofa poem is almost always a
warrior-hero who finds love in the hills but saddens the heart
ofhis lady love (now his wife) when he leaves her tofindfame
and fortune in the field of battle. . . . To the ancient Tamil
poet as well as to his modern descendent. tribal society has
always been associated with the unclean but omnipotent and
ultimately free. The independence. individualism. freedom.
spontaneity and orgiasticism of tribal life is felt to be in
complete contrast to the subservience. dependence and in
hibitions of caste society . ... Hindu speculation allows
only two kinds of individualism. the tribal and the ascetic.
and these are diametrically opposed to the corporate
hierarchy ofcaste society. 6
What has to be added, of course, is that while the tribal
cultures do in fact allow much more scope for individual ro
mantic love for their youths, this is well institutionalized in
forms usually allowed only before undertaking (often arranged)
marital responsibilities.
7
The antagonism between hill and
plains, tribe and caste, is explained not in psychological terms
but as representing the antagonism of different modes of pro
duction, and Kosambi is undoubtedly right in identifying the
spread of brahmanism, with its rigid subordination of the indi
vidual to social function, with the spread of a more productive
agrarian order which gave some underlying material base to the
superiority the plains people felt to the hills.8 What is not
explained so far. however 1 is the continuing coexistence ofthese
two modes in India over centuries. in a way that maintains a
polarity that seems unique to the world's great civilizations.
The basic point. however, that Lannoy and Tyler make is
that the tribes represent something important to the whole of
Indian culture; that they are not simply' . pockets ., of a primitive
society external to caste Hinduism, but represent a different,
opposing cultural principle of organizing human life. It is a
principle that spreads over into the lower levels of village
society as well. for as noted by the above quote, the lower castes
lean toward the tribal' 'pole" in their greater relative equalitar
ianism and emotionally free behavior. This attraction or absorp
tion towards a tribal pole-if we look at it that way-has many
forms. There are numerous castes and groups still considered
half-tribal. half-Hindu. There are the low castes often classified
as "criminal tribes" because while they may live in or near
villages, they playa role in relating the village to the forest.
protecting it on the one hand and maintaining a bandit tradition
on the other. There are the "sect-like" groups of bards or
bandits (the Bauls. the Thugs) who absorb dissident or expelled
members of village society-and. if we describe the "bandit"
tradition itself as part of a tribal element. it is important to note
its ambiguity: on the one hand preying on village society. on the
other hand performing a "Robin Hood" role of attacking the
wealthy. the upper caste. the landlords. often to the delight of
Churning butter (Jacob.onl.
16
the village poor. 9 At a cultural level. of course, there are not
only the hundreds of local gods and (especially) goddesses
absorbed from the indigenous neolithic traditions but also
numerous village festivals, semi-orgiastic practices and
customs such as possession. 10
The problem is, however, that while social scientists rec
ognize the existence of a tribal "pole," few see it in a com
prehensive fashion. Instead, even though Indian culture is de
scribed as representing mixtures of Aryan and Sanskrit-derived
elements with tribal and other non-Aryan elements, it is almost
always the Sanskritic and in fact brahmanic model that is seen as
the basic and dynamic element, the tribal element as simply
consisting of passive material which is absorbed and trans
formed. The term "Great Tradition" is used to refer to the
Sanskritic and brahmanic model which generates caste
hierarchy, while all others are lumped under the term "Little
Tradition. "II Two of the most influential versions of this are
M. N. Srinivas' theory of "Sanskritization" and Louis Du
mont's model of "Homo Hierarchus," both of which claim to
have captured the basic underlying elements of Indian culture,
one from a diachronic, the other from a synchronic point of
view.
In Srinivas' view there has been an ongoing process
through the centuries of tribes being absorbed into the lower
levels of village society and then of the lower castes within this
society adopting the higher, "Sanskritic" customs. On the one
hand this process involves both the cultural one of adopting
Sanskritic deities to absorb local gods and goddesses and utiliz
ing Sanskritic epics and myths on the cultural level. But on the
social level it means following as far as possible the brahmanic
rules of caste: maintaining the rules of purity and pollution and,
most notably, the principles regarding marriage and the treat
ment of women which require the seclusion and control of the
women and their general subordination to their husbands as pati
or lord. 11
Louis Dumont strikes the major theme of almost all con
temporary anthropologists in seeing the basic features of Indian
society in terms of caste hierarchy. He explains the logic behind
it in terms of the concepts of "purity and pollution." The
sacredness of the Brahman, who mediates between human soci
ety and the gods and therefore must be pure, has to be
maintained by the devotion to duty of the other castes who
perform the various specialized, mundane and often polluting
tasks of society, from the punishment and force required to rule
it to the humble daily artisan tasks. The relative purity and
pollution of a group resulting from function is passed on in a
permanent way through blood and heredity and in temporary
ways by social transactions. The whole system is bound to
gether in an organic hierarchy which leaves no room for the
individual except as a "renouncer." Dumont's approach,
which is not entirely original but has been enormously influen
tial, attempts to account for actual existing diversity in the
structure by arguing that, while diverse and even contrary lower
caste social customs and value standards may exist, they exist
only within the hierarchy at whose top stands the Brahman. The
very nature ofthe hierarchy itself is to . 'encompass" the diverse
and sometimes contradictory elements. 13
But both approaches fail at crucial levels of analysis. What
the theory of Sanskritization by itself fails to explain is the
continuing widespread existence of so many nonsanskritized
(and even anti-sanskriticl castes and groups. particularly when
the process has been going on for centuries and has accelerated
under colonial rule. If "The shift of tribal peoples into jati
society has been going on for many centuries and ... is still an
ongoing, indeed an accelerating process [that is] generally ir
reversible," 14 why aren't they all absorbed? No consistent
answer has been given to this simple question, though Srinivas
would stress the upper castes' resistance to sanskritization, and
Lannoy has argued that caste society has a psychological
"need" for the despised other. i.e., to keep the tribes
nonsanskritic. I believe we also have to postulate (I) a positive
attraction towards the greater freedom and equalitarianism of
the' 'tribal" way of organizing life and (2) active tendencies of
lower-class resistance to sanskritization. 15
As for Dumont, the basic criticism of his theory is that
while it is neat and attractive as an understanding of the
brahmanic cultural model, it falls into hopeless idealism, as do
many of his followers, when it attempts to be a theory of Indian
society as a whole, for Dumont ends by arguing simply that if
the brahmanic model is "encompassing" and superior within its
own terms, it is encompassing and determinant infact.
Rocking the baby (Jacob,on l.
I7
III
To suggest that there is a Counter-Great Tradition, a pole
of culture that is opposite to the brahmanical one and in many
ways equally attractive, we have only to look at the favorite
Indian epic, Ramayana. For millions of Indian children, we are
told, this has provided for century after century the favorite
model of human life, in the idealized pictures of Rama, the
perfect king; Sita, his devoted wife; Laxman, his loyal brother;
and Hanuman, the faithful servant. In recent years, however, it
is clear that significant groups are rejecting this model. When
Gandhi picked "Ram-Rajya" as the theme forthe perfect India
he wanted to create. it was resisted by untouchables and
nonBrahmans in Maharashtra, who focused instead on the
symbol of Shambuk-the untouchable boy killed by Rama for
the' 'sin" of attempting to follow the brahmanic religious path.
The story has been a stock-in-trade in recent years for rebellious
Maharashtrian ex-untouchables who reject Hinduism. And it is
perhaps more well known that the Dravidian movement of the
south has "reversed" the epic, playing it with Ravana, the
demon king as hero and Rama as an effete weakling. They
would argue that the original version represented a mythol
ogized account of the Aryan conquest of the Dravidian south.
What is important to note is that these rebellious versions
are not simply "modem" transvaluations. The Ravana version
in particular is based on deep, ancient and pervasive popular
themes. Santosh Desai has shown that in fact there were two
original constituent elements to the Ramayana story, which he
describes as the "Valmiki Ramayana," originating in the Aryan
traditions of north India, and the "NonVaimiki Ramayana,"
popular among nonAryan elements of the south-which turns
out to include Maharashtra, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Bengal
and Kashmir as well as the current Dravidian-speaking states. It is
the "northern" version that presents Rama and Sita as the ideal
models of Hindu dharma, depicting the perfect relationships
within the family, with Sita as wife, "the embodiment of wom
anly love, truth and devotion" loyal to her husband through all
sufferings, and Rama as the righteous kind "whose goal is to
restore Hindu order and maintain it. " 16
In contrast, the versions which focus on Ravana as hero are
unconcerned with "preaching Hindu ethical values of personal
or family life"; they emphasize love and warfare, often ab
sorbed in the details of the battles between Rama and Ravana
and depicting Ravana not simply as a scholar (which makes its
way into official versions) but as a resourceful and heroic
character, genuinely in love with Sita. Taking Thailand as an
example where contemporary versions focus on this very dif
ferent ethic
The Thai literary epic assigns as high a' value to human love
as the Hindu religious epic to Hindu social and moral order.
The Thai appreciate Ravana's sacrifice of his family, his
relatives, his kingdom and wealth, and even his life for the
love he has for Rama' s wife. 17
And in contrast to the over-idealized, onesided figures of the
Valmiki version. the characters in the nonValmiki version are
more subtle amalgams of good and evil. heroism and frailty. so
that the total effect goes beyond being a simple moral tale:
Thus the defeat and death ofRavana . .. creates an impres
sian ofgreat tragedy in the Thai story . ... The Thai Ravana
is not just a criminal or sinner but a great character with
human virtues and frailties. Moreover . .. there is a total
absence of the prescription of the Hindu social order based
on the four castes. 18
The connection between the patriarchal family and the hier
archical social order-both central to the values of the Valmiki
version but ignored by the nonValmiki stories-is clear.
It would be fallacious to characterize these two versions of
the Ramayana in terms of localized' 'little traditions" of primi
tive elements absorbed by a superior, literate culture. Both
represent powerful moral themes but they are the morality of
different types of societies. Both are equally widespread geo
graphically, but the difference in the spread is marked: only
China. of all the Asian societies affected by the Ramayana. has
preferred the Valmiki version; all the other Southeast Asian
societies center their versions on the Ravana theme of love and
war. This difference can only be explained in terms of the
linkages of the themes with different types of concrete social
structures. The distinction which Samir Amin draws between
feudal and tributory modes of production is important here. 19
Feudal societies are characterized by the existence of a landlord
class-an aristocracy or gentry claiming hereditary superiority
and control of the land and people on it-with relatively indi
vidualized peasant families bound to them in relations of per
sonal dependence. Relationships among the "gentry" and the
centralized state may vary, but stable hierarchical patterns of
one sort or another - whether emphasizing personal fealty or
bureaucratic merit-are worked out; at the same time the subor
dination of women within the patriarchal family (related to the
need to maintain purity of family status and hereditary claims) is
strong. Both Hindu India and China were" feudal" in this broad
sense.
20
and such societies require ideologies emphasizing or
ganic, hierarchical unity and subordinate loyalty of women and
social inferiors. In contrast, Southeast Asian societies were
marked by more collective peasant traditions at the village level,
greater equality for women, bilateral kinship, i.e., lack of the
patriarchal family-and unstable states, with no stable kin
linked landlord/aristocratic class, sacred kinship and continuing
but theatrical warfare and flux. 21 This by and large fits Amin' s
description of the "tributary mode" and probably represents
class societies closer to the first states developed out of com
munal (tribal) societies, including most of those in India. Themes
of romantic love, warfare and individual heroism (i.e., the
Ravana themes) are more consonant with this type of society.
What the Ramayana presents us with, then, once we delve
into it, is the existence of a counter tradition in Indian culture
a tradition that is nonAryan, "southern" only in the sense in
which the "south" can be said to extend to Kashmir and
Bengal, based on tribal and low caste elements in different ways
in different parts of India (e.g., in the Dravidian south the
counter tradition extends to a wider range of nonBrahman castes,
in the north it may be more limited to the very lowest castes and
tribes), and presenting an ethic of a mode of production different
from that of the feudal, caste-hierarchical Hindu one. It became
a suppressed tradition within the Indian subcontinent once the
orthodox caste system stabilized itself. but it has remained, and
remained capable of appealing to the lower, suppressed groups
within the society. Ultimately, it is as "encompassing" as the
18
brahmanic tradition itself.
To put this in a simple and schematic way; contrary to
Dumont's claim, the opposite of the Brahman is not the Un
touchable, suppressed bottom element of the caste hierarchy,
but the Tribal-who is external to caste hierarchy, but not to
Indian culture and society.
IV
,
I
I
How do we understand this in cultural terms? If we look at
"Indian culture" in a way that seeks to extract its basic and most
essential feature, probably the most common analysis would be
that the uniqueness of it is in the emphasis on the oneness of
existence, the organic unity of being, that it stands in contrast to
the western alienation of the individual which poses humans
against nature. Lannoy expresses this aesthetically:
On the Sanchi gateways one of the chief characteristics of
mature Indian art is already manifest: all organic forms look
as if they were derivatives ofone primal substance, whether
they represent vegetable, mineral, animal or human shapes.
Whole buildings seem to grow from the soil; their surfaces
blossom with figures, beasts, and foliage, all of which are
part of the same plantlike growth. Costumes, headdresses
and festoons ofjewellery are metamorphosed into the same
substance .... It is not just a matter of abundant detail
carved in a single material-stone; there is a concerted
attempt to express the unity ofall life in formal terms. 22
While this emphasis on oneness, harmony, the organic
unity of life may indeed be the dominant Indian cultural theme,
there are different ways of conceiving it. In fact, two opposite
ways of conceiving "oneness" have been present in Indian
thinking from very early-and idealistic (ultimately brahmani
cal, feudal) version and a materialistic (ultimately tribal, com
munal) one. These two strands of cultural emphasis pick up on a
different one of the poles of the ancient Indian version of
dualism, which poses purusha (spirit, the male. meditative
principle) against prakrti (matter, the female, emergetic prin
ciple).
The idealistic version of primal unity is the Vedantic one.
tat tvam asi, "that art thou." The individual soul (atman) is said
to be ultimately identical with the ground of being (brahman).
But this unity, it is clear, is achieved only at the price of
separating the individual soul from any attachment to and in
volvement with the material body. Thus throughout the ideal
istic tradition the material world is viewed as not only illusory,
but distracting. dangerous, polluting, that which must be re
jected and overcome. Ultimately this view provides the logic
behind the caste system: the goal and highest value of the society
is to maintain as much purity and noninvolvement as possible,
so that all of society becomes organized to maintain the purity of
the Brahman who carries on transactions with the gods. Those
who are caught up by and bound to material life are held down,
"polluted" by it. B This caste logic requires above all the
subordination of women because they are closely connected
with the "material" processes of polluting birth. death, men
struation, etc. Nor is it accidental that the logic be symbolized in
male terms: the earliest legend of the derivation of the four
varnas is that of the primal man, Purusha. out of whose head
come the Brahmans, whose arms provide the Ksatriyas. whose
thighs the Vaishyas. whose feet the Shudras.
These caste ideals and their hierarchy became the domi
nant, ruling class ideology in India through the feudal period,
"encompassing" and subordinating the lower caste, nonAryan
traditions. That does not, however, mean that they were the only
ones. Because of Brahman control of literacy and texts, 24 coun
ter traditions, including the Indian philosophical traditions of
materialism, have to be reconstructed from the distortions and
refutations of their opponents. But as the Marxist scholar Dev
iprasad Chattopadhyaya has so brilliantly shown in a recent
book,25 this can be done.
In materialist philosophy the principle of prakriti, the
materialist, female principle, becomes the only one, the basic
single oneness, which by itself and without any "idealistic" or
theocratic intervention gives birth to all the forms of the world
and to mind itself. Chattopadhyaya reconstructs this philosophy,
arguing from a common name for it-lokayata-that it rep
resented the basic philosophy of the masses, or the "people."
He also sees it as crucially linked to early agricultural
(horticultural) tribal society and its transformations. Here Chat
topadhyaya provides the socio-economic basis for guiding ideol
ogies, stressing the crucial linkage of materialism, the "fem
inine" principles (fertility cults and eroticism) with the nature of
Thakur woman makmg: mud stove, (Jacobson).
19
a mode of production based on early agriculture, where women
are primary producers and the fertility of the earth is seen as
closely connected with the fertility of women. Chattopadhyay
traces this theme through the development of Hinduism, Buddh
ism and the various Tantric cults. The tribal communities were
in the process of being destroyed, and attempting to replace the
broken-down tribal collectivities with the collectivity of the
sangha. 5
v
Finally it is crucial to examine the adaption and reinterpre
tation (not simply survival) of these competing cultural tradi
tions in the 19th and 20th centuries, when capitalist relations
and a new kind of class formation began to penetrate Indian
society. On the one hand are the "Sanskritizing" processes, the
absorption of tribal groups and the tendencies of lower castes to
adopt the sacred thread claim Ksatriya descent, seclude widows
and so forth. With this must be included all the revisions of
traditional brahmanic Hinduism, from the emphasis on an Ar
yan and Vedic heritage as the core of Hindu civilization-a
strand running through Savarkar, Tilak and even Dayanand to
the contemporary R.S.S.-to the more seemingly liberal Gand
hian effort to "modernize" the idealistic tradition, that is to
adapt themes of asceticism, devotion and nonattachment to
action-in-the-world.
On the other hand are active movements of resistance to
processes of sanskritization and an active coalescence towards
the other pole. These include the tribal refusals to accept Hindu
values and the reorientation towards their own cultural tradi
tions. For instance there were the adoption of the term adivasi
and the formation of the Iharkhand movement in the 1930s and
I 940s; the nonBrahman movements in Maharashtra and the
Dravidian south; and the adi movements among untouchables
throughout India, mostly dating from the 1920s. The latter
include the Adi-Dravidas in Madras, the Adi-Hindus in U.P.,
Adi-Karnatikas and Adi-Andhras and probably the biggest
group, the Adi-Dharn1 movement in the Punjab.
27
The Mahar
movement of Maharashtra is another version of the latter, even
though this, under the leadership of Dr. Ambedkar, chose to
emphasize Buddhism rather than an adi identity. But most of the
same themes were there; Buddhism was chosen as an Indian and
an equalitarian religion and one which was thought to represent
historical resistance to caste Hinduism as well as a real claim to
imperial greatness.
These various nonBrahman, untouchable and adi move
ments share common themes: the emphasis on equalitarianism
and the opposition to the caste system, a strong orientation to
secular knowledge and education, and an insistence that the
people of the movements (usually conceived of loosely as the
lower castes and tribals) represented the original "national"
group of India. While the latter was often expressed in racial
terms-Aryan/nonAryan, AryanlDravidian-its significance
is perhaps more than this, in the insistence by the adherents
of these movements that such values as equalitarianism are not
western and foreign, but basically and originally indigenous,
truly Indian. And I think they are right. There is a reality to and a
potential attractiveness of the "tribal" pole of values. It is more
capable of being integrating (or "encompassing") for insurgent
lower classes in the modern world and of representing a basis
for modern culture than the feudal caste morality of vedantic
brahmanism.
Let me give two illustrations of this, both drawn from the
Bhils of Maharashtra who represent one of the largest tribal
groups in India. The first occurred with a women's "study
camp" (shibir) organized by the Shramik Sanghata,na, which
had been organizing among Bhil agricultural laborers of Dhulia
district. In May 1975 nearly 20 caste Hindu women, more or
less involved in aspects of women's liberation and other class
organizing, attended the camp as invited guests and speakers,
and a very interesting interaction took place. Many of the
"outside" women, representing a more urban, middle class
culture that had nearly always been presented to the tribal
women as "superior," spoke of the way they were impressed by
the social freedom of tribal girls:
You have so much freedom-you can go away with a boy
[i.e., before marriage] and you don't have to get married
after that if you don't want to-but we don't even get a
chance to look at our husbands for jive minutes before we are
married!
What this illustrated was that from the point of view of a
developing Indian women's movement, such themes as equality
and even sexual freedom (the first is much talked about, the
latter still tends to be avoided) can be seen lIot as "Western"
contrasted with an "Indian" tradition based on Sita and Savriti,
but as themselves Indian-only Indian of a different tradition.
The other is a song, written in powada (popular Maharash
trian ballad) style by a leader of a group of Bhil agricultural
laborers (translated by me from the recording of a performance
in a village). The song is remarkable in uniting themes of
adivasi identity with class struggle and nationalist revolution. It
begins with three salutes, the first to "mother India," the
second to "the red flag" and the third to "the heroes ofrevolu
tion-Bhagat Singh, Subash Babu, Genu Babu"-and then
makes the assertion:
This land is the Adivasis'
It belongs to the Rhils, Kolis. Phasepardhis,
Katkaris, Thakuris, Warlis, Condo to these people.
they were the kings ofthe forest.
These landless people were once kings ofthe forest.
And then the song becomes a ballad of the 1857 mutiny, which is
seen as a fire spreading all over the country, when . 'adivasi
heroes with bows and arrows in their hands went to war." But
when "the growing power of rebellion shook the Company
Sarkar, " they cunningly found a way out by bribing a comprador
class:
They gave to some a bribe.
To others they gave jobs.
Those who lost. lost because of their fate,
Some don't even have shelter,
And the hired thugs bully them.
How many of the Rhils. Kolis. Thakurs. Katkaris today
Don't have a place to live in the land that belonged to them!
While the encounter of value systems does not occur in such
songs, it seems clear that the composers and singers do not see a
contradiction between a special adivasi claim to the land and
class and nationalist unity-just as the Santals apparently use
the term diku, their appellation for hated Hindus, primarily for
the upper caste and wealthy merchants/landlords. 2H The funda
mental impulse. in other words, is integrative more than separa
tist. but it poses the possibility of a more revolutionary integ
ration.
20
VI
To summarize, I feel that we should bury the notion of a
single "Great Tradition' '; that we should also reject the concept
of "homo hierarchus" seen as the essential feature of what
Indian culture is all about (all feudal societies have an ideology
of hierarchy and this was not the only existing widespread ideol
ogy in India); and that finally we should seriously modify the
notion of "sanskritization" to admit that while it has been one
process of social dynamics in India, it has not been the only one.
I
f
Instead of terms such as the "Great Tradition" or even "San
skritization" (because after all the Sanskritic culture of the Vedic
Aryans was quite different) to refer to the feudal caste hierarchy
and its ideology, I would prefer a term such as .. Brahmanic
tradition." Most important, Indian culture has to be seen in a
f
much more dynamic and historical fashion. Here a basic Marx
ist framework most adequately conceptualizes the data: cultural
expressions of a society or social formations are an outgrowth of
(though never mechanically determined by) its mode or modes
of production, and in societies where antagonistic class relations
exist there will never be simply one "value system" accepted
more or less by all the members of society. Rather, diverse and
conflicting values represent the needs and interests of dominant
and dominated classes. Within South Asia, there have been
varying modes of production with associated cultural themes:
the Indus Valley civilization; the pastoral mode of production of
the Vedic Aryans; the tributary mode of the rising Maghada
Mawyan states of the north after 500 Be (The Arthasastra is
I
j
after all very different from Brahmanic political theory) and
probably of the early Dravidian states in the south; and finally
full-fledged caste feudalism-within which tribal and perhaps
modified tributary regions have continued to exist up to quite
recently. 29 The tribal and tributary modes, perhaps in interac
tion. have produced their own Indian "Great Tradition" which
has continued to survive not only in tribal pockets but also in
providing basic themes for the suppressed peasantry of the
feudal society. And it continues to have relevance in the chang
ing class structure of neocolonial, contemporary India. The
basic historical justification for the Brahmanic tradition (as
emphasized by Kosambi, Nirmal Kumar Bose, etc.) that it was
linked with the changeover from shifting cultivation to a settled
agrarian society and thus was progressive in its beginnings
has been at an end for a long time. It is the suppressed but
resurgent counter traditions that may well offer more bases for
cultural adapt ion and collective action in the revolutionary
world of the last half of the twentieth century. To quote the final
verse of a Marathi song-
The final class war has not yet come
to Bharat; when it does
we'll fight not on the side of the
Kaurus nor the Panda vas .
but the long-neglected Ekalavya will take
up bow and arrow to establish his state.
Landless laborers harvesting wheat (Bhuri Metai. courtesy of D. Jacobson).
21
Notes
I. On the Nagas and Mizos. see "Further Notes on South Asia in Crisis.
with an account of India's Counter-insurgency war against the Nagas and
Mizos." by Eqbal Ahmad in the Bulletin ofConcerned Asian Scholars. Volume
5. No. I (July. 1973) pp. 25-36.
2. This term seems to have come into existence in an organized fashion in
the 1930s. when the Unnati Samaj in Bihar was renamed the Adivasi Mahasabha
in 1938; the Iharkhand movement was to develop out of this. It is now almost
universally accepted but it is interesting to note that its use was earlier resisted by
some scholars on the basis that the term implied claims to separation and G. S.
Ghurye. to take one example. argued against the idea that the tribals represented
an "original" culture. K.L. Sharma. ""lharkhand Movement in Bihar," Eco
nomic and Political Weekly. Jan. 10. 1976; Shashishekhar Jha. "Tribal Leader
ship in Bihar." EPW. Apr. 13. 1968.
3. Richard Fox makes this type of argument in contrasting Indian hunters
and gatherers with those found in Australia. the New World and to some extent
Southeast Asia. arguing that in India they perform basically a caste-like func
tional "specialization" in providing forest products in exchange for commod
ities from the plains; see Fox. "Professional Primitives: Hunters and Gatherers
of Nuclear Southeast Asia" i'n Man in India. April-June. 1969. pp. 139-40.
154-60.
4. D.D. Kosambi. The Culture and of 'Ancient India
(London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. 1965) Richard Lannoy. The Speaking
Tree (London: Oxford University Press. 1975).
5. The term dharma is usually translated as "religion" or "morality" in
discussions of Hindu culture. but since these terms imply a universality of
standards they seem inadequate. Dharma represents a feudal morality-dif
ferent for members of different castes and sexes but implying the maintenance of
the total hierarchy structure. Probably the best recent example is Morarji Desai.
described in U.S. newspapers as a "principled" politician and "religious"
man: he is a vegetarian, a sexual abstainer and at least a partial observer of caste
rules. for one of his daughters is said to have committed suicide many years ago
when he forbade her to marry a man outside of the caste.
6. Stephen Tyler. India: An Anthropological Perspective (Pacific Pali
sades. CA: Goodyear Publishing Co,. 1973) p. 107.
7. William Archer. The Hill of Flutes (1975); Verrier Elwin. The
Kingdom of the Young (Bombay: Oxford University Press. 1968).
8. See. for instance. Karve's description of the Pandavas' burning of
the forests in her retelling of the Mahabharata story.
9. For example. in parts of Nasik district in Maharashtra in the 1930s.
tribal Bhils often raided and plundered the Marwari landlords and merchants
of the plains areas, while the local non Brahman peasantry. involved in their
own differently organized struggle with these landlords, were silent but
applauding spectators.
10. Lannoy. pp. 191-206.
II. Some uses of this term seem to me simply blind; thus when Milton
Singer links the Great Tradition to the "textual elements" he describes the
contents of the culture considered to be higher as being "more ret1ective and
systematically presented and embodying the greatest intellectual and aes
thetic achievements of the culture" -and then mentions the Vedas. Up
anishads. Charmasastra. Mahabharata and Ramayana. What is astounding is
that this list leaves out all of Tamil literature. even though it comes from an
anthropologist specializing in Madras. Milton Singer. When a Great Tradition
(New York: Praeger. 1972) p. 4.
12. M.N. Srinivas. "A Note on Sanskritization and Westernization."
in Far Eastern Quarterly. August. 1956. p. 200.
13. Louis Dumont. Homo Hierarchus (Chicago: University of Chi
cago Press. 1976) translated by Mark Sainsbury.
14. David Mandelbaum. Society in India. Volume 2: Change and Con
tinuity (Berkeley. CA: University of California Press. 1970) pp. 573-588.
15. In addition the whole model of "sanskritization" seems to me too
methodologically naive in its postulates about why and how the process takes
place. It is generally said that when a low caste or tribal family get wealthy. they
tend to sanskritize their social customs. Why would they'! Only because the
culture of the wealthier and powerful groups seems superior'! I believe the
dynamic is much more complex. One of the major differences between tribal
and brahmanic practices is In the position of women. This would imply that all
other things being equal-with members of a family ha\'ing some attraction to
tribal or low caste customs and some attraction for the more "prestigious"
values of local dominant groups-it will be the man who will have the most
interest in sanskritizing. because it increases his power within the family. and
the women who will have the most interest in resistance. This doesn't explain
entirely why one tendency wins out. but if we note that under contemporary
conditions a low caste family usually becomes economically mobile because the
man gets educated and gets a white collar job, thus increasing his power within
the family relative to what it was before. we can make more precise hypotheses
about the nature of "sanskritizing" processes.
16. Santosh Desai. "Ramayana-An Instrument of Historical Contact
and Cultural Transmission Between India and Asia." Journal o(Asian Studies.
XX (November. 1970) pp. 16-17.
17. ibid .. p. 19.
18. ibid .. p. 20.
19. Samir Amin. Unequal Development (New York: Monthly Review
Press. 1976). Also see Samir Amin. "Universality and Cultural Spheres."
Monthly Review, February, 1977.
20. Of course there are broad variations within the "feudal" and "tribut
ary" modes described here. but I think the general contrast applies and is helpful
in understanding phenomena such as the spread of the Ramayana. It should be
noted that this use of the term "feudal" is different from the definition that most
anti-Marxist historians etc. use when they say China is "bureaucratic" and not
"feudal": it is closer to what historians of medieval Europe call' 'manorialism"
(see for instance Elvin where he talks about "manorialism without feudalism."
ie., landlord dominance minus the political decentralization characteristic of
European feudalism). The Marxist concept offeudalism centers on relationships
between the landlords and peasantry. not relative centralization of the political
sphere. Mark Elvin. The Pattern of the Chinese Past (Stanford: Stanford
University Press. 1973) pp. 59-83.
21. Robert Winzler. "Ecology. Culture. Social Organization and State
FOlJTlation in Southeast Asia," Current Anthropology. Vol. 17. No. 14. De
cember. 1976.
22. Lannoy, p. 22. Also Amin. 1977.
23. It has been argued. for instance by Hart. that the basic themes of purity
and pollution come out of southern Dravidian themes. Thus ancient Tamil
literature emphasizes that dangerous "sacred" power was carried in diverse
ways by women. kings and in situations of birth and death-and in order to
control this power. which becomes highly destructive if not subordinated. it
must be carefully. socially suppressed. Thus chastity of wives. the seclusion of
widows and even sati are seen as inherently southern more than Aryan. Never
theless. the idea of a dangerous, sacred power only generates something like a
caste system when connected with the themes of a hereditary transmission of
qualities of pollution. etc. (i.e .. the "code and substance" theme) and with the
standard that these are not simply threatening. but more. inferior. low. degrad
ing and distracting from the highest ends of life. This does not really seem to be a
part of the earliest Dravidian societies. George Hart, The Poems of Ancient
Tamil: Their Milieu and Their Sanskrit Counterparts (Berkeley. CA: University
of California, 1975).
24. Burton Stein. "Integration of the Agrarian System of South India." in
Robert Frykenberg (ed). Land Control and Social Structure in Indian History
(Madison: University of Wisconsin Press. 1969) Also his ""Early Indian Histori
ography: A Conspiracy Hypothesis." Indian Economic and Social History
Review. March, 1969.
25. Deviprasad Chattopadhyay, Lokayata (Bombay: Peoples' Publishing
House. 1970).
26. An article headlined ""Was Buddha an Aryan"" put forward the same
theme of/inking the creativity of Buddhism with tribal. nonA ryan traditions: see
V,S. Pramar, "Was Buddha an Aryan'!" in !IIustrated Weekly. May 16. 1976.
27. Mark Juergensmeyer, "Ad Dharm-The Origins of a Revolutionary
Religion" unpublished manuscript. n.d.
28. S.c. Sen. Jyoti Sen and Sudhir Panchbahi. "The Concept of Diku
Among the Tribes of Chotanagpur." in Man ill India. Vol. 49 (April-June,
1969).
28. The Islamic tradition, in practice linking northern India with
western Asia, complicates this schema even further. and has been unfortu
nately left out of this brief survey.
22
What If the Untouchables
Don't Believe in Untouchability?
by Mark Juergensmeyer
Louis Dumont has argued persuasively that the concept of
caste is not simply a form of social stratification, but a way of
looking at society as a whole. I Dumont argues that the "West
ern mind" sees society as the relationship between individuals
and the mass, but that the "Indian mind" sees relationships
J
between groups (castes) and social unity. 2 This holistic concept
1
of Indian society is essentially religious, for it is based on beliefs
and values which reflect a sacred order, undergird religious
institutions, and are the subjects of religious texts. At the heart
I
,
of these beliefs and values are the Hindu concepts of purity/
pollution, and the karmic cycle of birth and rebirth. Both of
these concepts are intimately related to the notion of Untouch
t
ability; and without them, the caste system would lose its
religious legitimacy. The question, then, is whether the Un
touchables accept this logic, or whether it is forced upon them.
