Ten years have passed since Japan’s triple disaster on March 11, 2011. The earthquake that occurred off the coast of eastern Japan triggered a powerful tsunami that in turn caused a nuclear...Show moreTen years have passed since Japan’s triple disaster on March 11, 2011. The earthquake that occurred off the coast of eastern Japan triggered a powerful tsunami that in turn caused a nuclear meltdown. As with the Great Hanshin earthquake in Kobe in 1995, most of the victims were elderly people. This paper articulates the causes of Japan’s elderly population’s vulnerability to (natural) hazards by examining to what extent neoliberalism aggravates the Japanese elderly’s disaster vulnerability by using the Disaster as a Social Vulnerability framework. The prevailing consensus in studies that utilize this approach is that neoliberalism and the most common developments associated with the neoliberal ideology, privatization, and decentralization4, harm people’s vulnerability. This paper shows that while processes associated with neoliberalism can exacerbate the Japanese elderly’s disaster vulnerability, as will be demonstrated by discussing the pension system, there is no evidence for the accuracy of this consensus regarding the healthcare system. Based on these insights, this paper concludes that the “neoliberalism aggravates disaster vulnerability”-consensus is too simplistic to consider the elderly population in Japan.Show less
This thesis examines the relationship of neoliberal policies and growing inequality in the Japanese labour market after the bubble burst in early 1990’s. The purpose of this research is to...Show moreThis thesis examines the relationship of neoliberal policies and growing inequality in the Japanese labour market after the bubble burst in early 1990’s. The purpose of this research is to determine whether labour inequality levels have risen as a result of the neoliberal agendas that the government of Japan has adopted over the past few decades. The policies and the agendas of four Prime Ministers will be discussed: Yasuhiro Nakasone (pre-bubble burst), Ryutaro Hashimoto (post-bubble burst and during Asian crisis), Junichiro Koizumi (pre-financial crisis) and Shinzo Abe (post-financial crisis). This research demonstrates that certain aspects of labour inequality have been altered using process tracing in a multi-disciplinary approach consisting of both qualitative and qualitative sources to analyze the outcomes of these policy measures. The theoretical and empirical analysis showcase that, whilst the transformation of the Japanese economic model has not been linear, there is a gradual neoliberal progress in the labour sector reflected by the continuous deregulation schemes that the administrations have chosen to pursue. The Japanese labour institutions and, therefore, the Japanese social contract have been considerably transformed as part of the neoliberal reforms.Show less
