Politics and Inequality In East Asia: Contested Boundaries, Social Divisions, and Political Responses

East Asia has been portrayed as a region characterized by rapid economic development, social stability, and strong state capacity. Yet over the past several decades, widening inequalities in wealth, employment security, education, housing, and access to social welfare have become increasingly visible across the region. Demographic aging, migration, family transformation, and economic restructuring have further generated new forms of social stratification and exclusion.

These developments raise important sociological questions about the relationship between inequality and politics. How are inequalities produced, reproduced, and contested in East Asian societies? Under what conditions do social inequalities become politicized? How do states, political actors, and social movements respond to growing social divisions? And how do historical, institutional, and cultural contexts condition how inequality is understood and addressed?

This panel seeks to bring together sociological perspectives on the intersections between politics and inequality in East Asia. We welcome contributions that examine a wide range of inequalities—including class, gender, ethnicity, migration status, generation, and regional disparities—and their connections to political institutions, policy processes, collective action, and public discourse. Particular attention will be paid to the diversity of political and social contexts across the region.

By fostering dialogue among scholars working on different East Asian societies, the panel aims to advance comparative and theoretically informed understandings of how inequalities shape political life and how political processes, in turn, structure patterns of inequality. Through this exchange, we hope to contribute to broader sociological debates on inequality, power, citizenship, and social justice in a rapidly changing world.