Let us begin with the religious notion of pollution. Accord
ing to Dumont, all aspects of the logic of caste' 'are reducible to
a single true principle, namely the opposition of the pure and the
impure." 3 Dumont continues:
I
This opposition underlies hierarchy, which is the superiority
of the pure to the impure, underlies separation because the
pure and the impure must be kept separate, and underlies the
I
division oflabor because pure and impure occupations must
likewise be kept separate. The whole is founded on the
necessary and hierarchical coexistence of the two opposites.
4
Dumont's statement brings wide agreement, but there is no
concensus on why the polarity of purity and pollution is of such
importance to Hinduism. According to Dumont, the polarity
corresponds to the war between nature and the spirit in which
"impurity corresponds to the organic aspect ofman."s Richard
Lannoy advances the apparently Freudian suggestion that' 'pur
ification is an overt imitation. . . of the infant's dependence on
the mother."6 Mary Douglas suggests that the purity/impurity
continuum in various cultures provides the function of ' 'impos
ing system on an inherently untidy experience."
7
None of these
explanations precludes the others, and we might add a more
basic one, as well. If we observe the articles of pollution
leather, dead animals, feces, cut hair, sweat, and other matter
which has passed from living tissue into rubbish-it is the
elementary fear of death and bodily decay which lurks behind
the concept.
Untouchable day laborer harvesting wheat (Jacobson).
In any event, and for whatever reasons, the concepts are
very much part of the Hindu tradition. Only Gandhi and a few
other modem reformers have denied their importance for the
integrity of the Hindu worldview,
8
and even fewer, if any,
would deny the importance of purity and pollution for the logic
of the caste system.
Presumably, most upper caste persons believe in the con
cept of ritual pollution as Dumont has stated it. Do the Untouch
ables share their beliefs? The answer to that question is not
immediately apparent. Like members of the upper castes, they
appear to observe the social customs regarding eating, smoking,
and fraternizing only with castes of their own social stratum.
They regard as polluting any contact with peoples of castes
deemed even lower than they (and of course, no caste will
willingly accept the notion that it is the lowest). Thus, they
appear to accept the concept of ritual pollution.
But do they? Their acceptance of behavioral actions does
not necessarily mean that they accept the concepts which tradi
tionally lie behind those actions. The beliefs of lower caste
villagers, and those of many other village folk as well, are quite
d i f f e ~ n t from those of the "high tradition." Their worldview is
populated with good and evil spirits which reside in trees and
rocks, and which invest their powers in certain people, words
and symbols. A particular item of food (a vegetable, for exam
ple, or an animal) may be associated with a certain caste, and
that caste will then refuse to eat the item of totemic association
-a matter that obviously has little to do with the traditional
avoidance of certain things for reasons of ritual pollution. And
even when inter-caste taboos are avoided by lower caste villag
ers, it may be because they fear the wrath of a village god, rather
than because they believe in the purity concepts of the "high
tradition."9 The god may punish with disease those who break
the taboo, and it is that, rather than pollution, which they fear.
Moreover, on those matters of pollution which do not
affect intercaste relationships, the Untouchables tend to ignore
the restrictions outright. In eating meat, handling dead animals,
23
or touching other such proscribed objects, the Untouchables
seldom hesitate, nor do they find it necessary to perform rituals
of ablution afterwards (nor for that matter after performing
bodily and sexual functions considered unclean by the tradi
tion). It is as if the stigma of Untouchability has liberated them
from the harmful effects. Since they are already Untouchable,
they cannot be thrust any lower.
Another indication that the lower castes reject the notion of
pollution-at least when applied to themselves-is found in
their attitudes towards Brahmans. Brahmans, of course, regard
Untouchables as inherently polluted, beings who are fundamen
tally different from themselves. The Untouchables, however,
do not see this difference. They regard Brahmans as essentially
no different than they, and their own myths are crowded with
accounts of how they were in fact Brahmans themselves in some
earlier age of history. Their mythic plunge from Brahman to
Untouchable status is not explained with reasons of their accre
tion of pollution, as a high tradition explanation might have it,
but rather because of some misfortune. Fate is the culprit. In
other myths, the lower caste people are portrayed as being
Brahmans in disguise, Prince-and-the-Pauper tales of lost iden
tities. One of the most famous stories about the legendary lower
caste saint-singer, Sant Ravi Das, involves an angry Brahman at
tacking the Sant for his presumption, only to find a sacred thread
lying under the skin of Ravi Das' chest when it is slashed with a
knife. The point of the story, quite literally, is that all are
Brahmans beneath the skin.
An even more dramatic example of the disregard for the
distinction between Brahmans and Untouchables is the exist
ence of Untouchable Brahmans. Presumably such a species is
impossible under Hindu logic, for Brahmans are the incarnation
of ritual purity and Untouchables the embodiment of pollution.
The two cannot go together. Yet I have found Untouchable
Brahmans in the Punjab, and they exist throughout India. These
priests are by definition impure, a parody of priesthood. Admit
tedly there are not many of them; but the phenomenon is not
new. The Punjab ethnography by Ibbetson, Mac Lagan and
Rose, based upon material collected for them for the 1883,
1892, 1901, and 1911 census reports devotes a dozen pages to
the subject. They report some of the folk legends of the Un
touchables which link the phenomenon to the sant tradition of
North India. In one of them, a group of Untouchable Brahmans
was created by the lower caste saint-singer, Ravi Das:
A Brahman. on his way to the Games to bathe. met Ram Das.
the famous Chamar bhagat. Ram Das gave him two cowries
and told him to present them to Gangaji [Ganges}. ifshe held
out her handfor them. She did so. and in return gave him two
kangans [bracelets}. The Brahman went back to Ram Das.
who asked him what the goddess had given him. and he.
intending to keep one ofthe two kangans, said she had given
one only; but when he looked for them they were not on his
own body. but in the kunda[breeches} ofRam Das. RamDas
then gave him the bracelets and warned the Brahman in
future to accept gifts only from his descendants. otherwise
great misfortune would befall him. Accordingly, his de
scendants only serve Chamars to this day. 10
From the Untouchables' point of view, therefore, the con
cepts of purity and pollution appear to have little weight among
their own attitudes toward religion and social values. For them,
even religious priesthood is not reliant on ritual purity. The
implication is clear: Untouchables observe caste customs, but
they do not seem fully to accept the concepts of pollution and
purity upon which the caste system is based.
The Religious Logic of Caste: Karma.
Much the same can be said about the Untouchables' at
titude toward the Hindu concept of the karmic cycle of birth and
rebirth. According to Dumont, this concept is linked with the
concepts of purity and pollution, in the logic of caste. II Put
simply, the notion of the karmic cycle is that one's present
station in life (including one's caste) is the result of one's virtue
or lack of it in a previous life. If one is born an Untouchable,
therefore, one must have deserved it, for it is an indication of
grave sin in a previous existence. It is popularly believed, and
sometimes reported by scholars, that the Untouchables' accept
ance of this concept allows them to live with their low status and
onerous conditions. The following, a recent and remarkably
inaccurate statement by a missionary anthropologist, demon
strates this misunderstanding:
The Chamars and. in fact. all the Hindu village people of
northern India believe in karma, afull retribution in the next
life for all a person's actions . ... A Chamar. consequently.
has to attribute his low social status and his hard economic
condition to his sins committed in a former life. and he can
rid himselfofthese bad effects only by accepting his hard life
as a just punishment for his former sins. Any defiance ofthe
inexorable law of karma and any attempt to improve his
social and economic status would prevent his attainment ofa
better life in his next birth. No doubt this belief is partially
responsible for the meekness and passivity with which the
Chamars accept their present hard lot. it also partially
accounts for their lack of initiative in improving their really
bad living conditions. 12
The very fact that there have been social movements
among Untouchables, such as those of Dr. Ambedkar among
the Mahars of Maharashtra and the Ad Dharm movement in the
Punjabl3 is sufficient refutation ofthe notion that the Untouch
ables have a "lack of initiative," and "accept their present hard
lot" with "meekness and passivity." Moreover, there is some
question as to whether the majority of Untouchables even be
lieve in the concept of the karmic cycle of birth and rebirth.
The lack of enthusiasm by Untouchables regarding the
concept of rebirth as a justification for their oppression has been
noted by several anthropologists. In Bernard Cohn's study of
village Chamars in Uttar Pradesh, he found that "they do not
have any ideas about rebirth," and that, in any event, they do not
accept karma as an explanation for their conditions. 14 Similar
observations have been made by Gerald Berreman, Kathleen
Gough and Andre Beteille, who suggest that the theory ofkarma
is in general less acceptable to Harijans than to upper castes. 15 A
case study by Pauline Kolenda indicates that the concept of
karma has little currency also among the sweepers, the Chuhra
caste. 16
In my survey of Punjab Scheduled Caste communities, I
raised both questions: belief in the karmic cycle of rebirth, and
(assuming that the respondent believed in rebirth), belief that
one's present fate was the result of acts committed in a previous
life. The responses indicated that the majority of all respondents
did not believe in the karmic cycle, but even fewer Scheduled
24
Caste respondents professed belief in the concept than upper
caste respondents. The following table indicates the percentage
of affirmative answers to each question: 17
BelieJthat one's conditions
BelieJin rebirth resultedfrom previous life
Scheduled Caste
respondents 39lk 29lk
Upper Caste
respondents 47lk l5lk
It is interesting to note that a smaller percentage of upper
caste respondents believed that their present conditions were the
result of actions in their previous lives, so there is some indica
tion that the lower castes accept a religious justification for their
conditions more than upper castes do for theirs. But the more
significant fact is that fewer Scheduled Caste respondents even
believe in the concept. 18 Like the concepts of pollution and
purity, the concept of karma does not playa significant role in
the belief systems of the Untouchables. Since these are regarded
as necessary for the logic of caste, one might conclude that the
caste system is not a necessary or natural outgrowth of the
Untouchables' own religious beliefs; and one would not expect
the Scheduled Castes to apply the concept of caste any more
than is required of them for social conventions.
The fact that the Untouchables do observe the social con
ventions of caste, even though they do not necessarily believe in
the value assumptions undergirding the caste system, is an
illustration that behavior and values need not be congruent.
Dumont credits that fact for the existence of caste in areas of
Indian culture which do not have the underlying Hindu con
cepts, such as the Indian Muslim and Christian communities. 19
Berreman, in observing the same phenomenon, concludes that
"value concensus is not essential to successful social interac
tion, but that behavioral articulation is essential,"2o and the
I
Sanskrit scholar, 1. F. Staal, has described Hinduism as an
1
orthopraxy, rather than an orthodoxy; it requires obedience of
i
practice rather than of faith. 21
Thus, the Untouchable castes are ordinarily obedient in
following the dictates of caste observance when they interact in
the larger Hindu society. But they should not be expected to be
rigorous about the concept of caste among their fellow Untouch
r
ables, if among them even the bases for believing in caste is
I
lacking.
i
j
I
An Economic Basis for Lower Caste Identity.
If the untouchables do not believe in the concepts that
f
legitimate caste, then what holds them together as a group? The
I
I
I obvious answer is their common experiences of social prejudice
from the upper castes. And yet there is more of a sense of
I
~ collective identity among the lower castes than would be war
ranted by merely a uniformity of response to prejudice. There
are social and economic differences which distinguish the lower
I
castes as a group from the larger society.
t
In general, the social habits and mores of the Scheduled
Castes are more flexible than those of upper castes. Scheduled
1
Castes are more liberal over the taboos against meat, of all
!
I
kinds-even beef. Divorce is permissible, although not espe
cially honorable. 22 The Scheduled Castes have a reputation for
using country liquor, marijuana, and narcotics-sources of
solace for the poor and disenchanted the world over. The family
patterns tend to be nuclear
23
rather than the large joint families
which usually characterize the village society. Perhaps this is
due to the possibility of divorce, but more likely it is due to the
mobility of the Scheduled Caste families. Out of occupational
necessity some Scheduled Caste nuclear families must live apart
from their joint families in order to live near their upper castes
employers; other families drift apart in search of work.24 The
language dialects of the Scheduled Castes are in some areas
different from those of the upper castes, and the Scheduled
Castes have channels of communication quite their own.
25
Traditionally, caste panchayats have provided them with sepa
rate social and political institutions. That role within this cen
tury has been played by lower caste religious and social move
ments. Beneath all of these social and cultural elements of the
sub-societies of the lower castes is a basic, unifying economic
fact as well: despite their traditional caste occupations, most of
them in the villages are all engaged in landless agricultural
labor.
Making pickles (Jacobson).
25
The Scheduled Castes all have been employed under the
general rubric of "agricultural labor," with varying degrees of
security and comfort. These economic roles have changed, in
time. The sorts of conditions which effected the changes in labor
arrangements for the Scheduled Castes included the following:
economic pressures on the upper castes, either through famine
or debt, which enabled them to support less family labor; con
solidation of land-holdings, which also required fewer families
and encouraged wage-rate arrangements; alienation of land
ownership, which promoted the tenant relationships; shortages
of labor, which raised the daily-wage prices; and labor sur
pluses, which drove the Scheduled Castes towards economic
relationships offering greater security.
For most of this century, there appears to have been a
general increase in the numbers of seasonal laborers, lured by
cash wages away from the traditional roles. The increase in
seasonal laborers has also been due to another trend developing
throughout this century: the erosion of the tenancy and share
cropping systems. Evidence of both trends are indicated in
census returns where the numbers of "farm servants and field
laborers" have risen and the income from the rent of agricultural
land has decreased. Even as early as 1911, significant shifts may
be charted, which have continued throughout the century. 26
The decrease of tenant cultivators is apparently a peculiar
ity ofthis century. According to some observers in the Punjab, 27
the tenancy system there gained wide frequency during the latter
part of the nineteenth century, because British policies encour
aged large landholdings. Tenancy patterns complemented the
system of multiple land holdings. Progressively during this
century a greater centralization of land control and the discour
agement of absentee landlordism
28
resulted in the abandonment
of tenant cultivation. The more efficient, centralized land-hold
ings did not need tenants, arid relied instead upon wage-labor.
This meant that the Scheduled Castes who were formerly ten
ants were making a step downwards in status, as wage-laborers,
or as family labor with no land rights. Ironically, the wages of
daily labor were relatively better than the income of tenants. 29
But the status was not the same.
Since Independence, the increased efficiency of agricul
tural productivity in the Punjab as elsewhere has created a new
trend in landless labor: a seasonal surplus during most of the
year, with a brief labor shortage during the immediate harvest
season. 30 The general effect has been to drive labor to the cities,
where more permanent employment may be found in industrial
labor (thus producing the phenomenon of large Scheduled Caste
labor colonies in and around the cities). During the harvest
season, large numbers of landless laborers are trucked to the
fields as migrant laborers from nearby Uttar Pradesh and
Rajasthan. In relative terms, therefore, the labor conditions of
the Scheduled Castes have not improved substantially since
Independence.
Within the whole of the last century, the conditions have
actually declined, due to the shifts from one form of labor to
another. The various forms of agricultural labor which we have
discussed are not caste-specific. The distinctions among Sched
uled Castes, such as those between Chuhra and Chamar, are not
relevant to labor categories, although in some villages all of one
caste may be employed in seasonal labor, and the other by tenant
cultivators. But in general the great mass of agricultural labor is
precisely that, a mass undifferentiated by caste. The trends in
the past century indicate that the lower castes increasingly tend
to identify themselves by that general category of landless
laborer rather than by their traditional caste occupations, and
their conditions as laborers have become relatively worse over
the years, both in job security and income. Therefore, the
economic ingredients have been present, at least since the tum
of the century, for massive unrest among the laborers as a social
group. In the social movements of the mid- I920s and 1930s, this
unrest became a potent force with mass support.
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26
I
Social Perspective and Social Consciousness
Max Weber has made a clear distinction between class and
caste, which, for Weber, was illustrative of the differences
between economic divisions and social stratification. 31 In the
case of the Punjab Scheduled Castes, we have seen that the two
) kinds of categories are not always coincident. The concept of
caste, especially among the Scheduled Castes, is weak within
!
the Punjab, and rather than the fragmentation into myriad
castes, we find two large, and sometimes overlapping caste
groups, the Chuhra and the Chamar. The two groups have many
similarities, and some differences. The physical location of the
Chamar and Chuhra in villages indicates their separateness
and the ambiguity of their separateness. The Chamar and Chu
hra castes live in areas separate from one another, but their
quarters are usually next to one another, outside or at the fringes
of the upper caste living areas.
Are the Untouchable castes in fact castes, or do they
comprise a separate class? They have characteristics of both.
But the interesting feature of this issue is that there is a diver
gence of agreement, following social lines. The Scheduled
Castes seem to view themselves as a class, and the upper castes
view them as castes. In my survey I found that eighty-four
percent of the Untouchable caste respondents thought that "all
Scheduled Castes are essentially the same," whereas consider
ably less of the upper caste respondents viewed the Scheduled
Castes as an undifferentiated whole.
Moreover, the respondents' opinions regarding the reasons
for the oppressed conditions of the lower castes also reflected a
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difference in social perspective between upper castes and lower
castes. In answer to my question about the cause of social
prejudice against the Scheduled Castes, the majority of the
upper caste replied "because of social customs," whereas the
majority of Scheduled Caste respondents said, "because of our
hard work and our poverty."
The implication of these responses is that there is a differ
ence of social perspective. In the worldview of the upper castes,
the Scheduled Castes are the unfortunate extensions of society's
social logic. But in the worldview of the Scheduled Castes there
are only the rich and the poor, those within the higher society
and those within their own. Perhaps the most direct indication
that the Scheduled Caste perspective is set in a consciousness of
poverty was given in response to my .open-ended question,
"Who are you?"-the largest number of Scheduled Caste re
spondents said simply, "a poor person."
If one accepts a concept of class as a cultural and political
unit, as well as an economic one, then one might argue that class
identity among the Untouchable castes eventually may replace
caste identity, rather than co-exist with it. In India, Ghurye has
argued, the traditional patterns ofcaste are gradually giving way
to stratifications of class. 32 It is a process which Ghurye regards
as unavoidable and welcome. For Ghurye, the hereditary nature
of caste occupations is the critical feature which must be
changed to transform the rigidities of caste into the more fluid
social categories of class.
The economic c ~ a n g e s have already come about, for the
most part, early in this century. But the consciousness of those
changes, and class identities based upon them, have arrived
later, through the activities of social movements. As Thomas
Metcalf noted in his analysis of the development of agricultural
classes in the nineteenth century, the "reasons for the lack of
class consciousness among the peasantry lie primarily in the fact
that they had neither the means nor the motivation to organize as
I
an effective political force." 33 A similar emphasis on organiza
tion is given by Lloyd and Suzanne Rudolph:
By acquiring a class consciousness that would unite a sense t
of economic exploitation with questions of dignity and
status, untouchable landless laborers might, given effective
and united leadership and organization and propitious cir
cumstances, be welded into a revolutionary force. 34
The Rudolphs were doubtful about the possibilities of such
revolutionary forces occurring, at least in the countryside. Yet,
in the guise of religious movements, there have been organiza
tional attempts to unite the Untouchables into forces which are
keen on improving their depressed conditions. Moreover, it is
the religious differences between upper castes and lower castes
which make class consciousness possible in the first place. As
we have seen, the absence of the religious concepts underlying
caste allow the Untouchables to perceive society-and their
own social conditions-differently. It is these differences
which have made the Untouchables uneasy participants in the
cultural life of the dominant society, and which have impelled
them to form their own independent religious and social organi
zations. Even if the Untouchables don't believe in Untouchabil
ity, the fact remains that many other people in India do; and the
social and economic implications of that fact continue to be
"* powerful forces for lower caste solidarity.
27
I
Notes
I. Louis Dumont. Homo Hierarchicus: The Caste Svstem and Its Impli
cations. by Mark Sainsbury (Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1970. first
published in France by Editions Gallimard in 1966).
2. Whether this view is unique to India is a subject of debate. There is also
a strong argument for the intercultural occurrence of caste; see Gerald D.
Berreman. "Caste in Cross-Cultural Perspective: Organizational Components"
in George deVos and Hiroshi Wagatsuma. lapan's Invisible Race: Caste in
Culture and Personality (Berkeley: University of California Press. 1967).
3. Dumont. p. 43.
4. Ibid. (Italics in the original).
5. Ibid .. p. 50.
6. Richard Lannoy. The Speaking Tree: A Study of Indian Culture and
Society (New York: Oxford University Press) p. 156.
7. Mary Douglas. Purity and Danger: An Analysis ofConcepts ofPollu
tion and Taboo (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. 1966) p. 4.
S. The attempts of nineteenth and twentieth century Hindu reformers to
extricate the caste concepts from Hinduism are described in Donald E. Smith.
India is a Secular State (Princeton: Princeton University Press. 1963) chapter
II. The contrast between Ambedkar and Gandhi's view of Hinduism is de
scribed by Andre Beteille. "Pollution and Poverty." in J. Michael Mahar. ed..
The Untouchables in Contemporary India. (Tucson: University of Arizona
Press. 1972)
9. For a thorough account of the animistic beliefs oflower caste villagers.
see George W. Briggs. The Chamars (Calcutta: Associated Press. and London:
Oxford University Press. 1920). I also have a chapter on the religion of village
Untouchables in a forthcoming book on the religious and political movements of
lower castes. tentatively titled. Religion as Social Vision: Against
Untouchability in the Punjab. I am grateful to Kathleen Gough for her reinforce
ments of these points. based upon her own experience in South India. in written
comments in response to an earlier draft of this article.
10. Denzillbbetson. E. D. MacLagan. and H. A. Rose. A Glossary ofthe
Tribes and Castes of the Punjab (Lahore: Civil and Military Gazette Press.
1911)p.141.
II. Dumont. p. 55.
12. Stephen Fuchs. "The Religio-Ethical Concepts of the Chamars in
Northern India . 'Missiology: An International Review. vol. IV, No. I. January
1976. pp. 50-51. The grammatical mistake in the first sentence of the quotation
is undoubtedly a typographical error. It is curious that Fuchs conveys such
stereotypes. since his earlier book. Rebellious Prophets: A Stud\" of Messianic
Movements in Indian Religions (Bombay: Asia Publishing House. 1965) records
a number of movements in which the lower castes had participated.
13. See my article. "Ad Dharm: Religion of Untouchables." in the Times
of India. Oct. 12. 1975; my forthcoming book on the political religion of
Untouchables will feature this movement prominently.
14. Bernard S. Cohn. "Changing Traditions of a Low Caste," in Milton
Singer. ed., Traditional India: Structure and Change. Bibliographical and
Special Series, vol. X (Philadelphia: American Folklore Society, 1959) p. 207.
15. Berreman. in DeVos and Wagatsuma. 01' cit .. p. 311; Beteille, in
Mahar. op. cit .. p. 413; Gough in Kathleen Gough and Hari Sharma. eds ..
Imperialism and Revolution in South Asia (New York: Monthly Review Press.
1973) p. 234.
16. Pauline Kolenda. "Religious Anxiety and Hindu Fate." in E. Harper.
ed. Religion in South Asia (Seattle: University of Washington Press. 1964).
17. Both groups of respondents-Scheduled Caste and upper caste
were of varied castes. and of mixed urban-rural localities. There were no
significant differences among the castes within the two groups. however. There
were some differences between urban and rural respondents in both groups; as a
result. the discrepancy between upper caste belief in karma and lower caste
disbelief was even wider in rural areas than the 47%/39'7( division shown in the
table. The upper caste urban respondents tended to show less belief in karma.
presumably because of their less traditional attitudes. The lower caste urban
respondents-especially the Balmikis of Jullundur-showed greater belief in
karma. apparently in an effort of Sanskritization to emulate the beliefs of the
higher castes. In the villages also, the few lower caste respondents who pro
fessed belief in karma tended to be upwardly mobile and better-educated. The
statistical results of the survey are in an Appendix to my dissertation. "Political
Hope: Scheduled Caste Movements in the Punjab." Dept. of Political Science.
Univ. of California. Berkeley. 1974.
IS. The lower castes' ideas about life after death are mixed. including the
notions of wandering spirits- ghosts and benign spirits-as well as places for
souls to rest. similar to Western notions of heaven and hell.
19. See chapter X. "Comparison: Are There Castes Among Non-Hindus
and Outside India')" in Dumont. op. cit.
20. Berrernan. in DeVos and Wagatsuma. p. 288, italics in the original.
Berreman cites the work of Anthony Wallace and C. Wright Mills in support of
this hypothesis.
21. J. F. Staal, ':Sanskrit and Sanskritization." lournal of Asian Studies.
vol. XXII. No.3. 1963; reprinted in John A. Harrison. ed., Asia: Enduring
Scholarship (Tucson: University of Arizona Press. 1972).
22. Marriage and family customs are described in George W. Briggs. The
Chamars (Calcutta: Associated Press. and London: Oxford University Press.
1920) chapter IV.
23. This and other generalizations are based upon the statistics of my
survey. corroborated by my observation of a wide variety of Scheduled Caste
neighborhoods in the Punjab.
24. In my survey. I found a high percentage of Scheduled Caste men who
had been born in locations different from their present places of residence; upper
caste families tend to be less mobile. since they are rooted in family land
holdings. There are a number of minor Scheduled Castes who originally had
wandered into the Punjab as semi-nomadic tribes. Also. the IS91 and early
twentieth century censuses indicate that during harvest seasons, Scheduled
Caste laborers came from other states, such as U.P. and Rajasthan. as migrant
laborers. as they still do today; many of these migrants then became permanent
residents.
25. Regarding Scheduled Caste dialects. and their distinct difference from
that of the upper castes, see John J. Gumperz, "Dialect Differences and Social
Stratification in a North Indian Village," in lou mal ofAsian Studies. vol. XXII.
June, 1964. For separate channels of communication among the Scheduled
Castes. see Robert J. Miller and Pramodh Kale. "The Burden on the Head is
Always There:' in J. Michael Mahar. ed .. The Untol/chables in Contemporary
Indill (Tucson: The University of Arizona Press. 1972).
26. The rise of farmworkers was 174.9 percent. the loss of rent revenue
nine percent (subsidiary table VII of chap. XII. PunjllbCensas. 1911; reprinted
in 1921 Punjab Census. Part A, chap. XI. p. 369). The Census narrative is
openly skeptical about the accuracy or comparability of its own figures. None
theless. on the issue of increasing wage-rate labor and decreasing tenancy. the
Census figures confirm the recollections of two old watchers of Punjab ag
ricultural conditions (interviews with Gurbax Singh Diwan. General Secretary
of the Communist Party of India. Punjab, June 4. 1971, and with Satwant Singh.
Chairman of the Executive Committee of the Communist Party of India/Marx
ist. Punjab. July 12.1971)
27. Interview with Gurbax Singh Diwan and Satwant Singh, op. cit.
2S. In part. absentee landlordism was discouraged through the Punjab
Alienation of Land Act, 1900. which prohibited non-agricultural castes from
owning land. The intention was to keep the moneylenders from taking over huge
amounts of mortgaged farmland.
29. In 1940. the land rents for tenants were as high as SO percent of the
profits (according to H. D. Malaviya's report. Land Reform in India (Delhi:
1955) quoted in Charles Bettelheim. India Independent. translated from the
French edition by W. A. Caswell (New York: Monthly Review Press. 1971)
p.21.
30. In a recent government report. one section of Ludhiana district was
reported to have gained in gross agricultural income from rs 4650 in I96S;
whereas the net return calculated per form laborer (both family and wage labor)
rose from rs 1413 tors 3192 in the same time period. (1.S. Sandhu. ed" Farm
Accounts in the Punjab. 1967-68. Punjab Government. 1970. p. 31). This
would seem to indicate that the cultivator was getting more for his money per
farm laborer in 1968 than in 1950 (due to greater efficiency. presumably). and
that he therefore needed less of them. The amount of expenditure on farm
laborers. incidentally. rose from rs S67 to only rs 1458 during that same time
period, thereby reinforcing the point (Ibid., p. 31).
31. Max Weber. Wirtschaji und Gesellschaji. Part II (Tubingen. 1922) p.
Weber makes a similar point in The Religion of India: Sociology of
Hinduism and Buddhism. trans. and ed. by Hans H. Gerth and Don Martindale
(New York: The Free Press. 1958l1920j) p. 39.
32. Modem scholarship in India on the subject of caste began with G. S.
Ghurye's Caste lind Race illlndill (London: Kegan Paul. 1932 reissued in 1950
as Caste and Class in India).
33. Thomas R. Metcalf. "Land Tenure and Rural Class Consciousness:
The North-West Provinces and Oudh in the Nineteenth Century:' Berkeley:
University of California. unpublished paper. August 1964. p. 6.
3 ... Lloyd I. and Susanne Hoeber Rudolph. The Modernity of Tradition.
Political Development in India (Chicago: The Univ. of Chicago Press, 1967)
p. lSI.
28
,
J
J
1
Tea and Insults:
Untouchability in Eastern India
j
j
by Doranne Jacobson
In a dusty village in the state of Orissa in eastern India, a
gaunt 40-year-old man of the Bauri untouchable caste patiently
sits on his haunches in front of a tea stall. High-caste patrons
relaxing inside the stall gossip without seeming to notice him,
and the ten-year-old waiter ignores him. Finally, the youth calls
out, "Hey there, ya damn Bauri boy, what'll ya have?" The
untouchable silently points toward the glass he has brought with
l
him, and the youth pours some tea into it. From a proper
distance, the untouchable drops coins into the boy's hand,
t drinks his tea, and shuffles off, respectfully crouching and
l
trailing his right hand in the dust.
(
With this little vignette of a moment in the life of an
untouchable 1 in a nation whose Constitution prohibits discrimi
nation against untouchables, and indeed attempts to abolish
untouchability itself, American anthropologist James Freeman
begins his life history study of Muli, the man who had to
I
swallow insults with his tea. This volume constitutes the first
1
full-length account of the life of an undistinguished, unlettered
rural untouchable ever to be published and provides fascinating
insights into the lives of Muli and his fellow villagers. Other
full-length biographies of untouchables have focused on emi
nent, well-educated men, while the lives of more ordinary folk.
have only been briefly outlined.
2
Many other studies of un
touchable groups and untouchability have, of course, been
written.
3
Another well-known book, also entitled Untouchable,
is a sympathetic fictional account of a day in the life of a
Sweeper, written in the thirties by a high-caste author.
4
The work includes introductory and analytical material by
Freeman but consists largely of Muli's rich first-person narra
tive, as elicited, translated, and edited by Freeman and his
research assistant Harihar Mallia. Muli' s account, recorded in
1971-72, presents an insider's perspective on the reality of
living with ever-present poverty, being ranked near the bottom
of the caste hierarchy, and suffering exploitation by higher
ranking landlords and others who view the Bauris as unclean,
lazy, and deserving of all their misfortunes. The narrative is
bursting with details of low-caste Orissan life. Struggles for a
few grains of rice, licit and illicit sexual activity, venality,
deceit, the physical trials of day laborers, intercaste and in-
Review Essay
UNTOUCHABLE: AN INDIAN LIFE HISTORY, by
James M. Freeman. Stanford: Stanford University
Press, 1979, $18.95, 421 pages
tracaste relations-these and many more topics are minutely
described in Muli's chronicle and illustrated by 56 well-taken
photographs.
Although many anthropological data are largely biographi
cal in the sense that they are derived from observations of what
people say and do,s and although it is the individual who
experiences and passes on his/her culture, in published an
thropological studies the individual is often lost in a sea of
generalities. Many anthropologists would agree with David
Mandelbaum, who observed that he felt that many of his writ
ings had omitted something of great importance: . 'My friends
had been dissolved into faceless norms, their vivid adventures
. . . somehow turned into pattern profiles or statistical types. "6
The life history study helps us to fill this gap; it is "the most
cogn i tively rich and humanly understandable wayof getting at
an inner view of culture. "7 In this volume, Freeman has noted
that
An authentic life history confronts us with an immediacy and
concreteness that compels our involvement, that causes us to
discover within ourselves something about human predica
ments everywhere in the face of which our cultural differ
ences become significant. (396)
In the case of the present study, the life history materials are of
special value, since they illuminate the experiences of a member
of an oppressed group whose struggles are far too little known to
others.
Clearly Freeman is not a dispassionate observer, but is a
scholar much disturbed by the inequity he has chosen to study.
In fact, he states
By recording the lives and sufferings of M uli and his people,
I hope that I have helped to hasten the day when such
sufferings cease, not only for Indian untouchables, butfor all
victims ofsocial inequality. (396)
Unlike the photographs in many other volumes on India,
which tend to depict only colorful rituals and pleasant genre
scenes, many of Freeman's pictures and their captions em
phasize the misery of Bauri life. For example, in one illustra
29
tion, an exhausted old woman rests against a huge load of
firewood she has been carrying (47), and in another, ragged
young Bauri children pick the ground for kindling, wild plants,
and snails, outside the guarded gates of what appears to be the
walled compound of a wealthy family (222). (Nowhere does
Muli's face appear in the pictures-he and his associates have
all been given pseudonyms and are not depicted in the photo
graphs.) Throughout the book, Freeman stresses the sufferings
and resentments of the Untouchables-a welcome change from
some other, all-too- "objective" studies of hierarchy in India
but sometimes Freeman's comments seem burdened with an
overabundance of negatively loaded words.
