|
|
|
Abstract
Sheldon Garon
Luxury is the
Enemy:
Mobilizing Savings and Popularizing Thrift in Wartime
Japan
To finance the costs of fighting World War II, the Japanese
government mounted intrusive savings campaigns. Although the campaigns
demanded drastic reductions in consumption, the populace overwhelmingly
complied—this essay argues—because people often understood official
exhortations to save in more self-interested terms. Many, particularly
women, attached positive meanings to wartime saving that in the postwar
decades helped shape Japanese housewives’ penchant for high household
saving. Wartime Japan did not necessarily reverse the emerging
middle-class consumer culture of the 1920s. The regime was compelled to
negotiate with people who wished to save for their families, as well as
for the nation.
Volume 26, Number 1 (Winter 2000)
© 2000 Society
for Japanese Studies
|
