by Axel Eriksson

“I’m not in Kansas anymore,” goes the expression from The Wizard of Oz, uttered when Dorothy finds herself beyond what once seemed normal. In the back seat of a car winding through the roads of south-eastern Honshu, I thought the same as we headed out to collect bamboo shoots at a cabin with two of my informants. Next to me sat a Japanese digital nomad, almost leaning over the front seat to chat in Japanese with the driver, who had her seat belt on, while her three-year-old child, unbuckled, sat beside her. Any romantic image of a safe Japan from TikTok faltered during this experience. Driving in Japan is intense, not exactly aggressive, but certainly energetic, though still conducted with a tone of respect. As they chatted, I struggled to follow the conversation with my limited Japanese, so I switched on my newly downloaded AI translator app for a test run: “That’s what capitalism does, isn’t it?” the driver said, to which the digital nomad hummed in agreement. The future of Japan seems to be on everyone’s lips here in the countryside.

The reason I was sitting in this car is my search for foreign digital nomads across rural Japan. Not long ago, Japan—like many other countries—caught the fever to attract those who use remote work to travel for extended periods. Yet freelance workers, business owners and others have long been able to detach themselves from a fixed home in favour of a more mobile lifestyle. What this new life could be was already described as early as 1997, when Tsugio Makimoto and David Manners coined the term in their book Digital Nomad, which, in the late-1990s spirit of Fukuyama’s book The End of History, envisioned a bright economic future shaped by mobility—a hopeful era in which those on the “right side of history” could escape the constraints of capitalist life. Now, nearly 25–30 years later, while the digital nomad visa may be the most widely known policy tool, many other schemes have emerged to support small-scale entrepreneurs in making digital nomadism viable—particularly in rural Japan. Digital nomads carry an aura of new hope, especially in connecting rural Japan to the wider world.

Trying to find any digital nomads in the Japanese countryside, however, felt almost like researching dead ends. Anyone who has done fieldwork knows that the world rarely unfolds as planned—each encounter turns out to be disturbingly different in ways that seem contradictory or nonsensical at the time. The timing seemed ideal: the yen is weak and many people now enjoy endless flexibility to travel while working remotely. Before starting my fieldwork, I had believed that digital nomads would be wandering freely across Japan. Yet when I arrived in the countryside, they were only a few. “Have you gone to Fukuoka?” countless people asked me rhetorically, as if already knowing the answer. “You’ll find what you’re looking for there.” Indeed, Tokyo, Osaka and Fukuoka are teeming with digital nomads—just like any other type of tourist. Outside these areas, they are far harder to come by. Even Sapporo in the north, where I had hoped to begin my journey into rural Japan, felt empty outside the season I had just missed. Cities accommodating tourists seem to swallow digital nomads into the same gravitational pull. Their mobility often mirrors that of tourists, arriving with the seasons—Hokkaido in winter, Tokyo in spring for the cherry blossoms.

Digital nomads do occasionally venture beyond the classic tourist cities—not by chance, but thanks to the intensive efforts of co-working spaces. My search led me to rural cities and towns across Japan which, at first glance, seemed no different from small places in Sweden, Portugal or Belgium, where I have lived before, but after some days walking in them it become apparent to me that they are slowly closing down. My realization of the need for revitalization did not come until I arrived in south-eastern Honshu, where I truly grasped the scale of Japan’s depopulation crisis. What began as “Ah, they’ll open later,” soon turned into the quiet realization—peering through shuttered blinds—that “Oh, they’re never going to open again.” In response, digital nomads have become a key tool for connection. A project leader for one such initiative admitted just how few people were coming: “We have to do something. Otherwise, in sixty years, there’ll be no one left on this island.” Digital nomadism is a trend that, if nurtured, could offer rural areas a way to reconnect. It is not the digital nomads that I follow, but connections between these places that provides merits for research.

As I visit these rural places that trying to attract digital nomads, it is hard to miss the willingness to meet new people and forge connections between temporary visitors such as digital nomads and local residents. On the winding roads of south-eastern Honshu, I find myself beginning to understand what digital nomads might mean for these areas. To most people I met in the countryside, I appear to be one myself. And not unlike other digital nomads, I have packed my belongings into a few cardboard boxes and left to begin another life. In that sense, I have become part of rural revitalization—linked to everywhere else through the presence of nomads. As I look out across the rice paddies in an otherwise densely forested valley, I know I need to return, to connect again with rural Japan. And I must ask myself: what can I, as a ‘digital nomad researcher’, do to help sustain life in these places?

Axel Eriksson is a postdoctoral researcher from Sweden who recently graduated at Mid Sweden University. He was rewarded a JSPS short–term postdoctoral scholarship to be in Hokkaido University in Sapporo conducting ethnographic research across Japan to understand how digital nomads connects to rural Japan. His research focuses on how groups meet and renegotiate their livelihoods, especially through tourism and new foreigner residents.

by Cornelia Reiher

Funding for our project ended in October 2024. Please find below a summary of the project report submitted to the German Research Foundation (DFG) and a link to the report itself. I would like to thank everyone who was involved and supported our project.

