For the Japanese audience in Japan, they too will likely feel a kindred spirit with their cousins in Brazil who, in characteristically Japanese fashion, were able to endure and persevere during difficult times. The twentieth-century history of Japan before World War II was perhaps in some ways equally harsh albeit not for undeveloped jungles and former slave owners but for the rising militarism, the repression of the people, and a series of costly wars which ended in the ultimate disaster of World War II. The latter resulted in millions of Japanese deaths and left much of Japanese society in ruins. From that vintage point of the Japanese perspective, the drama of Japanese Brazilians in their conflicted situation during World War II was certainly agonizing and harsh, but it was at least shielded from the worst ravages of that war. The happenstance advantage is then that the remote existence of the Japanese Brazilians turns out to be a blessing at least during the time when Japan was being obliterated by bombing raids.
Perhaps the greatest irony though is how the relatively recent transnational labor migration of the children and grandchildren of the initial Japanese immigrants to Brazil in some ways replicates the latter’s disappointing experiences. That is, the dream of the dekasegi Japanese Brazilians immigrating to Japan—to earn a lot of money quickly in Japan—was often thwarted. The opportunities for upward mobility were typically highly limited or blocked. Contrary to expectations, the work was often harsh and social environment uninviting. This chapter of the story informs us not only about the lives of Japanese Brazilians but also gives us valuable glimpses into the nature of contemporary Japanese society.
In sum, this book by Ethel Kosminsky is both informative and a pleasure to read. She writes with great sensitivity to the struggles and chronicles of her Brazilian compatriots. At the same time, her discussion is illuminated by social scientific analysis. In the following, you will find new stories that are intrinsically worthwhile to understand but which will also help you to place your own life experiences into a broader context.
The Transnational Migration of Japanese Brazilians
The centennial celebration marking the arrival of the first ship at the port of Santos, São Paulo, bringing the first Japanese immigrants to Brazil took place in 2008. Preparations for this commemoration began in earnest in 2004. Books and articles were published, and conferences were held at public universities with funding from the Japanese and Brazilian governments, private banks, and publishing houses. No centennnial commemoration of Italian, German, Portuguese, Spanish, Syrian-Lebanese, or of any other group had ever been celebrated in this way.
There have been no celebrations and very few books, master papers, and PhD dissertations examining the transnational migration of Japanese Brazilians, which began in the 1980s. Why did the centenary of Japanese immigration reach such a large public and gain so much financial support? Why has the transnational process between Brazil and Japan, or even the settlement of Japanese Brazilians in Japan, received little attention from the Brazilian academia and the public in general, with the exception of the Japanese Brazilian associations concerned about the disruption of families? What has been the quality of the family relationships of transnational migrant Japanese Brazilians in Bastos and in Japan? How did the early adjustment process of Japanese immigrants affect their family links in São Paulo State, especially in Bastos?
The transnational migration process is more than a labor migration, in which the migrants move to work in another country, to which they have ethnic connection or not, through labor brokers or not, and face difficulties obtaining citizenship from the host country. It is a temporary migration that can sometimes last for years. Immigrants occupy the lowest position in the host society. They perform the unskilled and cheap work that members of the host country refuse to do. This back-and-forth migration is not apparently a new phenomenon. Italians in the United States of America in the 1800s came as seasonal migrants and worked for wages, which they saved and invested back into their small farms (Nugent 1995: 157). However, the transnational migration is a contemporary phenomenon.
Transnational migration in the era of globalization presents new aspects. Changes in the technologies of transportation and communication stimulated migration because both help immigrants get in touch with their families who have stayed behind. This separation often causes strains within the family, for those alone in the host country, those who stay in the sending country, and even for the family who immigrated together (Foner 2000: chapter 6).
This kind of relationship based on technologies of communication is not restricted to the familial one. Immigrants created a network that improves forms of solidarity, such as an Internet newsletter, which does not depend on space appropriation and face-to-face contact (Vertovec 1999: 449). As an example, Brazilian Japanese immigrants created “Ipcdigital: O portal dos brasileiros no Japão” (Ipcdigital: The Portal for Brazilians in Japan). The May 7, 2015, newsletter, for instance, includes information about remittances to Brazil, different kinds of labor agreement, a division of labor at the Brazilian General-Consul in Hamamatsu, a readers’ help section, a section about retirement in Japan and in Brazil, several ads from people seeking work, and more.
The population of Japanese Brazilian immigrants to Japan initially consisted of men, then by women on their own, and finally by couples and their families. They came from the lower and middle classes, some with college degrees, and chose to move to Japan due to the Brazilian economic crisis in the 1980s. This crisis reached many Third World countries (Hobsbawm 1996: 571). They aimed to earn enough money to return to Brazil and buy a house or start a business. Japanese factories needed cheap labor, and the Japanese government preferred those of Latin American-Japanese descent in order to maintain Japan’s ethnic homogeneity and avoid potential social and ethnic conflicts (Tsuda 2003: 92). Japan’s ethnic homogeneity is a societal founder myth, interwoven with its social structure. This myth is similar to that of Brazilian racial democracy and American meritocracy, established to prevent conflict and improve social cohesion among society’s members. At the same time, a myth highlights a society’s contradictions (Schwarcz 1996: 179).
Their level of education mattered little. Factories in Japan were looking for workers to fill positions no Japanese was willing to fill. Transnational migrants expect to work many years in Japan, save money, and return to Brazil. If they fail, they return to work in Japan for an additional period of time. Disadvantaged people use this strategy to overcome the challenges of the current world economy (Portes, Guarnizo, and Landolt 1999).
The concept of socioeconomic formation includes social production processes and relationships and the social conditions of people’s lives (Marx 1976: 38). Globalized socioeconomic formation, the current capitalist step, certainly continues based on labor and capital. However, it depends on transnational migrants. Developed countries with well-protected boundaries need immigrants, but they do not give them citizenship rights. They concede temporary visas to immigrants who see these developed countries as a transient place to make money, while maintaining roots in their own homeland. This kind of transnational migration is only possible due to the improvement of transportation and communication. Technology will continue to expel human labor out of the production of goods and services as long as the number of consumers is large enough (Hobsbawm 1996). Rich countries increase the income gap between the wealthy and poor within their own societies, and further expand the division of the world into rich and poor countries. Countries regardless of their wealth demonstrate income gaps based on race/ethnicity and/or religion.
Some authors refer to this capitalist phase as transnationalism, which also comprises the state’s role as transnational entrepreneur and its creation of supranational organizations, and its opposite grassroots nongovernmental transnational organizations and movements. Transnationalism includes sociocultural activities, such as diasporic literature and satellite and cable networks (Portes, Guarnizo, and Landolt 1999; Vertovec 1999).
Transnationalism increased the number of labor brokers and human trafficking. Most of the Japanese Brazilian immigrants working in Japan were recruited by labor brokers, as were more than two-third of the migrant population of Maringá city, located in Northern