Untouchability in East Asia

Apart from India, Nepal and Pakistan, at least four other Asian countries are tainted by the practice of untouchability. Thus we see that communities of untouchables exist, though rarely talked about, in Japan, Korea, Burma and even Tibet. While Japan is a moderate exception, not much data is available about the life style and conditions of the untouchables in the other three countries. However, be it the para-gyoon (the Pagoda slaves of old Burma), the Paekchong of Korea, the Ragyapa of Tibet or the Burakumin of Japan, we find here, as we find elsewhere in Nigeria (see page 18) or in medieval Europe (see page 21) dirty, ugly, lazy and dishonest. The untouchable is sub-human, has to be shunned and should be cast out of society.

Historically, the ostracism of the untouchable started because his or her occupation was believed to be unclean, or more importantly, considered impure by the religious authorities. For example, if a person’s profession involves slaughtering animals, working with leather or digging graves, it was the association with the impurities of death that made them tainted. Since they are ritually impure, they must be despised by all right thinking members of society. The untouchable should not be allowed to pollute others, so to protect society they have to live away from the common people, and can interact with other members of society only when allowed to do so.

It started originally as a simple a division of labour, and at a time when social mobility was easy – but soon religious notions come in, and turn a social arrangement into a rigidly enforced oppressive structure, whose victims have no real remedy.

Japan and the Buraku People

Japan has been noted for its deep social divisions right from ancient times. While divisions in Japanese society can be seen as early as the 1st century CE, by 700 AD, Japanese society was clearly divided into the Ryomin (the good people) and the Senmin (the lowly people). The Senmin were the workers and were made of temple slaves, private slaves, government cultivators and tank guards. Apart from them, there were the semi-Senmin: the skilled Zakko who were engaged in leather work, tanning, cloth dyeing, shoemaking and weapon manufacture and the Etori (or Eta) who gathered food for the hawks and dogs of the imperial family.

When, under the influence of Buddhism, Takatsukasa the Imperial Department of Falconry in the Royal household was abolished in 860 CE, the Etori became butchers. When the slaughter of animals began to be despised (but eating meat was not rejected!), the Etori and others who worked with animal products lost their jobs and several of these became hunters, wanderers or vagabonds. Others became musicians and entertainers.

These professions began to be associated with forbidden or impious activities. In the later Chusei period (1192 - 1603) four divisions can be seen in Japanese society: the nobility, the warriors, the peasants and the Senmin. Interestingly, there was considerable social mobility amongst the classes, and the Senmin who were in considerable demand for the services they rendered to the Bushi, the warriors, were even exempt from taxation in return for their services. Such was the social mobility in Japanese society then that several warriors who were defeated in war joined the Senmin for tax advantages! Despite this attraction, the Senmin in reality continued to be at the bottom of society, and continued to live on river banks, away from the general settlements and cities, for when they were not performing military duties, they were still engaged in ‘lowly tasks’.

The Tokugawa Feudal System

It was under the strict and rigid Tokugawa feudal system (1603 - 1867) that the fate of the Senmin was sealed. In this period the prejudices of ritual obsessed Shintoism and Buddhism combined with the rigours of military dictatorship to make their lives truly miserable – probably only slightly better than the plight of the untouchables in India during the time of the Peshwa rulers in Maharashtra. The Tokugawa Shogunate ordained that there be 4 castes: the warrior, farmer, artisan and merchant. Outside these four castes were the outcaste groups of Eta (Great Filth) and the Hinin (literally meaning not Human). Sourced from the Senmin, the Eta were made of the poorest of the merchant and farming classes; and into the Hinin were put criminals as well as survivors of suicide.

The Eta and the Hinin were not included in the census, though their names had to be entered in separate registers maintained by the government. Since they were not considered human, the Eta and the Hinin were exempt from taxation – the reasons for the tax exemption had changed from the Chusei period. Consistent with this understanding that the Eta and the Hinin were not human, as late as in 1857, a Japanese court ruled that the life of 7 Etas was equal to that of one human being and that until this count was achieved, a commoner could not be tried for murder.

Shimamura writes abut the plight of the Eta in this dark period: (They had to) “wear more humble clothes than farmers, identifying themselves by rectangular pieces of cloth five by four inches attached to their clothes. When approaching the home of a commoner, the Eta were required to take off their headgear and footwear before entering the courtyard. Sitting, eating. and smoking in company of the commoners was also denied them”.

The Meiji Restoration (1868 – 1912)

Early in its life, in 1871, the Meiji government, which was the modernizer of Japan, issued an emancipation edict which was the first sign of recognition by the authorities of the humanity of those belonging to these classes. As per the emancipation decree the use of the terms Eta and Hinin was abolished. The government also decreed that the citizenship registers of the Eta- Hinin and the general citizenship be merged.