Summary of DFG-funded research project “Urban-rural migration and rural revitalization in Japan”

To counter population decline and labor shortages in rural Japan, central and local governments have launched programs aimed at revitalizing rural areas by attracting new residents to live and work in the countryside. Although the COVID-19 pandemic has changed the perception of rural life and led to an increase in urban-rural migration, the total number of migrants remains small and is unevenly distributed across Japan. Peripheral areas receive fewer newcomers than regions close to cities. This research project compared urban-rural migration in four municipalities in Kyūshū, Japan’s southernmost main island, to find out how urban-rural migration affects rural revitalization. Although all municipalities offer a wide range of quite similar financial incentives and other support programs aimed at encouraging migration, in none of them were numbers of in-migrants high enough to reverse the overall demographic decline. By combining ethnographic research with policy analysis, the research team found that the way central and local governments conceptualize urban-rural migration influences migrants’ self-perceptions and determines their eligibility for support. These classifications are often based on simplistic criteria, such as a migrant’s place of origin, and overlook the complexity of individual migration experiences. We challenge these traditional categories that classify migrants simply according to their place of origin or view migration as settlement by suggesting a more nuanced understanding of urban-rural migration that includes a broader concept of migration embracing more flexible and temporary mobilities. This perspective acknowledges the fluidity of contemporary migration patterns as in each of the four communities, both short-term and long-term urban-rural migrants have made significant contributions. They have started their own businesses, enhancing the appeal of their new hometowns for both locals and tourists, while also generating employment. Beyond their economic impact, these migrants are influencing local culture by introducing new and often mobile lifestyles and new notions of community. Although these changes may be small in quantitative terms, they are notable in terms of the qualitative transformation they bring to rural areas.

by Johanna Mayr

When I was thinking about the topic of my Master’s thesis, I had a dream that my research could have a positive impact on the world. I wanted to learn more about the reality of people’s lives and make these findings accessible to a wider audience so that they could read and become aware of them. As a woman, I have thought about motherhood before and wondered what impact it would have on my life. However, from pregnancy to child rearing, from part-time work to parental leave, and from marriage to relationships, many aspects of family life were only ever a topic I heard about without thinking about. So, the desire arose to help close this knowledge gap, not just for me, but for others pondering similar issues.

From mid-August to mid-September 2023, I traveled to the Aso region in Kumamoto. The Aso region is a rural area consisting of a few municipalities clustered around a caldera with an active volcano in the center. It is famous for its wide and flowing grasslands and is popular with cyclists and golfers, but also with researchers like me. I am not the first person from the Department of Japanese Studies at the University of Vienna to make this region the focus of my work. I was therefore fortunate to have a support network of colleagues, researchers and other contacts in and around the region that I could rely on and turn to. After twenty-one interviews with mothers in Aso, I felt that my knowledge gap had significantly filled with new insights and realizations. We talked about the many responsibilities and roles that women carry and fulfill in their daily lives, from their work (both paid and unpaid, both inside and outside the home) to their friendships and hobbies. Although I cannot provide full results at this stage, as my analysis is still ongoing, I would like to mention some interesting points that have already come to my attention:

Ms. Fujita (all names have been changed to protect interviewee anonymity), for example, talked a lot about the future and not just her present, which focused on her children, her husband, and her work as a restaurant owner. She wants to create as many memories as possible with her family before her children are grown and off to school or work and before her parents and mother-in-law need her help. The responsibility of raising her children can be hard, but planning small outings with them is also a source of joy and hope. She combines this hope with the ability to cope with future challenges and tough times.

This balance between the joy of having a family and the demanding responsibilities that limit one’s time and choices is described in one way or another by almost all the mothers I spoke to. Mrs. Chiba described it very aptly in the context of her work as a kindergarten teacher: “If I didn’t have a job, I wouldn’t be happy, and if I didn’t have a family, and just this job, I think it would probably have been hard. Yes. I feel like inside of me my work is my ikigai [one’s purpose in life or reason to live], and my family is my shiawase [happiness].” However, she also feels controlled by her work, childcare and her household duties. So much so that in her daily life she feels like she does not have the leeway to think much about more abstract concepts like hope, time, freedom and the future. At the same time, she sees herself as someone living freely, since she chose this life for herself.

Another point that was frequently raised was the fact that you have to make compromises in certain areas of your life in order to prioritize others, especially your family and particularly your children. Ms. Fujita has put her hobbies on hold for the time being until she regains more time and freedom as her children become more independent. Ms. Daichi describes that she has actively decided against club activities as a teacher, although this was her actual goal, for which she became a teacher while her children were still small. She also compromises for the sake of her husband, as he is able to teach club activities, partly because Mrs. Daichi prioritizes childcare duties.

These stories of mothers from Aso show that our lives are multi-faceted. Perhaps we are all simply balancing our joys and hardships, trying to outweigh the negatives with the positives and shifting our priorities as our environment and situation allows. Whatever the case, I believe that learning about other people’s experiences is invaluable and that it is important to share these insights. One thing I know for sure is that my research has helped at least one person, myself. And I hope it might be helpful or at least interesting to others, perhaps even to someone reading this blog post.

And if there is one piece of advice I could give to future field research beginners: It’s always okay to ask! I did my best to ask whenever, wherever and whoever. Of course, I was turned down a few times, but in the vast majority of cases I was kindly supported, informed and helped. I couldn’t be more grateful!

Johanna F. Mayr is currently studying for an MA in Japanese Studies and an MA in German as a Second and Foreign Language at the University of Vienna. Her research focuses on topics related to gender, identity and well-being.

by Arne Bartzsch

In my last blog post, I introduced Minakami, a small onsen town in Gunma Prefecture that, like so many rural towns in Japan, is struggling with various structural problems. In order to revitalize the town’s main touristic area, Minakami Onsen or Yubara, various measures and projects of urban planning were proposed in the Minakami’s 2020 master plan and other plans. Particularly interesting is a current project that relies on the collaboration between of business (san), administration (kan), academia (gaku) and finance (kin), which I will introduce in this article.

