Laura Kina's Blue Hawai'i & Wesley Uenten's "Okinawan Diasporan Blues"

"Graves By the Sea" by Laura Kina

In this excerpt from "Okinawan Disaporan Blues," included in Laura Kina's Blue Hawaii exhibition catalogue, Wesley Uenten describes the Japanese colonial rule's erasure of traditional Okinawan culture and ongoing resistance by a group of grandmothers and grandfathers, child survivors of the Battle of Okinawa, to the US plan to turn the habitat of the Okinawan dugong, a sacred cultural icon, into another military base:

...At least on the level of cultural genocide, what happened to Okinawans was similar to what happened to Native Americans. It seems so familiar when I read about the...philosophy of the “Indian Schools” that prohibited Native American school children from speaking their own language or practicing their culture.... By the time that my grandmother was born in 1893, most Okinawan children were in schools, where they would be punished for speaking the Okinawan language and expected to worship the Japanese emperor. A large wooden tag with the words 方言札 (hōgen fuda), or “dialect tag,” was place around the neck of school children who spoke in the Okinawan “dialect.” The tag symbolically relegated the Okinawan language to the inferior status as a backward “dialect” of Japanese, while corporeally ingraining a sense of shame and fear in generations of Okinawans for speaking their own language and being their own selves...

Physical genocide did take place on Okinawa. Japan’s leaders knowingly caused about a fourth to a third of Okinawa’s population to perish in less than 3 months during the Battle of Okinawa when they used Okinawa as a buffer to hold off American troops heading toward Naichi (mainland Japan)...in 1945...

I stare at "Graves by the Sea." ...Departed souls encased in concrete tombs pushed up against each other. They are testament of the reverence for ancestors and tradition in Okinawa that contradicts the reality of the lack of space on Okinawa...There is a strong and powerful message that the ancestors and land is telling us through Laura’s work.

I end this essay at a time when I have just returned from a trip to Washington D.C. with an Okinawan delegation that was making a direct appeal against plans by the U.S. and Japanese governments to push ahead with construction of a new U.S. Marine Air Station on the clear blue waters of Henoko...At this time, both the Jp and U.S. governments are stepping up their attempts to push past unyielding local Okinawan opposition... Henoko is the site of a large thriving coral reef, turtle spawning grounds, seaweed beds, and an already endangered species of dugong. The blue ocean of Henoko will be no more if this plan goes through.

Most of the officials, politicians, and researchers we met in Washington D.C. [during the Jan. 2014 Okinawan Delegation] had made up their mind about new base construction at Henoko saying that it is the best plan... However, what the delegation was trying to get across to deaf ears was that Okinawans have stopped the construction for 18 years by placing their bodies in front of ships and equipment coming to start construction. Old people, as old and tiny as my Baban in my memories of her, have come to sit on the beach everyday in quiet but unrelenting resistance to American Manifest Destiny and Japanese fatalistic dependency on that destiny...

Wesley Ueunten is an associate professor of Asian American Studies at San Francisco State University. A third generation Okinawan, he was born and raised in Hawaiʻi and received his Ph.D. in Ethnic Studies from UC Berkeley.

Vote by March 15th for sustainable Tokyo-based solar-sail cargo ship Greenheart - nominated for Royal Dutch Society of Engineers Prize

Your vote for Greenheart counts- Even in Dutch!

Via Jen Teeter in Kyoto, please check out the latest from Greenheart, a visionary renewable energy project based in Japan:

Creating the world’s first solar-sail cargo ship tailored to fit the needs of marginalized coastal communities is an idea that has propelled a small Tokyo-based international team closer to winning a major engineering prize far from home shore.

International NGO Greenheart Project is but one of 10 nominees for the Vernufteling Prize, to be awarded by the Koninklijk Instituut Van Ingenieurs (the Royal Dutch Society of Engineers), De Ingenieur and Technish Weeblad magazines, and a Dutch association of consulting engineers, NLingenieurs. The finalists were chosen from a field of more than forty submissions based on four criteria: innovation, economic worth, technological advancement, and social value.

The Vernufteling Prize is awarded annually to the initiative that is developing an imaginative project that promises to have a significant social and economic impact. Competitors were asked to respond to the challenge of creating ideas that both embody the social importance of innovative technology. The competition also seeks to make the important work of engineers more visible and widely recognized.

In line with the Dutch word Vernufteling, a portmanteau of inventor, engineer and a lot of creativity, entrants are encouraged to utilize a combination of new and existing technologies to solve real world problems. The winning project also must show potential to attract young people to technical studies and inspire them.

Over the past eight years, 83 engineering firms have submitted a total of 376 ideas, projects and innovative solutions to the Vernufteling Prize. In 2013 Arcadis took home the award for their innovative Winterhard Wissel which keeps railways free from snow and ice in the winter.

As Gert Schouwstra, a Dutch consultant at AA-Planadvies, who nominated Greenheart Project explained, “This project can really work. This year, we shall see how Greenheart will prove itself.”

Greenheart ships are customizable to meet the needs of the end user, whether they be used for fishing, fisheries monitoring, , ecotourism, cargo or passenger transport.

A unique feature is an open source platform which ensures that the end-users can have a say in how future ships are built without the financial and technical burdens of paying for patent rights.

Intentionally designed to be small scale at 32 meters in length and 220 tons, the vessels are designed to be easy to repair and service while maintaining the elegance of a yacht. Through its foldable mast/crane the ship can be maneuvered under bridges allowing greater upstream access, and lift items large and small on and off of shore, whether cargo, a haul of fish or even floating debris such as nets during an environmental cleanup mission.

Greenheart class ships promise to play a hefty role in restoring economic and ecological balance to transport in vulnerable and remote coastal communities, while setting an example that vessels powered by renewable energies are a practical alternative to fossil-fuel based fleets.

Voting by the general public is open from February 25th to March 15th through the Van Dag de Ingenieur (Day of the Engineer) website. After tallying up the votes, the Vernufteling prize winner will be announced on March19, 2014 at High Tech Campus Eindhoven.

To vote for Greenheart...

1. Go to this site: http://www.dagvandeingenieur.nl/vernufteling/publieksverkiezing-2014/
2. Choose "AA Planadvies-Groen vrachtschip voor eilandengroep" from the pull down menu at the top of the page
3. Put in your name and email address
4. Click Stemmen (Vote).
*No need to check any of the boxes there (The page is in Dutch and English)
The Vernufteling Prize is awarded annually to the initiative that is developing an imaginative project that promises to have a significant social and economic impact. If we win it will give us the wide public exposure that will propel us to finishing the construction of the boat and getting more people interested in joining us in changing the paradigm of shipping and waterway transport.

Drawing upon, and endeavoring to be compatible with, the rich sailing traditions of coastal communities, Greenheart is working to radically amplify access to the oceanic commons and distant markets, while interacting with the environment in a more equitable and just manner. Greenheart is intentionally open source small-scaled, durable, adaptable, affordable, energy-efficient, solar/sail cargo ship that is easy to service and repair. It expects to rearrange the balance of opportunities among rich and poor by making safe, long distance sea travel accessible to marginalized and excluded sectors of the world population.

ABOUT GREENHEART PROJECT

The Greenheart Project is an international non-profit organization founded in Tokyo, Japan with offices in Europe and Japan, preparing to build the world’s first fuel-free, container-ready commercial vessel. The small sail-solar ship is specially designed for use by communities in marginalized coastal communities and can serve as a mobile solar power station. It will be built in Chittagong, Bangladesh and launched as early as this year.

