On Monday, March 24, the Hamilton Lugar School's 21st Century Japan Politics and Society Initiative (21JPSI)* hosted Professor James Raymo (Princeton University) in its multidisciplinary “Japan Politics and Society” speaker series. Prof. Raymo, who also directs Princeton’s Global Japan Lab, is a social demographer whose research focuses on documenting and understanding the causes and potential consequences of demographic changes associated with population aging.
The Ferguson International Center auditorium was packed as over 60 students, faculty, staff, and community members turned out to hear Prof. Raymo’s public lecture on the “Demographic Challenges in East Asia: at the Forefront of Population Change.” His prepared remarks examined trends in China, Japan, and South Korea, with a particular focus on Japan. IU’s East Asian Studies Center and Institute for Korean Studies co-sponsored his visit.
Prof. Raymo kicked off his remarks with a comparison of aging trends in the three countries. While Japan is currently the oldest country of the three; Korea will soon surpass it. Meanwhile, China is also aging rapidly, and already contains the largest population over the age of 65. Raymo argued that although effective policy interventions can slow down these trends, they cannot be reversed—at least in the short-term. That reality has important social, economic, and political consequences, including severe labor shortages, slowing economic growth, and a growing social welfare burden on younger generations.
Raymo also highlighted three major causes of rapid aging in these three societies: declining mortality (i.e., longer life spans), declining fertility (fewer births per woman), and limited immigration—especially relative to the United States, Australia, Canada, and several other countries. He noted that the principal cause of rapid aging is declining fertility.
As the world’s oldest country, Japan has been aware of these trends for a very long time. Japan’s fertility rate first dropped below sustainable replacement (2.1 children per women) in 1973. Fifty years later (2020), people 65 years and older made up 28.9% of the Japanese population. This number is expected to rise to 38.4% by 2065.
Raymo pointed out that data show, somewhat surprisingly given public perceptions, that fertility rates in Japan among married couples have been relatively steady. However, there has been a significant decline in marriage. Because, in contrast to many societies, children outside of marriage are relatively rare in Japan, the consequences for population-level fertility rates are significant. Prof. Raymo offered a point of comparison, noting that whereas approximately 40% of babies born in the United States these days are born to a non-married mother, the corresponding figure in Japan is only 2%.
Further exacerbating this problem is that many of Japan’s policies are designed to encourage married couples to have more children. But, as noted above, married couples having fewer children is not the primary cause of Japan’s declining fertility rates.
To close his lecture, Prof. Raymo argued that different or better-designed policies could slow down and mitigate some of the demographic trends Japan and other countries face, but are unlikely to fundamentally reverse them. For example, Japan could increase immigration, rely on increased automation to cover for its shrinking labor force, and revise the “either-or” norm that leads many women to feel they have to choose between exclusively working or building a family.
Following his remarks, Prof. Raymo engaged in a Q&A session with an audience of enthusiastic students and faculty. Many hands remained in the air when the event ended on time—a testament to the interest generated by Prof. Raymo’s remarks and the importance of 21JPSI’s mission.
*The 21st Century Japan Politics and Society Initiative (21JPSI) was launched at Indiana University’s Hamilton Lugar School of Global and International Studies in 2018. Under the leadership of Founding Director and HLS faculty member Adam Liff, 21JPSI aims to invigorate and expand research, teaching, and programming on contemporary Japanese politics, society, and international (esp. U.S.-Japan) relations, and to educate, raise awareness, and debate policy responses to the various political, social, and foreign policy challenges that Japan faces in this extremely dynamic era of 21st-century change. For more information about 21JPSI, please visit https://jpsi.indiana.edu/. To be informed about its future public events, please sign up for our event announcement mailing list.