Welcome to Hiroto's Homepage!
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1 Hiroto Tsukada : Professor of Economics, Economic Policy, Yamaguchi University,
Japan, PhD in Sociology, Copenhagen
University
Brief History of Hiroto:
Hiroto
was born in Naganoken, Japan in 1953, raised in a small country town, had a
chance to go to Point Pleasant Boro H. S. in
New Jersey, the US as an AFS student in 1970-71, with wonderful memories of host
family and many friends there, came back and
went to Hitotsubashi University as an undergraduate and graduate student, started
his career as a teacher at Yamaguchi Unviersity in Yamaguchiken, Japan. After teaching there for
16years had a wonderful chance to stay and study abroad at the University of Kent at Canterbury, the UK in
1999-2000, and now, he is enjoying his job very much, teaching and studying,
back at the Faculty of Economics, Yamaguchi University.
One thing to regret these days is that Japanese government orders
too much non-education-research related work these years. He hopes these
unhappy years will soon end.
He got his Ph D degree on 14, April 2004.
For this examination he submitted his book, Economic Globalization and the
Citizens’ Welfare State, 2002, Ashgate, as doctoral thesis. He had once
tried to get the degree in Japan by his Japanese book, Market Economy as a
Social System, 1998, Seibundo. But he could not find senior professors in
Japan who would read his book, which was, according to at least two of them,
“difficult to understand”. He gave up his plan to get a degree for a while. As
time passed by, he wrote above English book and in the trend of “college
reformation” in Japan, which urged Japanese state universities to be
“independent administrative agencies”, he tried again and was fortunate to find
one country, Denmark, who would offer doctoral thesis examinations for
foreigners. He is grateful to the country of Denmark and those who took the
effort to examine his thesis, Peter Abrahamson, Copenhagen University, Sven
Olsson Hort, Sordetorn University, Sweden, and Alan Walker, York University,
UK, and Peter Gundelach, Copenhagen Univiersity.
If you know him and what he teaches at Yamaguchi University, you may
wonder why his degree is not that of Economics. Well, that owes to the
difference in disciplines in Japan and Europe. The thing is, his major theme is
often discussed in the field of Economics in Japan but is discussed usually in
the field of Sociology in Europe. This is interesting but that’s what it is.
One answer is perhaps the theme about welfare states is at the border of
Economics and Sociology. And if we look at his academic history, first studying
Japanese economic history in the 1930s in his undergraduate days, then American
economic policies in the 1930s, then to American post war economic growth up to
1960s in his graduate days, and turning to fundamental social structure of
modern society, drawing on John Rawls in his younger days as a college teacher,
and now trying to answer to the future path of welfare state in developed
countries, we could say that it was not only because he was the type to be
interested in many topics but that social questions are very often connected to
each other, whether of economics, sociology, philosophy, education, history,
and so on. In this sense it is not at all a wonder for him that the above
examiners were all sociologists and they agreed to bestow him doctoral degree
in the field of Sociolgy.
(To foreign colleagues: Thus in Japan college teachers above the age of
40s were not required to get doctoral degree when graduating from graduate
university in their days. The tide changed about a decade ago and since then
every graduate has been required and come to receive it. So don’t be surprised
if you meet middle age Japanese college professors who don’t have it yet. They
are only trying to ask for it by writing a “major” book which truly deserves
the name of doctoral degree that they used to think of it in their days.)
2 His ACADEMIC INTEREST:
SOCIAL
SYSTEM, MARKET ECONOMY, ECONOMIC GLOBALIZATION and WELFARE STATE
SOCIAL SYSTEM
He is interested in and worried by the weakening civil society in advanced
countries. He wants to find a social system where people are satisfied with
mutual relationships and feel like supporting it, not being much frustrated as
today. He believes that in such a system people must be able to feel they are
"treated rightly". It means a society where each person is allowed to
live fully up to one's capability, both in mind and body.
ECONOMIC THOUGHT
He reasons that to realize such a society it is necessary to
focus on some basic economic questions. A society could become as close to such
a society when it suffices three economic conditions: equitable distribution of natural resources, equitable
distribution of products by the criterion of contribution, and equitable
distribution of products by the criterion of human fellowship.
As to the relationship between the two kinds of equity, he argues that when
people feel that they are given the fair share of natural resources and
products, they are usually happy to share the products with the needy according
to our human fellowship. Such a society is the one where we can feel that we
are treated rightly by fellow humans.