To learn more about Greenheart Project visit: www.greenheartproject.org
Pat Utley, Greenheart Director
patutley@greenheartproject.org
P: +81-3-5606-9310

Still Praying for Tohoku: Uncanny Terrain follows mayoral candidacy of organic farmer in Fukushima

"Uncanny Terrain"  2012-2013 interview footage with Akira Asami, organic farmer in Fukushima

Via filmmakers Junko Kajino and Ed M. Koziarski, at work on Uncanny Terrain, a documentary exploring the lives of organic farmers in Fukushima in the aftermath of 3/11:

Akihiro Asami left his life as a city salaryman to raise his family on a self-sustaining organic farm in the mountains of Kitakata, on the western outskirts of Fukushima prefecture.

When the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant melted down in 2011, Akihiro's wife Harumi evacuated with their two young daughters. Akihiro stayed behind to continue farming. In the face of public fears of Fukushima food, some of Akihiro's neighbors were unable to keep their farms going and moved away. Akihiro found his crops showed no detectible contamination from the fallout. He worked to hold his community together.

In 2012, Harumi and the girls moved back to Kitakata, accepting the risk of exposure over the pain and disruption of separation and displacement.

Akihiro Asami on the campaign trail in the snow

In December, Akihiro announced his campaign for mayor of Kitakata on a platform of local economies and natural agriculture as an alternative to the unsustainable systems that spawned the nuclear disaster.

Next week we return to Fukushima to capture Akihiro's dark horse campaign, a hopeful protest by one Fukushima farmer for a better way to live.

Please help us to continue our journey, complete the film, and share the stories of Akihiro and his fellow Fukushima farmers with the world. We gratefully accept tax-deductible donations at Uncanny Terrain.

See more photos of Akihiro Asami and follow the election at Uncanny Terrain on Facebook.

Final Staw: "What a Natural Farmer Eats"

(Video: Final Straw)

Via Final Straw, a documentary by Patrick Lydon and Suhee Kang:

This series of 'Short Take' interviews offer sneak peaks of characters from the upcoming documentary film, which explores Japanese natural farming and the relationships between people and the environment.

This time around, we meet Osamu Yoshino, a natural agriculture farmer, and Keiko Domae a food activist who started one of Japan's first Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) networks. These two individuals worked together to build a successful natural farm by fostering a strong consumer awareness of the relationship between food, farm, and people...

Natural Farming was brought to the modern day agricultural world by two Japanese farmers, Masanobu Fukuoka and Mokichi Okada, and since its introduction has been slowly making its way into communities around the world who wish to create a more sustainable life, and to create closer connections with the land in our towns and cities.

More about Final Straw:

Due for initial screening in Spring of 2014, Final Straw is a cinematic exploration of Japanese natural farming, and...individuals who offer simple solutions to modern issues of sustainability, both on the farm and in the city. The film interacts with a cast of office workers, chefs, musicians, and farmers alike, all of who are students of the late Japanese farmer/philosopher, Masanobu Fukuoka.

It all started on a small mist-covered mountain farm in South Korea, and continued to include over 20 natural farmers in East Asia and the USA...And today, with over 1/2 of the world’s population living in urban areas, it seems we need to revisit this connection with nature more than ever before.

More about Osamu Yoshino, Keiko Domae, and the development of CSA in Japan:

Natural Agriculture farmer finds locating a market more challenging than letting go of chemicals (Lisa M. Hamilton, Newfarm.org, Feb. 13, 2004)

Global Article 9 Conference in Osaka - October 14, 2013

Via Global Article 9: 

Invitation to the Global Article 9 Conference in Kansai 2013

Article 9 of Japan's Constitution states that Japan renounces both war and military capability.  This article has unique value in today's global society.

Across the world, more and more countries are adopting pacifist constitutions that not only prohibit war in favor of peaceful resolution of conflicts, but also ban weapons of mass destruction – including nuclear weapons. Having experienced the horrors of World War II, Japan's adoption of Article 9 is one of the earliest manifestations of such a legal norm. The preamble to the Japanese Constitution guarantees the right to live in peace, an important concept that overlaps with the notion of the 'Human Right to Peace' which is currently being debated by the United Nations Human Rights Council.

In spite of this, the Japanese Prime Minister Abe Shinzo and his Liberal Democratic administration are maneuvering to distort the pacifist constitution by revising Article 9. This coincides with dangerous moves to justify Japan's former invasion and colonization of countries across the Asia Pacific region. In the face of these threats, many peace-loving Japanese citizens have joined together to oppose this constitutional revision, and are working to spread the value of Article 9 around the world. While there may be some Japanese politicians who have appalled the world with statements that approve of war-time slavery, the Japanese people do not approve of these statements. The movement to protect human rights and peace is spreading across Japan, and has forged links with youth activists, and others campaigning for nuclear weapons abolition, to end end nuclear power after the Fukushima disaster, and to protect employment, education and living standards.

After the great success of the “Global Article 9 Conference to Abolish War” of May 2008, which attracted 30,000 participants, the 'Global Article 9 Conference in Kansai 2013' will be held in Osaka in October 2013. We ask you to consider attending, and further cooperation not only in preventing constitutional revision but also in together spreading Article 9's message of peace around the world.

Co-Initiators of the 'Global Article 9 Conference in Kansai 2013

Ikeda Kayoko (Translator)
Niikura Osamu (Secretary General of International Association of Democratic Lawyers, Lecturer at Aoyama Gakuin University)
Yoshioka Tatsuya (Peace Boat Co-Founder and Director)
Kido Eiichi (Osaka School of International Public Policy)            
Matsuura Goro (Catholic Bishop)

Keiko Itokazu Wins Reelection in Okinawa!

Congratulations to Ms. Keiko Itokazu, and her many supporters, on reelection to her Upper House seat!  
(Photo: Keiko Itokazu on FB)

Keiko Itokazu, an Okinawan political leader strongly opposed to the proposed new mega-base at Henoko, Okinawa, was elected to a third term in the July 21 House of Councillors election.

Ms. Itokazu, head of the independent Okinawa Social Mass Party, beat Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) candidate Masaaki Asato, and other candidates in the Okinawa prefectural constituency where only one seat was contested this time.

In fall of 2012, she joined other MPs, Okinawa Prefectural Assembly members and local citizens in the all-Okinawa historic protest against US military V-22 Osprey flight training in Okinawa.

In January 2012, the regal political leader was a member of the 24-member Okinawan delegation that traveled to Washington and spoke with author and peace activist, David Swanson.

She is a co-chair of Okinawa Women Act Against Military Violence, together with Ms. Suzuyo Takazato, a globally recognized feminist peace activist who was nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize in 2005.

A native of Yomitan, Ms. itokazu served in the Okinawa Prefectural Assembly for three terms, starting in 1992, and was elected to the House of Councillors for the first time in 2004. After running unsuccessfully for governorship of Okinawa Prefecture in 2006, she was re-elected to the House of Councillors in 2007.

