Japanese Sociology and the Japan Sociological Society: A Brief History

I will briefly describe the history of Japanese sociology and the Japan Sociological Society (JSS) from my perspective because it is beyond my capacity to cover all the details of their history over more than one hundred years.

Foundations with the aim of improving Japanese society

The JSS was established in 1924, but Japanese sociologists had started conducting sociological research before then. As Auguste Comte conceived the reconstruction of French society after the French Revolution, Japanese sociologists envisioned the way Japanese society would be and should be structured after the Meiji Restoration. They heavily relied on the thought of Herbert Spencer, but they interpreted it in two different ways – conservatism and liberalism – depending on their political positions, as suggested by Akimoto.

Japanese sociology has strived to reflect the social realities of Japanese society and to solve them. Major social issues in prewar Japanese society were labor issues, poverty, and nationalism, to name a few; and Japanese sociologists studied them in detail hoping to improve Japanese society. Although prewar Japanese sociology was heavily influenced by European sociology, Yasuma Takada, a giant in the history of Japanese sociology, established an original theory focusing on social bonds as the building block of sociology. His intention was to make sociology an independent field in social science. The originality of his theory was highly valued by contemporary Japanese sociologists and his work became a milestone in prewar Japanese sociology.

Post-WWII: modernization and Marxist theories

After World War II, Japanese sociologists inherited a theoretical legacy from great prewar sociologists such as Yasuma Takada, Teizo Toda, and Eitaro Suzuki. Meanwhile, according to Tominaga in his book Sociology of Postwar Japan, they conducted sociological inquiries in particular fields such as sociology of the family, rural sociology, urban sociology, and industrial sociology. This led to the fragmentation of Japanese sociology. In response to this situation, two theoretical streams emerged: modernization theory and Marxist theory.

Modernization theory was influenced by structural functionalism proposed by Talcott Parsons and his collaborators. It focused on the effects of modernization and industrialization on various segments in society. Marxist theory also studied the effects of modernization and industrialization, but its analytical perspective was different from that of modernization theory: it mainly focused on the effects of class structure. This came from Marx’s theory on the contradiction between forces of production and relations of production.

Modernization theory became popular while Japanese society enjoyed strong economic growth (1955-1973); it depicted the reality of Japanese society at the time and optimistically predicted its brilliant future. However, it lost its popularity for several reasons: it could not explain social and economic stagnations in Japan after the economic bubble burst; not all countries in the world followed the trajectory predicted by it. Marxist theory also attracted many Japanese sociologists. They observed social problems caused by conflicts between different groups in society, such as that between capitalists/employers and workers/employees and that between large firms and local residents in the case of pollution. However, its influence also weakened for different reasons, such as the rise of the New Left and the collapse of the Soviet Union and Eastern Bloc.

New directions, American influence, and the SSM Survey

After the weakening of modernization and Marxist theories, the so-called multi-paradigm era began. This witnessed the emergence of excellent theories in various fields: phenomenological sociology and sociology focusing on information society, globalization, and welfare states, to name a few.

It should be emphasized that postwar Japanese sociology was strongly influenced by American sociology. Although European sociology had also been influential, the American style of empirical studies – qualitative and quantitative – attracted many Japanese sociologists. One of the major quantitative studies is the “National Survey of Social Stratification and Social Mobility”, commonly known as the SSM Survey. The first SSM Survey was conducted by the JSS in 1955 in collaboration with an ISA international project. Since then, it has been conducted every decade, with the next being conducted in 2025. All of the SSM Survey datasets are available upon request at the Social Science Japan Data Archive, from the Institute of Social Science of the University of Tokyo.

National and international trajectory

The JSS has evolved in tandem with this evolution of Japanese sociology. It has published its official journal since it was established in 1924. The name of the journal has changed several times; its current name is Japanese Sociological Review, the first volume of which was published in 1950. All of the articles on the Japanese Sociological Review are available online. In addition to the publication of the journal, the society has held annual meetings since 1925. The 97th annual meeting will be held at Kyoto Sangyo University in November 2024 to celebrate its centennial. A special international symposium will be held during the meeting with Geoffrey Pleyers, ISA President, as an invited speaker.

It should also be mentioned that the JSS has been active in the international arena. Evidence of this, as stated above, is that the first SSM survey was conducted in collaboration with an ISA project in 1955. The JSS published the first issue of its official English journal, International Journal of Japanese Sociology, in 1992 and has continued to publish it annually (the name was changed to Japanese Journal of Sociology in 2022). Many Japanese sociologists have collaborated with international sociologists and been active in the ISA; the most important event reflecting the international activities of the JSS was the XVIII ISA World Congress of Sociology in Yokohama in 2014. The congress was a great success thanks to support from the ISA and national associations around the world. In the decade that has passed since that congress, the JSS has entered a new phase of international activities in collaboration and cooperation with the ISA and national associations.

Yoshimichi Sato, Kyoto University of Advanced Science, Japan and President of the Japanese Sociological Society <sato.yoshimichi@kuas.ac.jp>