By Gunei Sato, Professor, School of Global Japanese Studies, Meiji University
https://www.meiji.ac.jp/cip/english/research/opinion/Gunei_Sato.html
The revised Immigration Control and Refugee Recognition Act (“Immigration Control Act”) passed in December 2018 and will come into force in April of this year. This will enable the country to accept more foreign workers, but there are many unsolved issues with systems to accept foreign workers smoothly, and this is becoming a serious problem. Underlying these issues is the education of foreign workers and their families.
The major premise for revising the Immigration Control Act is that Japan’s population is decreasing. This involves the so-called problem of a declining birthrate and the aging of the population, and in particular, the working-age population aged 15 or more and less than 65 will diminish rapidly in the years to come.
Most neglected has been education because foreign workers were recognized not as immigrants but as seasonal workers. With the revision of the Immigration Control Act in 1990, the number of ethnic Japanese working in Japan increased, but the education of such workers and their families, particularly their children, has been left to local governments.
* The contents of articles on Meiji.net are based on the personal ideas and opinions of the author and do not indicate the official opinion of Meiji University.
Research fields:
Immigration policy and coexistence of diverse cultures
Intercultural migration and education
Diversity and education
[Keywords] Intercultural education, globalization and education, and education for international understanding
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