I'm not convinced by point two, but that's mostly because my knowledge of economics is too rudimentary to balance all the aspects of the equation. You may well be right.

Points one and three definitely need to be made. The appeal to traditional values, well, many of these were invented or mythologised from Meiji onward, as you say. There are aspects to the recent Japanese historical experience that remind me of the lingering influences of Stalinism upon contemporary Russian culture. There are probably better examples and Russians never stopped complaining under Stalin and successors, they just had to do it in more devious ways.

The lazy way I grew to think of Japanese democracy when I lived there was fascism by concensus. I'll admit this is very imprecise, but it does record my own frustration in finding any substantial dialogue of criticism - whether of mainstream politics or indeed pop groups. The fact I never really found it hasn't yet led me to think that it's not there, especially in potential. Just as criticism may be looked upon as being un-Japanese, there's plenty of historical evidence that shows this to be a modern conceit.

But, with regard to point four, it may be economic collapse which could create a 'yonaoshi' mood around the country. But I don't know. Bureaucracy, inertia, never mind organised crime, where do they start and how?

Those bears are darn cute though...

A large majority of what is considered "Japanese culture" was created after the influx of Western ideas in the 19th century.
Oh, I'm totally into the dialectic of cultures. I think one of the really fascinating things Japan can teach the rest of the world is how to integrate foreign elements in ways that become completely domestic. The Japanese language now contains thousands of loan words from English, but most of them are unrecognisable to English speaking people, who have to re-learn them in Japanese form when learning Japanese. It's almost become an artform for the Japanese on a par with Appropriationism. It contains a fascinating mixture of attraction and hostility, admiration and satire; an 'ironism of affirmation'. I'm genuinely sorry for English-speaking cultures that they aren't oriented to other cultures in the same richly ambiguous way.

Japan is in economic decline.
But is economic growth really the be-all and end-all? Japan is currently about level, neither declining nor growing. Personally, I like the idea of all this Slow Life stuff, the idea that we can actually take time out to enjoy life and be sensual. Sakamoto said he'd like Japan to become a beautiful third-rate nation. If it does, and if the West follows suit, the Freeters you dismiss will actually have a lot to teach us.

Japanese culture has been invented by an authoritarian elite to keep itself in power.
I think if there were widespread political dissatisfaction with the political in Japan, we'd see it. I see it nowhere. I see people living, for the most part, in an apolitical way, although I do see a lot of peace and environmental activism in Japan. But I think politics as we know it doesn't exist in Japan, and I actually find that tremendously refreshing. Then again, I've never lived in Japan without the internet, that is, without access to political discussions with fellow gaijin at the touch of a button if I wanted them.

Have you ever heard of Japanese who left Japan so that they could pursue politics? Japanese who really got into debating and campaigning? I know some Japanese who work at UNESCO in Paris, but they're more passionate about culture than the political side of things. Earlier this year I walked into the Paris UNESCO building with my Japanese friend who works there, and we had to pass a demonstration of cleaners at the gate, striking for better conditions at UNESCO. She completely ignored them. But she was very passionate about the Buddha statues the Taliban had blown up, and the Ando meditation chapel they've just had built at UNESCO.

The decline could possibly hit a point where the Japanese people could demand a change in the elected government, and the new blood could work to reconstruct a system better suited for the 21st century.
I personally very much doubt that. I think it's much more likely that all nations in the 21st century, assuming we're spared any major cataclysms, will become peaceful, somewhat feminine consumer societies like Japan, and that culture will become 'the new politics'. If that is the case, what we're seeing now in Japan may well be what we see in the west in a decade or two. We're reading your blog to see into the future, Marxy, not to get a glimpse of the last days of a declining empire!

1) Japanese embrace of foreign cultures is great, but why do they then hide behind these imports as traditional Japanese culture? Criticism and scholarship can work towards breaking down these myths.

2) Economic growth is not the end-all-be-all, but it is responsible for the equally distribution of high income. If Japan continues to not grow, there will be a sudden burst of income inequality. Compare the freeter's kid with the salaryman's - this alone will be a huge change from the post-War social structure. Freeter are what we call "economically irresponsbile" in the West. They leech off their parents and have no hope for stability in the future. In America, anyone qualifiedcan get a job at a large firm at any juncture. In Japan, the employment structure is still so oriented towards direct college graduates, that this generation of freeter's greatest dream is becoming a store manager or something lower middle class. We are going to see a huge shift of upper middle class children into the lower middle classes. And with it will go consumer society.

