The response of Australian academics to the Changing Academic Profession survey indicates that they are among the least satisfied academics in the world. This dissatisfaction has been expressed after two decades of rapid growth in the student body and structural changes in the academic workforce, particularly an expansion in the amount of teaching provided by casual staff. Growth in casual staff numbers is a factor that has simultaneously created a precariously employed but cheaper and more flexible workforce along with higher levels of stress among the full-time teachers responsible for managing and supervising casual teachers.
The academic profession has an important role to play in creating a highly educated workforce for Australia and in generating export income by teaching international students. Careful attention needs to be paid to this situation, especially in light of the need to replenish the ageing academic workforce.
To see the four figures mentioned in the following text, it is necessary to purchase the paper from the centre.
Introduction
The Australian university system has grown considerably over the last two decades. The so-called massification [1] of Australian higher education, the result of policies introduced by education minister John Dawkins in the 1980s, saw a large increase in the university student population. Between 1989 and 2007, the number of students enrolled in courses at Australian universities increased from 441,000 to over one million.
In the last couple of years, movement from a mass to a universal system [2] has been initiated following recent growth plans announced for Australia's higher education sector [3]. These reforms have set a target of 40% of Australia's 25 to 34 year old age group attaining a bachelor degree by 2025.
Yet staff numbers, and particularly teaching staff numbers, have failed to keep pace with growth in student enrolments. For the purposes of this paper, 'teaching staff' include staff in academic positions classified by their universities as either 'teaching only' or 'teaching and research' staff, and working in academic departments. 'Research only' academics and academics who work outside academic departments have not been counted as 'teaching staff'.
Figure 1 has been constructed from national higher education statistics [4]. It compares the increase in the number of equivalent full-time students and teaching staff, and the extent of the widening gap between student and staff numbers is plain. Numbers have been expressed as 'full-time equivalent' (FTE) in order to control for students or staff who attend or work less than full-time, such as part-time students or casual staff. Between 1989 and 2007, there was an increase of about 376,000 full-time equivalent students, from about 350,000 to nearly 726,000 in 2007 (including around 197,000 international students). This is an increase of about 107%.
In the same period teaching staff increased by about 8,400 from 25,060 full-time equivalent staff in 1989 to 33,496 in 2007, an increase of about 34%. These figures include all teaching staff, including those employed under casual contracts. On top of the number of teaching academics, universities had about 9,850 non-teaching academic staff in 2007, including about 9,200 research only staff and about 660 full-time equivalent academic staff working in support and central administration departments.
The lag in the increase in teaching staff numbers has led to an increase in the ratio of students to teaching staff from almost 14 per teacher to nearly 22, even when casual staff are included. Of course, this carries implications not just for students but also for the way in which academics experience their work environment and the way in which institutions are managed in a rapidly changing environment.
The academy's changing structure
It is clear from Figure 1 that the somewhat flat growth in staff numbers has been far exceeded by the growth in the size of the student body. However, there has also been a change in the composition of the teaching body, particularly relating to its members' contractual arrangements with universities.
Figure 2 shows the size of the university teaching staff between 1989 and 2007 and the proportions with continuing appointments (including those on probation and those with confirmed appointments), those with time-limited appointments (reported by universities according to the number of months of the contract term), and those who were casually (sometimes called 'sessionally') employed.
As can be seen, casual staff have provided the majority of the growth in teaching staff. All in all, since 1989 the number of university teachers increased by 8,435 FTE, of which more than half were casual staff. Casual staff numbers increased from 3,162 to 7,440, about 135%. Further, as a proportion of all teaching staff, casual staff have increased from 12.6% of the total in 1989 to 22.2% in 2007. The 20% threshold was crossed in 1999.
By contrast, the proportion of continuing staff decreased from 63.6% to 59.3%, and the proportion of contract positions decreased from 23.8% to 18.5%. The shift from contract to continuing appointments from 1998 to around 2005 reflects the establishment and subsequent disestablishment of the Higher Education Conditions of Employment (HECE) Award. Notably, this did not reduce the expansion of FTE numbers of staff employed casually.
In summary, between 1989 and 2007, student numbers more than doubled during a period in which the number of teaching staff other than casuals increased by only 19%, and the overall student to teacher ration blew out from 14:1 to 22:1.
The influences of casualisation
The above analysis outlined how the teaching academic workforce has failed to keep up with growth in student numbers. To the extent that there has been growth in teaching staff numbers, the main response from institutions over the last decade has been through a consistent casualisation of the academic workforce. Discussions of casualisation generally focus on casually-employed staff, and studies have examined issues from this perspective. However, casualisation itself is not the main focus of this paper, but rather the perceptions of academic staff about how changes in the academic profession have affected them.
The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) in its 2009 report Measures of Australia's Progress shows that the casual staff issue in the university sector cannot be isolated from broader trends in Australian society [5]. The report provides an analysis of changes in work conditions over time, noting the strong growth in the number of casual employees over the last two decades. The ABS also notes that the pace of change has slowed in recent years and based on a comparison with higher education casual staff statistics, it would seem that the overall proportion of casual staff has levelled out earlier in the university sector than in the workplace overall [6].
However, structural changes in the academic workplace should be considered. In fact, much of the teaching in the modern university is now provided by casual staff. Percy et al have noted that "sessional teachers are the hidden part of the massification that has taken place in higher education in Australia over the last 30 years...Between 40 and 50% of teaching in Australian higher education is currently done by sessional staff" [7].
Even though the ABS notes that the increase in casualisation is seen by many employers and employees as being a beneficial thing, this view does not match the debate on the subject within the university sector. According to the ABS report, some employees (women and the young in particular) welcome the flexibility brought by casual employment [8]. However, many casual staff could be placed in the category of aspiring academics and most desire full-time (preferably continuing) positions. In response to a direct question on the preference for casual appointments in her study on casual staff in universities, Junor found that only 28% of casual academics said that this mode of employment was their first choice [9].
Although casual employment means under-employment or precarious employment for many staff, this is not universally the case. Using the typology outlined by Gappa and Leslie, the casual academic workforce also includes people doing sessional teaching as an extension of their regular professional life, and retired full-time academics eager to keep their hand in and make a contribution [10].
From the perspective of both continuing and contract staff and casual staff, Lazarsfeld-Jensen and Morgan offer a very pertinent comment:
"Casualisation has a profound impact on tenured staff. They must recruit and manage teachers who in turn have no access to training or support, and whose role is constrained by a minimalist contract system. Last minute recruitment was often based on prior relationships, which casuals felt opened them up to excessive demands and bullying because of their financial vulnerability. There is insecurity on both sides with neither feeling able to create parameters for the relationship or the work. It is not unusual for a full time academic to work exclusively with casuals, and for casuals to have no relationships within the university beyond their immediate supervisor and the person who handles their pay [11]."
The CAP survey and job satisfaction
The essence of this paper is that Australian academics are less positive about their profession than before. This information comes from the Changing Academic Profession (CAP) survey, an international survey conducted in 25 countries in 2007. CAP is the largest such research project conducted to date. CAP data provide the context for assessing the attractiveness of the academic profession in Australia as well as offering an international angle, which is important given the highly internationalised and mobile nature of academic work. The International Centre for Higher Education Research (INCHER) at the University of Kassel in Germany is coordinating the construction of the international database.
Using a common questionnaire, population definition and sampling approach, CAP sought the opinions of academics in each participating country. A total of 1,370 valid responses were received from full-time and fractional full-time academics at 20 Australian universities, that is from staff on both continuing and contract appointments but not from casuals.
According to the CAP survey, with the exception of academics from the United Kingdom, Australian academics are the least job-satisfied of all. This paper examines Australian responses relating to overall job satisfaction and compares them with responses from 18 of the 25 participating countries that had supplied data at the time of writing. The paper contends that in the Australian context, the additional burdens imposed by a much larger university sector, and increased workloads generated for permanent staff through casualisation, is a major contributing factor.
Figure 3 provides mean scores of a composite scale consisting of items measuring satisfaction with academic work, relating to several questions on the CAP survey. These questions address respondents' sense of personal strain; whether they would become an academic if they had their time over again; their perception of whether now would be a good time for a young person to enter academia; and their overall satisfaction with their current job. Respondents reported their perceptions on a five-point Likert scale, from 1 (very dissatisfied) to 5 (very satisfied).
Australia sits in a group with Portugal and China on the low end of the satisfaction scale. Only UK academics reported lower levels of satisfaction. Australia is considerably below the overall mean for all countries. Academics from Mexico reported the highest levels of job satisfaction.
Perhaps another telling perception of Australian academics was that they believed that things had got worse. In response to a question about changes in working conditions, 64% of Australian respondents believed that things had deteriorated or very much deteriorated [12]. This response was topped only by academics from the UK, of whom 68% thought that their situation had deteriorated [13]. Other high-scoring nations on this question were Japan and Italy, where 63 and 56% of academics, respectively, reported that there had been a deterioration in working conditions [14].
At the other of the scale, only 9% of Australian academics thought that working conditions had improved or very much improved. This was the lowest result of any nation in the CAP survey. Even 15% of British academics thought that working conditions had improved since they'd started their career [15].
The literature summarised by Long [16] suggests that job satisfaction is critical to an individual's overall well-being, and it also has important implications for organisational productivity and performance. A positive experience of work is important from both the individual's and organisation's perspectives.