However, the problem was not solved since the government set up at the same time a new class system composed of the Kazoku (peers) the Shizoku (descendants of former warriors) and the Heimin (commoners composed of former farmers, artisans and merchants). This, combined with a modified system of family registers – the Koseki system – that listed each citizen’s family background in great detail undid many of the social advances made by the Eta and the Hinin. Even though the emancipation edict meant that the Senmin could live anywhere in the country and could take up any occupation, they were put down in the register as Shin- Heimin or new commoners – an obvious and clear indication of their social origins! In addition to this, the fact that the Koseki register also recorded the place of birth of the individual (and geographical origin of family) meant that the data provided adequate information about the untouchable origins of the individuals. Prospective employers and life partners could – and did – easily investigate and avoid making the mistake of associating with an untouchable. The Koseki system a it existed then violated the privacy of all individuals – for example, it also enabled discrimination against unwed mothers by formally recording this information.

After the banning of the use of the terms, gradually, the Eta and the Hinin began to be referred to as the Buraku people or the Burakumin. While Buraku originally meant a community or a hamlet, when the word is used to refer to the former Eta and Hinin communities, it is actually a shortened version of Tokushu-Buraku meaning special communities – again revealing to us the imperfect reform of the Meijis where the people continued to be exposed to grave prejudice and discrimination.

While the term Buraku is still used generally, the government refers to them as ‘Dowa’, in line with the use of the word in 1926 by Emperor Showa in his ascension address. Dowa means the ‘same people’, and the Emperor was proclaiming the equality of all Japanese, including the Eta and the Hinin. One recalls that Gandhi referred to the untouchables in Indian society as Harijans or Children of God, a term that the untouchables no longer like. In Japan too, the term preferred by the untouchables for themselves is Buraku.

The Buraku today

Minorities constitute 4% of Japan’s 127 million citizens. The Buraku are the largest minority, but there are also
650,000 Korean nationals, apart from the Ainu people (the aboriginals). The Buraku Liberation League established estimates their number to be around 3 million – many times more than the official estimates. The Buraku are concentrated in the Western part of Japan and they constitute 10% of people in Osaka and Fukuoka prefectures.

In 1970, in an effort to make the situation better for the Buraku, the Japanese government instructed the officials that details relating to one’s birth address should be deleted from the Koseki registry. In 1974, the Ministry of Health and Welfare forbade the practice of showing family registry details to prospective employers, and in 1975 family lineage names were deleted so that tracing a person to his or her Buraku origins would be difficult. In 1976, access to family registry was restricted and today only the police and a limited number of government organs can access these apart from the individual concerned.

Scandalously, however, between 1976 and 1980, nine lists from the Koseki registers were secretly sold at high prices to big companies and major banks. They were bought by the prospective employers with the obvious intent of identifying the Buraku amongst employees and job applicants so that their applications could be rejected. Today about 9.4% of the Buraku are employed in government and municipal jobs, but very few hold high office – most are municipal workers engaged in garbage collection or in semi-administrative jobs.

They are virtually indistinguishable from the rest of their compatriots in their appearance, culture and religion, even though their language may at times give them away. No wonder that even today, about 33% of Burakumin have said that they are discriminated in society. A human rights activist notes that in the bookshops of Japan one is likely to find any number of books on the apartheid system, racial discrimination against the blacks in North America and elsewhere, but none on the plight of the Buraku!

Though under pressure from the Buraku Liberation League’s campaign, in 1996 the Japanese Government passed the Law for the Measures for Promotion of Human Rights Protection, and even though the Buraku discrimination clearly meets the universally recognized criteria of discrimination based on race and descent, Japan refuses to acknowledge the problem under the specious excuse that the Buraku are not a special race. One would expect that in that case, Japan would evolve and adopt other legislative means to penalize discrimination of the Buraku, but Japan does not have a specific law which punishes discrimination of the Buraku!

Even though about 47% of people polled have said that they would not oppose the choice of a Buraku life partner by their children, and that is a welcome improvement, the figures also indicate the formidable numbers who still do not accept the Buraku as equal human beings. Many Japanese, young and old, express disgust at even the mention of Burakumin. Urgent reform of the Koseki registers and expeditious introduction of legislation that awards exemplary punishment for the criminal practice of untouchability are necessary steps that the international community expects from Japan.

However, the problem of the Burakumin can only be solved through a cultural change amongst the Japanese people. It is, after all, Japan’s imperfect modernization that is responsible for the persistence of this problem – often ignored by the rest of the world, dazzled by Japan’s economic strength and prowess, and usually confused by the persistence of superstition in daily life as quaint expressions of Japanese culture.

The information for this article has been sourced from Masami Dewaga’s dissertation Racism without Race? The Case of Japan’s Invisible Group.

Babu Gogineni