Freeman repeatedly emphasizes that Muli's narrative
should lay to rest' 'the myth that untouchables are content with
their place in society ana with the treatment they receive from
other castes" (72). Freeman thus challenges such scholars as
Michael Moffatt, who has recently written that' 'the conscious
ness of rural Untouchables in Tamilnadu is basically in con
census with the system that has placed them lowermost."8 In
fact, both Freeman's and Moffatt's studies provide evidence for
both these contradictory views, with the Tamilnadu untouch
ables' apparently greater acceptance of their position possibly
being related to a better economic position than the truly im
poverished Oris san Bauris could ever reasonably hope to attain.
Certainly Muli and his caste fellows reveal great resent
ment of the exploitation and insulting treatment they have suf
fered at the hands of upper-caste people, and they sometimes
express rejection of the high-caste view of things. For example,
one ofMuli's Bauri friends told Freeman
The only difference between the mallias [high-caste temple
servants found only in Mult s village] and ourselves is that
the Mallias have more money than we do. Actually they are
lower than we are because they marry only within our vil
lage. That's uncivilized; that's incest; civilized people marry
outside their own village. (52)
A Bauri also tells a Brahman who has cheated him that ifhe is so
greedy for the Bauri' s property, why doesn't he also eat the
Bauri's excrement?9
But the Bauris in Muli' s tales also show clear resentment of
each other and they certainly do not reject hierarchy as the key
principle of social organization. They "look with revulsion and
scorn" on the garbage-collecting Sweepers and show a strong
concern with maintaining their own caste purity. There is no
rejection of caste per se evident in this material, and the high
levels of sensitivity to caste issues and organized protest against
injustice shown by untouchables in some other parts of India
appear to be lacking here.
The diversity and ambiguity of untouchables' responses to
their disadvantaged positions in Indian ritual and economic
hierarchies will certainly be a continuing subject of discussion,
and it seems likely that Freeman's material will be frequently
cited in this ongoing debate.
In his attempt to emphasize the difficulties experienced by
untouchables, Freeman has, unfortunately, barely mentioned
efforts being made to alleviate these difficulties throughout
India, both by untouchables themselves and by social and legis
lative bodies. In fact, untouchables are entitled to special bene
fits, such as legislative seats, scholarships, and government
jobs, reserved for "scheduled castes," as they are called. Such
benefits have failed to yield dramatic improvements in the lot of
most untouchables, but have led to some improvement and
should have been discussed. Perhaps such benefits have yet to
percolate to Muli's village, but some untouchables in the region
must know of them. In this, as in other matters, the book would
have been improved by more information on the status of
untouchable castes in the region as a whole.
Setting
Freeman's study was carried out in Kapileswar, a multi
caste village of some 2900 people on the outskirts of Bhuban
eswar, the capital of Orissa state. This densely-populated fertile
rice-growing region is subject to frequent highly destructive
cyclones, droughts, floods, and epidemics which particularly
aggravate the plight of the area's poor. In Kapileswar over half
the villagers are landless, and about one-fifth of the villagers
live on the brink of starvation.
Until recently, the economic, ritual, and political life of the
village was dominated by a famous temple, largely controlled
by the prosperous Mallia caste. Muli and his fellow Bauris, like
other untouchables, have never been allowed to enter the inner
rooms of the temple, nor does the temple bring them any
substantial economic benefit. The Bauris receive only small
payments for trimming weeds in the temple courtyard.
The Bauris are the second most numerous caste in the
village (most numerous are the Mallias) and form 16 percent of
the village popUlation. They work primarily as agricultural day
laborers, contractual farm workers, or sharecroppers for pros
perous landowners, and as unskilled road and construction
workers. Over half of Bauri earners are women (unlike high
caste women, who seldom work outside their homes). Bauris
live in mud and thatched huts in segregated areas of the village,
downhill from the high-caste wards, the sewage from which
drains info the low-castes' lanes.
The Bhubaneswar urban area has expanded dramatically in
recent years, and members of some castes have found advan
tageous new employment opportunities there. But the Bauris
and other impoverished groups, lacking appropriate contacts
and an economic cushion, have been unable to break away from
their labors in order to learn new skills. Few of the village
untouchables have found new job opportunities in the growing
capital city: only two Bauris had managed to find work as auto
mechanics, and some Sweepers were employed as garbage
collectors and latrine cleaners there. Here, as elsewhere in
India, the economic gap between the rich and the poor is
widening.
Land reform laws aimed at enabling those who actually
cultivate a plot of land to claim it as their own have led land
owners to dismiss their sharecroppers and salaried farm work
ers, thus forcing an increasing percentage of Bauris to work as
day laborers-the lowest-paying and least secure form of em
ployment. This trend, plus continuing periodic unemployment.
is felt in the empty bellies of these impoverished laborers and
their families.
Freeman details these and other aspects of the village' s
economic structures and caste-related inequities in this volume,
as well as in an earlier study of Kapileswar village. 10
30
Creating the Life History
The process of putting together the life history was arduous
and extremely time-consuming, involving Freeman, his re
search assistant, and Muli in six months of almost daily in
terviews, followed by Freeman's culling and editing of the raw
data and interpreting it for a scholarly Western audience. As
Freeman correctly observes, the life history is not an auto
biography spontaneously narrated by Muli, for whom an oral or
written autobiography would be an alien form of expression, but
is rather a creation emerging from the collaboration of the
anthropologist, his assistant, and his subject. As such, the study
reflects to at least some extent the personalities of not just one,
but three people.
I have elicited life history material from villagers in
Madhya Pradesh, Central India, and I am currently editing
copious amounts of data and preparing a full-length life history
study of an illiterate elderly village woman, high-caste but poor.
Therefore, I have a good idea of the problems Freeman faced in
creating Muli' s life history and I am fully sympathetic to his
difficulties with him on his resolution of these problems, which
I mention below.
I
Muli spoke to his private audience apparently quite unin
hibitedly, with his utterances written down in Oriya by Hari, the
assistant, who then worked with Freeman-who knows
Oriya-in preparing the English translation. A total of some
350,000 words was recorded. Freeman does not tell us why he
relied on his high-caste assistant's written recording of Muli's
words, rather than tape recordings, which would have captured
unusual expressions, pauses, and emotional tones quite exactly
so that they could have been referred to later while preparing the
translation and analysis.
Muli was selected as a subject because Freeman admired
his self-control at the scene of the tea-stall insults, he seemed
friendly and loquacious when visited at home, and he had
enough free time to make himself available for the time-con
suming interviews. Adequately recompensed, Muli indeed
proved to be a willing and brilliant narrator, vividly describing
the most intimate details of his life experiences, both painful and
pleasant. Freeman had been hoping to elicit from Muli a life
j
j
history that would refute negative stereotypes of Bauris held by
high-caste Indians. But by his own account, Muli revealed
himself to be a weak, lying scoundrel, whose greatest satisfac
tions came through acting as a pimp. He depended" on his
hard-working wife for support, shirked honest labor, and was
publicly denounced by his father. By Bauri standards-let
alone those of the critical high castes-he was a shiftless ne 'er
do-well. Focusing on Muli was a little like writing a biogrraphy
of a Mafia hit man to erase negative stereotypes of Italian
Americans.
As Freeman himself came to recognize, Muli viewed
Freeman as yet another potential client-a ticket to easy
money. Whether pimping (as he had vainly hoped to do for
Freeman and Hari) or giving interviews, he could earn an easy
wage while avoiding the back-breaking labor in which most
Bauris engage. His verbal skills were well-developed, and he
was available-unlike the more socially approved hard work
ers, who were too busy to spend hours recounting the past.
Freeman recognized that Muli was a deviant, yet felt that
his life, like that of most Bauris, was shaped by an environment
f
J
I
of extreme poverty and social stigma, and that Muli's particular
life style was an understandable adaptation to such an environ
ment. Therefore, he continued to interview Muli for the study.
Interestingly, Oscar Lewis found himself in a similar situa
tion when he selected a family of slum-dwelling Puerto Ricans
for his well-known family life history La Vida. Only when he
was well along in his interviews with his cooperative subjects
did he discover that the women of the family sometimes worked
as prostitutes, an occupation their fellow slum-dwellers re
garded as degraded but not as low as being thieves, alcoholics,
drug addicts, or homosexuals. II
In carrying out my life history study, I found that the most
verbally gifted and willing subject was a poor member of a
priestly caste-a morally uprighteous woman with very little in
common with a conniving pimp-but who nonetheless was
trained from birth to find favor with patrons and knew how to
cultivate the wealthy (village landlords and anthropologists
alike) to her own advantage. One of the remarkable character
istics of both Muli and my female informant was their ability to
immediately adapt their behavior to please their anthropological
inquisitors, particularly in the realm of telling the truth. Being
able to lie convincingly to each other is a key survival strategy
for Indian villagers. Muli's account is filled with his renditions
of blatant falsehoods he told others, and I have heard my
informant tell lies with the acting skill of Sarah Bernhardt. But
both Muli and my informant sensed that we anthropologists
wanted "the truth" from them, and they also felt that whereas
truths revealed to fellow villagers could lead to seriously harm
ful repercussions, truths confided to outsiders could lead to
profits for themselves. Freeman did a great deal of checking up
on his subject's stories and found them to be, in essence, factual;
and I followed the same course with the same result. Both
informants also gained a sense of personal satisfaction from
detailing their exploits and in pointing out the defects of others.
Freeman has tried to be honest about his own biases and
aspects of his own background that might have influenced the
shape of the life history, but with regard to the extent of his
questioning of Muli and his editing of the text he has given us far
too little information.
At the beginning of each chapter in the main body of the
book, Freeman provides helpful summaries of the main events
and themes discussed by Muli. Otherwise, the narrative pur
ports to be that volunteered by Muli speaking for himself, a
great story teller unfolding his tales, beautifully structured like
those of an accomplished author. The finely polished text doubt
less depends much on Muli's gifts, but we also sense-or
suspect-the heavy hand of Freeman as editor. In only one spot
are we given a question from the interviewer; did all the rest
flow freely without prompting? Surely not, but there is no way
we can guess at the actual words of all three men involved in the
interviews. I recognize that inserting too many interjections and
interrogatives can break the flow of a narrative and render it
difficult to read, but without any indication of which remarks
were volunteered and which offered only in response to inquiry
and prodding, the document has less scientific than purely
humanistic or literary value. The smoothly-flowing text as pre
sented here certainly lends itself less to psychological analysis
than Morris Carstairs' Indian life history materials, in which he
31
Winnowing wheat (Jacobson)
reproduces his dialogues with his subjects. I! In fact, Freeman
makes virtually no attempt at psychological analysis of Muli's
character, which is a shame since Muli is clearly such a deviant
and complex individual.
Like the author of a Western novel, Muli introduces each
character with an insightful physical description and a brief
suggestion of his nature.
After a while a fat, black man appeared. He was about
thirty-five,fivefeetfive, and he wore a dhoti, a long punjaabi
shirt, and an old-style landlord's jacket. He had a grave and
fearsome face with along, thick mustache, high forehead,
and a full head of hair. When he spoke, his voice was deep
and commanding . ... (100)
Throughout my reading of the book, I found myself wondering
if Muli, the unlettered hustler, had really spontaneously volun
teered such felicitously phrased word pictures. I also questioned
whether or not he would have bothered to mention-without
questioning-a number of things which would have been ab
surdly obvious to him. For example,
I replied, "How can I eat? My right hand is injured. I don't
want to eat with my left." We use our left hand to clean
ourselves after defecating. (97)
Similarly, a young woman is credited with telling Muli her role
as a young wife does not allow her freedom of movement, a fact
so obvious it is hardly credible that she would have mentioned it
to him (101). Surely these remarks are helpful explanations
offered by Freeman to his Western audiences? In a few places
such explanatory phrases are put in brackets, a much better
manner of presentation. Unless we know what Muli's actual
words were, the nuances of his narrative are found to be dis
torted-and readers made suspicious.
Since this is an orally-related narrative, it should have been
rendered in more-colloquial English; in particular, contractions
should have been used much more. The book is sprinkled with
numerous examples of awkward translations. For example,
"Oh priest, you should finish your song quickly. Our chil
dren are getting pain by sitting so long. You should be more
civil by stopping the song here." ( 177)
Ages and dates of important events are mentioned, but we
are not told where these figures came from. Did Muli know
them? If so, that fact is certainly worthy of special mention,
since in my experience, illiterate Indian villagers are quite
vague about ages and dates.
Some critical readers might question the fact that Muli
provides incredibly detailed verbatim renditions of conversa
tions held years earlier. Of course these cannot be exactly
correct, but they clearly are versions of what could have or
might well have been said. Part of the exactitude of Muli's
verbatim accounts is due to the structure of the language itself.
In all South Asian languages, with rare exceptions, all quota
tions are direct ratherthan indirect. 13
Muli's Chronicle
Muli's memories of his childhood include days of miser
able hunger, particularly during the rainy season, after all the
year's meager earnings had been eaten and before the new rice
harvest.
We often went without food for three or four days. We
children could not bear this; we cried for food. My father
then would steal taro from the fields, and Mother cooked all
ofit for us children. My motherandfather starvedfordayson
end. (66)
His days at school were short-lived; high-caste children sat
inside the school, while Bauri children were relegated to the
outside verandah. After a severe beating from the teachers, Muli
refused to attend. He began work as a stone-cutter and construc
tion laborer, but he frequently managed to injure himself and
showed other signs of physical weakness. It wasn't long before
he found easier work as a go-between for high-caste employers
and Bauri women, some of whom were quite eager to earn
money while reclining rather than carrying rocks. Muli's par
ents suspected him of involvement in what they considered
dishonorable activities, but they looked the other way as long as
he brought home a few rupees.
Muli describes quite graphically the sexual activity in
which he was involved and to which he was witness. By his
account, illicit sexual involvements were quite common, in
cluding both exploitative arrangements between high-caste
male employers and Bauri laboring women, and mutually en
joyable liaisons. Coarse bantering and insults, pathside
"quickies," a secret abortion, and a gross attck of venereal
disease suffered by a high-caste lecher are all explicitly detailed.
Muli also provides a rare account of a special way of life-the
underworld of transvestite male prostitutes with whom he as
32
I
I
sociated. Whether Muli himself was a sometime transvestite is
unclear (3l2n).
j
i
I
Of particular interest are Muli' s recitations of how he
arranged trysts. All anthropologists who have lived in Indian
villages are amazed at the number of illicit relationships that can
go on under the very noses of highly disapproving relatives and
neighbors. From Muli we learn of the elaborate subterfuges and
the role of the middle man in arranging such dangerous
1
,
encounters.
As a pimp, Muli knew several high-caste men to be hypo
;
critical lechers, and he seemed to enjoy watching them reveal
themselves as base creatures, lusting after untouchable girls,
despite their public reluctance to associate with ""polluting"
r
untouchables. Muli's pleasure in witnessing his high-caste em
!
ployers shamelessly ""panting like dogs" while enjoying un
t
touchable female favors reminds me of an admonition by Quen
1 tin Crisp, the flamboyant British transvestite: ""Never try to
keep up with the Joneses; drag them down to your level-it's
)
cheaper. " This approach was not appreciated by other Bauris,
f who continually objected to Muli's behavior as a threat to Bauri
honor.
I
Muli enjoyed association with and being flattered by upper
caste men; he imagined they liked him for himself and shut his
eyes to the fact they were simply using him to achieve their
sexual aims with his prostitutes. One wonders to what extent
I this kind of relationship characterized his dealings with his
I
!
anthropological audience. Although his questioners were not
interested in assignations, Muli realized they were happy to hear
the details of others' liaisons, and indeed, Freeman and his
publishers may well have appreciated that numerous scholars
would not be averse to contemplating such data.
It's all good juicy reading, and the material gives us a good
look at an aspect of Indian village life which is but seldom
mentioned in the anthropological literature. Certainly these
anecdotes provide a realistic contrast to the literary offerings of
those who attempt to present an image of India as spiritually and
morally superior to other parts of the globe. It must have taken
some courage on Freeman's part to publish this frank materiaL
which can hardly be welcomed by upper-class Indian officials
dedicated to maintaining India's ideal image abroad. Educated
untouchables themselves may object to this unflattering portrait
of an untouchable. Still, Freeman makes it clear that most
Bauris held higher standards than Muli did, and he tries to make
us understand that it was the real obscenity of discrimination and
economic oppression, coupled with Muli's own physical weak
I
ness, that led him to become a pimp.
I
Unfortunately, it would seem that so much prurient infor
mation could be included only at the expense of excluding other
material. The volume is fairly lengthy, but still there are gaps in
i
the data presented about Muli's relationships with other mem
bers of his family. We learn of his wife's strong character, their
I
quarrels, and her frustrations at having a lazy, misfortune-prone
husband who ends up being forced into a shot-gun second
marriage with the resultant ruin of his betel business, which had
been his best and last opportunity to lift himself from poverty.
We hear about his parents-although not enough-but we
I
r
learn almost nothing about his siblings. Were they so unim
portant to him he scarcely mentioned them? His account is
singularly lacking in portrayals of any really warm relation
ships: did Muli not have such relationships with his sisters if not
with his wife? At the end of the book, Freeman finally mentions
that Muli . 'described a number of incidents not included in this
book in which he helped his sisters, who confided in him."
(381) If forced to make a choice, I would have omitted some of
the description of Muli' s boss's scabrous syphilitic penis and
included these glimpses into the importance of sibling
relationships.
The lack of emphasis on religion in this book is striking,
particularly since Muli's drama unfolds in the home region of
the great Lingaraj Temple in Bhubaneswar and the Jagganath
Temple at Puri, major attractions for pilgrims from all over
India (but where untouchables have not been welcome). Free
man tells us that ""the religious activities and outlook of the
Bauris contrast sharply with those of the privileged high castes,
who emphasize ritualism and purification," although he men
tions that Bauri rituals sometimes ""imitate high-caste rites"
(again, cf. Moffatt, who emphasizes the similarities of un touch
able religion to high-caste religion in Tamilnadu). The Bauris
recognize religious leaders, but their participation in rituals
appears to be minimal, except for their involvement with sha
manistic faith healers, usually Bauris possessed by the goddess
Kali. At certain times of the year, devotees practice fire
walking, pass hot skewers through their tongues, or have hooks
put into their backs. 14 Muli scarcely mentions these shamans or
religious practices in his life story-they seem to hold no
interest for him. This was particularly surprising to me because
the woman whose lengthy life history I elicited constantly spoke
of religious m'atters, She felt herself to be intimately involved
with God and the Mother Goddess, and she tried to follow rules
of life she believed were divinely given. 15 Admittedly, she was
a member of a priestly caste, but Freeman's four-page summary
of Bauri religious life suggests that in his areligiosity, as in other
aspects, Muli was deviant by Bauri standards. For him, even big
temple festivals in Bhubaneswar were simply opportunities to
arrange illicit trysts for clients. In only one quasi-religious
activity did Muli show interest-dance-drama troupe perform
ances. These groups hired high-caste teachers to instruct them in
the performance of mythological dramas, and Muli was, for a
time. an enthusiastic participant.
S('()uring poL" alld
33
The low-caste women of Muli' s acquaintance are revealed
to be wonderfully strong characters, unafraid to speak out with
strong words when threatened by men, and, when necessary,
carry the weight of supporting their families on their shoulders.
Even Muli admitted his wife' strengths:
My wife is a hard worker, and certainly much stronger than I
am. She usually earns more than I do. She cuts paddy faster
and better than most men, and hardly anyone can keep up
with her when she works on road construction gangs. She
doesn't like eating unless she has earned a wage. She be
comes impatient when she has to spend time idly. (257)
But when his wife justly criticized him for being incompetent,
lazy, and selfish, while she labored to support the family, Muli
beat her up. Her response was not to leave him (there is no good
explanation here why she put up with him, since Bauri women
frequently remarry), but to attempt suicide. Although possessed
of the physical strength to do so, no Bauri woman was reported
to have responded to her husband's beatings by beating him
back. Also, despite the hypqcrisy of their male accusers, some
Bauri women guilty of illicit sexual activity were unable to
avoid being outcasted.
We learn a little about respect for elders-Muli's grand
father was a much-respected caste leader-and we listen in on
conversations revealing the love/hate relationships between
mother-in-law and daughter-in-law. An errant aunt, a thieving
sister-in-law, and a pious grandmother are among the many
other characters appearing in the narrative. Nitpicking quarrels
over rice supplies or a few rupees are common; discussions of
food or the lack thereof permeate the entire chronicle.
Muli speaks of bringing sweets to his only son (why he has
no more children is not discussed), but, as Freeman points out,
he never mentions the fact that his son was the first Bauri boy
from the village to enter high school-an achievement any
father other than Muli might have been proud of.
There is a disturbing lack of emotional content in Muli's
discussions of these kinsfolk; only when Muli believes his wife
has killed herself does he admit to feeling some grief. In fact, all
of the relationships he describes, save those based on inde
structible bonds of consanguinity, are strikingly brittle. The
intimate friendships he is at such pains to describe break off with
great regularity, often with intense flashes of rejection and
hostility, and Muli must circle round again to those kinsmen
who cannot be rid of him no matter how much they might want
to be. Whether Muli and his cronies are unusually callous and
fickle individuals is not clear.
There is a dearth of comment on the lifestyles of people
otherthan Muli's intimate associates. For example, we have no
idea whether a high or a low percentage of high-caste men
patronized untouchable prostitutes, nor is there any mention of
the sexual conduct of the high-caste women.
One ofthe best sections of the book is Muli's description of
how he was spectacularly cheated by a Brahman landlord who
hired Muli as a sharecropper and then managed to deprive him
of payment for his several months of arduous labor (ironically,
Muli suffered his worst defeat when he actually applied himself
to the task of making an honest living). Jadu, the Brahman, was
a pathological miser, a wealthy landlord who brought cheap
rotten vegetables home from the bazaar, expecting his down
trodden wife to feed the family for a week on a few decayed
okras. When he chanced to see his children eating, he called
them' 'cannibal demons. " If he was so cheap with his own flesh
and blood, imagine then his treatment of a despised un
touchable. 16
This was not the first time Muli had been cheated. For
example, earlier in life he had seen a Brahman drama teacher
borrow enough from the untouchables to pay for his own wed
ding and then weasel out of feasting his benefactors or paying
the debt. Muli was alert to the possibility of being cheated by the
infamous Brahman miser, but somehow even Muli failed to
imagine the depths to which Jadu would sink.
Muli 's vivid description (Chapters 28 and 29) of this man's
incredible stinginess and lack of moral principle-and the sys
tem that allowed him to get away with it-must rank as required
reading for all those who are interested in rural Indian life.
Muli's recorded life story ends on a downbeat. He has just
publicly challenged and insulted the Brahman-the first un
touchable of his village to dare to do so-but he has lost the
battle, and his labors have been for naught. We are left hoping
that Muli will think of something to get himself out of his
economic difficulties, or that' 'something will tum up," but we
know that only major changes in Indian socio-economic rela
tions will ever lift Muli and his caste-fellows out of the tarpit of
poverty.
Interpretations
In a concluding chapter, Freeman analyzes Muli's life
history material according to guidelines suggested by Mandel
baum. 17 He touches on the dimensions of the life-biological,
social, psychosocial; the major turnings or transitions; and
adaptations to changes made by the person. He stresses the
economic limitations and rejections that Muli suffered which
severely limited his options, yet indicates that through his own
behavior Muli helped to precipitate the disasters which befell
him.
The [negative] views that others [of all castes] had of him
prompted Muli to exaggerate the very qualities that people
criticized, and by doing so, he orchestrated his own disas
ters. (384)
Muli was well aware of the negative views others held of
him. He admitted being criticized by peers and elders, and he
even admitted being blatantly ridiculed by Bauri youths when he
was forced to marry a woman he got pregnant. Yet, like many
other subjects of life history studies and even autobiographies in
India, 1 K Muli was lacking in emotional introspection and appar
ently never analyzed his own motives. The reader, however
satisfied by the wealth of detail in Muli' s narrative ,still wants
to learn more about the emotions and the psychology of this
man.
Despite its imperfections, this fascinating study should
find a wide readership among all scholars concerned with South
Asia and stratified systems of inequality everywhere. It brings
us face to face with the reality of living with horrendous prob
lems similar to those shared by millions of people around the
* globe.
34
I
!
I Notes
I
1
I. Other terms for untouchables include Harijans (Children of God
Gandhi"s tenn). Scheduled Castes. ex-Untouchables. anddalit (the oppressed).
2. Biographies of eminent untouchables include Hazari. Untouchable
I
I
(New York: Praeger. 1969); Dhananjay Keer. Dr. Ambedkar. Life and Mission
(Bombay: Popular Prakashan. 1962); and Eleanor Zelliott. Dr. Ambedkar and
the Mahar Movement. unpublished Ph. D. dissertation. University of Penn
sylvania, 1969. Life history material on more ordinary educated untouchables
1
appears in Harold R. Isaacs, India's Ex-Untouchables (New York: John Day.
1965).
3. See, for example, Owen M. Lynch . The Politics of Untouchability
J
(New York, Columbia University Press. 1969); Michael Moffatt. An Untouch
able Communif',' in South India (Princeton: Princeton University Press. 1979);
Joan P. "The Caste System Upside Down. orthe Not-So-Mysterious
East." Current Anthropologv 15:469-493 ( 1974); Bernard Cohn. The Camars
ofSenapur: A Study of the Changing Status ofa Depressed Caste, unpublished
I
, Ph.D. dissertation, Cornell University, 1954; J. Michael Mahar (ed.J. The
I
I
Untouchables in Contemporary India (Tucson: University of Arizona Press,
1972); Sunanda Patwardhan. Changes Among India's Harijans: Maharash
tra-a Case Study (New Delhi: Orient Longman. 1973); Mark Jurgensmeyer.
Political Hope: MOI'ements ofNorth India's Untouchables, 1900-1970,
I
unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, University of California. Berkeley. 1974;
Satish Saberwal, Mobile Men: Limits to Social Change in Urban Punjab (New
Delhi: Viks. 1976). For a large bibliography, see Eleanor Zelliott. "Bibliog
raphy on Untouchability." in Mahar, op. cit.. pp. 431-486.
4. Mulk R. aj Anand. Untouchable (Bombay: Kutub-Popular, [1933J).
5. See L. L Langness, The Life History in Anthropological Science
(New York: Holt. Rinehart. and Winston. 1%5).
6. David G. Mandelbaum, "The Study of Life History: Gandhi," Cur
I

rent Anthropology 14(3): 178 (1973).
7. Herbert P. Phillips, "Comment" [on Mandelbaum. "The Study of
Life History"]' Current Anthropology 14:20 I ( 1973).
8. Moffatt. op. cit .. p. 58.
9. In Tamilnadu, at least one group of resentful untouchables saw to it
that some upper-caste people unwittingly consumed untouchable body prod
ucts. A Madras untouchable leader. Arya Shankaran. told a sympathetic West
ern scholar that untouchables hired to dig out wells for high-caste employers
sometimes urinated in them' (Owen Lynch. personal communication)
10. James M. Freeman. Scarcity and Opportunity in all Indian Village
(Menlo Park. CA: Cummings, 1977).
II. Oscar Lewis, La Vida: A Puerto Rican Family ill the Culture of
Poverty-Sail Juallalld Nell' York (New York: Random House. 1965). The life
histories presented in this study provide fascinating parallels and contrasts from
lower class Puerto Rican life with the Untouchable life history material. The
levels of guilt-free sexual promiscuity and family violence seem to be much
higher in the Puerto Rican data than in the Indian data.
12. Morris Carstairs. The T",ia-born: A Study of' a Communin' of High
Caste Hindus (Bloomington: University of Indian Press. 1967).
13. Franklin Southworth, personal communication.
14. James M. Freeman. "Trial by Fire," Natural History Maga:ille, Jan ..
1974. pp. 54-63.
15. Doranne Jacobson. "The Chaste Wife: Cultural Norm and Individual
Experience.;' in Sylvia Vatuk (ed.) American Studies in the Anthropologv of
Illdia (New Delhi: Manohar & American Instiiute of Indian Studies. 1978).
16. All Indian villagers have their share of misers. For example. in
Madhya Pradesh I once saw a high-caste farmer of some means attempt to evade
paying the $ I fee due the midwife who had just successfully brought his wife and
infant son through a very difficult 24-hour labor. He had refused to take his wife
to the hospital- he preferred to gamble two lives against the few dollars a trip to
the hospital would have cost. The previous year the same man had foregone
anti-rabies treatment for himself after he was bitten by a dog foaming at the
mouth. He decided he would take his chances and save the bus fare!
17. Mandelbaum. op. cit.
18. In a study of 96 Indian autobiographies written in English. Judith
Walsh found lack of introspection to be a general pattern. with a few notable
exceptions. (See Walsh. The Second Generation: A Study of Indian Auto
biographies. unpublished Ph.D. dissertation. Columbia University. 1976.) The
same was true of my village woman informant from Central India.
C;rindinf! wheat
35
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The Japanese Peasantry and Economic Growth
Since the Land Reform of 1946-47
by Bernard Bernier I
The Land Refonn of 1946-1947 marks a definite break in
the history of Japanese rural society. It thoroughly eradicated
the landlord-tenant class relation which had been a dominant
feature of the Japanese countryside since the late Edo period
(1600-1868). The Refonn was imposed on the Japanese gov
ernment by the Supreme Command of Allied Powers (SCAP).
One of its basic tenets was that landlordism had been a major
cause of the jingoistic and militaristic tendencies which
characterized Japanese society in the 1930s and 1940s.
2
It thus
had to be eliminated. But a more important goal of the Refonn
was to stamp out rural radicalism which had been an important
aspect of agrarian Japan in the 1920s and 1930s. Rural intransi
gence, prompted by the misery of the peasants under the land
lord system, was a major potential source of social unrest, and it
was feared that the peasantry might support left-wing parties.
3
In order to eliminate all dangerous socialist tendencies in the
countryside, it was necessary to return the land to the tillers, that
is to transfonn the majority of agriculturalists into small prop
erty owners. This rural "middle class' would hopefully become
a conservative political force, thus insuring that Japan remained
in the anti-communist camp. 4
The Land Refonn has in (act been successful, at least until
recently, in transfonning the peasantry into a conservative
bloc.
5
Since 1948 the countryside has voted overwhelmingly for
right-of-center parties, despite mounting difficulties for peas
ants and growing protests against various aspects of the State's
agricultural policy. But the Refonn never achieved its goal of
creating a "middle class" of farmers. In the first place, the
Refonn did not equalize land holdings. For example, in 1950,
73 percent of all farm households owned less than one hectare of
arable land (see table 1).6 Secondly, since about 1955, Japanese
agriculture has had to bear up under the pressures of rapid
economic growth whose prime moving force has been the heavy
and chemical industries dominated by monopoly capitalism.
Thus it will be necessary both to assess the various forces at
work within the agricultural sector itself and to examine the
national context in which these tendencies occur, taking into
account the effects of Japan's "economic miracle"7 and the
State's agrarian policy. Perforce it will be useful to examine,
albeit briefly, Japan's place in the international farm market.
The Agricultural Sector Since the Land Reform
Demographic Aspects
Throughout the twentieth century, the rural population has
been decreasing in proportion to the total Japanese population.
From a level of about 60 percent around 1900, it fell to 48
percent in 1950, 31 percent in 1965, and 19.9 percent in 1977
(see table 2). In absolute tenns, the rural population had grown
between 1900 and 1950 (from 26 to 37 millions, with various
ups and downs), but thereafter, a sharp decline has occurred,
dropping to 22.5 million in 1977. Of course, the 1950 figure is
inflated because of the influx of population to the rural areas
after the war, due to the destruction of homes and industrial
installations in the cities and the repatriation of Japanese sol
diers and fonner colonists. But this decline was still noticeable
even after industrial production had attained its prewar level in
1953. In fact, the average annual decrease in the 22 year period
between 1955 and 1977 was about 2 percent, and nearly 8
percent since 1968.
8
The evolution of the population actively engaged in ag
riculture has followed a different course. The 1955 proportion
was nearly equal to that of 1920: 15 million or 45 percent of the
total active population in 1955; 14 million, or 52 percent in 1920
(see table 2).9 However the farm population fell to about 12
million (30 percent) in 1960, and to 6.2 million (11.5 percent) in
1977. The annual rate of decrease stands at about 3 percent for
the period from 1955 to 1977. This downward trend in the active
farming population can be seen partly as a continuation of a
trend-already present in the late Edo period-which in
tensified with industrial development in the Meiji (1868-1912)
and Taisho (1912-1926) periods. This is the increase in the
proportion of non-agricultural to farm labor, at least part of
which is due to the exodus from overpopulated rural areas. to
However, this postwar trend, as I will show, did not remove
only excess farm population. It has increasingly taken needed
labor from the farms, transfonning cultivators into low-paid
workers employed in factories, the construction industry and the
services. Thus, the incorporation of agrictulture into the
capitalist economy has now entered a new phase in Japan, a
process which calls for further analysis.