Studies have also indicated a U-shaped relationship between job satisfaction and age. Younger and older groups in the academic workforce perceive their work more positively than do the groups in between and there is a negative relationship between higher levels of education and satisfaction with work. This relationship, however, essentially disappears if the level of education is in line with the knowledge and skills required for the job, that is, if people are not over-educated for their job.
Crucially, dissatisfaction has been articulated by the new generation as shown in Figure 4, assuming that junior ranks provide a reasonable proxy for age. Academics in lower ranks (that is, assistant lecturers and lecturers) and middle ranks (senior lecturers) report lower satisfaction than those in the upper ranks (associate professors and professors).
This perception has been matched in other studies. For example, interviews with postgraduate research students and early career researchers in the field of science and mathematics undertaken by Edwards and Smith also found perceptions of an increasingly unmanageable workload being absorbed by academics at all levels [17]. With the increasing need to juggle teaching, research and administrative duties (see also Lazarsfeld-Jensen and Morgan) [18], the desirability of the academic profession is waning at a time when the need to attract young people to this work has never been more acute.
Other research has found that academics increasingly find themselves on a 'post doc treadmill', perhaps an indication that the post doctoral pathway no longer represents a stepping stone into continuing academic positions to the extent that it once did. The relative decline in the number of continuing positions in universities is a prime reason for this situation. Views of this type are supported by research in Australia [19] and elsewhere in the world [20] especially in relation to the sciences. According to this literature, if the increase in short-term academic positions continues, it is likely that many young researchers will be discouraged from following an academic career.
Discussion
Academia in Australia, it appears, is not the most satisfying workplace when compared to higher education systems elsewhere. While links between job satisfaction and other facets of people's work are complex, the results set out above do not bode well for the academic profession in Australia, or for universities themselves.
This presents a two-sided problem. On the one hand, if casual staff are providing up to half of university teaching [21], a potential quality issue arises. If universities' main business is handled by its least-connected workforce segment, a lot could be at stake. Consistency is more difficult to achieve if teaching in individual subjects is split between several individuals, many of whom might not be present in the teaching department other than at class time. On the other hand, the coordination required by this model increases the pressure on the permanent academic staff member responsible for subject management and casual staff supervision.
Fees (predominantly tuition fees) paid by both domestic and overseas students provided universities with more than one-third of total university revenue in 2007 (including HECS-Help and Fee-Help loans) [22]. Yet, to what extent do students get value for money in terms of access to Australia's core and leading academics?
Overall, student evaluations such as through the Course Experience Questionnaire do not suggest an imminent problem, although international benchmarking through the Australasian Survey of Student Engagement [23] exposes several key areas of apparent risk. But there might well be a problem looming. Hugo has calculated that universities are likely to lose between a fifth and a third of their staff in the next decade or so [24]. Extrapolating from Hugo's figures, some 50% of our senior academics will retire over the next decade.
Australia is not unique in this respect, as most developed economies will see a comparable exodus from their academic workforce. This alone will increase the global competition for the best and the brightest. And as argued above, based on the results of the CAP survey, Australia is not in an enviable position compared to most of our direct competitor systems if one subscribes to the notion that job satisfaction is an important indicator of the attractiveness of a system. All of this leaves aside the challenges that the government's ambitious goals for increases in participation pose: who will be teaching all these new students?
To date, the principal response from university managements has been to appoint more casual staff, thereby increasing the squeeze on continuing staff. This may be understandable in the face of the harsh financial climate which universities continue to face. But it is not a response that can be sustained over time.
The retirement projections can be seen as a problem if the academic profession is being perceived as relatively unattractive by the next generation. They can also be seen as a massive opportunity to reshape career trajectories and reinvigorate the profession if a more proactive stance is taken by universities. Crucial ingredients in this are increased flexibility in employment arrangements to facilitate female participation in the academic workforce, a further expansion of post-doctoral positions, and a stronger focus on the teaching function itself through enhanced training and support for those at the coalface.
All the indications are that academic work is now perceived as being less likely to lead to a real career than in the past. That this is happening at the same time as student numbers are growing and as academics on continuing appointments age presents a serious problem.
* Hamish Coates is principal research fellow at the Australian Council for Educational Research; Ian R Dobson is an honorary research fellow at the Centre for Population and Urban Research at Monash University in Melbourne; and Lyn Meek is director and Leo Goedegbure deputy director of the LH Martin Institute at the University of Melbourne.
* "Australia's Casual Approach to its Academic Teaching Workforce" is published in the latest edition of the journal People and Place, produced by the Centre for Population and Urban Research at Monash University in Melbourne. It is republished with permission.
References
1- M. Trow, 'From mass higher education to universal access: the American advantage', Research and Occasional Paper Series, CSHE.1.00 Berkeley, Center for Studies in Higher Education, 2000. Trow's theoretical perspective was that massification has occurred in a higher education system once higher education is seen as a right among many classes of society, not just the elite. Higher education starts to become universal once access is possible for 50% or more of the appropriate age cohorts of the population.
2- Ibid.
3- D. Bradley, P. Noonan, H. Nugent and B. Scales, Review of Higher Education in Australia: Final Report. Canberra, Australian Government, 2008; Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations (DEEWR), Transforming Australia's Higher Education System, Canberra, DEEWR, 2009.
4- Higher Education Staff Collection, Canberra: DEEWR, various years.
5- ABS, Measures of Australia's Progress, 2009 accessed 6 December 2009 at: betaworks.abs.gov.au
6- Ibid.
7- A. Percy, M Scoufis, S.Parry, A. Goody, M. Hicks, I. Macdonald, K. Martinez, N. Szorenyi-Reischl, Y. Ryan, S. Wills and L. Sheridan, The RED report: recognition o enhancement o development: the contribution of sessional teachers to higher education', Australia Learning and Teaching Council (ALTC), Canberra, 2008. p 3.
8- Ibid.
9- A. Junor, 'Casual university work: choice risk and equity and the case for regulation', The Economics and Labour Review, vol. 14, no. 2, 2004, pp. 276-304.
10- J. Gappa and D. Leslie, 'The invisible faculty: improving the status of part-timers in higher education', 1993 Jossey-Bass, Hobeken, NJ, USA.
11- A. Lazarsfeld Jensen and K. Morgan, 'Overload: the role of work-volume escalation and micro-management of academic work patterns in loss of morale and collegiality at UWS: The way forward', South Melbourne, National Tertiary Education Union, 2009, p. 54.
12- INCHER (International Centre of Higher education Research), The Changing Academic Profession (CAP), Tables by Country (0) - Unweighted Data Table 52. University of Kassel, Germany Accessed September 2009 at www.uni-kassel.de.
13- Ibid.
14- Ibid.
15- Ibid.
16- A. Long, 'Happily ever after? A study of job satisfaction in Australia',The Economic Record, vol. 81, no. 255, 2005, pp. 303-321.
17- D. Edwards and T.F. Smith, Consultation Report: Supply, demand and approaches to employment by people with postgraduate research qualifications in science and mathematics', Canberra, DEEWR, 2008.
18- Lazarsfeld-Jensen and Morgan, 2009, op. cit.
19- Edwards and Smith, 2008, op. cit; D. Edwards and T.F. Smith, 'Literature review and data analysis, supply, demand and approaches to employment by people with postgraduate research qualifications in science and mathematics', Canberra, DEEWR, 2008; G. Laudel and J. Glaser, 'From apprentice to colleague: the metamorphosis of early career researchers', Higher Education: The International Journal of Higher Education and Educational Planning, vol. 55, no. 3, 2008, p. 387; C. McInnis, R. Hartley and M. Anderson, What did you do with your science degree? A national study of employment outcomes for science degree holders 1990-2000, Parkville, Australian Council of Deans of Science, 2001.
20- N. Dawson, 'Post postdoc: are new scientists prepared for the real world?' Bioscience, vol. 57, no. 16, 2007; J. Glanz, 'Young physicists despair of tenured jobs', Science, vol. 279, no. 5354, 1998, p. 1128; J. Huisman, E. de Weert and J. Bartelse, 'Academic careers from a European perspective, Journal of Higher Education, vol. 73, no. 1, 2002, pp. 141-160; C.B. Leggon, 'The scientist as academic', American Academic Profession, vol. 221, 2001; R. McGinnis, P.D. Allison and J.S. Long. 'Postdoctoral training in bioscience: allocation and outcomes',Social Forces, vol. 60, no. 3, 1982, pp. 701-722; R. Monastersky, 'The real science crisis: bleak prospects for young researchers', Chronicle of Higher Education, vol. 54, no. 4, 2007.
21- A. Percy, M Scoufis, S.Parry, A. Goody, M. Hicks, I. Macdonald, K. Martinez, N. Szorenyi-Reischl, Y. Ryan, S. Wills and L. Sheridan, 'The RED report: recognition o enhancement o development. The contribution of sessional teachers to higher education. ALTC Canberra, 2008.
22- Department of Education, Science and Training (DEST), Adjusted financial statements for higher education providers as listed in the Higher Education Support Act 2003 for the 2007 reporting period, 2008,www.dest.gov.au accessed 19 November 2009.
23- H. Coates, 'Development of the Australasian survey of student engagement (AUSSE)', Higher Education, 2009.
