Newsletters

Debito.org Weekly Newsletters, sent out by email to various sources before being blogged here.

Jun 6 2006: 2 mil gaikokujin, foreign crime, Kouno Taro, Sorimachi Katsuo

Posted on by Dr. Debito Arudou

mytest

Subject: Updates: 2 million gaikokujin, foreign crime, PM hopefuls speak out

Hi All. Arudou Debito here. Yet another set of updates:

/////////////////////////////////////////////////////
1) FOREIGN POPULATION TOPS 2 MILLION FOR FIRST TIME
2) PM CANDIDATE KOUNO TARO WANTS TO LIMIT FOREIGN POPULATION TO 3%
3) PUNDIT SORIMACHI KATSUO BLAMES FOREIGN CRIME ON A LENIENT JUDICIARY
4) EXCERPTS OF “DANGER! HUMAN RIGHTS BILL” BOOK ONLINE
5) NEW ALIEN REGISTRATION DETAILS
6) UPDATE ON TRAVEL AGENCIES: ESTIMATES NOW COST MONEY?
7) UPDATE ON POLICE HOME VISITS: ANSWERING QUESTIONS IS OPTIONAL
8) UPCOMING CONFERENCE ON MULTICULTURALISM BY IJUUREN, SAPPORO 6/24-5
9) UPCOMING CONFERENCE ON LABOR RIGHTS BY UTU, TOKYO JUNE 25
/////////////////////////////////////////////////////
June ６, 2006

1) FOREIGN POPULATION TOPS 2 MILLION FOR FIRST TIME

Well, guess what, it happened: Registered foreigners last year passed a benchmark. Pre-2000, this would have been heralded with media fireworks and ruminations on how international Japanese society is becoming. Nowadays however, since foreigners are constantly being portrayed as a source of social discord by the media and the profiting police forces, well… we’ll instead whisper the inevitable:

—————————————————————-
Mainichi Shinbun, Tokyo morning edition, May 27, 2006
(translation by Arudou Debito, not reported in English)
http://www.mainichi-msn.co.jp/shakai/wadai/news/20060527ddm012040087000c.html

According to Immigration statistics released on May 26, as of the end of 2005 the number of registered foreigners was 2,011,555 (a 1.9% rise over 2004), the first time it has broken 2 million. This was a rise of 0.02%, to 1.57% of the total Japanese population. By nationality, North and South Koreans were at the top, with 598,687 people. There are also 519,561 Chinese, 302,080 Brazilians, 187,261 Filipinos, 57,728 Peruvians, and 49,390 Americans.
—————————————————————-

COMMENT: Notice that the largest growth in the foreign community is Brazilian. Rising from 286,557 souls last year to break 300,000, this means close to half of last year’s net increase of foreigners (15,523 of the 37,808) were Brazilians. As this is largest increase of Brazilians since 2001, the trend is accelerating.

And I don’t see it stopping on its own. Reported a friend on another list, who heralds from near Nagoya:
—————————————————————-
[The foreign population] is already over 3% in at least 6 cities in Aichi, and Toyohashi (until the recent mergers,usually the 2nd largest city in Aichi) is pushing close to 5%. Okazaki’s population is growing at about 300 a month, very little of it from natural increase, and 20% of the growth from new foreign arrivals.
http://www.declan.tv/okazaki_notes/kokusekibetsu.html
The % of foreigners dropped below 3% due to a merger, but should be reached again well within 12 months. At least 4% by 2012.

Brazilian (and other foreign born) factory workers in Okazaki, Toyota and Toyohashi cities usually earn 33-380,000 a month including overtime, lower tier manufacturers simply cannot find native born workers willing to do these jobs in sufficient numbers.
—————————————————————-

Which makes a recent statement by one of the allegedly “more left-wing LDP members”, Kouno Taro, who is currently in the running to be then next Prime Minister, all the more ironic:

/////////////////////////////////////////////////////

2) PM CANDIDATE KOUNO TARO WANTS TO LIMIT FOREIGN POPULATION TO 3%

—————————————————————-
Mainichi Daily News, May 31, 2006 (English original)
http://mdn.mainichi-msn.co.jp/national/news/20060531p2a00m0na009000c.html

A Justice Ministry panel studying an overhaul of Japan’s immigration administration is set to propose that the proportion of foreign residents to the nation’s population should be kept at 3 pct or below, Senior Vice Justice Minister Taro Kono said Tuesday.

The proposal will be included in a draft package of immigration policy reform measures to be drawn up shortly, Kono, who heads the panel, told a press conference.

According to the ministry, foreign residents accounted for 1.2 pct of Japan’s population at the end of 2005.

By contrast, the proportion stood at 8.9 pct in Germany in 2001, at 11.1 pct in the United States in the same year and at 5.6 pct in France in 1999.

The panel is also considering requiring foreign nationals of Japanese ancestry to be fluent in Japanese and have regular jobs as conditions for their residency in Japan, Kono said.

Such people are currently allowed to live in Japan if they have relatives in the country.

The panel now believes it necessary to toughen the criteria because the number of problems caused by such residents has been increasing. (Jiji Press)
—————————————————————-

I see. So I guess it begs the question how this is going to be enforced. Compulsory birth control for the increasing number of foreign worker couples who decide to have children? Just kidding. I’m sure Mr Kouno just wants to man the barricades, for whatever reason (though I would like to know what these “increasing problems by such residents” are).

Pity he (and his ministry, which should know better) gets the figure for the percentage of the foreign population wrong. It hasn’t been 1.2 percent since around 1998! Worse yet is that the Mainichi Shinbun (which should also know better, as it reported the accurate figures not four days before), just parrots the incorrect information all over again. Shame on them. I’ve already sent a scolding through my Japanese mailing lists.