OUR BASIC TASK
He understands that present societies in the world are defective in this
respect. They are still under construction, though after a long and much
effort. For example, we have not found out if present ownership of natural
resources is undoubtedly right, income distribution between labour and
management right or not, or the distribution between the able and disabled
right or not. We are still on our way to find out the best answers to these
questions, in a word, how to distribute
rightly. This is our first and basic task for
which we have to keep working.
OUR IMMINENT TASK
He guesses an imminent task today in approaching such a desirable social
structure is to quickly realize stability
in economic life. It is troubled by economic
globalization. Its effects on economies in many countries are apparent both in
macro economic performance and at micro level, which is peoples' lives, both in
developed and developing countries. He understands that this stability is best
realized by sustaining the welfare system that has been developed in the
postwar years for half a century. It is threatened by unstable globalizing
market and firms' ruthless rush to compete worldwide, which demands lower
corporate tax rate and various kinds of deregulation some of which are often
destructive to workers' and citizens' daily lives. Withstanding these pressures
is our imminent task today and this will be best fulfilled by maintaining the
economic stability of people through strengthening the welfare system or the
welfare state.
THE CITIZENS’ WELFARE STATE
Regulating the firms'
behaviour and taming their pressures by governments' power will of course be
necessary. But while this takes time, I
would like to argue that the people, the citizens themselves must support the
welfare programs by accepting higher burden, such as higher taxation.
Some may doubt if people will really choose such a proposition. But the growing
instability will not be solved for the time being except by this path, the
mutual cooperation of citizens. Until governments succeed in regulating firms'
behaviours, the citizens' welfare state
will be the necessary and only feasible step.
Publications:
1) Economic Globalization and the Citizens' Welfare
State (English), Ashgate, January, 2002 →Books in detail
2))Market Economy as A Social System (Japanese), Seibundo, 1998
3) Economic System and Distributive Justice (English), Yamaguchi
Keizai Gakkai, 1997
4) Social Justice Reconsidered (Japanese), translated from David
Mapel’s book, Seibundo, 1996
Recent papers in English
Full paper for the 1st International Conference of
JEPA, at Chuo University, Nov. 30-Dec.1, 2002 (PDF file → http://wwwsoc.nii.ac.jp/jepa/text/36t.pdf )
4 Notes on daily life
Japan 2004/07/20 (There is a
problem)
Sorry to say, Japan needs some change.
This is a serious question.
I once wrote in my book about two similar
murder cases by juveniles in the UK and Japan. They were so
familiar that we may as well conclude there is some modern mechanism working
and threatening us, our children and our adults in developed countries
together. As children’s cases are shocking, they are reported and paid much
attention in these countries. The case above first happened in Japan and then
in the UK.
And in 2003 in Japan there
happened a murder case by an elementary school sixth grader boy against
a four or five years boy. We can recall this time a similar case by two young
boys against a younger boy some years ago in the UK.
This morning (2004/07/20) the radio said
there happened a serial killer murder (or mass murder) case in Korea,
killing 19 people, mostly rich or young feminine. The suspect reportedly says
he wanted to revenge the people around him, particularly the rich and females.
This is an anti-social crime. This makes us recall the recent case of Japan,
Takuma case who killed several, (eight?), elementary school children by a
similar motive. He said he hated the world, the people, divorced wife and
everyone who was happy. He used a knife and later he said he had better use a
truck hitting people. Then he could have killed more.
Many US cases are needless to say.
Like an epidemic flu, this kind of hate
crime, not just a racial or sexual, but a larger scale against the whole
society itself, is being fermented among the hopeless adults and confused
children. This is not a personal incident but a social one, it seems
Japan 2003/06/05 (What can we do?)
We need to fix our balance, a good balance in our society. One question
is in our “work” side of our life.
She needs to change. Her people work
too much and enjoy too little.
Most of us on earth must work to live.
Exception is Tuiavi's island.
But it is wrong to work to death. Karoshi
must be gotten rid of. We work to live, not to die.
Everyone must find a balance between
work and leisure. So must a country. We make a system for our purpose. If it's
against us, we can change it.
One thing Japanese don't know is that
we can change it. Top leaders are convinced that if we stop growing
economically, we will perish. But that is not so.
There are many ways of living. Look at
Nordic countries. Look at Southern European countries. They live differently
from us. Some live at lower GDP per capita. But they can maintain their life.
They don't die out. So we can choose.
