Civil Society and the State in Democratic East Asia: Between Entanglement and Contention in Post High Growth

Product Description


Civil Society and the State in Democratic East Asia: Between Entanglement and Contention in Post High Growth focuses on the new and diversifying interactions between civil society and the state in contemporary East Asia by including cases of entanglement and contention in the three fully consolidated democracies in the area: Japan, South Korea and Taiwan. The contributions to this book argue that all three countries have reached a new era of post high growth and mature democracy, leading to new social anxieties and increasing normative diversity, which have direct repercussions on the relationship between the state and civil society. It introduces a comparative perspective in identifying and discussing similarities and differences in East Asia based on in-depth case studies in the fields of environmental issues, national identities as well as neoliberalism and social inclusion that go beyond the classic dichotomy of state vs ‘liberal’ civil society.


Review


"The book is a collection of chapters prepared by social scientists with expertise in the Eastern Asian matters, specializing mainly in sociology, comparative politics and civil society studies. The background of the authors enables to apply interdisciplinary lenses to analyze the civil society phenomenon in Eastern Asia. What is especially important and interesting, the book is written both by experts from outside the countries of interest and by specialists originating from these countries. The cultural knowledge from the inside of the states is of great value to the presented texts and the book as a whole."
- Iwona Nowakowska,
Voluntas: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations (2021)


From the Inside Flap


This volume focuses on the new and diversifying interactions between civil society and the state in contemporary East Asia by including cases of entanglement and contention in the three fully consolidated democracies in the area: Japan, South Korea and Taiwan. The book argues that all three countries have reached a new era of post high-growth and mature democracy, leading to new social anxieties and increasing normative diversity, which have direct repercussions on the relationship between the state and civil society. It introduces a comparative perspective in identifying and discussing similarities and differences in East Asia based on in-depth case studies in the fields of environmental issues, national identities as well as neoliberalism and social inclusion that go beyond the classic dichotomy of state vs "liberal" civil society.


From the Back Cover


This volume focuses on the new and diversifying interactions between civil society and the state in contemporary East Asia by including cases of entanglement and contention in the three fully consolidated democracies in the area: Japan, South Korea and Taiwan. The book argues that all three countries have reached a new era of post high-growth and mature democracy, leading to new social anxieties and increasing normative diversity, which have direct repercussions on the relationship between the state and civil society. It introduces a comparative perspective in identifying and discussing similarities and differences in East Asia based on in-depth case studies in the fields of environmental issues, national identities as well as neoliberalism and social inclusion that go beyond the classic dichotomy of state vs "liberal" civil society.


About the Author


is Professor in Social Science of Japan at the University of Zurich, Switzerland. His research covers political and economic sociology of contemporary Japan in a comparative perspective. He is known for his publications on social movements, social inequality as well as Japan’s new immigration and immigration policy.

is Senior Lecturer at the Institute of Asian and Oriental Studies at the University of Zurich, Switzerland. She is also a research fellow of the European Research Center on Contemporary Taiwan (ERCCT), a