著者

石川 クラウディア Ishikawa Claudia

出版者

名古屋大学留学生センター

雑誌

名古屋大学留学生センター紀要 (ISSN:13486616)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.4, pp.5-26, 2006-10-16 (Released:2011-08-11)

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Japan’s‘Plan to Accept 100,000 Foreign Students’ proved an endeavour of unprecedented dimensions. Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone’s pledge in 1983 to increase the number of foreign students in Japan’s higher education sector tenfold within a span of twenty years not only had serious ramifications for universities, higher education policy, and the MEXT budget. The project was also to prove an immense challenge for the Ministry of Justice Immigration Bureau, with consequences continuing to be felt in education-oriented immigration control policy today. ‘Immigration for study purposes’ is attracting increasing attention amongst student-importing nations. Supported by primary materials, this paper intends to track and interpret developments in the little-explored field of education-seeking immigration in Japan. Analysing changes in the relevant MOJ laws, regulations and notifications, the paper seeks to uncover the impact of foreign student policy on immigration developments and outcomes. Meriting particular attention are the MOJ’s deregulatory drive of the late 1990s, which propelled foreign student numbers to their current levels, and the equally drastic U-turn to a policy of retrenchment in late 2003. Issues raised by the unprecedented influx of foreign students, including the jurisdictional blur between the Immigration Bureau and universities, the growing significance of foreign student labour, and a concern that foreign students may constitute a threat to the order of Japanese society are discussed. The paper concludes by a briefly deliberating on the legacy of the ‘Plan’.