Why restrictive refugee policy can be retained? A Japanese case

ABSTRACT

While some countries take relatively generous attitudes towards immigrants, other countries retain illiberal stances towards them. Why can the latter retain their first strict immigration policies? What mechanism would guide the countries towards more liberal attitudes? This article addresses these questions, with focusing on refugee policy in Japan. Japan has kept its strict and illiberal policy on accepting refugees. In 2016, she recognised only 26 cases as refugees among 10,901 asylum applications. Why can Japan retain its strict and illiberal refugee policy? Firstly, due to the sudden dissolution of the empire after World War II, the mono-ethnic understanding of nationhood and citizenship has remained in Japan. Then, in the institutional aspect, the Ministry of Justice retains its power in charge of immigration and refugee policies. Although there is a sign that international pressure makes the illiberal refugee policy a bit lax, like recently having an increasing number of asylum applicants from various countries and accepting Syrians as students not as refugees, no decisive factor is found to guide Japan towards more generous stance to accept refugees.

KEYWORDS:

• Refugee
• policy
• state sovereignty
• citizenship
• Japan

Acknowledgements

This article is based on two paper presentations at two conferences: One is International Conference `Migration in a Turbulent World’ held by ISA Research Committee on the Sociology of Migration, RC31 and Doha Institute for Graduate Studies, 26-28 November 2016, Doha, Qatar; and the other is the Doha Forum (XVII) 2017, ‘Development, Stability and Refugees Crisis’ hosted by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in the State of Qatar, 14–15 May 2017, Doha, Qatar. The author is deeply grateful to the organisers of the two conferences for providing him with the opportunities of presentations.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. I generally use terms of asylum seekers and refugees interchangeably hereafter. However, if necessary, while I call those who would like to have refugee status but have not obtained it, asylum seekers, on one hand. On the other hand, I put the term refugees to those who have already obtained refugee status. In the same line, I use the terms of refugee policy and asylum policy differently, if necessary.

2. Although the terms of Oldcomers and Newcomers might make odd feelings in minds of readers, they are traditionally used in Japanese immigration studies as well as in the Japanese public discourses. For example, see Graburn et al. (2008, pp. 6–9).

3. The majority of Nikkeijin who immigrated to Japan are Brazilians, followed by Peruvians as the second largest group. Nikkeijin from Argentina and the Philippines are quite minority in number.

4. See Note 1 for usage of the terms of asylum seekers and refugees in this article.

5. Tarumoto (2005) and Tarumoto (2012a) apply the HKT model to the general immigration and citizenship policies of Japan.

6. See Joppke (1998a) about constitutional sovereignty and parliamental sovereignty.

7. Recently, in 2010 Japan introduced the Refugee Resettlement system where Japan could accept asylum seekers who stay in refugee camps outside Japan even if they do not land the Japanese territory. But this system is quite new and still exceptional for refugee acceptance of Japan.

8. Traumoto (2012) discusses details about this change of Japan.

9. About unskilled immigrants, Tarumoto (2015) discusses the latest trend of Japanese immigration policy for them.

Additional information

Funding

Research of this article was supported by the Murata Science Foundation under the 2017 FY Research Grant; and the Japanese Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology and the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science under the Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C) [17K04107], the Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (B) [17KT003007], and the Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (B) [17H02476].

Notes on contributors

Hideki Tarumoto

Hideki Tarumoto is Professor at Faculty of Letters, Arts and Sciences, Waseda University, Japan. He obtained his Doctor of Sociology from the University of Tokyo, Japan (1999). He was Research Associate (1995-1997), Asssociate Professor (1998-2015), Professor (2016-7) at Hokkaido University, Visiting Research Fellow at the University of Warwick, UK (2001), Invited Professor at Sciences Po Paris, France (2013). His research interest goes to citizenship and migration, and ethnic stratification in Europe and Asia. His major publications include Kokusai imin to shiminken gabanansu (International Migration and Citizenship Governance, Mineruva Shobo 2012); Yokuwakaru kokusai shakaigaku (Understandable Transnational Sociology, Mineruva Shobo, 2nd edition, 2016); The Limits of Local Citizenship in Japan (in Thomas Lacroix and Amandine Desille (eds) International Migrations and Local Governance: A Global Perspective, Palgrave Macmillan, 2018; Managing Borders and Migrants through Citizenship: A Japanese Case (Eurasia Border Review, 3(2): 41-54, 2012). ([email protected])