The Rural Revival Movement in Japan: A Comparison of Two Communities

Donald C. Wood
Akita University School of Medicine, Department of Social Medicine

(Originally published in the Bulletin of the National Association of Student Anthropologists, 11(1-2):8-16, Spring 1999, Copyright 1999 American Anthropological Association)


        One of the most noticeable trends in rural Japan today is the village revival movement (mura-okoshi undo). This is encountered in towns (machi-okoshi undo) as well as in villages across Japan as they attempt to combat the effects of urbanization and the subsequent drop in population in rural communities.  The revival movement in rural Japan primarily aims to foster a stronger sense of community identity among town and village residents by motivating them to become more active in social events.  It also aims to encourage interaction between residents of all generations and sometimes outsiders as well. Immediate economic benefits are of secondary importance in the movement.  In this paper I compare the revival strategies of two neighboring rural communities in Akita Prefecture, where I conducted fieldwork between 1995 and 1997 while employed as an English instructor through the Japan Exchange Teaching (JET) Program.   I will show here that different municipalities will pursue different strategies for similar purposes within the rural revitalization movement, and that these strategies vary according to certain factors, among which local history is paramount.

The Rural Revival Movement

        One of the problems that rural communities in Japan are facing is the “shortage of heirs problem” (atotsugi mondai), as young rural people migrate to urban areas to seek better living and working conditions (Moore 1990:273). Due to industrialization and increasing access to higher education among rural residents, remaining in the hometown or village entails high opportunity costs for most young people; their labor is more valuable in the cities.  Farmers’ young male heirs who stay behind face a number of difficulties, including finding a bride (Tamanoi 1998:200). Another common rural problem, especially in the north, is the trend of young able-bodied farmers going away from home for seasonal, often dangerous, work (dekasegi). This occurs because of a lack of good regular employment for Japanese farmers and their heirs, nearly all of whom farm part-time, and it also leads to worries about securing heirs and the continuation of the family lineages (Bailey 1991:147). These problems are exacerbated by Japan’s falling birth rate, which is now below the level needed to maintain the current population of just over 125 million.  Rural communities are hardest hit by this, and other, demographic trends.

        Due to the problems described above, rural municipalities in Japan are now engaged in a great variety of revival programs which are designed to prevent towns and villages from dying out by energizing the populace, encouraging them to stay or return later, and attracting outsiders.  The planners of these revival programs– in some cases residents and in other cases local officials– sometimes try to stimulate tourism and immediate economic gains, but making residents active in their communities and using them as resources for building community pride and identity is the main element of the movement.  If this is achieved, it is assumed that other needs– new settlers, infra structural improvements, and economic development– will follow.  The rural revival movement often takes the form of large-scale community events and pageants involving media coverage and tourists, but encouraging local elders to teach young students traditional handicrafts, promoting the export of local products, and other efforts are also parts of the movement.  Sometimes there is an element of competition between small communities as they vie for media attention and tourists as well, for tourism often develops alongside the revival movement.  Knight (1994b:249) outlines three stages in this development: the first occurs when urbanization draws people from rural areas and threatens the futures of many towns and villages; the second is the intervention of the state in such demographic trends; and the third is the recognition that rural areas need to be made attractive to tourists and potential new residents.  The rural revival movement is dominated by a rhetoric of “rural self-reliance,” in which “valiant villages” struggle to combat dangerous demographic trends by relying on their inner strengths (Knight 1994a:634).  However, Knight shows that the state plays a major role in the movement in terms of financial support.

        There are many examples of eye-catching town and village revival projects across Japan.  Cases of local initiatives abound in the Japanese newspapers and in popular journals.  A bookstore in one remote area has offered plots of local forest-land to urban people in exchange for used books as a promotion (Efron 1997). Another town experiencing depopulation is trying to lure outsiders by granting ownership of local housing sites to settlers provided that they reside on the sites for at least 20 years (Yomiuri Shinbun 1996). A small town in Kumamoto Prefecture has decided simply to offer 500,000 yen in cash to community residents upon the birth of their fourth child (Daily Yomiuri 1996).  Even Japan’s ancient history becomes a part of the revival movement. Prehistoric sites of Japan’s Jomon period (10,000 B.C. to 300 B.C.) have been sparking the imaginations of the public for the last several decades (Kataoka 1997).  When these remains are discovered in towns and villages, they quickly become incorporated into local revival projects in the form of Jomon cultural festivals and musicals designed to boost community spirit and cohesion. More than 1,400 residents participated in such an event in a town near where I conducted my fieldwork (Akita Sakigake 1996a).

