ABSTRACT
This chapter examines two factors that determine the social structure of the Japanese rural community: the collective nature of Japanese agriculture, which requires farmers’ close collaboration in the usage of water, and the investment in social overhead capital; and capitalism, which undeniably permeates the Japanese rural community. It discusses the nature of Japanese agriculture and describes the social structure of the rural community in the feudal period during which capitalism was undeveloped. The chapter explores how farmers responded to the advent of capitalism during the light industrialization period, the pre-war heavy industrialization period, and the post-war heavy industrialization period. Heavy industrialization was accompanied by the transfer of two major economic resources–labor and financial capital–from rural to urban areas. Business leaders in the commercial and manufacturing sectors also supported Liberal Democratic Party’s massive income redistribution to farmers and rural areas. Supported by the sympathy of the intelligentsia, farmers’ dissatisfaction may escalate to the level of serious anti-government movements.
