The End of Certainty: Reflections on Immigration After Two and a Half Years in Japan
The issue of raising the threshold for business manager visas continues to ferment. Online and around me, I hear people discussing this matter every day.
To say I'm not anxious at all would be a lie.
But before the shoe finally drops and the details are announced, there's no use overthinking it.
I suddenly realized that our generation is actually standing at a turning point in history, witnessing it unfold.
The years 2020-2025 mark a major turning point for the world.
The sudden arrival of COVID-19 inadvertently triggered changes in the global order.
Geopolitical conflicts, populism, anti-globalization, intensified migration waves, tightened immigration policies.
In recent years, many popular destination countries including the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, Germany, and Portugal have successively tightened their immigration policies and even canceled certain immigration programs. Different countries have different purposes and methods, but what they share in common is that they are all responding to the challenges posed by the post-COVID-19 migration wave on the economy, society, public services, and national security. Before finding better solutions, attitudes toward immigration have shifted from general acceptance to selective acceptance.
Japan has finally caught up.
To be honest, the business manager visa was never meant to be a visa category for ordinary people. 5 million yen, roughly 250,000 RMB, as startup capital would be tight for starting a new business in most countries, let alone in a developed country.
From being overlooked before 2020 to rapid growth starting in 2022, this "immigration valley" visa has surprised the Japanese government.
It's all thanks to the contrast with others.
The number of emigrants from certain countries has grown rapidly, while popular countries continue to raise entry barriers. Japan was forced to catch this wave of traffic, neither too big nor too small.
Some people rushed in to frantically buy buildings and land, some completely ignored Japanese society's rules in doing business, and some even tried every means to take advantage of capitalist wool. Although there are currently only 20,000 Chinese people holding business manager visas, this growth trend is genuinely alarming.
In the early 1990s, a TV series swept across the country: "A Beijinger in New York." I was too young then and didn't have much impression of this series.
30 years later, I suddenly realized that a life like that TV series is happening to me—"A Beijinger in Osaka."
A full 30 years have passed. The first generation of immigrants, though perhaps with different motivations and destinations, all face the same anxieties, courage, sacrifices, cultural clashes, and other issues.
Times are always changing, for better and for worse.
In recent years, many people have been hesitant, wanting to wait until conditions are more sufficient, thinking more clearly, before taking this step.
They're essentially waiting for a more certain answer.
But, I'm sorry,
In this era, we are getting further and further away from the word "certainty."
For us, apart from keeping in mind what matters most to ourselves, focusing on the present, and moving forward courageously,
There is no other way.
这里是中文版
