1

Research Proposal

How does the capitalist idea of time is money affect the

institution of contemporary family? The case study of Japan

By Rodrigo Arenas C.

1.1. Research Goals

General

To find out the most salient challenges that the institution of family is facing in the

context of global capitalism.

Specific

To evaluate the impact of these challenges in the Japanese context.

1.2. Research Problem

Global capitalism and its laws of demand and supply are reaching almost every aspect of

society. Not only the basic domestic products are being commodified, but now also the

environment, 1 religion, 2 arts, 3 education, 4 health care, 5 traditional events, 6 human

relations, etc. The utilitarian ideology of capitalism is expressed in the conversion of

virtually anything with a socially recognized value into a utility that can be priced and

traded in the market. In order to maximize wellbeing, utilitarians argue that it is necessary

to calculate the advantages and disadvantages resulting from every decision. The more

advantages and less disadvantages people can get in less time, the happier they are

1 ONeill, John, Managing without prices: 12. 2 Goodchild, Philip. 2003. Capitalism and Religion: The Price of Piety. Routeledge, Sept 2. Business & Economics. 3 Leacock E and Engels F. 1972. The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State, J. Marriage Fam.: 214. 4 Wang I and Guo L. 2013. Introduction to Asian Culture(s) and Globalization. 15 Comp. Lit. Cult. Purdue Univ: 2. & Hashimoto A and Traphagan JW, Changing Japanese Families: 9. 5 Lister, John. 2013. Health Policy Reform: Global Health versus Private Profit. Oxfordshire: Libri Publishing & Jacobs AJ, 2010. Max Weber Was Right about the Preconditions , Just Wrong about Japan : The Japanese Ethic and Its Spirit of Capitalism: 12. 6 Sanagavarapu P. 2007. What Does Cultural Globalisation Mean for Parenting in Immigrant Families in the 21st Century?: 36.

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expected to become. Thus, time acquires a value that in the capitalist system, can also be

commodified and expressed as time is money.7

In contrast with this, the family, understood as the basis of society,8 and as an institution

for emotional exchange between its members9, depends on ties that also require time to

consolidate. In Japan, people are opting to delay marriage or simply opting out of it. 10 This

behavior is studied as the result of two different causes: 1) the desire to form a family but

that cannot be afforded, or 2) the rebellion against tradition. With a birth rate decline and

a continual rise in life expectancy, the Japanese population is shrinking. Many

anthropologists and sociologists have placed their attention on the institution of family

which is seen as facing a crisis due to a change of values from communitarian into

individualistic ones.11 Instead of dedicating time to others, namely partner and children,

recent surveys show that people prefer to dedicate time to their own individual

development.12 The values of pleasure and individual achievement derived from global

capitalism are taking precedence over Confucian values of traditional conservatism and

relational hierarchy.13

2. Body

2.1. Hypothesis and arguments

In this research I will test the hypothesis that the utilitarian ideology of global capitalism is

opposed to the love-favoring post-modern concept of family in contemporary Japan and it

is the main responsible for the family crisis. Firstly, because people's time is being

disputed between family and economic activity in a zero-sum game.14 Forming a family is

calculated as a highly risky investment of time and money and thus, economic activity is

7 Adam, Barbara. 2000. When Time Is Money 94. 8 Zhang, Shengyong. 2012. Globalization, Asian Modernity, Values, and Chinese Civil Society 8 (2): 23.

9 Hashimoto, Akiko and Traphagan, JW. 2008. Changing Japanese Families: 5. 10

Ibid: 2. 11 Ibid: 1. 12 This is especially the case for women. Nihon Seishonen Kenkyujo. 2004. Ko kosei no gakushu ishiki to nichijo seikatsu: Nihon, amerika, chu goku no 3 kakoku hikaku. (Tokyo: Nihon Seishonen Kenkyu jo): 87. 13

Xu, Xiaoge. 1998. Asian values revisited: In the context of intercultural news communication, Media Asia: 25. Xu, Asian values revisited: In the context of intercultural news communication, 14

Smith, Thomas C, 1986. Peasant time and factory time. 111: 165.

