Can Dr. Uzawa revive an old house that has become vacant? Can he do it?
Hello. I'm Mike, a lawyer living in Hong Kong.
It's been a long time since the last update. Thank you for your patience. I may have kept you waiting too long (you know I've been watching Netflix).
Why did the old house become vacant?
The old house I bought and the surrounding houses were built in the middle of the Meiji period, around 1870-1890. It was a very wealthy area because it was a key point in the shipping industry and a centre for salt production. It was the kind of place where neighbours competed with each other to build the most magnificent houses: if the neighbour had five noshi tiles, we had six. Of course, they also had their own fields, where they grew crops for themselves and their neighbours. There was a traditional "yui" system of community co-operation, where everyone worked together on the farm and on the maintenance of the surrounding reservoir and its waterways. Each family lived together and carried on the family business as it had done for generations.
There were several wars and economic cycles beginning with the Sino-Japanese War, but basically this lifestyle continued until World War II.
After the defeat, Japan rose from the ruins in a wave of rapid capitalization, and from the 1950s to around 1970, children graduating from junior high and high school, known as golden eggs, flocked from the countryside to the cities. These children, who until then had no choice but to stay at home and work in the family business, came to the cities with freedom of choice and freedom of movement. Children from wealthy families also went to college in the cities, thanks to the money they spent on their education.
The children then went on to work in the city, got married, and began to live in the city. Around 1970, 100 years after the houses were built, the "children" who left home started families in the cities and had children. This is the generation of "grandchildren. They will only visit their parents' home a few times a year, taking their grandchildren with them. The grandchildren were born and raised in the city, and their parents' home is where their grandparents live.
After another 30 years, around the year 2000, the grandchildren are grown up, married, independent, and have babies. They are "great-grandchildren. The grandparents who lived in the "family home" have passed away and there is no one left to live in the house, so the house is vacant. The "children" are concerned about the "family home," so they return a few times a year to clean and tend the yard. However, grandchildren who have a family have no reason to go to their parents' house where they have no grandparents and no friends around. Furthermore, from the "great-grandchildren's" point of view, the "family home" is an area in history that they have never been to or seen before, a place that only comes up when they trace their own roots.
Let me give you a bird's eye view from a legal perspective (since I am a lawyer, after all).
In Japan, from ancient times until the end of the war, the "family" functioned on the premise of a patriarchal system based on Confucian ideology. A "house" is a concept similar to a kind of legal entity that is separate from the individual, the smallest living community, so to speak, and to use an analogy, a "00 family" is a "00 village," the patriarch is the village head, and the family is the villagers. The family house is the symbol of "home" and the center of activities. The family headship, consisting of the family name, family business, and family production, belongs to the family, and the eldest son of the family takes over its management as the patriarch from generation to generation. The patriarch had absolute decision-making authority over the family, and the family's residence and occupation were all under the patriarch's direction and supervision. On the other hand, the patriarch was obligated to support the family, protect the patriarch, and perform rituals. In this sense, the patriarch and his family were similar to a lord and his servants, and in the neighboring society, they were the administrative officers in charge of the household.
The Meiji era saw the introduction of individualism from Western culture, but the family system, which had already taken root as a cultural institution, was retained and legislated for in the old Civil Code of 1898. First, with the formation of the state, the "house" became the smallest unit of state governance, with the Emperor at the head of a system of government that included the government, the prefecture, the municipality and the house. The head of the family was given the status of head of household and, like the prefectural governor and the mayor of the municipality, was responsible for the end of the system of state governance. On the other hand, in order to respect individualism, the "juridical personality of the family" was denied, and the head of the family became the owner of the family, but the next head of the family (the eldest son) inherited everything, thus maintaining the system of the succession of the family from generation to generation. The family register clarified the scope of the family members belonging to the "family" and stipulated that the head of the family had the right of supervision and the duty of support to his family. A family member is not legally allowed to change his or her residence, engage in any occupation other than that of the family business, get married, or start a separate family, without the permission of the head of the family. A married woman is registered in the family register of the family to which her husband belongs, and is subject to the supervision of the head of the family (not necessarily the husband). There is no limit to the number of generations or people who can be included in the family register.
As a side note, the Supreme Court recently ruled again on the constitutionality of themandatory married-couple system. The court said that it is important and a Japanese tradition to have married couples share the same family name in order to protect family ties, but the first time that this was legally stipulated was in 1898 when the old Civil Code was enacted. Before that time, even samurai families had their own family names, and even after the Meiji era, when commoners were given their own family names, the basic rule was that married couples had separate surnames. When the old Civil Code established the family register and made the "family" the minimum unit of governance, it was stipulated that upon marriage, women would be registered in the family register to which their husbands belonged, so women always took the name of the family to which their husbands belonged, and this was only a reflex effect of this change. This was not for the sake of marital bonding, but because they became members of the family to which their husbands belonged.
