ABSTRACT Often essentialized as a national tradition, ethic, or even spirit, Japanese traditional craft has been less discussed in terms of its practical aspects, such as promotional activities, which are becoming increasingly important in the growing uncertainties of an aging and shrinking craft scene. The recent engagement of Tamba potters in organizing collective public events highlights this missing aspect. Based on ethnographic fieldwork conducted in Japan in 2018–19, this article explores potters’ changing perceptions of tradition as they seek its practical value in the sustainability of the local craft industry. On the surface, their public performance of traditional skills appears to strengthen their ties to the past. A closer look, however, reveals that doing so with a collective awareness of the practical value of tradition fosters their sense of agency in shaping the future. Through the notion of collective traditionalism, I show how tradition becomes an ingredient in the reconfiguration of the future.

ABSTRACT This paper comparatively analyses the political economy of labour immigration in Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan as new immigration countries in East Asia. It argues that the logic of their political economy of developmentalism, productivist welfare regime, and social contract of shared growth explains why all three democracies have a dual labour immigration regime, which encourages the immigration of highly qualified foreign labour and strictly controls the inflow of low- and medium-qualified foreign workers. This leads overall to low immigration movements and limited expansion of foreign residents. To reveal these commonalities of labour immigration regimes in East Asia, we discuss the three new East Asian immigration countries and their political economy in comparison to Italy and Spain as two new democratic immigration countries in South Europe. The paper also discusses the variations between political economies and resulting differences in labour immigration patterns among the three new East Asian immigration countries. This comparative analysis shows more pronounced similarities between Japan and South Korea and stronger peculiarities in the case of Taiwan. It can explain why Japan, despite having by far the fastest and most advanced demographic aging process among the three countries, had proportionally the lowest inflow of foreign labour. Still, based on this analysis, we expect a significant increase in labour immigration in Japan and in contrast to this a slowdown in labour inflows in South Korea in the coming years. Finally, it also explains why labour immigration regime in Taiwan is more responsive to the national labour market situation.

ABSTRACT This paper investigates the relationship between the conceptualization of foreign workers’ roles in regional revitalization, their visibility, and the support they receive in rural Japan amid population decline and labor shortages. Foreign workers in rural areas are often less visible and more vulnerable than their urban counterparts, as rural communities typically lack the resources needed to support them effectively. In Japan, this is largely due to the absence of comprehensive immigration policies. The 2019 Comprehensive Strategy to Overcome Population Decline and Revitalize Local Economies acknowledged the importance of foreign workers in regional revitalization and prompted local governments to enhance their support through financial incentives. However, significant disparities in support persist across rural municipalities. This study, drawing on fieldwork conducted in three rural municipalities in Kyūshū between 2021 and 2023, explores the varying responses of local governments to international labor migration. It compares how these governments perceive foreign workers, their role in regional revitalization, and the nature of the support provided, examining how these factors influence the workers’ visibility within their communities. By highlighting differences among rural municipalities, the research reveals how marginalized groups, like foreign workers, are often excluded from the public sphere, impacting their access to services and the policies that govern them. The paper argues that the (in)visibility of foreign workers in rural Japan is not merely an outcome of local governance but also a determinant in the diverse approaches to their conceptualization and support.

ABSTRACT This study examines the representation of war and defeat in post-war Japan through sociology, political science, and history, focusing on documentary literature (kiroku bungaku, 記録文学) that addresses colonial war and military defeat narratives. It explores the portrayal of Japanese individuals in prisoner-of-war camps in the former Soviet Union and Joseon during Japan’s imperial collapse. By analyzing narratives from the Bibliography of Post-War Documentary Literature (Kōsa Jimu Sankō Shiryō, Volume 4), compiled by the National Diet Library in 1949, the study investigates the rise of the genre in post-war Japan, particularly through works like A Story of the Border (Kokkyō monogatari, 国境物語) and The Flowing Stars Are Alive (Nagareru hoshi wa ikiteiru, 流れる星は生きている). The popularity of documentary literature invites reflection on whether individual memories can be unified into a collective history. This study argues that the genre has allowed individuals to reinterpret shared experiences with state power as subjective narratives, distinguishing them from historiographical notions of truth. First, it highlights Japanese documentary literature as an underexplored yet critical lens for understanding war and defeat through the perspectives of everyday citizens. Second, it addresses the stagnation in Japanese war literature’s dichotomy of perpetrator versus victim. This research breaks away from that binary approach, offering nuanced insights into how shared memories can reshape historical discourse.