You can make your feelings known to Dietmember Kouno in four languages (see how “progressive” he is?) through his flash website at http://www.taro.org . One would hope, though, that somebody aspiring for international leadership would at least make policy pronouncements grounded on accurate information.

Still, I wonder how Toyota, Suzuki, Yamaha, Nissan, et al would feel about this proposed labor force cap. Close to two decades of “Foreign Trainee” workers, working for less than less than half wages, no social benefits, and no job security, are what’s keeping Japan’s labor costs down, stopping many of Japan’s major industries from relocating overseas. How about Toyota? In its national-pride push to finally overtake GM as the word’s leading carmaker, it’ll need even more cheap labor for the foreseeable future…

Anyway, back to the “increasing problems” chestnut:

/////////////////////////////////////////////////////

3) PUNDIT SORIMACHI KATSUO BLAMES FOREIGN CRIME ON A LENIENT JUDICIARY

Forwarded to me by a reporter friend, here is one of the most laughably fatheaded pieces on foreign crime I’ve ever read. Entitled “Sorimachi Speaks: Japan’s Criminal Justice System and Crimes Committed by Foreigners”, Sorimachi writes some pretty amazing social science (and in English too, perfect for forwarding to the UN). Some choice excerpts:

—————————————————————-
“The substantive and procedural laws of Japanese criminal justice presuppose a monolingual nation. It is axiomatic that this kind of nation will be very lenient towards offenders… However, Japan’s criminal justice system is on the verge of a crisis, faced with the internationalisation of crime and the underworld activities of foreign criminals resident in Japan brought about by globalisation…

“Examining the crime of theft, bold methods hitherto unimagined by Japanese offenders and not out of place in an action movie stand out. These include the widespread and systematic use of lock picking tools in theft following breaking and entering (so that access is gained in seconds), the use of cranes to steal automatic vending machines…”

[I guess that means the newly-imaginative Japanese also committing these crimes have been inspired by the more creative foreigners. How a rote-memorization education hitherto pacified an entire society!]

“It is not possible to get a grip on these cases using the investigative methods based on presumptions about fellow Japanese. New legislation has become necessary. It is desirable that the Wiretapping Law passed in August 1999 be made particular use of in the investigation of crimes committed by foreigners in Japan…”

[Yes, you read that right.]

“Japanese justice is said to be precise justice… It is doubtful whether this kind of process is entirely appropriate for the crimes of foreigners in Japan whose culture, code of conduct and standard of living are completely different… It is impossible to avoid the impression that, whilst in Japanese justice we see a model with a deep and rare lenient tinge, it is more and more the case that this precise justice is far removed from the prevention of recidivism in and rehabilitation of foreign offenders in Japan… Japan’s penalties are amongst the lightest in the world. This is because we have assumed offenders in Japan will be fellow Japanese.

“…The reality of crime committed by foreigners in Japan, which incurs waste in terms of time and money of Japan’s human and material capital is precisely that, activity interfering with the enjoyment of the nation. To put it in the extreme, it may be appropriate to classify all crime committed by foreigners in Japan as crime relating to the national legal interest.”
—————————————————————-

Grab a coffee and read the rest at:
http://www.lec-jp.com/speaks/info_013.html

Who is this guy? Some pundit in a policy thinktank/private-sector quasi-university, who according to a Google search seems to have the ear of quite a few people. Sorimachi’s profile in English:
http://www.lec-jp.com/corporation/english/greetings.html
http://www.lec-jp.com/corporation/english/profile/index.html

Giving Sorimachi’s thesis its due, he essentially maintains that Japan’s “precise” justice system is not suited to dealing with foreigners. He then proposes that the policing and incarceration of them be toughened up, and that repatriation for trial back in their home countries be required as an adequate deterrent (as Japan’s jails are too sweet on their inmates).

Yow. Where to start. Okay, here: The major blind spot of these types of people people who wish to single out foreign crime for special attention is, well, what do you also say about the corresponding (and far higher numerically) rises in Japanese crime? Are foreigners to blame for that too? Alas, Sorimachi offers no insight or comparison, except to say that Japanese can be rehabilitated (it’s axiomatic, remember), while foreigners are incorrigible, and thus a threat to the “enjoyment of the nation” at large.

I’ve seen to it that the UN’s Dr Diene gets a copy of this screed, of course.

/////////////////////////////////////////////////////

4) EXCERPTS OF “DANGER! HUMAN RIGHTS BILL” BOOK ONLINE

Last update I wrote about the “emergency publication” (kinkyuu shuppan) of a book on why Japan should have no human rights law, or a human rights committee to enforce it. Well, I had a better look at it. The authors’ thesis is one of garden-variety alarmism, that giving foreigners and general malcontents any power would lead to abuse.

For example, according to a quite well-rendered manga within, if you create any means for people to enforce their constitutional rights, you will get:

a) foreigners getting kicked out for picking fights in bars and then siccing the Human Rights Committee on the barkeeps,
b) colored foreigners forcing companies to hire them, then lying down on the job and getting away with it because of the HRC,
c) yakuza forcing their way into bathhouses, extorting money in the name of the HRC,
d) bigoted landlords being forced to rent their apartments to Chinese [yes, you read that right],
e) politicians (quoting another PM hopeful Abe Shinzou) unable to criticize Kim Jong-Il anymore…

It even compares the UN Diene Report (pg 154-155) to Iris Chang’s RAPE OF NANKING, and calls upon the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to buck up and combat this insult to “our country” and “our people”.