Nobel Peace Laureate Mairead Maguire on Article 9 & a World based on Democracy, Human Rights, & International Law

(Article 9 monument on Ishigaki Island, Okinawa. Photo: The Asia-Pacific Journal)

Via The Global Article 9 Campaign:

Message from Mairead Maguire, 1976 Nobel Peace Laureate, Co-founder of The Peace People, Northern Ireland:

I write to support Article 9 of the Japanese Constitution and to appeal to the Japanese people and government to protect this wonderful Article 9, which is so important and a treasure for all of humanity.

This article is a commitment to peace and against war by the Japanese people and has since its inception given great inspiration not only to generations of Japanese people but many people around the world.

Being the only people in the world to experience the horror of nuclear war, Japan has carried out its great role to call the world to abolish nuclear weapons and war. With the spread of nuclear weapons and the ongoing policies of some governments of occupation, militarism, and war, there is a moral and spiritual responsibility for Japan and its people to increase their voices and efforts to call the world back from the brink of nuclear war and destruction.

A massive peoples movement is spreading around the world demanding the human family move beyond militarism and war to a world based on democracy, human rights and international law.

The Government of Japan can help lead this movement at the United Nations and amongst the world's nations by discussing Article 9 and the proposal that such an article could be included in every country's policy and constitution. This would be real leadership by the peace loving Japanese people who knows the suffering and pain of nuclear weapons and war and such a commitment would give hope to civil societies and governments trying to build a world based not on threat of violence and war, but on real democracy, human rights and international law.

"They Don't Want You to Know What is Going On": Performance Artists Noora Baker and Yoshiko Chuma Bring Pain of Palestinian Reality onto Tokyo Stage

Japan-born, New-York based performance artist Yoshiko Chuma, founder of the School of Hard Knocks, and Noora Baker, a dancer with the El Funoun company in Ramallah, Palestinian territories, teamed up this week to bring a powerful message to a Tokyo audience in a small theater in Sangenjaya. 

Titled "Love Story, Palestine", the multi-media show featured Chuma and Baker performing to the backdrop of imagery from 6 Seconds in Ramallah, the show performed during Chuma's recent visit to Palestine with a team of other Japanese musicians and artists, including genre-bending violinist Aska Kaneko and singer Sizzle Ohtaka. Interspersing the performance were hauntingly gorgeous vocals from Ohtaka, who was live in the house, as well as a frank conversation between Chuma and Baker about a reality that few outsiders know.

Baker recounted stories of relatives and friends arrested on a constant basis by Israeli occupation officers--often with little or no justification. "In addition to the regular checkpoints that we all must pass through, they suddenly also sometimes erect barriers so that you cannot pass,"Baker recounted. "They do not care even if they are separating families." She relayed a story of being detained at age seven with a group of other children and having tear gas thrown at her by authorities simply because she happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time.

In response to Chuma's question whether her troupe could possibly face arrest if their visits to Palestine continued, Baker responded, "Yes, the action of simply visiting Palestine on multiple occasions is enough to draw yourself into the spotlight and possibly face detention by Israeli authorities. They don't want you to know what is going on."

Chuma then went on to point out the similarities existing between Palestine and Fukushima following last year's nuclear accident, wherein people truly have no idea what is actually going on. "Both places appear normal from the outside, but in reality, they are not."

                                    Yoshiko Chuma (center) with audience members in Tokyo

The latest news about Yoshiko Chuma and the School of Hard Knocks may be read on her blog.

An interesting review of "Love Story, Palestine" may also be read in Dance Magazine here.

--Kimberly Hughes

Related posts on this blog:

Speakers contemplate Palestinian human rights, urge action at Tokyo event

Live theater performers from Iraq and Tunisia bring deep emotion, human connection to Tokyo stage

"War Makes People Insane": Dramatic work by performance artist Tari Ito lays bare the realities of military sexual violence

Jody Williams: "Demilitarization is not a dirty word"

Jody Williams' testimony on behalf of developing a global vision of  humane and environmental planetary security:

Demilitarization Is Not a Dirty Word

HUMAN SECURITY FOR GLOBAL SECURITY: Demilitarization is not a dirty word, nonviolence is not inaction, and building sustainable peace is not for the faint of heart

by Jody Williams, Nobel Peace Prize Laureate (1997)

The political, social and economic changes we all face are serious. Some might call the state of the world today chaos. The ongoing, dramatic changes in technology and communications are other elements adding to uncertainty and the feelings of insecurity that people around the globe are confronting. No one can predict the future but we can work hard to shape the outcomes.

Clearly there are huge obstacles to creating a world of sustainable peace with justice, equality and an end to impunity. A world free of militarism, armaments and the arms trade in which human and other resources are focused on meeting the needs of humanity rather than fueling conflicts and war. A world of sustainable development that nurtures our planet instead of continuing to devastate the environment and threaten life on earth. This will not happen over night. But worrying about the future is not a strategy for shaping it.

My own work, beginning with protests against the Vietnam War, has been against weapons, war and militarism. It is based on an understanding that sustainable peace is not simply the absence of armed conflict. The absence of armed conflict provides the bare minimum for the possibility of constructing sustainable peace based on socio-economic justice and equality. And to accomplish that we must change the understanding of security.

For centuries security has been defined as “national security” – which essentially has meant assuring the security of those in power and the apparatus of the state. Defending the state requires military power based on nationalism and patriotism. “Us” against “them.” How else could armies be formed that send other people’s children off to fight battles for resources, territory and to project the power of the state?

Now, with globalization where all aspects of life are increasingly and more rapidly interconnected around the world, it is time to move away from state-centric security to security based on the individual – “human security” not “national security.” The human security framework understands “security” as directing policies and resources toward meeting the basic needs of the majority of people on the planet: providing decent housing, education, access to medical care, employment with dignity, protection of civil and human rights and governments that respond to the needs of citizens. It means creating a world where people live with freedom from want and freedom from fear.

One part of being able to create that world is reclaiming and reasserting the meaning of “world peace.” It isn’t meditation, a rainbow with a dove flying over it, or singing peace songs. Nonviolence is not inaction and building sustainable peace must be understood as hard work every single day. We must all be active participants in change for the good. It doesn’t matter what issues people choose to work on – it could be global warming, an end to militarism, an end to poverty, or HIV/Aids for example.

What matters is that we all work on issues we feel passionate about and that our actions are for the benefit of everyone. By doing that our combined efforts enhance human security. We also must talk about our work in the context of human security so that people become familiar with the concept and understand the various elements that contribute to promoting and protecting human security.

Another aspect of creating a world based on human security not national security is to tackle demilitarization and the glorification of violence head on. It is an abomination that with the current global economic shake-down, countries still managed to find billions of dollars for weapons and the military while at the same time they are cutting funds for education, health care, job training, social services –the elements of daily life that are the basis of human security.

Demilitarization is not a dirty word. Civil society and national nongovernmental organization should confront demilitarization in our own countries. At the same time we must collectively press regional bodies such as the European Union, the African Union, the Organization of American States, and so on for global demilitarization. We also have another means of collective action, which is Article 26 of the UN Charter – not that we have illusions about the ability of the UN to seriously work for demilitarization. But every country that joins the UN commits to fulfilling the articles of the charter and Article 26 states:

In order to promote the establishment and maintenance of international peace and security with the least diversion for armaments of the world's human and economic resources, the Security Council shall be responsible for formulating…plans to be submitted to the members of the United Nations for the establishment of a system for the regulation of armaments.

