TY - JOUR
T1 - Invisible immigrants
T2 - Undocumented migration and border controls in early postwar Japan
AU - Morris-Suzuki, Tessa
PY - 2006/12
Y1 - 2006/12
N2 - The economic "bubble" of the 1980s is widely assumed to mark the start of large-scale immigration to postwar Japan. This article questions that assumption by examining the neglected topic of immigration to Japan in the decades immediately following the Pacific War. Though the scale of immigration to Japan in these decades is difficult to assess, there is good reason to believe that tens of thousands of "illegal" migrants (so-called mikkōsha) entered Japan, mainly from Korea, between 1946 and the 1970s. The article explores the experiences of these migrants and suggests that official responses to their presence had a lasting impact on Japan's migration and border control policies.
AB - The economic "bubble" of the 1980s is widely assumed to mark the start of large-scale immigration to postwar Japan. This article questions that assumption by examining the neglected topic of immigration to Japan in the decades immediately following the Pacific War. Though the scale of immigration to Japan in these decades is difficult to assess, there is good reason to believe that tens of thousands of "illegal" migrants (so-called mikkōsha) entered Japan, mainly from Korea, between 1946 and the 1970s. The article explores the experiences of these migrants and suggests that official responses to their presence had a lasting impact on Japan's migration and border control policies.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=33745614622&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1353/jjs.2006.0021
DO - 10.1353/jjs.2006.0021
M3 - Review article
SN - 0095-6848
VL - 32
SP - 119
EP - 153
JO - Journal of Japanese Studies
JF - Journal of Japanese Studies
IS - 1
ER -