JAPAN TIMES ARTICLE # 4
FOR THE COMMUNITY PAGE
THE ZEIT GIST
Turning Japanese no simple process
The hows and whys of naturalizing in Japan
By ARUDOU DEBITO
Tuesday, January 28, 2003
(Courtesy http://www.japantimes.com/cgi-bin/getarticle.pl5?fl20030128zg.htm)
Japan's aging society and low birthrate demand dramatic measures, some say.
A 2000 UN report stated unequivocably that Japan must import 600,000 workers per
year to maintain fiscal balance. A Prime Ministerial commission that same year concurred:
"Japan should set up an explicit immigration . . . system to encourage foreigners
. . . to move in and possibly take up permanent residence here."
Unfortunately, this is not happening. Though about 4.5 million foreigners cross Japan's
borders every year, the average annual increase in registered foreigners is only
about 75,000. So to keep its taxpayer base young, Japan must make foreigners want
to stay, even encourage them to become immigrants or citizens.
How difficult is it, say, to take Japanese citizenship?
Well, the process, like naturalization procedures worldwide, has a paper chase. After
being screened for eligibility (criteria include living in Japan for five years continuously
and having the Japanese level of an eight-year-old), you must submit tax, income
and police documents (demonstrating upstandingness).
Second, lineage records both domestic and overseas (for the Family Registry), and
other forms are handed over to present a full picture of your background. Some difficulties
arise (since documentary systems differ overseas), but the Japanese authorities proved
bendy with rules after sufficient explanation (they even trust you to translate documents
yourself).
Still, it does get overly intrusive. Surrender snapshots of and hand-drawn maps to
your house and workplace. Survey your relatives to see if they approve of your naturalizing.
Write a one-page essay on "Why I Want to be a Japanese."
And prepare for an inspection to see how "Japanese" you are.
You read right. Ministry officials may drop by to quiz your neighbors, look at your
house interior, refrigerator, and children's toys, and otherwise get cozy about your
lifestyle.
How do you pass? "If we feel no 'sense of incongruity' (iwakan)," said
a queried official. Sounds highly arbitrary, but I was actually a test case. I am
one plaintiff in a controversial lawsuit against a bathhouse and the City of Otaru.
Yet I passed. They said, "suing is permitted under the Japanese Constitution."
If you can tolerate this degree of third degree, and don't mind giving up your original
citizenship (Japan is the only OECD country which forbids dual nationality), then
things become surprisingly easy.
As ineligible applicants get weeded out at the very start, Ministry of Justice statistics
indicate almost everyone who completes the papers gets a passport. The number of
newly-minted Japanese is small. About 20,000 per year -- the overwhelming majority
ethnic Koreans and Chinese, born and raised in Japan anyway.
So why would a white boy like me do it? To prove a point? No.
In my case (of course, hardly indicative), I don't entwine identity with nationality
-- I am who I am even if I had no passport at all. Moreover, I have property, family,
and a steady and enjoyable job, giving me good reasons to stay here permanently.
Moreover, Japan has as high a standard of living as any developed country, and can
be, if one learns Japanese, as easy to assimilate into (seriously!) and make friends
in as anywhere else.
Ultimately, I realized, people like me live here and contribute to Japan like any
other citizen. We might as well legally be one.
And once we are, there is no doubt about it. We passed a nationality and assimilation
test that many native Japanese, especially the corrupt and the criminal, could not.
We earned our stripes. Now, do my fellow Japanese accept this?
Well, if you really must let other people determine your identity, the answer is
-- believe it or not -- yes. Very few deny I am Japanese when I tell them so. Many
realize, with Japan's internationalization and increased racial intermarriage, that
"Japaneseness" is -- and must be -- a matter of legal status, not appearance
or acculturalization. Of course it will take time for this notion to sink in, but
my two plus years of experience as a Japanese do not disappoint.
So why don't more people naturalize? Partially because of the soul sacrifice of giving
up one's birth nationality, but also because there is another perfectly good option:
Permanent Residency (PR).
With PR, one can enjoy a stable life with increased financial access and no visa
hassles. Recent changes to the laws mean you can get it after five years or so if
married to a Japanese, ten if not. You still generally cannot vote or run for office
(for me, rights sacrosanct), but PR is sufficient for most potential immigrants.
Still, if Japan were to legalize dual nationality, I bet the numbers naturalizing
would skyrocket.
In any case, time is on immigration's side. Japan needs new blood to support the
old. Somebody has to pay for the future. Immigration will do that, revitalizing Japan's
economy and society in unprecedented ways; look around Shizuoka, Kobe, and Kanto
and see the largely positive roles that immigrants are playing.
The Japanese government is aware of this, and has made it easier to stay. Now they
must make it easier to become Japanese.
The Japan Times: Jan. 28, 2003 (C) All rights reserved