In the more than six decades since the establishment of the UN, the Security Council has done absolutely nothing to fulfill its Article 26 obligation. But the member states of the UN have not done a thing to pressure the Security Council on Article 26 either.

Collectively, global civil society should begin actions to force the Security Council to “formulate plans” under Article 26 as soon as possible. Knowing that they will do everything in their formidable power to continue to ignore those obligations, global civil society should draw up its own plans and recommendations for demilitarization and how to use the resources resulting from demilitarization to enhance global human security. We can develop strategies and tactics around our plans and recommendations to pressure governments nationally, regionally and internationally to begin the process of demilitarization.

With demilitarization, the possibilities of positive change and human security in our world would be limitless. Humanity has the right to the real security of sustainable peace not the false “security” of militarism, armaments and war.

Artists bring message of harmony, spirit of earlier era to Tokyo event

Alicia Bay Laurel performs "Rinpoche", a song that she wrote for Tibetan Buddhist master Kyabje Dorje Chang Kalu Rinpoche, which includes an enlightenment mantra, at his request

This past Sunday, in a home that doubles as a café and event space overlooking the stunning vistas of the Hachioji Basin in western Tokyo, one might have thought they had traveled back in time.

Accompanied to the backdrop of a flashing multi-colored light show, artist and author Alicia Bay Laurel—whose 1970 best-seller “Living On the Earth” has inspired generations of hippies and permaculturists across the planet—strummed her acoustic guitar and told fascinating stories of her life as a traveling artist.

“Over and over again, I watched people come to Hawaii and heal their bodies and spirits simply by absorbing the energy from the sun and the ocean,” she said, speaking of Maui island, her home for some 25 years. Her stay there served as the inspiration for her second book, “Being of the Sun”—described by Amazon as a “cult classic among nature-worshippers to this day”.

Laurel has earned a devoted following in Japan, where she has traveled nearly every year since 2006 to play music, sign individual copies of her books and CDs in her trademark flowing script, and collaborate with numerous artists, musicians and designers. She illustrated a book for bestselling author Banana Yoshimoto in 2010, and her works have helped raise funds for environmental nonprofit Artist Power Bank, as well as its sister project Kurkku, a complex of environmentally sustainable businesses. Her designs also helped raise funds for survivors following the 2011 disaster in Tohoku.

This past Sunday’s event, held at the aptly named Holistic Earth Café, indeed featured a distinctly Beatnik vibe. Guests were invited to try on and purchase hemp-based clothing, and the lineup of kitchen offerings even included fresh hemp pasta. “I could easily imagine myself in northern California in the 1960s, but here we are in present-day Tokyo,” Laurel commented. “The popularity of Living On the Earth never diminished in Japan, in large part because of the absolutely phenomenal community of people here who are committed to the ideas represented in the book.”

Event attendee, who told Laurel that he and his wife utilized the advice from her book to home-birth all three of their children

Laurel was joined by actress-turned-environmentalist Ikue Masudo (who was also a featured speaker at Harukaze 2010, a peace and sustainability event held in Tokyo). Masudo left the metropolitan capital several years ago to build an organic café and event space along the gorgeous shores of the Boso peninsula in Chiba prefecture, later going on to the island of Ishigaki in Okinawa, where she is now in the midst of creating a retreat and healing center. “My hope is that more and more people will become connected with the natural world, which will have positive repercussions for society on the whole,” she said, sharing her own personal story of becoming deeply inspired to change her life after filming television documentaries that featured swimming with dolphins in Hawaii and aboriginal communities in Australia.

Ikue Masudo

Sunday’s event, while unmistakably holding a vision for a better world, was most certainly not exclusively idealistic. Kathie Inoue, vocalist and ukulele player for the Hawaiian/reggae band Inoue Ohana, utilized the time in-between the band’s upbeat set to urge attendees to take action by adding their voices to citizen movements to end nuclear power and advocate alternative energies—including a recent worldwide petition urging Japan not to restart its nuclear reactors.

“There are many tools, including social networking sites like Facebook, that we can use to share information with each other and encourage positive social change,” she said, also echoing Laurel and Masuda with her message of simple living.

Kathie and Keni Inoue performing a chilled-out acoustic version of their song "Touch the Sun"

Alicia Bay Laurel and the full Inoue Ohana band play Yokohama Thumbs Up on June 21^st, and Kunitachi Chikyuya on June 22^nd. Laurel’s complete Japan tour schedule may be found on her website. In addition, this article provides a lovely introduction to her work and her long-standing connection with Japan.

--Kimberly Hughes

Makiko Segawa: After The Media Has Gone: Fukushima [reopening of Minami-soma], Suicide, and the Legacy of 3.11

In-depth, eyewitness report from Fukushima by Makiko Segawa published at APJ: "After The Media Has Gone: Fukushima, Suicide and the Legacy of 3.11" explores realities in the exclusion zone:

The March 11, 2011 disaster attracted thousands of reporters and photographers from around the world. There was a brief deluge of Japanese and international media coverage on the first anniversary, this spring. Now the journalists have packed up and gone and by accident or design Japan’s government seems to be mobilizing its agenda, aware that it is under less scrutiny...

Ainu Political Party launch: Reports from Ainu Mosir & Aotearoa

The Ainu Party of Japan (homepage here) was launched last weekend in Ebetsu City, Ainu Mosir (Hokkaido), marking a historical moment for Japan, the Ainu, and indigenous peoples all over the world. This is the first time an ethnic minority group has ever created a political party of its own in Japan.

Maori Party representative and member of the New Zealand Parliament since 2005 Te Ururoa Flavell and his wife Erana Hond-Flavell, a research associate at Te Kōpae Piripono (Center of Innovation) in Te Tāhuhu o Te Mātauranga (Aotearoa/New Zealand Board of Education) joined Ainu Party supporters in their Saturday, January 21st celebrations.

The day of the launch commenced with an Ainu ceremony held outside the snow-covered Ebestu City Community Center. Representative Flavell presented a Taiaha, a traditional Maori weapon to the Ainu Party.

While reports of the new party in English and Japanese are scarce, Maori news sources have been reporting extensively on the groundbreaking launch.

Co-leaders of the Maori Party, Dr Pita Sharples and Tariana Turi, made a statement in support of the party:

The Maori Party congratulates the Ainu community for their determination to take their policy priorities and concerns into the political landscape in Japan.

We are delighted to acknowledge Shiro Kayano, the leader of the Ainu Party, and to extend our best wishes for their launch on the 21st January.

The recognition of the voices of the Ainu community has achieved momentum in Japan through the establishment of a Parliamentary Committee to investigate the rights of the Ainu, headed by former Prime Minister, Yukio Hatoyama.

Our seven years experience in the Maori Party has confirmed how important it is to create the space for the voices of tangata whenua in national and local politics. Our mission has always been to ensure that ‘every issue is a Maori issue’; and that ultimately we know that what works for Maori, is in the best interests also of Aotearoa.

We join with other indigenous political movements across the globe, to welcome the formation of the Ainu Party, and to extend greetings of solidarity to the wider Ainu community in their determination to make a significant contribution to the political destiny of their land.

- Jen Teeter

Gordon Hirabayashi, challenger of the constitutionality of WWII Japanese American incarceration, passes at age 93

(Hirabayashi (left) is joined by fellow coram nobis plaintiffs Min Yasui and Fred Korematsu in 1983. He was the last surviving plaintiff who challenged the legality of the wartime exclusion and incarceration of Japanese Americans. Photo: Steven Okazaki

Yesterday Gordon Hirabayashi, the last surviving plaintiff who challenged the constitutionality of U.S. wartime exclusion and incarceration of Japanese Americans, passed yesterday.