40
,
I
t
I
Table I
I
I
!
NUMBER OF FARM HOUSHOLDS BY SIZE, 1940-1977
(in thousands)
i.
t
I
j
Acreage

f
categories 1940 1950 1960 1965 1970 1972 1973 1976 1977
t
0.0-0.3 ha 1283 1142 1100
i
ll>
1796 2531 1922 1922 1920 1911 ~
0.3-0.5 992 954 899
i
,
0.5-0.7 866 808 747 733 727 695 682
1768 1973
0.7-1.0 1041 954 857 820 805 741 734
1.0-1.5 1002 945 868 !D2 805 727 710
1322 1339
1.5-2.0 404 407 404 393 383 347 342
2.0-2.5 157 156 170 174 167 164 161
309 208
2.5-3.0 54 59 71 74 73 78 80
3.0 et plus 195 125 36 41 61 68 72 88 88
SOllrce: Yujiro Hayami. A Celllllr\" o(AgriCllllllrlll Crmr/h ill Jal'all (Tokyo. Tokyo University Pre". 1'l75). p. 'l:
Niholl N{igYli Nellkal/. (Tokyo. Ie no Hikari. 1<)7'+). p. 156.
NilulIlN,igrliNellklill. (Tokyo.lenoHikari.I'l78)p. 158.
Table 2
NUMBER OF FARM HOUSEHOLDS, AGRICULTURAL POPULATION
AND POPULATION ACTIVE IN AGRICULTURE, 1945-1977
Year Number of farm Agricultural Percentage Population Percentage
t
households population of IotaI active in of total
~
( 1000) ( 1000) population agriculture active
! ( 1000) population
f
t 1945 5.698 13.934
1950 6.176 37.760 48.3 15.886 45.2
1955 6.043 36.347 40.8 15.172 37.9
1960 6.057 34,411 36.5 11.960 30.0
I
t
..
1965 5,655 30.083 31.0 9,810 22.8
I 1970 5,342 36.595 25.3 8,110 17.8
1973 5.098 24.380 22.0 6.820 13.1
1975 4.953 23.195 21.3 6.500 12.5
f
1976 4.891 22.900 20.5 6,429 12.1
t
1977 4.835 22.560 19.9 6.201 11.6
r
I
SOllrce: Bureau of Statistics. SllIlisliml Hlilldbook O(J"I'"I/. I 'l7.+. p. 2'1:
Oriellwl Ecollomisl. Nov. 1<)75. p. 25:
!Villllll N,igni Ne"kllli. (Tokyo, Ie no Hikari. 1'178) p. 155IS'l.
SIt/lisliclil Yearbook o(Millislr\" o/AgricII/l/(re lIlId Foreslr.'. 1'l76 77. p. 222.,.
TABLE 3
AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTION AS A
PERCENTAGE OF GNP 1936-7 to 1977
Year Percentage
1934-36
1946
1950
1954
1958
1960
1970
1972
1975
1977
16.6
31.1
21.3
16.7
13.5
10.8
5.5
4.0
3.0
2.5
SOllrce: Ogura. Ed .. op. cit.. p. 6'1: Danno. op. cit .. p. 2'15
TABLE 4
Rice Price Index,
1960-1978
( I'I6S = IO())
TABLES
Annual Rate of Increase or Decrease in the Number of
Farm Households by Acreage Categories, 1960-1977
Year Index
Acreage
(in percentage)
1960 63,8
categories 1960-65 1965-70 1970-75 1976-77
1966
1968
109,2
126,1
0.0-0.3 ha.
0.3-0.5
-2.2
-0.8
-0.8
-1.2
-0.3 -0.5
1970 126,0
0.5-0.7 -1.3 -1.6 -1.7 -1.9
1972 137,0
0.7-1.0 -\.7 -2.1 -2.9 -1.0
1974 196,0
1.0-1.5 - I. I -\.7 -3.6 -2.3
1976 248,0
1.5-2.0 0.2 -0.2 -3.0 -\.7
1977 264,0
2.0-2.5 1.1 1.8 -1.2 -1.8
1978 274,5
2.5-3.0 1.9 3.8 0.6 2.1
3.0 plus 2.7 8.2 10.0 0.3
SOllrce. OCDE. "p. (It.. p. 27: ./1111<11/ Timn. July 7. 1'176. p.l.
Oriental Econ<lllli,t. ./ul'"I1/:c(!llOlIIic ) l'urj,,,,,k. I'J71l. p. SO.
SO/lrcl'. lVi/ulIl X(lgy() ,vellkill. 1'17... p. 156: Niillill N()gyo N'IIktlll. 1'I7X.
Oriental Econom"t. ./UI,ull Lnlllolllic ) (,lIr"o,,". 1'177 7S. p. "S
p. 15S
TABLE 6
Number and Percentage of Farm Households By Source of Income, 1947-1977
(in IO(X) and percentage)
Full-time Percentage of Part -ti mc Percentage of Part-time Percentage of
Year agricultural total member of farm households total member of farm households total member of
households farm houscholds category I farm households category II farm households
1947 3,270 55.4 1,680 28.5 951 16.1
1950 2,770 45.2 1,950 31.8 1,410 23.0
1955 2,020 34.7 2,210 37.9 1,590 24.4
1960 2,100 34.3 2,030 35.0 1.940 30.0
1965 1,200 21.5 2,080 35.5 2,360 43.0
1970 832 16.0 1,800 32.0 2,710 52.0
1973 675 12.0 1,300 23.0 3,120 65.0
1975 616 12.4 1,259 25.4 3,080 62.1
1976 659 13.5 1,002 20.5 3,231 66.1
1977 643 13.3 927 19.2 3,265 67.5
SOllrc'. Hayami. op. cit.. Bureau of Stali,li". op. cit.. p. 2Y: ja/,ulI Til/WI. July 7. 1'176. p. I: ,Villoll :v()gyil Nellkull. 1'17-+. p. 156: lVillOlI Ni)gyi) Nellkal/. 1'I7S.
p. IS5
This fact is borne out by the decrease in the number of farm land, and not on an increase in the productivity of labor. Labor
households after 1960. From 1950 to 1960, the number of farm was abundant in the countryside; there was no need to "save"
units remained relatively stable at the unprecedented high level
of about 6 million. Only between 1965 and 1970 was the prewar
level reached-a level that had been maintained from the late
Edo period until 1945 at between 5.3 and 5.5 million families.
Thereafter a sharp decrease occurred, and in 1977 the number of
farm households was 4.8 million. The decline between 1960
and 1970 can be viewed as a process of elimination of the excess
farm households created by the unusual conditions of the im
mediate postwar period, but the downward trend that has pre
vailed since 1970 cannot be explained in this way. In fact, in
1975, for the first time in two centuries, the number of farm
families fell below 5 million. II This trend has continued. Ac
cording to most observers, 12 the quasi-mystical attachment to
the land is now breaking down among many Japanese peasants.
An important feature of the feudal period when land was for
many the only means of survival, this attachment has persisted
because, until now, farming has been the only way for most
rural inhabitants to eam a living. Now survival can be secured
by non-agricultural work, and the sale of land, which until
recently was thought of as disrespectful toward the family
ancestors who bequeathed the land,13 is now based on cold
economic calculations. This is the case in peri-urban areas 14 but
is also true of outlying regions. 15
Agricultural Production
Agricultural production has accounted for an increasingly
low percentage of the Gross National Product (see Table 3).
From a level of 16.5 percent in 1934-1936, it reached 31
percent in 1946, but settled back to its prewar level in 1954.
Thereafter, it has decreased constantly, falling from 13 percent
in 1960, toamere2.5 percent in 1977. Themajorreasonforthis
decline is the fantastic development of the industrial and service
sectors. Overall agricultural production has increased however,
at least until 1968. In fact, from 1960 to 1968, the average
; annual rate of increase of agricultural production in current
prices has been near 4 percent. 16 But since 1969, there has been
I
a slow decline every year, except 1972 and 1975 (good harvests,
higher rice prices; see Table 4).
A main reason for the decrease in farm production is,
first, a reduction in the total area of land under cultivation. For
example, between 1969 and 1976, an annual average of 50,000
hectares were transferred out of cultivation. 17 While much of
this is the result of urban and industrial development, it is also
due to the abandonment of agriculture by many peasants, partly
because of the government's policy of encouraging the curtail
ment of rice production.
18
Secondly, rice yields per hectare
have decreased. For example, between 1967 and 1971, the yield
per hectare on large farms fell from 45.4 qt. to 41 qt. 19 Finally,
many farmers have abandoned winter crops, and consequently,
the rate of land use has declined from 134 percent in 1960 to 100
percent in 1973. Since then, it has risen somewhat to 103
percent in 1976.
20
The increase in production which occurred before 1969 is
the result of two trends. The first is an increase in the yield per
i
hectare which took place chiefly before 1955. This increase was
prompted by the generalization of many technical innovations
previously used only sporadically or regionally such as chemi
J
cal fertilizers, herbicides, insecticides, high-yield varieties, etc.
In this period, the emphasis was on a more intensive use of the
it. 21 In fact, there was a 10 percent increase in the ratio of labor
f
per hectare between 1934-36 and 1953.
22
The second trend, which gathered momentum after 1955,
l
is the increase in labor productivity. This increase became
necessary in order to offset the heavy drain on rural labor caused
by the demand for cheap labor power in the industrial and
service sectors. 23 Relieved of their surplus workers, and even,
later, of their required labor power, farm families have had to
I
I
!
look for ways to save labor. Indeed, from 1955 to 1970, labor
productivity in agriculture increased an average of 6.4 percent
annually.24 Between 1970 and 1976, the increase of labor
productivity in agriculture has outstripped that in industry (44.2
percent compared to 30.8 percent). 25
This second trend is the result of the massive use of small
scale agricultural machinery. In fact, peasants have tried to
replace labor, which could be more gainfully employed outside
agriculture, by machinery and also by the more intensive use of
chemical products. To a certain extent, this shift was successful
but it has not been without its cost. Once given the possibility of
buying machines, many full-time farmers have also discovered
the possibility of taking occasional outside jobs in order to
increase family revenues, and even, in some cases, of financing
the purchase of farm machinery. 26 Thus off-farm wage labor
entails the closer subordination of farm households to the
capitalist economy not only as a source of wage labor, but also
as a profitable market for industrial farm goods. There have also
been ecological effects; the use of fertilizers, herbicides and
machinery cannot regenerate the soil the way hard work does.
For example, the hand tractor which is widely used now does
not plow the land as deeply as the old ox-drawn plows; further
more, chemicals have changed the soil into a sticky matter that
bears no resemblance to the rich organic soil which was the
hallmark of Japanese wet rice agriculture. 27 The major result of
this labor-saving agriculture has been a decrease in yield which I
mentioned earlier. A second consequence is the weakened re
sistance of plants to cold temperature.
Another danger is chemical poisoning.
2H
Together with
industrial pollution, pollution by agricultural chemicals has hit
all Japanese but especially peasants. Matsushima
29
states that
25 percent of all peasants are affected one way or another by
such chemical intoxication and 4 percent are seriously
poisoned. Most chemicals used in agriculture have not been
tested previously (a consequence of very lax rules regarding the
testing of industrial products in Japan),30 and their side effects
are not known.
Agricultural Products
Japanese agriculture is still strongly centered on cereals,
particularly rice. However, since 1950 specialization in other
crops has been gaining ground. In 1950 cereals accounted for
more than 70 percent of total farm production. This is only
slightly lower than comparable figures for the early 20th
century. But since 1950 the importance of cereals has de
creased. In 1960 they accounted for 55 percent of total ag
ricultural production but this percentage had fallen to 36 percent
by 1973 and to about 33 percent in 1977. The decline has been
much more dramatic for cereals other than rice (wheat, barley,
buckwheat, com). In 1950 these other cereals accounted for
more than 10 percent of the total farm output, but less than I
43
percent in 1976. The major reason for this rapid drop in produc
tion lies in the fact that cereals cultivated in Japan are expensive.
In 1969, Japanese wheat sold, at more than double the interna
tional price.
31
However, this in itself is not a sufficient condi
tion, for in the same year the price of Japanese rice was about
three times that of American rice. 32 A second important factor is
U.S. pressure on the Japanese government to import large
quantities of American farm goods. This pressure has been
applied more or less consistently since 1945. Just after the war,
the Japanese government had little power to resist. The U.S.
was producing large surpluses, especially of wheat and soy
beans, and Japan proved to be an ideal market both because of
the immediate food shortage and because of low farm productiv
ity. Agreements were even signed in 1954 to insure the flow of
certain American agricultural products into Jpan.
3J
The net
result was a slackening off in production of many Japanese
crops, including wheat, barley and soy beans.
Conversely, the production of livestock, dairy goods,
fruits, and vegetables has increased tremendously. From 35
percent of total production in 1960, these products have grown
to 57 percent in 1972 and almost 60 percent in 1975.
34
The
increase in the production of fruits, vegetables, meat, milk and
eggs, together with the decline of cereal production, is a sign of
a more diversified diet, a consequence of the higher standard of
living brought about by the economic growth of the 1960s.
35
However, the sustained growth of non-cereal production has
been possible only through heavy tariff protection. Since 1971
international pressure has been applied, especially by the United
States, to force the easing of Japanese trade barriers on many
agricultural goods. These pressures, which are analyzed in more
detail below, have strained the growth of many types of prod
ucts, including beef, dairy products, and citrus fruits. To offset
the effects of liberalization on the peasants, the Japanese gov
ernment has had to ease up on its policy of rice production
control, thus putting an end to its lO-year-old farm diversifica
tion program. This policy change has led to new rice surpluses.
However, by 1973, the policy of restricting rice production was
again revived, resulting in a drop in Japan's overall agricultural
output.
Categories of farms
Fam1 households in Japan, as was mentioned earlier, did
not receive equal amounts of land during the Land Reform. This
inequality of households based on land holdings has been a
constant feature of Japanese agriculture up to the present (see
table I). In the decade from 1940 to 1950, there was an increase
in the number of farms in the small holder categories (less than 2
hectares), but a decline in relative and absolute terms of large
fam1s. This is due in large part to the unusual conditions that
prevailed in the immediate postwar period. After 1950 these
tendencies were reversed. From 1950 to 1960, there was an
increase in the number of farms in all acreage categories except
for small farms of less than one hectare, From 1960 to 1965, the
decline affected the I to IV2 hectare category, and the 0.7 to I
hectare group decreased at a faster rate (see table 5). From 1965
to 1970, the decline reached the I 'h to 2 hectares category and
quickened for farms with I to 11/2 hectare of land. But there was
a slowdown in the rate of decline of the smallest farms. From
1970 to 1975, all small holder categories, that is farms with less
than 21/2 hectares, showed a decline. This process was particu
larly clear in the 0.7 to 2 hectare categories. Conversely the
largest farms, i.e. more than 3 hectares, showed a 10 percent
increase. In '76--'77, the rate of decline slackened off for the 0.7
to 2 hectare categories, but it increased for the smaller farms and
for the 2 to 21/2 hectare category.
In fact, what we see here is a sort of stabilization of the
number of smaller 'farms accompanied by a rather rapid decrease
in the number of larger farms, a decrease which is even more
rapid now for these farms than it was for smaller ones in earlier
years. Thus the downward drift which used to characterize small
fam1s is now spreading to medium-size operations. According
to Ouchi 36, this means that the lower stratum of the peasantry,
i.e. farm households with insufficient land to live independently
(that is, without regular off-farm work), now includes families
which used to be in the middle stratum (I to 2 hectares). The
middle stratum is now confined to the 2 to 3 hectare categories,
and even these seem to be dwindling at present. Only the larger
farms are thriving, and they are a small minority. According to
Ouchi and others 37, this is the increasingly polarized form the
. decom position of the peasantry" assumes, a form, it should be
noted, that is normally found in all capitalist societies.
The determination of peasant strata, however, cannot be
made solely on the basis of farm size, as the above definition of
the lower stratum makes clear. It is necessary to take into
account the importance of full-time or part-time farming in the
different fam1 households. Table 6 traces the evolution of full
time and part-time farm families from 1947 to 1977. What this
table shows is that the proportion of full-time or specialized
farms to total fam1 households has dropped from 55.4 percent in
1947 to 12.4 percent in 1975. Butthis percentage has gone up to
13.3 percent in 1977. The fastest rate of decline was between
1960 and 1965 when the number of full-time operations de
creased from 2.1 millions to 1,2 million for an average annual
decline of more than 10 percent.
I
Part-time farms in category I (i.e. farm households whose
I
income derives partly from non-agricultural work but which
receive more than half their total income from agriculture) grew
I
in absolute and relative number from 1947 to 1955, levelled off
in the decade 1955-1965, then decreased slowly until 1970, and
since then have declined rapidly. The number of part-time farm
households in category II (i.e. farm households who earn less
than 50 percent of their income from agriculture) has increased
constantly, both in real numbers and as a percentage of total
households, from 1947 to the present. From just below I million
(16%) in 1947, these households jumped to 2.3 million (43%) in
1965, and to 3.2 million (67.5%) in 1977. It is clear from these
figures that agriculture has become a secondary occupation for
about two-thirds of all farming families. The net result has been
a decrease in the portion of the total income all farm households
derive from agriculture. This has fallen from 50 percent in 196 I
to 36 percent in 1972 and finally to 3 1.6 percent in 1976.
38
Table 7 gives the breakdown of full-time and part-time
farm households by acreage categories between [960 and 1973.
The clearest trend is the constant decrease of full-time opera
tions in all farm-management categories during this period.
Larger farms have always fared better, starting at a much higher
level offull-time farms (about 72 percent for categories over 2V2
hectares, compared to less than 20 percent for small farms of
less than V2 hectare), and declining less rapidly (to about 28
percent and 3. I percent respectively for the same categories in
19,73). In fact, the proportion of full-time farms increases at a
44
TABLE 7
I
}
Percentage of Farm Households By Source of Income
According to Acreage Categories, 1960 to 1973
{
Acreage Full-time farm households Part-time, category I Part-time, category II

categories 1960 1965 1972 1973 1960 1965 1972 1973 1960 1965 1972 1973
1
(
Total 33.7 20.5 13.5 12.3 34.1 37.2 27.1 25.3 39.3 42.3 59.4 62.4
1
i 0.0-0.3 12.5 8.8 8.1 7.9 10.3 5.9 3.9 3. I 79.2 85.5 88.0 89.0
t
0.3-0.5 18.6 10.5 30.9 19.7 50.5 69.8
1 0.5-0.7 27.9 14.7 9...1- 8.9 45.7 39.6 16.2 13.5 26.5 45.7 74.4 77.6
t
0.7-1.0 39.9 21.8 12.6 11.3 48.9 55.2 33.2 29.8 11.2 23.0 54.3 58.9
I
J
1.0-1.5 64.6 31.7 18.6 17.1 42.9 60.5 52.8 49.8 3.6 7.8 28.6 33.0
1.5-2.0 63.3 40.5 25.2 22.7 35.3 56.8 63.4 63.4 1.4 2.7 11.7 13.8
2.0-2.5 68.4 45.9 28.7 24.6 30.7 52.5 64.9 67.7 1.0 1.6 6.3 8...1
2.5-3.0 71.3 50.1 29.7 26.0 27.8 48.6 66.2 68.5 0.9 1.3 4.1 4.1
3.0 plus 73.0 54.6 35.3 30.6 26.0 43.6 61.8 65.3 1.0 1.8 2.9 4.2
,
Source: Niholl N(,gyo Nell!;lIl1. p. 157
TABLE 8
Income of Farm Households by Size, 1976
( 1000 yen and percentage)
Acreage Income Agricultural Non- Rate of
categories of farm income agricultural dependance
household income on agriculture
0.1-0.5 ha 3506.1 284.9 3221.2 8.1
I
0.5-1.0 3563.7 922.8 2640.9 25.9
1.0-1.5 3718.1 1662.1 2056.0 44.7
1.5-2.0 3847.0 2226.0 1621.0 57.9
2.0-2.5 3929.3 2717.4 1211.9 69.2
2.5-3.0 4524.1 3084.7 1439...1- 68.2
3.0 plus 4781.0 3812.7 968.3 79.7
SOl/l'ce: Nilu}// Nogy() Nell!;lIll. p. 296; NilulI/ N('gyi, Nell!;lIl1. 197M.
p.
TABLE 9
Income of Farm Households and Working Class Households, 1965-1976
Family income Family income Per capita Per capita
Year of farm of working-class Percentage income of farm income of Percentage
households (A) households (B) of (A/B) households (C) working-class of (C/D)
(1000 yen) (1000 yen) (1000 yen) households (D)
1965 835 797 104.7 115.5 139.7 82.7
1970 1.576 1.390 114.8 236.8 248.6 95.3
1972 1.779 1.521 117.0 267.9 273.7 97.9
1973 2.150 1.713 125.5 311.5 297.9 102.5
1976 4.279 3.173 134.9 847.5 756.7 112.0
Source: NillOll Ni,gyo NI'II!;lIll. p. .\',"gyiJ Nt'Il!;lIl1. 1978. p..,12
45
o
("'I
c::
!IJ
Q..
constant rate as we move up in size. Conversely, the proportion
of type II part-time farms has increased in all categories, espec
ially among small holders; 89 percent of farm families owning
less than Vz hectare belong to this category. And the percentage
of this type of farm operation decreases constantly as we move
into the larger farm categories.
The category I part-time group, which is devoted primarily
to agriculture, has undergone a special evolution. In 1960, these
holdings were concentrated in the medium-size categories (1Iz to
I Y2 hectare). Smaller farms had the smallest representation and
larger ones occupied an intermediate position. But from 1960 to
1973, fewer smaller farms were included in the category I group
while the proportion of medium-size farms increased until
1965, but decreased afterward. The percentage of farms in the
I Y2 to 2 hectare category increased from 1960 to 1972, but this
trend seems to be reversing itself at the present time since, in
1973, it remained stable at the same level as in 1972. Finally, all
categories above 2 hectares have shown a constant increase.
It is thus clear that part-time and full-time farm operations
are very closely related to farm size. The link is not absolute,
and we will see why below. But what is clear for the moment is
that large farms tend to specialize in agriCUlture, although a
growing proportion of even the very largest have non
agricultural sources of income.
The reasons for these trends are complex. One is that farm
owners are hesitant to sell their land even when they engage in
farming only as a secondary activity. As I mentioned previ
ously, the ideological restraints on selling farm land have been
weakened and peasants actually sell more than they did previ
ously. For example, in one year, in 1971-1972, 3.5o/c of all
culti vated land in Nagano, 4.4% in Gumma, 2.9% in Chiba and
Saitama, 2.7% in Ibaragi. and 2% in Hiroshima was sold for
non-agricultural purposes.
39
But despite this increase in land
sales, the general tendency remains for farmers to hold on to the
soil. The reasons for this "attachment" to the land are usually
very concrete. Many cultivators own land whose price is rising
faster than the interest they could obtain on the amount of money
they would receive for their land, so, if the price is not high
enough or if they do not really need to sell, they prefer to keep
their land. Moreover, many farm owners prefer converting their
land partly to other uses, such as apartment building, near the
cities. Still others, and they are in the majority, want to keep the
land as an insurance against hard times. Many farmers still
remember the famine of the middle '40s and they want to be
protected should the same difficulties arise again. Besides,
given the inadequacy of social security programs in Japan, old
people generally have a hard time of it particularly when they
own nothing, and this encourages peasants to cling to their land
as a form of old-age insurance.
4o
Finally, prices for land or
houses are so high that even should a farm owner sell at a good
price, he/she is likely to spend most of it on the purchase of a
new house.
Small holders thus prefer to keep their land: some cultivate
it, part-time or full-time; others rent it, even if rents are very
low; and still others simply allow it to lie fallow. A second
reason for the trend toward part-time farming is the income
differential that exists between agriCUlture and wage-Iabor.41
The higher wage level in non-agricultural employment lures
farmers, especially those with smaller farms, into outside em
ployment. However, two facts must be noted in this regard. In
the first place, given the low general wage level obtaining in
Japan until 1973, non-farm income was not high enough to
entice farmers entirely away from agriculture. 42 Secondly, most
non-agricultural jobs for farmers are still low-paid and non
permanent and are found primarily in the construction in
dustry. Farmers thus represent an important source of cheap
labor. 43 This is particularly true of seasonal workers (dekasegi),
although their working and living conditions have improved
somewhat in the last few years.
44
What is interesting, though, is that type II part-time house
holds tend to engage in more lucrative non-agricultural pursuits,
that is they are more often permanently or self- employed.
45
Thus many smaller farms, which constitute the majority of
part-time category II operations, have managed to obtain a
household and even per capita income higher than that of
medium-size farms whose land is too small for full-time farming
but too large to depend primarily on non-agricultural sources of
income.
46
It is also interesting to note that the average family
revenues and, since 1972, even the per capita revenues for farm
households, have surpassed those of working-class families
47
However, this is true only of type II households and has been
achieved by putting to work outside of agriculture a larger
number of family members whose jobs are not always stable.
Furthermore, until recently, the average per capita income for
workers in Japan was quite low; it was just a little under $1000 a
year in 1972, at the then-prevailing exchange rate. With the later
wage increases as well as the increase in the value of the yen,
this average has gone up to $4000 in 1978.
4S
The consequences of these trends are complex and far
reaching. In the first place, the refusal of small holders to sell their
land, coupled with high land prices resulting from urban develop
ment, have retarded farm consolidation. Thus the constitution of
46
I
j
!
J
I
t
I
t
I
f
i
t
\
f
I
J
}
1
I
a substantial group of prosperous family fanns has been thwarted.
Secondly, the possibility of keeping the land while working
outside ofagriculture has led to an increase in the number of fanns
short of even one full-time worker (man or woman). In 1973, as
well as in 1977, 50 percent of fann households were of this
type.49 Another 15 percent had only one woman as a full-time
worker. In this case, it is considered "normal" for women to
keep on doing household chores, a fact that cannot but diminish
their effectiveness as fann workers. Moreover, if we take into
account the fact that a sizeable proportion of fanns with full
time employees are geared to subsistence farming and worked
by old people, 50 the percentage of fann operations run on a less
than adequate basis is very high, probably near 75 percent. This
leads to the type of farm management that has become the trade
mark of Japanese agriculture. Fanning is done part-time either
in the evenings or on weekends by women and old people.
A third consequence is that part-time cultivators tend to
withdraw from cooperative ventures and deal with their prob
lems individually. The net result is the breakdown of village
coooperation and the purchase of agricultural machinery at a
pace much faster than is really needed. Each household requires
its own machinery in order to complete the fannwork in the
short periods when manpower is available. 51
Fourthly, as has been mentioned earlier, there has been a
reduction in the yield per hectare for many types of crops despite
an increase in farm productivity. The replacement of labor by
industrial goods does not result in as productive a use of the
land. Besides, it increases the danger of toxic poisoning.
A fifth consequence is the growing strain on village and
family life. Although conditions for seasonal workers have
improved, it remains that, with the departure of so many villa
gers for the cities, the families left behind encounter serious
problems and many villages have become deserted, with
schools closed, etc.
52
The devastation of the countryside and
urban over-population are really two sides of the same cob: the
uneven regional development whicl). characterizes all capitalist
societies-Japan being, however, in this instance, an extreme
case. 53
Finally, the preservation of so many part-time fanns has
encouraged rice cultivation even in the period of surplus produc
tion, which began in 1966. In the last decade or so, wet rice
cultivation has become highly mechanized
54
and heavily depen
dent on chemicals, thus making it a very suitable activity for
small-scale part-time operations. In fact, in 1971, only 9 percent
of full-time farms were dependent on rice production. 55 The
main reason that producers keep growing rice at high levels
remains the State's policy of maintaining high rice prices, as we
will see below. Farmers' cooperatives, which operate as busi
ness concerns and whose profits rely heavily on the
government-controlled rice market also encourage rice produc
tion.
56
But necessities of part-time fanning, which has as a
corollary a high degree of mechanization, and the increase in
subsistence farming
57
have strengthened the tendency to sup
port rice cultivation.
The National Context
The State's agricultural policy
An analysis of agricultural programs in Japan since the
Land Reform is not easy because the policy-making process has
many contradictory aspects which have forced the government
to change course at different times or even to devise and imple
ment contradictory measures. One important aspect is the fact
that, since the end of World War II, the Japanese government
has been structured to accommodate even more closely than
before the war the interest of giant business concerns. 58 Since
the economic strength of dominant zaikai interests is based on
the export of manufactured goods, and since it is necessary to
compensate for these exports by importing foreign products, the
zaikai and its related organizations (Keidanren, etc.) have,
since 1955, applied pressure on the government to liberalize
agricultural imports, terminate government control of the rice
market and consolidate farms and encourage their mechani
zation.
59
A second aspect is the dependence of the ruling Liberal
Democratic Party, whose relations to the zaikai are well known,
on the rural vote.
60
In order to get the agricultural producers to
vote conservative, the government has had to make concessions
to them, mainly by maintaining rice prices at a high level. This
points to another important aspect of agricultural policy: it must
take into account the fact that agriculture is at one and the same
time an economic sector and the means of livelihood for several
million people.
47
A final aspect is the pressure exerted by foreign countries,
especially the United States, to liberalize the Japanese farm
market. The policy on rice prices has had the greatest impor
tance for the peasantry since 1945. At first, the rice-price policy
was geared to the regulation of foodstuffs needed for the war
effort. The first government controls on the rice market were
imposed in 1939, but only in 1942 were these controls explicitly
applied to prices. The price of rice at that time was calculated on
the costs of agricultural means of production and the price of
consumer goods needed by the peasants. This policy had a
double goal: to insure that agricultural production would be
sufficient for the war effort, and that foodstuffs would be priced
low enough to depress wages in the industrial sector.
61
This
policy lasted until 1946.
In 1946, due to new economic and political circumstances,
the method of determining rice prices was modified. Instead of
taking as a base the cost of agricultural means of production, the
price of rice was tied to a basic price-index for all products
purchased by agricultural producers. This policy was devised at
a time when these producers were prospering because of the
food shortage and was meant to curb the inflation of food
prices.
62
Peasant affluence was short-lived. In 1949, the "Dodge
plan, " a package of anti-inflationary measures, was im
plemented, cutting deeply into peasants' gains.
63
Rural income
fell rapidly in comparison to urban working-class earnings, and
in 1951 peasant unrest forced the government to change its
agricultural policy. The price of rice was now calculated on the
basis of income parity between the country-side and the city.
This new method of calculation was based not only on a com
parison of prices between agricultural products and all items
deemed essential to farm families, but also on a comparison of
consumption levels between peasants and urban workers. The
main objective of this new formula was to raise the peasants'
standard of living.
However, even with this type of computation, farm house
hold revenues were deteriorating in comparison to working
class incomes. The primary cause was wage increases linked to
the heavy labor demand brought about by rapid economic
growth. Under rural pressure, the government, with the im
plementation of the Fundamental Law on Agriculture in
1961,adopted a new way to determine rice prices by adding to
the production costs of the least productive farms an amount of
money intended to raise the standard of living of farm families.
This method of calculating rice prices has in fact led to an
increase in rural incomes, but it also resulted in a doubling of the
price of rice paid to producers between 1960 and 1968 (see table
8). It is during this period that the price of Japanese rice rose far
above international prices. Moreover, so as not to accelerate
inflation, and to keep wages at a fairly low level while avoiding
a public outcry, the government has not allowed the sales price
of rice to rise at the same pace as the purchase price at the farm.
One of the most visible results of the 1961 policy was the
rapid accumulation of a vast rice surplus which has been very
difficult to sell. In fact, in 1970, this surplus was equivalent to
the total national consumption for about one year. Secondly, by
encouraging rice production, this policy has gone contrary to the
government's effort to diversify agricultural production.
Thirdly, the Ministry of Agriculture has had to shoulder increas
ing deficits.
48
What prompted this curiously contradictory policy is, first
of all, the necessity for the LOP to please its rural constituency.
The party is elected by the rural vote. With the defection of the
urban working class, the LOP has had to make some conces
sions to the peasants to acquire their votes. Furthermore, with a
higher standard of 1iving, rice had lost its importance as the main
food item in workers' diets, and its price has been able to rise.
Before 1955, it was necessary to guard against increases in the
price of rice in order to keep wages low; rice was the major food
item and low wages were a must for small enterprises.
64
How
ever, it is important to note that, even though it became possible
to let rice prices climb after 1960, the rate of increase was not
high enough to prevent the spread of part-time farming. In fact,
with the rapid progress of mechanization, the new rice policy
encouraged this development by allowing small holders who
normally would have been evicted from agriculture to maintain
a certain level of rice production while working only part-time
in agriculture, thus obtaining good secondary incomes. How
ever, given price levels, social needs, the size of farm plots, and
agricultural productivity, it was impossible for the majority of
rice producers to depend mainly on agriculture for their income.
