Kodokushi (孤独死): The death of people and properties in japan

Tash Durie

This paper explores the entangled relationships between agency, community, and repair in Japan through an analysis of the built environment and socially constructed notions of, care and decay. Facing an unprecedented demographic crisis, socially constructed attitudes to mortality are complex: reflected in, and at times generated by, objects and materials. Drawing on key anthropological debates, this piece explores the ways in which houses act as independent agents, and at times, are seen to stand in for their inhabitants, acting as indexes of wellbeing.

“I asked the man who lived across the street from me if he had any idea what had happened. He just motioned down the alleyway, saying: “If it is down that street, it could be any number of people.” … He explained that the same thing had happened recently, just before I had moved into the area. “There are a lot of old people that live down there. A lot of old people living alone!”” (Danely 2019, 214).

With almost a third of its population aged 65 and over, and a rapidly shrinking population, Japan is experiencing an unprecedented demographic crisis (Matanle 2014). Every year, an estimated 32,000 elderly people die alone in their homes in Japan (Tamaki 2014, 211), a situation called kodokushi (孤独死), or ‘lonely death’. This term carries feelings of uneasiness, uncertainty, and tragedy (Danely 2019). Upon the ‘lonely death’ of an elderly person, the property is classified as a jiko bukken (事故物件), a ‘stigmatised property’. It may then be rented out at much lower price, left unoccupied, or even destroyed (Higginbottom 2016).

This essay raises key anthropological debates concerning notions of community, repair, and agency. I aim to explore why kodokushi evoke feelings of uneasiness and why jiko bukken have such powerful social effects. By investigating these facets, we can begin to address how the house can stand in for the person as well as exist as act as an independent agent.

Drawing on Actor-Network Theory (ANT) (Latour 1987), I emphasise how people, spirits, and things are co-constitutive of the community in Japan (Daniels 2012). Thus, kodokushi expose a perceived failure of the community infrastructure, generating uneasiness (Danely 2019). I then analyse how the house can stand in for the person as an index of wellbeing, assessing the central role that practices of repair play in caring for both body and building (Graham & Thrift 2007). The final section employs theories concerning the agency and biography of objects (Kopytoff 1986; Gell 1992, 1998) to examine how jiko bukken catalyse powerful reactions.

Japan’s demographic trend is rapidly being observed in countries worldwide making this topic of pressing global relevance. We need to expand conversations, offer public interventions, and make policies that reflect people’s lives (Cearns & Haapio-Kirk 2021). I explore how addressing the built environment within such discussions may contribute to a better understanding of wellbeing across the life course.

background

Whilst the number of single-person households in Japan is rapidly increasing (Rebick & Takenaka 2009; Ronald & Alexy 2011), the ideal living arrangement typically involves a privately-owned home inhabited by a nuclear family (Daniels 2010, 17). Traditionally, households were organised by filial piety which established the expectation that adult children care for elderly parents (Ronald & Alexy 2011). Intergenerational intimacy continues to influence Japanese values (Daniels 2010) with the home as “the symbolic basis by which reciprocal family obligations are defined, the physical space where welfare services are exchanged” (Ronald & Hirayama 2006, 2478). I will explore the tensions that occur when these ideals are visually and spectacularly neglected.

Living, aging, and dying well are concerns at the forefront of global and local discussions (Cearns & Haapio-Kirk 2021). Japan’s rapidly aging population is stretching the resources of the health and social care sector. By promoting community level care rather than providing sufficient state-funded institutions, the Japanese government are encouraging elderly people to die at home rather than in hospital (Danely 2019, 233). This discourse is founded on the ethos of ‘self-responsibility’, (jiko sekinin, 自己責任), of taking responsibility for one’s own struggles. Asserting that the Western-style welfare state encouraged excessive dependency on state resources, The Government of Japan instead cultivated the ideology of self-responsibility in the establishment of a ‘Japanese-style welfare society’ (Goldfarb 2016, 179). This encouraged dependency on traditional care networks and presented state welfare services as a last resort. This ideology was strengthened during Japan’s economic recession in the 1990s when individuals drawing on state provisions were said to be directly contributing to the country’s further decline. Thus, many elderly people do not want to become a burden on society and the welfare state (Danely 2014). Furthermore, the traditional centrality of the house in notions of care make dying at home more desirable than dying in hospital (Allison 2018, 187; Danely 2019, 232). As many elderly people withdraw from society and care institutions (Cearns & Happio-Kirk 2021), care practices are often situated within the home.