3

prioritized. Secondly, based on Engels critique of the Victorian nuclear family,15 I will

present the argument that traditional family gender roles are being seen as old-fashioned

and do not adjust with womens educational or professional expectations in

contemporary Japan. Finally, I argue against the view that capitalism is giving women

autonomy16 through money because: 1) it is in fact encouraging them to become slaves of

the market forces just as men have been, and 2) it is converting them into sexual utilities

that can be traded in mens market, thus reproducing the patriarchical status quo. The

utilitarian ideology of global capitalism is facilitating the conditions for alternative forms of

social interaction such as online dating services, webcam chat smartphone applications,

pornography or prostitution to take place as an attempt to maximize the socially

recognized value of sex and/or romance converted in utility and minimize the cost of an

emotional relation through a disengaging tool, namely, money.

2.2. Academic Significance

Although this research is focused on the case of Japan, the crisis of the family is a

worldwide phenomenon, specially taking place in highly industrialized societies. The

continual commodification of every socially recognized value is constantly presenting the

dilemma of where to draw the line between what should and what should not be

commodified. The post-modern love-favoring concept of family presents an interesting

example due to the fact that love still appears reluctant to be commodified since it

depends on factors that vary from person to person. Time, being the only exception to

that rule, is the basic factor to consolidate any social relation and is now however, also

commodified. Through the analysis of the contemporary family crisis, this research

attempts to determine whether the utilitarian ideology of capitalism has a pervasive

influence in every area of society that limits and in many cases, opposes the original

meaning of many social institutions such as the family. Thus, on the one hand, it may

contribute to draw the line between the sociology of family and ethics, and on the other,

15 Engels, Friedrich, and Lewis Henry Morgan. 1884. The origin of the family, private property and the state. Moscow: Foreign Languages Publishing House: 1-99. 16 Horwitz Steven, 2012. How Capitalism and the Bourgeois Virtues Transformed and Humanized the Family. 41 J. Socio. Econ: 792

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between anthropology and economics, through the recognition that the utilitarian

ideology of the market is opposed to the family, because it cannot be measured in terms

of efficiency but in long-term, unpaid time investments to others.

Finally, the nostalgic view that the Edo, Meiji traditional family or the 1950s love-favoring

Japanese family was a stable institution that could coexist harmonically with the capitalist

production17 and thus we should return to, is impracticable today because it was based on

patriarchy18, which does not adjust with womens aspirations in contemporary Japan.

Recognizing that the 1950s love-based marriage was also built on the subordination of

women,19 narrows down the scope of factors that can define the new concept of family in

contemporary Japan.

3. Terminology

1) Time

Time has a social origin as a category of the mind.20 We cannot understand the world

without concepts such as time, space, number, cause, and so on.21 Time, alongside with

the other categories, helps to create the real world as a social phenomena. But where do

this categories originate in the first place?

a) Ecological time and Structural time

ET is the set of time concepts derived from natural events such as the movements

of the sun. ST is time defined by Evans-Pritchard as institutionalized relationships

between political groups.22

b) Time and Cultural Relativism

17

Engels, Friedrich, and Lewis Henry Morgan. 1884. The origin of the family, private property and the state. Moscow: Foreign Languages Publishing House. 18 Rosen R, Is Marriage Dead? (2005) 52 Dissent 97: 100. 19 Rosen R, Is Marriage Dead? (2005) 52 Dissent 97: 99. & Leacock, E and Engels, F, The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State: 39. 20 Gell, Alfred. 1992. The anthropology of time: cultural constructions of temporal maps and images. Oxford, Berg: 8. 21

Ibid. 22 Gell, Alfred. 1992. The anthropology of time: cultural constructions of temporal maps and images. Oxford, Berg: 15.