I should have a translation of the pertinent bits (maybe even a parody of the manga, a la Chibi Kuro Sanbo) out relatively soon. But for now, for you Japanese readers, scanned pages with comments at:
http://www.debito.org/abunaijinkenyougohouan.html

I’ve already passed the information on to my Japanese lists, with a list of books they can present policymakers as a counterweight to this propaganda.

/////////////////////////////////////////////////////

5) NEW ALIEN REGISTRATION REGULATIONS

I’ve written a number of articles in the past about the new proposed regulations for fingerprinting and registering foreigners (in the name of terrorism and disease prevention, natch). For example:
http://www.debito.org/japantimes062904.html
http://www.debito.org/japantimes052405.html
http://www.debito.org/japantimes112205.html

There’ll also be a pro-and-con article on this in today’s (Tuesday) Japan Times Community Page.

Well, now that the proposal has become law as of three weeks ago, here’s how things are starting to shape up. Forwarding from a friend who has Permanent Residency:

—————————————————————-
Check out these overviews of recently passed amendments to the Immigration Control and Refugee Recognition Act. Apparently people like me and other registered aliens will be able to pass through automated gates on the basis of having complied with specific prior to departure. This is related to introduction of smart alien reg cards. Such automated gate passing has already been initiated in some other countries for nationals who apply and qualify.

第164回国会において成立した「出入国管理及び難民認定法の一部を改正する法
律（平成18年5月24日法律第４３号）」について (Japanese)
http://www.immi-moj.go.jp/keiziban/happyou/20060524_law43.pdf
2006-06-01

Law for Partial Amendment of the Immigration Control and Refugee
Recognition Act (Law No. 43 of May 24, 2006) Enacted at the 164th Diet
Session
http://www.immi-moj.go.jp/english/keiziban/happyou/law43_20060524.pdf
2006-06-01
—————————————————————-

I haven’t given these documents a thorough going-over yet, but there’s the information out there for those who need it.

/////////////////////////////////////////////////////

6) UPDATE ON TRAVEL AGENCIES: ESTIMATES NOW CHARGED?

Through March and April, friends exposed domestic travel agents (such as No.1 Travel and HIS) and their “Japanese Only” tickets and different pricing structures based upon nationality.
http://www.debito.org/HISpricing.html

One thing suggested by some Internet BBSes was to make reservations with them, then cancel out of protest of this policy.

I’m wondering if this hasn’t caused some sort of reaction within the industry. I just tried to get an official travel estimate from Twinkle Plaza in Sapporo Station (I think it’s a member of the JTB group). And they tried to charge me 2000 yen just to put something on paper. I took my business elsewhere, of course, but is this happening to anyone else?

/////////////////////////////////////////////////////

7) UPDATE ON POLICE HOME VISITS: IT’S OPTIONAL

I wrote last time about the “Police Patrol Card” (junkai renraku caado), where cops visit your home and ask detailed questions about the occupants, their work and legal status, etc.
http://www.debito.org/junkairenrakucard.jpg

I got quite a few answers back from people who had experienced the same thing. Most, however, said they cooperated with the survey, seeing it as a valuable service (in case of emergency), or the mere expression of Japan as a “benign police state”. It tended to happen most often in the Kantou Area around Tokyo, less in the provinces. It’s never happened to me or any of my friends AFAIK up here in Sapporo.

However, the Japanese who responded, if they had been asked, refused to cooperate. Now, given my audience (mostly socially-conscious people) this is not a representative sample. Still, they found this procedure just as intrusive as I would, and said many of the details they would and should not be bound to divulge.

I talked to a lawyer. Responding to this police request for information is in fact optional. Which means: If the police show up at your door and you don’t feel like divulging this information, just take the card and say you’ll get back to them someday. Rinse and repeat. That’s what my Japanese respondents did, FYI.

/////////////////////////////////////////////////////

8) UPCOMING CONFERENCE ON MULTICULTURALISM BY IJUUREN, SAPPORO
This series of talks on recreating and recognizing Japan as a multicultural society will take place on Saturday and Sunday, June 24 and 25, 2006, at Hokusei Gakuen University, Atsubetsu, Sapporo.

Information in their website in Japanese
http://www.ijurenkita2006.com/
How to get there (English)
http://www.hokusei.ac.jp/en/support/access/

Sponsored by Solidarity for Migrant Workers Japan (Ijuuren). More on them at:
http://www.jca.apc.org/migrant-net/English/English.html
Recommended. I’ve been asked to speak there as well.

/////////////////////////////////////////////////////

9) UPCOMING CONFERENCE ON LABOR RIGHTS BY UTU, TOKYO JUNE 25

A University Teachers Union (UTU) Forum

“Working at University: Securing Our Future”

1.10 – 5.00 Sunday 25th June 2006
Tokyo Shigoto Center, Iidabashi 3-10-3, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo

1.10 – 1.30 Registration
1.30 – 2.30 Forum and Discussion
“Rights and Wrongs – The Issues Teachers Face Today”

Guest speakers:
Arudou Debito
Louis Carlet
(Deputy General Secretary NUGW Tokyo Nambu)

The job security of college and university teachers is under increasing threat – from cuts in salary, the non-renewal of contracts, outsourcing and attacks on our right to organise to protect and improve our working conditions. In the face of such threats, what are our rights? What can we learn from past and present disputes? How can we stop the tide of outsourcing? How, as committed professionals and trade unionists, can we secure our future? Our two opening speakers will set the context, followed by questions and answers, and an open forum to discuss the issues.
_____________________________________________________

3.00 – 4.00 Workshops

*Power Harassment
*Challenging Conditions on Campus
*The NIC Strike – Learning From a Dispute

