ABSTRACT
This chapter will provide an overview of the marriage situation in some selected countries in East Asia, namely Japan, Hong Kong, and the Republic of Korea, and the West such as France, Italy, Sweden, and the US.1 Along the way the chapter examines cultural traditions and the norms governing the institution of marriage in Japan by placing them in an international perspective. James White reports that ‘all social institutions within a given society continually adapt to the changes in the world economic, social, and political system’ (1992: 209). He also notes that even though different cultures adapt to changes in the world environment at different speeds, adaptations to the concept or institution of marriage seem surprisingly uniform throughout all societies and cultures. Both the East Asian regions and Western countries I examine share many similarities such as the fact that they are all developed and urbanized countries. Nonetheless, compared to Western countries, East Asian regions appear to share significant cultural similarities that contribute to shaping people’s ideas about marriage, such as Confucian values about the strong division of labour between the sexes. In this chapter, it is argued that cultural tradition is a significantly important factor influencing changes in marriage patterns in the societies being studied. Japan is a good example to illustrate this. Hendry (1985) even claims that the patterns of marital change in Japan are, more or less, shaped by Japanese culture rather than by world economic development.
