Sakurai Yoshihide, Terazawa Shigenori Journal of the Graduate School of Letters 7 21 -29 2012年03月
This paper was originally presented at the Beijing Forum 2010, held on November5th-7th, 2010, at Beijing China, which was sponsored by the Peking University, the BeijingMunicipal Commission of Education and the Korea Foundation for Advanced Studies. Theobjective of this forum is to promote the study of humanities and social sciences in the Asia-Pacific region,and the theme of 2010 was"The Harmony of Civilizations and Prosperity for All―Commitments and Responsibilities for a Better World."This term "harmony"was used by the Chinese state leaders, and given the rapid transitrailway the name"和諧号."Inside China, it is used as"harmonious society(和諧社会)"and alsoit means the realization of the"harmonious world (和諧世界)"in international relations. PRCPresident Hu Jintao proposed the concept of"the harmonious world"at the Asia African summitmeeting in 2005,when it was extended to various fields such as politics,economy,culture,security,and environment. It is China to carry out not by an idea but by a substantial policy and stateapparatus in order to adjust the structure of the conflicts among different interest groups as wellas nations.The Beijing forum is a part of politics that aimed at "harmonious society,"and the world ofarts and sciences is not unrelated to political practice,either. Therefore,my paper was given thepolitical meaning that contributes to the construction of the humanities researchers'networkwhich leads to "harmonious world"of East Asia.In addition to that,it is obvious that religions carry out charitable actions under the controlof Chinese religious policy. Probably, in that sense my argument that discussed whether religionscontributed to the formation of social capital was understood as a thing in alignment withChinese political intention. It is the right science in China that a scientific result contributes topolitics.Apart from Chinese context,my paper aims at seeing the social context of religion carryingout social actions in Japanese society. This paper focuses on the role of religious institutions,organizations,and the spirit of cultivating reciprocity,trust,and social networks,which developssocial engagement. First, I will glance at "individualization of a family, neighborhood, andworkplace"in recent Japan,which resulted from the low birthrate and longevity, differentiationin class and regions, and various social changes in globalization. Second, I will review thetheory of social capital and the academic literatures of social services and social capital provide by Christianity in the US and Theravada Buddhism in Thailand. Last, I will extend my argument to the case of Japan, where both religious pluralism and secularism are institutionalized.