After the defeat in the war, the family system was abolished under the new Civil Code. However, at the time of the enactment of the new Civil Code, the law had been enforcing the same family status for nearly 50 years, so the idea of separate family names for married couples suddenly did not occur to them. Even so, I believe that the egalitarianism of the new system led them to maintain the same family name for married couples by giving up the "husband's or wife's family name" in a very generous way. The reason that it is important for family ties that husband and wife take the same family name is an afterthought in view of the legislative history.
A quiet word of caution.
The introduction of liberalism under Allied rule after the defeat of the war and the rejection of prewar imperialism also led to the rejection of the system of governance with the emperor at the top, and inevitably to the rejection of the family system. The new Civil Code was based on complete individualism, and the family register was prohibited, meaning that only parents and their children could be registered. The concept of "family head" was also eliminated, and children, including the eldest son, were free to leave home, choose their own occupation, and marry freely. Children who had been bound to their families by the family system were now freed en masse. (Of course, the collective employment was done against the will of the children in order to improve the economic situation of impoverished rural families after the war.)
The miraculous recovery of Japan after the defeat was brought about by the collapse of the family system, which had been in existence for hundreds of years. The concentration of the productive population in Tokyo and the increase in the number of nuclear families led to an outflow of the productive population and depopulation of the countryside.
If the cause of vacant houses is the disappearance of the house system, should the solution to vacant houses be to bring back the house system?
It is an undeniable fact that houses have been maintained for more than 100 years on the basis of the house system, and families have lived in them for generations. If we want to find a solution to the problem of vacant houses, not as a remedy, but as a cure, as a system that can last for the next 100 years, the answer is to restore the house system. However, it is not realistic to deny individualism now, and moreover, it is impossible to revive the family system in the present age, when families had no freedom.
If so, why not create a modern version of the "family system"?
What elements of the family system were essential for families to maintain their houses and fields and live together for 100 years? If we break down the family system into its component parts, we find that
1) "House"
The entity to which the family and the patriarch belong and which survives through the ages.
2) "Governor"
Tangible and intangible property belonging to the family and passed down from generation to generation.
(iii) "patriarch (head of household)"
A representative of the family that is passed down from generation to generation.
4) " Family (members of the family)"
Those who maintain the family under the control and supervision of the patriarch.
We can see that these four elements were important.
And in the old family system, these factors were determined on the basis of blood relations.
In other words, the family is made up of those who are related by blood, and the eldest son succeeds to the position of patriarch, and the family maintains and operates the family viceroyalty with the patriarch at the centre. The family, the patriarch, the family and the viceroy were all determined on the basis of blood relations. Today, however, the family unit is so fragmented, with different residences and occupations, that it is no longer possible to determine these four elements on the basis of blood relations.
What do we do now?
If not by blood, how about by land?
Even though the old family system was supported by blood, blood is not indispensable if the family system is viewed from the perspective of a system for the succession of houses and fields. If the four elements of the family system are determined by ties that replace blood ties, a modern version of the family system can be created.
If not blood, then land ties. Rather than distant relatives, we should be strangers nearby.
Originally there was a local cooperative system called "Yui". All members of the community worked together to carry out agricultural work and maintenance of the surrounding reservoirs and their waterways. Some of this system still exists today. "Yui is based on local relations. It might be easier to create a house system based on local community, which is a development of "Yui".
So let's reconfigure the modern version of the family system in terms of geographical relationships rather than blood.
The "family" was "a concept akin to a kind of legal entity separate from the individual." It is the entity to which a patriarch or family belongs. If we think of this as a geographical relationship, it becomes a local community, a legal entity of some kind, composed of neighbors. The members of the community change over time, but the community continues to exist. It is like the Giants, who are eternal and immortal, even if the players and managers are replaced. Since the purpose is to keep the modern version of the family system alive, a non-profit organization is appropriate, not a for-profit corporation such as a joint-stock company.
The "patriarch" is the family house, fields, and family business that have been passed down from generation to generation in the community, and are owned by the community.
The "patriarch " is selected from the members of the community according to certain rules. The elected patriarch is responsible for the management and supervision of the "family" and the operation of the family business.
The "family" is the neighbors who are members of the community. The family's role is to maintain the family, especially in the family business.
In this way, old houses are like the social common capital proposed by Professor Uzawa. Old minka that are more than 100 years old and have been completely integrated into the community are already part of the community, just like forests and reservoirs. So I began to think that, in addition to forests and reservoirs, it would be a good idea to create a system in which old minka are maintained and managed by the local community.
I feel that Dr. Uzawa has given me a clue to the solution.
Now, having said that, it's not really that easy. Who will live in the house once it is owned by the local community? Who will finance the restoration of the old house? What is a family business? Is it economically viable? The community is a stranger, so how do you resolve its interests?
To be continued next time.