24- G. Hugo, 'The demographic outlook for Australian universities' academic staff', CHASS occasional paper no. 6, Adelaide, Council for Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences (CHASS), 2008.
COMMENT:
Interesting article and findings. We in Malaysia had also embarked on a project to look at what it takes to make an academician feel appreciated or we prefer to call it "the feel good factor". Was just wondering if we could embark on an international project to create a "feel good index" for academics.
Yang Farina
Showing posts with label paper. Show all posts
Showing posts with label paper. Show all posts
28 September 2009
PAPER : Bullying in the Workplace: A Proposed Model for Understanding the Psychological Harassment Process
ABSTRACT
Because different studies suggest that psychological harassment represents a great threat to most workers, it has received considerable and growing interest across the world and has emerged as a new field of study in Europe, Australia, South Africa and the U.S. In spite of these studies, bullying still appears as a complex phenomenon. This paper summarises the relevant literature and proposes a specific model of the psychological harassment process. This model presents psychological harassment as a four phase process to improve the understanding of this pernicious workplace phenomenon. As a very costly phenomenon, which harms the health of the victim and the competitiveness of the firm, the paper concludes that HR managers should combat psychological harassment in organisations.
12 August 2009
PAPER - Psychological Illusions: Professionalism and the Abuse of Power
Psychological Illusions: Professionalism and the Abuse of Power
by Dr Tana Dineen
by Dr Tana Dineen
Reprinted from (Ab)Using Power: The Canadian Experience.
Susan C. Boyd, Dorothy E. Chum, Robert Menzies (Eds.)
Fernwood Publishing; Halifax, Nova Scotia, 2001 pp.162-173
"Man’s major foe is deep within him. But the enemy is no longer the same.
Formerly it was ignorance; today it is falsehood."
~Jean-Francois Revel, The Flight from Truth
10 July 2009
JAPAN - The Era of Bullying: Japan under Neoliberalism
The Era of Bullying:
Bullying (ijime) and school nonattendance (futoko) have been the key ‘behavioural problems’ among students in
One apparent reason for this difference is that bullying is generally hard for adults to recognise,[4] whereas school nonattendance is highly visible; adults find school students outside school during class hours and teachers find empty seats in the classroom. A more fundamental reason, however, is that school nonattendance is generally seen to be a problem of student maladjustment to school and society, whereas bullying is, to a large extent, a manifestation of students’ adjustment to human relations around them. The notion that ‘bullying prepares children for the future’ describes this reality. Even though its political incorrectness may inhibit adults from being explicit about it, indications of tacit approval of bullying are ubiquitous in schools and society at large. The perception of bullying as a ‘rite-of-passage’ experience is not unique to Bullying, moreover, appears to have become a key concept in understanding Japanese society today. Recent publication of popular titles which claim Japan to be a ‘bullying society’ (ijime shakai) suggests the centrality of the concept at this time.[7] The common thesis is that conformist and hierarchical pressures in Japan have been so great that bullying has become the key to understanding human relations at school, work and society at large. The paper examines this thesis first by looking into bullying among Japanese youth, followed by analysis of the broader socio-political climate of PART 1: BULLYING CRISES IN JAPANESE SCHOOLS 1. The Figure 1 Figure 1 shows the number of school students who took their own lives after being bullied by other students (i.e. ijime-suicide or bullycide) for the period 1985-2006. The red line indicates the number reported in major newspapers, and the blue, the official statistics by the MoE.[8,9] The graph begins in 1985, the year the MoE started to collect data about bullying. Since then, it is estimated that at least 200 students have taken their own lives because of bullying. In most cases, the students died in ‘ordinary’ circumstances, being bullied by ‘ordinary’ (‘good’) students. It is this ordinariness of their situations that links bullycide with the everyday life of schools.[10] Bullycide constitutes only the tip of the iceberg. Beneath it are numerous others who have been killed, injured, physically or psychologically impaired,[11] or disabled because of bullying.[12] Some victims of bullying direct their anger at the innocent, as was the case with the indiscriminate knife attack by a 16-year-old in Tokyo in January 2008.[13] Bullying also causes and triggers school non-attendance. Official statistics for 2000-2006 show that ‘trouble with friends’ (presumably victimisation in most cases) accounted for the annual average of 11.3% (or 2,834) of school nonattendance of primary and 21.9% (or 22,613) of junior high school students.[14] As will be discussed below, there has been a problem in the accuracy of the statistics on bullycide. Nonetheless, they provide the most reliable of all statistics on bullying which otherwise fluctuate wildly depending upon the definition of bullying and the method of data collection. The graph shows that there have been three peaks at roughly ten-year intervals. The first two peaks coincided with a case which attracted extensive media coverage: the 1986 case of Shikagawa Hirofumi (13) in Tokyo,[15] and the 1994 case of Ohkochi Kiyoteru (13) in Aichi.[16] It is hard to know how well these peaks reflect the actual number of bullycides, let alone the incidence of bullying. It is possible that they reflect, to some extent, public awareness of the issue heightened by media reportage. Nonetheless, the recurrent pattern in the graph suggests that whatever measures taken to reduce bullying in the past decades have had limited success. If anything, victims may be confronted with a greater sense of helplessness in the third peak as is discussed below. 2. Denial and Deception The third peak was triggered in early October 2006 through the expose that despite having found several suicide notes, a school and the local board of education in Mayor and educational board members (Mizunami, Although the concentration of incidents of bullycide in such a short period was unprecedented, the tendency for school authorities to suppress such cases was not.[17] They had often reacted in indeterminate or evasive ways to such incidents. Between 1985 and 2006 there were 17 court cases of bullycide where local administrations, including the school concerned, were found liable – by negligence or inertia – for the death of the students (i.e., circa 8 to 9 per cent of some 200 known cases of bullycide for the period).[18] What was new in 2006 was that because of the repeated misrepresentation by school authorities the matter reached the MoE. The validity of the MoE statistics on bullycide which were based on reports by prefectural boards of education was questioned. Figure 1 shows a consistent gap between newspaper reportage and MoE statistics. This might be partly because of the fact that national and private schools were not included in the official statistics until 2005 (which constituted in 2007 1.2% of primary, 7.3% of junior secondary, and 24.2% of senior secondary schools). It might also reflect the reluctance on the part of school to recognise and/or report bullycide. The number of bullycides for 1999-2005 had been recorded as zero, but, under pressure, late in 2006 the MoE announced that it would reassess the statistics.[19] An MoE notice, addressed to all chairs of prefectural and municipal boards of education, governors, and vice chancellors of all national universities with affiliated schools, urged that bullying not be hidden. However, teachers and school administrators understand that ‘problems’ such as bullying, school nonattendance, student injuries, accidents, etc. would impact negatively upon their performance evaluation.[20] Unless this system of evaluation is changed, the consistent gap in the graph is likely to persist. 3. Shattered Trust and Lost Authority
The envelope and the ‘certificate’ addressed to the Minister of MoE. Source: Mainichi Interactive One of the consequences of the repeated exposure of cover-ups by school authorities is that it shattered students’ and the general public’s trust in teachers, principals, and boards of education.[21] This came to a head in early November, 2006 when a ‘package’ was received by the MoE, addressed to its then Minister Ibuki Bunmei. It appeared to be from a boy who wrote that he would take his own life if ‘my teacher does not caution the bullies’ in two days time. The ‘package’ consisted of a ‘certificate’ declaring ‘This suicide was caused by bullying’ together with seven separate letters addressed to the Minister, board of education, the principal, class teacher, classmates, their parents, and his own parents. No details were given to identify the student or school, however, and the content of the package suggested that it was a desperate voice of protest about the corrupt social relations surrounding ijime, rather than a direct call for help. The following are some excerpts from the package. [22] ‘The certificate: This suicide was caused by ijime’ I certify that I’m going to commit suicide because of ijime, on Saturday 11 November. Please show this letter to the bullies, teachers, the principal, bullies’ parents, and my parents. Also, please show all the letters to the media. To the Minister of Education and Science Ibuki Bunmei The reason I write this letter is that I find it too hard to live on. Bullies have never been punished. I told teachers about ijime, but they’ve done nothing. I told my parents about it but I was only told to ‘put up with it’. They contacted the principal and the board of education, but nothing changed. My parents and teachers only say ‘your personality is the problem’, so ‘put up with it’. If the situation does not improve before Wednesday 8 November, I’ll take my own life as I wrote in ‘The certificate: This suicide was caused by ijime’. I’ll do it at school. I can trust no one, so I write to you Minister Ibuki Bunmei…. Please release my name to the media on Saturday 11 November. Please. Please. To all classmates: Why do you bully me?... I am going to kill myself because of your bullying…. I saw on the TV that bullies went with teachers, the principal and board of education to destroy evidence, tell lies and say that there was no ijime. No bullies take responsibility. It’s the fault of adults. You may think that you’ll be protected by adults, but you’re wrong. I wrote letters to many people so that you must all kill yourselves to take responsibility…. To the class teacher: Why don’t you help me? I told you about ijime many times and so did my parents. You told me to ‘hang on’ and ‘it is your fault’… If you don’t caution the bullies by Wednesday 8 November, I’ll commit suicide at school on Saturday 11 November. You’re no different from bullies. I’ll hold a grudge against you forever and will never forgive you. When I die, you’ll tell lies on TV. You’ll definitely say that ‘there was no ijime’ or ‘there is no causal relationship between ijime and suicide’…. I can’t trust you. So I’ve decided to write to the Minister. Other teachers are the same. I can’t trust teachers. They pretend that they haven’t seen ijime. You saw me being bullied, didn’t you? But you did nothing. Why? I don’t understand. To my parents: When you read this, I will be gone. I’m sorry. I