What kind of life shall we lead? Should
it be like a car, starting slowly, gathering speed, reach top speed, and
maintain it, or should we gather more and more speed forever? Like an
ever-growing tree, should we grow as tall as possible? Or should we grow taller
than any other tree?
It is impossible for everyone to become
No 1 at the same time.
Happiness is better than wealth. Wealth
helps happiness but it is only a part of it.
The pursuit of wealth cannot become our
leader.
To regain our healthy life, we need to
restore our balance, balance between work and leisure, purpose and measure.
We work to live, work to enjoy, not to
die for work, die for the prosperity of company.
Choose, Japanese people, a new balance of
life.
Three
Movies 2004/July
(For the past few
months I saw some movies. they were made in Germany, UK, Spain US and Denmark.
As a part of my academic interest is in welfare states in these countries, and
all of them deal with daily life of ordinary people there, I could come in
touch with the life there, the life of ordinary citizens. For this reason I
leave notes on them.)
(For two other movies, see my notes in Japanese on 2004/5/17, http://web.cc.yamaguchi-u.ac.jp/~ht/4daigakunomado.htm.)
I am Sam. Made in America.
Sam is not smart. He is probably in his thirties, but mentally 7 years
old. He works at a coffee shop, Starbucks. He cleans tables and sets sugar. He
once offered bed to a homeless woman and had a sex. She became pregnant and
gave birth to a girl.
The woman ran away the day they were out of hospital. Sam raised the
baby and the girl is now 6 years old. She loved to hear Sam read a picture book
when she went to sleep. It was one of the few that Sam could read. But now her
teacher worries that she doesn't like to study further. She doesn't like to
surpass her father.
That day was her birthday. Sam prepared a lot for this and invited her
friends. He made a little trouble with one of the invited children. This became
the start for the people around him, the smart, grown up ones, to take her out
of his hands and put her into someone else's custody.
Sam asked a famous lawyer to defend him. He himself tried hard at the
court but the court was about to judge against him. But the girl, now in a kind
foster parent couple, with her love for Sam made them give up. The woman, one
of the couple, gave her back to him the night before the court. She cried
because she loved her very much but thought she should be with Sam.
Goodbye Lenin. Made
in Germany.
Berlin. A mother tells her children their father ran into
west Berlin with a woman. They all believed it. She became a patriotic citizen
in east Berlin taking care of children’s' activities and writing letters of
complaint to authority about goods sold and made by their beloved socialist
firms.
But the fall of the wall was near. Her son was one of the
demonstrators walking and protesting against their government. Mother saw him
and fainted. She was in a coma for eight months. Meanwhile her son met a girl, a
nurse. She came from Russia. She was in that demonstration and rubbed his back
when he was choking with pieces of an apple. At the hospital they fell in love.
His sister quit college when the fall fell and now works at a Burger King. She
has a child, about a year old but her husband left them. She now has a
boyfriend who works at the same shop, too. He is from west. The son used to
repair TVs and now sells antennas for satellite broadcast.
She recovered consciousness and the son tries very hard so
that she won't be shocked by the big change of their country, afraid of the
second heart attack. He works with old bottles of pickles, TV news, outside
views from her window... But finally she walks out of her apartment and sees a
lot of things new to her. Even above her head is being carried a statue of
Lenin by a helicopter. Her children now made her believe there was actually a
change but it was the triumph of the east and western people are coming into
their country trying to get a better living.
One day at a cottage she confesses them she once tried to run
into the west, following her husband. He didn't run away with a woman. They
made the plan together. He was out first and the rest of the family were to
follow him. She could not do it, worrying that her children may be caught and
taken away on the route. After visiting the cottage she was not well and the
son, now knowing his father's address, shows him to her. She dies, probably
believing her son's story. (Or his girl friend told her the truth and she dies
knowing it?) Her ash is spread above the city, blown up by a small hand made
rocket.
Which is, or was, happier, living in which side? Probably in
the western side, but the film seems to tell us "don't lose the ideals of
the east".
Italian language class (Title, may be a bit
different) Made
in Denmark.
Some people attend an Italian language class. (It is just like the Spanish movie, several people making a story. At that time the movie proceeded with cow as the leading motif.)
A hairdresser, woman, and her mother, who is in a hospital
but sometimes walks away for drinks, bothering her daughter while working.
A delicatessen saleswoman, but somewhat awkward, "this
is my 43rd job", living with her father, hopeless and difficult to get
along with.