Rafu Shimpo, a bilingual newspaper for the Los Angeles Japanese American community, published a thorough and moving obituary (that does not use the euphemism "internment"):

Civil Rights Icon Gordon Hirabayashi Dies at 93 -
Wartime Supreme Court case was reopened in 1983

Gordon K. Hirabayashi, who challenged the constitutionality of the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II, passed away on Monday. A resident of Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, he was 93.

The announcement was made on Facebook by his son Jay, who wrote, “He was an American hero besides being a great father who taught me about the values of honesty, integrity, and justice. My mother, Esther Hirabayashi, who was 87, also passed away this morning about ten hours later. She was a beautiful, intelligent, generous soul. Although my parents were divorced, they somehow chose to leave us on the same day. I am missing them a lot right now.”

Hirabayashi is remembered along with Minoru Yasui (1916-1986) and Fred Korematsu (1919-2005) for violating curfew and exclusion orders imposed on West Coast Japanese Americans and appealing their convictions all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. The court ruled against them, accepting the government’s argument of military necessity.

Through a legal maneuver called writ of error coram nobis, the three cases were reopened in 1983 by a group of mostly Japanese American attorneys on the basis of newly uncovered documents showing that the government knew Japanese Americans did not pose a security threat but hid that information from the court. The convictions were overturned, thus strengthening the movement to obtain redress for former internees.

A biography of Hirabayashi, to be published by University of Washington Press, is being written by his nephew, Lane Hirabayashi of UCLA’s Asian American Studies Center, and brother, James Hirabayashi, former dean of ethnic studies at San Francisco State University.

“Gordon believed very strongly that his war-time Supreme Court case, and his 1980s coram nobis case, were both the JA community’s and the larger American public’s cases,” Lane Hirabayashi told the Rafu Shimpo. “He never felt, that is, that these were somehow exclusively his own. My understanding is that he remained profoundly grateful to all the individuals, networks, and the organizations that supported him, and never forgot that these included people of all colors, from all walks of life.

“Thus he believed that the Ninth Circuit Court’s ruling in his coram nobis appeal, vacating his conviction after more than four decades, was a victory for everyone.”

The coram nobis cases were the subject of an Oscar-nominated 1985 documentary by Steven Okazaki, “Unfinished Business,” and two books, Justice at War (1983) and Justice Delayed (1989) by Peter Irons, who led the effort to reopen the cases...

(Source for quotes: The Courage of Their Convictions: 16 Americans Who Fought Their Way to the Supreme Court by Peter Irons, 1988)

DENSHO: The Japanese American Legacy Project has a series of interviews with Gordon Hirabayashi online and a thoughtful exploration of terminology used to describe the mass detention: "Frontier Colonies or Concentration Camps? Euphemisms for the Incarceration".

Paul Hawken: "The Biggest Global Movement in History"

It is my belief that we are part of a movement that is greater and deeper and broader than we ourselves know or can know. It flies under the radar of the media by and large. It is nonviolent. It is grassroots. It has no clusterbombs, no armies, and no helicopters. It has no central ideology. A male vertebrate is not in charge.

This unnamed movement is the most diverse movement the world has ever seen. The very word "movement" is too small to describe it. No one started this worldview. No one is in charge of it. There is no orthodoxy. It is global, classless, unquenchable, and tireless. Its shared understanding is arising spontaneously from different economic sectors, cultures, regions, and cohorts. It is growing and spreading worldwide, with no exception.

It has many roots. But primarily the origins are indigenous cultures, the environment and social justice movements. Those three sectors and their subsectors are intertwining, morphing, and enlarging... This is a democracy movement...It's marked by kinship, communities, symbiosis. It's Pachamama ("Mother Universe"). It's Mama. It's the earth talking back, waking up...

This talk is now five years old––but this clip of Paul Hawken speaking at a 2006 Bioneers conference describing the collective energy of hundreds of thousands of civil society organizations made up of tens of millions of people––if not more, from all over our planet–– is still breathtaking.

The social entrepreneur drew his talk from his 2007 book, Blessed Unrest: How The Largest Movement in the World Came Into Being and Why No One Saw It Coming.

The movement Hawken describes is not something new. Citing poet/environmentalist Gary Snyder and actor/activist/writer Peter Coyote––Blessed Unrest refers to "the great underground, a current of humanity that dates back to the Paleolithic and its lineage can be traced back to healers, priestesses, philosophers, monks, rabbis, poets, and artists 'who speak for the planet, for other species, for interdependence, a life that courses under and through and around empires.'" 

Hawken's imagination was captured by not only the explosion of movements––but also by the shift towards the "intertwingling" of causes––environmentalism; renewable energy and sustainability; biodiversity; indigenous issues; civil society, children's issues; community development; cultural heritage; democratic activism; fair trade; good governance; human rights; social and economic justice; disarmament and peacemaking; water and other resource rights; and gender issues.

Orion excerpts Blessed Unrest here.

Korean Protest Culture: Struggle for Democracy — "still being negotiated, in parliament & on the street..."

Citizens and students participating in a candlelight vigil demonstration against the South Korea-U.S. Free Trade Agreement (KORUS FTA) at Seoul Plaza attempt to march down street while police assault them with water cannons, Nov. 23, 2011. (Photo: The Hankyoreh: "FTA fallout")

"Candlelight Vigil (Chopul): Widespread since the 2002 Yang-ju incident in Kyoung-gi Province. A U.S. military vehicle killed two school girls, but the American military court exonerated the driver, bringing discontent with U.S. military presence to a boil. Nationwide candlelight vigils ensued, quickly becoming a dominant protest genre..." (Text: Gabriele Hadl. Photo: Kyoto Journal)

The Nov. 23 South Korean police assault on citizens during a candlelight vigil against the South Korea-U.S. Free Trade Agreement (KORUS FTA) in Seoul brings home the reality that South Korea has only been a democracy since the late 1980's. It took South Koreans decades of political and social resistance to overturn the U.S.-backed military dictatorship established after the Korean War that followed the even more notorious Japanese military dictatorship of the peninsula.

The Lee Myung-bak administration has attempted to turn back the clock and undo many of the democratic reforms of the 1990's. This, in turn, has given rise to an intensification of resistance: a part of everyday culture in South Korea. Engaged scholar Mark Selden, editor of The Asia-Pacific Journal, notes that South Koreans have created the most vibrant and sustained grassroots democratic movement in the Asia-Pacific, comparable only to the Okinawan movement in intensity, longevity, and creativity.

Korean-Jewish-American filmmaker Koohan Paik explains the South Korean passion for democracy:

When I was a child in South Korea during the 1960s, we lived under the repressive dictatorship of Park Chung-hee. Anyone out after 10 p.m. curfew could be arrested. Anyone who tried to protest the government disappeared. A lot of people died fighting for democracy and human rights.

Today, the South Korean people carry in living memory the supreme struggles that forged the freedom they currently enjoy. And after all they’ve sacrificed, they are not going to give that freedom up.

