[Special Feature: Understanding the "Immigrant Society"] Multicultural Coexistence in Kawasaki: What Do the Youth Dream Of?

In 2015, the murder of a first-year junior high school boy occurred in Kawasaki Ward, Kawasaki City, Kanagawa Prefecture—an area that serves as both a bedroom community for Tokyo and an industrial zone. The aftermath of this incident served as a stark reminder that the district stands at the forefront of multicultural coexistence in Japan.

At the time, media coverage of the incident became frenzied due to the brutal nature of the crime. Because the victim had abrasions on his knees and appeared to have been forced to kneel before having his throat cut from behind with a blade, theories emerged that the perpetrators were mimicking the execution methods of the extremist group "Islamic State," which was causing a global stir. Furthermore, the catchphrase "Kawasaki Kingdom" (Kawasaki-koku) began appearing in weekly magazines, and public prurient interest grew, fueled by the impact of that label.

The fact that two of the three perpetrators had foreign roots further fueled the controversy. Kawasaki Ward developed as an industrial zone and is a district with many foreign workers. While the atrocities of the "Islamic State" were linked to Islamophobia, the phrase "Kawasaki Kingdom" was similarly exploited by racism, and the internet was flooded with discriminatory comments. Graffiti reading "Go back to ××××!" was sprayed on the wall of the perpetrator's home, and the so-called "hate demos" that had been taking place in Kawasaki Ward since 2013 grew more extreme. Placards using the phrase "Kawasaki Kingdom" were displayed, and the demonstration routes began to blatantly target districts with high populations of foreign residents.

On the other hand, movements to resist this also emerged. For example, "C.R.A.C. Kawasaki." Formed by activists living in Kawasaki City, this "Counter-Racist Action Collective" conducted thorough counter-protests against the hate demos. They utilized various methods, from direct action like sit-ins to block the path of demonstrators to steady lobbying of the city council, eventually creating a situation where hate demos could no longer be held in Kawasaki. Additionally, BAD HOP—a rap group formed primarily by young men born in Kawasaki Ward in 1995—began to confront the problems facing their hometown through music.

"The horrific incident that has been causing a stir in the streets did indeed happen in our hometown of Kawasaki. It has absolutely nothing to do with BAD HOP, but in our new song 'Stay,' we sang about when we were still at the bottom of Kawasaki's worst environment. In such a place, we are now active, finding potential in hip-hop." BAD HOP posted this message on Twitter shortly after the murder of the junior high school boy. Their new song at the time, "Stay," mentioned in the text, sings about their harsh upbringing and past involvement in crime before concluding with the line, "Now I'm a dealer selling dreams instead of drugs."

After the war, businesses catering to workers' desires for drinking, gambling, and sex flourished in the entertainment districts of Kawasaki Ward, and the power of the outlaws who controlled them grew strong. A pyramid-shaped power structure existed in the district with these figures at the top, and local delinquent youths were integrated into the lower tiers. Both BAD HOP and the group responsible for the murder of the junior high school boy lived in such an oppressive society. To be precise, the latter were outcasts from the pyramid—delinquent dropouts, so to speak—who ended up committing the crime after creating their own even smaller vertical society. In contrast, BAD HOP, who were the "elite" of the delinquents, were trapped by strong ties for that very reason, but they chose to live through music.

BAD HOP became role models in their hometown, and around 2015, many young people could be seen practicing rap in parks, looking up to them. Their popularity soon spread nationwide. At the end of 2018, they successfully performed a solo concert at the Nippon Budokan. On that grand stage, the leader T-Pablow shouted, "If you want to be famous in Kawasaki Ward, you either kill someone or become a rapper." In other words, the Kawasaki junior high school murder and the success of BAD HOP symbolize the crossroads faced by delinquent youth in the district.

Alternatively, one could say that what C.R.A.C. Kawasaki and BAD HOP initiated was a new social movement in a broad sense, one that inherited and developed the history of multicultural coexistence in Kawasaki Ward. In 1912, Kawasaki Town (now Kawasaki Ward), then a rural area, began inviting factories. Among the workers gathered from various places were Korean immigrants, who formed communities by building shacks in wetlands where Japanese people did not live, as if huddling together for support. Eventually, while Kawasaki Ward developed as an industrial zone, social issues such as pollution and discrimination came to the fore, and movements arose alongside them.