4.00 – 4.30 Reports and Final Comments
_____________________________________________________

All welcome! Admission: 500 yen voluntary contribution

To register in advance, further details of the event and information about UTU,
email: utu.forum@yahoo.com

Venue map:
http://map.yahoo.co.jp/pl?nl=35.41.49.133&el=139.45.10.929&la=1&fi=1&skey=%2
52&sc=3

More on UTU at http://www.utu-japan.org/

The University Teachers Union is a member union of the National Union of General Workers Tokyo Nambu
http://www.nugw.org

/////////////////////////////////////////////////////

All for today. Thanks for reading!
Arudou Debito in Sapporo
debito@debito.org
www.debito.org
June 6, 2006
ENDS
/////////////////////////////////////////////////////

SUCCESS STORIES: Article on Divorce in Japan

Posted on by Dr. Debito Arudou

mytest

Hi All. Arudou Debito here. What follows is a version of an essay recently published by executive newsletter Success Stories (http://www.successstories.com), and is written with that audience in mind.

Excerpted and adapted from our upcoming book, “Guidebook for Newcomers: Setting Down Roots in Japan” (working title), to be published in early 2007. I’d like to say “enjoy” as usual, but it’s not that kind of topic. Be advised, however, that the information within is very important to those hoping to stay and and create firmer roots in Japan. Because if a marriage with a Japanese goes sour, the system is not designed to protect both parents, and you as a foreigner could really lose big. FYI. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

//////////////////////////////////////////////

DIVORCE IN JAPAN
WHAT A MESS
By Arudou Debito, Sapporo, Japan
debito@debito.org, http://www.debito.org
(All substantiation for claims made within can be found in the Referential Links section at the very bottom.)

For many readers of Success Stories, understanding the demographics of the Japanese market is essential to your business. This essay will deal with one fundamental facet, which affects consumer preferences, disposable income, and the stability of the oldest business proposition in existence: Marriage and the Family Unit.

Given the strong image of “docile Japanese wives” and “Japan’s selfless corporate workers”, many readers might be envisioning Japan as a homogeneous land of stable families and low divorce rates. But let’s look at the figures:

According to Japan’s Ministry of Health, Labour, and Welfare, there have been fewer marriages between Japanese in recent years: weddings steadily dropped from 764,161 in 1995 to 680,906 in 2004, an 11% decrease.

In the same time period, international marriages, where one partner is Japanese, have jumped from 27,727 to 39,551 couples, or a 43% increase. (And let’s answer the inevitable question of “Who’s marrying whom?” Perhaps counterintuitively (but not so when you consider how many farmers import brides), overwhelmingly more Japanese men marry foreigners than the other way around–at a ratio of nearly eight to two, and growing!)

However, perhaps because people prefer to leave the altar with smiles and hope for happy endings, less attention is paid to divorce figures. Between 1995 and 2004, broken unions in Japan also increased nearly without pause: from 199,016 to 270,804 divorces, a 36% increase. Of those, however, divorces between Japanese have plateaued, even decreased, in recent years. International divorces, however, have increased steadily, nearly doubling within the same time period (for Japanese men-Foreign women: from 6,153 to 12,071 divorces; for Japanese women-Foreign men: from 1,839 to 3,228 divorces).

This essay chooses not to speculate on the possible “cultural” or “sociological” reasons behind these numbers (since it is difficult to even accurately calculate a “divorce rate”). Suffice it to say that marriage in any society to anyone is risky.

However, marriage within the Japanese system is especially risky, because if it goes sour, people regardless of nationality can lose big. Enforcement of laws connected to alimony, child support, visitation rights, court orders, and custody in Japan is very weak. If you marry a Japanese, have children, and then get a divorce, you–and especially you as a foreign parent–could lose custody and all access to them. This may affect not only your bottom lines, but also your future personal plans in Japan.

————————————–
PARTING IS SUCH BITTER SORROW

Divorce in Japan, like marriage, is easy if both parties agree to it. All you have to do is head for the Ward Office and fill out a Divorce Form (rikon todoke–essentially the opposite procedure for getting married using a kekkon todoke). Spouses put their inkan stamp on the todoke (signatures are not valid), and file it with the Ward Office. That is all. They are divorced. This is called kyougi rikon, or “divorce by mutual consent”, which happens, estimates a lawyer friend who specializes in these cases, in about 80% of divorces. Assets, possessions, or property are divided up either informally or through the legal community, and you make a clean sweep of it and get on with your lives.

However, if both parties do not agree to divorce, things can get very messy. According to Japan Civil Code Article 770, there are five grounds for unilateral divorce:

1) infidelity
2) malicious desertion (which for foreign spouses can include being deported)
3) uncertainty whether or not the spouse is dead or alive for three years or more,
4) serious mental disease without hope of recovery, or
5) a “grave reason” which makes continuing the marriage impossible.

What is considered a “grave reason” is unclear, and at the discretion of a judge if things go to court. One reason can be the wife refusing the husband sexual relations for a long period of time (a reason only men can claim). Another can be the husband refusing the family unit his financial support (which only women can claim). However, the simple fact that you do not like each other anymore, i.e. a matter of “irreconcilable differences”, is not, according to lawyer Mizunuma Isao of IGM Law Offices, Sapporo, considered to be sufficient grounds.

Here things begin to pinch. If one side refuses to agree to the divorce, you will have to negotiate until you do, which can take many years. You can legally separate, but this is not a divorce, and you cannot remarry. Moreover, if there is a secret relationship behind the breakup, a spouse in Japan can sue your new partner for damages, demanding both you and your partner pay consolation for wrecking the marriage!