couldn’t stand it any more. Bullies, teachers, the principal, board of education – they’re all the same. I saw on TV that there were others who want to commit suicide, and I found that I don’t have to put up with this any more. I’m going to die because of the bullies, teachers, the principal, and the board of education…. They’ll all try to avoid responsibility as I saw on TV. I can see that and I hate them. The letters were filled with resentment toward the system which silences the voice of the victim even after death. The blackmail of self-annihilation, the direct appeal to the Minister, and the request to involve the media are adopted as a strategy to gain a voice as victim. The letters also indicate the impact the series of cover-up scandals had on victimised children, leading them to believe that no help could be expected from adults. By the end of November, 43 letters of similar content were received by the MoE. The MoE noted that the cover-up incidents had seriously undermined the trust and authority of school administration. [24] This does not mean, however, that the authority of teachers collapsed suddenly in 2006 because of the ijime-crisis. Rather, the scandals delivered a powerful blow to their authority, which had been on the decline for some time, vis-à-vis students, parents and society at large. Teachers had been blamed by the media for all sorts of school-related problems. With their authority undermined, it was increasingly difficult to maintain order in classrooms. The hollowing of teacher authority goes hand in hand with the sense of lack of norms in society which can lead to the sense of isolation and anxiety at an individual level. The most controversial bullycide in 2006, the case of Mori Kesuke, illustrates this juncture of hollow authority of teachers, normlessness, new modes of class management, and bullying. 4. ‘Reading-the-vibes’ Teachers: Bullying as a Method of Class Management The suicide of Mori Kesuke became especially controversial because the school admitted that Kesuke had been the target of ‘bullying’ by his homeroom teacher before he was bullied by his classmates. It was disclosed, for instance, that Mori’s teacher, who ranked students by using the classification of strawberries: ‘first class’, ‘second class’, and so on, labelled Kesuke as a strawberry ‘unfit to dispatch’.[25] To consider whether such behaviour constitutes bullying or not, it is necessary to clarify the definition of bullying. The standard definition of bullying consists of three elements: 1) imbalance of power, 2) abuse of power, and 3) sense of fun felt by the bully and humiliation, by the bullied. There must be a clear difference in power between the bully and the bullied, whether it is physical, psychological (e.g. verbal), or social. Group bullying is a powerful way of bullying as it establishes supremacy of the bullying group in all these respects, and it is the predominant form of bullying in Japan where it is unusually prevalent .[26] Collective or not, the imbalance of power per se is inevitable in many aspects of life, especially in formal organizations, and is not inherently bad. The imbalance becomes bullying when power is abused, so this abuse of power constitutes the second element of bullying. The third is the sense of fun that the bully finds in the humiliation of the bullied. The bully’s defence that ‘it was just fun’ proves not innocence, but guilt. This element often distinguishes abuse from the legitimate use of power held by individuals who hold managerial positions, although this is hard to detect for obvious reasons. What happened in Kesuke’s class was a quintessential example of bullying. It involved a clear imbalance of power between teacher and student with the teacher abusing his power by making hurtful and humiliating remarks. The teacher’s remarks made the class laugh while humiliating Kesuke. Each time the class laughed, it sided with the teacher, making him the ringleader of the bullying group. By making the class laugh, the teacher gained power to manage the class. Order may have been maintained, but at the cost of filling the class with negative energy, uneasiness, insecurity and fear arising from the lack of clear norms. Without being able to rely on an intrinsic sense of right or wrong, students constantly have to read the ‘vibes’ in class for a sign of what is acceptable at a particular point in time. ‘Reading the vibes’ (or kukiyomi, a compound word made up of ‘kuki’, meaning ‘air’ or ‘atmosphere’ and ‘yomi’, from the verb ‘yomu’, meaning ‘to read’; thus literally: ‘reading the atmosphere’, ‘sniffing the air’, or ‘reading the mood’) becomes the method of survival in the normless space of a classroom. Fujiwara Tomomi, a writer and critic, pointed out that bullying has become a convenient method of class management for some teachers who have lost the authority to manage their class. He writes: When a homeroom teacher cannot be the pivot of the class, the atmosphere of the class becomes permanently unstable. Such a class is in need of a clown. The model to follow can be found in variety-shows in television, which revolve around a clown – the bullied – who is constantly laughed at each time s/he screams at being poked and pushed. The class follows the same power dynamics. To ‘read the vibes’ means to grasp instantaneously the role to be played by each individual, to select a victim, and to direct the whole scene. The skill to operate ‘vibes’ can be regarded as a ‘petit-fascism’ in contemporary society. Some teachers have fallen into using this technique as it is an easy way to manage a class. Thus bullying has become a method. [27] The key to Fujiwara’s point is that the teacher in this context needs to ‘sniff out’ the mood of the class before positioning him/herself cleverly to enthral the students. Only when s/he can get the attention of the class successfully by making them laugh does this ‘method’ of class management work. The teacher therefore is not an isolated tyrant, but has a complicit relationship with the ‘vibes’ of the class or ‘classroom climate’. To try to make students laugh carries a risk, however. If the attempt fails, the teacher risks being labelled ‘samui’ (uncool) or ‘kimoi’ (sick) – contemptuous labels often used to refer to adults who unsuccessfully try to be funny to go along with the young. To avoid that risk, the laughter must also induce a sense of fear among students. Thus, some teachers consider ‘bullying’ the easiest strategy for class management. 5. ‘Reading-the-vibes’ Students: Bullying as a Way of Reducing Tension For many children and teenagers, ‘reading-the-vibes’ is a skill essential for social survival. Amamiya Karin, a prominent punk critic and novelist, widely seen as a voice of the disadvantaged, recalls. When I was in the first year of junior high school, there was a lot of ijime around me, and I was always reading the vibes to avoid being the next target. The tension was extremely high. In order to protect myself, I had to concentrate all the time, doing such things as following what the powerful person had said, or laughing at a particular moment [28]…I knew that I would be targeted one day and was constantly on my toes to avoid it, and that was in a way tougher than the time I was actually being bullied [29]… When bullying of someone else began, the tension of the place eased at once. All felt relaxed. I felt that atmosphere every day.[30] The young expect each other to be able to sense subtle nuances of communication, and to be able to say something quickly to enliven the atmosphere. Those who cannot do it get excluded.[31] This ability is considered to be so important in peer relations that, ‘KY’ which stands for ‘Kuki ga Yomenai’, meaning ‘unable to read the vibes’, became a buzzword in 2007.[32] In order to measure how well you are equipped with this skill, a ‘Kukiyomi test’ or ‘KY test’ is available online free of charge.[33] The importance of raising children who can sense the mood is also preached on a website for young mothers.[34] ‘KY’ is one of the most commonly used ‘keitaigo’ (mobile-phone terms). There is even a word, ‘KY-go’ (KY-language), to refer to acronyms used in mobile-phone and internet communications especially by teenage girls. Thus, ‘MK5’ stands for ‘Maji Kireru 5 byomae’, meaning ‘5 seconds before I really snap’. Some KY-go have multiple meanings, such as ‘JK’ which can be ‘Joshi Kokosei’(senior-high school girl), but also ‘Jodan Kitsui’ (‘got to be joking’) or ‘Jodan wa Kao dake ni shite’ (‘your face is a joke and let’s leave it at that’).[35] To understand which one is meant in a particular context, one needs to be constantly connected with others and keep up with the flow of the communication. In two ways, then, ‘KY phenomenon’ is associated with the culture of bullying: KY provides an instant means to label others for not being able to read the vibes, and KY-go provides a means of communication which is inherently exclusive while providing fun for those kept within the circle. The prevalence of ‘reading-the-vibes’ as a skill and ‘KY’ to refer to those who lack it, suggests the intensity of the pressure to conform felt by Japanese youth and the infinitely subtle, fast and unpredictable mechanism of inclusion and exclusion. It has become a way of relating, a way of ‘friendship’. The IT-based communication, especially the exchange of text messages through the mobile phone, has pushed this mode of friendship to a new height. The technology, however, is nothing but a means of communication: it can also be used to build stable human relations which have nothing to do with bullying. Reading-the-vibes phenomenon is based on a pattern of bullying that has been prevalent among school students in 6. Bullying as the Learnt Behaviour of Good Students: Type A and Type B Bullying According to the most comprehensive survey on bullying in Japan, about a quarter of students in primary and junior high school are involved in bullying, and nearly half of the students who had been bullied were bullied by close friends.[36] The ‘role’ of perpetrator and victim was found to rotate,[37] so that almost 10% of primary school students and over 4% of junior high school students are ‘bully-victims’; i.e., they are bullied and they in turn bully others.[38] Bullying has to be understood as a continuum, whose two ends are shown in Figure 2 as contrasting types. Since this is only a conceptual model, the reality may not be so clear-cut. ‘Type A’ is the bullying by an individual ‘problem kid’, or a group of ‘problem kids’ who bully others, often outside the friendship loop. Their ‘role’ as perpetrator is more or less fixed, although they could very well be victims in a different setting (e.g. at home). The cause of bullying is likely to lie primarily in the individual attributes of the bully, such as personality and family background. This is where the solution to this type of bullying can be sought. Figure 2 'Type B' 'bullying, on the other hand, mainly involves good students with few signs of ‘problematic behaviour’.[39] They tend to be engaged in group bullying where there is considerable rotation in the roles of bully, victim, or bully-victim. A longitudinal study found that the actual students involved in bullying either as bully or victim changed substantially while the total proportion of students involved in bully/victim problem remained constant.[40] Type B bullying occurs largely among ‘friends’. The prevalence of this type of bullying, which involves substantial numbers of ‘good students’ with rotating roles, suggests that there are environmental factors at work, i.e. that bullying cannot be attributed only to the characteristics and/or backgrounds of each individual student.