A man in charge of a football stadium restaurant, and his
friend, Jorgen, and an Italian girl working there.
A pastor, who just started his career some months ago. He has
also just lost his wife. There was one senior pastor before he went to the
church but he had trouble there and he is about to take his place. He and the
saleswoman fall in love.
An Italian teacher has a heart attack and dies. As the
restaurant man talks like fighting against customers, he is fired. As he is
good at Italian, he becomes the teacher of the language class.
The pastor is not very confident of his career, but gradually
gets it as he spends time with people around him and the classmates.
Jorgen likes the Italian girl and the girl likes Jorgen too,
but they do not know this. Jorgen once hit his genitals in a rugby game four
years ago and finds it hard to have an erection, though it erects when he
masturbates.
The hairdresser loves her mother but is also tired with
taking care of her. She dies.
The saleswoman loses her father, too. She is informed that
her mother, whom she had no contact for years, died. When they meet to attend
the funeral, the drunken woman's, they find that they are sisters.
The father leaves some amount of money. They decide to visit
Italy with their classmates. They go to Venice and Jorgen confesses the Italian
girl that he loves her. She says yes. The hairdresser and the Italian class
teacher, once in a fight, makes lovers again.
A good movie. It makes us feel we are living there. They are our
friends. We are living in the same town together.
Books in detail:
(sorry only one book here yet)
Economic
Globalization and the Citizens' Welfare State, Ashgate, UK，January, 2002
Contents 1 Questions
2 Civil Society and the Welfare
State
3 Setback of the Welfare States
-- Sweden, UK, Japan, US
4 Arguments on the Future Welfare
State
5 People’s Choice 6 Toward a Citizens’ Welfare
State
Conclusion |
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The conclusion of this book: In industrialized countries the anti-welfarism of neo-liberalism and economic globalization has tilted the social balance too much toward market mechanism and economic efficiency in the past two decades. This imbalance has put society in a serious condition today. In the long-term prospect we can expect a new Welfare State on international corporatism to emerge. And in the short-term prospect, in order to cope with the problem in the strong globalization trend of today we need to rebuild the proper balance by building the citizens’ Welfare State.→Conclusion in detail
The arguments of this book
consist of three major parts: first, the argument on fundamental social
structure featuring efficiency, equity and human fellowship in Chapter 2, which
also provides the analytical viewpoint for the following chapters, secondly,
the analyses of the changing spheres of the Welfare State and related arguments
in Chapters 3 and 4, and thirdly, the argument on the people’s preferences in
Chapter 5. The argument in Chapter 6 about the Citizens’ Welfare State is the
logical and inevitable conclusion derived from the previous ones.
We can
summarize these arguments as follows:
Chapter 1:
With the 1970s as the watershed, post-war industrialized societies changed into
a lower growth rate economy, which then made the growth of the Welfare State
difficult. In a conflict between limited economic resources, the Welfare State has had a setback. Why and how much the Welfare
State should change concerns the fundamental relationship between economic
growth and social welfare, and past studies have shown the necessity to clarify this further.
Chapter 2:
As the question of the Welfare State is related to the whole structure of our
modern society, we need to have an analytical framework for the overall social
structure itself. Good balance between efficient production and proper
distribution has always been the fundamental question for a society. A useful
viewpoint for this question is to analyse it through the balance between three
fundamental virtues of society: efficiency of production on the
one hand and equity and human fellowship of distribution on the
other. Civil society has adopted market mechanism but this has the
intrinsic bias toward more efficiency in production and less equity and human
fellowship of distribution. The Welfare State has been devised to meet this
fundamental defect of market mechanism.
Chapter 3:
The Welfare State kept growing until the 1970s (Sweden, the UK, Japan, the US).
But the turbulence in the 1970s gave birth to anti-welfarism or neo-liberalism. Its economic and social policies then pushed society toward market
mechanism too far and thus toward too much insecurity. Emerging economic globalization further aggravated this imbalance.
Chapter 4:
The postures of the government leaders predict that this imbalance will
continue in the coming years. But arguments for the necessity and possibility
to change this trend are apparent, too.
Chapter 5:
People’s will, both expressed explicitly in opinion polls and demonstrated in
pathological social phenomena, shows that we should make progress toward an alternative society
today, for maintaining and strengthening the Welfare State to regain the social
balance that we have lost in the past two decades.
