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Japan Family
The family is the earliest locus of social life for an
individual, and it provides a model of social organization
for most
later encounters with the wider world. Yet, as
uchi, the
Japanese family does not have clear boundaries. At times,
it may
refer to a nuclear family of parents and unmarried
children. On
other occasions, it refers to a line of descent, and on
still
others, it refers to the household as a unit of production
or
consumption.
A great variety of family forms have existed
historically in
Japan, from the matrilocal customs of the Heian elite,
which are
described in Genji monogatari (Tale of Genji), to
the
extreme patrilineality of the samurai class in the feudal
period.
Numerous family forms, through which ran a common belief
in the
existence of the family-household beyond the life of its
current
members, coexisted particularly in the countryside. Among
the upper
classes and wealthier merchant and artisan urban
households of the
Tokugawa period, the chonin, providing for
household
continuity, and if possible enriching the household's
estate,
represented duty to one's ancestors and appreciation
toward one's
parents.
With the promulgation of the Domestic Relations and
Inheritance
Law in 1898, the Japanese government institutionalized
more rigid
family controls than most people had known in the feudal
period.
Individuals were registered in an official family
registry. In the
early twentieth century, each family was required to
conform to the
ie (household) system, with a multigenerational
household
under the legal authority of a household head. In
establishing the
ie system, the government moved the ideology of
family in
the opposite direction of trends resulting from
urbanization and
industrialization. The ie system took as its model
for the
family the Confucian-influenced pattern of the upper
classes of the
Tokugawa period. Authority and responsibility for all
members of
the ie lay legally with the household head. Each
generation
supplied a male and female adult, with a preference for
inheritance
by the first son and for patrilocal marriage. When
possible,
daughters were expected to marry out, and younger sons
were
expected to establish their own households. Women could
not legally
own or control property or select spouses. The ie
system
thus artificially restricted the development of
individualism,
individual rights, women's rights, and the nuclearization
of the
family. It formalized patriarchy and emphasized lineal and
instrumental, rather than conjugal and emotional ties,
within the
family.
After World War II, the Allied occupation forces
established a
new family ideology based on equal rights for women, equal
inheritance by all children, and free choice of spouse and
career.
From the late 1960s, most marriages in Japan have been
based on the
mutual attraction of the couple and not the arrangement by
the
parents. Moreover, arranged marriages might begin with an
introduction by a relative or family friend, but actual
negotiations do not begin until all parties, including the
bride
and groom, are satisfied with the relationship.
Under the ie system, only a minority of
households
included three generations at a time because nonsuccessor
sons
(those who were not heirs) often set up their own
household. From
1970 to 1983, the proportion of three-generation
households fell
from 19 percent to 15 percent of all households, while
twogeneration households consisting of a couple and their
unmarried
children increased only slightly, from 41 percent to 42
percent of
all households. The greatest change has been the increase
in
couple-only households and in elderly single-person
households.
Public opinion surveys in the late 1980s seemed to
confirm the
statistical movement away from the three-generation
ie
family model. Half of the respondents did not think that
the first
son had a special role to play in the family, and nearly
two-thirds
rejected the need for adoption of a son in order to
continue the
family. Other changes, such as an increase in filial
violence and
school refusal, suggest a breakdown of strong family
authority.
Official statistics, however, indicate that Japanese
concepts
of family continued to diverge from those in the United
States in
the 1980s. The divorce rate, although increasing slowly,
remained
at 1.3 per 1,000 marriages in 1987, low by international
standards.
Strong gender roles remained the cornerstone of family
responsibilities. Most survey respondents said that family
life
should emphasize parent-child ties over husband-wife
relations.
Nearly 80 percent of respondents in a 1986 government
survey
believed that the ancestral home and family grave should
be
carefully kept and handed on to one's children. More than
60
percent thought it best for elderly parents to live with
one of
their children. This sense of family as a unit that
continues
through time is stronger among people who have a
livelihood to pass
down, such as farmers, merchants, owners of small
companies, and
physicians, than among urban salary and wage earners.
Anthropologist Jane M. Bachnik noted the continued
emphasis on
continuity in the rural families she studied. Uchi
(here,
the contemporary family) were considered the living
members of an
ie, which had no formal existence. Yet, in each
generation,
there occurred a sorting of members into permanent and
temporary
members, defining different levels of uchi.
Various family life-styles exist side by side in
contemporary
Japan. In many urban salaryman families, the husband may
commute to
work and return late, having little time with his children
except
for Sundays, a favorite day for family outings. The wife
might be
a "professional housewife," with nearly total
responsibility for
raising children, ensuring their careers and marriages,
running the
household, and managing the family budget. She also has
primary
responsibility for maintaining social relations with the
wider
circles of relatives, neighbors, and acquaintances and for
managing
the family's reputation. Her social life remains separate
from that
of her husband. It is increasingly likely that in addition
to these
family responsibilities, she may also have a part-time job
or
participate in adult education or other community
activities. The
closest emotional ties within such families are between
the mother
and children.
In other families, particularly among the
self-employed,
husband and wife work side by side in a family business.
Although
gender-based roles are clear cut, they might not be as
rigidly
distinct as in a household where work and family are more
separated. In such families, fathers are more involved in
their
children's development because they have more opportunity
for
interacting with them.
As women worked outside of the home with increasing
frequency
beginning in the 1970s, there was pressure on their
husbands to
take on more responsibility for housework and child care.
Farm
families, who depend on nonfarm employment for most of
their
income, are also developing patterns of interaction
different from
those of previous generations.
Data as of January 1994
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