Importing Diversity: Inside Japan's JET Program

by David L. McConnell

  It takes three years for dripping water to make a mark on a rock (Ishi no ue ni sannen).

  Japanese proverb

  On 7-8 October -1996, hundreds of people converged on the Keio Plaza Inter-Continental Hotel in Tokyo for two days of ceremony and symposiums held to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the Japan Exchange and Teaching Program. Walter Mondale, the U.S. ambassador to Japan at the time, presented the commemorative speech, and the three sponsoring ministries gave out dozens of "meritorious service awards." Panelists who had played key roles in the development of the JET Program discussed such topics as the changing roles of assistant language teachers, the internationalization of local communities, and future issues for the JET Program. By the following spring, CLAIR had published a 36o-page tome titled The JET Programme: Ten Years and Beyond, which boasted in its foreword that JET was "one of the largest human exchange programs in the world."' The overall tone of the commemorative events was celebratory, and the moral of the story seemed clear: through programs like JET, Japan was gradually coming of age in learning how to cope with "internationalization."

  The tenth anniversary provides a useful opportunity to assess the major continuities and changes in the JET Program over its history. This long-term perspective is invaluable for it allows us to distinguish the essential and fixed features of the program, and the cultural ideologies and political priorities that support them, from those that are transient and malleable. Such a perspective is crucial for understanding how the JET Program managed to rise above the difficulties that plagued its formative years.

  This chapter therefore revisits policy developments at CLAIR and the Ministries of Home Affairs, Education, and Foreign Affairs since the early 19gos. As noted earlier, one of the most striking features about the JET Program at the national level is the complex relationship among the several bureaucracies involved, each with distinct interests in seeking internationalization. For each of these ministries and their subordinate branches, we must assess the learning curve as it pertains to the main (if vague) goals each envisions for the JET Program-improving the "internationalization" of local communities (CLAIR/Home Affairs), reforming English education (Education), and enhancing foreign understanding of Japan (Foreign Affairs).

  My argument in this chapter is twofold. First, improvements have occurred surprisingly quickly, thanks to a combination of top-down leverage, the mobilization of knowledge, and the ability of local teachers and administrators to put themselves in the position of learners without relinquishing autonomy. National-level officials have tackled, with some degree of success, virtually every problem raised by the JET participants, and they have pressured local officials to do the same. Second, in examining the program's implementation broadly and over the long term, one can see a subtle yet powerful cultural drift at work. In shaping program policy and structure, the view of the JET Program as a vehicle for improving foreign understanding of Japan clearly has gained the edge.

  CLAIR AND THE MINISTRY OF HOME AFFAIRS: PERFECTING PROGRAM POLICY

  My most recent visits to CLAIR in 1995 and iggg were eye-opening. Now situated on the twenty-fourth floor of the Shin Kasumigaseki Building in the heart of Japan's government district, and affording a breathtaking panorama of Tokyo, the office was a far cry from the crowded room in the prefectural office building (todofuken kaikan) where the agency got its start in 1987. CLAIR's staff had increased tenfold, and most concerned themselves with other dimensions of the Ministry of Home Affair's growing international presence. The atmosphere, too, had changed considerably. The pace was noticeably less frantic, and conversations with CLAIR officials confirmed that heated disagreements between program coordinators and Japanese staff were rare. As one program coordinator put it, "Now we fight about where we're going to eat lunch." The program was by no means on autopilot, and the CLAIR staff clearly remained dedicated and hardworking, but much of their task had become routine.

  Subsuming the World under JET. Program Expansion

  The smooth workings of the office are particularly striking given the rapid expansion of the JET Program. By 1999 the total number of participants was double the initial target of 3,000. Most of this growth has been achieved by steadily increasing the numbers of ALTs from the six core English-speaking countries. It seems quite likely that the program will continue to expand, as the secretary-general of CLAIR confirmed in 1997: "Seeing that our survey shows that the number of JET participants requested are increasing every year, we take it that there still exists substantial potential demand. In order to meet such demand from local public bodies, it is necessary to increase steadily the number of participants."'

  Several trends in this overall expansion are worth highlighting. The most significant growth in recent years has taken place in municipalities rather than prefectures (see table 6). In the first year of the program, 72 percent of JET participants were assigned to prefectural boards of education, and municipalities employed only i8 percent. By -1997, however, the prefectural share had fallen to 47 percent while those in municipalities had risen to 46 percent (the remaining participants in both cases were employed in private schools or in special district offices). This meant that by the tenth year of the program, fully half of Japan's municipalities employed a JET participant. For instance, when Chiba Prefecture began the JET Program in 1987, fewer than 20 percent of its eighty municipalities participated. Ten years later, 81 percent of the municipalities were inviting ALTs each year, and Chiba prefectural officials were talking seriously about ways to reduce the financial burden on the smallest villages that wanted an ALT but simply couldn't afford to add even one additional staff member. In Toyama Prefecture, an ALT is now posted to every single public high school, and there is one ALT for every two junior high schools. Local officials' thirst for JET participants shows little sign of abating. Shiga Prefecture plans to increase their eighty-one JET participants by 50 percent in the near future, and continued expansion is planned for every prefecture in Japan. The goal of placing a JET participant in every single municipality in the nation, which seemed so idealistic ten years ago, is now well within reach.