If you after talking things out you still cannot agree to divorce, you go to Family Court. The first step is called choutei (mediation), where you sit down with three representatives, i.e. two “upstanding members of the community” (who are generally not certified counselors) and one representative of the court. This mediation system is designed to give disputing couples a forum for their grievances without snarling up the courts. However, the role of the choutei is not to find fault on either side, rather to help both sides reach an agreement–i.e. reconcile or divorce. Meetings take place around every month or two, generally in separate rooms for a few hours, and can continue for years.

————————————–
TELL IT TO THE JUDGE

If the couple cannot reach an agreement even after court mediation (which is estimated to happen in around 5% of all divorce cases), then the next step is a lawsuit in Family Court. There, a judge will only rule that a contested divorce is legitimate if you can prove that the marriage has completely “collapsed” (hatan).

This is one of the reasons why divorces in Japan get messy. Since judges hardly ever grant divorces to the person who did wrong, you must show that your partner was at fault. In other words, you cannot separate amicably–you have to dredge something up. This does not create a constructive atmosphere; it can cause even more feelings of ill-will and a future desire for revenge. Also, since laws governing perjury in Japan are at best weakly enforced in civil cases, your spouse may make some exaggerated claims about your past in court with impunity. If it goes to court, it will get very nasty.

After all that, if the judge does not rule the marriage has actually “collapsed”, all you can do is wait. Sometimes former couples still reside together yet live divorced lives (katei nai bekkyo) of no contact. Separations of at least five years (ten to twenty years are not extraordinary in Japan) are necessary before a contested divorce may be granted by a court. Meanwhile, if there are children who need feeding, child support will be assessed by looking at a fee schedule created by the Bar Association, which measures both parents’ income and determines an appropriate monthly sum.

————————————–
BUT WHAT ABOUT THE CHILDREN?

Divorce proceedings and the aftermath are tough on the kids in any society, but Japan further complicates things through legal negligence. During separation, divorce court, and onwards, the parent who does not have custody may have problems meeting the children for more than a few hours a month, if at all. Visitation rights are not granted before the divorce is complete, but even then, Japan has no legal mechanism to enforce visitation rights or other court-negotiated settlements afterwards.

Also, enforcement mechanisms for the payment of alimony or child support have loopholes. For example, if your spouse owes you money but refuses to pay, you must know the home address, the workplace, and bank account details of your spouse in order to seek redress. However, if your spouse changes any of these things and happens not to notify you, you will have to track down those details yourself, which often requires hiring your own private detective. The police or government officials will not get involved.

————————————–
MULTINATIONAL MARRIAGES COME OFF WORST

What makes this situation especially difficult for international, and especially intercontinental, divorces is that foreign partners have extreme difficulty being granted custody of children in Japan. In a March 31, 2006 interview with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, lawyer Jeremy D. Morely, of the International Family Law Office in New York, stated:

—————————————-
“Children are not returned from Japan, period, and it is a situation that happens a lot with children of international marriages with kids who are over in Japan. They do not get returned. Usually, the parent who has kept a child is Japanese, and under the Japanese legal system they have a family registration system whereby every Japanese family has their own registration with a local ward office. And the name of registration system is the koseki system. So every Japanese person has their koseki, and a child is listed on the appropriate koseki. Once a child is listed on the family register, the child belongs to that family. Foreigners don’t have a family register and so there is no way for them to actually have a child registered as belonging to them in Japan. There is an international treaty called the Hague Convention on the civil aspects of international child abduction, and Japan is the only G7 country that is not a party to the Hague Convention.”[1]
—————————————-

This means that if things go intercontinentally ballistic (say, a Japanese spouse abducts a foreigner’s children back to Japan), the foreigner will lose all contact with them, according to the Children’s Rights Network.

Even if the foreigner tries to go through proper domestic channels, he loses. One clear example is the Murray Wood Case. Wood, a resident of Canada, was awarded custody of his children in 2004 by Canadian courts. Yet when his children were abducted to Japan by ex-wife Ayako Wood, he found himself powerless to enforce the court order. Not only were the Canadian Government’s demands to extradite Ayako ignored by the Japanese government, but also Japan’s Saitama District and High Courts awarded custody to her, essentially declaring that “uprooting the children from the current stable household is not in the child’s best interest”. What then? If the foreigner takes the law into his own hands and abducts them back, he will be arrested for kidnapping by the Japanese police, as was witnessed in a recent case handled by the American Embassy. Consequently, Japan has become a safe haven for international child abductions.

————————————–
CONCLUSION

The author does not wish to give the impression that divorce is any more likely if the spouse is a Japanese. “Any marriage,” my lawyer sources dryly indicate, “is a gamble.” However, what raises the stakes of the transaction is the fact that Japan has weak-to-nonexistent recourse to prevent potential abuses. According to Colin P.A. Jones J.D., Associate Professor at Doshisha University Law School, the system is geared to support the distaff side of the divorce. The woman, as wife and mother, is given overwhelming priority in divorce cases, as opposed to viewing each divorce on a case-by-case basis (spawning a cottage industry of guidebooks on wringing the most out of your man). Yes, weak-to-nonexistent enforcement of laws and court rulings mean that men in the Japanese system (as compared to, for example, the American) do not stand to lose enormously financially. They will, however, lose their children.

Veterans of broken Japanese marriages very often lead separate lives without any connection to each other or the children for decades. (Prime Minister Koizumi’s nonexistent relationship with his youngest son Yoshinaga is a prime example.) It is a system that encourages “fortress Moms”, “deadbeat Dads”, and “who dares, wins” custody battles. With all this, it is no wonder why marriage is not an option for some people, and why Japanese divorce statistics may in fact be artificially low (although we should see a jump from 2007, due to a reform where wives will be able to claim part of their ex-husbands’ pension).