At the beginning, two measures were taken to solve the prominent problem of abandoned houses and properties in Minakami Onsen. First, a cleanup campaign was conducted at several deserted sites, bringing lightness to the townscape and new spatial prospects. And second, for smaller vacant commercial or residential buildings, an executive committee was established as an intermediary between owners and potential users. That measure provided facilities for some new businesses in or near the district. The next step was about improving public space to create a more appealing and easy-to-walk touristic area. Under the concept of “5 public places” (itsutsu no hiroba), three places in Yubara and one each at the train station and the michi no eki were selected to help connecting the onsen-gai and the Tone River areas. The keyword of “walkability” emphasizes ease of access and leisure. This project is supported by special funding by Gunma Prefecture. The actual joint development project of the four partners, however, does not focus on the entire Minakami Onsen area, but on a central site in Yubara in the area of the former Hotel Ichiyo-Tei. Here, a public square is planned, with a park linking the onsen-gai with the riverbank and an open area for markets, events and festivals (matsuri). New buildings on the base of remaining structures (sustainable use of „grey energy“) will house a hotel as well as touristic and public facilities. However, the final design of this site has not yet been decided but is depending on the search for suitable operators and tenants and on remaining questions about the urban layout. For example, a new public onsen bathhouse is in consideration, and also the scale of space for parking lots is still an issue of discussion.

The project is a collaboration of “san-kan-gaku-kin” (business, administration, academia and finance) and the project design reflects the specific roles and motives of the four partners involved. The business side (san) is represented by The Open House Group, an expanding real estate investor, active in urban development. Since the company’s roots are in Gunma Prefecture, interest in investing in Minakami is strong. The company has acquired the former hotel Ichiyo-Tei – beside several other real estate in the community, including a ski-resort and plots of land for luxury accommodations. The commitment of Open House proofs that Minakami is an attractive place for investment. And it reflects a general trend of real estate investment in Japan to flee the heated marked in Tokyo and other major cities, and to look for profitable projects in the countryside.

The municipality of Minakami represents the administration (kan). It has chosen the former Ichiyo-Tei as the project’s main site because of its central location and the relevance for strategic communal development, but also because of certain necessities. The site comprises several large buildings and has a long history under the former name “Higaki Hotel”. In 2019, the hotel ceased operations. Due to debts and irregularities on the part of the previous owner, the municipality was left to struggle with the desolate site and considerable financial burdens. In the search for redevelopment opportunities and suitable investors, the Open House Group came onto the scene. This cooperation, and the concentration of the project’s scope to this central area, were strategic moves by the municipality, which had (and still has) to manage its limited resources.

Financial support came from the Gunma Bank which represents the finance sector (kin). The bank’s support is important for the municipality which bears the main burden of demolition, renovation and rebuilding of the hotel’s facilities. The building site itself, however, was acquired by the Open House Group who will be its lessor. This pattern of separate ownership of a real estate’s site and the objects built on it is quite common in Japan. In any case, the realization of this project goes along with substantial investment backup, and with considerable risk as well.

To link this business development with a sound and sustainable local development, a proper framework of urban design and planning is inevitable. For this purpose, important expertise could be secured from the Urban Design Laboratory of the Department of Urban Engineering of Tokyo University which represents academia (gaku) in this project. Sponsored by the Open House Group, the Urban Design Laboratory is supporting the municipality’s planning department with know-how, project design, organization and other activities. The Tokyo University, on the other hand, benefits from interesting opportunities for fieldwork education of its students, and from budget enhancement through third-party funding. The Urban Design Laboratory’s main tasks are to coordinate the central project at the former Ichiyo-Tei with comprehensive local development strategies, and to design a suitable framework for citizens’ participation, including facilitating the concurrent process. While seminar groups conduct on-site research of local histories, the Urban Design Laboratory is also taking part in the formal planning process. It discusses ideas and designs in public workshops, publishes information via various media, and initiates further dialog.

The former Ichiyo-Tei has become the main location for activities of the Tokyo University student group, especially the abandoned accommodation buildings for employees of the former hotel, the „Higaki-dorm.“ The students, who frequently come from Tokyo for the project, have cleaned the desolate site and continue to provisionally renovate the buildings. They are joined by motivated citizens. While being accommodated privately, they can experience local life and develop cordial and trustful relationships. In the autumn of 2022, a market (Marché) was organized by the Tokyo University students at the Higaki-dorm. This form of event with flea-market, food-stands, project workshops and information tables are fashionable in present-day Japan, and it became quite a success in Yubara, too. It was repeated in 2023 and 2024 and expanded to additional sites. Machizukuri events like this attract a large number of visitors and serve as multipliers for information about the project, and as measures for confidence-building.

Arne Bartzsch graduated as M.A. of Information Science and Japanese Studies from Freie Universität Berlin. He is researching topics of cultural information and local development. In Japan, he has taken part in various machizukuri activities. Knowledge transfer between Germany and South Korea about re-unification and transformation was another long-term project.

by Ian Harano Grey

Breaths of thick damp air entered my lungs as I frantically dragged my suitcase through the Narita Airport. This is how I knew I was back in Japan. I tried to follow a group of other random terrified “English teaching assistants” who came to Japan with the JET Program as we were all ushered like cattle into big buses that would take us to Shinjuku. The last time I was in Tokyo, I completely fell in love with the massive electric titan that it is, but was unfortunately ripped away due to the COVID-19 pandemic. But this time I was only there for a short (and strict) 72 hours before being shipped off to a city named Kumamoto in the middle of the Island of Kyushu. The only thing I managed to learn about the area before being sent there was that their mascot “Kumamon” is beloved and that the regional delicacy was horse meat (much to the dismay of my horse loving grandmother).