  Revisiting Nationality

  The diversification of participating countries has also been astounding. I vividly remember attending a session for coordinators for international relations at the i99o Renewers' Conference in which the issue of the nationalities of JET participants was brought tip. One American CIR complained, "My prefecture has international relations primarily with China and Brazil yet there's no one to deal with them. I kept asking my boss, 'Why did you hire me?' I almost talked myself out of the job." The program coordinator facilitating the session replied that they had repeatedly brought up this point with Japanese officials at CLAIR, but the idea had never gone very far. She concluded, "We still come up against a lot of racism and'the West is best.' You can imagine the politics involved." Another CIR wondered if it would be possible to have CIRs who don't speak English at all. Again, the program coordinator replied that it had been proposed, but to little effect; indeed, the little progress that had been made was almost accidental. "Even with the French and German participants, he [then-Prime Minister Takeshita] made promises that shocked the ministries and for diplomatic purposes they had to be kept." As the discussion concluded, many observed that CIRs can do much to promote the idea that internationalization is more than just hiring Westerners and that they all should encourage their local offices to hire people from non-Western countries.

  Such exhortations would be unnecessary today. By 1997 fully 35 percent of CIRs hailed from non-English-speaking countries. Beginning with China in 1992, which was soon followed by Korea (1993) and Russia (1994), ten additional countries have been invited to send CIRs to select prefectures and municipalities. More recently, individuals from Italy, Mexico, and Israel have joined the program. Especially significant was the dispatching of an Israeli to Yaotsu-cho-the hometown of the late Sugihara Chiune, who as Japan's acting consul in Lithuania during World War II issued visas to more
than 6,ooo Jews fleeing Nazi oppression and who thereby saved many lives.

  In addition, an entirely new category of JET participant, the Sports Exchange Advisor (SEA), was created in 1994. A local government can forward a request for a specific type of professional athlete to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which then begins inquiries through its diplomatic channels to locate a suitable candidate. Alternatively, ministry officials may locate a potential applicant abroad and then set out to find a municipality willing to host him or her. Some of this expansion has been tied to the hosting of international sporting events. By 1996, for instance, Nagano Prefecture, home of the 1998 Winter Olympics, was employing forty-two CIRs and SEAs, double the number of any other prefecture. The proportion of CIRs and SEAs to ALTs has been steadily growing, from approximately 4 percent of total JET participants in 1987 to io percent in 1997.

  Obviously, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has played a crucial role in facilitating this expansion. In fact, countries have been lining up at the door to gain admittance to the program, as the director of the Cultural Affairs Division has noted: "Governments of many countries, including both those which have sent JET participants and those which have not, are interested in and think highly of JET. For example, JET sometimes becomes a topic of conversation at bilateral top-level meetings or meetings of foreign ministers and desire is sometimes expressed to the effect that they also want to send their youths on the JET Programme or that they want to have the number of their participants increased."3 But this growth is also clearly in line with the Ministry of Home Affair's interest in using the JET Program to improve international linkages among local communities. Discussion is currently under way at CLAIR to create new categories for participants with artistic or cultural talents. These new developments highlight the pressing need for a careful ethnographic study of the CIR and SEA components of the JET Program.

  The Re-Asianization of Japan

  The inclusion of Korean and Chinese JET participants is a manifestation of larger regional dynamics. After deliberately remaining aloof from Asia for four decades, Japanese leaders are being forced by new economic realities to turn their attention back to their nearest neighbors. Under low-key government leadership, Japanese corporations are increasingly shaping an interdependent regional system of trade, finance, and production.4 While many Asians are understandably uneasy about Japan's expanding role, Japan's image in the region is nevertheless much better than it was two decades ago. One high-level government study group suggested that Japan could become a "culturally oriented industrial state" (i.e., a state possessing the economic but not military status of a major power) by creating new economic relations with its Asian neighbors.5

  South Korea is increasingly viewed not as an ancillary element in U.S.Japan relations but as a significant political and economic partner (and competitor) in its own right. Japan has recently made overtures toward overcoming the legacy of its past colonial rule by apologizing for past transgressions and offering economic compensation. And while Chinese bitterness lingers over Japan's joining with Western countries in imposing sanctions over the Tiananmen incident, Japan still stands as China's top loan source and second only to Hong Kong as a trading partner.' Within this context of growing economic integration, the JET Program has played an important role on the individual level, both fostering new ties and building on old ones. Thus when Chinese CIR Huang Bao zhong arrived in Kagawa Prefecture in 1992, he was only the most recent in a long line of exchanges between Kagawa and Shaanxi, beginning over 1,200 years ago when Kukai (Kobo Daishi) studied at Quinlong Temple in the T'ang capital of Chang'an (now Xi'an) and brought back to Japan something of Chinese Buddhist culture and art. Even the governor and senior treasurer in the prefecture took an interest in Bao zhong's stay, and after returning to China he was closely involved in preparing for the 1994 signing of a friendship agreement between the two districts. Since that time, Shaanxi and Kagawa have sponsored at least ten exchange events each year.'