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Time elapses differently from an economical perspective. If time is measured in

terms of money, then a richer person has more time to spare than a poor one.

a) Time is Money or Commodified Time

Some economists refer to time as a form of raw material23 which is allocated to

competing ends on economizing principles. Inaction being the most anti-capitalist

act. The individual wealth of a person can be measured by the length of time he or

she can keep inactive without missing the basic elements for survival. in order to

grasp not just the changes in contemporary work relations but to conceive of

potential alternatives, time is regarded as a resource and commodity, as medium

for exchange, as measure of the work time to be exchanged, as parameter within

which transactions are conducted.

2) Japanese family

As a once lived experience and imagined social and cultural construct amid continually

changing social conditions.24 For the purpose of this research I will be referring to the

traditional, functionalist, patriarchical Edo, Meiji family and the love-favoring, post-

modern family in increasing crisis from the 1950s until today.

3) Global capitalism

As a dominant mode of production 25 that involves not merely the exchange of

commodities, but the advancement of capital, in the form of money, with the purpose of

generating profit through the purchase of commodities and their transformation into

other commodities which can command a higher price, and thus yield a profit.

4) Utilitarianism

Understood as a theory in normative ethics holding that the proper course of action is the

one that maximizes utility, usually defined as maximizing total benefit and reducing

suffering or the negatives.26

a) Utility

23 Becker 1965; Linder 1970; Soule 1955. 24 Hashimoto, Akiko and Traphagan, JW. 2008. Changing Japanese Families: 9. 25

James, Paul; Gills, Barry. 2007. Globalization and Economy, Vol. 1: Global Markets and Capitalism. London: Sage Publications: xxiii. 26

Mill, John Stuart. 1863. "Utilitarianism, trad. it.".

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The ability of a commodity to satisfy needs or wants; the satisfaction experienced

by the consumer of that commodity.27

b) Commodity

Anything which has both a use-value and an exchange-value.28

5) Zero-sum game

A mathematical representation of a situation in which a participant's gain (or loss) of

utility is exactly balanced by the losses (or gains) of the utility of the other participant(s).29

6) Opportunity Cost

The opportunity cost of money is easy to assess, whereas the opportunity cost of time is

more ambiguous.30 The greater ambiguity of the value of time allows people to be more

flexible in their evaluation of time.

7) Opportunity Cost of Money versus Opportunity Cost of Time

While opportunity cost of money is a fixed and objective concept, the opportunity cost of

time is a flexible and subjective one. Opportunity cost of money can be exemplified as if a

person does not perform a particular action, that person looses a particular amount of

money, whereas opportunity cost of time can be exemplified as if a person does not

spend time in a particular activity, that person looses the possibility of spending it on

another activity. Opportunity cost of money and time may be at odds with one another.

For example, someone could say: 'I hate to work as a speculator; I only do it for the

money'. That persons monetary opportunity cost is low because there is feasibility that by

speculating, that person will receive a high income.

4. Methodology

4.1. Disciplinary orientation and methodology

In order to answer the research question, I will focus on answering the following

preliminary questions:

a) What is the concept and characteristics of the family in Japan?

27 Wiktionary. Commodity. http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/commodity. Accessed on May 20th, 2014. 28 Marx, Karl; Engels, Frederick. 1844. Communist Manifesto 29

Wikipedia: Zero-sum game. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-sum_game. Accessed on May 23th, 2014. 30 Xie C and Haugesund S. 2008. How Is Satisfaction Affected by Spending Time Having Fun vs . Spending Time in Boredom?: VIII.

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b) What is the relation between time and money within a capitalist society?

c) To what extent is the commodification of time in opposition or in alliance with

the free development of family in contemporary Japan?

d) To what extent is the traditional male dominance being challenged by the

capitalist need to constantly increase production?

In this research project I will be bridging two main fields: Anthropology and Sociology of

the family and Economy, through time as their constitutive element.