        The establishment of rural gardens intended for the use of both local and urban people has also been a part of the town and village revival movement (Aoki 1996:797).  Concerning state initiatives, the Japanese government has offered 100 million yen to each municipality in the country for revival projects and community-level identity building (Knight 1994b).  The government has also allocated funds for the Artist in Residence Program, under which rural communities can receive money to use for building facilities in which temporary resident artists are expected to interact with community members and to display their creations (Akita Sakigake 1996b).  The Japan Exchange Teaching (JET) Program, begun under the Nakasone administration in the 1980’s, was also a part of the government’s nation-wide revival plans (McConnell 1996).

Ogata Village and Hachirogata Town

        The two communities I compare here, Ogata Village and Hachirogata Town, are about 35 kilometers north of the capital city of Akita Prefecture on the Sea of Japan coast, at 40 degrees north latitude.  Ogata Village is located inside what was once the nation’s second largest inland body of water, Lake Hachirogata. For centuries it was the source of many varieties of fish and also seasonal flood damage for area residents because the lake was connected to the sea by a natural channel.  The government used Dutch impoldering techniques, which involved constructing a dike around a center area inside the lake and then filling in that area with rock and soil while pumping out the water, in order to transform Hachirogata into farmland in the 1960's. This created over 17,000 hectares of new land which was to be used for growing rice in a large-scale, fully mechanized manner on farms far larger than the national average (Gordon 1965).  Ogata Village was founded in 1964, the year of the Tokyo Olympics, and about 700 households were admitted in five settlement waves from 1967 to 1974.  Ogata’s population has remained steady at about 3,300 people over the last two decades.  The Ogata farmers are unusual in that they practice agriculture on a full-time basis and are among the wealthiest in the nation.  This village also has the highest per-capita income in Akita Prefecture.

        Hachirogata Town is located on the eastern border of the ribbon-like remains of the lake.  It has a long history, having been an important market town during medieval times, but is experiencing marked population loss as its 8,000 residents dwindle year by year.  The town is primarily service-oriented, and is physically defined largely by its long main street lined with small businesses. Some town residents hold small rice fields and a few of them still fish.  It is significant that a large part of the town’s livelihood– the fishing industry– was all but destroyed by the creation of Ogata Village.

Revival Efforts at Ogata Village

        Until the late 1980's the village of Ogata made few concerted efforts at village revival.  Community festivals and events such as the village sports day and the summertime o-bon dance, which can be found in any Japanese community, were seen as sufficient by both the residents and the village administration alike. However, due to disagreements between a number of village farmers, the village officials, and the national government, the village became a national embarrassment in the 1980's.  The village was conceived as a model farming community built on a foundation of rational, industrial agriculture and communal rice marketing, but unforseen rice surpluses and other problems led to black market activities on the part of some farmers and legal actions on the part of the government (Moore 1991, 1993).  The village office was firmly on the side of the national government throughout the disputes.  Bad publicity was received by the village over the affair, and its image was thereafter perceived by the administration as having been seriously tarnished.  The late 1980's were an important period for the young village because it was during this time that a serious office-directed effort at rural revival began to appear.  It is important to note that Ogata Village’s revival efforts, unlike those of Hachirogata Town, differ from the norm in at least three ways: (1) they are planned and implemented by the village officials with little or no community input, (2) the events are of a scale larger than those of most other communities, and (3) the village’s projects tend to exclude most of the community residents and alienate many of them.  Village employees, many of whom live in the surrounding towns, are required to “volunteer” their time to work the events.

