English Version
Following is an excerpt of my past dissertation which Splinger will publish in N.Y.(http://www.springerpub.com)


“Gangland” women

If we consider only the number of arrests, the role of women in organized crime seems irrelevant. However, between 1 January and 31 October, 1999, out of 302 cases (4.7% of the total) of people connected to a gang who have been convicted and sentenced to a period of parole that brought with it the prohibition of any contact with the criminal element, there were only twenty women (i.e., 6.6%). None of these was formally a gang member. But they were either the wives or companions of gang members or quasi-members. They act as accomplices (hiding weapons and drugs) for their spouses or lovers or as an “interim” in case their companion is imprisoned or dies. They also perform the role of providing for the financial needs of the man. According to another inquest from 1999, 27% of 2,825 convicted criminals who were sentenced to prison had experienced financial problems and 45.3% were married.Up until just after the Second World War, gangster women existed and held autonomous positions in the underworld that were not subordinate to men. Their disappearance is due to the transformation of the gangland environment, particularly tied to the progressive disappearance of the distinction between the two large categories that formed the underworld at one time: professional gamblers and traveling salesmen. For example, professional female gamblers existed during the Edo period (from the 17th to the mid-19th century). Immediately after the conflict of 1945, one of the best-known female gang bosses was Yoshiko Matsuda, who, after the death of her husband, killed in a fight, took the reins of a very powerful gang (Kanto Matsuda-gumi). Yoshiko Matsuda led street fights in the Shinbashi with rival Taiwanese gangs for control of the black market. Subsequently, a female professional gambler, Tsune Hoshinoled a gang of around forty men in Komatsugawa on the outskirts of Tokyo. This gang (Omasu) was active in the market of “parallel” betting on outboard racing and in the world of traveling salesmen. Another woman, Nami Odagiri (born in 1953), was the boss of the Ryugakai gang in Osaka that was a dependent of the largest Japanese crime syndicate, the Yamaguchi-gumi. Today, these rituals are no longer used. But women exercise no less substantial influence within the gangs, an influence proportional to the power of their husbands or lovers. In traditional gang structure, the woman of the boss also becomes part of the system of close family relations; she is the “great sister” (anego). In this environment, the word “nesan” (sister) is preferred. As in every male dominated society, the world of the yakuza also possesses strong matriarchal components: the mother or spouse who glorifies the men’s “successes.”
Perspectives
The relationships between women and the underworld have evolved in relation to the underworld’s transformation because of the institution of anti-gang laws in 1992 and afterward another three laws: in particular, the law regarding the crimes of criminal association and money laundering. The number of gang members, as well as quasi-members, has diminished, expanding the gray area between legitimate and outlaw society. Alongside this, criminal gangs have attempted to diversify their sources of income beyond traditional sectors (amphetamine trafficking, blackmail, illegal gambling, and parallel betting) and into hiding behind legal organizations (extreme right-wing political parties, real estate agents, etc.). Their activities have also become more sophisticated: stock transactions, public works, illegal credit income through threats of violence, and various racketeering schemes more hidden to the police; this trend is on the increase. In this new organized crime configuration, quasi-members (as well as members) perform a more important role compared to the past. In some cases, women, wives of gangsters, have taken the reins of “cover businesses.” This happened in September 1999 when the wife of a Yamaguchi-gumi member became general director of a construction company. On the other hand, the international activities of the underworld have been greatly expanded. The Japanese underworld has for a long time trafficked arms, drugs, or women who come from Southeast Asia or Latin America. Different cases have shown Japanese gangsters who have, for example, forced Russian women to become prostitutes in Japan. Today, the Japanese underworld has become stronger in the following international activities: a) Collaboration with foreign organizations (from Hong Kong, China and Russia), frequently in terms of individual relationships and, more rarely, in collaboration with the organizations themselves; b) The illegal transfer of funds, particularly to the United States; c) Japanese groups abroad use quasi-members who reside or manage activities abroad as collaborators; d) As opposed to foreign gangs (such as the 14K from Hong Kong, as well as gangs from mainland China who manage illegal immigration in particular, Russians from Sakhalin, etc.), these groups penetrate into Japan and either ally themselves or enter into conflict with local gangs.



