Abstract
This is a thoughtful, detailed and beautifully written book about work, life and career in Japan. It focuses on how young, male, white-collar corporate employees negotiate their transitions into adulthood and into ‘responsible’ employment, discussing their ‘target’ identity (the ‘Japanese salaryman’) as a highly gendered construct. Although the study is very focused and particular, many wider implications emerge. The book has much to say across an array of sociological dimensions such as marriage, family, adolescence and adulthood, work, employment, masculinity and femininity and broad social norms around ‘appropriate’ roles and behaviours. Many of the issues raised are highly relevant to societies beyond Japan.
Dasgupta draws on conceptual literature widely used in Western contexts, particularly Raewyn Connell’s work on hegemonic masculinity and, to a lesser extent, Dorinne Kondo’s (1990) study of Japanese self-identity. The book draws on an interview-based study of young salarymen (mostly in their 20s) from two somewhat conventional Japanese employers: ‘Northern Energy’ and ‘Northern Print’. The study aims to explore how young men attempt to become salarymen and thus model citizens (and employees), subtly enquiring into how they understand, come to terms with and, in many cases, embrace the strong cultural norms and expectations that are deeply associated with this still iconic role in Japanese society.
The introductory chapter provides powerful temporal grounding and justification for the study, noting that the research participants are becoming shakaijin (or responsible adult members of society) just as the concept of the salaryman itself is widely said to be ‘in crisis’ given changing gender norms, Japan’s economic stasis and the wider loss of confidence in Japan’s ‘model’. Dasgupta shows that salarymen are often criticized for being ‘part of the problem’ of Japan’s economic rudderlessness, but he also identifies fascinating counter-examples that try to re-assert and enliven the salaryman ideal. These include popular culture products such as ‘how-to’ and ‘self-help’ guides to understanding the salaryman role, as well as manga, anime and music about salarymen urging the downtrodden corporate lifer to get back on his feet, such as the song ‘Fight! Salaryman’ by J-pop outfit Ketsumeishi (pp. 4, 159).
Chapter Two provides a very useful historical backdrop explaining the emergence of the salaryman concept and the investment of gendered socio-economic norms into this idealized figure. The salaryman was projected as a national icon of the post-war mission to rebuild Japanese economy and society. Dasgupta notes the intensely gendered inscription of work and family roles into this projection; the salaryman becomes daikokubashira, ‘the central support pillar of the house’, whereas women play support roles as either ‘office ladies’ or ‘good wives, wise mothers’. Chapter Three moves on to explore qualitative data from Dasgupta’s interviews with 31 young white-collar employees. Informants’ views of childhood and adolescence are examined, in which highly gendered constructs of appropriate ‘male’ and ‘female’ roles feature prominently.
The following four chapters explore interview data on the following themes: the ways in which organizations transmit accepted norms of salaryman behaviour through extensive training and induction; the everyday enactment of salaryman masculinity at work; how salaryman masculinity is entwined into broader family and fatherhood norms; and how it is written into and reproduced in ‘homosocial’ corporate cultures. Each of the themes is very clearly sketched out and explored and the book is structured in an extremely clear and accessible fashion. For some salarymen the responsibility of becoming daikokubashira and shakaijin appears to weigh heavily, whereas for others the burden of expectation is less onerous. Throughout the book Dasgupta adroitly discusses informants’ acceptance of and accommodation to these social and employment norms, as well as their knowing critique and even minor subversion of them.
Overall, the durability of conservative social norms in Japan around employment, manhood, loyalty and commitment emerges very strongly. The overall picture generated from the dataset is very well handled and one can easily see the broader implications for the hegemony of ‘responsible’ employment, masculinity and adulthood at large in Japan’s comparatively conservative and conformist society. The concluding chapter brings the reader back to the totality of the salaryman concept in the 2010s, discussing the contemporary manifestation of the salaryman construct across its gendered, pop-cultural, ideological and employment forms. As fewer graduates enjoy or expect to enjoy salaryman status due to cutbacks and recession the notion of the salaryman becomes more important than ever.
This is an important discussion both of Japanese salaryman masculinity and of the ways in which masculinity is ‘crafted’ in general. It will be essential reading for those interested in Japanese work, management and organization and it makes a valuable contribution to debates on gender studies, masculinity and self-identity and around the social norms ascribed to white-collar careers in any national context.