In this era of modernity and more lifestyle choices, if Japan ever aspires to the ideals of “upholding the sanctity of marriage” and “strengthening the family unit”, it will have to reform this system to make all parties more accountable for relationships gone sour. Keep this information in mind if your business involves this sector of the Japanese market.

[1] Interview, Canadian Broadcasting Company, March 31, 2006, http://www.crnjapan.com/articles/2006/en/20060331-japanambassadorinterview.html

———————————
Referential Links:

Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare statistics on marriage and divorce in Japan:
http://www.mhlw.go.jp/toukei/saikin/hw/jinkou/suii04/

Regarding Issues of Divorce and Child Custody in Japan:
http://www.crnjapan.com/en/issues.html

The Children’s Rights Network Japan
http://www.crnjapan.com

The International Family Law Office (Lawyer Jeremy D. Morely, Esq.):
http://www.international-divorce.com

Regarding PM Koizumi Junichiro’s divorce–the perfect case study of nonaccountability:
http://www.crnjapan.com/pexper/juk/en/

The Murray Wood Case
http://www.crnjapan.com/pexper/wom/en/

About the author of this article:
http://www.debito.org

AUTHOR BIO: ARUDOU Debito, a naturalized Japanese citizen, is an Associate Professor at Hokkaido Information University, and a columnist for the Japan Times. His books, ‘JAPANESE ONLY’–The Otaru Hot Springs Case and Racial Discrimination in Japan (Akashi Shoten Inc., revised 2004 and 2006) are available in English and Japanese. His latest book, “Guidebook for Newcomers: Setting Down Roots in Japan” (working title), is being co-authored with a Japanese lawyer and will be available in early 2007. This essay is an excerpt and adaptation from Chapter 4 of the Guidebook. The author may be reached at www.debito.org and debito@debito.org.

ENDS
June 20, 2006

DEBITO.ORG NEWSLETTER JUNE 17, 2006

Posted on by Dr. Debito Arudou

mytest

Hello All. Arudou Debito here. Contents of this week’s newsletter:

//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
1) “DANGER! HUMAN RIGHTS PROTECTION LAW” MANGA TRANSLATED
2) “ILLEGAL FOREIGN LABOR MONTH” SIGNS UP AGAIN IN SHINAGAWA STN
3) TOKYO PRESS CONF JUNE 22: HAMAMATSU MAYOR KITAWAKI
4) JT ON REINSTITUTION OF FINGERPRINTING, AND RESPONSE
5) KOFI ANNAN ON JAPAN’S NEW IMMIGRATION LAW
6) KOFI ANNAN ON MIGRANTS
7) JOHN EDWARD PHILIPS ON ACADEMIA AND MONOCULTURALISM IN JAPAN
//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

June 17, 2006 Freely Forwardable

1) “DANGER! HUMAN RIGHTS PROTECTION LAW” MANGA TRANSLATED

Last report, I told you about the “emergency publication” of a book designed to scupper any prospects of a law safeguarding human rights in Japan (particularly the Jinken Yougo Houan, currently under consideration by the Diet). I mentioned a manga within which illustrated the “abuses” of such a law, like denying obdurate landlords the “right” to refuse narrow-eyed Chinese tenants, denying employers the “right” to refuse to hire or fire lazy darkie women foreigners, etc.

Well, no need to leave people out of the party. Friend and fellow naturalized Japanese MIKI Kaoru (ne Coal Restall) has kindly translated the manga into English with verve and flair. See them with comments on his blog at
http://libationkowloon.blogspot.com/2006/06/protecting-human-rights-is-dangerous.html

Or see them side by side in English and Japanese at
http://www.debito.org/abunaijinkenyougohouan.html

//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

2) “ILLEGAL FOREIGN LABOR MONTH” SIGNS UP AGAIN IN SHINAGAWA STATION

Alert commuter Steven H. spotted this: The return of the “BEWARE OF FOREIGNERS” type of signs paid for with our tax monies.

In Shinagawa Station, one of Japan’s biggest, there is a stadium-size banner reading:

———————————-
“THIS MONTH IS THE POLICY CAMPAIGN AGAINST ILLEGAL FOREIGN LABORERS
JUNE 1 TO JUNE 30”
———————————-
on the obverse, and
———————————-
“INTERNATIONALIZATION WITH RULES OBEYED”
———————————-
on the reverse.
Sponsored specifically in name by your friendly Ministry of Justice, Tokyo Immigration Bureau. See photos and commentary at
http://www.debito.org/shinagawasigns061106.html
Photos again courtesy Kaoru.

Sheesh. This isn’t even the first time this banner has appeared. Last time (June 2004) the Japan Times even put it on their Community Page, with an indictment of Japan’s emerging draconian Immigration policies.
http://www.debito.org/japantimes062904.html
Guess by recycling they’re getting our money’s worth.

These sorts of activities, especially when sponsored by the government, have been roundly condemned by the United Nations’ Special Rapporteur Mr. Doudou Diene as encouraging racism and xenophobia. See what I mean at http://www.debito.org/rapporteur.html

Segueing nicely from official meanspiritedness into local government benevolence:

//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

3) TOKYO PRESS CONF JUNE 22: HAMAMATSU MAYOR KITAWAKI

Why am I bringing this to your attention? Because Mayor Kitawaki presided over one of the more progressive policy drives towards foreigners in Japan’s history.

