ABSTRACT
Women in farming areas in Japan have played a critical role in establishing a model of self-sufficiency, local sustainability and community engagement long before such topics gained greater popular and national interest. This chapter examines the gender construction within the post-WWII Life Reform Program in Japan, designed to improve the status and ikigai (“life worth living”) of women since the 1950s. 1 It attempts to answer questions like “How was gender linked to age and economic status?” and “Which women actually benefitted from LRP programs?”—issues not concretely examined in existing scholarship. In summary, the aim of the chapter is to provide a critical sense of the role that the conception of female gender played in life reform projects.