Most of them have had to rely increasingly on wage labor,
usually in low-paying industrial jobs. Actually, the rice policy
has had to accommodate the need of many industrial sectors for
a steady supply of low-paid rural labor, and the price of rice has
had to satisfy rural voters while insuring a constant outflow of
cheap labor to factories, shops and construction sites. 65
There is no doubt that the maintenance of this labor force
on the land has allowed for lower real wages. On the one hand,
most part-time farmers are considered seasonal or temporary
workers. They thus earn much less than the permanent work
force even though they work at least as much. Furthermore since
they derive an income from agriculture and can live partly off of
their own farms, they're prepared to accept lower wages. On the
other hand, their continuing presence on the land allows their
employers and the government to duck social security measures
since part-time farmers are expected to live solely or mainly off
the land when they are unemployed. Besides, given the fact they
consider themselves peasants rather than workers even though
the majority earn most of their income from wage labor, part
time farmers are often opposed to working-class organizations
and labor movement activities. 66
The government's farm policy is not limited to the price of
rice. Since 1956, when the first hints of trouble in agriCUlture
appeared, the government has tried to encourage the specializa
tion of farms in one crop and, on a national level, the diversifica
tion of farm production. 67 The Fundamental Law of 1961 was a
major plank in the government's new farm policy. Its main goal
was to create through specialization and diversification inde
pendent farms, large enough to survive without off-farm wage
employment and without government subsidies.
68
However,
this goal was not achieved, as the increase in part-time farms
between 1961 and 1977 amply demonstrates.
All through the '60s, the government attempted in various
ways to speed up farm consolidation, mechanization and
diversification-in short, the establishment of viable family
farms. However, these efforts went contrary to the necessity, for
electoral reasons, to maintain the majority of peasant families
on the land. Furthermore, since diversification had to be backed
up by high tariff barriers, this policy drew fire from the zaikai
whose interests required a more open internal market for ag
ricultural imports. 69 Criticism also came from the U. S. govern
ment which was pushing for trade liberalization. Nevertheless,
the Japanese government succeeded temporarily in its efforts to
protect local producers in key sectors of livestock, dairy, fruit
and vegetable production. But this was done at the expense of
cereal production (except rice), raw materials for fodder, and
soybeans.
The entire farm program had to be changed between 1968
and 1971. In the first place, pressures from the zaikai and the
urban working class forced the government to halt rice-price
inflation for three years beginning in 1968. In fact, the new
policy was only carried out for two years (1969 and 1970), for in
1971, the price of rice was hiked 3 percent, then 6. I percent in
1972,32.2 percent in 1974, 14.4 percent in 1975, 10.2 percent
in 1976, and 4 percent in 1977. Moreover, in order to reduce
rice surpluses, the government initiated its policy of subsidies
for the curtailed rice production.
70
These subsidies were sup
posed to encourage diversification, but, in fact, as we saw, they
very often resulted in the non-utilization of agricultural land.
The net result, however, was to lessen the rice surplus to about
20 percent of annual consumption in 1977.
The "Nixon shock" of 1971 was the main blow to the
government's diversification program. As a result of U.S. pres
sures, the Japanese government had to lower or abolish trade
barriers on agricultural products. This led to difficulties for
many agricultural producers. To compensate, the government
decided to raise the price of rice, which encouraged many
producers to revert to rice production. However, international
pressures were not limited to the Nixon shock alone. The year
1972 saw the disappearance of the world's agricultural sur
pluses which had been maintained for the previous 25 years, and
world food production became insufficient. Japan, whose de
1
gree of self-sufficiency in food
71
had plummeted from about 80 ~
percent in 1960 to less than 50 percent in 1973,72 thus faced
severe problems in obtaining badly needed farm goods on the
international market. The most acute problem centered on soy
beans. In 1971, Japan imported 96 percent of its soybeans, 97
percent of which came from the U. S. In 1972, the U. S., for
various reasons, put an embargo on soybean exports to Japan.
Because of such difficulties in the international market, many
groups in Japan have proposed a return to food self-sufficiency
partly for security reasons. But still, in 1975, Japan depended
for 97 percent on imports of soybeans, 92 percent of which came
from the United States. 73
Confronted with these many-sided problems, the govern
ment has remained indecisive since 1971. There have been
tentative plans to reduce the number of farm families and in
dustrialize the countryside, etc.
74
But most of these have been
as severely criticized by the representatives of Japanese capital
as by peasants and workers. However, the vacillation of the
government has not prevented the uncontrolled implantation of
industries in the countryside. The city continues to encroach on
rural areas, and pollution is increasingly hazardous to farm
villages. 75 Rural unrest has been increasing and the rural vote no
longer goes automatically to the LDP. In these circumstances, it
is possible that the LDP will sacrifice its rural constituency to
the interest of the zaikai. But what would become then of this
stabilizing force that is the peasantry?76
Big Business and Agriculture
A good share of the Japanese farm market is controlled by
giant monopolies. And if we include among these the farmers'
cooperatives which are very often more concerned with
capitalistic pursuits than with family farmers, monopoly capi
tal's control of the farm market is almost complete. The case of
the milk industry, which is controlled by three companies, is
probably the clearest case in point. 77 All sectors of the market
for agricultural means of production are also dominated by giant
companies (machinery, fertilizers, feeds, herbicides, insecti
cides, etc.). The cooperatives are in this instance often reduced
to the role of middle men; one exception is Zenkoren, associated
with the co-operative movement, which is a producer of con
centrated feeds, but on a much smaller scale than either Nihon
Haigo Shiryo (Mitsui group) or Nihon Nosan.78 Furthermore,
most agricultural imports are controlled by giant trading com
panies (Mitsui Bussan, Mitsubishi Shoji, etc.). These com
panies are also attempting to take over various supermarket
chains. 79
Vertical integration, a characteristic feature of agriCUlture
in all advanced capitalist countries, has progressed very rapidly
in Japan in the last decade. Vertical integration actually reduces
the producer to the status of a wage laborer who works at home
and is paid on a piecemeal basis. It has been gaining ground
chiefly in livestock and dairy production (pigs, chickens, eggs,
milk), but also in fruit and vegetable production. Even some rice
producers have entered into this type of arrangement with sake
brewers and candy manufacturers. 80
However, vertical integration is only one step in the control
of agriculture by monopoly capitalism. Since 1970, giant food
combines (Kombinats) have been set up, especially by trading
companies such as Mitsubishi Shoji, Mitsui Bussan, Itoh and
Marubeni. These Kombinats are sometimes limited to process
ing only foodstuffs or feeds using local or imported products.
But the trading companies have also taken over a good share of
the actual production of chickens, eggs, and pigs. The four
trading companies mentioned above controlled up to 71.4 per
cent of the total production of chicken in 1970.
81
These com
panies have organized production on an industrial scale, making
use of automated plants with a capacity of several million
chickens a year-a far cry from small-scale farming. It must be
noted that most of these plants have been established in rural
areas and employ local part-time farmers. They require very
little land and are thus exceptions among smaller farms. They
engage in agricultural production on a full time basis.
Finally, these trading companies have established
plantation-type ventures in countries such as Indonesia and the
Philippines where they produce cheap agricultural products
which are then shipped to Japan for processing. 82 The effects of
the increasing control of monopoly capital over agricultural
production have been deeply felt by smail-scale family farms.
In the first place, many small cultivators have had to become
vertically integrated to giant companies. Secondly, many others
have decreased farm production to become workers in giant
food factories. Thirdly, direct monopoly control over certain
types of production, either in Japan or abroad, has weakened the
position of small holders, thus forcing more family members to
seek wage-employment. Fourthly, as mentioned above, this has
led to a decrease in self-sufficiency in food production. Finally,
the use of chemical feeds for animals in giant plants has in
creased the chances of poisoning consumers.
49
Conclusion
Since 1950, the Japanese peasantry has had to adjust to the
encroachment of monopoly capitalism on the countryside. 83
This has not been a smooth process as many peasant protest
movements have clearly shown.
84
But in the long run, the
peasants have obviously not had the strength to resist these
pressures. Indeed, the cooperatives, which represent the
strongest fanners' organization to appear in the postwar period,
have been one of the agents of capitalist extension in the
countryside, mainly through the sale of various means of ag
ricultural production.
In search of profit,85 giant companies have gained an
increasingly tighter control over the entire agricultural scene:
production, markets, imports, etc. Their interest is to obtain
cheap agricultural products for processing and to tear various
sectors of production away from small-scale farmers. They also
require labor. A good portion of the cheap, young, docile and
partially qualified labor force which is needed by the giant
companies comes from the countryside. These are fanners' sons
and daughters who, since early Meiji and up until now. have left
the farm permanently to become workers. 86 But companies also
need "coolie" labor, and a good portion of this is furnished by
part-time farmers.
In fact, the development of postwar capitalism in Japan has
had a curious impact on the rural areas. One consequence,
"normal" in capitalist societies, has been the expropriation of
more than I million fanns between 1960 and 1977. Another has
been the maintenance of a majority of farm owners on the land.
This, as we saw, results from the dependence of the conserva
tive parties, who represent business interests, on the rural vote.
The continuing presence of so many smallholders on the land is
a feature unique to Japan. It is found in no other capitalist
society.
..... an excel/tnt new jouf'1I4/ of itkaJ .... "
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Another consequence of capitalist encroachment on the
countryside has been the proletarianization of many farmers,
even though these have managed to keep their land. Part-time
"farm owners" who do very little fanning, sometimes only for
home consumption and always on a small-scale, can hardly be
considered" peasants" any longer. They are really workers. To
be sure, keeping the land has a certain importance. The land can
be sold or used as a hedge against hard times. But for most
cultivators, as long as they work for wages, it is their job which
most effects and defines their life; agriCUlture is only a secon
dary occupation, a source of subsidiary income. The land actu
ally serves to devaluate the labor force. Because part of their
subsistence comes from their own farms, these cultivators ac
cept low wages. Moreover, below a certain size (2Vz hectares in
1972; see Table 8) the more land a farm household has, the
lower its per capita income. Land is thus, paradoxically, a strain
on income. Farm families with smaller holdings enjoy higher
incomes than larger farms, but only where their members work
outside agriculture.
With agricultural income so low (despite high prices), the
trends toward the proletarianization of fanners and a decrease in
agricultural output are bound to continue. The first trend is
apparent in the inclusion of farms with relatively more land into
the lower stratum of the "peasantry." In fact the majority of
peasants owning less than 2 hectares of land are increasingly
caught up in the transition to part-time farming. Not all are
really workers; many still depend heavily on agriculture for a
living and see farming as their primary occupation. But even
here the trend toward part-time agriculture is in evidence and in
fact now appears irreversible.
We arrive at the paradoxical conclusion that today more
than half of all Japanese" peasants" are in reality workers. The
rest can be classified into four categories: those who are verti
cally integrated to big companies and who are therefore in the
process of becoming workers; the truly independent family
farmers who live exclusively or primarily from their own pro
duction but still depend entirely on farm labor; the prosperous
specialized farmers who employ a quasi-permanent labor force;
and finally, capitalist agricultural entrepreneurs. The last have
nothing to do with the peasantry as they are part of monopoly
capital entering agriculture from the outside. Prosperous
farmers, whose numbers probably do not exceed half a million,
are those who have established themselves in specialized areas
of production and who have gained control of most specialized
cooperatives.
s7
These also cannot be classified as peasants. As
for the independent family farms, their number has decreased
markedly with the inclusion of medium size farms in the part
time II category, and the tendency seems to be for a greater
number of formerly independent farms to go this same route.
If the trends described above continue, and there is no
indication that they will not, it is to be ex pected ( I) that up to 90
percent of Japanese "fanners" will become workers owning a
small plot of land; (2) that agricultural production will continue
to decrease; (3) that, consequently, agricultural imports will
increase; and finally (4) that big business will consolidate its
grip on the entire food production process. What will be left of
* Japanese agriculture then'?
50
Notes
I. I wish to thank Robert Ricketts who, together with Daniel Desmarais
and Jean-Marc Fontan, is currently working with me on a research project,
financed by the Canada Council, on Japanese agriculture in the Postwar period,
and who read an earlier draft of this paper. His comments on the content as well
as the style were very valuable I also want to thank Robert J. Smith for his
suggestions on many aspects of the paper. Finally, Akio Yasue was very helpful
in the choice of the Japanese literature relevant to the subject treated here.
2. See, among others, Ronald P. Dore, Land Reform in Japan,
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1959), pp. 115 ff: and Ronald P. Dore
and Tsutomu Ouchi, "Rural Origins of Japanese Fascism," in James W.
Morley (ed.), Dilemmas of Growth in Prewar Japan (Princeton University
Press, 1971), pp. 181-209.
3. See AI McCoy. Land Reform as Counter-Revolution. Bulletin of
Concerned Asian Scholars, vol. 3. no. I. 1971. pp. 451-465: K. Bieda, The
Structure and Operation of the Japanese Economy (Sydney: John Wiley and
Sons, 1970). p. 245: Takekazu Ogura (ed.). Agricultural Development in
Modern Japan (Tokyo: Fuji Pub .. 1967). p. 69: Kiyoshi Oshima. Nihon Kei:ai
to Nogvo Mondai (Tokyo: Nosangyoson Bunka Kyokai. 1972). p. 215: and
Makoto Hoshi. Sengo Nihon Shihon Shugi to Nogy" Kiki No Ko:o (Tokyo:
Ochanomizu ShobO. 1975), p. 60.
4. See AI McCoy, op. cit., p. 18: and Jon Halliday. A Political History of
Japanese Capitalism (New York: Pantheon Books, 1975), pp. 191 ff
5. I use the term peasant to refer not only to so-called" peasant societies"
but to all types of small-holding family farming undertaken in a class society.
The majority of Japanese farmers, up to the present. tit such a definition. The
term has. of course, no derogatory meaning. In fact, it is intended to render the
Japanese word hyakusho.
6. See also Yujiro Hayami. A Century ofAgricultural Growth in Japan
(Tokyo: Tokyo University Press. 1975). p. 9: Tadashi Fukutake. Japanese
Rural Society (London: Oxford University Press, 1967). p. 21: and Dore, op.
cit.. p. I.
7. Hubert Brochier. Le miracle economique japonais (Paris: Clamann
Lev\'. Nfl5).
8. H. Fukui. "The Japanese Farmers and Politics," in Isaiah Frank
(ed.). The Japanese Economv in International Perspectiw (Baltimore: Johns
Hopkins University Press. 1975. pp. 134-167) p. 136: Nihon NOKWJ Neinkan
(Tokyo: Ie nohikari, 1978), pp. 155. 159.
9. See also Seiichi Tohata, NillOn Nogy() No Hcnkaku Katei (Tokyo:
Iwanami Shoten, 1968), p. 9.
10. See Koji Taira, EconomicDevelopment and the Labor Market ill
Japan (New York: Columbia University Press. 1970): Ryoshin Minami. "The
Supply of Farm Labor and the 'Turning Point' in the Japanese Economy," in
Kazushi Ohkawa, Bruce F. Johnston. and Hiromitsu Kaneda (eds.). Agriculture
and Economic Growth: Japall's Experience (Princeton. N.J.: Princeton Uni
versity Press, 1973), pp. 270-299; Tsutomu Ouchi. Natsuki Kanazawa and
Tadashi Tukutake (eds.). NihonlloNogyo(Tokyo: Daigaku Shuppankai. 1970).
chap. I: and Mataji Umemura, "Agriculture and Labor Supply in the Meiji
Era." in Ohkawa et al. (eds.), op. cit .. pp. 175-197.
I I. ., Agricultural Households Drop Below 5 Million Level." in Oriental
Economist. vol. 43, no. 781, Nov. 1975. p. 25.
12. See, in particular. Kahoku Shimposha Henshukyoku. Mura no Niholl'
jill (Tokyo: Keiso ShobO, 1975). chap. 2.
13. All through the late Edo. Meiji. Taisho and early Showa periods. some
peasants were forced to part with their land, very often in order to repay debts.
This kind of land loss was seen as shameful, but it was inevitable Now. many
farmers sell their land for cash without a thought for the ancestors (Kahoku
Shimposha HenshUkyoku. op. cit., pp. 43 ff.).
14. Akira Ebato, "Kyodai Toshi Kinko Noson no Henshitsu," in Daijiro
Nishikawa. Yuichiro Noguchi. and Yoshio Okuda (eds.), Nihon RellO: Sor/O
Genjitsu. vol. 3, Nosangyoson. (Tokyo: Keiso Shobo. 1972, pp. 261-274), p.
264.
15. Kahoku Shimposha Henshukyoku. op. cit.. chap. 2: Takumi Usui,
"Kasoto Kyoka Rison." in DaijiroNishikawaetal. (eds.),op. cit .. p. 319.
16. This increase in current prices does not mean an equivalent rise in
production in tonnage: a comparatively high price for agricultural products
would mean an artificially high share for agriculture in the GNP.
17. Augustin Berque. "Une agriculture et une paysannerie sacrifiees aux
imperatifs de la haute croissance," inLe monde diplomatique. Dec. 1975, p. 24:
Niholl Nog.l'o Nellkall. 1978, p. 168.
18. Augustin Berque, op. cit.. p. 24: same author, "Les campagnes
japonaises et I'emprise urbaine," in Etudes Rurales. no. 49-50, 1973. pp. 339
n. and OCDE. La politique agricole da Japoll (Paris: OCDE, 1975). pp.
66 ff.
19. Augustin Berque, Le Japan: Gestioll de l' espace ct challgement social
(Paris: Flammarion. 1976), p. 242.
20. Ibid.. p. 237: Tsutomu Umekawa. "1970 Nendai no Nihon no Nogyo
Mondai," in Kei;aigaku Zasshi. vol. 79, no. 4, 1979. p. I.
21. Yujiro Hayami. op. cit . pp. 28 ft. and 88 ff.
22. Ogura(ed.).op.cit.,p. 75.
23. Tsutomu Ouchi. "Nihon No Nogyo Wa Yomigaeru Ka." in Chi/o
Karon. Sept. 1973, p. 72.
24. Hayami. op. cit., p. 30.
25. Nihon Nogya Nenkall. (Tokyo: Ie No Hikari Kyokai. 1978). p. 119.
26. See Chuhei Kawamoto. "Dekasegi No Mura." in Nishikawa et al.
(eds.). (pp. 290-3(4), p. 295.
27. Berque, Le Japon .. . p. 242.
28. Yoshiro Hoshino (ed.), Kaitai Suru Nihon Retto (Tokyo: Gakuyo
Shobo, 1975), chap. 2.
29. Shosui Mtsushima, "Kakudai Suru Noyakuka," in Daijiro Nishikawa
et al. (eds.). op. cit.. p. 390.
30. Ibid., p. 390.
31. Daijiro Nishikawa, "Ketsuron ni Kaete.' in Daijiro Nishikawa et al.
(eds.). op. cit .. p. 476; Tsutomu Ouchi et a!. (eds.), op. cit., p. 105.
32. Daijiro Nishikawa. op. cit .. p. 476.
33. Ogura (ed.), op. cit.. pp. 66-67.
34. OCDE, op. cit.. p. 16: Tsutomu Umekawa, op. cit.. p. 10.
35. Y oshiki Hanamura, "Nosanbutsu Shijo to Korudochen," In
Nishikawa et al. (eds.), op. cit., p. 73: Hiromitsu Kaneda, "Long-Term
Changes in Food Consumption Patterns in Japan," in Ohkawa et al. (eds.), op.
cit.. pp. 398-431: and Tsuneyoshi Ukita, .. Hembo Suru Kinko Sosai Seisan,"
in Nishikawaet al. (eds.), op. cit.. p. 94.
36. Tsutomu Ouchi. Nihon Ni Okeru Nominso No BUllkai (Tokyo: Tokyo
Daigaku Shuppankai. 1969. pp. 252 ff.
37. Ibid .. pp. 243 ff.: and Oshima, op. cit .. p. 219.
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38. Tadashi Fukutake. Japanese Society Today (Tokyo: Tokyo University
Press. 1974). p. 52; Hayami. op. cit .. p. 77: Nihon Ni5gyo Nenkan. 1978. p.
311.
39. Nihon Ni5gyi5 Nenkan. 1974.j p. 116; see also Kahoku Shimposha. op.
cit .. 53 ff.
40. See Kahoku u. . op. cit.. pp. 60 ff.; Berque. Le Japon .... p.
241; Bieda. op. cit.. pp. 253-54; Ouchi et al. (eds.). op. cit.. p. 41; and Ukita.
op. cit.. p. 99.
41. Hayami. op. cit.. p. 77; Ouchi et a!. (eds.). op. cit.. pp_ 25-26; Taira.
op. cit.; and Koji Taira. "Growth. Trends and Swings in Japanese Agriculture
and Industry. " in Economic Development and Culture Change. vol. 24. no. 2.
Jan. 1976. pp. 423-36.
42. Ouchi et al. (eds.). op. cit.. p. 52.
43. Berque, "Les campagnes japonaises ...." pp. 336 ff.; Berque. Le
Japon. .. pp. 245 ff.; Fukui. op. cit .. p. 164; Nishikawa. op. cit .. p. 475;
Ouchi et al. (eds.). op. cit.. p. 47; Toji Takase. "Mura No Senkyo," in
Nishikawa et al. (eds.). op. cit.. p. 410; and Tohata. op. cit.. p. 40.
44. Reiji Hayashi. "RyOdoka No Naka No Kitakami Sanchi." in
Nishikawa et al. (eds.). pp. 249 ff.; Kahoku .... op. cit.. chap. I; Chtihei
Kawamoto. "Dekasegi No Mura." in Nishikawa et al. (eds.). op. cit .. pp.
290-304; Yoshiro Kunimoto. "Rural Communities in Northeastern Japan." in
Japan Quarterly. vol. 17. no. 4. Oct.-Dec. 1970. pp. 443-450; Brett Nee.
"Japan's Internal Colony." in Bulletin oj Concerned Asian Scholars. vol. 6.
no. 3. Sept.-Oct. 1974. pp. 12-18; and Shingo Takasugi. "Shudatsu Ni KoSuru
Dekasegi Nomin." in AsahiJiinaru. 22 Feb. 1974. pp. 36-40.
45. Nihon Nogyo Nenkan. 1974. p. 158; Ibid .. 1978. p. 157.
46. See Hoshi. op. cit .. pp. 188 ff.; Nihon Nogyo Nenkan. 1974. p. 296;
Oshima. op. cit .. p. 217; and Ouchi et al. (eds.) .. op. cit.. pp. 28 ff.; See also
Table 8.
47. Nihon Nogyo Nenkan. 1974. p. 294; See Table 9.
48. See Ministry of Finance. Main Economic Indicators ojJapan (Tokyo:
Sept. 1978. p. I; and Bureau of Statistics. Office of the Prime Minister. Japan
Statistical Yearbook. 1977 (Tokyo: pp. 394 ff.; See also Tsutornu Umekawa.
op. cit .. p. 3.
49. Fukui. op. cit.. p. 137; Nihon Nogyi5 Nenkan. 1974. p. 125; Nihon
Ni5gyoNenkan. 1978. p. 157.
50. Berque. "Les campagnes ...." p. 344.
51. Kahoku .... op. cit.. chap. I.
52. See. in particular. Berque. "Les campagnes ... ,'. pp. 333 ff.;
Nobuo Danno. "The Changing Face of Agriculture." in Japan Quarterly. vol.
19. no. 3. July-Sept. 1972. pp. 292-300; Anonymous. "Deserted Villages.
Crammed Towns." in Japan Quarterly. vol. 19. no. 1. Jan.-March 1972. pp.
3-6; Kawamoto. op. cit.; Kunimoto. op. cit.; Yoshiro Kunimoto. "Deserted
Mountain Villages in Western Japan" in Japan Quarterly. vol. 20. no. I.
Jan.-March 1973. pp. 87-96; and Usui. op. cit.
53. Berque. Le Japon .. ; Kazuyuki Hibino. "Tokyo: The Over
crowded Metropolis." in Japan Quarterly. vol. 20. no. 2; April-June 1973. pp.
203-211; Ken'Ichi Miyamoto. Chiiki Kaihatsu Wa Kore De Yoi Ka (Tokyo:
Iwanami Shinsho. 1973); Nishikawa et al. (eds.). op. cit .. pp. 180 ff.
54. Motosuke Kaihara. The Changing Structure of Agriculture in Japan
(Madison: Land Tenure Center. University of Wisconsin. Special Paper. 1976):
and Naomi Saeki. "Nomin." in Shokichi Endo (ed.). Jitsuryoku Shudal/ No
Shiso to K"do (Tokyo: Gakuyo Shot><>. 1975). pp. 137-186.
55. Nihon Ni5gyo Nenkan. 1974. p. 125.
56. See Fukui. op. cit .. pp. 154 ff.; Koichi Nishimoto. "Nokyo: Pressure
from the Coops." in Japan Interpreter. vol. 7. no. 3-4. Summ.-Aut. 1972. pp.
321-331; Oshima. op. cit.. chap. 2; Ouchi et al. (eds.). op. cit.. chap. 4. For
other tinancial aspects of cooperatives. see Yotaro Hamada. "Kyodai Soshiki
Nokyo," in Nishikawa et al. (eds.). op. cit .. pp. 422-454; and Koichi
Kobayashi. "Orenji beruto." in ibid .. pp_ 173 IT.
57. Non-commercial farms. which accounted for 14.5 percentofall farms
in 1970. increased to 18.2 percent in 1973 and to 23 percent in 1977. These are
prevalent mainly among smallholders. In fact. non-commercial farms account
for 43 percent of the nearly 2 millions farms owning less than y, hectare. See
Nihol/ Nogy" Nenkan. 1974. pp. 124-125; Statistical Yearbook oj Ministry of
Agriculture and Forestry. 1976-77. p. 12.
58. See H. Fukui. Partv in Power: The Japanese Liberal Democrats and
Policy-Making (Berkeley: University of California Press. 1970); Gabriel and
Joyce Kolko. The Limits oj Power (New York: Harper and Row. 1972); and
Chitoshi Yanaga. Big Business in Japanese Politics (New Haven. Conn.: Yale
University Press. 1968).
59. See Ouchi. "Nihon No Nogyo ... "
60. Fukui. Party in Power . .. ; and Nathaniel Thayer. How the Conserva
rives Rule Japan (Princeton. N.J.: Princeton University Press. 1969).
61. See Hayami. op. cit" p. 75; same author. "Rice Policy in Japan's
Economic Development." in American Journal oj Agricultural Emnomics.
vol. 54. no. I. Feb. 1972. p. 21; andOgura(ed.).op. cit.. pp. 198-201.
62. See Ogura (ed.). op. cit .. p. 208.
63. Ibid .. pp. 61-67 and81;and Kolkoand Kolko.op. cit.. pp. 521 ff.
64. Hayami. "Rice Policy ...." p. 20.
65. Ouchi. "Nihon no Nogyo wa Yomigaeru ka." p. 72.
66. Ouchi et al. (eds.). op. cit.. p. 120.
67. Hayami. A Century . ... p. 72.
68. Ibid .. p. 73; Bieda. op. cit. p. 250; Fukutake. Japanese Societv Today.
p. 50; and Ogura (ed.). op. cit.. pp. 286 ff.
69. J iro Iinuma. "The Curious Crisis in Japanese Agriculture. " in Japan
Quarterl.'. vol. 21. no. -I. Oct.-Dec. 197-1. pp. 3-11-3-1Ii;andOuchi. "Nihonno
Nogyo ...
70. OCDE. op. cit.. pp. 67 ff.
71. The ligures given here are calculated on the basis of calorie equiva
lence. i.e. they include not only foodstuffs per se but animal feeds as well. In
terms of foodstuffs only. the rate of self-sufficiency was 72 percent in 1971. See
Nihon Nogvo Nenkan. 1974. p. 60.
72. Ibid .. p. 60; Ouchi et al. (eds.). op. cit .. chap. 5; Ouchi. "Nihon no
Nogyo. .." p. 74.
73. Hayami. A Century . ... p. 79; Urnekawa. op. cit.. pp. 5-6.
74. Miyamoto. op. cit.. chap. 1.2 and 3; Yoshiro Hoshino. "Remodeling
the Archipelago." in Japan Quarterlv. vol. 20. no. I. Jan.-March 1973. pp.
39-45; Kakuei Tanaka. Le parijaponais. (Paris: Presses de laCite. 1974).
75. See Berque. Le Japon .. ; Usui. op. cit .. pp. 317 If.; Michihiro
Kono. "Koba Shinshutsu to setonaikai no Gyomin." in ibid .. pp. 353-369;
Yutaka Nishibe. "Kakure Minamatabyo." in ibid .. pp. 370-387; and Akira
Nishimura. "Tokyo No Ritto: Hachijojima." in ibid .. pp. 32-328.
76. Fukui. "The Japanese Farmers ... "; and George O. Totten. "La
crise agricole dans la politique japonaise. in Asia Quarterly. no. 2. 1975. pp.
175-187.
77. Berque. Le Japon . . p. ~ 4 1 .
78. Terutoshi Ishihara. ,oRakuno to Nyiigyiishihon." in Nishikawa et al.
(eds.). op. cit .. p. 159.
79. Hanamura. op. cit .. pp. 78 II
80. Berque. "Les campagnesjaponaises ... ,'. p. 348.
81. Ibid .. p. 348: Hanamura. op. cit .. pp. 79 If.; and Masuo Ando.
"Yiikei Kojo." in Nishikawaet al. (eds.). op. cit .. pp. 120-133.
82. Ouchi. o'Nihon No Nogyo. .." p. 78.
83. The penetration of a market economy actually dates back to the feudal
period. But the encroachment of monopoly capitalism began sometime in the
Meiji period. However. its expansion since the end of World War II has been
much more rapid because of the elimination of landlordism and because of the
high rate of economic growth which has benefitted chietly the big companies.
See Ouchi. Nihonni okeru . ... chap. 5.
84. Oshima. op. cit.. chap. 10.
85. Christian Sautter in his book Japon: Ie prix de la puissance (paris:
Seuil. 1973. pp. 141 ff.) has shown that. contrary to a widespread conception.
profit is the prime motive of Japanese capitalists: indeed it would be surprising
were it otherwise. Sautter has also shown that. not only do Japanese capitalists
seek profits like any others. but they also enjoy a higher rate of profit and of
capital accumulation than capitalists in other countries. This high rate of ac
cumulation is. to some. the utmost in progress and growth. What is certain.
however. is that it represents the utmost in unequal income distribution. See
Martin Schnitzer. Income Distriblllion: A Comparative Study (New York:
Preager. 1974).
86. Robert E. Cole. Japanese Blue-Collar (Berkeley: University of
California Press. 1971); and Joe Moore .. 'The Japanese Worker." in Bulletin oj
Concerned Asian ScholaT.\". vol. 6. no. J. Sept.-Oct. 1974. pp. 35-47.
87. Isao Kajii. "Piggu Saikuru to Yoton," in Nishikawaet al. (eds.). op.
cit.. pp. 134-147; Kobayashi. op. cit.; !chiro Sato .. 'Sakyii Niigyo ni Ikiru. in
Nishikawaet al. (eds.). op. cit.. pp. 211-224; and Ukita. op. cit.
52
Japan At the End of the Seventies;
The Treatment of the Political in Recent Japanology
by Herbert P. Bix*
The following discussion focuses on Ezra Vogel's Japan
As Number One: Lessons for America (Harvard University
Press, 1979), but only in order to see how it does or does not
shed light on politics in Japan today. Although constructed in
the form of a critique, its main object is less the criticism of a
particular author's views than the direct consideration of two
inter-related questions: a) how the Japanese state is conceptualized
and presented at a given historical moment (the late seventies);
and b) the role of the large corporation in the Japanese political
process.
Throughout the Cold War and into the I960s, American
developmental theorists persisted in treating Japan as a safe
"model" for the Free World's underdeveloped countries. Then,
at the start of the seventies, Herman Kahn put the West on notice
about the Japanese economic challenge with a book provocatively
titled The Japanese Superstate. Now, at the end of the decade,
Harvard sociologist Ezra F. Vogel has broken with the develop
mentalists, turned the earlier model of Japan around somewhat
and, following a path reconnoitered by Kahn, offered it to the
advanced market-economies of the West to imitate. His icono
clasm has not gone unnoticed by the mass media. So far,
the book's reception in the United States has been quite favor
able, while in Japan, where media attention is even more fre
quent, extensive and laudatory, it has had a considerable impact
and become a national best seller. As one reviewer opined,
"Those attracted or shocked enough by Vogel's title to delve
into the book will find an awesome array of well-marshalled
scholarly research on a wide range of Japanese social organiza
tion. . . . a most useful and accurate presentation of certain key
features of presentday Japan. " I
Bold observations rather than accurate, scholarly research
about Japanese crime control, welfare and education are cer
tainly a major distinguishing feature of this work. Vogel also has
many interesting and intelligent things to say about Japanse
organizational styles, bureaucratic planning and "the group
directed quest for information," which he aptly terms "knowl
edge for consensus." But, on the whole, a careful reading of
Japan As Number One discloses a text grounded in one-sided
This essay will be printed concurrently in Kikan Kuraishisu ICrisis] in Japan.
assumptions about the consensus nature of Japanese society.