Kodokushi are deaths which involve someone who has been living alone, most commonly an elderly person, and whose body is discovered weeks after their death (Allison 2018, 182). Increased urban migration has often been used to explain incidences of elderly isolation as it makes it more challenging to care for one’s parents, degrading intergenerational care practices (Danely 2014). Research has found that ‘village societies’, where ties with neighbours, colleagues, and family members have traditionally been stronger, have a higher rate of elderly suicides (Traphagan 2004). Furthermore, as contemporary Japanese social relations are primarily formed through schools and workplaces, the social importance of the neighbourhood has been reduced (Daniels 2010, 85), isolating elderly residents. Therefore, the increasing number of kodokushi has often been attributed to the degradation of filial piety practices, and the changing relationship between domestic life and local communities (Allison 2018). 

Jiko bukken are houses with fatal histories of fires, suicides, murders, or kodokushi (Higginbottom 2016). These events legally must be declared when renting or selling a property (Oshimaland n.d.). Being listed as such can dramatically decrease the property value or rent price making landlords reluctant to rent to elderly people (Higginbottom 2016). Thus, kodokushi are closely associated with the houses where they occur, justifying this essay’s focus on the built environment.

community: Building relationships

This section explores how communities and dwellings in Japan are bounded and interconnected, constituted by a flow of material and social exchanges. Previous studies overemphasised the Japanese house as a private domain, observing spatial divisions without considering how people actually live in their homes (Daniels 2010, 3). Using ethnographic fieldwork, contemporary studies highlight the tensions between constructed ideals and lived experience, exposing the often-overlooked “fluidity and ambiguity which characterises much of social life” (ibid., 5). It draws on ethnographic evidence which, in critique of romanticised constructs, focuses on houses as spaces of lived experience and embodied practice (Daniels 2010).

By attending to spectacular failures of community structures, I respond to Daniel’s call for studies of Japanese houses which focus on the complexities and contradictions of everyday life (ibid., 195). To age well is to make meaningful and satisfying relationships, contribute to one’s society, and have mental and physical wellbeing (Cearns & Happio-Kirk 2021). This is much like any other life stage; people live well by maintaining a strong sense of connection, whether it be socially, materially, or spiritually. ANT emphasises the culturally specific relations between humans and objects which constitute the world (Latour 1987). Communities are thus constituted of people, materials, and actions which are bound relationally in learnt arrangements. This essay will analyse kodokushi by situating them within their socio-material setting.

Japanese houses have often been described as materially closed-off domains which enforce material and social oppositions between the ‘individual’ and ‘society’ (Daniels 2010, 3). These studies make reference to the high walls and gates surrounding houses and infrequent social interactions between neighbours in contemporary urban neighbourhoods. Daniels (2008; 2010), in critique of earlier ahistorical and romanticised notions of the Japanese house, highlights both its closed-off and porous nature. For example, as part of a ‘fire watch’ scheme, red buckets filled with water are placed outside many people’s houses in urban Japanese neighbourhoods (Daniels 2008, 129). Should a fire break out, neighbours form a line and pass the buckets along to control the fire, often long before the fire brigade arrives. Such liminal objects demonstrate the continuing value placed on social cohesion and a concern for the wellbeing of one’s neighbours (Daniels 2010).  

Similarly, in reaction to the occurrence of kodokushi, community volunteers, minseiiin (民生委員), take responsibility for 'watching over' elderly people (Danely 2019). The media widely presents images of people who are “excluded from the community of the still living” (Elias 1985, 66). Whilst there are no repercussions for reporting such a death, minseiiin are still hesitant, “There are police, and reporters arriving-and then what would people think? That minseiiin-san wasn’t doing anything!” (Danely 2019, 223). Isolated deaths are viewed retrospectively by their neighbourhood as disruptive and dangerous, “casting a shadow over other community efforts to instantiate connectedness and belonging” (Danely 2019, 225). Kodokushi provoke unease by exposing the breakdown of the ethical and aesthetic sense of community.

