A few forms

At the moment I'm starting to re-apply for my Japanese residence visa. I've had to do this every year so far but I'm hoping that this time they will give me a three year extension. Tomorrow we are off to the Immigration Bureau in Chiba with a fistful of forms and papers.

Today in preparation for the trip we got a current copy of our 'koseki' from the local town office. This is the family registration document that acts as a kind of ongoing birth, marriage and death certificate for everyone in the household. Actually ours was wrong. Last year, after my visa was renewed, it seems that I should have gone back to the town office again and had my record changed there. A pity no-one mentioned it to me then but no problem, it was corrected in a few minutes.

This little episode pointed up for me the often invisible yawning chasm between Britain and Japan and how we think about "The State" and all things 'offical'. In Britain we have no equivalent of the koseki though I'm sure every policeman and bureaucrat would love it. We put on public record various life events - we have to register births, marraiges and deaths for example. There are other ways - tax and health registration and driving licences for example in which the state demands to know about us. But, despite Mr. Blair's blandishments and efforts to introduce ID cards, we still have no one official central record of our exstence and relationships. Actually over the centuries people have given their lives to prevent that kind of state power over individuals. Basically a lot of us wouldn't trust them an inch. We are of a mind with Emerson who once observed about someone that "the louder he talked of his honour, the faster we counted our spoons."

In Japan on the other hand you except it as both natural and reasonable that the state should know exactly who you are and where you are. You have had something equivalent to the koseki for centuries. I'm sure most people here would say - just as they did in England in our recent ID card debates - that only criminals and bad people have anything to fear from such a system.

Well, need I point out the obvious weakness in that argument? What happens when the criminals and bad people are those in charge of the state? The German police residence registers in the 1930's made the arrest of Jews a very straightforward task.

Two different views of 'reality', and there are 'pro's and 'con's for each.

In my studies I find myself thinking about 'The State' more and more these days and wondering what the heck it actually is and what is going on? Is the Japanese or British state actually 'Japan' or 'Britain' do you think? They like to say so but if it all disappeared in the night would you or I be any less Japanese or British? There are certainly some things that we need states for and public order and safety is perhaps their oldest and most useful task. But what about the rest - can't we just sort out our lives together without them?

Here's a question for you - if you could sit down with a blank sheet of paper and a pencil and design Japan or Britain or America again from scratch - is what the state has created around you now in Tokyo or Manchester or New York what you would like to end up with in your perfect world? It's a fair question eh?