ABSTRACT This article considers Thai-Japanese relations during the Pacific War, focusing on the economic activities of Japanese companies and the labor movement in Thailand. Thailand had become a supply base which supported Japanese military operations in Southeast Asia since 1941. Japanese companies in Thailand produced munitions, daily necessities, and food and supplied them exclusively to the Japanese forces. While some workers went on strike to raise wages and improve working conditions, the labor movement developed the economic struggle into various anti-Japanese movements under the guidance of the Thai Communist Party (TCP). The workers disrupted the production activities of the Japanese military through strikes, slowdowns, and sabotage, and damaged their military operations by producing defective munitions. Using underground wartime Chinese newspapers, the writings of former labor activists, documents at the National Archives of Thailand, and personal interviews as sources, this study looks at the actions taken by Japanese companies and how the labor movement developed in Thailand. The article also shows how the TCP developed the labor movement against both Japan and the Phibun government based on the recognition that Thailand was a semi-feudal society in the process of being colonized.

ABSTRACT One of the most captive and resilient notions reified in post-war Japanese society is that Japan is a racially homogeneous island nation. This ethnonationalist ideology has contributed to the Japanese government’s resistance to immigration for decades. However, confronted with increasing demographic crises and skills shortages, Japan has been opening its door wider toward foreigners, making it a de facto immigrant society. This paper highlights two parallel processes in this development: the normalization of exceptions and the acceptance of differences. The first process is at the national government level, happening in the policy arena, and the second is more localized, involving a wide range of people, organizations, and local governments. Nonetheless, for Japan to transform into an immigrant society, two ideological barriers need to be overcome: One is the discourse of “no-immigration”, and the other is the identity-binary of “Japanese” versus “foreigner”. These two discourses exert influences on both policymaking and everyday life. The paper argues that where Japan is heading is very much contingent upon whether, when, and under what conditions such discourses will be abandoned.

ABSTRACT In this paper, we examine changing perceptions of being single in Japan and trace the emergence of the trend of “doing things alone” (sorokatsu) and changes in its meaning and uptake. We focus on singles as marginal actors in a familialist society, recognizing that while the proportion of unmarried (including divorced and widowed) adult Japanese is increasing, typicality and marginality are not statistical categories but rather discursive constructs. Using select data from an original large-scale survey on COVID and practices of intimacy among unmarried Japanese aged 25–49 years, contextualized with data from long-term fieldwork and media and popular literature, this paper addresses the ways that ideas about being single and acting alone have been modified, amplified and challenged over the last two decades, in the emergence of a so-called hyper-solo-society. We find that in a resolutely family- and marriage-centric society, a growing and heterogenous group of singles of “marriageable age” is navigating changing socio-economic realities, and, in so doing, (re)negotiating what a “normal” adult life looks like or could look like.

ABSTRACT This article discusses the significance of whaling heritage in contemporary Japan. It distinguishes between whaling as lived socioeconomic practice on the one hand, and whaling heritage as social imaginary that is central to the construction of collective identities on the other. Its argument is twofold. First, it argues that heritage-making is not just a matter of nostalgia or care for history but fundamentally a future-oriented endeavour, and that conceptions of heritage are key components of social imaginaries today. Second, it argues that whaling heritage can be preserved and recreated as a set of cultural practices and resources for tourism and identity construction irrespective of the survival of the whaling industry. The article discusses three examples of whaling heritage that have gained new significance in recent years as markers of local identity, tourist attractions, and symbols of community cohesion: the cultivation and promotion of early modern whaling heritage in the whaling town of Taiji (Wakayama Prefecture), the meanings attributed to a re-enactment event and festival in the former whaling town of Kayoi (Yamaguchi Prefecture), and the changing significance of a similar but older festival in the non-whaling town of Yokkaichi (Mie Prefecture). None of these practices is contingent upon whaling per se. All of these cases constitute creative attempts to draw upon histories of whaling and other human-whale relations to shape new meanings, notions of belonging, and livelihoods today.

ABSTRACT Japan has one of the longest average lifespans in the world, but this has not yet been fully translated into an extension of the working lifespan of employees. In particular, older employees from business fields in which working beyond the company’s retirement age is still not common face limited job opportunities in the labor market if they change companies after reaching retirement age. A striking reduction in working conditions after reaching retirement age triggers older people to reconstruct their identities and attitudes regarding work after retirement. Adjusting to these changes in a flexible and creative way increases their job opportunities. This paper investigates the responses of older people to changes triggered by retirement age through a case study of a project run by an employment agency in Tokyo, Mystar60, for older job seekers with high levels of English skills. This study uses the filter model developed by Röpke to investigate the deciding factors for their actions linked with working after a company’s retirement age. The case study shows the typical difficulties of older job seekers. The findings reveal that the Mystar60 program improved interviewees’ job opportunities in a creative way by encouraging them to act as an entrepreneur. Through active interaction as co-learning, Mystar60 and older people created a niche business market in which older people can apply their English skills effectively and get “fair” remuneration.