Abstract
AbstractThis article aims to specifically contribute to debates concerning dissent within the scholarship of International Relations (IR), through elaborating the constructive qualities of resistance. Composite and fruitful stories concerning resistance against power have flourished in studies of the ‘global’. Still, there has been a trend in IR to embrace resistance as a sense of opposition and it has been primarily described in terms of, ‘“counter”, “contradict”, “social change”, “reject”, “challenge”, ‘opposition”, “subversive”, and “damage and/or disrupt”’.1 This article adds to the literature on resistance's productive dimensions by drawing upon the case of the #MeToo campaign in Japan. The #MeToo movement in Japan should not only be viewed as a ‘non-cooperative’ form of resistance – that is, resistance that breaks norms, rules, laws, regulations and order, typically in public and in confrontative ways; rather, the #MeToo movement should be regarded as a ‘constructive’ form of resistance, which produced new resistance figures, movements, narratives as well as established new expressions of resistance. It may be perceived as a contagious form of resistance, which operated through reiterations, doublings, and re-experiences. The campaign provides a significant example of how discourses move transnationally through the force of repetition.
Highlights
The #MeToo campaign against sexual abuse began in the United States (US) and spread virally across the world during 2017
The #MeToo movement in Japan should be viewed as a ‘non-cooperative’ form of resistance – that is, resistance that breaks norms, rules, laws, regulations and order, typically in public and in confrontative ways; rather, the #MeToo movement should be regarded as a ‘constructive’ form of resistance, which produced new resistance figures, movements, narratives as well as established new expressions of resistance. It may be perceived as a contagious form of resistance, which operated through reiterations, doublings, and re-experiences
Liv Coleman, an Associate Professor in Political Science and International Studies who specialises in Japan, has argued that the outspokenness of the #MeToo movement has been met with disapproval and that, ‘when high-profile [alleged] victims such as Itō Shiori have come forward with allegations, they have received a lot of criticism
Summary
The #MeToo campaign against sexual abuse began in the United States (US) and spread virally across the world during 2017. A representative of a Japanese feminist organisation stated that: if you are asking for events which had more direct influence preceding the (#MeToo) movement, perhaps we can say that many gender discriminatory events lead to gradual change of the public perception, young people’s awareness of the issues and increased media reports Events such as discriminatory action and comments by politicians, degrading article of popular magazine ranking college by college women most likely/available to have sex, discriminatory handling of medical school entry exams, issue of JK business and online sexual. Liv Coleman, an Associate Professor in Political Science and International Studies who specialises in Japan, has argued that the outspokenness of the #MeToo movement has been met with disapproval and that, ‘when high-profile [alleged] victims such as Itō Shiori have come forward with allegations, they have received a lot of criticism This deters other women from bringing forth allegations of sexual harassment and assault.’. The reinvented hashtags are not passive containers of different meanings, and do not represent discourses and partake in the ongoing processes of establishing different truths and norms, while at the same time, drawing attention to, and in some senses repeating, the #MeToo discourse.116 Taking stock of recognised symbols to establish new discourse of resistance is a powerful strategy of constructive resistance
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