When I got off the plane, I entered the small box that they are calling the airport. I was dragged by a small group of foreign people in shorts and two Japanese officials in formal business wear that were all shaking signs at me. They hurriedly got my LINE account while taking a forced group photo. After this was all acquired, they quickly scuttled off to their respective airconditioned cars and I was placed with my “helper” who was supposed to help me settle in my new apartment. Walking to her car, the true horror of the Kumamoto heat began to dawn on me. I wore a suit out of peer pressure from other anxious newcomers even though the regional advisor told me explicitly to wear clothing that was “good for hot weather”. As I dripped buckets into the car of my helper, she still treated me with efficiency and kindness. While trying to pretend I was fine between suppressing the gasps of air and wiping off my forehead sweat, she finally says “It is hot here, isn’t it? That’s why we call it hi no kuni. The Land of fire!”  We both laughed, but I looked out of the window onto the piercing neon green rice fields, volcanos, and mountains that made the bowl of soup that is Kumamoto. I couldn’t help but think “What the hell am I doing here?”

As I settled into the job, the magic of living in Japan wore off, and I entered the complaining phase. Kumamoto is not only extremely hot in the summer, but bone chillingly cold in the winters. Most of my coworkers were difficult to communicate with while working insane amounts of overtime. I had no idea how to teach hundreds of kids on my own, and I had to push down my queer identity to fit in with the strong binary gendered expectations of Japanese society. Anytime there was talk of needing to go to a bigger city to get something done or the transit was messed up, the teachers all laughed and said: “Jā, inaka desu ne”, meaning: “Well that’s the countryside right?” When discussing the frustrations I had with this confusing city, my coworker stated “Kumamoto is trying its absolute hardest to be cool.” This would end up being the key that opened everything for me. If Kumamoto was trying, I needed to try, too.

With time, Kumamoto bloomed before my eyes. In the countryside, you make your own fun and find your own community. We had crazy parties at the local foreigner bar. I began to look forward to seeing the legion of old women who ran my closest konbini, always asking if I am dating and or observing my weight gain/ loss. The best weekends were bike rides along the rice fields and drinking cheap 7-Eleven wine in the park. I found myself saying “Count me in!” to take pottery lessons in a stranger’s backyard. Instead of being intimidated by horse meat, everyone eventually fought over the last piece at a group

dinner. I joined university students practicing their acapella singing routine at night by the river. The burst of glee I let out when the shy student in my class got 2nd in the relay at the sports festival shocked me. A sweet elderly woman I met at a conference insisted on making me a buffet in exchange for helping her grandson practice his English for High School Exams. So many simple but special moments invited me into this lovely community in a random city across the world. Often in big metropolises it can be incredibly isolating and discouragingly lonely because you don’t have a community. However, in Kumamoto, I enjoyed a community that transcended age, background, and nationality. I learned to open my soul and accept something that transcended my expectations. The heat no longer suffocated me, instead, it was a reminder of life around me.

Ian Harano Grey is a master’s student currently enrolled at Freie Universitaet. They are a Japanese-American from Reno, Nevada who did their undergraduate studies at the University of Nevada, Reno with a focus on History in China and Japan. They had worked in Kumamoto as an “Assistant Language Teacher” (ALT) through the JET program before shifting perspectives to Global East Asian Studies in Berlin.

by Cornelia Reiher

When newcomers move to the countryside, they need a place to live. Although there are many abandoned properties in rural Japan, they often struggle to find land and houses to buy or rent (Lollini 2024). This may come as a surprise, as even international media outlets have picked up on the results of the Japanese Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communication’s 2023 Housing and Land Survey, which found that 9 million or 13.8% of all houses in Japan were vacant (Lau and Maruyama 2024; Sōmushō 2024). The problem of house abandonment has attracted increasing media attention in recent years and is not only a problem of rural areas, but also affects many cities. However, the proportion of the nine million houses that are vacant in Japan is high in rural areas and highest in Wakayama, Tokushima and Yamanashi prefectures (Jiji 2024).

But why is it so difficult for newcomers to find a new home when rural Japan is full of abandoned houses? In many cases, the homes of elderly people who live alone are left empty when they die or move into nursing facilities (Jiji 2024). Since the economic value of old or “second-hand” houses is low, heirs often do not want to take over inherited houses. They are not required to register inherited property titles in their own names, so the owners of abandoned houses are often unknown (Nozawa 2022), or the property is divided among a growing number of people, making it difficult for local authorities to track them all down to do something with the property and collect property taxes (Lollini 2024). But even if the owners are known, they may decide to simply leave the house empty for economic reasons. The cost of demolition, for instance, is high and a lot without a house is subject to much higher property taxes. Thus, owners would rather leave the house vacant than demolish it (Platz 2024). There are also private and cultural reasons for holding on to vacant properties. Some owners use the houses for storage, as a second home, or for sentimental reasons. Furthermore, since the house is also a place of ancestor worship in Japan, the owners have a duty to take care of it.

Despite these difficulties, newcomers to rural Japan do find places to live. The Act on Special Measures Concerning Vacant Houses promotes reuse of abandoned houses, and encouraged local governments to create databases of vacant houses (akiya bank). Through these databases, local governments provide information on available housing. The national government is also obligated to financially support the administrative efforts of local governments on issues covered by this law (Umeda 2014). As a result, most Japanese municipalities have established their own akiya bank. In some cases, akiya banks provide information not only about available housing, but also about local history, culture, and customs. Local governments often cooperate with real estate companies or NPOs, and hire staff through chiiki okoshi kyōryokutai (COKT; English: Community building support staff program) to run akiya banks (Hatayama 2016). In addition, local governments across Japan have developed a variety of programs to support housing for urban-rural migrants. Some offer subsidies to convert akiya into guesthouses or to help people rent apartments by reducing the rent or paying their moving expenses, while others offer to reduce property taxes or pay a percentage of the interest on loans (Reiher 2020).

Despite these efforts, urban-rural migrants often find housing through word of mouth rather than through akiya banks (Pollacco 2023; Lollini 2024). Therefore, local authorities and other actors involved in supporting urban-rural migrants recommend that they visit places they are interested in and build relationships of trust before moving. Migrants with previous connections to the place through kinship or stays there for work or vacation purposes might have an advantage when looking for housing. However, many organizations also try to act as intermediaries to match migrants with no previous ties to their municipalities with the local community and housing.

