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Performing Ethnic Harmony: The Japanese Government's Plans for a New Ainu Law
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 14 March 2025
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On 14 May 2018 the Japanese government's Council for Ainu Policy Promotion accepted a report sketching the core features of a much-awaited new Ainu law which the Abe government hopes to put in place by 2020. The law is the outcome of a long process of debate, protest and legislative change that has taken place as global approaches to indigenous rights have been transformed. In 2007, Japan was among the 144 countries whose vote secured the adoption of the 2007 UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples: a declaration which (amongst other things) confirms the rights of indigenous peoples to the land they traditionally occupied and the resources they traditionally used, and to restitution for past dispossession. As a response to this declaration, in 2008 both houses of the Japanese parliament voted unanimously (if rather belatedly) to recognize the Ainu people as an indigenous people, and the government embarked on a ten-year process of deliberation about the future of Ainu policy. The main fruit of those deliberations is the impending new law. But how far will this law go in fulfilling Japan's commitment to the UN Declaration? Will it, in fact, be a step forward on the path of indigenous people from colonial dispossession towards equality, dignity and ‘the right to development in accordance with their own needs and interests‘? Will it take account of the vigorous debates that are occurring within the Ainu community about key aspects of indigenous rights, including the voices of those whose demands are at odds with the aspirations of the Japanese government? To answer those questions, it is necessary to look a little more closely at the way in which the pursuit of indigenous rights has played out in Japan over the past three decades or so.
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1 Asahi Shinbun, 15 May 2018; Hokkaidō Shinbun, 15 May 2018; Ainu Seisaku Shuishin Kaigi, ‘Dai-10 Kai Ainu Seisaku Suishin Kaigi Seisaku Suishin Sagyō Bukai Hōkoku’, 14 May 2018, (accessed 27 May 2018).
2 United Nations, United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, Geneva, United Nations, 2008, (accessed 28 May 2018).
3 United Nations, United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, p. 2.
4 See Richard Siddle, Race, Resistance and the Ainu of Japan, London and New York, Routledge, 1996, p. 184.
5 Tahara Ryoko, ‘Genba kara Mita Ainu Shinpō no Mondaiten’, in Kayano Shigeru et al, Ainu Bunka o Keishō suru: Kayano Shigeru Ainu Bunka Kōza II, Tokyo, Sōfūkan, 1998, pp. 162–166, quotation from pp. 163–164.
6 As of 2010, 10 of the 17 members of the Foundation's Board of Directors and 8 of the 18 members of its Board of Councillors were Ainu; see Ann-Elise Lewallen, The Fabric of Indigeneity: Ainu Identity, Gender, and Settler Colonialism in Japan, Albuquerque NM, University of New Mexico Press, 2016, p. 77.
7 Center for Ainu and Indigenous Studies, University of Hokkaido, Living Conditions and Consciousness of Present-Day Ainu, Sapporo, University of Hokkaido, 2010, p. 3 (accessed 26 May 2018).
8 Center for Ainu and Indigenous Studies, Living Conditions and Consciousness of Present-Day Ainu, p. 153.
9 Center for Ainu and Indigenous Studies, Living Conditions and Consciousness of Present-Day Ainu, pp. 33–35.
10 Center for Ainu and Indigenous Studies, University of Hokkaido, Living Conditions and Consciousness of Present-Day Ainu, pp. 68–71.
11 Center for Ainu and Indigenous Studies, Living Conditions and Consciousness of Present-Day Ainu, p. 170.
12 See Uemura Hideaki and Jeffry Gayman, ‘Rethinking Japan's Constitution from the Perspective of the Ainu and Ryūkyū Peoples’, The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus, vol. 16, issue 5, no. 5, 1 March 2018 (accessed 30 March 2018).
13 Advisory Council for Future Ainu Policy, ‘Final Report’, July 2009, quotation from p. 27.
14 Advisory Council for Future Ainu Policy, ‘Final Report’, p. 27 (I have adjusted the English translation on the basis of the Japanese original).
15 For the membership of the committees, see ‘Ainu Seisaku Suishin Kaigi Meibo’, and ‘Seisaku Suishin Sagyō Bukai ni Tsuite’, (both accessed 28 May 2018).
16 Ainu Seisaku Suishin Kaigi, ‘“Hokkaidō-gai Ainu no Seikatsu Jittai Chōsa” Sagyō Bukai Hōkokusho’, June 2011. (accessed 28 May 2018).
17 Ainu Seisaku Suishin Kaigi, ‘“Minzoku Kyōsei no Shōchō to naru Kūkan” Sagyō Bukai Hōkokusho’, June 2011, (accessed 27 May 2018).
18 Website of the Council for Ainu Policy Promotion, (accessed 31 May 2018).
19 Ainu Seisaku Shuishin Kaigi, ‘Dai-10 Kai Ainu Seisaku Suishin Kaigi Seisaku Suishin Sagyō Bukai Hōkoku Kankei Shiryō‘, (accessed 28 May 2018), p. 2.
