5 ms·

I never understood how organized crime can exist in a society as modern as Japan (or most western countries for that matter). Most people are against it, so why

by mrb 15y ago

I never understood how organized crime can exist in a society as modern as Japan (or most western countries for that matter). Most people are against it, so why doesn't it die off by itself? There is an estimated 100k Yakuza members. Japan has a population of 127M. That's 1 Yakuza member per 1270 inhabitant. How can they seemingly be so prevalent? Most likely the Yakuza phenomenon is exaggerated by the media, and for most people, they are just a thing you hear about on the TV, but that you never see in real life.

rhizome31 15y ago
Actually if you go out a bit in Japan, you'll often hear that such place is own by Yakuza or you'll be told that such person is Yakuza. The Japanese are generally quite tolerant with the Yakuza, considering them a normal and distinctive part of their culture, some kind of necessary evil, which is something I never understood.
- toyg 15y ago
  The key element of yakuza is that it's organized and somewhat predictable. It's violent and illegal, yes, but it's also very formalized and fairly static. Whereas in Western countries criminal cartels are wildly unpredictable, and more often than not involve innocent parties in their squabbles, Yakuza families are very conservative, in a very Eastern way, and value stability above many other things. Inevitably, in large metropolis, you'll have things like red-light districts. These places will be full of people who don't particularly value the rule of law, which means they're going to be hotbed of instability. Policemen have little incentive to risk their neck for prostitutes and various scumbags. In comes the yakuza, and order is guaranteed; nobody will make trouble, and if they do, yakuza will dispatch of them quickly and reliably. Police are happy, less work for them. They also provide easy cash, something hard to come by in a very conservative society where banks often lend money depending on your surname rather than your cashflow. They like finance as much as anybody else. In a society that (in most cases) still values tradition and stability above everything else, yakuza provides these elements to the inevitable "dark underbelly"; as long as they cover that role, rulers are not particularly interested in going after them for a bit of unpaid taxes. Nowadays it's fashionable for mainstream media to bash them because they all need scapegoats for a long-running financial crisis that has no clear culprit (apart from the usual "generalized greed" and "implicit flaws in the capitalist model", but nobody wants to really address those two, of course).
  - rhizome31 15y ago
    Good overview of the problem. Nowadays the romantic image of the Yakuza who doesn't bother innocent people seems to be loosing a bit of credibility though. Maybe people will start to realize that human trafficking actually involves innocent people.

by mrb 15y ago

rhizome31 15y ago

Actually if you go out a bit in Japan, you'll often hear that such place is own by Yakuza or you'll be told that such person is Yakuza. The Japanese are generally quite tolerant with the Yakuza, considering them a normal and distinctive part of their culture, some kind of necessary evil, which is something I never understood.

toyg 15y ago
The key element of yakuza is that it's organized and somewhat predictable. It's violent and illegal, yes, but it's also very formalized and fairly static. Whereas in Western countries criminal cartels are wildly unpredictable, and more often than not involve innocent parties in their squabbles, Yakuza families are very conservative, in a very Eastern way, and value stability above many other things. Inevitably, in large metropolis, you'll have things like red-light districts. These places will be full of people who don't particularly value the rule of law, which means they're going to be hotbed of instability. Policemen have little incentive to risk their neck for prostitutes and various scumbags. In comes the yakuza, and order is guaranteed; nobody will make trouble, and if they do, yakuza will dispatch of them quickly and reliably. Police are happy, less work for them. They also provide easy cash, something hard to come by in a very conservative society where banks often lend money depending on your surname rather than your cashflow. They like finance as much as anybody else. In a society that (in most cases) still values tradition and stability above everything else, yakuza provides these elements to the inevitable "dark underbelly"; as long as they cover that role, rulers are not particularly interested in going after them for a bit of unpaid taxes. Nowadays it's fashionable for mainstream media to bash them because they all need scapegoats for a long-running financial crisis that has no clear culprit (apart from the usual "generalized greed" and "implicit flaws in the capitalist model", but nobody wants to really address those two, of course).
- rhizome31 15y ago
  Good overview of the problem. Nowadays the romantic image of the Yakuza who doesn't bother innocent people seems to be loosing a bit of credibility though. Maybe people will start to realize that human trafficking actually involves innocent people.