After Japan’s first court victory citing international treaty in a racial discrimination case (Ana Bortz vs. Seibido Trading, 1999), which just happened to take place in his city, Mayor Kitawaki in October 2001 convened a meeting of 13 cities from six prefectures with high foreign worker populations. Issuing a historical document entitled the “Hamamatsu Sengen” (Hamamatsu Declaration), these government heads demanded the national government create policy guaranteeing foreigners the modicum of social welfare entitled to every worker and resident of Japan. (At the time even the regional government, Shizuoka Prefecture, refused to grant National Health Insurance (Kokumin Kenkou Hoken) to foreigners–because, they argued, they weren’t nationals!) Kitawaki and company submitted this proposal to Tokyo Mandarinland Kasumigaseki in November 2001, where it was duly ignored.

It should have ended there, but to his credit, Kitawaki cares–enough so that, like Diene, he’s doing a follow-up. Details as follows, courtesy of a reporter friend:

————————————-
“THE CASE OF HAMAMATSU”
A Speech by Mayor Kitawaki
JUNE 22, 3PM, 6TH FLOOR, FOREIGN PRESS CENTER,
NIPPON PRESS CENTER BUILDING, HIBIYA, TOKYO
Non-journalists or non-diplomats, phone and ask if you can get in.
Press Center at 03-3501-3401
————————————-

The full text of the “Hamamatsu Sengen”, with a brief in English, is available at:
http://www.debito.org/hamamatsusengen.html

More on the Ana Bortz Case (from the NY Times) and discrimination in the Shizuoka area at
http://www.debito.org/bortznytimes111599.html
http://www.debito.org/bortzdiscrimreport.html

//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

4) JT ON REINSTITUTION OF FINGERPRINTING, AND RESPONSE

After decades spent by domestic activists getting Japan to repeal fingerprinting for all foreign residents, the Japanese government last month reinstated them all over again–for all non-Zainichi foreigners entering and returning to Japan. On June 6, The Japan Times ran a debate on the pros and cons of fingerprinting as an anti-terrorist measure, with two friends from internet activist group The Community, Scott Hards and Matt Dioguardi, arguing pro and con respectively. Worth a look. See the articles (after free registration) at :

SCOTT T. HARDS
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/mail/fl20060606z1.html

MATT DIOGUARDI
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/mail/fl20060606z2.html

It caused enough of a furor that the JT ran a follow-up article on it one week later.
Community Page readers on Japan’s new immigration law
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fl20060613zg.html

I think you can probably guess where I stand on this issue, but FYI:

This singling out of foreigners for special treatment, predicated on the need for, to quote the ministries, “control of infectious diseases and terrorism”, is flawed even before we get into the science. If you’re going to fingerprint people, do it universally, without the assumption that foreigners are a higher risk or are more likely to be a detriment to society. Of course, politically that’s not possible at the moment (the Japanese public wouldn’t stand for it), so do it to the disenfranchised first. My previous Japan Times columns on Japan’s anti-terrorist and immigration policies available at:

On “Gaijin Chips” (IC Cards) :
http://www.debito.org/japantimes112205.html
On “Gaijin Dragnets” (the NPA illegally deputizing hotels) :
http://www.debito.org/japantimes101805.html
http://www.debito.org/japantimes030805.html
On Policymaking Based upon Fear (the harbinger article for future anti-terrorist policies) :
http://www.debito.org/japantimes052405.html
On Overdoing Immigration Crackdowns:
http://www.debito.org/japantimes062904.html
On NPA “Gaijin Biota Fingerprinting” Research:
http://www.debito.org/japantimes011304.html
And more at http://www.debito.org/publications.html#JOURNALISTIC
The Community info site at http://www.debito.org/TheCommunity
Newest article first. Trace the arc.

Thus to me, reinstating fingerprinting was years in the making and an inevitable outcome, sadly. It’s a matter of CITYS (See, I Told You So)…

Fortunately, important people would agree this is part of a bad trend:

//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

5) KOFI ANNAN ON JAPAN’S NEW IMMIGRATION LAW

I mentioned last report about UN Secretary General Kofi Annan’s press conference in Tokyo I had the privilege of attending, and a reporter friend asking about Japan’s new fingerprint policy:
————————————-
Question: “Japan yesterday passed a law reinstating fingerprinting for foreigners (http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20060518a2.html). Special Rapporteur Doudou Diene is also here investigating the situation of racism and xenophobia within Japan. Do you have any comment concerning Japan’s election to the Human Rights Council and its domestic situation vis-a-vis xenophobia?”

Annan’s answer: “I was unaware that Japan had passed this law. I am aware that Diene is here but we have not met to discuss his trip or findings. I am distressed that many countries worldwide are increasingly legislating xenophobic tendencies in the name of fighting terrorism, and I would hope that people will understand that legislating away civil liberties for peoples within its borders is not the proper path to take.”
————————————-
http://www.debito.org/rapporteur.html#annan

Well, a friend dug up the text of the entire press conference.
Tokyo, Japan, 18 May 2006 – Secretary-General’s Press Conference at the National Press Club
http://www.un.org/apps/sg/offthecuff.asp?nid=876

The exact quote of the question and answer was:
————————————-
Q: Today, here in Tokyo, Mr. Doudou Diene of the United Nations Commission of Human Rights said that Japan should take more steps in order to fight the discrimination against foreigners, and also regretted the fact that yesterday the Diet passed a new law to fingerprint every foreigner coming to Japan. Do you have a comment on that? We would discuss the report of Mr. Diene [Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance] generally. Thank you.