3) Hate to be a shrill Marxist about this, but isn't the reason they are apolitical because they have an education and media system that teaches them to be unpolitical? Their uninterest in politics is because 1) they are never taught to think critically or skeptically in school and 2) all the political action takes place behind the scenes, on which the media obliges not to report. If you lived in a society structured to be like this, there would not be much political discourse either. When things were rocky in Japan in the 60s, there was great political movement, but once the Socialists were defeated and the country got bought out by wealth, the next generation promptly forgot about it.

4) I wish Japan was the future, but all I see is a bunch of barriers and downward trends. Again I have extremely pro-Japan in the past and willing to overlook some of the dark underbelly, but now I am surrounded by the collapsing cultural markets I so loved long ago.

I few months ago, a man in an elevator said to my friend, a fresh expat in Tokyo: "You look like a baby in this country." Just the same, I'm offering a piece of my view as a baby in Japan, albeit one with a pretty extensive education abroad for an infant.

On Freeters: My view on this trend (and I am at this point trusting uncritically that it is actually as much of a trend as media sources say it is) is that people faced with the prospect of entering the salaryman or office lady culture find it constrictive, depressing or unacceptable. I am currently studying at a small college in Chiba, full of people learning foreign languages. A lot of the graduates here become Freeters. Frankly, the people I resonate most with as an American are the students who can't figure out how to deal with graduation and passage into the job market. It's only the so-called leeching off the parents that bothers me. But if so many upper-middle class kids are going into a supposedly new class category, and if they bring with them their family and personal connections, you end up not with a new influx into lower-middle class, but rather a new sect in upper-middle and a redefinition of class lines.

On late-coming "ancient" culture: It is true that the Meiji and MacArthur eras had a massive effect on the sociopolitical daily life of Japanese, and that many Westerners mistake aspects of the fresh Japanese culture as ancient. But coming from the United States, it affirms people's views of the culture as ancient to walk around and happen upon 600-year-old gardens or temples (not particularly in Tokyo, where everything was torched). As for the "State Shinto cult," its image is clearly greater than its power, since most Japanese one meets are nonreligious (even though they go through the motions at the temples, which the seem to visit to get a feel of their ancientness). My biggest question about the "ancient" aspects of culture is whether most Japanese view them as ancient, or just as valued traditions however relatively new.

David Brooks' Bobos in Paradise showed how young semi-bohemians who protested the strict business culture in the 60s went on to create their own brand of capitalist endeavor, and I wonder how likely this is to happen in Japan. Graham seems to think that the organized freeter fight against the salaryman world will create a new more diverse upper middle class. This is what I am hoping for, but I am extremely suspicious about this outcome occuring naturally. America has free markets and institutions that encourage entrepreneurial action, whereas Japan's employment practices and no-interest monetary policy make it difficult to either join the system after you've intially rejected it or get investmet money to work outside the box. An ex-freeter upper middle class would be absolutely revolutionary for Japan, and I would hope that the current social barriers will decay enough for this to sneak through.

You made two statements that I think expose your relative lack of broad cultural & life experience.

1) You said, "A large majority of what is considered "Japanese culture" was created after the influx of Western ideas in the 19th century." This is provably false. And your statement reveals much of how you view Japan--from a perch looking down.

2) You also said, "In America, anyone qualifiedcan get a job at a large firm at any juncture." Marxy, you may be from America, but you clearly have very little experience with corporate America. Your statement is not true. Oh, it's true in THEORY, but not in practice.

To Momus: I think you are taking a young man's idealisms too seriously. Understand that you've probably had a lot more life experience and hence perspective than this young man. So while he talks and writes well, you aren't really on an equal footing, you have access to a broader perspective than he; and your imomus.com blogs posts prove this over and over again.

since momus has so much life experience, and perspective. then can't he make the decision on his own, who and what he replies to and about? dunno.

Momus, please stop reading my blog. My wide-eyed ideas may be dangerous.

As to my anonymous elder:

1) Ok, prove me wrong. I don't mean that in a dick way. I want to know specifically what parts of Japanese society are not modern conceits. I have probably overstated my position, but how much rice did Japanese people eat before the end of the War?

2) Nothing in America exists that is akin to Japan's very strict shuushoku katsudou system. My comparison was related to David Brooks' book, and I do think America's system is way more flexible. This doesn't mean I hate Japan as much as the fact that I think some flexibility in the hiring system would make a lot more sense in today's world. A better way to disprove this is to suggest evidence that firms are indeed becoming more flexible, which sounds like it could be true. Can you point me to some writings about this? Can you suggest something besides telling people NOT to read me? Can we duke this out blog-o e blog-o?

Marxy

Point 1 reminds me of the "Invention of Tradition", a book by Eric Hobsbawm which shows how things we think of being really old were in fact created. Although a lot of the stuff in Japan is recognisable as 'invented' because they took it from Europe.

Tom, thanks for the book tip.