| Chapter 1: | Reconsiderations of Race, Ethnicity, and Identity: Transnational Migrants in Post–World War II Global Society |
social networks are formed and established in ethnic enclaves, the members can develop relationships to resist economic and political exploitation. Field (2003, 1) calls such social networks “social capital.” He argues that “people connect through a series of networks and they tend to share common values with other members of these networks; to the extent that these networks constitute a resource, they can be seen as forming a kind of capital” (Field 2003, 1).
As we will see in the following chapters, Japanese transnational migrants have made connections with various social networks and groups of people—both in the host nation and beyond, and within and between ethnic groups. But, at the same time, they tend to form strong socialnetworks—especially for financial assistance—with people of the same ethnicity. In many places, early pre–World War II Japanese migrants helped each other by organizing tanomoshik
, mutual financial assistance associations, in the new host nations. As I have argued previously (Adachi 2004), the qualification for becoming a member of a tanomoshik is being Japanese; if he or she was not, it was not possible to become a member. But once you were accepted as a member, you pooled your savings with the others and lent this capital out to other members who needed loans. The borrowers had to return their loan within a certain period. While some took money out, others kept banking their money into the pool. By doing this, the savings grew and the more people could be helped.
When Japanese immigration to Brazil started in 1908, the majority of Japanese ended up being coffee plantation farmhands, living in slave-like conditions. However, with the help of these ethnic-oriented mutual assistance associations, by 1932 some ten thousand Japanese households were listed as landowners, collectively possessing 370,000 hectares of farmland in the state of São Paulo alone. Furthermore, by 1940 the number of Japanese landowners increased to 193,364, which amounted to over 90 percent of the Japanese population in the farming areas of São Paulo state (Uchiyama and Tajiri 1991, 113; Adachi 2004). This ethnic social network was formed through trust fostered by sharing the same social and cultural values.
The notion of “my homeland,” then, could end up helping to support immigrants climbing up the economic ladder, and help to alleviate social