Introduction; Part I. Context: 1. What is civil society? Frank Schwartz; 2. From Meiji to Heisei: the state and civil society in Japan Sheldon Garon; 3. Capitalism and civil society in postwar Japan: perspectives from intellectual history Andrew Barshay; Part II. The Associational Sphere: 4. Japan's civil society organizations in comparative perspective Tsujinaka Yutaka; 5. Molding Japanese civil society: state structured incentives and the patterning of civil society Robert Pekkanen; 6. After Aum: religion and civil society in Japan Helen Hardacre; 7. State-society partnerships in the Japanese welfare state Margarita Estevez-Abe; Part III. The Nonmarket Activities of Economic Actors: 8. Redefining the conservative coalition: agriculture and small business in Japan Robert Bullock; 9. The death of unions' associational life? Political and cultural aspects of enterprise unions Suzuki Akira; 10. The struggle for an independent consumer society: consumer activism and the state's response in postwar Japan Patricia Maclachlan; Part IV. State-Civil Society Linkages: 11. Media and the Internet in the development of civil society in Japan Laurie Freeman; 12. A tale of two legal systems: prosecuting corruption in Japan and Italy David Johnson; Part V. Globalization and Value Change: 13. Trust and social intelligence in Japan Yamagishi Toshio; 14. Building global civil society from the outside in? Japan's development NGOs, the state, and international norms Kim Reimann; Conclusion: targeting by an activist state: Japan as a civil society model Susan Pharr.

'This impressive and wide-ranging collection of essays explores the problems and potential of Japan's increasingly robust civil society … The scope and high quality of the 15 chapters make this an important and rewarding book with wide appeal.' The Japan Times