The Limits of Local Citizenship Policies in Japan

Abstract

The unprecedented amount of human moves across national borders increases burden on local governments in managing migrants. But performance of local governments varies differently across countries and cities/localities in policy type and policy competence. In contrast to the Western cases, the Japanese case demonstrates that local governments are pressed to implement integration policies even without legal nor financial bases. As is well known, the Japanese type of multiculturalism ‘Tabunka kyosei’ (multicultural coexistence) is so weak to secure substantial citizenship of immigrants and minorities without covering structural inequality. Why do Japanese local governments take a role of de facto responsible actors of integration policies? Why do they fail to develop integration policies well? To address these questions, it is useful to categorise Japanese cities/localities into four types: (1) middle-sized cities with concentrated foreign population such as Kawasaki and Hamamatsu, (2) large-sized cities with dispersed foreign population such as Tokyo and Osaka, (3) rural localities where foreign workers are often introduced through the technical internship scheme, (4) middle-sized and large-sized cities with fewer foreign population like Sapporo and Fukuoka. These types of cities/localities are motivated to develop or undevelop integration policies, led by different reasons such as kinds of foreign residents and pursuit of international city brand. Some local governments started to introduce new services such as interpretation services for non-Japanese speakers and educational assistance for foreign children in collaboration with NGO/NPOs. But their policies are still insufficient mainly due to lack of national integration policy framework. This Japanese case embodies one character of neoliberal governance and policymaking, with neglecting immigrant rights. To guarantee substantial citizenship of immigrants, it is crucial to overcome the ethno-racial understanding of nation and residents in the local level as well as in the national level.