Chapter 6: The long-term prospect is to re-establish the Welfare State by the growth of the governments’ and workers’ powers and the dissolution of a low wage workforce. And as these take time, we need a short-term remedy, namely to create a more secure Welfare State through the citizens’ burden, namely the citizens’ Welfare State.
I would like to conclude my arguments here with some other observations for the readers. First, this book is an attempt to relate economy with society, particularly market mechanism to the overall social structure. It has been motivated by the perception that a fundamental change is happening today in the post-war industrialized societies, in which once intertwined economic and social factors in the Welfare State are being torn apart. In a socio-economic analysis of the present and future of the Welfare State today, forming or regaining a total social image – where it is leading, and where it can lead – will be the essential for us in order to live through these tumultuous years of the pro-efficiency and insecure globalization era. This understanding and a hope to reconnect them form the basis of this study. So this book covers such interdisciplinary fields as philosophical arguments and causal relations between economic factors and social pathology, and both merit and demerit will derive from this analytical method itself.
East Asian International Conference at Yamaguchi
University
The Transition of Employment Structure and
the Tasks of Government, Labour and Management in Korea, China and Japan
Invitation to a Conference:
May
29, 2003
Dear
Colleague,
On
behalf of the Faculty of Economics, I would like to invite all of you who are interested
in the above theme to attend a two-day conference entitled, " The
Transition of Employment Structure and the Tasks of Government, Labour and
Management in Korea, China and Japan". The conference is grounded in the
belief that the employment problems are one of the most important issues in the
economic situations in East Asia as well as in the world today, and it will be
profitable to learn lessons from the past and present experiences of these
three countries.
The
conference will be held from October 17 to 18, 2003, at a conference room of
the Faculty of Economics and the University Hall of Yamaguchi University in
Yamaguchi city, Japan.
As
you will see from the attached programme, this conference will pursue the
issues around two major themes of inquiry:
- What are the characteristics of
employment problems of Korea, China and Japan today?
- What are the lessons to be learned from
these characteristics to improve the respective situations of these countries?
This
conference also aims at strengthening the established ties between the
faculties/departments/colleges.
I
hope that the conference participants as well as all the attendants will have
on this occasion a great co-operative learning opportunity.
The
presentations will be done in Korean, Chinese and Japanese.
We
look forward to seeing you at the conference in October.
Sincerely,
Hiroto
Tsukada
Chair,
Executive Committee for the International Conference
ht@yamaguchi-u.ac.jp
Phone
and Fax: +81 839 933 5558
Mailing
address:
Mr.
OOBA Heishiro, Tou Keizai Kenkyujo, Faculty of Economics, Yamaguchi University,
1677-1, Yoshida, Yamaguchishi, 753-8514, Japan
Programme:
Schedule
October 17, Friday
10
a.m. – 12 a.m. Preliminary
meeting of participants:
Conference room, Faculty of Economics
Attendants: Participants and members of
executive committee
13
p.m. – 18 p.m. Workshop:
Conference room, Faculty of Economics
Attendants: Participants and members of
Faculty of Economics
October 18, Saturday
13
p.m. – 17 p.m. Symposium:
University Hall, Yamaguchi University
Attendants: Participants and general
audience
Participants:
Korea:
YOON, Jin Ho, Professor, Inha
University
JEONG,
Jae Hoon, Professor, Inha University
LEE,
Jeong, Professor, Hankuk University of Foreign Studies
CHANG,
Seh-Jin, Professor, Inha University
China: GAO, Debu, Professor, Renmin University
of China
YAN,
Fashan, Professor, Fudan University
Japan:
ARITA, Kenji,
Professor, Yamaguchi University
YOKOTA,
Nobuko, Associate Professor, Yamaguchi University
HAMASHIMA,
Kiyoshi, lecturer, Yamaguchi University
Members
of executive committee:
Chair:
TSUKADA, Hiroto
UESUGI,
Nobutaka
SAITO,
Tadashi
CHEN, Jianping
ARITA, Kenji
YOKOTA, Nobuko
YUN,
Chunji
Li,
Haifeng
SAKURADA, Yuzuru
HAMASHIMA,
Kiyoshi
Secretaries:
OOBA,
Heishiro
KATAYAMA,
Mitsue
SASAKI,
Keiko
OOSAWA,
Harumasa
YUAN,
Lihui
COMMENTS INVITED
Such
is his proposition and what he would like to invite comments on.
Please send your comments to his
e-mail address.