H. Tonomura
Ie, to historians, was also an abstract embodiment of kafuchōsei, or patriarchy. Expressed in the
oft- used phrase, “the formation of the ie” (ie no seiritsu), ie was seen as an ontologically verifiable
and datable phenomenon in the development of patriarchy, which marked an important moment
on the Marxian teleological axis of evolution. The term “ie” stood both for the social reality and
a theoretical construct in historiographical ruminations. Too often the two were conflated and
created confusion as to ie’s precise meaning and historical significance.^20
A 1992 publication of Ie to kafuchōsei (“Ie and Patriarchy”) by the Society for Comparative
Family History (Hikaku kazoku shigakukai) illustrates the confusion and frustration surround-
ing the concept of ie and patriarchy. While expressing the need to determine when and how ie
(written with scare quotes) evolved in relationship to the aristocratic accumulation of private
estates and the economic instability of peasants, the medieval historian Nagahara Keiji ultimately
questions if the formation of ie in fact signaled the formation of “patriarchy,” a concept which to
him also lacks clarity in meaning.^21 As for women, Nagahara offers: “It is usually considered that
patriarchy makes women into persons with ‘no rights and no abilities’ and subjugates them
totally, but we cannot presume that the kind of relationship the Meiji Civil Code prescribed was
always a [historical] reality.”^22 Gomi Fumihiko likewise questions if “kafuchōsei was an effective
concept in Japan’s medieval age” and focuses on two related questions: whether or not the “patri-
archal family” (kafuchōsei kazoku) was “formed” and what was meant by “control” (shihai).^23 A
decade later, the state of confusion prompted the British social anthropologist Jack Goody (who
was not a Japan specialist), to remark: “It is difficult to see what is meant by this often- used,
omnibus term, which obscures as much as it illuminates. One has to look at the question class by
class, sector by sector, rural or urban, settled or nomadic.”^24
Both before and after the publication of Ie to kafuchōsei, dozens of articles and books tackled
various questions related to ie and patriarchy, by identifying, refining, and expanding the meaning
of the “omnibus” term. Discussions of patriarchy seem to have tapered off in the twenty- first
century, while ie continues to appear as a structural framework within which family members
defined rights and negotiated their positions.
The forerunners of women’s history: Inoue Kiyoshi and Takamure Itsue
Inoue Kiyoshi (1913–2001) was committed to examining the history of ordinary people (minshū),
the discriminated- against, and the disadvantaged, from a Marxian perspective. Inoue began to
study women’s history in the 1930s, and published his seminal work, Nihon joseishi (“Japanese
Women’s History”) in 1948, in the postwar atmosphere of freedom of expression.^25 It covers the
entire history of Japan, from ancient through modern times, and finds the start of a class system
in the spread of agriculture and the ensuing accumulation of wealth and property by a few.
The downfall of women’s position, Inoue concluded, began once the chieftains, as patriarchs,
began controlling the rest of the people. Heian- period aristocratic women were cherished only as
a reproductive tool for the nobility. As the feudal system evolved, warrior- class women were
treated like domestic sexual slaves under the autocratic rule of men. The sengoku- period stripped
women of any recognizable human character. Commoner class women were similarly affected.
In the Meiji period, tennōsei, or “emperor- ism,” fused the feudalistic family system with landlord-
ism and capitalism, and fostered debates over the equal rights of women and their liberation.
Writing in postwar Japan, Inoue called the constitutionally guaranteed equal rights of women
and men a “sham,” since economic reality continued to foster disparities between men and
women. He predicted the total liberation of women only when a classless society was achieved.
Inoue’s book became a bestseller and has been reprinted dozens of times, with some revision
in 1953 and 1967. Of its more than three hundred pages, the book devotes only twenty- four to