SG: No, I haven’t met [Doudou] Diene. I understand he’s here in Tokyo, and I have not discussed his report with him. And I’m not familiar with the new law that you referred to. But let me say this. On the issue of discrimination and xenophobia, I must say I’m getting worried. It’s increasing around the world in many societies and in many communities where politicians often use the presence of foreigners in their midst for political advantages. And when you look at the way migration is becoming a major issue around the world, and the way foreigners are being profiled, it is a very worrying situation. In fact, at the next General Assembly, one of the topics we will be talking about at a high-level dialogue will be migration so that all the leaders of the world will have a chance to discuss migration. I will be submitting a report to them. And so we need to not focus narrowly on this issue. Ever since terrorism reared its head since 9/11, and governments’ determination to protect themselves and to fight terrorism, I have noticed erosion of human rights and civil liberties. And I have had the chance to speak out on this and indicate that there should be no trade-off between effective action against terrorism and civil liberties and civil rights of individuals. And if we allow our civil liberties and our basic belief in rule of law to be eroded, because we are fighting the terrorists, then we are giving the terrorists a victory they could never have won on their own.
————————————-
END QUOTE

I guess my memory wasn’t too rusty after all…

While we’re at it:

//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

6) KOFI ANNAN AUTHORS ARTICLE ON MIGRANTS

Listen up, Japan:

EXCERPT
————————————-
Historically, migration has improved the well-being not only of individual migrants but of humanity as a whole. And that is still true. In a report that I presented last week to the U.N. General Assembly, I summarize research showing that migration, at least in the best cases, benefits not only the migrants themselves but also the countries that receive them, and even the countries they have left… All in all, countries that welcome migrants and succeed in integrating them into their societies are among the most dynamic — economically, socially and culturally — in the world.
————————————-
END EXCERPT
Rest of the article at
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/eo20060611a1.html

Finally, saving the best for last:

//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

7) JOHN EDWARD PHILIPS ON ACADEMIA AND MONOCULTURALISM IN JAPAN

It took me some time to get to this academic paper, but once I’d finished it, I realized I had read–and I say this with no hyperbole–probably one of the best dissertations on Japan ever.

Entitled “‘Perversion de l’Histoire’: George Balandier, his disciples, and African History in Japan”, Dr Philips, of Hirosaki University in Aomori Prefecture, starts off talking about how Japan’s academia clings to a long-discredited school of thought (anthropologist Balandier, whose proponents, especially in Japan, ultimately argue that historical analysis only applies to societies with a surviving written account, not an oral one).

That should have made my eyes glaze over (I was unaware of, nor did I care much about, the tensions between historians and anthropologists). But Dr Philips goes far beyond that, expanding the noose while tightening it.

He describes the sad state of Japanese academia (the process of creating carbon-copy research for generations, installing kingpins of dogma who promote time capsules of outmoded and even misinterpreted ideology, little subjected to the Socratic or even scientific method), the effects on Japan’s attitude towards Africans (essentially that of illiterate uncivilized Blacks vs literate civilized non-Blacks–which pops up in Japan’s diplomatic statements to and dealings with the UN and UNESCO), the role of history and education in Japan as a matter of societal engineering, and how it all contributes to Japan’s political economy as a steadfast defender of monoculturalism.

My favorite paragraphs are in the conclusion:

EXCERPT
————————————-
When the relevant powers in Japan have decided a question, discussion of the subject is closed. For example, the debate about whether ethnic conflict is natural and primordial, or whether it is contingent and politically provoked, is not a debate. The existence of a debate is not even acknowledged… Japanese sources universally [hold] that racism had created slavery… This is the way ethnic conflict is conceptualized in Japan, as natural and primordial.

The result of accepting only such perspectives, and of unquestioned obedience to [established academic kingpins]… is apparent if we look carefully at a recent publication in English from Japan…

************
“What makes up history for people in an unlettered society is an accumulation of memories, an oral history that is indispensable to their perpetuation as a people. Each ethnic group has its own accumulation of memories, which is a representation of their culture and the source of their identity. Independent states in Africa are busy forcing ethnic groups to abandon their memories, considering them to be insignificant for the construction of a modern society, and to be interfering with modernization by preserving a tribal mentality.
************

Here we see compounded several different, unquestioned Japanese assumptions that have made it so hard for Japanese to understand the outside world. These are the assumptions that history is the official propaganda of nation states, that nations are, or should be, synonymous with ethnic groups, and that memories and traditions can never be held in common across ethnic boundaries, which assumptions are axiomatic in Japan. The ideas that oral traditions are somehow collective memories (instead of individual memories–there really being no such thing as a group mind) and that contemporary African nation states are trying to erase ethnicity (as opposed to tribalism) are flatly at odds with reality… [I]f Japan still has not learned, even 60 years after defeat and occupation by a multi-ethnic United States of America that Japanese leaders thought could never unite in face of an attack by Japan, that multi-ethnic and even multi-racial societies are possible, then Japan… should not be allowed to subvert the existing African states with the goal of replacing them with ethnically defined states.
————————————-
END EXCERPT

The lessons of this article, twenty years in the making, reverberate for hours afterwards. You can purchase it at
http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/brill/afas/2005/00000004/00000004/art00008
However, since the copyright belongs to an academic society which charges extortionately in this age of open information ($25 bucks for 25 pages? So much for free academic discourse…), those with light pockets or without research budgets can contact Dr Philips directly at philips@cc.hirosaki-u.ac.jp. His website http://human.cc.hirosaki-u.ac.jp/philips/

But again, if you can get a copy of the article, do so. It’s really worth it. It’s even worth putting up on the bathroom wall for rereading at your leisure.

//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

All for today. As always, thanks for reading!
Arudou Debito in Sapporo
debito@debito.org
www.debito.org
June 17, 2006
ENDS