This conference aims at understanding the reality of crisis Japanese youth have been facing and examining the possibility of hope for them with empirical and comparative approach. Three sessions are organized about crisis and hope in family formation and partnership, social and political participation, and transition and life planning respectively.
The first question is what or where the crisis is for youth. A lot of people have been talking about “Youth Problems” or “Youth Crisis” since late 1990s in Japan like other advanced societies. They, however, do not necessarily ground their understanding of youth on empirical data. As a result, “Problems” or “Crisis” are sometimes like urban folklores or just false stories. “Worsening youth crime in Japan” is one of those stories. We need to approach crisis for youth in a more empirical and comparative way.
The second question is what or where the possible hope is for youth. Crisis sometimes has possibility for hope inside because when existing system fails, they can find room for various alternative ways. For example, when they face difficulty making family or they are not willing to do so, they could start to try new ways of living together. Thus understanding the reality of crisis can help us to tackle the second question.
Japan Youth Study Group has been conducting time series survey since early 1990s. Based on the third survey data collected in 2012, we will try to answer those two questions. We also try to introduce comparative perspective by inviting guest presenters from abroad.
For further details, kindly visit: http://jysg.jp/img/chjy2013.pdf