Rgarding the late Mr. Whymant;
Robert was really a Cambridge gentleman, and genius of languages.
Following is one of his articles that reflects a small part of our frequent conversations.
"The Times" (June 17 th, 1999)

Foreigners just a necessary evil ; FROM ROBERT WHYMANT IN TOKYO

MANY foreigners in Japan complain that they are discriminated against daily. Often landlords refuse to let properties to non-Japanese and public baths mysteriously empty at the approach of an alien. There are no laws banning racial discrimination, so the store-owner who threw on a Brazilian woman because of her nationality last year considered it perfectly acceptable behaviour. Accuse a Japanese of racism and the reaction will be head-shaking and mystified looks."Most people don't feel bad about discriminating against non-Japanese, said Ryu Otomo, a writer. Racism is simply not an issue, or something children hear about in school. a society that prides itself on homogeneity, foreigners - 1 per cent of the population - are regarded by many as a necessary evil, tolerated because there are some jobs; Japanese cannot, or will not do, whether digging ditches or teaching English. The Japanese are best described as unwitting racists. They perceive that their ingrained attitudes can cause problems; only when they sally forth to manage overseas subsidiaries. They are shocked when the natives are uppity and turn to the law when they realise that foreigners are - in the words of > one sacked American executive "disposable".

Following is one of "Obituaries"concerniing his passing (British press)

Robert Whymant

Tokyo correspondent with an eye for what was unique to Japanese society and an ear for the Japanese language

Donald Kirk
Tuesday January 11, 2005

When Robert Whymant, who died aged 60 when the tsunami hit Sri Lanka, began to file from Tokyo in 1974, Japan was bound in tight alliance to the United States and just beginning to assert post-occupation independence as the world's second largest economy.

For the Guardian, for the Daily Telegraph and for the Times from 1995 to 2002, Whymant covered the ups and downs of 14 Japanese prime ministers. He witnessed Japan's rise to seeming economic invulnerability and then the bursting of the bubble in the 1980s. He covered travel and fashion, business and finance, social trends and politics, diplomatic and military confrontations; he established himself as a most perceptive commentator upon Japanese society. He mingled gentle humour with irony in commentary that alternated between the scathing and the sympathetic.

Whymant was born in Luton. After reading oriental studies at Magdalene College, Cambridge, he arrived in Japan in the late 1960s as an English teacher eager to improve on the Japanese that he had begun to master. He became one of the few correspondents who spoke Japanese, and he had the intellect to bring a subtle understanding of his surroundings to his reports. Whymant was a witty, genial presence among colleagues, and shared his broad knowledge and cheeky views with them, when not retreating from foreign company in favour of his Japanese friends in an attempt to get closer to understanding their culture.

Many of his colleagues had veered off to cover the Vietnam war, but he stayed in Japan for almost all of his career, except for forays to China (which he visited after the Tiananmen Square events in 1989) and South Korea, which he saw as an integral aspect of the confrontation of forces in Asia.

His reporting caused consternation from time to time. Japanese Imperial Household Agency emissaries investigated after he wrote about wartime experiments on prisoners said to have been conducted by Unit 731 in Harbin, Manchuria, with the knowledge of Emperor Hirohito. Later, Whymant appeared on television with the governor of Tokyo to talk about harmless issues, and questioned him about his personal record in Harbin.

It was Whymant's eye for what he saw as unique in Japanese society that distinguished his work. Sometimes he seemed to mock Japanese mores even as he caught societal trends, as he did in an article that began "To slurp or not to slurp?"

Since leaving the Times, he had been lecturing at Tokyo's Waseda University and writing for an Australian newspaper. He planned a major project based on his years covering a pivotal period in Japanese history, and building on the success of his first book.

Ten years ago, he married Minako, a bank executive. She was with him when he died, but, since she was on the other side of the giant wave, she survived.

・ Robert Whymant, journalist, born November 29 1944; died December 26 2004

Waldemar Januszczak writes: Whymant-san played an important role in my life. In the 1980s, the Guardian hit upon the wheeze of sending a dozen correspondents to a foreign locale for a fortnight to write about everything that moved. The third invasion took us to Tokyo. I was the art critic: Whymant was our man in Japan. We liked each other immediately.

From his lofty lair in the Foreign Correspondents Club, he rushed me through an excellent crash course in full-on, Scotch-after-Scotch, late night Tokyo. Back in London, I met the woman of my dreams, and within a few months of encountering Whymant, I was back in Tokyo to wed a Japanese artist. Whymant agreed to act as best man. I had never met my Japanese in-laws, and was frightened by the prospect. But Whymant - tall, courteous, fluent, with something James Bond-like about his Englishness - charmed my new family, and I sneaked into their circle through the huge gap he opened up. I am still there



Rgarding the late Mr. Whymant;

Robert was really a Cambridge gentleman, and genius of languages.
Following is one of his articles that reflects a small part of our frequent conversations.
"The Times" (June 17 th, 1999)