Lee In-ha, the pastor of Kawasaki Church in Sakuramoto—a residential area for Zainichi Koreans in Kawasaki Ward—opened Sakuramoto Nursery School in 1969, starting from the painful experience of his own child being refused admission to a local kindergarten because they were Zainichi Korean. However, the facility did not only accept Zainichi Koreans; it opened its doors to all local dual-income families. This became the starting point for multicultural coexistence in Kawasaki Ward. Of course, even before that, in districts like Ikegami-cho, there was mutual aid between Zainichi Koreans and Japanese people amidst poverty. However, there is no doubt that the social welfare corporation "Seikyusha," established by Lee in 1973, led the movement, put it into practice, and influenced city administration. They were the first to respond to the problems faced by immigrants from the Philippines and South America, which increased after the 1980s, and the first to protest the hate demos that occurred after the 2010s.

One of the achievements of the aforementioned C.R.A.C. Kawasaki was likely connecting traditional anti-discrimination movements, like those led by Seikyusha, with the new anti-discrimination movements of the 2010s and beyond. If the former had a challenge, it was the aging of activists and the insularity of the movement itself due to its long history. In contrast, the new anti-discrimination movement included not only so-called activists but also people involved in social movements for the first time and those involved in culture. By bringing in a fresh breeze while utilizing the knowledge and methods accumulated by traditional movements, the anti-discrimination movement in Kawasaki Ward was able to achieve certain results. However, even after the hate demos ceased, hate speech continues in the form of street propaganda and election campaigning, and the struggle continues.

As a presence symbolizing Kawasaki Ward in music, there was Carol in the past. This band, known as the starting point for Eikichi Yazawa—Japan's representative singer who needs no introduction—was formed in 1972 after Johnny Okura contacted Yazawa in response to a recruitment flyer Yazawa had posted in a musical instrument store near Kawasaki Station. Yazawa is a second-generation atomic bomb survivor from Hiroshima. He lost his parents early, was moved around between relatives, and spent a destitute childhood. After graduating high school, he moved to Tokyo dreaming of making it big in music. He lived in Kawasaki Ward and pursued his musical activities while working.

Meanwhile, Johnny Okura was a second-generation Zainichi Korean from Kawasaki Ward. He also lost his father at a young age, and his mother worked at a cabaret in Kawasaki to support three children. Okura had been delivering newspapers since early elementary school and reportedly bought a guitar with money he saved in junior high. Yazawa and Okura met precisely because Kawasaki Ward was a town of workers and immigrants. Carol played rock and roll, the star of youth culture at the time, but if they were the youth of today, they might have been rapping. In that sense, BAD HOP is the 2010s version of Carol.

The members of BAD HOP also come from various backgrounds: some grew up in impoverished families, some have fathers who were former outlaws, and some have roots in the Korean Peninsula. In their 2015 song "Chain Gang," there are lyrics like, "You can tell by the eyes, a kid from this town" and "More than anything, just a bunch of guys who hate being alone / If they were friends when we were growing up, it doesn't matter if they're multi-national." A "chain gang" refers to prisoners chained together at the feet. BAD HOP likens this to themselves, trapped by local ties, rapping, "Korean, Chinese, South American, all linked / We are Chain Gang of Kawasaki." They embody multicultural coexistence, not as a mere slogan, but as a reality.

However, if we view rap music as a social movement in a broad sense, we must also consider its negative aspects. For example, the past criminal acts sung about in the genre serve to explain how harsh an environment one grew up in, but this can give the impression that one is not "real" without such experiences, potentially reproducing crime.

Furthermore, when an indiscriminate stabbing incident occurred in Noborito, Tama Ward, Kawasaki City in May 2019, T-Pablow's aforementioned lyrics—"If you want to be famous in Kawasaki Ward, you either kill someone or become a rapper"—were frequently cited on Twitter. To begin with, the scene of the incident was not in Kawasaki "Ward," but as the expression spread, it could be said to have created a stigma against the land. What makes it even more complicated is that such a stigma can become a badge of honor for local delinquent youth. They might think, "Because we live in a dangerous place, we are dangerous (cool) too." The term "Kawasaki Kingdom" was also originally used to mock Kawasaki's uniqueness or discriminate against its multiculturalism, but later, local delinquent youth began to refer to themselves by that name with a mix of self-deprecation and pride.

Many young people living in Sakuramoto, a multicultural district of Kawasaki Ward, did not have identities as Kawasaki residents or Sakuramoto residents because they had moved there from other places. However, after hate demos targeted the area in 2015 and counter-protests occurred, a sense of local pride began to emerge. Naturally, discrimination should not exist. Yet, it is also true that harsh experiences can push coexistence forward. Including these issues, Kawasaki Ward likely shows us a future for Japanese society, which has no choice but to move toward multicultural coexistence.