  To be sure, the JET Program still caters primarily to recent college graduates from six English-speaking countries: the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and Ireland. Yet even among these core countries there has been a significant change, as their own internal diversity is increasingly being represented in successful JET applicants. One longtime participant in the New Zealand selection process notes, "Where at first they were almost totally of European origin, Kiwi JETs are now of Pacific, Chinese, African, Middle Eastern, West Asian and even Japanese ancestry. The success of these candidates is in itself effectively communicating to Japan something about New Zealand."8 This a far cry from the program's early days.

  But such growth in scale and diversity is bringing new problems. Now that a JET participant is no longer the only foreigner in his or her school or office, competition and friction between co-workers may arise. There have been some reports of fallings-out between JET participants who share the same office or school but who have different attitudes toward Japanese culture. Having other ALTs so close can also encourage a dangerous tendency to rely too heavily on each other, as one former MEF (Mombusho English Fellows) Program participant noted:

  Because the number of JETs is so great now-I mean, you can swing a bat virtually anywhere in Japan and hit two or three or them-just having someone nearby has changed the whole feeling of the program. When I was on MEF it was me alone in one prefecture so if I had a problem, I called a friend in the next prefecture. That was as close as it got. Otherwise, I had to rely on the Japanese to help me out, which, for me, in retrospect was wonderful. Even at the time I never felt completely isolated or lonely, but now I think most JETs, unless they really make an effort to rely on the Japanese, can pretty easily get all the help and information they need either through foreign friends on the program or through all the English information the prefecture puts out. It seems like the prefectures have done so much to make the participants comfortable that maybe the result is there's not much need for them to communicate with the Japanese.

  And as a larger number of countries participate, the criticism of the American focus of the program has intensified. A high-ranking official in the German embassy in Tokyo had this to say in the summer of 1995:

  The ALTs from Germany are of very high quality for the simple reason that there are so many applicants for each position [there were only four assistant German teachers in 19951. When we contacted Gaimusho and Mombusho officials about increasing the numbers, they told us that the original JET Program was only meant for English language education and that we should be happy to be able to participate at all. "So don't complain about the small number from your country"-that was their message. But I continue to go there and tell them that internationalization should have tangible results, and if it is done, it should not mean tightening your relations with the U.S. I mean, there are a few other countries in the world-insignificant of course [laughter]-but they are there. So we've strongly raised the objection against internationalization being a camouflage for the improvement of U.S.-Japan re- lations.9

  The growing presence of Korean and Chinese CIRs has also led to calls to increase the use of Japanese as the common language among JET participants. Complaints such as the following began to be lodged with CLAIR: "American English is not the only language; American culture is not the only culture; even the United Kingdom or New Zealand has a culture entirely different from American culture; when it comes to Chinese or Koreans, they have a different language and a different way of thinking; this is Japan, and being in Japan where the common language is Japanese, they should use Japanese among them."10 Kim Chishyku, a Korean CIR in Fukuoka Prefecture from 1995 to 1997, agreed on the need "to see more consideration given to JET Programme participants from non-English speaking countries."" As more and more Asian participants join the JET Program, the huge gap between their linguistic competence in Japanese and that of most participants from Western countries will likely receive even more attention. CLAIR has already responded to
this change by printing a Japanese version of its monthly newsletter.

  The growing diversity of participating countries also makes it more likely that JET participants will interact with and learn from different peoples within the program, and it is increasingly common for ALTs to report that the best part of the program was getting to know their colleagues of other nationalities. Some American participants have also been taken somewhat aback to discover that their compatriots from other parts of the world do not always have a high opinion of them. An interesting submission to the JET Journal in 1995 described the surprise of one American ALT at hearing the term "American American" applied to some loud, boastful, and self-absorbed JET participants from the United States. "What I did not expect to be confronted with," she wrote, "was how some other westerners stereotyped Americans."''- Her defensive letter in turn provoked a number of responses, including one from a Welsh JET: "in my experiences, nonAmericans are far more informed on world issues than their inwardlooking American counterparts.... Your article just strengthens my belief in the inadequacies, intellectual and cultural, of many American people."" The result was an escalating game of "Which is the most ethnocentric nationality?"

  The gradual addition of non-Western countries in the program suggests that Japan is now willing to look beyond the United States and other Western nations in coming to terms with internationalization, and the proportion of American participants will no doubt continue to decline as Japan broadens the scope of its "JET relations." But it is important not to overstate the trend. In the postwar era Japan has largely defined itself in relation to the United States, and by and large this mind-set persists.14 Japan will likely view the United States as the embodiment of "Western" culture and perceive "American English" as the most desired form of English for the foreseeable future.