[41] It should also be considered as a social and cultural issue, requiring structural solution. This is the type of bullying that is very difficult for teachers to discern since they are often part of the same system. However, it is the type of bullying that teachers can play a key role in reducing.[42] A scene from a film ‘Mondai no nai watashitachi’ [We who have no problems] The Japanese school has been known as a place where the pressure to conform is strong. Ijime can be a manifestation of students’ over-adjustment to excessive pressures to conform at school where ‘group’ is used to maximise conformity.[43] Through ijime, students learn to be docile to the powerful, at least on the surface, and to be aggressive to the socially weak. Endo Mika, a Japanese American, schooled in the When I first met these children, I was very shocked…. I noticed something peculiar in the way they used words. They spoke very fast, with high tension, and I was surprised to see that they could not endure not to keep up the high tension. At the same time, they used violent language such as ‘Die’ (shine), ‘Shut up’ (uzee), ‘Erase yourself’ (kiero) with a surprising calm… One day, a child asked me a question and my answer showed a lack of confidence. Then the other child said to me, ‘Hey, the way you answered is weak, touch up! (shoboi zo)…. If you answer that way, you’ll get bullied’…. Listening to the language they use, I often feel suffocated. ‘Feeling empty’ (munashii), ‘don’t be weak, toughen up’ (shoboi), ‘not fitting in’ (uiteiru), ‘can’t read the vibes’ (kuki yomenai) – After observing children whose communication is dominated by such language, I came to understand why children find it difficult to step into school.[44] The quality of ‘friendship’ maintained by this kind of communication is likely to be thin, unstable, and filled with anxiety. According to Unicef, 30% of the 15 year-olds surveyed indicated that they ‘feel lonely’ which was almost three times higher than the next highest-scoring country.[45] There is some survey evidence of such a thinning of human relations in Japanese society.[46] There are many factors explaining the diminishing human relations, but it is possible that bullying has worked as a vehicle for it. While it is important to have ‘social intelligence’ to be able to sense the mood in a particular setting, the notion of non-conformity as problematic contravenes the principle of a civil society where diversity and tolerance are cherished.
PART 2: THE ERA OF BULLYING 1. The Discourse of the Strong Ogi Naoki, a leading educational critic, points out that the third peak of bullycide (1997-present) differs qualitatively from the previous two. Although the first two peaks did not witness a substantial reduction in bullying, Ogi, nonetheless, values the progress made between 1985 and 1996 in terms of the level of general awareness of bullying as a human rights issue. According to Ogi, however, this progress ‘vanished into thin air’ after around 1997 and it was as if the public understanding on bullying had ‘reverted by twenty years to that of the 1980s’.[47] Ogi holds that the real issue behind bullying among school students is the rise of the ‘logic of the powerful’ in society. In relation to the discourse on bullying, he points out, the trend is now to work on the victim rather than on the bully, by giving the victim kind encouragement such as ‘be positive and survive’, ‘there will come a better time’ or ‘hard experiences will be useful to you’, all of which eventually suggest that the victim should persevere. These messages have replaced the previous ones directed towards bullies such as ‘it is a shame to bully someone’ or ‘it is uncool to bully, so stop it’. The shift in the ijime discourse, he argues, symbolises the decline in the public awareness of human rights and the widespread inability to be sympathetic to the socially disadvantaged in general. This, he suggests, reflects the broader changes in social, economic and political climate of The change has been pointed out by others as well. “‘Stop bullying!’ is the phrase required by the era when the notion of the survival of the fittest prevails” writes Shin Sugo, a human development consultant who published, with a psychiatrist Kayama Rika, Ijimeruna!: Yowaimono ijime shakai Nippon [Stop Bullying!: Bullying-the-weak society, Nippon].[49] Saito Takao, a journalist, points out in Anshin no fashisumu: Shihai saretagaru hitobito [The fascism of the easy-going: people who want to be ruled] that the tendency to reduce social issues to individual responsibility by using the word ‘jikosekinin’ [one’s own responsibility] became prevalent in the late 1990s.[50] At the same time, he continues, power-dominant human relations such as power harassment and sexual harassment increased in the workplace, as follows: In the workplace, the performance-based wage system and temporary employment are linked to the notion of ‘do it on your own responsibility’ [jikosekinin]. In this environment, democratic procedures and the spirit of mutual help have been lost, on the one hand, and sexual harassment, bullying (power harassment), and over-aggressive and exclusive human relations became common and established, on the other.[51] According to the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, consultations sought by individual citizens concerning labour conflict increased by more than 90% between 2002 and 2007, whereby in 2007 bullying and power harassment constituted the second largest category accounting for 12.5% of all consultations.[52] They include verbal intimidations such as: ‘How stupid you are, being unable to understand such a thing!’, ‘You cause trouble to others’, or ‘If it is so hard, why don’t you quit?’.[53] There are numerous reports of physical, verbal, and sexual abuse and harassment at work,[54] including such cases whereby a young woman’s being hit, kicked and stepped upon on the face with a shoe by a senior employee.[55] 2. Neoliberalism and Social Change in the Late 1990s Saito Takao points out that underlying these trends are globalisation dominated by US-style neoliberalism, which advocates unlimited free-market competition, coupled with neoconservatism, the political philosophy that upholds traditional values, limited welfare and the interventionist approach to international affairs to maximise national interests.[56] Indeed, the late 1990s was the time when the neoliberal reform was adopted in full in Japan.[57] In 1995, a report by Nikkeiren (the former Japan Federation of Employers’ Associations), Shinjidai no ‘Nihonteki keiei’ [‘Japanese management’ for the new era][58] laid the foundation to promote the employment of a massive number of casual workers who provide cheap ‘disposable’ labour with little job security while imposing on full-time workers an achievement-based assessment system.[59] The number of full-time employees actually peaked in 1997 and declined rapidly thereafter.[60] The ‘working poor’ who maintain regular employment but remain poor due to low wages and an absence of benefits and security surfaced as a social issue in 1998.[61] The number of households on welfare has risen steadily since around 1997 (Figure 3). The number of suicides exceeded 30,000 in 1998 for the first time in Figure 3: Households on welfare 1990-2005; Adopted from McCormack 2007, p.40 [63] While the need for social security increased dramatically, the social security system had been under pressure in the political climate of neoconservatism, which aims to minimise the cost of social welfare. A 52-year-old taxi driver with health problems, for instance, died of starvation in It is possible that the declining system of social security – whether it be ‘life-time’ employment, social welfare, pension, or medical insurance – fuels the individual needs for the sense of security. The driving force of ‘reading the vibes’ – whether it be a method of classroom management, a way of relating to friends, or a method to maximise security – is fear.[66] Bullying associated with ‘reading the vibes’ may have become particularly prevalent since the late 1990s as a way to minimise fear and maximise the sense of safety and security. 3. Violence and the Declining Rule of Law The diminishing sense of security seems to be accompanied by a sense of norms crumbling at various levels of Japanese society. The cases of bullying-style punishment/training that led to the deaths of young people in In September 2008, a 25-year-old petty officer died of an acute subarachnoid haemorrhage after being hit in a martial-art-style ‘training fight’ at the school of the Maritime Self-Defence Force in This case resembles that of the death in 2007 of a 17-year-old stablemate of a sumo wrestler, Tokitsubeya, from multiple-trauma shock after being beaten with a beer bottle by his stablemaster, forced to fight for half an hour against three senior wrestlers under the order of the master, and kicked and hit with a metal bat after he fell. Everyone went along with the order in order to ‘straighten up’ the boy who had fled from the stable.[71] The master and three wrestlers have been arrested and indicted.[72] Two other cases of physical violence against junior wrestlers were subsequently reported.[73] Deceased 17-year-old Tokitaizan (Saito Takashi) It is hard to tell to what extent these cases reflect recent change in Japanese society, i.e. wide-spread violence and the absence of norms, and to what extent ‘traditional practice’ in each institution. However, the violent death of a stablemate during ‘training’ was unheard of, and the relationship between recent increase in suicide among Self Defence Force officials and bullying, violence and lack of discipline has been noted.[74] The gravity of the problem of eroding social norms surfaced most strikingly in April 2008 in the government’s reactions to the Nagoya High Court decision that Japanese operations in In response to the decision, the then Chief Cabinet Secretary Machimura Nobutaka stated publicly that the government ‘could not accept such a court ruling’[76]; the then Prime Minister Fukuda Yasuo, stated that the decision ‘would have no impact on the continued deployment of the ASDF to Iraq’[77]; the then Foreign Minister Komura Masahiko, said that ‘the judgement reflects the opinion of only one person [the judge]. I will read the judgement document when I have more time after retirement’; and the then ASDF Chief General Tamogami Toshio, said that most of the members of ASDF engaged in the operation would feel that the decision ‘has nothing to do with us’ (‘sonnano kankene’). Tamogami’s reply was couched in the catchphrase of comedian Kojima Yoshio,[78] known for dancing about shouting it wearing only swimming trunks. These responses ‘raise questions about the rule of law and the separation of powers in Representatives of the government, and the military, have made public statements contradicting the findings of the court, rejecting its conclusions, and dismissing the relevance and significance of its constitutional interpretation…. This response by the executive branch of government to a judicial decision in a constitutional democracy is difficult to comprehend. It raises questions about the extent to which the rule of law is respected. It provokes concerns about the continued normative power of the Constitution. It creates serious doubts about the proper distribution of power among the three branches of government within the democratic structure of the state.[80] Although this government response to the decision was not directly linked to bullying, it highlighted one facet of a society where the culture of bullying prevails: the denial of the principles and ethos of democracy and rule of law.