In "Korean Protest Culture", a photo essay for the Kyoto Journal, Gabriele Hadl describes some of the many symbolic actions found in Korean social movements:

Downtown Seoul has more protest spots than coffeehouses. Protesters of many persuasions have taken up a permanent, rotating residency in front of the Blue House, South Korea’s presidential mansion, while the American embassy is never without riot police.

For most of the country’s history, demonstrations have been put down with an iron fist. In the 1960s, widespread protest won a three-year respite from dictatorship. Though short-lived, it piqued the hunger for democratic reform. Dissent then burned underground for two decades. Ultimately, the military regime could not contain it. In 1985, the struggle was reignited en masse, and a two-year protest campaign brought down the government. No velvet revolution here, but a series of powerful, sustained confrontations, culminating in a radical rewriting of the social contract. Its provisions are still being negotiated, in parliament and on the street...

A labor media activist reflects, “We separate action and daily life…go to a rally, then home. We have to integrate struggle into our everyday lives.”

Background on the KORUS FTA candlelight vigil demonstration:

• The Hankyoreh:"Preventing a KORUS FTA train wreck"

• Tim Shorrock: "Korea-US Trade Agreement: The Hidden History":

...In fact, KORUS represents a major victory for U.S. multinational corporations, banks and financial institutions, which have lobbied intensively for the pact for more than half a decade. It’s also a major setback for Korean and American unions. Both (with the exception of the U.S. United Auto Workers) saw that KORUS, like NAFTA, was above and beyond an investment agreement designed to improve conditions and decrease risk for foreign capital while doing nothing to improve labor rights (dismal in both South Korea and the United States, as recognized by the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions) or lift the general conditions of workers and consumers in either country. Now that the AFL-CIO has failed to convince a Democratic president and Senate to oppose it, it remains to be seen if South Korea’s labor-led opposition can muster the strength to defeat the treaty in Seoul. We shall see...

The South Korean-U.S. free trade agreement (KORUS) cannot be seen apart from U.S.-South Korean security ties, the presence in South Korea of more than 30,000 U.S. troops and a 50-year economic relationship that has been heavily weighted towards American interests. From this perspective, KORUS is the fourth attempt by the United States to force its economic will on South Korea over the past half-century.

Traditional Americans & Japanese Against the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) "Free Trade" Agreement

Poster for the 2008 Black Ship Festival at Shimoda. 

Locals did not appear enthusiastic about the commemorative event.

On both sides of the Pacific, family farmers, small and medium-size business owners, environmentalists, labor unionists, and traditionalists who want to conserve what remains of respective national sovereignty and local culture in the U.S. and Japan are voicing opposition to the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) "Free Trade" Agreement.

A recent Mainichi article about organic farmer and poet Kanji Hoshi echoes the thoughts of many traditional Americans as well as traditional Japanese people:

Hoshi is the author of an essay called "Sonno joi no shiso: han TPP no chiiki ron" ("The philosophy of revere agriculture, expel the barbarians: anti-TPP localism"), published in May 2011 in the book, Takahata-gaku (Takahataology).

In it, he writes: "I would like the philosophy of revering agriculture and expelling the barbarians to be the stronghold against the black ships of TPP," Hoshi writes. "We need to give primary importance to agriculture for its production of food for life, and to justly appreciate its function of protecting the environment. If we destroy our beautiful homeland, we will not be able to face our descendents. 'Expel the barbarians' refers to the elimination of our disposable consumer civilization. We need to possess a set of values necessary to live simply and spiritually rich in a mature society, and let us attempt self realization."

Hoshi's philosophy mirrors the "Back to the Land" movement that began in the U.S. in the 1960's and 1970's when Americans began a renewal of traditional regional rural cultures.

A parallel movement gathered steam in Japan during the 1990's, after the bursting of the economic bubble was followed by a "hollowing out" of Japan's industry and "corporate restructuring" (fueled by foreign takeovers of Japanese corporations). These neoliberal changes ended the prospect of permanent and lifetime employment for many young people in Japan who might have otherwise followed their parents' footsteps into the corporate or manufacturing worlds. Koji Nakano’s The Philosophy of Noble Poverty became a Japanese best-seller in 1992. Like their American counterparts, Japanese neo-traditionalists joined an already thriving local farming counter-movement. Many Tokyo-dwellers, disenchanted by or ejected from the neoliberal rat race, moved back to their ancestral rural hometowns.

In both the U.S. and Japan, these Back to the Land and Slow Food/Slow Life pioneers value organic and natural farming, renewable energy sources, quality of life and simplicity. Paul Gruchow's The Necessity of Empty Places elegiac exploration of American rural life before corporate agribusiness and chain stores invaded traditional landscapes epitomizes the American quest to renew local heritage.

Americans and Japanese opposing the TPP are the 99% who are actually conservatives. They want to conserve their economic and social systems as they are and renew what has been lost because of past American and Japanese unsustainable obsession with economic competition and growth—that unduly benefited the 1%. Americans and Japanese opposing the TPP want to save their jobs, their farms, their environment, their ways of life from the radical neoliberal shifts that the "free trade" agreement would bring. Because the deceptive nature about the ostensible benefits of past "free trade" deals have been revealed over time, American and Japanese people know that TPP "free trade" changes would only benefit financiers, corporate agribusiness (factory farms and plantations), some global corporations, and law firms representing these interests.

Who needs or wants cheaper (and shoddier) consumer products made by exploited workers (or quasi-slave laborers in Vietnam and Burma)? Who wants the loss of domestic jobs, delicious locally grown heirlom fruits and vegetables and authentic (from the grassroots up) culture? Who wants the loss of democratically created regulations protecting what's left of our planet, and democratically created labor standards protecting what's left of our human dignity? Who wants the continued erosion of constitutionally guaranteed rights and liberties in places where they're still extant?

Good political analysis (as always) on TPP at Shisaku and sensitive insights (as always) from a food sovereignty perspective at Kurashi. Here are some more articles from September on the American 99% view towards the TPP:

"Unions and Farmers—Plus Ben and Jerry—Unite Against Trans-Pacific Trade Deal":

...After the failure of post-NAFTA negotiations by the Clinton administration to create new trading blocs for Asia and the Pacific and for the Americas, the Bush administration attempted to expand both the geographic and policy scope of an emerging Asian-Pacific partnership. For now it includes the US, Australia, New Zealand, Peru, Chile, Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and Singapore, but it could be designed to add more countries in the future, even China.

Obama, who had campaigned for a new style of trade agreement, delayed action on the Bush-proposed talks, but by late 2009 he embraced the project and the old paradigm. Although the new text is not publicly available (even though corporate trade lawyers get access), critics—who have surreptitiously seen parts of the text—say it largely follows the NAFTA, corporate-rights model.

But it seems that the Trans-Pacific Free Trade Agreement not only is running into broad-based opposition, including from many businesses without Ben & Jerry’s high-profile social consciousness as well as unions, environmentalists and many other progressive groups. It also faces numerous internal conflicts and contradictions, argues Public Citizen Global Trade Watch director Lori Wallach...

More info and insights from Michele Chen: "Labor Day Showdown: Can Advocates Stop ‘NAFTA of the Pacific’?":

...The provisions of the Trans-Pacific Free Trade Agreement or Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) are still under wraps. But the general outline seems to mimic the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and similar pacts that have brought political and economic turmoil to rich and poor countries alike. The new negotiations are also taking place amid political friction over pending trade deals with South Korea and Colombia, which have run into opposition over concerns about labor abuses abroad and offshoring of U.S. jobs. Yet the White House continues to push free trade as a path toward the country’s economic revitalization...