References:

Hatayama, N. 2016. “Ijūsha o chiiki to tsunagu no wa dare ka? Chichibu akiya banku ni okeru minkan kigyō to jichitai no renkei.” Nihon toshi shakaigaku nenpō 49: 137–145.

Jiji. 2024. “Number of vacant homes in Japan hits record high of 9 million.” The Japan Times, May 1, 2024. https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2024/05/01/japan/japan-vacant-homes-record-high/.

Lau, C., and M. Maruyama. 2024. “Super-aged Japan now has 9 million vacant homes. And that’s a problem.” CNN, May 7, 2024. https://edition.cnn.com/2024/05/07/asia/akiya-homes-problem-japan-intl-hnk/index.html

Lollini, N. 2024. “The right to abandon and the duty to maintain: Addressing the akiya mondai in regional Japan.” Electronic Journal of Contemporary Japanese Studies 24 (2): http://www.japanesestudies.org.uk/ejcjs/vol24/iss2/lollini.html.

Nozawa, C. 2022. “Land and homes and the Japanese: The issue of vacant houses and land with unknown owners today: What progress with preparations for closing houses?” Japan Foreign Policy Forum. https://www.japanpolicyforum.jp/society/pt2022012616580811841.html.

Platz, A. 2024. “From social issue to art site and beyond: Reassessing rural akiya kominkan.” Contemporary Japan 36 (1): 41–56.

Pollacco, L. 2023. “Renting akiya: A backdoor into Japan’s abandoned homes.” The Japan Times, November 18, 2023. https://www.japantimes.co.jp/life/2023/11/18/lifestyle/akiya-renting-kochi/?utm_medium=email&utm_source=pianoex&utm_campaign=64922372.

Reiher, C., 2020. “Embracing the periphery: Urbanites’ motivations to relocate to rural Japan.” In Japan’s New ruralities: Coping with decline in the periphery, edited by W. Manzenreiter, R. Lützeler, and S. Polak-Rottmann, 230–244. London: Routledge.

Sōmushō. 2024. “Reiwa 5 nen jūtaku, tochi tōkei chōsa jūtakusū gaisū shūkei (sokuhō shūkei) kekka.” https://www.stat.go.jp/data/jyutaku/2023/pdf/g_kekka.pdf

Umeda, S. 2014. “Japan: New law and tax measure to promote demolition and reuse of abandoned houses.” Global Legal Monitor.  https://www.loc.gov/item/global-legal-monitor/2014-12-05/japan-new-law-and-tax-measure-to-promote-demolition-and-reuse-of-abandoned-houses/

by Signy Goto-Spletzer

Over the years that I have been researching revitalization in the Aso region in Kumamoto Prefecture one topic seemed to come up in almost every conversation – the efforts to make Aso a UNESCO World Heritage site. While the municipalities of the region have been working hard to get Aso added to the list of World Heritage sites, “surprisingly” – as noted in a blog by Aso City’s Michi no eki– it has not yet received this recognition (MICHINOEKI Aso 2021). I am biased, but anyone who has ever been to Aso must admit that it is a unique place. I still cannot get over the fact that a massive caldera is home to thousands of people. And there is of course the still very active Mount Aso sitting majestically in the middle of the caldera and lots of wonderful hot springs. The Aso region consists of seven municipalities: Aso City, Minamioguni, Oguni, Ubuyama, Takamori, Nishihara and Minamiaso. Only Aso City, Minamiaso and Takamori are located directly in the caldera but the whole region is part of the efforts to become a UNESCO World Heritage site as a volcanic region with a distinct cultural landscape (Kumamoto Prefecture 2020).

The cultural landscape mentioned here refers mainly to the grassland that covers large parts of the region. However, like so many rural areas in Japan, the region is struggling with a shrinking and aging population. For the cultural landscape this means that there are less people using and maintaining the grassland and that the forest has pushed forward reclaiming inch by inch. More than half of the area has already been lost over the last hundred years, and if nothing changes, most of the remaining grassland will disappear in the near future. The grassland of Aso has a long history, possibly dating back to the late-glacial period (Kawano et al. 2012). The protection of the grassland is therefore clearly connected to its significance as a unique ecosystem and the cultural heritage it represents. Being listed as a World Heritage site would offer protection and create new possibilities for financial support and investments. Another reason why countries might be interested in adding their sites to the list is the tourism boost they are likely to receive from the increased attention.

While working on a research project in the Kuma region, I met a researcher who supports Aso City’s efforts to get the Aso region on Japan’s Tentative List. Japan currently has 26 World Heritage sites, with four more sites on its Tentative List (MOFA 2024; Agency of Cultural Affairs n.d.). To be considered for a nomination, the site must first be included on the Tentative List that is prepared by each country. Even if a site gets on the list, it can still be a long way to the nomination. Two of the four sites on Japan’s Tentative List have been added in 1992. Nevertheless, becoming a UNESCO World Heritage site is the only way to secure the future of the grassland, this researcher told me. This would also include a boost in tourism. Tourism is deeply connected to revitalization efforts of rural areas. Because farming cannot sustain the income of the local population, tourism could be a way to stop the decline of Aso’s communities and attract new residents. Even if not so well known internationally, the Aso region has been a famous tourist destination in Japan for a long time. Still, local governments and local groups are struggling to make Aso a better place for tourists, hoping that this will make the region a better place for locals as well.

