Migration policymaking in Aging East Asia: Japan and South Korea Compared

2023 Fiscal Year Research-status Report

• Project/Area Number: 22K13325
• Research Institution: Hitotsubashi University
• Principal Investigator: 禹 裕眞 一橋大学, 大学院法学研究科, 講師 (80915794)
• Project Period (FY): 2022-04-01 – 2027-03-31
• Keywords: migration / survey experiment

Outline of Annual Research Achievements

My research aims to analyze and assess the role of migration in combating negative demographic changes in East Asia. I plan to examine whether opening up its door to migrants is a plausible option for contemporary Japan and analyze what type of policies would be ideal. My plan focuses on the perception of migrants among the general public and political actors (e.g., politicians and bureaucrats) by conducting both quantitative (e.g., statistical analyses based on survey experiments) and qualitative (e.g., content analysis based on archival research and interviews) methodologies in Japan and South Korea. To achieve these goals, I have finalized several survey experiments while conducting archival researches in the Japanese Diet Library and the Korean Assembly Library.

Current Status of Research Progress

3: Progress in research has been slightly delayed.

Reason

Originally, I planned to conduct research in Japan and South Korea (as a comparable case to Japan). However, while going over the literature on migration and policymaking, I realized that there is a need to enlarge the scope of countries since some cross-national differences on nation-building process and nationalism are critical in understanding divergent migration sentiment and policies. Therefore, I have now decided to conduct survey experiments in the United States, Canada, and some European countries. This change of scope implies that I needed to make a huge modification on survey experiment designs while spending tremendous amount of time to understand migration issues in non-Asian contexts.

Strategy for Future Research Activity

I have finally finished designed survey experiments and am ready to go through ethnics approval process. Meanwhile, European countries require some special approvals for survey experiments, so I will need to deal with it for next few months. After obtaining ethnics approval (hopefully in summer of 2024), I plan to run preliminary pilot survey in fall 2024 and run actual surveys in winter 2024. I will be spending the first few months of 2025, and present the findings in academic conferences throughout 2025 in order to solidify statistical results.

Causes of Carryover

I had to download a lot of documents from the Japanese Diet Library and Korean Assembly Library in pdf format. Because it was impossible to obtain all the documents in papers, I purchased a tablet so that I could put all these files in the portable device. Based on the obtained information, I designed many survey experiments which I plan to field in this summer. The amount from 2023 and 2024 will be spent to cover the cost for it.