20 Ainu Seisaku Shuishin Kaigi, ‘Dai-10 Kai Ainu Seisaku Suishin Kaigi Seisaku Suishin Sagyō Bukai Hōkoku’, p. 2.
21 The old Shiraoi Ainu Museum was a ‘general incorporated foundation’ [ippan zaidan hōjin], while the new museum will be a more highly regulated ‘public interest incorporated foundation’ [kōeki zaidan hōjin].
22 Kensetsu Tsūshin Shinpō, 20 April 2018.
23 For further details of these reports and of committee memberships, see Website of the Council for Ainu Policy Promotion.
24 Lewallen, The Fabric of Indigeneity, p. 75.
25 Ainu Seisaku Shuishin Kaigi, ‘Dai-10 Kai Ainu Seisaku Suishin Kaigi Seisaku Suishin Sagyō Bukai Hōkoku Kankei Shiryō‘, p. 34.
26 Ainu Seisaku Shuishin Kaigi, ‘Dai-10 Kai Ainu Seisaku Suishin Kaigi Seisaku Suishin Sagyō Bukai Hōkoku’, p 9.
27 Ainu Seisaku Shuishin Kaigi, ‘Dai-10 Kai Ainu Seisaku Suishin Kaigi Seisaku Suishin Sagyō Bukai Hōkoku’, p. 9.
28 Ainu Seisaku Shuishin Kaigi, ‘Dai-10 Kai Ainu Seisaku Suishin Kaigi Seisaku Suishin Sagyō Bukai Hōkoku’, pp. 10-11.
29 Hokkaidō Shinbun, 28 March 2018. The publisher in question is Kyōiku Shuppan, whose year three junior high school ethics texts now include four pages of material about the traditional Ainu relationship with nature and the concept of kamui within the Ainu belief system.
30 Hokkaidō Shinbun, 15 May 2018.
31 Ainu Seisaku Kentō Shimin Kaigi, ‘Genzai no Ainu Seisaku no Susumekata nit suite no Ikensho’, May 2018 (accessed 20 June 2018); Hokkaido Shinbun, 11 May 2018.
32 See, for example, Seok Soon-hi, ‘Kindaiki Chōsenjin to Teijūka no Keitai Katei to Ainu Minzoku: Awaji, Naruto kara Hidaka e no Ijū ni Kanshite’, Ajia Taiheiyō Rebyū [Asia Pacific Review], no 12, 2015, pp. 17-26, particularly p. 23.
33 Ainu Seisaku Shuishin Kaigi, ‘Dai-10 Kai Ainu Seisaku Suishin Kaigi Seisaku Suishin Sagyō Bukai Hōkoku Kankei Shiryō‘, p. 9.
34 See Karafuto Ainu-Shi Kenkyūkai ed., Tsuishikari no Ishibumi: Karafuto Ainu Kyōsei Ijū no Rekishi, Sapporo, Hokkaidō Shuppan Kikaku Sentā, 1992; also Tazawa Mamoru, ‘Keishi Saretsuzukeru Enchiw’, in Ainu Seisaku Kentō Shimin Kaigi ed., Seikai Hyōjun no Senjū Minzoku Seisaku o Jitsugen Shiyou! Sapporo, Ainu Seisaku Kentō Shimin Kaigi, 2018, p. 9; Karafuto Ainu commonly refer to themselves as ‘Enchiw’, a word which, like ‘Ainu’, means ‘person; human being’.
35 See, for example, Morris Low, ‘Physical Anthropology in Japan: The Ainu and the Search for the Origins of the Japanese’, Current Anthropology, vol. 53, supplement 5, 2012, pp. 57-68, particularly pp. 60-61.
36 See Ueki Tetsuya, Gakumon no Bōryoku: Ainu Bochi wa naze Abakareta ka, Yokohama, Shunpūsha, 2008.
37 NHK News, 31 March 2016.
38 Kotan Association / Hokkaido University Information Research Disclosure Group, Ancestral Repatriation 85 Years Later: Ainu Ancestral Remains Return to Kineusu Kotan, documentary film, dir. Tomoaki Fujino, 2017; Shimizu Yūji, ‘Ainu Ikotsu no Songen aru Henkan no tame ni’, in Ainu Seisaku Kentō Shimin Kaigi ed., Seikai Hyōjun no Senjū Minzoku Seisaku o Jitsugen Shiyou! p. 8; presentation by Shimizu Yūji and Kuzuno Tsugio at the International Workshop ‘The Long Journey Home: The Repatriation of Indigenous Remains across the Frontiers of Asia and the Pacific’, Canberra, Australian National University, 7–8 May 2018.