PART 3: TEACHERS AS LYNCHPIN: BULLYING POLITICISED? The social changes in the late 1990s discussed above – the dominance of the culture of the strong, neoliberalism, economic polarization, and crumbling norms - seem to have a synchronous relationship with the promotion of nationalism. The second half of the 1990s saw the emergence of a number of ‘neo-nationalist, revisionist, and reactionary Diet organizations’[81] to preach the legalisation of hinomaru (the rising sun flag) as 1. Kimigayo Discipline and Peace Education since the Late 1990s In late-1990s Figure 4: The number of teachers disciplined or verbally reprimanded in relation to kimigayo and hinomaru 1993-2005. Source: Produced based on data available from MoE (2002-2005)[82] Between 1998 and 2005, 570 teachers were officially disciplined and 620 verbally reprimanded in relation to hinomaru (the national flag) and kimigayo. Sato Manabu, Tokyo University professor of education, points out that such a systematic and large-scale crackdown on teachers is rare in the history of education, second only to the ‘red-labelling of teachers’ in 1932 under fascist Japan.[83] Although the majority of cases involved an official ‘verbal reprimand’ (kunkoku) or ‘written reprimand’ (kaikoku), in reality this meant being labelled an ‘ideologically prejudiced teacher’ (henko kyoshi) or ‘incompetent teacher’ (shidoryoku busoku), constantly marked and watched, and likely to be transferred to a remote school.[84] As Figure 4 indicates, the general trend is that official discipline has largely replaced verbal reprimand, suggesting the adoption of tougher measures towards teachers. Most of the kimigayo-discipline occurred in A series of lawsuits has been filed by individual teachers and groups of teachers concerning the punishment inflicted upon them in relation to kimigayo. Although the decisions have been mixed, the Tokyo District Court ruled in September 2006 that the policy of the Tokyo Metropolitan Board of Education of forcing teachers to sing kimigayo during school ceremonies violated Article 19 of the Constitution, which guarantees freedom of thought and conscience, and Article 10 of the Fundamental law of Education, which prohibits subjecting education to improper control’.[91] The court ordered the board to pay 30,000 yen in damages to each of the 401 plaintiff teachers, and ‘not to go after such teachers, saying the imposition of punishment would constitute abuse of power’ (Italics added).[92] 2. The Revision of the Fundamental Law of Education and the Ijime Crisis of 2006 As the pressure to silence teachers built up, The Fundamental Law of Education, whose Article 10 constituted one of the legal grounds of the above decision, was revised in the New Fundamental Law of Education enacted in December 2006. Where the original Article 10 stated that education should not be subject to improper control, the revised clauses allow the central government and local administrations greater power to control education. Among other changes, three stand out. First, the word ‘peace’ was erased from the preamble: in the formula ‘we shall…endeavour to bring up people who love truth and peace’, ‘peace’ was replaced with ‘justice’. Second, where nurturing ‘independent spirit’ and ‘spontaneous spirit’ of the individual was one of the main aims of education in the original law,[93] these phrases disappeared in the revision. The aim of education became, inter alia, cultivation in the mind of children of ‘a sense of morality’, ‘autonomy for self-control’, and ‘a sense of public spirit/duty’, and of an ‘attitude to respect tradition and culture’.[94] Figure 5 The revision of the Fundamental Law of Education, together with the revision of Article 9 of the Constitution which declares state pacifism, were the ‘twin towers’ of the LDP’s political agenda in the postwar period. Some suspect the possibility that bullying among school children may actually have been used through media management to clear the path to achieve the former.[95] Four days after Prime Minister Abe Shinzo took office on 26 September 2006, it was reported that a school in Hokkaido had covered up the ijime-suicide which happened almost one year earlier.[96] This report was the first of a series of ijime-related news discussed earlier, which literally swamped the media in October and November. On 10 October, the Abe cabinet established the Education Rebuilding Council, and with minimal debate in part due to the preoccupation with bullying, the revision of the Fundamental Law of Education was passed on 16 November, just about the time the media reportage on bullying began to subside. For two months, teachers and school authorities in general were on the defensive. Confronted with the bullying scandals and a strong public sense of the need to reform education, Abe expressed serious concern about bullying, positioning it as a central problem to be solved in the Council, and publicly projected the image of a Prime Minister with a mission to solve the problem of ijime.[97] When the ‘dust’ of the bullying crisis settled towards the end of the year, the revision of the Law had already been accomplished. The state of health among teachers seems to reflect the changes described above. Figure 5 shows the number of teachers who took sick leave during the period 1991-2005.[98] Before 1997, the number was fairly stable, ranging between 3,300 and 3,800 teachers. In 1997, however, the number for the first time exceeded 4,000 and started to increase dramatically as a result of mental-health problems. The number of teachers who took sick leave due to mental-health related problems tripled in 10 years between 1996 and 2005, and that figure exceeded 4,000 in 2005, despite the fact that the total number of teachers declined by 4.7% (over 45,000 teachers) during this period.[99] While there are obviously multiple factors accounting for the breakdown of each individual teacher, such an increase seems to point to an increase in the difficulties they faced at work since around 1997.
PART 4: POSSIBILITIES FOR CHANGE 1. Historical and Comparative Relevance The social changes witnessed since the late 1990s are of course not unique to Historically as well, the collective bullying in a hierarchical social structure, as represented in the sumo-stable affair and the Maritime Self-Defence Force affair, has strong resemblance with ‘shigoki’ practiced in the Japanese military toward the socially weak, by those who themselves had been oppressed by others.[102] Maruyama Masao pointed out, as characteristic of the Japanese populace before and during the war, the tendency to bow uncritically to authority and to replicate the oppressive treatment by the powerful to the less powerful.[103] These were also features of people under fascism in Germany according to Erich Fromm [104] and Theodore Adorno, what Adorno call the ‘authoritarian personality’.[105] These commonalities suggest that bullying in Japanese society today is not something unique to 2. Japanese Society at a ‘Chaos Point’? Ervin Laszlo, a philosopher of science, argues that the existing systems of the world have been crumbling and heading for a catastrophe, but that there is still a chance to bring about a breakthrough instead of a breakdown. This is because, he argues, the world is at a chaos point where a tiny fluctuation can trigger a major change in the system, causing a so-called ‘butterfly effect’ such that[106] “if a monarch butterfly flaps its wings in Laszlo also writes that these trends can change depending on changes in people’s values and expectations.[108] This paper’s analysis of bullying in a broad socio-political context of Like the rest of the world, it is possible to consider that Japanese society is at a ‘chaos point’. If indeed 1. Juxtaposed with the neoliberal and neoconservative trends described above, citizen activism has also been notable especially since the 1995 2．The Fundamental Law of Education was revised, yet the revision of the constitution’s Article 9 is expected to be very difficult: Some 7,000 citizens groups have emerged at the grassroots level to demand its retention.[110] (Access the homepage of the “9 jo no kai” or Article 9 Society” through this link) 3. During the period the revisionist view of history gathered strength, the opposing view also gained strength. The ‘New History Textbook’ which was the revisionist vehicle to promote nationalistic education in 2001 was overwhelmingly (99.8%) rejected by local boards of education.[111] Two politicians with strong nationalistic agendas, Abe Shinzo as Prime Minister in 2007 and Nakayama Nariaki as Minister for Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism for the Aso Cabinet in 2008, fell from power as ‘KY’s, being out of touch with the needs and the sentiments of the public and commonsense. Oe Kenzaburo who challenged the official denial of the ‘forced mass suicide’ by the Japanese military during the battle of Okinawa won the case, and former General of Japan’s Air Self Defence Forces, Tamogami Toshio, who ridiculed the Nagoya High Court decision on Japan’s involvement in the Iraq war mentioned above, also fell from the sky for his essay defending Japan’s colonialism and war.[112] 3. Institutional Reform at School for Culture of Change One consequence of the 2006 bullying crisis is that bullying has become an educational issue involving not only students but teachers, principals, boards of education, and the MoE as parties directly involved. It is no longer the ‘fire on the other side of the river’ for any party. Shortly after the 2006 crisis, the MoE published a collection of examples of how schools had responded to the issue of bullying. One of the 35 examples contained a checklist designed to help teachers raise awareness of potential human rights issues in their dealings with students.[113] The report states: In order to create a school and a class that does not allow bullying to happen, it is important that each teacher consciously cares about each individual student and expresses it in her/his attitude every day. Teachers should fully recognise that what they say or do has significant influence upon students and pupils. Anybody worthy of the name of a teacher should never hurt a student or encourage bullying of the student by other students.[114] This is not to say that the student-teacher relationship is the only factor relevant to bullying among students. As discussed in this article, bullying is associated with institutional structure and climate that allow and promote the domination by power in various aspects of society, not just at school. Young people can be exposed to such a mode of human relations directly or indirectly at home, through the media, and other influences outside school and home. Yet precisely because of the injustices in human relations outside school, the school must be a sanctuary where students can feel safe and secure. To feel secure should not demand that they ‘read the vibes’ of the place quickly, or take part in bullying, or avert their gaze from bullying around them. The sense of safety and security should be felt without compromising fundamentally the sense of being oneself. The key to reduce bullying seems to be, initially, for teachers and other adults to deal promptly and caringly with each small incident of bullying. Research shows that students who have experienced being bullied tend to trust teachers less, consider teachers less caring and more tolerant to injustices.[115] By using cases of bullying as leverage, it might be possible for teachers to gain greater respect and trust, not only from those who are directly involved in bullying but also other students who witness how the teacher has responded to the socially weak. At the institutional level, in order to establish mutual trust between students and teachers, practices that harm students such as corporal punishment and senseless penalties should be eliminated.[116,117] In order to enable teachers to have caring relationships with students, work conditions that allow them to do so will be needed. A democratic and supportive work environment free of discrimination and harassment of any sort (including power harassment) will also be essential to create a school climate that will nurture positive human relations in general. If human relations at school can be changed gradually in the effort to reduce bullying, it might be possible for school to bring about a culture of change outside school as well.[118] In a school that is encapsulated in the culture of caring, students will have little fear of being different from others. Nor will they be afraid to ‘change the air’ instead of ‘sniffing it out’ or ‘feeling the vibes’. To allow students to learn to be their individual selves may indirectly help Japan to minimise the risk of being further drawn into what has been termed the ‘fascism of the easy-going’, where the more ‘safe’ and ‘secure’ people feel, the more their freedom is restricted.[119] To deal with small cases of bullying in everyday life may seem trivial, but perhaps constitutes the effective means to challenge the existing culture of power and the broader social roots of bullying. The political imperative to deal with bullying in Japanese schools also presents an opportunity. Paradoxically, there are indications not only in Japan but around the world that increasing numbers of people are interested in and pursuing alternative ways of life based on new paradigms of relationships, including the pursuit of alternative education.[120] Bullying may appear insignificant yet it may become a powerful catalyst to bring about change to a society at a chaos point.