From English language sources Vogel collects an amazing num
ber of affirmative observations about how Japan functions, or is
supposed to function, as a polity and society. That evidence,
together with details obtained from his own direct observation
of Japanese bureaucratic and corporate life, and from interviews
with authoritative Japanese sources, serves as the basis for his
account. Shaping the entire study is a strictly bilateral (US
Japan), rather than global, perspective, which sets Japan up as a
"model" in the belief that America alone is in crisis, while
Japan is not.
A pervasive sense of crisis and anxiety among America's
liberal intellectuals thus has a lot to do with the timeliness ofthe
book. Vogel pays homage to Japan in a period when American
hegemony is on the decline and the conditions of life for Amer
ica's poor and its working class continues to deteriorate with no
hope in sight. He breaks with the "ethnocentrism" of the Japan
field in order to celebrate the virtues and lessons of bourgeois
capitalism in one of the very few lands that have enjoyed
virtually uninterrupted growth for nearly a quarter of a century.
The picture that emerges from his mildly iconoclastic ap
proach is of a homogeneous, overwhelmingly middle class,
affluent Japan. Intractable conflicts between classes and groups
are non-existent, authority and consensus prevail intact, and
workers and others without power wholeheartedly respect and
support the rule of their elites, who invariably govern benevo
lently and wisely. In Japan As Number One virtually all phenom
ena of Japanese life which fall under the twin categories of
dissensus and class have been neglected or blocked out in the
interest of idealization for the purpose of instructing Americans.
Excised, therefore, are the concrete struggles of the Japanese
people over the last three decades against rearmament and
constitutional revision, and for improved living, working and
environmental conditions. Yet those struggles, and the settle
ments resulting from them, are precisely what eventuated in
today's relatively prosperous economy, currently stable parlia
mentary democracy-and a society which is still characterized
by such problems as extremely modest welfare allocations,
comparatively low purchasing power of wages, a low standard
of housing, urban over-crowding, and gross inequalities in the
wages paid to its female workers. Vogel also has chosen to
disregard the crucial international circumstances supporting and
53
conditioning Japan's entire postwar development. While by
ignoring the content of Japanese political processes (in which
the social principles of this group-oriented society are worked
out in practice), he sometimes misconceives even those" selected
aspects of the Japanese national system" (p. x) that he sets out to
describe.
As a result of all these avoidances, it may well be that the
most important questions Vogel has succeeded in raising are:
What can be learned from a model which reflects only partially
certain individual features of Japanese reality or the Japanese
context? Of what use is a model in which Japan is depicted in an
historical void, the problems and failures integral to its suc
cesses are mentioned only as qualifying caveats or afterthoughts,
and the successes themselves are treated as products of unique
social and psychological arrangements (rather than seen in rela
tion to the actual position of Japan situated concretely in the
multiplicity of its connections with the world economy)?
To begin with, a one-sided model is not automatically a
useless model. Vogel's book is useful if it stimulates us to think
about Japan and its social and economic successes in compara
tive international terms. At the same time, as with any attempt to
expound features of social reality, for practical purposes we can
learn how ideology enters into and guides the discourse from a
critical reading of the assumptions that inform it, the concepts it
deploys, the claims it makes for Japanese superiority in certain
areas, and most especially, by its silences. From'Ruth Benedict
and Robert Bellah to Nakane Chie and Vogel himself, there has
been popularized in the West a tradition of sociological writing
on Japanese national character, value-orientation, and social
structure that concentrates thinking about Japan in a particular
direction: namely, on the group rather than the individual agent,
on the relationship between elites rather than classes, on how
people act toward social organizations rather than toward objec
tive situations, and on a single set of consensus values and value
structures which appear to mediate the group and individual
interactions of the Japanese. This tradition, to be sure, has
useful things to say about "consensual elements" in Japanese
life. But, as many writers have pointed out, it operates with
ill-defined concepts, is profoundly ahistorical in its modes of
explanation, and slights the individuality and heterogeneity that
abound in Japanese society, not to mention the central role of
class conflict in the making of modem and contemporary Japan. 2
So long as Vogel draws on this tradition at a time of
unprecedented social peace on the economic front, when busi
ness and manufacturing firms are managing to contain within
themselves most conflicts with labor, and class struggle appears
chiefly in the guise of inflation, he seems correct. Popular
perception of the current phase of economic and social life in
Japan do indeed lend a semblance of reality to his general thesis
that many of Japan's successes can be accounted for by a
"corporatism" and "communitarian spirit" that bridges the
gap between the property owning class and the rest of society,
that minimizes social resentments precisely because it meets,
more or less adequately, the major needs of the majority of
Japanese urban workers. Patterns of collective group behavior
such as "decision making by consensus" (or "root binding")
are parts of that corporatism. They help to reproduce and reinforce
the values of social harmony, group solidarity and consensus
that he finds dominant in a "post-industrial" Japan.
But reasons other than Vogel's close reflection of how the
national ecconomy is popularly perceived at the end of the
seventies may be more important in shaping the enthusiastic
Japanese response to his message. The very categories in which
it is couched also lend support to a basic tenet of nationalism per
se: the elevation of the group above the individual in the in
terests of the larger collectivity and the slighting of the costs of
such subordination. If Japan As Number One does nothing else,
it appeals to the Japanese in terms of values and categories
supportive of their very own nationalism at a time when it is on
the rise. Conversely, it might be added, judging from the phenom
enal Japanese response to Vogel's book, the new nationalism is
still fully compatible with the traditional Japanese yearning for
outside (Western) applause.
Yet though the focus of the book is Japan's successes, it
purports to be a discourse addressed to Americans to teach them
lessons. Exactly what those lessons are, and what Americans
are to do once having learned them, is nowhere spelled out. But
that does not matter; American readers can easily recognize in
parts I and III of the book - "The Japanese Challenge" and
.. American Response" -aclear appeal to their own nationalism
as well.
Vogel couches his case in terms that play upon, as much as
they challenge, the ethnocentric sensibilities of his readers.
Wanting Americans to catch up with Japan by making structural
and administrative changes at home which do not threaten the
status quo, he appeals to their latent patriotism in an argument
which runs along these lines: my fellow Americans, indeed it is
asking a great deal of you "to acknowledge that in many areas
[our] supremacy has been lost to an Asian nation and to learn
from that nation.' '(po 225) But the Japanese have made progress
in industrial modernization and urban living, and learn from
them we must if we are to continue to remain number one in all
areas.
It would not be wrong, I think, to see behind this appeal an
unexamined belief in the rightness of American hegemonism.
Vogel candidly admits at the outset of his study that in 1960
when he returned to the United States from Japan he "had not
even questioned the general superiority of American society and
American institutions." (p. viii) A decade later he writes of
having become "increasingly preoccupied with the decline in
our confidence in government, with our difficulty in coping
with problems such as crime, urban disorganization, unemploy
ment, inflation, and government deficits." (p. viii) He might
have used this occasion to consider some of the causes of these
problems or to address, even briefly, the two major genocidal
wars of aggression America waged in Asia which helped Japan
to forge ahead, or to examine the profitable uses to which the
Soviet threat has been (and still is being) put by the big business
and government elites in both the United States and Japan. That
he did none of these things suggests that, at least where American
society is concerned, he still is not raising serious questions. He
accepts as an immutable given the existing global hierarchy of
pri vilege and oppression, and assumes as a matter of course that
the United States has the right to be its hegemon and to .. con
tinue to provide world leadership. " (p. 232)
A sociologist who takes an uncritical stance toward his
own society is also unlikely to raise and pursue probing ques
tions about a foreign country. In a study devoted to identifying
and analyzing Japan's successes, Vogel never once mentions
Japan's ability to live at peace for the past thirty-four years with
its Asian neighbors and the world, while simultaneously profit
54
ing from the United States' regional wars. Japan also profits
from its international relations with Indonesia, the Philippines,
Taiwan and South Korea, etc., where the corrupt and repressive
ruling elites were installed by the United States and have since
been kept in power by both Washingtn and Tokyo. We are
talking about the neglect of Japan's profitable interaction with the
larger world context of imperialism in each phase of its postwar
development. It is the first of several omissions relating to
politics in Japan As Number One upon which comment is
necessary.
A critical study of areas in which Japan's economy and
society does or does not excel that of the United States could
hardly avoid taking account of the general postwar structure of
imperialism, the specific structure of military and economic
alliances centering on Japan, and changes over the past two
decades in the international political situation insofar as these
have affected Japanese capitalism in East Asia. In short, Japanese
behavior traits and corporate-bureaucratic practices can be eluci
dated in an illuminating, comparative way by first stopping to
situate Japan concretely in the real world in which it plays so
important a role.
As the third most powerful industrialized nation-state after
the United States and the Soviet Union, Japan is a highly
developed component in the international system of capitalism,
as well as the epicenter of a discrete subunit of capitalism
subsumed within the larger system. It benefits from a specific
division of labor between the advanced capitalist countries and
those of the former colonial world. That division of labor, it
should not be forgotten, evolved from, and now represents a
new stage of, an earlier division originally imposed on the
colonial world by the imperialist countries. Japan also possesses
a relatively strong currency, the yen, which it uses to exchange
its high priced manufactured goods for the cheaper raw mater
ials of the developing world. Studies of its trade structure and
overseas investment patterns, such as Free Trade Zones and
Industrialization in Asia (AMPO 1977), show the nature of its
exchanges with the developing countries to be a highly unequal
one. By contrast, in relation to the advanced industrialized
countries, its economic successes have a distinctive character of
impermanence and fragility, as the constantly fluctuating sur
pluses and deficits in its bilateral trade with the United States
attest.
Still, Japan continues to enjoy certain structural or back
ground advantages, at least over the older capitalist countries,
which contribute to its economic successes. These include, first,
the comparative historical recentness of its postwar industriali
zation. The reconstruction of war-devastated industry in Japan
began at a time when industry in the United States had ac
cumulated huge excess capacity. By relying on the latest bor
rowed technology, Japan, like West Germany, starting from
virtually nothing, turned a temporary weakness into a long-term
advantage. Interestingly, the continual application of borrowed
technology to rebuild the Japanese industrial apparatus presup
posed an earlier accumulation of technological innovation in the
West arising out of war spending, which may now be tapering
off.
A second background factor aiding the Japanese economy
has been the existence of huge latent unemployment in ag
riculture. The economic "miracle" which lasted for nearly
twenty-five years, from about the mid-1950s to the early 1970s,
drew on low-wage farm labor.
Third, while the economy in this period registered an
average annual real growth of to percent, Japanese industry was
also benefitting from the defeat of the labor movement around
the time of the Korean War. The rollback of militant, indepen
dent unionism undoubtedly helped to keep wages low. It went
on throughout the sixties, paving the way for the triumph of
today's highly conservative (and now numerically declining)
company unions.
Will such background factors be operative in the 1980s'?
For the past six years-since the oil shock and the commence
ment of the yen float in 1973-Japan has experienced a protracted,
though mild, depression in comparison to its earlier achieve
ments. Some of the structural preconditions and advantages of
the era of high growth, such as the post World War II revolution
in technology and its own surplus agricultural popUlation, have
begun to disappear. Meanwhile the international conditions by
which all the advanced countries-but particularly the older
states-secure oil and raw materials from the Third World has
turned unfavorable. Responding to the combination of the loss
of some of their traditional advantages over Third World re
source suppliers, the rise in oil prices and the sharp acceleration
of world price inflation, France, West Germany, Britain and the
United States have stepped up their own military spending and
their arms transfers to the Third World. Only in Japan have
ruling groups resisted, so far, the option of external militarism
by making use of a constitution which forbids it, but whose
ideals they do not believe in.
That situation too is likely to change in the 1980s as growth
slows at home and ruling elites struggle to re-tool industry,
acquire greater control over critical raw materials and cope with
the ongoing international crisis of' . stagflation " (meaning: slow
growth and high domestic price inflation interacting simultane
ously with rising rates of joblessness). In the 1980s the LOP
government, either alone or in coalition with some other con
servative parties such as Komeito and the tiny Democratic
Socialist Party, may have to face the breakup of the international
currency and trading system as presently constructed. The con
servatives might then redouble their efforts to eliminate legal
and constitutional obstacles blocking a policy of either rapid
technological strengthening of the Self Defense Forces or, more
likely, the direct sale abroad of arms manufactured by Japanese
industry. Certainly economic pressures, such as the need to
sustain capital accumulation and reduce unfavorable trade im
balances, might incline the government in the direction of arms
sales abroad; both Washington and Beijing would strongly
encourage such a move; and the present conservative mood
among the electorate could well prepare the ground for it,
though it would not be sufficient to legitimate it.
But quite apart from such speculative projections of Ja
pan's future technological military build-up and where it may
lead, foreign interest in Japanese domestic politics and political
processes seems certain to deepen in the years ahead as Japan
goes on increasing its role in Asia and the world. And it is here
that Vogel's approach to Japanese politics once again contravenes
his goal of understanding and learning from Japan. A brief
examination of the way politics is treated in three of his seven
core chapters on .. Japanese Successes" will bear that out.
Political decision-making in its dominant corporate form,
or the role of the Japanese corporation in shaping and misshap
ing Japan's domestic and foreign policies is not addressed in the
55
chapter on "The Large Company: Identification and Perform
ance." Vogel is concerned instead with the hypothetical Japanese
corporation as a narrowly defined social institution, plus those
superior features of its management and treatment of workers
which could conceivably increase the productivity of American
workers and the profits of the large American firm. He talks
about company loyalty, "permanent employment," the "sep
aration of rank and task, low differentials in pay and status for
workers of a given age, 'bottoms-up' management and small
group responsibility" (p. 134). But since he is implicitly argu
ing about how model A is superior to model B, a distinct
tendency to romanticize the favored model enters the picture at
two politically sensitive points: a) when he claims that Japanese
'workers have no rich capitalist class above them but only a
managerial class whose style of life is not so different from their
own." (p. 154); and b), on the next page, when he writes that
"In ordinary companies, where workers identify with the long-
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run interests of the company, strikes have been virtually un
known since the Occupation ended and the economy returned to
normal in the early I 950s . " We will consider first the issue of
organized class contestation and defer for the moment that of
class inequality which Vogel also tends to dismiss as insignificant.
If we limit the focus just to strikes, then by official count a
total of 5,416 (and by unofficial count 5,533) labor disputes
occurred in 1978. The government's latest labor white paper
classifies only 546 of them as strikes and the overwhelming
majority (4,852) as sagi koi, meaning disputes accompanied by
or containing the threat of strike action [see Showa 54, rada
hakusho (Rodosho 1979), p. 33-34]. The Labour Year Book of
Japan 1979 (Ohara Kenkyujo) recorded a small number of
strikes annual1y over the whole period from 1948, 1,247 in 1958
and 2,359 in 1965, the first year during the postwar period that
their number ever exceeded 2,000. Thereafter the picture changed
dramatically. Strike activity increased by leaps and bounds,
peaking finally in 1974 at 9,851 incidents. The nine years from
1965 to 1974 spanned the period of high economic growth
stimulated by the Vietnam/Indochina War, the brief upsurge
and suppression of New Left student protest ( 1969-71), the first
"oil shock" and the beginning of low growth. In these years,
organized worker militancy-expressed in short-lived, shunto
type wage struggles-represented labor's effort to catch up in
wages for losses incurred by inflation.
During the next four years however-1975 to 1979-a
different concatenation of historical circumstances emerged,
which Vogel's book reflects in a highly partial, distorted way.
First, on the positive side, despite rising prices for oil, Japan
continued to experience a comparatively low rate of consumer
price inflation, estimated at 3.1 percent during the first half of
1979 versus over 13 percent for the United States. On the other
hand, accompanying the mild economic recession in Japan were
an historically massive number of business failures and bank
ruptcies, and a significant growth of unemployment in man
ufacturing.
3
Further, starting around 1974 and continuing there
after, capitalists and government bureaucrats launched a campaign
to inculcate in the working class a sense of depression crisis
under the slogan" all the people, without regard to class, should
practice self-restraint" (sagamanron). Under these circum
stances strike activity and wage increases declined precipi
tously, while productivity and profit -taking continued to rise.
Simultaneously, the floating yen grew stronger, causing a de
crease in the prices Japanese importers paid for food and raw
materials, and also greatly exaggerating the size of Japan's trade
surpluses with other countries, especially the United States. The
appreciation of the yen and the rapid rise in Japanese exports
during 1977-78 were sudden, highly dramatic developments
which directly affected foreign as well as Japanese perceptions
of Japan's economy. Coming after nearly twenty-five years of
unprecedented growth and prosperity, and at a time when other
advanced capitalist economies were suffering continued high
inflation, they helped to reinforce the strong feeling among
many foreign and Japanese observers of Japanese exceptionalism
-as if Japan were somehow immune from the laws of advanced
capitalism.
Certainly the temporary phenomena of enormous export
surpluses and yen appreciation helped to check the rate of
domestic inflation in the late seventies, which in tum mitigated
the previous stagnation in workers' payrolls. But the LOP
government was also acting in these years to maintain growth by
56
I
\
increased deficit financing, which would eventually have the Here what is being excised is nothing less than the problem I
opposite effect of fueling inflation. Japan's national debt as a of structural corruption in Japanese politics, that truly momen
percentage of the general (closed-account) budget had averaged tous system undermining the democratic formulation and con
I
annually about 10 percent from 1970 to 1974. But in 1975, the
same year the business community launched its attacks against
organized labor's "spring offensive," the government began
issuing bonds in excessive amounts-i.e. running huge debts in
relation to its total budgetary expenditure. By the end of that
year the debt had jumped to 24.6 percent of the general budget.
Thereafter it rose steadily until, by autumn 1979, the Japanese.
government's rate of dependence on national loans stood at
nearly 40 percent of the estimated national budget (versus 9.8
percent for the US and 16.8 percent for Great Britain), making
Japan perhaps the most heavily debted country, the country with
the largest budgeting deficits, in the advanced capitalist world. 4
Obviously, these developments all point to a highly con
tradictory and unstable economic situation, with as many fea
tures in it of darkness and shade as of light. Vogel, viewing this
scene, chooses to ignore its conflicting nature and to treat
the sudden, sensational changes in Japan's economic position as
if they were permanent rather than transitory features of its
society and eC0nomy. Wanting to transmit to American readers
an image of what the good company and worker ought to be like,
he is led inevitably into exaggeration. At the same time, his
exaggerations tell us that his picture of the Japanese company
and its workers is colored by the high value he himself places on
hierarchy and order, loyalty and discipline-in short, on de
politicized workers who neither strike nor contest the sovereignty
of management, or its prerogative to control the business as it
sees fit.
Turning next to Vogel's chapter on "The State: Meritocratic
Guidance and Private Initiative," we find that virtually all
issues of state are depoliticized.
At the very outset Vogel assumes what he should have to
prove: namely, the meritoriousness and relative success of Japa
nese bureaucrats in handling unspecified contemporary prob
lems as compared with their American counterparts. Descrip
tion of the formal criteria by which top politicians and bureaucrats
get to the top then follows, so that the politics of the state is
actually reduced to the formal criteria of selection and advance
ment of its functionaries. In prewar Japan they were the servants
of the emperor and today too they operate virtually free of
democratic control. Vogel, however, describes them as func
tioning within a parliamentary system which he assumes, be
forehand, to be substantively democratic in its modes of organi
zation and operating procedures. Disconnected from the mar
ketplace and embedded in a .. postindustrial society, " the par
liamentary democracy he describes is also characterized by a
single set of Japanese values, to which the competitive and
acquisitive values of capitalism are subordinated. The complex
synthesis of different, nonconsensual values which helps to
constitute urban Japanese society is dissolved. Americans can
now consider adopting mechanically the Japanese type of con
sensus (don't rock the boat) system. This is the same set of
institutional practices that the Lockheed, Grumman, and Mac
Donnell Douglas aircraft scandals of the late 1970s called into
question and that have continued to be dramatized by subse
quent revelations of corruption in semi-government corpora
tions such as the Japan Railway Construction Corporation and in
public utilities like KDD.
WORLD
DEVELOPMENT
THE MONTHLY MULTIDISCIPLINARY JOURNAL DEVOTED
TO THE STUDY AND
PROMOTION OF WORLD DEVELOPMENT
Chairman of the Editorial Board Managing Editor
PAUL P. STREETEN, Washington ANNE GORDON DRABEK,
Oxford
'.'. I have just completed a review of 'TwentyFive Years of
Economic Development' for the World Bank. As you can see from
the reference list, World Development was of more use in this
review than any other single journal. This is a truly impressive
performance for a journal which has been in existence for only
five years. , , David Morawetz
World Development encourages the publication of articles which
assist in the definition of problems of development and present
innovative ideas for their solution. The editors welcome articles
from all viewpoints in order to stimulate constructive discussion.
As a monthly journal, World Development offers rapid publication
to contributors. It reaches members of the academic community,
of government, national and international agencies, and of
commerce, industry and finance. Its geographical distribution is
trol of public policy. The structural corruption-that is, regular,
I
systematic plundering of the public purse for private ends-which
I
is historically endemic to all capitalist systems, and not just to
Japanese capitalism, arises from the privileged position of busi
I
ness and the dual leadership that exists within them, whereby
top businessmen share grants of public authority with govern

I
ment officials, and act so as to shape the general interest in ways
that benefit chiefly the special interests of the capitalist class.
l
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worldwide.
A Selection of Special Issues
Capital Theory and Development
Trade Marks in Developing Countries
Capitalist and Socialist Agriculture in Asia
International Indebtedness and World Economic
Stagnation
The Urban Informal Sector: Critical Perspectives
The Urban Informal Sector: Case Studies and
Critiques
Chinese Rural Institutions and the Question of
Transferability
Poverty and Inequality
Cost Benefit Analysis and I ncome Distribution in
Developing Countries
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57
But in Japanese politics it often seems that the special interests
of capitalists are somehow better represented and that corrup
tion is more tightly' 'structured" than anywhere else. In Japan,
writes Charles Lindblom,
an intimacy ofconnection between businessmen. civil service.
and legislators goes beyond that of the United States or the
Western European polyarchies. It is a connection that gov
ernment officials do not establish with labor or any other
groups. It is achieved by devices including family connec
tion. old-school ties. and movement of personnel from gov
ernment to business. 5
Although Lindblom is correct to focus attention on the
specificity of Japanese corruption, it is necessary to keep in
mind a more fundamental conceptualization: namely, the prob
lem of capitalist corruption, particularly on a trans-Pacific basis.
One example can illustrate what is involved here. Historically, a
tiny elite of very wealthy Americans with close personal, school
and professional ties to America's leading corporations, banks
and ideological institutions have shaped the US-Japan relation
ship. During the American occupation of Japan (1942-52), the
former ambassador to that country, Joseph Grew, together with
John L. Curtis, the vice president of the First National City
Bank, J.L. Kauffman, a New York corporation lawyer, Harry F.
Kern, Newsweek magazine's foreign affairs editor, Eugene 000
man of the State Department, and several others, formed a
highly influential, non-official pressure group whose object was
to protect and advance U.S. corporate interests. With secret ties
to the CIA via Kern and Dooman, this group, known as the
.. American Council on Japan," aided right-wing Japanese offi
cials and businessmen in sabotaging MacArthur's zaibatsu dis
solution program and in undoing the purge of prominent
Japanese militarists. When the occupation ended, Kern shed his
journalistic cover. Acting as a covert lobbyist and influence
peddler on behalf of war criminal Kishi Nobusuke, he helped
further Kishi's ascent to the prime ministership. In return, he
seems to have been given a "letter of marque" allowing him to
profit particularly after Kishi and his clique came to power, from
the ever deepening U.S.-Japan economic economic cooperation.
Surprisingly, Kern was not exposed until early 1979, when the
U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission revealed that
Grumann International had paid huge sales commissions to its
American consultants [Kern) on the sale of the EC-2 early
warning aircraft to the Japanese Defense Agency, and that the
consultant "intended to pay part of his commission to 'one or
more Japanese officials' presumably as bribes for their assistance
in the sale. "6
But to return to the problem of the intensity of organization
in Japan and the appearance this lends of a more tightly
structured corruption there than elsewhere. Lindblom calls at
tention to the practice of amakudari whereby a small number of
highly privileged large corporations place their top executives in
related government ministries. In their role as officials, they are
empowered to participate in the drafting of government policies
affecting their former employers. Conversely, elite bureaucrats
ofMITI, the Transportation Ministry, the Defense Agency, the
Finance Ministry, the Prime Minister's Office, etc. often retire
into large industries as presidents, vice-presidents and directors.
The resulting identification of economic interests is sometimes
reinforced by special "political merchants" and "powerful
personages" who operate in the interstices of the system. The
end result is the creation of conditions and a climate in which
corrupt dealings flourish. Throughout the postwar period, but
especially in the 1970s as the conservatives entered their third
decade of one-party rule, successive scandals provided close-up
views of how high government officials, from prime ministers
on downward, used public power to advance their own private
interests or those of the clique to which they belong.
But the term "structural corruption" connotes far more
than amakudari. It involves as well the massive buying of votes
by politicians, the fraudulent sale of state-owned land by high
officials, including a former prime minister, the financing of
electoral politics, and the purchase of politicians (such as Raizo
Matsuno and Kishi Nobusuke) by leading Japanese corporations
and zaibatsu groups. It refers also to the many ways in which
Japanese government-business relations lock into a complex,
ramifying network of ties to America's military, political, eco
nomic and intelligence establishments, not to mention the re
pressive police dictatorship in South Korea to which Japan's
ruling elites have especially close ties.
Space does not permit the pursuit of these aspects of the
problem of structural corruption, which is also a phenomenon of
group and community in Japan. But three points can neverthe
less be made on the basis of a wealth of already accumulated
evidence. First, corruption and the circumvention of democratic
procedures by the conservative party governments is as much a
basic fact of postwar political life as it once was of prewar
politics. Second, it is a phenomenon automatically minimized
and discounted by anyone who accepts as truth the big business
community's self-image and self-evaluation of its ties with the
bureaucracy and the political world. And third, even the briefest
look behind the Lockheed, Grumman and other scandals reveals
a crass bourgeois morality of profiteering which is the very
antithesis of Vogel's notion of the high moral consciousness of
elite bureaucrats and politicians.
Which brings us back to the issue of class inequality and
class structure in flourishing Japan. In a chaptertitled "Politics:
Higher Interests and Fair Shares," Vogel argues that
Groups in Japan interact with one another frequently. so that
they are particularly effective aggregating interests
engaging in joint political activity for a broader common
purpose. And at all/evels in Japan. people make a conscious
effort to provide a balanced though not equal 'fair share' to
all recognized groups in the society. The distribution offair
shares, like the aggregation ofinterests. is made possible by
the solidarity of these multipurpose groups. (97)
At a time when the economy is still booming after twenty-five
years of unprecedented growth and unemployment levels out
side of manufacturing are still relatively low, a proposition of
this sort seems plausible. But Japanese history offers abundant
evidence for two different, more accurate contrary theses: a)
that in Japan, as elsewhere, a major determining factor in setting
limits to social change has been the unity and merging of class
interests over time rather than the aggregation of discrete group
interests; and b) that just as important as the solidarity of
.. multipurpose groups" have been the schisms and antagonisms
within and between them, such as occurred during the interwar
period between, among others, the military and finance capital.
Whether solidarity or antagonism is predominant at anyone time
is an empirical matter, dependent on concrete historical cir
cumstances. And the same holds true for Vogel's thesis on
58
"fair shares" with respect to income distribution. The shares
were certainly not fair for tenants and workers in prewar Japan,
not to mention pre-Meiji history. And Ohashi Ryuken's studies
of postwar social stratification and income distribution-e.g.,
Nihon no kaikyii kosei (Iwanami Shinsho 1972)-cast doubt on
any claims of Japan's comparative success today in distributing
income more equitably than other capitalist countries. If any
thing, since statistics on income and the distribution of assets
tend to conceal the very low rate of taxes on fixed assets such as
land and real estate, Japanese inequality in this respect might be
greater even than in the United States.
Now, for a last insight into the political consciousness that
informs Japan As Number One, we skipto the end ofthe chapter
on politics, a section titled "Threats Old and New: Over
conformity and Chaos." Vogel, after noting the dangers of
overconformity arising from the strength of group ties in Japan,
expresses the modernization view of Japan's recent past. Ac
i
I
cording to it the postwar democracy is seen essentially as the
revival of prewar (1920s) liberalism and party politics, and no
gap is allowed between the past and present structure of con
sciousness of the Japanese people and the political ideals em
bodied in their postwar occupation reforms. Vogel's main point
I
I
is that because the Japanese people have grown sophisticated
they are no longer threatened by the strength of group cohesi ve
I
ness and the dangers of overconformity. Grossly oversimplify
ing Japan's prewar political experience he writes:
I
The prewar totalitarian state dominated an unsophisticated
public that had no choice but to follow blindly a militaristic
government because so few ofits members had the sophistica
I tion to know otherwise or the opportunities to say otherwise.
With the explosion offoreign movies and later television shows
since World War /I, the sophistication ofthe Japanese public
I
I
We've got a "book" of essays
by Herbert Bix
Report on Japan, 1972: the Military Dimension (Vol. 4
I
1
#2, 1972, $1.50).
Report on Japan, 1972: the Economic Dimension (Vol. 4
#4, 1972, $1.50).
Ii
Regional Integration: Japan and South Korea in
America's Asian Policy (Vol. 5 #3, 1973, $1.50).
Imagistic Historiography and the Reinterpretation of
I
I
Japanese Imperialism (on four books by Akira 1rire)
(Vol. 7 #3, 1975, $2'()().
1
On Jon Halliday's Contribution to Understanding
4
I
Japan/a review essay and critique of A Political History of
I,
Japanese Capitalism (Vol. 8 #3, 1976, $2.00).
Miura Meisuke, or Peasant Rebellion Under the Banner
I

,
"
of "Distress" (Vol. 10 #2, 1978, $2.50).
g
Japan at the End of the Seventies; The Treatment of the
i Political in Recent Japanology (Vol. 12 #1,1980, $3.50).
1
Purchase all sevenfor classroom work: $9.50. Or purchase the
six back issues for $7.50. Or select them singly at the listed
price.
BCAS, Box W, CHARLEMONT, MA 01339 USA
about foreign and domestic affairs has reached a level that
precludes a return to prewar ignorance. (127) (emphasis
added]
Leaving aside the problem of defining what constitutes
"sophistication" or a prewar level of ignorance, let us tum
instead to the actual rightward trend in Japanese politics which
became particularly noticeable at the end of the seventies.
In early April 1979 the Japanese press revealed that 14
"Class A War Criminals," including former prime minister
Tojo Hideki, foreign minister Matsuoka Yosuke, and Haranuma
Kiichiro had been secretly enshrined the previous fall (October
17, 1978) as "Showa era martyrs" at Yasukuni Shrine. The
disclosure coincided with the announced official visit (on April
21) of Christian Prime Minister Ohira Masayoshi to the Shinto
shrine where Japan's war dead are buried. A few months later,
on June 6, 1979, conservative business and political leaders
successfully concluded their drive of many years to strengthen
emperor-consciousness among the people and bring it back into
politics: on that day the Diet finally enacted legislation which
legalizes the system of counting time according to the era name
(gengo) given to the reign of each emperor.
In the area of military affairs, there have been more serious
regressive actions. On July 19, 1978, General Kurisu Hiroomi,
chairman of the Joint Staff Council of the Self Defense forces,
declared that because of legal restrictions on Japan's defense
posture, "extra-legal" action by the Self Defense Forces was a
possibility during a national emergency. Eight days after Kurisu' s
carefully prepared statement burst like a bombshell on the
political scene (and one day before sacrificially dismissing him
for making it), the Fukuda cabinet indicated publicly the need to
study the necessity of "emergency legislation" (yiiji rippo),
presumably in order to give the Self Defense forces legal author
ity to set aside the human rights provisions of the constitution in
a war emergency and to act without order of the prime minister
in repelling an attack. This action touched off small-scale but
fierce nationwide protests by university students, opposition
party Diet members and left wing unionists,some of whom no
doubt remembered the first postwar "emergency legislation."
