Organizer and Chair: Miriam Y. Murase, Saint Mary's College

Discussant: Suzanne Ryan, UC Berkeley

Feminist scholarship has largely viewed the state as an adversary, positioning women against the state. Recent literature portrays the state as an advocate, focusing on women working within the state. Rather than generalize, this panel emphasizes the specific historical context that has shaped the nature of the relationship between women and the state in Japan at different points in time. By bringing together researchers from Japan, Korea, and the United States, representing the fields of history, political science, and American studies, this panel provides an international and interdisciplinary view of this complex and evolving relationship. Taeko Shibahara’s account of Kato Shizue’s struggle to bring birth control to Japanese women highlights state attempts to control women’s bodies during the first half of the twentieth century in order to serve imperialist and militarist goals. Atsuko Aoki examines the relationship between the state and Japanese women settlers in colonial Korea. She finds that Japanese women’s groups were instrumental in state efforts to mobilize Korean women on behalf of colonial interests. Miriam Murase examines Japan’s vast network of public women’s centers, which were built in response to domestic and international pressure, and represent an important form of state aid to the women’s movement. Ki-young Shin examines recent developments at local women’s policy offices. She argues that these offices have created a space in which women can engage the state, and become active participants in policy making. Discussant Suzanne Ryan contributes her expertise in comparative politics and the Japanese bureaucracy.

Taeko Shibahara, Doshisha University, Japan

Some scholars see Kato Shidzue (1897-2001), a leading Japanese birth control activist, as a supporter of eugenics for the sake of race purity. To some degree she was, but she was primarily concerned with birth control and the welfare of the mother. This paper analyses Kato’s motivation for "eugenics advocacy." It focuses on the birth control movement in Japan in the mid 20th century, in relation to the Eugenics Protection Law. Before WW II, Kato's fundamental motivation for promoting birth control was her concern for the wellbeing of women. While population control was seen as a key solution for the creation of a good society, Kato also supported birth control based on ideological grounds that smaller families might reduce poverty to raise the "quality" of the population. Following WW II, in the midst of scarcity, rising birth rates, and pregnancies resulting from contact with US GIs, many Japanese women resorted to back-alley abortions. There was an urgent need to promote reliable contraceptive methods for women. Kato was elected to the Diet in 1946 and became one of the key legislators who introduced a bill to legalize eugenic sterilization, contraception and abortion. Although the bill was ignored in 1947, it developed into the enactment of the Eugenic Protection Law in 1948, which allowed for eugenic sterilization and abortion. Unlike Kato’s original motivation to promote family planning, however, the law resulted in free access to abortion with no reference to birth control.

Atsuko Aoki, Brown University, Japan

The relationship between the state and "women" has long been discussed, with its complexity being unearthed to some degree. This paper examines how such a relationship between women and the state operated in a colonial setting. By focusing on activities of Japanese women settlers in colonial Korea, this paper hopes to offer insight into the ways in which the Japanese state (whose interests in general were represented by actions of the Government-General of Korea) co-opted groups of Japanese women settlers in order to use them as rather active agents to intervene Korean women’s lives and mobilize the latter for various colonial projects. Moreover, this paper traces how Japanese women settlers forged their political, social and cultural identities in the course of colonial encounters vis-à-vis Korean women and of their political cooperation with the Japanese state.

Miriam Y. Murase, Saint Mary's College

Although Japan has been slow to adopt effective policies on behalf of women, the government provides substantial resources to women through hundreds of publicly funded women’s centers. These centers are designated, physical spaces used for women’s social, political, and cultural activities. This paper examines women’s centers within the theoretical framework of state feminism. The relationship between women and the state has long been viewed as adversarial. But current scholarship focuses on women’s policy agencies and their potential to act as allies of women’s movements. Do women’s centers promote the interests of the women’s movement in Japan? This paper analyzes the content of programs at several hundred women’s centers. The issues addressed by women’s centers are then compared with issues taken up by women’s organizations. While women’s issues and social issues are the main focus of organized women’s groups, programs offered at women’s centers tend to address issues of daily living, family, and home. This study demonstrates that women’s centers are not neutral spaces that automatically reflect women’s interests. It serves as a reminder that state feminism may be incompatible with societal feminism.

Ki-young Shin, University of Washington

Since the 1999 Basic Law for Gender Equal Society passed in Japan, it seems that the Japanese government has attempted to revise the long controversial paradigm of women’s policy based on the male bread winner model to that of "gender-free" policy. Drawing on my two time interviews with local government officials and the women participants in local government in 2004 and 2005, this essay analyzes the changing nature of women’s political participation at the local level. It asks what gender-free citizenship is understood in local legislation of the Gender Equal Society Ordinance; what the gender-free citizenship came to mean to various stake-holders of women’s policy; how the legislation affects both women’s participation in local government projects, both legally and practically. I tentatively argue that various women’s concerted effort and experiences to negotiate with the local government and the fierce conservative opposition during the legislation process provide an opportunity to women’s groups to redefine and practice women’s new citizenship apart from the old model of good wife and wise mother.