Japan has a race problem. As I’ve catalogued for a quarter century, there are “Japanese Only” signs and rules on businesses nationwide. Refusing entry and service to all “foreigners” on sight, they exclude people who don’t “look Japanese.”
The government announced that it widened the door to foreign nationals’ entry to Japan starting from November 8 for short-term business travelers, foreign students, and technical interns, but byzantine regulations continue to signal that the welcome mat for foreigners is not yet out, and students in particular are feeling the brunt.
Japanese courts have been forced to grapple with the tricky question of whether or not acting is a category of work that requires legal labor protections.
Globalization has encouraged a shift in language towards the acceptance of diversity and inclusion, but some terms in the Japanese language are still missing the mark.
The Tokyo 2020 Olympics are now past. This is a postmortem.
Debito.org turned 25 years old last week. What, if anything, has it contributed to help make conditions for Non-Japanese residents and Visible Minorities better?
International students who wish to join a university or language school are a major resource for Japan’s economy and aging population. Many of them have dreams of learning the language, becoming accustomed to the culture, and contributing long term to the Japanese society.
Among Japanese corporate leaders there are a handful who openly and proudly espouse racist views with little or no penalty from the government or business partners.
The coronavirus continues to rampage through society, but 2021 has begun. Unnoticed by some, several coronavirus crisis villages (sodan mura) sprang up around Japan’s capital city in recent weeks. The pandemic has devastated people’s livelihoods as well as public health.
On August 28, Toshimitsu Motegi, Japan’s foreign minister, was giving an official press conference to reporters in Japanese. A foreign reporter for Japan Times, Magdalena Osumi, asked some questions in Japanese. When Osumi followed up on a point he left unclear, Motegi responded to her in English.