At that time official Tokyo collaborated with Washington in the
infamous' 'red purge" and trampled underfoot the human rights
provisions of its new 1947 constitution. Finally, on November
27, 1978-with the 23-month-old Fukuda cabinet nearing its
end, the yuji rippo debate still raging, and after China's deputy
premier, Deng Xiaoping, had completed his visit to Tokyo
bearing the usual denunciations of hegemon ism and words of
praise for AMPO-the US Embassy in Tokyo held a press
conference at which it revealed that military officers of the US
and Japan had worked out, and the 17th meeting of the US
Japan Consultative Committee on Security had approved, new
"guidelines" for joint action by the SDF and US forces. That
announcement came three years after the United States' historic
military defeat in Indochina and the shift in its strategic em
phasis to northeast Asia; it also followed the emergence of a new
diplomatic-military alignment in East Asia in which Japan co
operates with the United States and China against the Soviet
Union. Hereafter, as the US-Japan military alliance in East Asia
enters a new stage of greater technological preparedness and
strategic coordination, the delicate internal balance between the
various forces in the Japanese state system is sure to be affected
by the enhanced power and authority that will slowly but stead
ily accrue to the Japanese military under the "guidelines."7
59
These four highly symbolic and ominous events of 1978
79-the enshrinement of the war criminals. the era-name legis
lation, the yuji rippo debate and the "guidelines"-belie op
timistic judgments about the impossibility of Japan's leaders'
endangering their democracy. Any tum by them. however slight,
toward more activist policies in pursuit of their own and US
policy aims in Asia is a danger to Japanese democracy. such as it
is.
These same events also cast doubt on the existence of any
supportive relationship between the Japanese media and "the
sophistication of the Japanese public about foreign and domestic
affairs. " To say that is not to imply that the establishment media
in the United States are. in general. more of a critical force for
public enlightenment. or that the situation in that regard is better
in any of the non-capitalist countries. But as we are talking
about the US and Japan. the pertinent point to note is that in two
recent and major wars of aggression-Korea and Vietnam
the American "Free Press." which is never wanting in self
praise. worked strenuously to encourage the vast majority of
Americans to line up, and stay lined up, in support of national
leaders who. to secure their own policy objectives. repeatedly
opted for the use of military force and the disregard of interna
tional law. g Furthermore. during the past four years that same
US press. with the Japanese media faithfully echoing it. has
been the main vehicle of official Western efforts to calumniate
the Vietnamese and Cambodians and to inspire in Western and
Japanese audiences fear and hatred of their respective revolu
tions. Meanwhile. in the Japanese media. the effort continues to
indoctrinate citizens to overlook the constitutional illegality of
the Self Defense Forces and to think of article 9 of the 1947
Constitution as a "limitation" rather than an asset in the na
tion's diplomatic practice.
So. even if one were to grant that Japanese media audi
ences are exposed to a broader range of ideological opinion on
more subjects than American audiences. it is surely naive to
imply that in this corporate-capitalist age of communications,
the dominant institutions of propaganda-indeed. the "prop
aganda system" itself-somehow function to protect their
democratic freedoms. The voluntary constraint prlOCticed by
journalists as part of their ideology of professionalism. together
with their own nationalistic bias. plus the ideological control
exercised by the state over all of the institutions and techniques
of modem communications-these things have always ruled
out truth-seeking as the major object of the media. If anything.
today they have made it easier than ever before for governments
to control publics and neutralize whatever "variant opinion"
and serious criticism of official policy is allowed to get through. 9
If. as Vogel believes. Japan's postwar democracy is not
endangered by thought control and the pressure of group con
formity. by what is it endangered? Vogel answers in a neutral,
reportorial way: by "chaos." protest action outside of established
institutional channels. "In the opinion of many thoughtful Japa
nese leaders, the greatest threat to Japanese style democracy
comes ... from ... the dissipation of group cohesiveness. "
(128). In other words. Japan faces mainly the threat of a weak
ening of group leadership. for (according to this view) on
ly groups can carry on democracy, or rather democracy exists
only in negotiations and bargaining between hierarchically or
ganized groups. When such groups cease to be run oligarchi
cally and bureaucratically by a few leaders from above (as
happened in the late sixties and early seventies with New Left
and residents movements), when their internal structuring be
comes more open and democratic, more responsive to input
from their members, then democracy itself is endangered. This
odd and dangerous line of argument calls to mind the Trilateral
Commission scholars who authored in the early seventies The
Crisis of Democracy, a book which, in effect, identified the
expansion of popular participation in national decision-making
as one of the greatest threats facing the democracies. And that is
exactly how the discussion of politics comes to an end in Japan
As Number One . .. with its author following Japanese power
holders (who in tum echo the Trilateralists) in labeling as
, 'chaos" not the abuse of power by corporations and govern
ment but the spontaneous initiatives. protests and acts of insub
ordination against it by ordinary Japanese citizens. *
Notes
I. Paul Henriques, "Japan, the Wave of the Future'!" Japan Times (June
30. 1979). '
2. See for example Ross Maoa [Ross Moore'!l "Kutabare jyapanorojii
. N ihonjin dohitsuron' no hohoronteki mondaiten ... Gendai no me (June 1979):
"Nakane Chie setsu no hohoronteki gimon," Gendai no me (July 1979).
3. See "US/Japanese Relations: Hearing Before the Subcommittee on
East Asian and Pacitic Affairs of the Committee on Foreign Relations, US
Senate, 95th Congress, 2nd Session," April 27, 1978 (Washington, GPO,
1978). One official of the Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs told the
Committee that "Business failures climbed steadily since the oil crisis, from
14,000 per year in 1974 to almost 19,000 in 1977. The asset value of bankrupt
cies has risen even more dramatically. Employment in manufacturing has fallen
9 percent since 1973." (p. 22).
4. On this point see ltd Makoto, "Gendai shihonshugi no tenkai" [The
Development of the Theory of Contemporary Capitalisml in Kikan kuraishisu
[Crisis}. No. I (1979); Hayashi Naomichi, "Nihon Keizai no hachiju nendai"
[The Japanese Economy in the I 980sJ , Gendai 10 shiso, No. 36 (June 1979), p.
9.
5. Charles Lindblom, Politics and Markets (New York: Basic Books,
1978), p. 181.
6. See John G. Roberts, "The 'Japan Crowd' and the Zaibatsu
Restoration" in The Japan Interpreter. Vol. XII. Nos. 3-4 (Summer 1979).
7. The emergency legislation issue and the guidelines have, of course. a
significance quite apart from the question of Japanese democracy and, for that
reason, will be considered in a separate article. For a recent, incisive discussion
of these issues see Fujiwara Akira, "Gaidorain to NichiBei kyoroyoku taisei"
[The Guidelines and the Japan-US Cooperative System I in Horitsu jiho. No.
624 (September 1979),36-41.
8. See Noam Chomsky. "The Remaking of History," Ramparts. 8-9
(1975), p. 2; and "Ten Years AtierTet:The Big Story That Got Away," More
(June 1978).
9. For an important objective assessment of the role of the liberal press in
the United States see Noam Chomsky and Edward S. Herman. The Political
Economy of Human Rights (Vol. /) The Washington Connection and the Third
World; and The Political Economy ofHuman Rights (Vol. I/) After the Cataclysm:
Postwar Indochina and the Reconstruction o/Imperial Ideology (Boston: South
End Press, 1979).
60
1
I
,
Japanese Corporate Zen
by Daizen Victoria
In the popular Western mind, contemporary Japanese Zen
is characterized by austere yet beautiful Zen gardens, and
monks with shaven heads seated serenely in meditation. Vari
ous television programs have also popularized the idea that
monks spend a good deal of their time studying either karate or
another form of the martial arts. However, contemporary
Japanese Zen is also characterized by the growing number of
Zen temples in the countryside which, due to a decrease in rural
population, either have no permanent resident priest or only a
nichiyo-bOzu. a priest who holds a secular job as a school
teacher or clerical worker during the week and only functions as
a priest on Sundays. Moreover, many urban Zen priests have
utilized their temple lands to build highly profitable con
dominiums, supermarkets, parking lots, kindergartens, and the
like.
In spite of the increasing secularization of Zen (and, for
that matter, traditional Buddhism as a whole) in Japan, the close
observer would notice another interesting phenomenon at those
relatively few Zen temples where meditation is still practiced
with some regUlarity. The phenomenon referred to is the in
creasing number of both lay men and women who are coming to
Zen temples for short periods of time to participate in meditation
and other forms of Zen training.
This increased lay interest might seem to indicate a revitali
zation of contemporary Japanese Zen. Indeed, during the past
few years the popular media in Japan have often referred to a
so-called Zen-bumu (boom). Interestingly enough, one cause
given for this Zen-biimu is that the Japanese, particularly young
people, have come to regard Zen more highly because of the
attention it has received in the West. While that may be partially
correct, it cannot be the complete answer. Careful investigation
of these lay trainees reveals that many of them are not participat
ing by choice. That is to say, many ofthese trainees have been
sent to Zen temples by the companies in which they are em
ployed. Usually these employees have just entered the company,
and their Zen training is considered part of their orientation
program.
Zen training is not limited to freshman employees alone,
however; middle management, even top management, groups
are also numerous. There are, in fact, management consultants
in Japan who specialize in arranging Zen training sessions for
the various strata of company employees. It is also not unknown
Main entrance (sanmon) of Eihei-ji (D. Victoria).
for members of top management themselves to conduct, or at
least partially conduct, these training sessions for their
employees.
Unfortunately, no hard statistical data exist on the numbers
of employees involved in these training programs. Observation
at upwards of a dozen major Zen temples, belonging to both the
Rinzai and Soto traditions, however, has convinced me that a
significant number of individuals is involved. In the Tokyo
area, for example, the Rinzai Zen-affiliated temple of Engaku-ji
in Kamakura has become one of the centers of this kind of
training. On any given morning, and especially on weekends,
one can see anywhere from ten to over one hundred company
employees filing in and out of the meditation hall. These em
ployees are easily distinguishable from the other lay trainees
because of their uniform dress, often with the company's crest
emblazoned on their jackets or baseball caps. At the Soto Zen
temple ofJokiiin in Saitama prefecture, where I trained for some
time, there were approximately 5,000 lay trainees a year, be
tween 60-70 percent of whom were in company-related groups.
What benefits do these employees, or more properly, the
companies which send them, hope to derive from Zen training?
Could it be that these companies wish to have a group of
.. enlightened beings" on their payroll? Would such enlightened
beings insure greater corporate profits? As compassionate and
self-sacrificing Bodhisattvas, would they perhaps be able to
eliminate the cut-throat competition of the market-place? It is to
the "why" of corporate Zen training that this article will ad
dress itself. At the outset, I would like to suggest that the
companies involved have some very pragmatic and immediate
reasons for wishing their employees, new and old, to undergo
Zen training. This proposition is borne out by the fact that
corporate Zen training is often conducted in tandem with, or in
place of, so-called "temporary enlistment" (Kari-nyutai) in the
Japanese Self-Defense Forces. It seems unlikely that employees
61
would be made to undergo military training if the company's
goal were truly their enlightenment!
What, then, are these "very pragmatic and immediate
reasons?" The answer to this question is closely related to what
it was that made Zen training attractive to Japan's ruling elites in
the past. To demonstrate the validity of this statement, however,
it is necessary to investigate some relevant aspects of Zen's
traditional sociopolitical role in Japanese society.
The Traditional Sociopolitical Role of Zen
Although Buddhism was first introduced to Japan in the 6th
century, it was not until the Kamakura period (1185-1382) that
Zen took root in Japan as an independent school. I The two
monks primarily responsible for this were Eisai (1141-1215)
and Dogen (1200-1253), founders of the Rinzai and Soto Zen
sects respectively. Although contemporaries, these two men
had many differences. For example, the esoteric rituals of the
then-predominant Shingon school played a much greater role in
Eisai's Zen than they did in Dogen's. Furthermore, Eisai taught
that the goal of Zen training was the attainment of enlighten
ment. Dogen, on the other hand, maintained that such training,
particularly the practice of the Zen form of meditation known as
::azen, was itself the manifestation of enlightenment.
There were, of course, many similarities as well. Both
men had studied Zen in China and both reacted strongly against
the scholastic doctrinalism and degeneracy of the Buddhist
prelates of their day. In terms of this article, the most important
similarity is that, to varying degrees, they both identified Zen
with the welfare of the state. In his famous treatise, Kozen
gokoku-ron (The Spread of Zen for the Protection of the
Country), Eisai argued that it was through the universal adop
tion of the teachings of Zen that the nation could be protected.
Dogen also wrote a similar treatise entitled Gokoku-shobo-gi
(The Method of Protecting the Country by the True Dharma).
Although the contents of this latter treatise are no longer
extant, its title, as well as Dogen's other writings on the same
subject, a similar position to that of Eisai. In the
Belldowa section of Dogen' s masterwork, the Shobogenzo (lit. .
True Dharma Eye Treasury), for example, he states:
When the true Way is widely practiced ill the nation, the
various buddhas and heavenly deities will continuously pro
tect it, and the virtue of the emperor will exert a good
influence on the people, thereby bringing peace."
Eisai and Dogen were not, of course, the first Japanese
priests to identify Buddhism with the welfare of the state. Both
Kukai the founder of the Shingon and
Saicho the founder of the Tendai school. had previ
ously written tracts similar to theirs. In fact, it can be argued that
this element is found in Japanese Buddhism from the very
beginning. Prof. Anesaki Masaharu, for example, points this
out in his book, History ofJapanese Religion. In discussing the
introduction of Buddhism to Japan in the 6th century, he writes
that"A close alliance was established between the throne and
the [Buddhist] religion, since the consolidation of the nation
under the sovereignty of the ruler was greatly supported by the
fidelity of the imported religion to the government. "
Still, it can not be denied that by their actions Eisai and
Dagen set the stage for the later close relationship between the
interests of the state and Zen. This is particularly true in the case
of Eisai, who, unlike Dogen, closely aligned himself with the
feudal military government in Kamakura. It was this alignment
with the Kamakura Shogunate, and its associated samurai class,
that was, in the following years, to produce a uniquely Japanese
development of Zen, the belief in the efficacy of Zen training in
warfare.
The origin of this belief may be traced back to Shogun Hojo
Tokimune (1251-1284) and those Zen priests who surrounded
him. Like his father, Hoja Tokiyori (1227-1263), Tokimune
was deeply interested in Zen. Unlike his father, however, he
was faced with the first serious threat of foreign invasion in
recorded Japanese history. In his book, Zen and Japanese
Culture, the noted Zen scholar, D.T. Suzuki, describes how
Tokimune sought strength from Zen to deal with this threat. 2
According to Suzuki, he went for guidance to his spiritual
mentor, a Chinese Zen master by the name of Tsu-yuan Wu
Hsiieh (Sogen Mugaku, 1226-1286), shortly before the ex
pected invasion.
When Tokimune said: "The greatest event of my life is
here at last," the master asked: "How will you face it'?"
Tokimune replied by merely shouting the exclamatory word:
"Katsu!," as though he were frightening all of his enemies into
submission. Pleased with this show of courage, Tsu-yuan indi
cated his approval of Tokimune 's answer by saying: . 'Truly, a
lion's child roars like a lion. " Subsequently, with the assistance
of a "divine wind" (Kamikaze), which was, most likely,
merely a timely typhoon, Tokimune was successful in repelling
the Mongol invaders.
It should be noted that the shouting of "Katsu," a teaching
method first advocated by the Chinese monk, Lin-chi I-hsuan
(Rinzai Gigen, d. 867), originally had nothing to do with mak
ing one fearless in the face of an enemy. Rather it, together with
the use of sharp blows, was a method of forcing the trainee to
transcend discursive dualistic thinking and grasp reality im
mediately and directly. The purpose was to comprehend the true
form of things, not to subdue an opponent who, in reality, was
nothing but another manifestation of oneself.
Although dating several centuries after the preceding inci
dent, there is a letter written by the famous Zen master, Takuan
(1573-1645), which clearly shows how the mind 'which has
transcended discursive thought, technically known in Zen as
"no-mind" (mushin), came to be identified with martial
prowess, particularly in the use of the sword. Addressing the
famous swordsman, Yagyu Tajima no kami Munenori (1571
1646), Takuan writes:
''No mind" applies to all activities we ma)' perform. such as
dancing. as it does to swordplay. The dancer takes up the fan
and begins to stamp his feet. If he has any idea at all of
displaying his art well, he ceases to be a good dancer,for his
mind "stops" with every movement he goes through. In all
things. it is important toforget your' 'mind" and become one
with the work at hand.
When we tie a cat, being afraid of its catching a bird, it
keeps on struggling for freedom. But train the cat so that it
would not mind the presenceofa bird. The animal is now free
and can go anywhere it likes .In a similar way, when the mind
is tied up, it feels inhibited in every move it makes, and
nothing will be accomplished with any sense ofspontaneity.
Not onlv that, the work itself will be of a poor quality, or
it may not be finished at all.
62
Therefore, do not get your mind "stopped" with the
sword you raise;forget what you are doing, and strike the
enemy.
3
It was during the Ashikaga Shogunate (1392-1568), when
the political center of Japan was once more in Kyoto, that Zen
exerted its strongest influence on almost all fields of Japanese
life and culture. Zen monks were to be found in such diverse
occupations as trade representatives in negotiations with China
and teachers of young people in the small schools attached to
temples in the countryside. Some of them also served as the
spiritual and political advisers and confidants of the Ashikaga
Shoguns, often, it is said, with salutary effect. Zen monk Gido,
for example, close confidant of Shogun Yoshimitsu (1358
1408), encouraged the latter to pursue religious and literary
studies, with the result that Yoshimitsu became one of the
greatest patrons of Zen and the arts in Japan's history.
It was, however, in the field of social philosophy that Zen,
or rather Zen monks, were to have what was in many ways their
most profound influence on the future development of Japanese
society. It was they who had first introduced the Neo-Confucian
teachings of the Song dynasty (960-1279) into Japan. While the
new Buddhist-influenced metaphysics of Neo-Confucianism
had only a limited appeal to the military rulers, its social phil
osophy was very attractive. The latter taught the need for a
social order characterized by a strict hierarchical structuring of
the classes. It further required the conformity of all people to the
obligations imposed by the five primary human relationships:
that is, the relationships between father and son, ruler and
subject, husband and wife, older and younger brother, and two
friends.
In medieval Japan, the obligation of a subject to his ruler
came to mean, at least among the samurai class, complete
devotion or loyalty to one's feudal lord. The emphasis that
Japanese Zen came to place on such devotion can be clearly seen
in the following statement of Zen monk Suzuki Shosan (1579
1655). In a classic work on Suchido (the feudal warrior code)
entitled Hagakure, he said: "What is there in the world purer
than renouncing one's own life for the sake of one's lord?"4
What Shosan, and Zen Buddhism in general, did was to equate
the self-renunciation of Zen, based on the Buddhist teaching of
the non-substantiality of the self (muga) , with absolute loyalty
to one's lord.
Nakamura Hajime has pointed out in his book, Ways of
Thinking of Eastern Peoples:: "The ultimate aim of Zen prac
tice became, among the warriors, devotion to the lord. "5 How
at variance this aim was with the original teachings of Buddhism
can be seen in the fact that little or no esteem for the sovereign,
be he/she feudal lord or king, is to be found in the early Buddhist
writings of India.
6
This is not surprising, for it was Buddha
Siikyamuni himself who taught the equality of all members of
the Buddhist monastic community (Sanskrit, samgha) regard
less of their prior caste affiliation. This equality was practiced in
the early samgha by making monks' rankings dependent upon
their years of service and by putting all important questions to a
majority vote.
Be that as it may, Japanese Zen continued through the
succeeding centuries to place heavy emphasis among the sam
urai class on loyal and faithful service to the lord. At the same
time, its temple schools instilled in the common people respect
for the Confucian ideal of a hierarchically structured society in
which everyone had a rigidly defined place and function. In
terms of social morality, at least, Confucianism, or more ac
curately, Neo-Confucianism, had become Zen dogma.
With the coming of the Meiji Restoration in 1868 and the
elimination of the feudal system, however, devotion to one's
lord became an anachronism. The temple school system, too,
was abolished by the new government, and in its place a state
supported public school system was established. As a result,
Zen, and the other traditional Buddhist sects which had, in
general, played a similar role vis-a-vis feudal authority, were
thrown into confusion. The emergence of Shinto as a state
religion and the repressive governmental measures directed
towards Buddhism served to worsen the situation.
Soto Zen monastery of Eihei-ji near coast of
Japan Sea. Fukui prefecture (D. Victoria).
It did not, however, take traditional Japanese Buddhism,
particularly Zen, long to adjust to the new environment. Though
there were no longer lords, the new oligarchs of Japan needed
the devotion of their subjects as much, if not more, than did the
old feudal rulers. No longer was it sufficient for the military
class alone to be instilled with the absolute loyalty to their
superiors. Now, the whole nation must be made to respond with
the same unquestioning obedience, especially as Japan had
embarked on a policy of foreign conquest and expansion.
It should be pointed out that not all Zen priests supported
this new sociopolitical role for themselves. A few, influenced
by newly introduced socialist and anarchist ideas, objected to it
quite vigorously. One of them, a Soto Zen monk by the name of
Uchiyama Gudo (1874-1911) even dared to oppose the revital
ized emperor system itself. He did this in a pamphlet entitled
Nyugoku Kinen (In Commemoration of Those Imprisoned). The
result of this pUblication, however, was not only his ouster from
63
Grave of Uchiyama Gudo in Hakone. Meiji authorities pennitted the use
of only this small unmarked stone. When it was discovered that someone
had placed tlowers on the grave a few weeks after the burial. the police
conducted a house-to-house search of the village seeking the "guilty"
party. (D. Victoria)
the Soto sect but also his own imprisonment. Subsequently,
while still imprisoned, he was charged with earlier involvement
in an anarchist plot to kill the emperor, and in 191 I, together
with eleven other alleged co-conspirators, he was executed.
In spite of exceptions like Uchiyama, most Zen priests
became adept at promoting the cause of devotion and loyalty to
the new central govemment and its military policies. At the time
of the Russo-Japanese War (1904-5), for example, Shaku S6en
( 1859-1919), abbot of the Rinzai Zen-affiliated monasteries of
Engaku-ji and Kencho-ji in Kamakura, made an extended visit
to the U.S. During one of his lectures given at that time and
recorded in his book, Sermons ofa Buddhist Abbot, he said: "In
the present hostilities into which Japan has entered with great
reluctance, she pursues no egotistic purpose, but seeks the
SUbjugation of evils hostile to civilization, peace, and enlight
enment. "7 In describing the purpose of his visit to the battlefield
during this conflict, he went on to say: " ... I also wished to
inspire, if I could, our valiant soldiers with the ennobling
thoughts of the Buddha, so as to enable them to die on the
battlefield with the confidence that the task in which they are
engaged is great and noble."8
Given the preceding sentiments, it is not surprising to learn
that Shaku S6en refused to sign a joint peace appeal with the
famous Russian pacifist and author Leo Tolstoy. Tolstoy had
appealed to the abbot on the basis of the Buddhist precept
against the taking of life. S6en replied, however, that as a loyal
subject of the Japanese Empire he would never sign such a
declaration. In this connection it is worthy of note that his pupil,
D.T. Suzuki, was also a strong supporter of Japan's military
actions on the Asian mainland. D.T. Suzuki is, as mentioned
earlier, well-known for his pioneer work in introducing Zen to
the West. In one of his earlier writings entitled "A Treatise on
New Religion" (Shinshukyo-ron) , Suzuki also discussed the
relationship of religion to the state. He said: "The first duty of
religion is to seek to preserve the existence of the state. "9
As Japanese militarism grew ever stronger in the 1920s and
30s, the emphasis on the efficacy of Zen training in actual
combat also became more pronounced. Ichikawa Kakugen,
himself a Rinzai Zen priest and professor emeritus of Kyoto's
Hanazono University, has written about this development in a
number of books and articles. Zen Master Iida Toin, for exam
ple, is recorded as having said:
We should be well aware of how much power Zen gave to
Bushido. It is truly a cause for rejoicing that. oflate. the Zen
sect is popular among military men. No matter how much we
may do zazen, if it is of no help to present events. then it
would be better not to do it. 10
Prof. Ichikawa also discusses one of the most famous exponents
of what was to become known as Kodo-zen (Imperial Way Zen),
namely Rinzai Zen Master Yamazaki Ekishu. abbot of Buttsu-ji
(temple). This master described the relationship of Zen to the
emperor as follows:
With awareness of our daily actions, we investigate the
"self." In the great concentrated meditative state [i.e ..
samiidhi1ofZen , we become united with the emperor. In each
ofour actions we live. moment to moment. with the greatest
respect [for the emperor]. When we personify [this spirit] in
our daily life. we become masters of every situation in ac
cordance with our sacrificial duty. This is living Zen. I I
It was in this spirit that Master Yamazaki taught the mil
itary men under his guidance. One of these, a young captain by
the name of Matsumoto Goro (1900-1937), was destined to
become immortalized as the very incarnation of the Japanese
military spirit. It was claimed that though mortally wounded in
combat in Manchuria in 1937. he not only turned toward the east
and saluted in the direction of the Imperial Palace, but he
actually died standing up, as if ready to give his next order.
Not only were Captain Matsumoto's utter devotion to the
emperor and fearlessness in the face of death thought to be the
results of his Zen training, but his ability to die while still
standing was believed to be an expression of his deep spiritual
attainment. This latter belief stemmed from the traditional Zen
teaching that enlightened persons could choose their own post
ure at death. 12
After his death Captain Matsumoto's heroism was written
about and eulogized throughoutJapan, particularly in the schools.
His post-humous book, Daigi (Great Loyalty) became the ob
ject of intense study, and he became the ideal for all youth to
emulate. At the same time, Zen masters occupied themselves
more and more with giving military men Zen training. A large
meditation hall was built in the heart of Tokyo and used exclu
sively to train military men to the very end of the war. What
Japan lacked in material military power she hoped to make up
for with spiritual military power.
64
Zen priests were not only busy on the home front. They
served in the military itself as both soldiers and chaplains. OfteIl
they would tour the front lines to inspire the men. One of them.
Zen Master Yamada Mumon. now president of Rinzai Zen
affiliated Hanazono University. is quoted by Prof. Ichikawa as
having said the following during one such visit: "This is a
sacred war to drive out the European and American aggressors
from Asia. Please fight without any regard for your lives." 13
In the same spirit were these words by the abbot of Hos
shin-ji (temple). Harada Sogaku (l870-196\). Prof. Ichikawa
quotes him as saying:
Forgetting [the difference between Jself and others in every
situation, you should always become completely one with
your work. [When ordered toJ march-tramp, tramp; lwhen
ordered to] fire-bang, bang; this is the clear expression of
the highest Bodhi-wisdom, the unity ofZen and war .. .'4
Needless to say, despite all the words of encouragement
given by Zen masters, and the spiritual martial powers derived
from Zen meditation and training. Japan lost the war. Mis
guided samiidha-power was, in the end. no match for the nation
alist and revolutionary resistance of the Asian peoples combined
with American technological might. Seemingly. with Japan's
military bankruptcy, the unity of Zen and the martial skills had
come to an end. after a history of some 700 years.
Post-War Economic Development and Zen
Japan's "miraculous" emergence as a economic power
less than a generation after total defeat has been described
exhaustively by both Japanese and Western writers. Hence.
there is no need to repeat that description here. As Japan has
emerged as an ever greater economic force, however. those
factors which contributed to growth have become the subject of
intense study and speculation by "Japanese experts" and busi
ness analysts of every type. Each of them has attempted to
unlock the secrets of "Japan. Inc.," with particular focus on
those elements which make the Japanese worker into the ded
icated, loyal, diligent part of the corporate machine that he/she
is. In his book on Japanese business entitled Japan: The Fragile
Superpower, Frank Gibney, for example. notes four character
istics of the modem Japanese corporation: ., ( 1) the dedication
to the group goal. (2) the sense of hierarchy, (3) the depen
dence on superiors, and (4) the formalism." IS
Gibney ascribes the origin of the preceding characteristics
to the social values of the Japanese village. While he may be
correct to some extent, it is also equally true that. as anyone
even slightly acquainted with Japanese Zen monastic I!fe will
recognize, these are exactly the same characteristics which are
to be found in Zen training. Furthermore. even if these charac
teristics have their origins in village society of the past. the vast
majority of Japanese today are born and raised in an urban
environment divorced from traditional village society. Where
and how. then. do they acquire these values?
It would appear that this same question has also been of
concern to Japanese business leaders. In the June 1977 issue of
Focus Japan, an English-language magazine published by the
semi-governmental Japan External Trade Organization (JETRO),
there is a highly revealing article entitled "Marching to the
Company Tune." In describing the history of training programs
for new employees. the article states:
lThese programsJ were developed in the late /950's when
companies realized that schools were no longer emphasizing
the old virtues of obedience and conformity. Living and
training together. sometimes for as long as a month, are
designed to artificially recreate the old neglected virtues.
If "artificial recreation of the old neglected virtues" is the
goal, what better place to accomplish it than in a Zen monastery
where monk and lay trainees rise at 3:30 a.m. to meditate, eat
rice gruel for breakfast. and endure the winter cold with only
tiny charcoal braziers for heat! There can be no doubt that this
Reproduction of only known photograph of Uchiyama Gudo. From
Taigyaka jiken to Uchivama Guda by Kashiwagi Ryuho. (D. Victoria)
65
spartan life style does increase the ability to withstand adversity,
and, as Prof. George A. DeVos has pointed out, endurance has
long been a highly desirable virtue in Japanese business or
ganizations. 16 In this regard, it should also be mentioned that
even for the experienced meditator, let alone the novice, ex
tended periods of sitting in the traditional cross-legged "lotus
posture" can be physically quite painful. If even the slightest
movement is detected, the meditator will be "encouraged" to
remain immobile by repeated blows of a long wooden stick
known as a kyosaku wielded by a senior monk-monitor.
It is, however, in the social rather than the physical, envi
ronment of a Zen monastery that the greatest emphasis on
obedience and conformity is to be found. To be allowed to enter
a monastery as a trainee, a monk is expected to prostrate himself
in supplication before the entrance gate for hours if not days
(depending on the monastery). When asked why he wishes to
enter the monastery, the monk should reply: "I know nothing.
Please accept my greetings!" This answer is thought to indicate
that his mind is like a blank sheet of paper, ready to have his
superiors inscribe on it whatever they may wish. If a monk fails
to give the foregoing answer, he is struck repeatedly with the
kyosaku until the desired state of mind is achieved.
Once given permission to enter the monastery,the monk,
like his lay counterpart, finds that everyone is his superior to
some degree. Even a fellow monk who was only admitted a few
hours before him will automatically precede him on any formal
or semiformal occasion, even at meals, and exercise some
degree of authority over him. Those senior monks who have
been in training for more than one or two years seem, to the new
entrant, to be superior mortals; they not only wield the kyosaku
but also determine whether or not the novice's work assign
ments are done satisfactorily. These senior monks wear nicer
and more colorful robes than their juniors and live in more
spacious quarters. They also have the official privilege of leav
ing the monastery for short periods of time and the unofficial
privileges of surrepticiously eating meat, drinking alcohol and
keeping petty monetary and in-kind gifts made to the monastery .
If the preceding description seems not unlike that of basic
training in the military, 1 can attest, having experienced both,
that the parallels are indeed striking. Senior monks act much
like drill sergeants, and novice monks are their recruits. Al
though it is not generally well-known, the Japanese military
establishment prior to W. W. II modelled itself organizationally
along the lines of a Zen monastery. Even the ordinary Japanese
soldier's mess kit was adapted from the monk's set of rounded
eating bowls. It is little wonder, then, that Japanese corpora
tions continue to find the military-like discipline of a Zen
monastery attractive. As one new salesman who had just com
pleted his company's training program noted: "My work has
much in common with that of a soldier. " 17
If senior monks are the drill sergeants, then it is the Zen
master or masters who act as the generals (or, in the contempo
rary context, corporate heads). They enjoy the real authority in a
Zen monastery and are ultimately responsible for directing the
training programs for both monks and laypersons. In the talks
they give to incoming trainees, one of their most recurrent
themes revolves around the Zen phrase: "Daishu ichinyo." 1M
This phrase means that all members of the monastic community
should act as one. That is to say, when it is time to do zazen,
everyone sits. When it is time to eat, work, sleep, etc., everyone
likewise does these activities together as if they were one body.
To do otherwise is called katte na kodo, 19 or "self-willed
action, " and condemned as the very antithesis of the Zen life.
Total conformity is thus by no means an old neglected virtue in a
Zen monastery.
Discipline, obedience and conformity are not the only
attractive features of monastic life for corporate Japan. The
traditional Buddhist teaching ofthe non-substantiality of the self
(that is to say, the lack of any eternal and unchangeable sub
stance in the self) has also been given a unique corporate twist.
This twist is well illustrated by Ozeki Shuen, the abbot of
Daisen-in (temple) and one of the best known Zen priests
conducting employee training courses. In a collection of his
sermons delivered during such training courses, he states:
Employing your vital life force, you should exert yourselves
to the utmost, free of any conceptual thought ... This is
what it means to be alive. That is to say, at every time and in
every place, you should work selflessly. 20
A further example is provided by Sakai Tokugen, another
leading Zen master involved with employee training programs.