However, many people I spoke to, including government employees and people who depend on tourism for their livelihoods, were skeptical about the kind of tourism a nomination would bring. What Aso needs, I was told, are tourists who come to spend a whole week there. In other words, sustainable slow tourism. The locals voicing their concerns are not without reason. The examples of other World Heritage sites have shown that the status can come at a cost to nature and local communities. Think of the numerous news stories over the recent years about overtourism. Some places are completely overrun by tourists and need to find strategies to cope or reduce their numbers (Hall 2024). World Heritage sites are right in the middle of this trend. Paradoxically, the World Heritage status that should protect the cultural landscape could be a trigger for enormous stress on the local nature. Tourism needs infrastructure. Not only hotels, but roads, parking spaces, and toilets right up there on the mountain next to the observation deck, a government worker of Aso City explained to me with a troubled face. This means that some parts of the local nature might have to be sacrificed to meet the demands of economic interests. In recent years, semiconductor factories have been built in a town next to the Aso region, raising further questions about water use and environmental protection in the area.

The road to a nomination might still be very long for Aso. However, not only the region has a lot to gain from the status as a World Heritage site, because the cultural landscape is critically linked to the water supply far beyond the Aso area. I am curious to see how the UNESCO project in Aso will continue, what ways the proponents will find to allay the concerns of local communities, and whether being listed as a World Heritage site can really deliver the revitalization so many in the Aso region are hoping for.

References:

Agency for Cultural Affairs (n.d.), Nihon no zantei ichiranhyō kisai isan, https://www.bunka.go.jp/seisaku/bunkazai/shokai/sekai_isan/zantei.html (accessed January 28, 2025).

Hall, Laura (2024), “The summer that tourism fell apart,” BBC, 26 September 2024, https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20240925-the-summer-that-tourism-fell-apart (accessed January 28, 2025).

Kawano, Tatsuichiro, Naoko Sasaki, Takayoshi Hayashi, and Hikaru Takahara (2012), “Grassland and Fire History since the Late-Glacial in Northern Part of Aso Caldera, Central Kyusyu, Japan, Inferred from Phytolith and Charcoal Records,” Quaternary International 254 (March):18–27. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.quaint.2010.12.008.

Kumamoto Prefecture (2020), ‘Aso’ no seikai bunkaisan tōroku ni muketa torikumi nitsuite, https://www.pref.kumamoto.jp/soshiki/22/367.html (accessed January 28, 2025).

MICHINOEKI ASO (2021), “Shuku! Okinawa・Amami ‘sekai shizenisan’ tōroku: Aso mo ‘sekai bunkaisan’ tōroku ni muke ganbatteimasu!!“ Michinoeki Aso Blog, 27 July 2021, https://www.aso-denku.jp/recommend/2021/07/asoeffortforworldheritage/ (accessed January 28, 2025).

MOFA (2024), Cooperation with International Organizations (UNESCO,UNU): World Heritage, 25 November 2024, https://www.mofa.go.jp/policy/culture/coop/unesco/c_heritage/w_heritage/index.html (accessed January 28, 2025).

Signy Goto-Spletzer holds a BA and MA in Japanese Studies from the University of Vienna. Her research focuses on the implications of rural revitalization as a business model and the recovery and resilience of remote areas in Kyūshū after disasters.

by Julia Olsson

One night during fieldwork in Kochi prefecture, I found myself the only guest at a hostel in the mountains of Otoyo. It is not the easiest place to get to unless you have a car, and even then, my teacher and I drove a bit back and forth before we came to the right drop-off place. I was left at the side of the road with a steep stone stair between me and the pink, wooden building I had found online earlier that week. It is called Midori no tokeidai, named after its green roofed clocktower. However, until 2006, it was known under another name: Kawaguchi Elementary School.

I have visited several Japanese elementary schools as part of international events as an exchange student and I am familiar with the design from movies, TV shows, and manga, but have never attended one myself. It was therefore a strangely familiar feeling to walk the empty halls of this hostel, looking in at the classrooms turned sleeping halls for visiting school classes. Today,  the hostel is a place to stay at school excursions or for visiting sport teams. Most things are kept as they were when the building still housed students. Even the blackboards are left up. However, in contrast to a real school, you are encouraged to doodle. Midori no tokeidai was abandoned about 17 years prior to my stay in 2023. In the same year, it was taken over and renovated by I-turn migrants Yumi (or principal Yumi as she is affectively titled on the hostel website) and her husband Masaki. With games such as zōkingake rēsu or cleaning rag race, where people race against each other in the hallways while cleaning the floor with a large rag, the hostel invokes school nostalgia for visitors. “You are allowed to do the things that you would get scolded for at school, so it’s like a dream come true,” a guest remarks on a YouTube clip on the hostel homepage.

Closed schools are a typical sight in ageing and depopulated rural Japan. In the town of Otoyo alone, this elementary school is one of twelve that have closed in the last 25 years, not to mention middle and high schools. Schools are a symbol for children, the next generation and thus for the future itself. When they are closed, they are a stark reminder to residents of their uncertain future. When a new purpose is found for schools or other public buildings it is possible to reimagine the future as something new.

As seen in this blog, media (both traditional and social), and in scholarship, repurposing abandoned buildings in rural Japan has gained much attention in recent years. In addition to DIY projects for urban migrants, vacant houses are increasingly renovated and turned into guest houses, cafés, and art installations (Platz 2024). As telecommuting has been mentioned as a possible solution to depopulation of settlements, a need for office space has also emerged (Matsushita 2022). I saw several schools, kominka and an old factory in Kōchi being used for this purpose. As shown in a workshop in Yamagata (Takahashi et al. 2014), there are many more options for the use of vacant houses, ranging from community centers to libraries to demolition for the construction of golf courses. While community-led initiatives have proven to be positive in both finding creative solutions and fostering community spirit, many emphasize the need for leadership, especially in revitalization projects that focus on repopulation. It takes a village, but it also takes a driving force, which scholars refer to as a “star migrant” (Yamagishi and Doering 2025). This represents both a possibility and a vulnerability for communities striving to repopulate.

