World: Toward the Japanese Century

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reached his small farm, Dyusaku Ohno sold his three acres to a development company for $280,000. Now 60, Ohno has his money in good stocks. his children in good schools, his wife in a modern house. But he has lost, he says, "the smell of the earth, the satisfaction of a good crop, the scalding bath at the end of a hard day's work."

Taming Taming the Thunderbolts

Yoshikazu Maeda. 54, a Tokyo bank executive, remembers that day when "the family was more closely knit, living quarters were more cramped, and there was consideration." much He more says mutual sadly: personal "The whole pace of life seems to have speeded up. Human relationships seem to be getting colder." Moreover, the problem of caring for the elderly is growing, if only because there are so many more of them. Improvements in diet and medical care have increased life expectancy for men from only 50 years in 1945 to 69 years today.

A youth problem has already arrived — and how. In a country where chil dren traditionally are coddled up to the age of nine or ten, then are expected to begin facing society's rigorous de mands without complaint, Japanese youths are baffling their elders by taking to the streets to protest everything from the "dehumanization" of life to air pollution. In few lands is communication between generations breaking down more rapidly. The suicide rate among 15-to 24-year-olds is one of the highest in the world. So is the rec ord for campus chaos. Last year, 3,500 students were jailed in clashes that closed 100 of Japan's 377 universities, some for as long as twelve months.

The catalogue of student complaints is familiar, and in many respects well justified. Competition for admission is fierce, especially to Tokyo and Kyoto universities, the Oxbridge-like axis that produces most of Japan's ruling establishment of businessmen, bureaucrats and politicians; according to one estimate, 20% of Japan's Diet (parliament) members and 30% of its corporation presidents are Tokyo U. alumni. Jammed with 1.5 million students, a 100% increase since 1960, the understaffed universities strike many youths as diploma factories geared to feed industry. Tokyo's Nihon University has 75,000 students; in its 7,000-student school of economics, there are but 27 professors.

Westerners accustomed to the atmosphere of improvisation at U.S. or French demonstrations are apt to find the Japanese protest scene quite different. Clashes between helmeted students and shield-carrying riot cops seem as stylized—and puzzling—as a No play. Moreover, the rioters, often led by members of the radical Zengakuren (a student federation), are usually higher on doctrine than drugs (pot has yet to spread far in Japan). Before long, however, Japanese dissent may be taking on a Western character.

Thousands of students and hippie-style dropouts are being drawn to a Viet Nam protest movement called Be-heiren, which often draws 5,000 "folksong guerrillas" to monthly protest meetings in Tokyo's swinging Shinjuku area. When the cops come, the kids give them flowers and songs instead of staves and curses. Sample:

Oh, the sad, sad riot-squad men Withering away their finest years Like wintry shrubs under duralumin shields

Beheiren's founder is Novelist Makoto Oda, 38. He launched the new wave in