Master Sakai is also a professor of Buddhist Studies at Soto
Zen-affiliated Komazawa University in Tokyo. In the May 1974
issues of Daihorin, a popular Buddhist magazine, he lamented
the lack of sincerity in carrying out the orders of one's superiors
on the part of post-war Japanese. He wrote:
Sincerity [in carrying out orders 1means having feelings and
actions of absolute service, giving one's all [to the task at
hand]. In doing this there can be no thought ofpersonal loss
or gain ... By carrying out our [assigned] tasks, we be
come part of the life of the entire universe; we realize our
original True Self ... This is the most noble thing human
beings can do.
In other words, for Master Sakai, selfless devotion to the
accomplishment of one's assigned duties is none other than
enlightenment itself. Little wonder that he is a popular leader of
employee training courses. Here, certainly, the Protestant work
ethic has met its match.
Conclusion
At the beginning of this article it was suggested that the
companies which arranged for their employees to participate in
Zen training programs had some very pragmatic and immediate
reasons for doing so. At this point the truth of this proposition
should be quite apparent. The discipline, the emphasis on group
rather than individual action, the ability to endure hardship, the
heightened sense of "selfless" loyalty and subordination both
to one's group and to one's superiors are all aspects of Zen
training which have immediate relevance to corporate life.
It should also be clear that, in essence, the same spirit
pervades Suzuki Shosan's words about "renouncing one's own
life for the sake of one's lord" and Sakai Tokugen's lamentation
quoted above, or for that matter, the exhortations of Harada
Sogaku and the other Zen supporters of Japanese militarism.
The only difference between them is on the question of to
whom, or to what, one should be loyal and devoted. Originally,
it was the feudal lord; later"it became the central government and
its policies as embodied in the person of the emperor; and now,
of course, it is the corporation and its interests. It should be
noted, however, that to an even greater degree than in the U.S.,
66
Japanese corporate interests are closely connected with those of
the state.
There is one other aspect of Zen training which is very
attractive from the corporate standpoint. This is none other than
the practice of zazen itself. As Zen Master Iida pointed out
earlier, the samurai were indeed strengthened by the concen
trated state of mind achieved through the practice of zazen. This
samadhi-power was originally utilized in Zen training to give
the practitioner a deeper insight into his or her own nature and
the nature of reality itself. Yet, it can be and, as already noted,
has been applied to any work in which one may be engaged
everything from wielding a samurai sword with lightning swift
ness, or fighting "selflessly" in battle, to assembling a color
television set with flawless precision. What could be more
attractive to a Japanese company than the utilization of
samiidhi-power, and thus zazen, for its own corporate ends?
This, however, brings up an extremely important question:
"Is corporate Zen training a legitimate expression of Zen Bud
dhism?" The answer in the best Zen tradition, must be both yes
and no. On the affirmative side it must be admitted that if one
looks at corporate Zen training in terms of its historical antece
dents, this training is very much a part of the popular tradition of
Japanese Zen. Although historical analogies can be misleading,
there is a very real sense in terms of values in which the
corporate leaders of present-day Japan are actually samurai
disguised in Western clothing. Instead of the long and short
swords of the samurai they wield the computer and pocket
calculator.
On a deeper level, however, there is reason to ask whether
corporate Zen is not as alien to the true spirit of Zen as were its
historical antecedents- "feudal Zen" and "militarist Zen."
Although a whole article could be devoted to this topic alone, let
it suffice here to quote Zen Master D6gen's most succinct
expression of the goal of Zen training. In the Genjo-Koan
section of the Shobogenzo, he states:
To study the Way is to study the self. To study the self is to
forget the self. To forget the self is to be enlightened by all
things. To be enlightened by all things is to remove the
barriers between one's selfand others. 21
A true student of Zen, then, would use his samiidhi-power,
first and foremost, to break through those barriers of ignorance
which separate him from his own True Self and from others.
Having acomplished this, he would, in accordance with the
Bodhisattva ideal, use that same power to aid others in their own
search for release. To use that power for his or a particular
group's selfish ends, at the expense of others, would be com
pletely alien to him. To borrow Dogen's words again: "[Only)
the foolish believe that their own interests will suffer if they put
the benefit of others first. "22
This is the true spirit of Zen. Interestingly enough, even
some Zen masters who are involved in corporate training pro
grams admit to this. How, then, do they justify their involve
ment in such programs? Zen Master Murase Genmy6, leader of
the lay training center at Obaku Zen-affiliated Mampuku-ji, has
expressed the belief that out of any large group of employee
trainees there will be at least a few who will "acquire a taste"
for Zen in spite of the companies' goals. This will lead to their
further practice of Zen.and, eventually, to an understanding of
its true spirit.
While one can certainly hope this will occur, it is my
experience, based on ten years of training in Japan as a Zen
monk, that few if any employee participants ever do reach an
understanding of Zen 's true spirit. Were employees to adopt the
Bodhisattva ideal they would clearly become a liability, not an
asset, to their corporate bosses. Statements like those made by
Master Murase are nothing more than feeble attempts to ration
alize the symbiotic relationship which presently exists between
Zen and corporate Japan. This relationship, as has been shown,
is based on more than 700 years of Zen cooperation with, and
support for, the power structure of the day. Its reform will be no
easy task.
Japanese Zen is not, however, completely without hope for
progressive change. As has been noted, there were Zen priests
like Uchiyama Gud6 who recognized the basic incompatibility
of Zen and capitalism as early as the late Meiji period. He gave
the following explanation of why he had become a socialist:
As a propagator of the Buddha's teachings, I believe that all
sentient beings have Buddha-nature [i.e., the capacity to
realize enlightenment]; that they are all equal, without any
superiors or inferiors; and that they are all my children.
These are the golden words which form the basis ofmy faith,
Jdiscovered that these golden words are identical with those
spoken by socialists. It was for this reason that I finally
became a believer in socialism. 23
Although priests like Uchiyama almost completely disap
peared (or more accurately, were removed) from the Zen tradi
tion during the 1920s, 30s and 40s, a few did reappear after
World War II. These were priests like Ichikawa Hakugen who
has already been mentioned. Included in his books condemning
Zen's (and his own) collaboration with Japanese Fascism are
discussions of Zen's political, economic and social thought. In
Meditating monk being struck with a kyosaku
by a senior monk-monitor. (D. Victoria)
67
The War Responsibility ofBuddhists (Bukkya-sha no sensa seki
nin), he devotes one full chapter to the direction and content of a
possible "Buddhist socialism. "24 Rooted in the Buddhist con
cept of siinya or "emptiness" (the absence of any permanent,
changeless entity in the universe), he maintains that Buddhist
socialism would be characterized by, among other things, a
humble and open spirit cleansed of the will to power and the
absolutism of self. It would, furthermore, work toward the
ultimate demise of state power and the emergence of a com
munal society free of the capitalist mode of private property.
A generation of students of Zen at Hanazono University
have grown to maturity under Ichikawa's guidance. One of
them, Kashiwagi Ryuho, has only recently written the most
complete account of Uchiyama Gudo's life and thought yet
available.
25
Together with a small group of Buddhist intellec
tuals and social activists, he has formed the "Gudo Society"
(Gudo no kai). It already counts as one of its members, Setouchi
Harumi, a Buddhist nun and one of Japan's leading woman
writers.
It is, of course, still much too early to talk about the
existence of a significant Zen (or Buddhist) socialist movement
in Japan. The most that can be said is that the potential does
exist. In the meantime, employee training programs will con
tinue to be the main "social activity" of the majority of Japan
ese Zen Buddhist monasteries. In fact, in the short run these
programs will undoubtedly be expanded. As the worldwide
crisis of capitalism deepens, the Japanese corporate need for a
disciplined and subservient work force will become greater than
ever before. However, given the growing strength of both the
external and internal forces opposed to "Japan, Inc." (and its
American and European allies), there is no more reason to
believe that contemporary Japanese 'Zen leaders will, ulti
mately, be any more successful in maintaining the corporate
state than their predecessors were in maintaining the feudal and
fascist regimes of the past. '*
Notes
I. The meditative aspect of Buddhism had been Introduced into Japan at a
relatively early date. The Japanese monk. Dosho (628-700). in fact. built the
first meditation hall in the then-capital ofJapan. Nara. in the latter part of the 7th
century.
2. Although there ar.:: other more "Zen-like" interpretatIons of thl'
exchange, another noted Zen scholar. Heinrich Dumoulin. agrees with SuzukI
that the following exchange reveal> the way in which Tokimune derived courage
from his Zen training to face the Mongol Thu,. thi, incident may well
be said to mark the origin of the belief in Japan that Zen training wa, efficaciou,
in warfare. See Heinrich Dumoulin. A Historv of Zen Buddhism. (Bo>lon:
Beacon Press. 1963). p. 138. and D. T SuzukI. Zen and Japanese Culture.
(New York: Princeton Universlly Press. 1959). pp. 66-67.
3. D. T. Suzuki. Essentials of Zen Buddhism. (New York: Princeton
University Press. 1962). p. 458.
4. A. Moore (ed.). The Japanese Mind. <Honolulu: Umver,lty
Press of Hawaii, 1967). p. 2JJ.
5. Nakamura Hajime, Ways of ThinkinE; of Easlern Peoples. edited by
Philip P. Wiener. (Honolulu: East-West Center Press. 1964), p. 430.
6. Ibid., p. 429.
7. Shaku Siien, Sermons of a Buddhist Abbot. (LaSalle. Illinois: Open
Court Publishing Co.. 1913). p. 202.
8. Ibid., p. 203.
9. Ichikawa Hakugen, 'Shukyo-sha no senso-seekinin 0 IOU' in Nihon no
shiiky(J. vol. I. no. I (Dec. 1974), p. 38.
10. Ichikawa Hakugen. Zen 10 gendai shiso. (Tokyo: Tokuma Shotc;n.
1967), p. 206.
II. Op. cit.. p. 45.
12. Toward the latter part of the (A Universal Recommen
dation forthe Practice of Zazen) Dogen wrote: "By virtue it is possible
to transcend the difference between 'common' and 'sacred' and attain the ability
to die while doing zazen or while standing up ...
13. Maruyama Teruo. Nihonjin no kokoro 0 dame ni shila meiso. akuso.
guso. (Tokyo: Yamate Shobo. 1977). p. 49.
14. Ichikawa HakuE;en. Zen 10 E;endai shis6. p. 173.
15. Frank Gibney. Japan: The Fragile Superpower. (New York: W. W.
Norton and Co., 1975): p. 204.
16. George A. De Vos. "Apprenticeship and Paternalism." in Modern
Japanese Organization and Decision-Makin/(. ed. Ezra F. Vogel (Berkeley:
University of California Press. 1975). pp. 221-23.
17. "Marching to the Company Tune." Focus Japan. June 1977, p. 36.
18.
19.
20. Maruyama Teruo. Nihonjin no kokoro 0 dame ni shira meiss. ahusa.
gusu. p. 194.
21. As quoted in Yokoi Yuh6's Zen Masler Dopen. (Tokyo/New York:
John Weatherhill. 1976). p. 5.
22. Ibid.. p. 62.
23. A, quoted In Ka,hiwagi Ryuho', Taigvaku jiken to Uchiyama Gudo.
(Tokyo: JCA Shuppan-,ha. 1979). p. 29.
24. Ichikawa Hakugen. Bukkyo-sha no senso sekmin. <Tokyo: ShunJu
sha. 1970). pp. 150-68.
25. Kashiwagi Ryuho. Talgvaku jiken to Uchiyama Guda. (Tokyo: JCA
Shuppan-sha,. 1979>.
Outer hall of the meditation hall (zazen-do). Lay trainees meditate in this
area while monk> meditate (and ,Ieep) in the inner part. The wooden fish
is struck to announce meals. (D. Victoria)
68
Medical Care for the Atomic Bomb
Victims in the United States
by Stephen SalafT
Profound physical. emotional and financial hardships char
acterize the socially neglected lives of the 1.000 or more survivors
of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bomb catastrophes living
in the United States no less than similar hibakusha in Japan. *
These victims. principally US citizens of Japanese ancestry who
were studying or working in Japan when World War II began. I
and postwar brides of US servicemen. have long been engaged
in a tenacious struggle to obtain adequate medical care. This
struggle has reached a new turning point with medical relief
legislation before the U.S. Congress.
Until recently. the poorly understood maladies of these
A-bomb survivors were considered idiosyncratic even in ad
vanced non-military medical circles of North America. The
Japanese term hibakusha. literally" A-bomb received person."
is now entering general use to designate all victims of nuclear
radiation.The serious nuclear reactor accident at the Three Mile
Island power station. and the medical claims of U. S. service
men and civilians exposed to radiation at the Defense Depart
ment's nuclear weapons testing s i t e s ~ have led many others to
realize that they are also hibakusha. The need for sophisticated
knowledge about radiation exposure. and the treatment of radia
tion-related illness. is now more urgent than ever.
The Hiroshima and Nagasaki victims residing in the US are
a special group among the nearly 370.000 survivors of the
August 1945 onslaughts who have been medically registered as
A-bomb sufferers by the Ministry of Health and Welfare of
Japan. Since they were strong enough to break their roots and
emigrate. their number automatically excludes the grossly in
jured and sufferers of acute radiation diseases. Their daily lives
are for the most part manageable. but as the hibakusha reach
their middle and later years. they report greater susceptibility to
disease. and a slower recovery rate from illness. They vividly
recall the monstrous injuries. deaths and lingering radiation
poisoning of the A-bomb shocks. They find their terrible pains
for the most part undiagnosed by the medical profession. and
cannot avoid attributing their complaints to the holocaust. Any
symptom. to the hibakusha. is a possible sign of premature
death. and their worries are heightened by apprehension that
their children and grandchildren may suffer serious health de
ficiencies and physical deformities.
* On the hiblkllsl!a in Japan. ,ee the Bullelill of CO/lcerned Asiull Sclw/ars.
Volume 10. No.2. April-June. 1978. pp. 28-.n. available for $2.50.
And yet. if the hibakusha openly reveal their tragic histories
and distressing psychic trauma. insurance companies may cancel
or raise the cost of their health coverage. or amend policies to
exclude infirmities resulting from the atomic bombings. 3
An Exclusion' Clause in many Blue Cross Plan health
insurance contracts disallows claims resulting from "war in
jury ... which would encompass the many radiation and other
A-bomb aft1ictions in the hibakusha of 1945. (Moreover. Blue
Cross corporations specifically absolve themselves of claims
resulting from "atomic explosion or other release of nuclear
energy" occurring after the effective date of the insurance
agreement. This would bar insurance protection against future
radiation release from nuclear misfortunes such as Three Mile
Island.) The extent to which anemia or more serious blood
diseases. such as leukemia. which debilitate the hibakusha are
insurable with Blue Cross is unclear. Needy hibakusha sub
scribers may also find it difficult to obtain, through Blue Cross,
Medicare and Medical insurance policies, the preventative medi
cine services they require.
Owing to the frustrating. decades-long inability of ~ h e
survivors to obtain medical services in the US. the "Committee
of Atomic Bomb Survivors in the United States of America,"
centered in Los Angeles and San Francisco. has invited two
specialized medical teams from Japan to conduct examinations
and lay the basis for future treatment. In March-April 1977, a
mission from the Hiroshima Prefectural Medical Association
and the Radiation Effects Research Foundation (formerly the
Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission), Hiroshima, was assisted
by the Los Angeles County Medical Association and the Japanese
American Medical Association in examining 100 of the survivors
in California. The Hiroshima physicians, through comprehen
sive medical examinations and screening by a survey and ques
tionnaire, found that hypertension occurred in about 27 percent
of the females and 10 percent of the males. that the incidence of
female gynecologic surgery appeared high. and that a signifi
cant number of the hibakusha had low white blood cell counts. 4
According to Dr. Thomas Noguchi. Los Angeles County Medi
cal Examiner-Coroner. and one of the US physicians best in
formed on hibakusha symptomatology. the weakened blood
formation systems of the hibakusha have led to a high degree of
nutritional anemia. and there appears in addition to be a greater
incidence of breast and uterine cancer than among the general
female population. 4
69
-----
A six-member medical visitation group from Hiroshima
conducted examinations of 150 survivors in Los Angeles and
San Francisco in May 1979, and the data from this extended
survey is now being analyzed in Japan. The Survivors Commit
tee is attempting to regularize annual visits by Hiroshima doctors.
Before treatment can be effectively prescribed, the radiation
dosage must be calculated as a function of both the distance
from the hypocenter of the explosion, and the nature of the
shielding protecting the victim. The establishment of a central
registry of such information in the Health Physics Division of
the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, with the cooperation of the
Japanese experts,6 will aid physicians in relating radiation do
simetry to the occurrence of cancer, leukemia, genetic abnormali
ities, and other disorders. The hibakusha themselves are reas
sured by the' 'kind, supporting hand" they are at last beginning
to receive, and their increasing contact with physicians who
have devoted their careers to the welfare of the sufferers. 7
Under intense mass pressure, the Japanese Government
has enacted two A-bomb sufferers medical treatment laws,
whose purpose is the preservation and improvement of the
health of the hibakusha through programs of medical examina
tion, treatment and disability payments. S In March 1978, the
Japanese Supreme Court handed down, in the case of a Korean
hibakusha. a major decision entitling hibakusha from any foreign
country to receive medical treatment in Japan. 9 But it is difficult
for victims in the US to undertake the arduous, costly journey to
Japan, and to meet the prohibitive accommodation expenses
while undergoing treatment there.
The United Nations General Assembly resolved on Nov
ember 24 1961 that the use of nuclear weapons is a violation of
international law and a crime against humanity. 10 The US
government, which along with Great Britain and Canada voted
against this resolution, denies any ethical or legal liability for
the survivors of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic disasters,
and the Japanese victims of the thermonuclear fallout calamity
at the Bikini Atoll in March 1954. A protracted legislative battle
has thus been joined in Congress to secure a modicum of
financial support for hibakusha medical care in the United
States. An Atomic Bomb Survivors Bill (HR 1129) was intro
duced in the House of Representatives in January 1979 by Con
gressman Edward Roybal (Democrat, Los Angeles). At the time
of writing (late December 1979), Bill 1129 possessed 23 cospon
sors and was under consideration in the Subcommittee on Ad
ministrative Law and Governmental Operations of the House
Judiciary Committee. The bill would extend limited medical
coverage to US citizens and permanent residents II who were
injured by the atomic bombings. To obtain coverage under HR
1129, victims would require certification by the Secretary of
Health, Education and Welfare that their physical illness or
injury is directly attributable to the bomb explosions or their
radioactive fallout. The physician or medical facility treating the
sufferers would then obtain from HEW payment of that portion
of the charges not already covered by insurance. Predecessor
hibakusha aid legislation, which Roybal has been patiently
carrying since 1972, expired in the full Judiciary Committee in
1978, but HR I 129 stands a better chance of passage. I learned
from Rep. Roybal in December 1979 that his measure enjoys the
support of 30 to 40 percent of the Judiciary Committee ..
12
The Roybal Bill provides financial compensation, but no
program of medical services and treatment, which would re
main the responsibility of the individual hibakusha. Neverthe
less, the Survivors Committee, which has worked hard t",keep
the Bill before Congress, regards it as a good beginning. Dr.
Noguchi has shared with me his vision that the modest financial
resources which HR I 129 would make available to the hibakusha
could in practice be pooled. Thus, a group of hibakusha might
organize periodic centralized clinics, in association with com
munity-oriented hospitals, which could sponsor annual medical
visitation teams from Japan. 13 Rep. Roybal emphasized to me
his hope that following Three Mile Island, HEW will be moved
by the constructive spirit of the Bill 1129 campaign to establish,
under the N ationaiinstitute of Health, a center for interdiscipli
nary research and treatment of nuc lear radiation afflictions. 14
The Roybal Bill has received backing from the entire
medical community, commencing with the Los Angeles County
and California Medical Associations, faced with the medical
quandary presented by the local hibakusha populations, and
culminating in endorsement by the American Medical Associa
tion in 1978.
15
However, the Bill has thus far been blocked by
Congressmen close to the State and Defense Departments, who
Nuclear War "Uni magi nable Destruction"
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70
fear that enactment of HR 1129 "could establish a far-reaching
precedent for war damage and injuries occurring as a result of
past wars." 16 Rep. Roybal and other medical relief advocates
have countered that the A-bombings and their resulting damage
and after-effects constitute a .. unique act of war," 17 which
created a special, long-term complex of "unprecedented" dif
ficulties in maintaining and rebuilding the lives of the hibakusha.
clearly distinguishable from the rehabilitation problems faced
by victims of non-atomic war. The obligation which many now
feel to aid the hibakusha suggests a more general obligation of
the United States to accept both the 1961 United Nations resolu
tion outlawing nuclear war, and belated responsibility for the
human and environmental destruction caused by the blast, burn
and radioactivity of nuclear weapons. *
Notes
I. In 1929 there were more than 10.000 Nisei (born in the US otJapanese
immigrant parents) temporarily residing in Japan. several thousand of whom
were living in Hiroshima. An unknown number of Nisei dwelt in Nagasaki. All
of the 10.000 were US citizens. most of whom intended to return to the United
States (and Hawaii). Rinjiro Sodei. Were We the Enemy?: Testimonies oj
Hibakusha in the United Slates (in Japanese) (Tokyo: Ushio Publishing Co ..
1978) p. 16. Owing to the anti-Japanese hysteria in the US. many immigrants
returned to Japan during the 19JOs. which may have swelled the number of
"strandees" at risk under the bombings.
2. The governmental Center for Disease Control in Atlanta has found
. 'twice the number of expected leukemia cases arllong participants in Shot
Smoky. one of the [1957 J atmospheric nuclear weapons tests in Nevada."
"Cancer Victims. Seeking US Aid. Say A-Bomb Roles Caused Disease." New
York Times. June 9. 1979. P 12. Over 100 claims were filed with the Govern
ment in 1978 by cancer patients and the families of persons who died from
cancer after exposure to fallout from the more than 80 atmospheric nuclear
weapons tests held in Nevada from 1951 to 1962 .. 'The thousands of American
servicemen exposed to Hiroshima and Nagasaki residual radiation are among
several hundred thousand US veterans exposed to atomic radiation while in the
armed forces. The vast majority were ordered to be part of US atomic bomb
testing between 1946 and 1962 ... Petitions signed by 40 veterans and widows
urging that the United States Government grant their claims for service-connected
benetits based on residual radiation exposure in Hiroshima and Nagasaki - have
been presented to White House and Veterans Administration ofticials." News
letter. Committee for US Veterans of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Portland. Ore ..
Vol I. No 2. Autumn 11l79. pl.
3. Testimony of Mr. Kanji Kuramoto. President. Committee of Atomic
Bomb Survivors in the United States of America. in Hearings on Payments to
Individuals SuJjering .fTom EJji'ClS of Atomic Bomb Explosions. Subcommittee
on Administrative Law and Governmental Relations. Committee on the Judiciary.
House of Representatives. March 21. 11l78. (Washington. D.C.: US Govern
ment Printing Oftice. 1978) pp 4l1-49. See also the testimony of Dr. Thomas
Noguchi. p 26.
4. Testimony of Dr. Mitsuo Inouye. President. Japanese-American Med
ical Association. Hearings. March 21. 1978. P 57.
5. Dr. Thomas Noguchi. interview with Stephen Salall. June 28. 1979.
6. George D. Kerr. Hiroaki Yamada and Sidney Marks. A Survey of
Radiation Doses Recei"ed bv Atomic Bomb Surl'ivors Residing in the United
States (Oak Ridge Tenn.: Oak Ridge National Laboratory. January 1976) p 2.
7. Mrs. Kazue Suyeishi. interview with Stephen Salall. June 26. 1979.
Mrs. Suyeishi. Vice President of the Survivors Committee. conducted the long
negotiations with the Japanese Ministry of Health and Welfare which led to the
1977 and 1979 medical visitation teams.
8. The IllS7 Law for Health Protection and Medical Care for A-bomb
Victims provides for biannual governmental medical examination and treatment
of injury and sickness caused by the A-bombings. The 1968 Law for Special
Measures for A-bomb Victims went somewhat beyond the primarily medical
benefits of the 1957 Law. and ret1ected the demands ofthe hibakusha for
livelihood security. Limited tinancial allowances are extended under this law to
a small percentage of the hibakus/w. Although these two measures are not
without their shortcomings. they form the scaffolding for any comprehensive
aid program for victims of radiation disasters.
9. Asahi Shimbufl (in Japanese). Tokyo. March 30. 11l78. P I.
i
I

1
f
10. Resolution 1653 (XVI) adopted by the General Assembly on November
24. 1961. states that the use of nuclear weapons is a direct violation of the UN
Charter. that it causes indiscriminate sutTering and destruction to mankind and
civilization. and as such is contrary to the rules of international law and to the
laws of humanity. Under the September IllS I San Francisco Peace Treaty
'igned by the US-allied combatants and Japan. the Japanese Government
surrendered the right to demand reparations ti)r the A-bomhings from the US. In
the view of the Japan Council Against A- and H-bombs. "Japan therefore bears
the responsibility of instituting a hibakusha aid law providing for full state
compensation." No More Hiroshimas'. Tokyo. March 1979. p 8.
I I. A permanent resident is an immigrant documented by the State De
partment to live and work permanently in the United States. For specific
personal reasons. such as the need to qualify for medical benefits in Japan. some
permanent resident hibllkusha. although naturalizable. have not become US
citizens.
12. Rep. Edward Roybal. letter to Stephen Salaff. December 12. 1979.
13. Dr. Thomas Noguchi. interview with Stephen Salaff. July J. 1979.
14. Rep. Edward Roybal. interview with Stephen Salaff. July J. 1979.
15. Report T of the AMA Board ofTrustees adopted by the AMA House of
Delegates at its June 1978 meeting.
16. Letter of Jack E. Hobbs. Acting Assistant Secretary of the Army
(Installations. Logistics and Financial Management) to Rep. Peter W. Rodino.
Jr.. Chairman. Committee on the Judiciary. June 8. 1978. p. 4. The Hobbs letter
explains further that since under the San Francisco Peace Treaty the Japanese
Government waived all claims against the Allied Powers arising out otihe war.
"[I]f an exception is made in this bill to adjudicate waived claims. this action
could have a far-reaching impact upon a number of other treaties concerning the
wide variety of claims arising out of World War II." The State Department
points out that "[I]t has been the longstanding policy of the Unite States
Government ... not to pay claims. even on an ex gratia [not compelled by legal
rightJ basis. arising out of the lawful conduct of military activities by US forces
in wartime." Letter of Edward.,M. Featherstone. Country Ofticer for Office of
Japanese Affairs. Department of State. to Kanji Kuramoto. February 8. 1978.
17. Rep. Edward Roybal. interview with Stephen Salaff. December 26.
1979.
71
Continued from the inside front cover....
and economic conditions of our society. In the field of psychol
ogy the major trend is toward behavioral psychology, while
sociobiology is taking on an ominous eminence within sociol
ogy and threatens to supercede it. Programs with humanist,
Marxist and other progressive perspectives are being cut back
while progressives on campus are denied tenure. Social work
ers, many of whom enter the profession with good intentions,
increasingly function as paper shufftlers in repressive bureauc
racies that control a growing oppressed underclass.
While, for example, progressive Asian scholars have won
the right to be heard at AAS meetings, or members of URPE are
provided a forum at economic conferences, etc., simultane
ously their real position is being attacked and eroded. Many fail
to get tenure and others are being forced out of academics
completely.
Many progressive journals and conferences address these
issues with grave concern and are providing analyses to under
stand them. Academic and professional associations attempt to
respond to the attacks within their disciplines.
It is time to bring these issues into the mainstream political
arena. The 1980s promise to be extremely difficult years for
poor, working. as well as middle income people. These years
are beginning with new political developments-grassroots
union and community organizing, the emergence of new leader
ship with new tactics among rank and file members in the trade
unions, and the growth of an independent third party movement
which has the potential of coalescing and giving a voice to all
progressive strata of our society-labor. the unorganized.
women, gay people, middle class intellectuals-independent of
the Democratic Party.
If our concerns as social scientists are to be heard and if we
are to be effective, we must be organized and our demands
brought to the new political movement. That is why we are
organizing to build this independent. interdisciplinary, mem
bership organization. We are at an embryonic stage of develop
ment and we would like more people and existing organizations
to join us. We ask readers of the Bulletin of Concerned Asian
Scholars who want to participate in the political and structural
development of such an organization to contact us.
Ann Green/Apt. IC
865 West End Avenue
New York. NY 10025 USA
(212) 663-5056
AN ACT OF GENOCIDE:
INDONESIA'S INVASION
OF EAST TIMOR
by Arnold Kohen and John Taylor
Foreward by Noam Chomsky
133 pp. Fully documented
Send $4.00 plus $.25 postage to:
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New Jersey, 07042
Books to Review
The following review copies have arrived at the office of the
Bulletin. If you are interested in reading and reviewing one or
more of them, write to Bryant Avery, BCAS. P.O. Box W,
Charlemont, MA 01339. This is not, of course, an exhaustive
list ofthe books in print-only a list ofbooks received.
We welcome reviews of other worthy volumes.
Robert J. Smith; Kurusu: The Price of ProgreH ill u Jupunese Vi/luge. 11.)5 I
1975 (Stanford University Press. 1978).
Keiji Nakazawa: Gell, A Cur/(}oll Story Vol. 2 (Tokyo;
Project Gen. 1979: distributed by War Resisters League. New York. 1979).
Milton Osborne; Southeust Asia. All Ilitroductory History (Allen & Unwin.
1979).
Willard Hanna: II/dollesia Bal/da: Co/tmiulism und Its Ajiermuth ill the Nutmeg
Isla lids (Institute forthe Study of Human Issues. 1978).
Harold Crouch; The Army ulld Politics in Illdoliesiu (Cornell Univ. Press.
1978).
Fang Xiu; Notes 011 the History olMalayall Chillese New LiterulLlre. II.)]()II.}.J].
Nonie Sharp: PUfliUl New Guillea: Illdollesia' s Next Domillo? (Greensborough.
VIC. Australia: 1979).
Kees Lagerberg; Westlrialland Jakarta Imperialism (New York; St. Martin',
Press. 1979).
Carl Trocki: Prillce of Pirates (Malaya/Singapore) (Singapore Univ. & Ohio
Univ. Presses. 1979).
Asia Forum on Human Rights; The SllIte Rights ill Maluysia (Hong
Kong. 1979).
Charles F. Keyes (ed.): Ethnic Adaptation and Idemity: Tile Kurell 011 the Thui
Frolllier with Burma <Philadelphia; I.S.H.1. 1979).
M. Nazif Mohib Shahrani; The Kirghi: and Wakili (Seattle;
Univ. of Washington Press. 1979).
Wm. McCagg. Jr. and B. Silver (eds.): SOl'iet Ethllic Frollliers (Perga
mono 1979).
Lawrence Lifschultz: Bangladesh: The UI!/illished Rel'OllIIioli (London; Zed
Press. 1977. 1979).
Vilho Harle (ed.); The Political Ecol/omy Food (Farnborough. Hants. Eng
land; Saxon House. 197M: distributed by Renouf. Brookfield. VT.).
Sklar. Rudavsky. Stevenson et aJ.; The Trilateral Commissiol/ Tukes on World
HilI/gel'; Plullllillg/or Imemutiol/ul AgricllllUre (San Francisco; Earthwork
Publications. 1979>.
Hartmann and Boyce; Needless HUI/ger; Voicesfrotn a Ballgladesh Villuge (San
Francisco; Inst. for Food and Development Policy. 1979).
James ReardonAnderson; Yellall al/d the Greut POIl'ers. II.}.J.J.J{) (Columbia
University Press. 1980).
Michael Schaller: The U.S. Crusade iliChilia. 11.)3N11.}.J5 (Columbia University
Press. 1979).
King C. Chen (ed.): China ulld the Three Worlds: A Foreign Polin' Re<lder
(M. E. Sharpe. 1979).
Samuel S. Kim: China. the United Nutioll.l WId the World Order (Princeton
UniversitY.Press. 1979).
Marc Blecher and G. White; Mil'rof'olitics ill COl/temporary Chilla: A Techlliml
Unit duril/g und ajier the Cultural Re\'()llIIioli (M. E. Sharpe. 1980).
Henri Maspero: Chilla ill Amiquity (Univ. of Massachusetts. 1979).
Silas H .. L. Wu; Pas.mge 10 Power: Kwlghsi alld His Heir Apf'urem. 1M I
17]] (Cambridge. MA; Harvard Univ. Press. 1979).
Tong and Li: The Memoirs of Li Tsullgjell (Boulder. co: Westview Press.
1979).
John King Fairbank; The Ullited States alld Chilla. edition (Harvard Univ.
Press. 1979)
J. Fogel and Wm. T. Rowe (eds.); Perlpectil'es OIl a Cltwlgill,l( Chilla (Boulder.
CO. 1979).
P. Seybolt and G. Kk Chiang; Lallgllage Refimll iI/ Chilla (M. E. Sharpe.
1979).
Jim Hyde: Allstruliu: The Asia COl/l/ectioll (Malmsbury/Melbourne. Australia;
1978).
Cover photo; Women transplanting rice (B. P. Reddy. Hyderabad. courtesy of Maria Mies).
72