        By 1996 the village had three main revival projects underway.  The youngest of these is the nanohana (canola flower) festival, which was held for the first time in 1995.  The event takes place every year in May in the 3.7 hectare nanohana field at the north end of the village.  This field explodes with brilliant yellow every spring when the flowers bloom.  The 1996 event centered around the opening of the village’s new hotel, which was built largely with prefectural funds on a site adjacent to the nanohana field.  Professional models posed for photos among the flowers, and prizes were offered to participants for the best portraits resulting from these sessions.  Helicopter rides, concerts, games, and food were also parts of the entertainment.  The 1997 and 1998 events featured rides on a mini train that ran along a permanent track through the field.  Because the event takes place at the peak of planting time for the village farmers, Ogata Village residents, including children, are rarely seen at the event.  Rather, tourists from inside and even outside the prefecture dominate the event, and many village residents look upon the festival as a waste of their tax money.

        Another revival plan that the village has is the bunkajin neighborhood project, which seeks to locate and select people throughout the country with special skills (bunkajin, or “cultural people”) to build houses and live at least part of the year in the village, sharing their talents and knowledge with the residents.  They are offered annual cash payments and the titles to their housing sites after residing in the village for a certain number of years (Ogata Village 1997).  The neighborhood is spacious and nicely landscaped compared to the farmers’ neighborhoods. As of 1997 there were three of these cultural people listed as having already signed contracts with the village. Two houses had been built and one of these was occupied by a professional hang glider.  All village farmers I spoke with about the project were skeptical at best and most were opposed to the idea, citing both the expense and the division between “cultured” bunkajin and “culturally deficient” farmers that the village administration has created by using the bunkajin label.

        The primary revival projects that the village has today are its solar car and bicycle races, which have been held every year in July or August since 1993.  The car event was conceived by a hair dresser who owns the most upscale salon in Akita City.  He learned about the solar races in Australia and the United States by watching television, and decided that he wanted to start such an event in Akita.  Since Ogata Village has both space and special government connections, he took his idea to the mayor who quickly made it a reality.  The first year, the event was held on village roads, but by the second year a special track had been built outside of the village among the fields, and the race has been held on the track every year since then. This track is the only one of its kind in the world: built and certified for use as a solar vehicle race course.  The bicycle race was added in 1994 in an attempt to lure more teams, since solar bicycles are much easier and less expensive to build and transport than solar cars.  Each of the events features more than one hundred teams from other parts of Japan and the world, and they attract much private and government funding, as well as attention from the media and tourists.

        Residents are divided over the solar races, which have become central to the mayor’s new image-building scheme for the village in the 1990's. Many residents view the races as bottomless money pits, and feel that they bring no appreciable benefits to the community.  One argument against the events is that the track is located far from the settlement, so most contestants do not need to spend much time at all inside the village itself. Some older farmers like the races and a few families serve as hosts for foreign team members, but the solar events seem to hold the greatest appeal for the younger generations of the village. Many school-age children enjoy attending the races, and some of the young farmers who are just now taking over their fathers’ farms are forming racing teams.  However, even the middle school students (ages 12-15) are divided in their opinions. Standardized surveys I distributed among them in 1997 indicated that some view the events as political, reflecting the views of some of their parents.  About one half of them responded favorably toward the events while the other half were apprehensive or negative.

        The effects of the nanohana nestival, the bunkajin, and the solar events on the village residents are difficult to measure.  So far, the first two projects appear to be generating little interest among them.  Most school kids were ignorant of the cultural people project, and most adults seem to be skeptical at best.  There is a possibility that this project will have appreciable benefits if any of the imported cultural people do manage to capture the residents’ attention and influence them.  The effects of the solar sports are also hard to quantify. On an individual level there are some benefits, especially among those young people who are participating.  Furthermore, cheering for local teams may bring a sense of community identity to the villagers who are interested.