It is important to remember that there were eleven other elementary schools in Otoyo that have not fared as well as the hostel. While the successful cases are uplifting, I must admit that I am not convinced they are as significant. The undeniable truth is that not every place can become the next big tourism destination and even fewer are likely to experience significant repopulation. I wonder how we can think about those places, and what they mean for the future of rural Japan. The tension, between celebrating success stories and recognizing the realities of decline, is something I struggle with. While the story of Midori no tokeidai and its owners is a rare case of someone choosing to build a life in a depopulated village, most places will not be so fortunate. If we focus only on the positive cases, we risk overlooking the many places and people left behind. At the same time, looking at these exceptions offers a glimpse into what’s possible, even if only for a few.

As I was alone that night in the hostel, I stayed in what used to be the main office, just off the entrance and next to the large communal kitchen. In the evening, principal Yumi joined me for a meal and a couple of drinks. Her husband was in the hospital, so it was just the two of us. She told me about their move from Osaka to Otoyo, drawn by the town’s excellent river rafting conditions, and about her involvement in an NPO focused on attracting urban migrants. It is just one of her many social engagements. For Japanese urbanites looking to relocate and for Otoyo Yumi might indeed be a “star migrant”. Midori no tokeidai is an inspiring place, and I look forward to another visit next time I am in the area.

References:  

Matsushita, K. (2022). How the Japanese workcation embraces digital nomadic work style employees. World Leisure Journal, 65(2), 218–235.

Platz, A. (2024). From social issue to art site and beyond – reassessing rural akiya kominka. Contemporary Japan, 36(1), 41–56. https://doi.org/10.1080/18692729.2024.2314331

Takahashi, R., Ishibashi, K., Sugiyama, R., & Aiba, S. (2014). ‘Akiya katsuyō machizukuri keikaku’ sakusei e no shimin sanka shuhō no kaihatsu [Development of a method for citizen participation in the creation of a “vacant house utilization community development plan”], Nihon kenchiku gakkai gijitsu hōkokushū, 20(44), p.273-278.

Yamagishi, D. & Doering, A. (2025). Dressing up the place: Urban lifestyle mobilities and the production of “fashionable” tourism destinations in rural Japan. Tourism Management, 106, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tourman.2024.104995

Julia Olsson is a first year PhD student at the Centre for East and South-East Asian Studies, Lund University in Sweden. Her main research interests include rural depopulation, rural-urban dynamics, vacancy, and post-growth futures.

by Melanie Steinbrugger

If you have ever taken a train late at night through Japan’s countryside, you might know the feeling of stepping off at a nearly empty station in the freezing cold, unsure if you have arrived in the right place. That was exactly how I felt when I first arrived in Aso City. It was winter, and I had just taken a train from Kumamoto to reach this scenic region known for its caldera, vast farmland and beautiful hot springs. I was a bit worried about whether I would be able to conduct enough interviews for my master’s thesis on the professional identity of caregivers in rural Japan. My host, the owner of a guesthouse, kindly picked me up at the station, we stopped by a Family Mart to grab a quick bite (because the supermarket had already closed) and then headed to a cozy yet very cold guesthouse. Even though I was nervous about the next few weeks I would spend in this region, the kindness of the local people quickly put me at ease.

One of my most memorable visits was at a day centre, where I met a 106-year-old man. The staff told me he had no family left in Aso, so being at the centre was his main source of contact with others. When they introduced me to other patients, I was surprised by how interested they were about Austria, my home country, and they loved the Mozartkugeln (a traditional chocolate souvenir) I brought. Moments like this made me realize that even though Aso is famous for having the largest caldera in Japan, its true heart lies in personal connections. But not every visit to the various care facilities went smoothly. One day, an older woman slipped in the bathroom and needed urgent help, so we had to cancel our interview. Seeing how quickly the caregivers reacted reminded me that unexpected emergencies are a normal part of life in small, rural facilities with limited staff.

During my fieldwork, I sometimes worried about taking up too much of the caregivers’ time because they already worked long hours under a lot of stress. I usually travelled by public bus, which was difficult due to limited bus schedules, but the caregivers always welcomed me warmly. Some of the locals showed me around the caldera and explained how houses in Aso are often far apart, which creates extra travel time, especially when providing home care. One caregiver said she had to drive along long winding roads just to see a single client. In winter, heavy snowfall makes this even harder. But if they do not go, nobody else will. This sense of duty is common in rural caregiving in Aso, especially as many younger people have moved away to find jobs in bigger cities. A few caregivers told me they suffer from constant back pain caused by years of lifting and carrying patients. They worried about how much longer they could do this job once they reached their sixties. While some urban care facilities have advanced technologies, care centres in Aso typically do not. One caregiver, who came from a big city, also criticised the lower pay and fewer resources in Aso.

Generally, the caregivers were worried about the long-term impact on their bodies. One caregiver mentioned that despite enjoying some aspects of the job and making a lot of meaningful connections, she’s not sure if she would pick the same profession again if she could go back in time. The physical work is not the only challenge. Emotional labour also plays a big role in caregiving. Many elderly people in Aso have no family nearby, so caregivers become trusted companions to listen to concerns and combat loneliness. One caregiver said he locks away his own problems before work to stay cheerful for his clients. Another said she had become “like family” to a person who had no one else in town. While this closeness can be rewarding, it can also be emotionally draining. Some caregivers said they felt lonely themselves and needed small tokens of gratitude from their families and patients to keep going.