Foreigners just a necessary evil ; FROM ROBERT WHYMANT IN TOKYO

MANY foreigners in Japan complain that they are discriminated against daily. Often landlords refuse to let properties to non-Japanese and public baths mysteriously empty at the approach of an alien. There are no laws banning racial discrimination, so the store-owner who threw on a Brazilian woman because of her nationality last year considered it perfectly acceptable behaviour. Accuse a Japanese of racism and the reaction will be head-shaking and mystified looks."Most people don't feel bad about discriminating against non-Japanese, said Ryu Otomo, a writer. Racism is simply not an issue, or something children hear about in school. a society that prides itself on homogeneity, foreigners - 1 per cent of the population - are regarded by many as a necessary evil, tolerated because there are some jobs; Japanese cannot, or will not do, whether digging ditches or teaching English. The Japanese are best described as unwitting racists. They perceive that their ingrained attitudes can cause problems; only when they sally forth to manage overseas subsidiaries. They are shocked when the natives are uppity and turn to the law when they realise that foreigners are - in the words of > one sacked American executive "disposable".

Following is one of "Obituaries"concerniing his passing (British press)

Robert Whymant

Tokyo correspondent with an eye for what was unique to Japanese society and an ear for the Japanese language

Donald Kirk
Tuesday January 11, 2005

When Robert Whymant, who died aged 60 when the tsunami hit Sri Lanka, began to file from Tokyo in 1974, Japan was bound in tight alliance to the United States and just beginning to assert post-occupation independence as the world's second largest economy.

For the Guardian, for the Daily Telegraph and for the Times from 1995 to 2002, Whymant covered the ups and downs of 14 Japanese prime ministers. He witnessed Japan's rise to seeming economic invulnerability and then the bursting of the bubble in the 1980s. He covered travel and fashion, business and finance, social trends and politics, diplomatic and military confrontations; he established himself as a most perceptive commentator upon Japanese society. He mingled gentle humour with irony in commentary that alternated between the scathing and the sympathetic.

Whymant was born in Luton. After reading oriental studies at Magdalene College, Cambridge, he arrived in Japan in the late 1960s as an English teacher eager to improve on the Japanese that he had begun to master. He became one of the few correspondents who spoke Japanese, and he had the intellect to bring a subtle understanding of his surroundings to his reports. Whymant was a witty, genial presence among colleagues, and shared his broad knowledge and cheeky views with them, when not retreating from foreign company in favour of his Japanese friends in an attempt to get closer to understanding their culture.

Many of his colleagues had veered off to cover the Vietnam war, but he stayed in Japan for almost all of his career, except for forays to China (which he visited after the Tiananmen Square events in 1989) and South Korea, which he saw as an integral aspect of the confrontation of forces in Asia.

His reporting caused consternation from time to time. Japanese Imperial Household Agency emissaries investigated after he wrote about wartime experiments on prisoners said to have been conducted by Unit 731 in Harbin, Manchuria, with the knowledge of Emperor Hirohito. Later, Whymant appeared on television with the governor of Tokyo to talk about harmless issues, and questioned him about his personal record in Harbin.

It was Whymant's eye for what he saw as unique in Japanese society that distinguished his work. Sometimes he seemed to mock Japanese mores even as he caught societal trends, as he did in an article that began "To slurp or not to slurp?"

Since leaving the Times, he had been lecturing at Tokyo's Waseda University and writing for an Australian newspaper. He planned a major project based on his years covering a pivotal period in Japanese history, and building on the success of his first book.

Ten years ago, he married Minako, a bank executive. She was with him when he died, but, since she was on the other side of the giant wave, she survived.

・ Robert Whymant, journalist, born November 29 1944; died December 26 2004

Waldemar Januszczak writes: Whymant-san played an important role in my life. In the 1980s, the Guardian hit upon the wheeze of sending a dozen correspondents to a foreign locale for a fortnight to write about everything that moved. The third invasion took us to Tokyo. I was the art critic: Whymant was our man in Japan. We liked each other immediately.

From his lofty lair in the Foreign Correspondents Club, he rushed me through an excellent crash course in full-on, Scotch-after-Scotch, late night Tokyo. Back in London, I met the woman of my dreams, and within a few months of encountering Whymant, I was back in Tokyo to wed a Japanese artist. Whymant agreed to act as best man. I had never met my Japanese in-laws, and was frightened by the prospect. But Whymant - tall, courteous, fluent, with something James Bond-like about his Englishness - charmed my new family, and I sneaked into their circle through the huge gap he opened up. I am still there

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