Manuel Perez-Rocha, an analyst with the D.C.-based think tank Institute for Policy Studies, says that free trade deals tend to use “investment” and “growth” as a pretext for ruthless exploitation. The agreements “push wages lower and dislocate production with the ensuing loss of jobs,” says Perez-Rocha, adding that “the prospects for the TPP are very bleak and workers everywhere must resist it."

- JD

Amnesty International: Japan Minister Must Not Cave in to Pressure on Death Penalty, says Amnesty International

Japan Minister Must Not Cave in to Pressure on Death Penalty, says Amnesty International

WASHINGTON - October 28 - Japan’s justice minister should not sign execution warrants, Amnesty International and the Anti-Death Penalty Asia Network said today, following the minister’s announcement that he does not intend to end capital punishment, despite saying last month that he would not approve executions.

Justice Minister Hideo Hiraoka said Friday he would look at each death row case individually, after a prominent politician reportedly had encouraged him to exercise his power to authorize executions.

"After showing reluctance to sign execution warrants last month when he first took office, it is deeply alarming that Minister Hideo Hiraoka now seems to be under pressure to approve executions despite his own calls for caution," said Catherine Baber, Amnesty International’s deputy director for Asia and the Pacific. "The minister must stand by his original commitment which was to suspend executions until Japan’s application of the death penalty can be more carefully considered."

Chief Cabinet Secretary Osamu Fujimura reportedly encouraged Minister Hiraoka at a parliamentary committee on Wednesday to press ahead with executions.

The last executions in Japan were carried out on July 28, 2010, when Ogata Hidenori and Shinozawa Kazuo were hanged in the Tokyo detention center.

A study group on the death penalty was established by the former Minister of Justice Keiko Chiba in 2010. The study group is continuing to work under the current Minister, Hideo Hiraoka, who encouraged discussions on the subject both in public and within his ministry, taking into account international trends and opinions.

No date for its report has been announced.

There are currently 126 people on death row in Japan.

Executions in Japan are by hanging and are typically carried out in secret. Death row inmates are only notified on the morning of their execution and their families are usually informed only after the execution has taken place.

This means that death row prisoners live in constant fear of execution. Enduring these conditions for years or even decades has led to depression and mental illness among many death row inmates.

More than two thirds of the countries in the world have abolished the death penalty in law or practice. Out of 41 countries in the Asia-Pacific, 17 have abolished the death penalty for all crimes, nine are abolitionist in practice and one – Fiji – uses the death penalty only for exceptional military crimes.

This means that less than half of the countries in that region still use this ultimate and irreversible punishment. Of the G8 nations, only Japan and the United States still use capital punishment.

Amnesty International opposes the death penalty as a violation of the right to life in all cases, regardless of the nature of the crime, the characteristics of the offender, or the method used by the state to carry out the execution.

"Japan should immediately commute all death sentences and introduce an official moratorium on executions as a first step towards abolition of the death penalty," said Baber.

Amnesty International is a worldwide movement of people who campaign for internationally recognized human rights for all. Our supporters are outraged by human rights abuses but inspired by hope for a better world - so we work to improve human rights through campaigning and international solidarity. We have more than 2.2 million members and subscribers in more than 150 countries and regions and we coordinate this support to act for justice on a wide range of issues.

Wangari Mathaai: When we destroy our natural environment, we degrade ourselves; in helping the earth to heal, we heal ourselves

Wangaari Mathaai, the late Kenyan visionary, articulated the interconnections between democracy, demilitarization, human rights and environmentalism in her holistic vision of a life-sustaining civilization:

Spiritual Environmentalism: Healing Ourselves by Replenishing the Earth

During my more than three decades as an environmentalist and campaigner for democratic rights, people have often asked me whether spirituality, different religious traditions, and the Bible in particular had inspired me, and influenced my activism and the work of the Green Belt Movement (GBM). Did I conceive conservation of the environment and empowerment of ordinary people as a kind of religious vocation? Were there spiritual lessons to be learned and applied to their own environmental efforts, or in their lives as a whole?...

However, I never differentiated between activities that might be called "spiritual" and those that might be termed "secular." After a few years I came to recognize that our efforts weren't only about planting trees, but were also about sowing seeds of a different sort—the ones necessary to give communities the self-confidence and self-knowledge to rediscover their authentic voice and speak out on behalf of their rights (human, environmental, civic, and political). Our task also became to expand what we call "democratic space," in which ordinary citizens could make decisions on their own behalf to benefit themselves, their community, their country, and the environment that sustains them...

In the process of helping the earth to heal, we help ourselves.

Through my experiences and observations, I have come to believe that the physical destruction of the earth extends to us, too. If we live in an environment that's wounded—where the water is polluted, the air is filled with soot and fumes, the food is contaminated with heavy metals and plastic residues, or the soil is practically dust—it hurts us, chipping away at our health and creating injuries at a physical, psychological, and spiritual level. In degrading the environment, therefore, we degrade ourselves.

The reverse is also true. In the process of helping the earth to heal, we help ourselves. If we see the earth bleeding from the loss of topsoil, biodiversity, or drought and desertification, and if we help reclaim or save what is lost—for instance, through regeneration of degraded forests—the planet will help us in our self-healing and indeed survival. When we can eat healthier, nonadulterated food; when we breathe clean air and drink clean water; when the soil can produce an abundance of vegetables or grains, our own sicknesses and unhealthy lifestyles become healed. The same values we employ in the service of the earth's replenishment work on us, too. We can love ourselves as we love the earth; feel grateful for who we are, even as we are grateful for the earth's bounty; better ourselves, even as we use that self-empowerment to improve the earth; offer service to ourselves, even as we practice volunteerism for the earth.

Human beings have a consciousness by which we can appreciate love, beauty, creativity, and innovation or mourn the lack thereof. To the extent that we can go beyond ourselves and ordinary biological instincts, we can experience what it means to be human and therefore different from other animals. We can appreciate the delicacy of dew or a flower in bloom, water as it runs over the pebbles or the majesty of an elephant, the fragility of the butterfly or a field of wheat or leaves blowing in the wind. Such aesthetic responses are valid in their own right, and as reactions to the natural world they can inspire in us a sense of wonder and beauty that in turn encourages a sense of the divine.

The environment becomes sacred, because to destroy what is essential to life is to destroy life itself.

That consciousness acknowledges that while a certain tree, forest, or mountain itself may not be holy, the life-sustaining services it provides—the oxygen we breathe, the water we drink—are what make existence possible, and so deserve our respect and veneration. From this point of view, the environment becomes sacred, because to destroy what is essential to life is to destroy life itself.

Read more of this entire excerpt of Replenishing the Earth: Spiritual Values for Healing Ourselves and the World here.

Call for Nominees: 2011 Yayori Awards seek to honor activists, artists, journalists working on women’s issues worldwide

The organizing committee for the Yayori Awards is pleased to announce that nomination forms are now available for the 2011 competition.

The Yayori Awards were created through the final will and funds of the late Yayori Matsui, a well-known journalist, feminist/human rights activist, and founder of the Asia-Japan Women’s Resource Center (AJWRC). Her profile may be accessed here.

