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1、Kenichi Ikeda and Sean Richey Social networks and Japanese democracy: Thebeneficial impact of interpersonal communication in East Asia. New York: Routledge2012.Kenichi Ikeda5 a professor in the Department of Social Psychology at the Universityof Tokyo, and Scan Richey, Assistant Professor of Politic
2、al Science in the Department ofPolitical Science at Georgia State University, have written a concise book describing theempirical research undertaken to investigate the role of social networks in Japanese politicsand democracy. Most of the studies on social networks that show the role of both inform
3、aland formal networks on democracy and political life are focused on Western democracies. Assuch, the role of social networks in East Asia and the ways in which such networks influenceEast Asian democracies are not often considered. Thus, the authors of this work raise thequestion of democracy in Ea
4、st Asian countries, specifically, and the influence that East Asianculture and social networks may have on democracy.The book is organized into eight short chapters, an introduction, and a conclusion. Itexamines East Asian values, with a specific focus on Japan; describes social networks,including t
5、he measures and determinants! of participation in such networks; follows with ananalysis of the influence of several aspects of social networks on politics and democracy; andfinally, shows how some programs in Japan benefit democracy In their research, Ikeda andRichey used the Japanese Elections Stu
6、dy (JES) I, which is the largest academic politicalsurvey ever conducted in Japan (p. 7). The JES III consisted of a panel survey conducted bymostly face-to-face interviews between 2001 and 2005 and analyzed several topics that are ofgreat interest in Japanese society, such as the influence of socia
7、l hierarchy and groupheterogeneity on social networkse Obedience to hierarchy and the maintenance of groupharmony so that disagreement is avoided are two fundamental Japanese cultural practices,and the JES III sought to analyze the extent to which such practices arc observed within therealm of socia
8、l network interactions.Among the questions that the authors of this book sought to answer was whetherJapan can be considered to have a more East Asian or more Western culture. The statisticalresults of the research presented indicate that Asian societies, specifically Japan, have well-functioning, l
9、iberal democratic societies that share both East Asian and Westerncharacteristics. For example, the authors find that while many Japanese citizens perceive theexistence of social hierarchy and the pursuit of group harmony to be important forces in theirlives, political disagreement is indeed common
10、in Japan. Another important finding is thatsocial networks have a powerful influence on Japanese political behavior; this is aparticularly interesting finding since it is a result that differs from prior research on thesubject.Ikeda and Richey examine the Asian values that are based on the Confucian
11、 culturaltradition and the extent to which these values have been accepted in Japan. While Confucianelements are a part of Japanese culture, Confucianism never became the dominant stateideology in Japan as it did in China and Korea; Japanese society also incorporates somevalues from the Buddhist tra
12、dition as well. The authors make a distinction between publicaspects and private aspects of Confucianism in Japanese society behavior. (In this case,public aspects are related to government behavior and not to the behavior of Japanese peoplein public situations.) For the purpose of analyzing whether
13、 Confucian values are present intwenty-first-century Japan, the authors used the East Asian Barometer (EAB) Survey. This1 What were some of these determinants? Some measures of social networks are: activeness, hierarchy, andharmony in informal and formal networks. The authors describe the variables
14、that have been found to besignificant causes of each of these three measures, such as age, male, education or income.Social Networks and Japanese Democracy127survey compares how Confucian values arc distributed in eight East and South East Asiancountries and finds that the Japanese keep the vertical
15、 hierarchy and harmony values in bothpublic and private interactions but do not maintain other Confucian values related to publicaspects.After examining the foundation of Japanese interactions in the public and privatespheres, Ikeda and Richey move on to study social networks, specifically. In order
16、 to do so,they measure three important aspects to social interaction in Japan: (1) activeness, which isconsidered the basic deliberative democratic norm, (2) hierarchy, and (3) heterogeneity (or“non-harmony)and discuss the influence of these three aspects of social interaction on bothformal and informal social networks in Japan. The authors find that Japanese networks ar
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