Acknowledgement: I am grateful to Katalin Ferber,
Notes: 1. The Ministry of Education (Monbusho) changed its name to the Ministry of Education and Science (Monbukagakusho) in 1991. In this text, an acronym of MoE is used to cover both. 2. Wong, So fei (2008) ‘Reframing Futoko (school non-attendance) in 3. Kamata, Satoshi (1998) Ijime shakai no kodomotachi [Children in bullying society] 4. An official survey found that some 40% of primary, 30% of junior secondary and 70% of senior secondary teachers, and about 70% of parents were not aware of the victimisation of their students or children. See the survey through this link ( 5. See for instance, Takekawa, Ikuo (2005) Ijime gensho no saikento: Nichijyo shakai kihan to shudan no shiten [Reexamining ijime phenomenon: the perspective of group and the everyday social norm] 6. Yoneyama, Shoko (1999, and 2007 paperback edition through Routledge Paperbacks Direct) The Japanese High School: Silence and Resistance, 7. This includes, for instance, Ijimeruna! Yowaimono ijime shakai Nippon [Stop bullying!: 8. The blue line in Figure 1 is based on MoE, “‘Jido seito no mondai kodo to seito shido jo no shomondai ni kansuru chosa (Heisei 18 nendo)’ ni tsuite”, [Regarding the 2006 report on “Survey on issues on teacher guidance regarding problematic behaviour among school students”] Access here. ( 9. The red line in Figure 1 is based on 1) ‘Monbukagakusho happyo no kodomo no ijime jisatsusha to kuichigau shimbun hodo sareta ijime jisatsu’ [The discrepancy in the number of ijime-suicide reported by the media and the Ministry of Education and Science], Takeda, Sachiko (2004), Anata wa kodomo no inochi to kokoro o mamoremasuka?: Ijime hakusho [Can you protest the life and the soul of children?: The white paper on bullying], Tokyo: Wave shuppan, p.264; and 2) Table ‘Kodomo ni kansuru jiken/jiko 1’ [Cases and accidents relating to children 1], the website, ‘Nihon no kodomo’ [Children in Japan] (by Takeda, S.) ( 10. See for instance, Kamata 1998, Ijime shakai, pp.213-219; Ogi, Naoki (2007) Ijime Mondai to do mukiauka [How to face the problem of bullying] Iwanami Booklet no. 695, pp.43-46, Yoneyama (1999), Silence and Resistance, pp.157-185. 11. See for instance Kayama & Shin (2008), Stop Bullying, pp.60-66. (see note 7 above.) 12. Details are available on the table ‘Kodomo ni kansuru jiken/jiko 1’ by Takeda above. 13. The 16-year-old student who attacked people on the street in Shinagawa, 14. MoE, Jido seito no mondai kodo to seito shidojo no shomondai ni kansuru chosa [A survey on behavioural problems of pupils and students and issues of student guidance] 2000-2005, available through this website ( 15. Actual names of the victims are being used here in the effort to provide them with the opportunity to ‘voice’ their experience. They have been widely reported in the Japanese media. Japanese names included in the body of the text are given in Japanese style, i.e. family name first, except where the name of the person in English is well established. 16. For details see Yoneyama (1999) Silence and Resistance, pp.157-159. 17. See Yoneyama (1999) Silence and Resistance, especially, pp.177-181. 18. See ‘Kodomo ni kansuru jiken/jiko 1’ by Takeda above and Ijime Saiban [Ijime trials] special issue (no. 126) of Kikan Kyoikuho, September 2000, 19. Mainichi shimbun (2006) ‘“Ijime jisatsu” 16ken atta: Monkasho “zero” happyo no 7nen 20. Anonymous teachers of 21. MoE ‘Ijime Mondai e no torikumi no tettei nituite (Tsuchi)’ [Regarding the total permeation of measures against bullying: a notice] 22. Mainichi Interactive (2006)‘Jisatsu yokoku tegami: “Ikiteikunoga tsurai”’ [Letter announcing ijime suicide: ‘too hard to live on’] Mainichi Interactive, 07 November ( 23. Left photo: Ibid. Right photo is from Shibui, Tetsuya (2006) ‘Tanrakuteki na kodomo jisatsu no hodo’ [Simplistic reportage on the suicide of children], Ohmy News ( 24. See note 21 above. 25. Yomiuri Online 19 October 2006 ‘“Karakai yasukatta” ryoshin to gakkogawa hanashiai de: kyoyu’ [‘He was an easy target’ said the teacher at a meeting with the student’s parents] ( 26. Some 80% of bullying among school students in Japan has been reported to be collective (Morita Y., Taki, M., Hata, M., and others (1999) Nihon no ijime [Bullying in Japan], Kaneko shobo, Tokyo, p.41) when the figure is 60-65% in Scandinavia (Olweus, D. (1993) Bullying in Schools, Oxford, Blackwell, p.39) and 40 to 60% in Australia (Rigby, K. (1996) Bullying in Schools, Melbourne, Australian Council for Educational Research, p.39). Moreover, collective bullying in 27. Fujiwara, Tomomi (2006) ‘“Kuki yomi” to kashita kyoshi tachi’ [Teachers who turned to be ‘kuki yomi’], Chuokoron, December, pp.30-31. All translations of Japanese texts included in this article is mine. 28. Amamiya, Karin and Kayano, Toshihito (2008) Ikizurasa ni tsuite: Hinkon, Identity, Naitonalism’ [On the sense of ‘hard to live on’: Poverty, identity and nationalism’, Kobunsha shinsho, p.151. 29. Ibid, p.30. 30. Ibid, p.31. 31. Kagami, Ryuji (2006) ‘Seitoha okaruto ni kaserareta “anchi” to shiteno shimei’ [A mission to pursue the position of ‘anti’ to the traditional occultist] , Chuo Koron, December, p.166. 32. See ‘2007 U-can shingo ryukogo taisho kohogo: Gendaiyogo no kisochishiki’ [Nominations for the 2007 U-can prize for new words and buzzwords for Gendaiyogo no kisochishiki]’ ( 33. See for instance, ‘Kukiyomi tesuto’ [Reading-the-vibes test] ( 34. Matsubara, M. ‘SQ no takai kodomo ni sodateru 7tsu no pointo’ [7 points to raise a child with a high SQ], Ikuji no kisoshishiki [Basic knowledge on child rearing: All about] (27/072008). 35. ‘Joshi kokosei no ryakugo, ryukogo’ [Acronyms and buzzwords used among high-school girls] ( 36. Morita et al. (1999), Nihon no ijime, pp.86&185. (See note 26 above.) 37. Taki, Mitsuru (2001) ‘Relation among bullying, stress and stressor: A follow-up survey using panel data and a comparative survey between 38. Morita et al. (1999), Nihon no ijime, p.86. 39. Ogi (2007) Ijime Mondai. (See note 10 above.) 40. Taki, Mitsuru (2007) Evidence ni motozuku ijime taisaku [Evidence-based Interventions against bullying] Kokuritsu kyoiku seisaku kenkyujo kiyo [National Institute for educational policy research] no. 136. ( 41. Yoneyama (2003) ‘Problems with the paradigm’, BJSE, pp.315-330. (See note 26 above.) 42. Shoko Yoneyama (in press) ‘What can be done by classroom teachers’, in Esther Ng (ed.) Breaking the Silence: Bullying in Singapore. Harvest Centre for Research Training & Development. 43. See for instance, Yoneyama (1999) Silence and Resistance, especially Chapter 7 ‘Ijime: the price of super-conformity’. 44. Endo, Mika (2008) ‘Futoko to no hajimete no deai’ [My first encounter with school nonattendance], Horistikku kyoiku nusu [Holistic education news] The newsletter of 45. Unicef, The United Nations Children’s Fund (2007) ‘Child poverty in perspective: An overview of child well-being in rich countries’, p.38. 