The Yayori Awards are presented during each competition round in two separate categories:

1) The Women's Human Rights Activities Award (commonly referred to as the Yayori Award) is presented to a grassroots-level woman activist, journalist, or artist (either an individual or group) who works with socially marginalized peoples to solve serious social issues in Asia and other regions, and whose work helps to create a 21st century free from war and discrimination against women.

Nomination forms for this award must be submitted in English. Self-nominations will not be accepted.

2) The Yayori Journalist Award is presented to a woman journalist or artist (either an individual or group) who vividly portrays the situation of women from a global gender perspective. Self-nominations for this award are acceptable. Since the nominee’s future work shall be subject to publication in Japanese, all submissions must be in the Japanese language.

Winners in both categories will receive a certificate and a monetary award in the amount of 500,000 yen. In the event that multiple awardees are selected for the Yayori Journalist Award,the money will be divided amongst all recipients.

The organizing committee is seeking nominations from around the world for both awards, and will send printed leaflets upon request. The deadline for this year’s competition is August 25, 2011.

Detailed information regarding the awards, including a leaflet, nomination forms, and list of past award recipients are all available on the Yayori Award website.

Past winners have included a group of women working to bring justice to victims of sexual violence committed during the civil war in Guatemala, a feminist photojournalist from Nepal working on issues of peace and human rights, and numerous others doing important work for empowerment and justice at the grassroots level. The Japan Times did a feature story on the 2008 Yayori Journalist Award winner's work on the fight against nuclear power plants in a Japanese town.

[See this previous post at Ten Thousand Things for a description of the 2010 Yayori Award winners and their work for human rights.]

*************************************************
Mikiko Ishihara
Secretariat of the Committee for the Yayori Award
C/O Asia-Japan Women's Resource Center,
14-10-211, Sakuragaoka, Shibuyaku, Tokyo
150-0031 Japan
Tel: 81 3 3780 5245
Fax: 81 3 3463 9752
Email: info-award@ajwrc.org,
**************************************

Ainu and Okinawan Human Rights- UN Committee on Elimination of Racial Discrimination recommendations to Japan

Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discimination meeting at the UN (Photo courtesy of the International Movement against all Forms Discrinination and Racism)

The Japanese government has been receiving increasing criticism for its policies towards the indigenous people of Japan. Just last week, the Shimin Gaiko Centre (Citizens' Diplomatic Centre for the Rights of Indigenous Peoples) submitted a report to the United Nations Forum on Indigenous Issues, detailing the abuses of Ainu and Okinawan human rights by governmental plans to build an industrial waste disposal site on sacred Ainu land in Monbetsu, and to construct new bases in Okinawa.

Furthermore, in February 2010, the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) also submitted a report on Japan. Based on CERD's findings, they recommended:

1. The establishment of a national human rights institute
   
2. The observance of the indigenous rights of the Ainu people
   
3. The engagement in consultation with Okinawan representatives to promote their rights

In March 2011, a year after the recommendations were made, the Japanese government submitted a document in response. While acknowledging the need for a national human rights institution and the insufficiency of current efforts to prevent and handle human rights infringements, the Japanese government has yet to initiate the drafting of legislation on the matter.

Japan reports that the Meeting for the Promotion of Ainu Policies will ensure the respect of Ainu rights as guaranteed by the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People (UNDRIP):

In order to promote policies by sincerely listening to the opinions of the Ainu people, five of fourteen members of the Meeting for the Promotion of Ainu Policies were appointed from among the Ainu people. Each working group is also making efforts to reflect the Ainu people’s opinions in the policies through their participation. In addition, two prominent scholars of international human rights law participate in the Meeting as well.

There are more Ainu people included in these policy meetings than ever before. Previous expert panels on Ainu policy have included only 1 Ainu person or none at all. However, each working group has the participation of two Ainu people each making the majority of each group non-Ainu. While the " two prominent scholars" are key members of both groups, one Ainu participant is left out of both of the working groups entirely.

The working groups are focusing on the establishment of a "symbolic space for ethnic harmony" and conducting "survey of the living conditions of the Ainu people outside Hokkaido." A multitude of pressing issues covered by UNDRIP, including the Ainu right to control their education, are completely neglected. Therefore, the Japan Society for the Study of Adult and Community Education is currently researching the issues surrounding education for other indigenous peoples in Japan. The Shimin Gaiko Gaikou Centre further analyzed the workings of the Meeting in their response to the Japanese government's comments on CERD:

While the Meeting for the Promotion of Ainu Policies stresses that it refers to the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, it has not clearly indicated which paragraphs of the Declaration are taken into considerations, and how these are reflected in their work. Looking into the substantial work of the Meeting, we have not found any essential parts of the Declaration that have been being reflected in its work. Now, the two working groups are have almost reached their own conclusion, however, it is hard to say that the Meeting takes into consideration the various voices of the Ainu living in and out of Hokkaido in their promotion work, and its transparency and representation is still questionable.

We recommend that the Meeting for the Promotion of Ainu Policies or future successive agency of the Meeting has a structure in place to reflect the various voices of the Ainu and allows the Ainu to take their own initiatives in the work of the Meeting.

The Shimin Gaiko Centre also notes that the government has yet to set up a third working group in accordance with the CERD recommendations.

In addition to recommendations based on UNDRIP, CERD also urged Japan to ratify the International Labour Organization Convention No. 169 which specifically covers indigenous and tribal rights. Japan responded that it can not ratify the convention because some provisions are "not consistent with the legal system of Japan." Japan specifically noted: Article 9- respecting the customs of indigenous people in penal matters; and Article 10- giving preference to indigenous methods of punishment other than confinement in prison for indigenous peoples. Japan argues ILO No. 169 would permit the unequal treatment of Japanese citizens. In response, the Shimin Gaiko Centre recommends:

the Government list up all provisions contained in the Constitution, laws and systems that are not consistent with the provisions contained in ILO No. 169, and study how such provisions could be revised so that Japan ratifies ILO Convention No. 169. In doing so, it is recommended that the government conduct a consultation with the Ainu Peoples and Ryukyu/Okinawa Peoples to examine which provisions of the ILO Convention need to be implemented. It is very unrealistic that the Ainu and Ryukyu/Okinawa Peoples request the implementation of Article 9 and 10.

Should the Japanese government follow these recommendations, ILO No. 169 could be ratified with revisions.

Finally, in respect to recognizing the rights of the Okinawan people, the government responded by detailing the actions it has taken on a governmental level to develop the economy of Okinawa, arguing that the Japanese Constitution guarantees the rights of Okinawan people. Shimin Gaiko Centre notes that taking actions only on a governmental level will not ensure Okinawan rights are respected:

In its follow-up information submitted to CERD, the government limited itself to explaining only about its Okinawa promotion measures in the legal and institutional framework, which, according to their explanation, are based on the intentions and interests of the Okinawa prefectural government. CERD, however, encourages a wide range of consultations with Okinawan representatives. It is inadequate and insufficient to guarantee the human rights of the Okinawan people only by responding to what the Okinawa prefectural and municipal governments have requested.

We recommend that in addressing the structural discrimination against the people of Okinawa, the Japanese Government guarantee the rights of the Okinawan people in the context of CERD.

Japan has an obligation to ensure that the Ainu and Okinawan people are fully represented in policy deliberations and that their rights are respected. By following the recommendations of the Shimin Gaiko Centre it can be possible to overcome the institutional exclusion of their voices.

- Posted by Jen Teeter