Revival Efforts at Hachirogata Town

        Hachirogata’s revival strategies are fundamentally different from those of Ogata Village, and are more similar to revival projects found in other typical rural communities across Japan.  This is because Hachirogata Town has several things that Ogata Village does not have.  First, the town has a history measured in centuries, rather than Ogata’s which is measured in decades.  This is the main point influencing the town’s choice of revival strategies and differentiating them from those of Ogata Village and will be elaborated on below. Second, there is the train line.  Hachirogata Station, about twenty minutes away by car, is the closest train station to the village.  Access to the train makes it easier for town residents to travel to Akita City for shopping or social engagements, and those who work in the city can more conveniently commute to their jobs while continuing to live in their home town.  Third, the town is very close to its larger neighbor, Gojome Town, a recently amalgamated community comprised of many hamlets stretching far eastwards into the foothills of the Taihei mountain chain.  Gojome offers locally famous markets and job opportunities for some Hachirogata residents.

        Hachirogata Town has had a close relationship with the lake bearing the same name for centuries. Many town residents once depended on the lake for its fish, combining rice production with fishing, but today only very few do this.  Most town farmers received plots of reclaimed land along the shore from the government as compensation for the loss of the fishing grounds, and so were transformed into weekend and holiday farmers with full-time wage labor jobs.  This brought them into the mainstream of Japanese farmers, almost all of whom practice agriculture on a part-time basis and depend on regular wages to survive (Jussaume 1991).

        This historical relationship with the lake is expressed in two of the three large revival projects the town has today.  One of these is a fishing contest that has been held every September since 1991.  Contestants compete in different categories, trying to catch varieties of carp from the waters of the lake.  More than 500 people from inside and outside Akita Prefecture took part in the contest in 1996.  Many town residents appear supportive of the event because it brings large numbers of potential customers to their businesses, and because it attracts the attention of the media.  The other event, which emphasizes the lake, is the annual water festival, which takes place in August and sometimes overlaps with Ogata’s solar races. This is a smaller-scale event than the fishing contest, and attracts mostly area residents.  The festival explores the town’s historical relationship with the lake by featuring boat rides which take visitors out into the largest remaining area of the lake to show them modern boats rigged with large square-shapes sails and nets being used to catch fish in the way it was done before the reclamation. Long lines attached to the corners of the sail are secured on the other end to a net which is totally submerged.  The sail catches the wind and the boat is carried across the water. In the process, the net scoops up fish to be pulled into the boat once the sail is rolled up.  Other attractions at the event include a small museum which holds a wooden fishing boat (utase-bune) like those that were once used on the lake, demonstrations of the use of foot-powered water wheels for irrigation, and the opportunity to eat fresh fish from the lake as well as local rice.

        The town’s largest revival project today is an event that is attached to its traditional summertime dance (bon-odori).  The bon-odori is held every August during the time of year when the gate of the underworld is said to open and Japanese make special trips to their family graves to clean them, make an offering to the temple which tends the graves, and pray for their ancestors.  All communities–towns, villages, and neighborhoods– hold these traditional bon dances at this time. These dances involve community members dancing slowly and methodically in a large revolving circle, usually in groups based on school, class, club, or block affiliation, and often in traditional clothing or in costumes signifying their group identity within the community. Hachirogata’s bon dance is famous throughout Akita Prefecture as one of its three greatest, and consequently it attracts numerous tourists each year.  The residents have recently incorporated this traditional summer festival into the town’s revival movement by adding a community street musical. In 1996 the performers wrapped up their first musical series with the fourth, and final, installment of the story of the town’s founding and development.  They then began a new series the following year.  Other than some experts brought in to handle lighting and sound, the musicals are planned, directed, and performed entirely by members of the Hachirogata community.  The inclusion of these musicals has boosted interest in the bon dance, and received much added news coverage for the event as a whole.  The town also advertizes the events heavily in the local newspapers.  Since the events take place on the town’s main street for several nights in a row, the large crowds offer significant benefits for the local economy.

Comparing Ogata Village and Hachirogata Town

        I have shown above that the rural revival movement manifests itself differently in these two communities. Ogata’s effort in this is a direct response to the village’s political problems that began with government interventions in rice production in the mid-1970's, and erupted in open defiance to these policies ten years later.  Most Ogata farmers, whether supportive of these events or not, will concede that the village’s image as a model agricultural community was soiled by the episode.  Japanese people in their twenties today generally only know of the Hachirogata land reclamation project from a grade-school textbook, but most in their thirties who paid attention to national news and politics remember the quarrels between the opposition farmers of Ogata and the government.  The mayor of Ogata Village for the last eighteen years told me clearly that the village engages in revival efforts primarily to erase the “dirty” image of the past and to build a new image for the village as it heads into the next century. The deputy mayor explained that this new image is based on a “solar village” concept, wherein the solar sports and agriculture are considered closely related because both rely on the sun’s energy.  The village hotel, “Sun Rural Ogata,” even has solar panels on the roof which provide energy for a decorative lighting system in the building as a part of this new village image.