Anthropologists should emphasise the mutuality of interhousehold relations and the complexity of social lives (Helliwell 1996). Japanese homes are spaces where socialities and materials are exchanged, negotiated, and disrupted. The spectacular image of the isolated death exposes the breakdown of these community infrastructures, generating discomfort. To further explore the effects of these breakdowns, I will now analyse the centrality of practices of repair in maintaining the wellbeing of bodies, houses, and communities.

repair: caring for body and mind

The building as a body is a well-engrained metaphor within architectural thinking, raising questions concerning transformation, social entropy, and decay (Carsten & Hugh-Jones 1995. 3). Recent studies have challenged assumptions of the banal nature of processes of repair and maintenance, reclaiming them as vital everyday practices which reproduce social life (Graham & Thrift 2007). In this way, I will discuss how the house may stand in for the person and how its state of repair may index the wellbeing of the inhabitant and the community at large.

Renaissance architect Filarete (1965) argued that the body and the building both sicken, and each must be guarded through care. This has been an influential lens through which the intertwined stability and decay of people, buildings, and social life has been analysed (Carsten & Hugh-Jones 2012). In Japan, people typically socialise within public spaces (Daniels 2010) and the uninvited entry to elderly homes is not socially permitted, posing a challenge for minseiiin (Danely 2019). Volunteers may instead rely on other cues: “First, we look to see if their plants are OK, if it looks like they haven’t been tended in a while. Or we look to see if they have been getting their mail. We can’t go around to everyone and be ringing doorbells.” (Danely 2019, 223). Thus, the material decay of a property indexes the social and physical wellbeing of the inhabitant, and of the larger community. To maintain one’s home is an important aspect of cultivating one’s status as a social person, a connected citizen within the community (Graham & Thrift 2007).

Helliwell’s (1996) analysis of the Dayak longhouse similarly attends to the interconnectedness of people and buildings in reproducing social life. Helliwell was struck by how poorly constructed partitions between apartments enabled the flow of noises and light along the length of the longhouse. In an attempt to increase privacy, Helliwell placed pieces of bark along her apartment’s partitions (ibid., 140). However, this was met with disapproval by neighbours who not only had their light blocked but also their social life. Gerai neighbours are responsible for each other’s presence within the community and the flows of light and sound enabled them to remain socially connected. Informants claimed that Helliwell’s desire for privacy was a denial of her ‘need’ for community (ibid., 140).

Signs of neglect of one’s apartment generated gossip and also motivated individuals to check on their neighbours. Whenever Helliwell was ill, neighbours called through to her “Why is your apartment in darkness, Tin?” (ibid., 139) and, if there was no response, a neighbour would enter her apartment. Social relations are constituted by an exchange of materials, gazes, and socialities. The wellbeing of the person is intimately connected to their capacity to maintain and cultivate these social and material connections.

Much like the blockages of light and noise between Dayak longhouse apartments, when an elderly person becomes isolated, they become disconnected from the community’s social and material exchanges. When an elderly person dies or their house is not maintained, it is a highly visual breakdown which exposes the failures of the community to maintain and repair the network of persons and things (Danely 2019). However, Daniels (2010, 192) argues that when circulation of goods is blocked, new opportunities are created for social, material, and spiritual connections. Minseiiin work to observe persons and buildings to evade the decay of the wellbeing of the person and the community.

agency: the life and death of persons and properties

Whilst it cannot be claimed that the houses themselves are the causes of kodokushi (Danely 2019, 233), these houses do have powerful effects on systems of social actions after their inhabitants have died. This section will analyse how jiko bukken, empty of people, are able to generate intense feelings of unease and catalyse powerful economic and iconoclastic reactions.