46. Yomiuri Online (2006), ‘Ningenkankei “kihakuni” 80%’ [80% indicated that human relations became thinner], 47. Ogi (2007) Ijime Mondai, pp.8-9. (See note 10 above.) 48. For points in this paragraph, see Ogi (2007) Ijime Mondai, pp.8-11. 49. Shin & Kayama (2008) Stop Bullying! p.197. (See note 7 above.) 50. Saito (2004) Anshin no fashizumu, pp.18-20. (See note 7 above.) 51. Saito (2004) Anshin no fashizumu, p.21. 52. Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare (2008) Heisei 19 nendo kobetsu rodo funso kaiketsu seido shiko jokyo [The implementation of the individual labour conflict solution system: 2007 report], ( 53. Asahi shimbun, 54. See examples reported in Pawahara Netto, Power Harassment Net, ( 55. Amamiya & Kayano (2008), Ikizurasa, p.151. (See note 28 above.) 56. Saito (2004) Anshin no fashizumu, pp.158-162. 57. 58. Nikkeiren (Japan Fedeartion of Employers’ Associations)(1995), Shinjidai no ‘Nihonteki keiei’ [‘Japanese management’ in the new era], Nikkeiren, p.32. 59. Amamiya & Kayano (2008) Ikizurasa, p.70. 60. Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communication, Statistics Bureau, Employee by type of employment, ( 61. Goto, Michio (2008) ‘Workingpoor zodai no zenshi to haikei’ [Historical backgrounds of the increase of the working poor] Sekai, January 2008, p.112-124. 62. Losgene sengen [The lost generation declaration] ( 63. McCormack, Gavan (2007) Client State: Japan in the American Embrace, Verso, p.40. 64. Seikatsu hogo mondai taisaku zenkoku kaigi [National congress to promote countermeasures for livelihood protection], ‘Kokura kitaku gashi jiken’ [The starvation case in Kokura] . 65. TV Asahi, Hodo Station, ‘Jakusha kirisute no kakusa kakudai “Yami no Kitakyushu hoshiki” to wa?’ [Discarding the weak and expanding the gap: What is the ‘mystery of 66. Saito (2004) Anshin no fashisumu, p.165. 67. The Japan Times editorial, 68. Mainichi shimbun, 69. Yomiuri shimbun, 70. Asahi.com, 71. The 72. Sankei shimbun, 73. Suportsu Nippon, 74. Miyake, Katuhisa (2008) Jiei taiin ga shinde yuku [The Self Defence Officials are dying] Kadensha, 75. The 76. Martin, Craig (2008) ‘Rule of law comes under fire’, The Japan Times, 77. Ibid. 78. See Kojima, Yoshio homepage ( 79. Martin (2008) ‘Rule of the law comes under fire’. 80. Ibid. 81. McCormack (2007) Client State, p.10. (See note 63 above.) 82. See, for instance, MoE (2002-2006) Kyoiku shokuin ni kakawaru chokai shobun to no kyojyo ni tsuite [Regarding disciplinary measures taken to teachers] Table 7 ( 83. Sato, Manabu (2007) ‘Ishihara tosei hachi nen o kenshosuru: kyoiku seisaku’ [Critical examinations of eight years of 84. Anonymous teachers (2007) ‘What is happening at schools?’ p.135. (See note 20 above.) 85. MoE (2006), ‘Heisei 17 nendo kyoshokuin ni kakawaru chokai to no jyoko ni tsuite’ [Situations regarding the discipline towards teachers] Table 7 ( 86. Anonymous teachers (2007) ‘What is happening at schools?’ 87. Saito, Takao (2004) ‘“Hokoku” no bofu ga fukiareru’ [A windstorm of ‘serving the nation’ howls frightfully] Sekai, April 2004 (no.725), p.85. 88. Watanabe, Atsuko (2007) ‘Shitashii shisha tachi no koe o kitete’ [Recalling the voices of the beloved dead], in ‘Kyoshi to iu shigoto: Watashi wa naze kyoshi o yametaka’ [Teachers’ work: Why I quit being a teacher], Sekai, June 2007 (no.766), p.142. 89. Hiroshima Heiwa Kyoiku Kenshusho [Hiroshima Institute for Peace Education] (2004) ‘“Heiwa kyoiku jittai chosa” matome’ [Summary of ‘Peace Education Survey’] ( 90. Kyodotsushin (2003) ‘Heiwa karenda tekkyo o shido: Onomichi-shi kyoi ga bunsho haihu’ [Instruction to remove Peace Calendar: Onomichi City Board of Education distributed a missive] ( 91. The Japan Times, Editorial, 92. Ibid. 93. Ohe, Kenzaburo (2006) ‘Kyoiku no chikara ni matsubeki monodearu: Kaiteian kara ketsuraku shiteiru ikku’ [It shall depend on the power of education: the phrase missing in the draft proposal for the revision of the Fundamental Law of Education], Sekai, July, no. 754, pp.80-88. 94. See MoE (2006) ‘Kaisei zengo no kyoiku kihonho no hikaku’ [Comparison of the Fundamental Law of Education before and after the revision] ( 95. Prideaux, E. and Nakamura, A. (2006) ‘Education bill shifts power to the state: “Fascist” power grab?’, Japan Times, 18 November. 96. Ibid. 97. Abe, Shinzo (2006) ‘Stop the ijime: Abe sori kara no messeji’ [Stop the ijime: a message from Prime Minister Abe], Kantei Kids Room [The Prime Minister’s Official Residence Kids’ Room] ( 98. See MoE (2006) ‘Kyoiku shokuin ni kakawaru chokai shobun to no jyokyo ni tsuite (Heisei 17 nendo)’ [2005 Report on disciplinary punishments towards teachers] ( 99. From 1,001,432 to 919,154 teachers. See above for the source. 100. McCormack (2007), Client State. (See note 63 above.) 101. David Riesman (1961) The Lonely Crowd, 102. See Yoneyama (1999) Silence and Resistance, p.165. (See note 6 above.) 103. Maruyama, Masao (1948) ‘Nihonjin no seji ishiki’, in Maruyama Masao shu dai san 104. Erich Fromm (1941, 1960) Fear of Freedom, 105. Theodor Adorno, B. Aron, M.Levinson, and W.Morrow (1950) The Authoritarian Personality, Harper&Brothers, 106. Laszlo Erving (2006) The Chaos Point: The World at the Crossroads, Hampton Roads publishing, 107. Ibid. p.9. 108. Ibid. p.28. 109. Takao, Yasuo (2008) Reinventing 110. Ohe, Kenzaburo (2008) ‘Teigishu’, Asahi Shimbun, 111. Sato (2007) ‘Ishihara’, p.147. (See note 83 above.) 112. Gavan McCormack (2008) ‘Facing the past’, Kyungyhang.com, 113. MoE (2007) ‘Ijime mondai ni kansuru torikumi jirei shu’ [The collection of examples of measures against bullying], ( 114. Ibid. p.109. 115. MoE (1996) ‘Jidoseito no ijime to ni kansuru anketo chosa kekka ni tuite’ [Results of the survey on bullying and other issues among school students] (media release), ( 116. Ogi (2007) Ijime mondai, p.58-59. (See note 10 above.) 117. MoE (1996) ‘Jidoseito no ijme to ni kansuru anketo chosa’. 118. ‘Culture of Change’ was suggested by Peter K Smith, Goldsmiths College, London University, as the title of one of the panels for ‘Safer South Australian Schools’ conference held in Adelaide on 29-30 June 2006, and organized by the South Australian Department of Education and Children’s Services. 119. Saito (2004) Anshin no fashisumu. See note 7 above for details. 120. For instance see Nagata, Yoshiyuki (2007) Alternative Education: Global perspectives relevant to the Asia-Pacific region, Springer-Verlag.
Shoko Yoneyama is Senior Lecturer in Asian Studies, School of Social Sciences, University of Adelaide, and the author of The Japanese High School: Silence and Resistance, London & New York, Routledge, 1999 (paperback edition, 2007). Recommended Citation: Shoko Yoneyama, "The Era of Bullying: | |
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