Despite these challenges, many caregivers are proud of their work. At one day centre, they organized quizzes, dancing, and karaoke so that the older patients could have some fun. It was touching to see moments where the caregivers and patients would laugh and chat happily with each other. These moments gave some lightness to the stress of juggling other parts of the job like handling heavy lifting, bathing schedules, and health checks for everyone. One caregiver said that the care profession acts as a “bridge of the community.” I indeed felt a strong sense of community in Aso. One of my research participants even drove me around when the bus did not come, and it seemed like everybody knew everybody else. This close network is important for helping elderly people in remote areas. The COVID-19 pandemic, however, had temporarily interrupted events in care facilities to bring together younger and older residents. Even during my fieldwork in 2023, a few interviews had to be cancelled when there were new COVID-19 infections in care homes.

After my field research, I wish more young people lived in places like Aso. Salaries may be lower and public services less than in cities, but there is also a strong sense of solidarity there. Many interviewees said they were very concerned about the future of the nursing profession and they wished there were strategies to make the profession more attractive to younger generations. If more young carers returned, this could address staff shortages, bring a breath of fresh air into local life and ensure that older people receive the care they deserve. In the end, I had great respect for the care workers in Aso. They manage difficult physical tasks, provide emotional support and make their patients feel good, despite their own heavy workloads. The generosity and determination I found there show that personal commitment and solidarity really do keep rural Japan alive.

Melanie Steinbrugger recently finished her MA in Japanese Studies at the University of Vienna. Her Master’s thesis explored the professional identity of rural caregivers. Starting in April 2025 she will be part of the Austrian Pavillion Team at the Ōsaka Kansai World Expo 2025.

by Cornelia Reiher

My research focuses on urban-to-rural migrants in different municipalities in Northern Kyūshū. Initially, I was mainly interested in their lives before relocating to the countryside, the relocation process itself and their everyday life in their new rural homes. However, they are mobile in their everyday lives to shop, commute to work, further their education and organize their leisure time both within and outside the administrative borders of the rural municipality in which they have settled.

Although mobility is an important part of rural lifestyles and shapes rural places, rural communities are often portrayed as closed, static and traditional. Geographer Doreen Massey (1995) showed that the local is the complex and multi-layered result of social interactions and should be approached less as a fixed entity associated with stagnation, nostalgia and stability and more as an intersection of flows of people and objects. Milbourne and Kitchen (2014) have argued that the stabilities of rurality, associated with belonging, tradition and stasis, are both reliant on and undermined by rather complex forms of mobility. John Urry (2007) showed that places are produced through “multiple mobilities of people, but also of capital, objects, signs and information” (p. 269). Thus, rural places are characterized by a complicated interplay between mobility and fixity. The mobilities that characterize rural places include, for example, migration, tourism, everyday mobility by car, internal migration from the city to the countryside and transnational migration. And not only people are mobile, but as I showed in my book on local identity and rural revitalization (Reiher 2014), it is objects such as porcelain that travel transnationally and are charged with cultural value through these mobilities.

An example from my fieldwork will show how urban-rural migrants are mobile beyond municipal borders in their everyday lives and how this relates to social structures in rural communities. In 2022, I took a day trip with Junko. I met her for the first time in 2018. She was born and raised in the Kantō area where she later worked in fashion. When she got married and pregnant, she decided to move to the countryside to raise her child in a clean and healthy environment surrounded by nature. Together with her husband she renovated a kominka and started growing vegetables and rice. Junko baked and sold bread. After a divorce, she moved to another house and started working in a company. Since moving, she has been driving around a lot every day and is dependent on her car: First she drives 20 minutes to take her child to school. Then she drives another 30 minutes in the other direction to work. In the afternoon, she picks up her child and does her shopping on the way. To escape the gossip of her neighbors, she takes her child on weekend trips to neighboring towns. I was invited to join one of her outings. That day, we visited an artisan market in the neighboring town, which was held in a former elementary school building. Markets are hubs of mobility. Junko used to sell her home-baked bread at several markets in the region. She visited the market with me because she wanted to restart her baking business to earn extra income. According to the leaflet and map, more than 90 exhibitors, mainly from the region, were offering their handmade products. These included wooden spoons, jewelry, ceramics and homemade clothing. Most of the people were urban-rural migrants, either young families or older people, and knew each other from other markets where they either sell their own handicrafts or food, or spend time with their families on the weekends. While I enjoyed the food sold at the stalls and the live music on a small stage with Junko’s child, Junko talked to the market organizers to negotiate her next participation in the market. After a few hours of eating, shopping, listening to music and talking to many people, we drove back to Junko’s house in the mountains.

Living in rural communities means a high degree of everyday mobility. It also means different types of mobilities after social relationships have changed. These include moving house, changing jobs and leaving town at weekends to escape gossip and seek emotional support. Markets are another form of mobility that offers migrants the opportunity to meet, display and sell their products, earn extra income or simply spend their free time. Markets are mobile and at the same time places where flows of people, things and ideas come together temporarily and form new networks. While some of these mobilities are voluntary, to meet up with friends at the weekend, involuntary mobilities, e.g. to work, often take as long as a commute in Tokyo. Urban migrants in particular often feel less connected to the municipality they have moved to and more connected to “the countryside” as such, as Junko’s case shows; administrative boundaries of municipalities and prefectures do not play such a big role in their sense of belonging. The community often consists of migrants who are located in different municipalities and meet in different places run by other migrants, or at mobile events such as markets.

References:

Massey, Massey (1995), “The conceptualization of place“, in: Massey, Doreen and Pat Jess (eds.), A place in the World? Places, Cultures and Globalization, New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 45–86.

Milbourne, Paul and Kitchen, Lawrence (2014), “Rural mobilities: Connecting movement and fixity in rural places”, Journal of Rural Studies 34: 326–336.

Reiher, Cornelia (2014), Lokale Identität und ländliche Revitalisierung. Die japanische Keramikstadt Arita und die Grenzen der Globalisierung, Bielefeld: Transcript.

Urry, John (2007), Mobilities, Cambridge: Polity Press.