4.2. Sources

I will be analyzing a body of text regarding the Japanese family in transition to modernity

and the new set of values that come along with the capitalist modus operandi.

4.3. Outline chapter by chapter

1. Time is Money

1.1. The Commodification of socially recognized values.

1.2. Time as the raw material of every individual.

1.3. Cost of Opportunity

1.3.1. Temporal

1.3.2. Monetary

1.4. Cultural Relativism

2. The Japanese Family and its contemporary characteristics

2.1. Why is it labeled as in crisis? (international phenomenon).

2.2. The case study of Japan and its distinctive crisis

2.2.1. Shrinking population

2.2.2. Aging population

2.2.3. Highest rate of suicides

2.2.4. Still strong (as compared with western family)

2.2.5. Coexistence of old and new

2.2.6. Hikikomori, Otaku: two personality types and their relation with productive

activity

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2.2.7. Prostitution and Pornography handled by a mafia that cannot be stopped

because they profit.

2.2.8. Renewed attention to Japanese family and the need for conceptual

redefinition

2.2.9. Feminist sociology of the family: How the patriarchical model of the family

has remained despite a change of context.

3. Japanese family versus time is money

3.1. Confucianist values versus Liberal and Utilitarianism values

3.1.1. Egalitarian roles over hierarchical ones (tomodachi no youna oya)

3.1.2. Individual success over Communitarian lifestyle (eg. Both men and women

are delaying or opting out of marriage)

3.2. Bubble and the impossibility to provide stability to the family, which came to

depend on the economy.

3.3. Global capitalism: Immigration, interracial marriage and the need to

reimagining/reconceptualise the family.

3.4. Family does not simply exist but its defined in peoples minds. The role of the

media, language, individuals and public discourse in creating a global

understanding of the family.

3.5. Alternative paths and solutions to the crisis.

3.5.1. Sustainability

5. Scope and limits of the research

I will not be referring to the large variety of family configurations that the Japanese society has

had along its history. Neither will I focus on the different theories of family to distinguish how they

match the Japanese case because I will be based on Akiko Hashimotos understanding of family. I

will limit my research to its relation with global capitalism and gender relations in contemporary

Japan.

As a counter-argument, I will present the recent views that capitalist production is not in

opposition with an egalitarian model of family provided that the companys employers apply a

personalized treatment of their employees.31 Not only through programs such as flextime and

31

Friedman, Steward. 1998. Work and Life: The End of the Zero-Sum Game. Harvard business Journal: 119.

9

paternity leave, but according to Friedman, through the application of three principles directed at

supporting but at the same time separating personal life from working life and reconciling both

time investments into one whole.32 The limitation to that is that not every company can afford to

create time for its employees while remaining competitive. Time sustainable companies

necessarily have to be money (salary) sustainable.

As a future development of this research, I will present the relation between the family and

sustainability from an economical perspective. The term sustainability is a controversial one

because it has been missused to encourage the sustaining of the unjust status quo.33 Many

companies are polluting the environment where the employee and his or her family develop their

lives. Sustainability involves the different societal groups and its interactions in harmonic

coexistance with the environment and economic development. In other words, the cyclical

treatment or reutilization of the product of peoples actions without abusing neither those people,

nor the resources in the process, will be the definition of sustainability for this research. The

treatment of the elderly, sick, children, criminals and unemployed, has found some sustainable

answers in recent scholarly discussions and experiences. One example is the coresidence of the

elderly with children. In Japan, this trend is taking ground as a sustainable match of interests by

both societal groups.34

6. References

6.1. Cited

1. ONeill, John, Managing without prices: 12.

2. Goodchild, Philip. 2003. Capitalism and Religion: The Price of Piety. Routeledge, Sept

2. Business & Economics.

3. Leacock E and Engels F. 1972. The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the

State, J. Marriage Fam.: 214.

4. Wang I and Guo L. 2013. Introduction to Asian Culture(s) and Globalization. 15 Comp.

Lit. Cult. Purdue Univ: 2. & Hashimoto A and Traphagan JW, Changing Japanese

Families: 9.

