Kayo Murakami

Evolving place governance innovations and pluralising reconstruction practices in post-disaster Japan

While outside of Tohoku, the Great East Japan Earthquake of 2011 is no longer headline news, recovery and rebuilding is the everyday reality in the region, and for planning schools and consultants across the country, the rebuilding of Tohoku dominates practice and study. However, does the recovery have the potential to transform Japanese planning more profoundly? Japanese planning has had an intimate relationship with natural disaster and the mode of governance in place shaping has evolved accordingly. There are two significant measures that underpin the role of government in leading and assisting in disaster recovery (Yoshikawa, 2013). In 1946, after the Showa Nankai Earthquake (magnitude 8.0, 1300 deaths), the Disaster Relief Act was enacted, which outlined government relief activities and financial aid and established a special fund. The Basic Act on Disaster Control Measures, enacted in 1961 after Typhoon Vera, the strongest recorded typhoon to hit Japan killing 5000 people and causing widespread damage and flooding, enhanced centralized control mechanisms in disaster prevention and recovery assistance. But it is not just planning for disaster recovery; most modern techniques and mechanisms in Japanese urban planning derive from post-disaster legislation, and this has come in three waves. Many of the most important, such as land readjustment, were developed through the first two: the Imperial Capital Revival Plan (in 1923) after the Great Kanto Earthquake, and Post-War Revival City Planning (in 1945), which Nakano (2013) called a compilation of modern city planning models. Government-led city planning flourished with both economic and urban population growth in the second half of the twentieth century. Aiming at swift post-war recovery, implementation was facilitated by industrial capital under the strategic direction of central government bureaucrats. Reconstruction of infrastructure was prioritized and housing options offered by the government were limited, from temporary shelters to public restoration housing. All assistance schemes and funding mechanism were set in a fixed frame and inflexible to local needs. Nakajima (2013) described the ethos of post-war reconstruction as a belief that the government’s strong leadership in creating a welfare state backed by industrial capitalism can achieve not only a swift recovery but also further economic development. But this top-down mechanism has marginalized individuals, communities, and even local municipalities in the planning process. However, the last two decades have seen a third wave in Japanese planning: machizukuri (community development) – everyday street-level activities spread through participatory processes – which continues to challenge the Japanese planning system (see: Sorensen, 2002). Again, disaster proved to be a significant trigger event: the 1995 Great Hanshin Awaji Earthquake ushered machizukuri into the formal planning system, with the recognition of machizukuri councils (residential-based community groups).

Planning for the Ageing Countryside in Japan: The Potential Impact of Multi-habitation

Abstract This paper explores how the aspirations of the retiring Japanese ‘baby boomer’ generation are being harnessed by depopulated rural areas as drivers for revival. Drawing upon case studies and key actor interviews undertaken in Hokkaido prefecture, the paper makes three points. Firstly that, as in the UK, the baby boomer generation in Japan is creating opportunities for the regeneration of rural areas. Secondly that proactive local authorities can act as facilitators in meeting both the aspirations of incomers and the growing needs of existing communities. Finally that, by blending the dreams of the rural idyll with the harsher realities of rural life, new, inclusive rural values can be framed that provide a positive strategy for the future survival, and indeed growth, of rural areas.

The Benefits of an Ageing Population: Case Studies from Rural Hokkaido, Japan

This paper explores the strategies employed by Japanese rural municipalities to support growing numbers of older people in the face of dwindling financial and human resources. Drawing on case study research from a study visit made by the authors, the paper considers the social and economic benefits gained by taking a community based approach as seen in Kuriyama and an older-person centred approach to spatial planning as seen in Nanporo. It concludes by considering what lessons rural municipalities in the UK might draw from these approaches.

Chapter 11 The regenerative power of older migrants? A case study of Hokkaido, Japan

This chapter explores how the retiring Japanese “baby boomer” generation is rethinking the role of later life and potentially provides a new future for depopulated areas in rural Japan. Drawing on a case study of the Hokkaido prefecture, the chapter highlights three points. First, the baby boomer generation in Japan has very different ideas about the meaning of later life, and the spatial implications of these may present opportunities for regeneration. Secondly, hard-pressed rural local authorities are looking to exploit these opportunities to build a new socioeconomic base from the needs and aspirations of older people. Third, the chapter questions what kind of rural futures might be built.