Anthropologists have traditionally observed how the lines between humans and things are culturally variable. Kopytoff (1986) encourages anthropologists to approach objects as they would people, asking questions about the object’s complex social identity, history, and identity. This likens the way that society constructs people to the way it constructs objects. The “socioculturally mediated capacity to act” (Ahearn 2001, 112) of objects and how they act on the world has been an important anthropological focus. Gell (1992; 1998) emphasises the agentive power of objects by arguing that they catalyse systems of social actions, causing people to act in desirable ways. Gell argues that anthropology’s value lies in its ability to trace social relations over the life course, mapping biographies (1998, 8-10). Thus, anthropologists must attend to the biographies, socialities, and effects of objects, detailing their complex social lives over time. Similarly, buildings should be analysed through their biographies, understanding them “not simply as places but as sets of events” (Harris 1999, 163-164). This approach encourages understanding buildings over time: how we shape our buildings and how they shape us (Brand 1994).

In Japan, social life is constituted by the bonds between spirits, people, and places (Daniels 2003). The horror film Jiko Bukken Kowai Madori (事故物件怪談 恐い間取り) ‘Stigmatised Property’ (2020) depicts a man’s encounter with paranormal events in a jiko bukken. This was based on a famous true account and film crew reported strange occurrences on set, indicating the spiritual associations with such houses (AsianBeat 2020). Miller (2001) similarly discusses the agency of houses with reference to accounts of haunted stately houses in England where ghosts are thought to effect objects and the inhabitant’s wellbeing. The longevity of a house’s material structure imbues it with agentive properties. The ghost is thus a “partial anthropomorphism of the longer history of the house” (ibid., 109). The occurrence of kodokushi is inscribed within the biography of house, investing it with spiritual agency. The agentive nature of jiko bukken causes tensions between people and houses which must be navigated by the community.

The real power of objects is shown when they need to be destroyed (Latour 2002). The contentious and agentive nature of jiko bukken often results in their destruction (Higginbottom 2016). Anthropologists highlight how buildings act as reminders of the past as well as shaping people’s concepts of the future (e.g., Schwenkel 2020; Endsor 2005). By destroying the property, the landowner may erase its history and associated anthropomorphic agency, thus enabling them to sell the land at a higher price. Furthermore, kodokushi are often regarded as indexing Japan’s larger societal decay and aging (Danely 2019). The removal of jiko bukken is iconoclastic, removing the image of community and state infrastructural breakdown from the public sphere. The iconoclastic destruction of stigmatised properties may be an attempt to remove their capacity to capture the Japanese imagination, erasing the image of Japan as a “mass-dying” society.

conclusion

Kodokushi highlight the tensions that occur between traditional familial values and state infrastructures of care, within communities, and between people and buildings. Previous studies overemphasised the Japanese house as a private domain, observing spatial divisions without considering how people actually live in their homes (Daniels 2010, 3). Contemporary ethnographies of jiko bukken highlight the tensions between constructed ideals and lived experience, exposing the often-overlooked “fluidity and ambiguity which characterises much of social life” (ibid., 5). Thus, this essay responds to Daniel’s call for studies of Japanese houses which focus on the complexities and contradictions of everyday life (ibid., 195).

With reference to theories of the entanglements of person and building, I addressed how minseiiin observe the materiality of the building as an index of the inhabitant’s wellbeing. Kodokushi evoke feelings of uneasiness as they interrupt flows of people, materials, and spirits, exposing a breakdown of the community and its ability to care for the individual. The agentive properties of jiko bukken and their capacity to demand economic, political, and iconoclastic action engages in anthropological discussions concerning the biographies of objects and how they are imbued with agency. I argued that the removal of jiko bukken erases their history and thus their agency, neutralising their economic effects and removing the contentious image of community failure from the public sphere. There is a lack of ethnographic research on the intertwined phenomena of kodokushi and jiko bukken. Approaching these phenomena using a material culture lens is an opportunity for further research.

As countries worldwide are rapidly experiencing similar demographic shifts, and thus the same social issues as Japan, policies and public interventions must be introduced which reflect people’s lives. Care practices are often closely associated with the domestic space, making this of central importance in the experience of living, aging, and dying well. Therefore, reclaiming the position of the built environment is an invaluable contribution towards better understanding individual and community wellbeing across the life course.

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