5. Lister, John. 2013. Health Policy Reform: Global Health versus Private Profit.

Oxfordshire: Libri Publishing & Jacobs AJ, 2010. Max Weber Was Right about the

32

Ibid: 120. 33 Marcuse, Peter. 1998. Sustainability Is Not Enough, 10 Environ Urban: 103

34 Ochiai E. Japanese Family System in Transition

10

Preconditions , Just Wrong about Japan : The Japanese Ethic and Its Spirit of

Capitalism: 12.

6. Sanagavarapu P. 2007. What Does Cultural Globalisation Mean for Parenting in

Immigrant Families in the 21st Century?: 36.

7. Adam, Barbara. 2000. When Time Is Money 94.

8. Zhang, Shengyong. 2012. Globalization, Asian Modernity, Values, and Chinese Civil

Society 8 (2): 23.

9. Hashimoto, Akiko and Traphagan, JW. 2008. Changing Japanese Families: 5.

10. Hashimoto, Akiko; Traphagan, John. 2008. Changing Japanese Families: 2.

11. Ibid: 1.

12. This is especially the case for women. Nihon Seishonen Kenkyujo. 2004. Ko kosei

no gakushu ishiki to nichijo seikatsu: Nihon, amerika, chu goku no 3 kakoku hikaku.

(Tokyo: Nihon Seishonen Kenkyujo): 87.

13. Xu, Xiaoge. 1998. Asian values revisited: In the context of intercultural news

communication, Media Asia: 25. Xu, Asian values revisited: In the context of

intercultural news communication,

14. Smith, Thomas C, 1986. Peasant time and factory time. 111: 165.

15. Engels, Friedrich, and Lewis Henry Morgan. 1884. The origin of the family, private

property and the state. Moscow: Foreign Languages Publishing House: 1-99.

16. Horwitz Steven, 2012. How Capitalism and the Bourgeois Virtues Transformed and

Humanized the Family. 41 J. Socio. Econ: 792

17. Engels, Friedrich, and Lewis Henry Morgan. 1884. The origin of the family, private

property and the state. Moscow: Foreign Languages Publishing House.

18. Rosen R, Is Marriage Dead? (2005) 52 Dissent 97: 100.

19. Ibid, 99. & Leacock, E and Engels, F, The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the

State: 39.

20. Gell, Alfred. 1992. The anthropology of time: cultural constructions of temporal maps

and images. Oxford, Berg: 8.

11

21. Gell, Alfred. 1992. The anthropology of time: cultural constructions of temporal maps

and images. Oxford, Berg: 8.

22. Ibid: 15.

23. Becker 1965; Linder 1970; Soule 1955.

24. Hashimoto, Akiko and Traphagan, JW. 2008. Changing Japanese Families

25. James, Paul; Gills, Barry. 2007. Globalization and Economy, Vol. 1: Global Markets

and Capitalism. London: Sage Publications: xxiii.

26. Mill, John Stuart. 1863. "Utilitarianism, trad. it.".

27. Wiktionary. Commodity. http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/commodity. Accessed on

May 20th, 2014.

28. Marx, Karl; Engels, Frederick. 1844. Communist Manifesto

29. Wikipedia: Zero-sum game. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-sum_game. Accessed

on May 23th, 2014.

30. Xie C and Haugesund S. 2008. How Is Satisfaction Affected by Spending Time Having

Fun vs . Spending Time in Boredom?: VIII.

31. Friedman, Steward. 1998. Work and Life: The End of the Zero-Sum Game. Harvard

business Journal: 119.

32. Ibid: 120.

33. Marcuse, Peter. 1998. Sustainability Is Not Enough, 10 Environ Urban: 103

34. Ochiai, E. 1997. The Japanese family system in transition: A sociological analysis of

family change in postwar Japan (Vol. 6). LTCB International Library Foundation.

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