        Ogata’s revival projects are top-down initiatives which are planned, implemented, staffed, and funded by the village office.  Individual initiatives do exist, but these receive little or no encouragement from the administration.  The mayor’s political opponent, a local farmer with a large rice-marketing business, has begun a rural revival project of his own.  He has founded a sausage factory at which visitors can make their own sausages and eat them while drinking beer. Area children have made school trips to the village to experience making their own sausages.  Another group historically opposed to the government and the village administration makes and markets its own environmentally-friendly soap.  One farmer who was probably the most active in opposing the government has built a lodge above his garage where he hosts urban people who buy his rice.  They can stay in this lodge and help him and his wife with the farm work, and therefore actually participate in growing the rice they eat.  If one receives village information only from the office, they will not know of any of these projects.

        Hachirogata’s events are more typical in both their traditional foundations and in their planning and implementation.  As Knight (1994a) has shown, rural revival initiatives usually originate with community residents who are often young returning migrants.  These are people who have left their home towns and villages for the cities, and then returned after gaining a new appreciation for rural life.  The amount of return-migrant involvement in Hachirogata’s projects is unknown, but the town’s efforts are markedly different from those of the village.  There is a special revival event planning committee consisting of town residents that meets to discuss the town’s events. One town official, the head of the planning division, sits on this committee to serve as the primary administrative link between these residents and the administration.  This committee plans all of the town’s revival projects and presents its proposals to the office, which handles the budget and works to secure any government funds which may be available.  The committee’s name appears in large print on the town’s event advertisements, attesting to its major role in them.

        Hachirogata Town engages in revival projects in direct response to immediate pressures stemming from population loss and also from other local communities, who are also pursuing revival endeavors.  An assistant to the planning office director explained that the town engages in these projects in order to “not lose out to some other town.”   He further explained that the town was seen as having few natural resources, such as great amounts of land or a natural hot spring, that could be exploited in revival efforts, so the from the beginning the committee hit upon the idea of using the town’s history and the residents themselves to stimulate the town through grass-roots initiatives. Hachirogata’s revival strategy is similar to those described by Knight (1994a), in which such projects are initiated at the community level and supported by the local government, which also secures some national government funds as well.
Conclusions

        The two communities of Ogata Village and Hachirogata Town pursue different revival strategies.  This is primarily due to two reasons: (1) compared to Hachirogata and other typical rural communities, Ogata Village has a brief history and no real traditions to call its own, and (2) the village was built as a model community by the government but became a national embarrassment due to certain political problems which arose later.

        The town and the village each exploit its resources differently in their revival efforts.  The history of each community affects how these resources are used.  Both have the lake, but only the town makes use of it in its revival projects.  The village was the cause of the lake’s demise, so celebrating the history of the lake does not work in the village. The immediate pressures felt by each community also affect the form that revival projects take. Hachirogata’s population loss makes grass-roots attempts at raising community spirit more sensible than events aimed at gathering outsiders which alienate residents.  Ogata Village’s administration, on the other hand, is concerned with the outward expression of the village, and so goes for the biggest events that it can produce– the opinions of the residents not withstanding.  Perhaps if the residents of Ogata Village warm up more to the administration’s revival efforts, and if the administration becomes more sensitive to the resident’s wishes, the village will soon find greater community spirit and cohesion through its brand of mura-okoshi as is currently taking place in the town of Hachirogata.

Acknowledgements

        I am indebted to Dr. Norbert Dannhaeuser of Texas A&M University for his suggestions concerning the original draft of this paper.  I am also grateful to Robert Stokes and Dr. Circe Sturm of the University of Oklahoma for their time and many suggestions as well.                 

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