39 Mainichi Shinbun, 4 June 2018.
40 For example, the US Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA), passed in 1990, states that remains should be returned to the lineal descendants of the dead, or, if descendants cannot be identified, to the indigenous group from whose land they were taken, or the indigenous group which can claim the closest cultural affiliation to the remains; In Australia, where issues of repatriation are also central to the indigenous rights struggle, the government's Advisory Committee for Indigenous Repatriation – all of whose members are Aboriginal or Torres Strait Island people – produced a 2014 report on an Australian National Resting Place for indigenous remains which emphasised that this should only be for remains about which nothing is known except the fact that they come from Australia. In all other cases, remains should be returned to their communities of origin or, if these are unknown, to institutions in the region from which they came, which should continue the task of trying to identify the communities of origin; Native American Grave Protection and Repatriation Act [2006 edition] (accessed 22 June 2018); Advisory Committee for Indigenous Repatriation, National Resting Place Consultation Report, 2014, Canberra, Commonwealth of Australia, 2015.
41 Edward Halealoha Ayau and Honor Keeler, ‘Injustice, Human Rights, and Intellectual Savagery: A Review’, H/Soz/Kult Kommunikation und Fachinformation für die Geschichtswissenschaften, April 2017 (accessed 22 June 2018).
42 Shimizu Yūji, ‘Ainu Ikotsu no Songen aru Henkan no tame ni’.
43 Ainu Seisaku Shuishin Kaigi, ‘Dai-10 Kai Ainu Seisaku Suishin Kaigi Seisaku Suishin Sagyō Bukai Hōkoku’, pp. 6–8.
44 See United Nations Economic and Social Council, Commission on Human Rights, ‘Standard Setting Activities: Evolution of Standards Concerning the Rights of Indigenous Peoples – Human Genome Diversity Researcn and Indigenous Peoples’, 4 June 1998, E/CN.4/Sub.2/AC.4/1998/4, p. 11.
45 ‘Code of Ethics of the American Association of Physical Anthropologists’, 25 April 2003.
46 Kyōdō Tsūshin News, 26 February 2017.
47 Noboru Adachi, Tsuneo Kakuda, Ryohei Takahashi, Hideaki Kanzawa-Kiriyama and Ken-ichi Shinoda, ‘Ethnic Derivation of the Ainu Inferred from Ancient Mitochondrial DNA Data’, American Journal of Physical Anthropology, vol. 165, issue 1, January 2018, pp. 139–148.
48 See the letter of protest sent by Shimizu Yūji, Tonohira Yoshihiko, Ogawa Ryūkichi and others to the University of Yamanashi and the National Museum of Nature and Science on 14 May 2018. As well as raising questions about the lack of informed consent from the relevant Ainu communities, this letter questioned the researchers' crucial assumption that the skeletons they studied were all of people buried during the Edo period (1603–1868). Documents relating to over 30 skeletons from a graveyard in Urakawa indicate that the Ainu skeletons unearthed from that site are modern (post-1868). In July 2018 the National Museum of Nature and Science and the University of Yamanashi sent two separate but identical replies to the letter of protest, without adequately addressing the issues raised. They stated that the research was conducted ‘in a manner that, as of 2007, was thought to respect indigenous rights. Thereafter we carried out [the research] without fundamentally altering our approach, which we consider also conforms to government policies’. This statement is clearly at odds with the ethical approaches set out by UN bodies in the 1990s and by bodies like the American Association of Physical Anthropologists well before 2007. For copies of the letter of protest and the two replies, see here (accessed 24 October 2018).
49 See Ainu Seisaku Kentō Shimin Kaigi ed., Seikai Hyōjun no Senjū Minzoku Seisaku o Jitsugen Shiyou!
50 Hatakeyama Satoshi, ‘Umi no Shigen ni taisuru Kenri’, in Ainu Seisaku Kentō Shimin Kaigi ed., Seikai Hyōjun no Senjū Minzoku Seisaku o Jitsugen Shiyou! p. 15.
51 Tazawa Mamoru, ‘Keishi Saretsuzukeru Enchiw’, in Ainu Seisaku Kentō Shimin Kaigi ed., Seikai Hyōjun no Senjū Minzoku Seisaku o Jitsugen Shiyou! p. 9.
52 Inoue Katsuo, ‘Mikan no Ainu Minzoku Kyōyū Zaisan Mondai’, in Ainu Seisaku Kentō Shimin Kaigi ed., Seikai Hyōjun no Senjū Minzoku Seisaku o Jitsugen Shiyou! p. 7.
53 ‘The Larrakia Declaration on the Development of Indigenous Tourism’, March 2012 (accessed 25 May 2018).
54 Craig Martin, ‘Striking the Right Balance: Hate Speech Laws in Japan, the United States and Canada’, Hastings Constitutional Law Quarterly, vol. 45, no 3, Spring 2018, pp. 455-532, citation from p. 468.
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