Profile of the Article contributor

International Career Development Inc.
CEO Kazuko Yokoyama

Journalist living in Brazil
Tomoko Oura

Kazuko Yokoyama was born in Hokkaido, Japan. After graduating from Hokkaido University, she earned an MBA from Indiana State University in the United States and PhD. in Economics from Kyoto University, Japan. She had worked for UN Organizations such as ILO, UNHCR, and FAO before returning to Japan for teaching at university. Currently CEO of International Career Development, Inc., and part-time university lecturer.

Tomoko Oura was born in Hyogo Prefecture, Japan in 1979 and grew up in Kobe City until graduating from high school. After graduating from the Faculty of Education at Shinshu University, she has lived in Sao Paulo, Brazil since 2001. She has been working as a freelance journalist and writer for the Nikkei Newspaper in Brazil and is also working in editorial work.

Countries that grant multinational nationalities

Currently, 80% of the world’s countries recognize multiple nationalities in some form. In Japan, where the population is in crisis due to the declining birthrate, it is expected that there will be an even greater shortage of general workers as well as highly skilled workers in the future. One solution to this problem is to accept foreign workers. An increasing number of countries are not only accepting foreigners as short-term workers but are also accepting them as immigrants and granting them citizenship in the future if they meet certain conditions. The Japanese government could seriously consider granting Japanese nationality to foreigners who work in Japan on a long-term basis.

European Countries are Utilizing Human Resources from Smaller Countries

The Nihon Keizai Newspaper reported on September 1, 2023, that Germany, where immigrants account for more than 10% of the population are in the process of revising nationality controls in order to accept dual nationalities. In fact, some European countries are already utilizing excellent human resources for the development of their countries by allowing them to settle down with the intention of granting them nationality in the future, rather than accepting them for a few years of short-term work.
There is a woman from Albania, a small country located north of Greece, who came to Japan as a Japanese government-sponsored student and obtained a doctorate from one of the top Japanese universities. She was employed by a prominent Japanese manufacturing company, but she was not accustomed to the so-called Japanese management style, so she was transferred to the European headquarters in the Netherlands, where she worked for several years before moving to a global company and acquiring Dutch citizenship. Albania is a geographically and historically complex country, and the country lacks economic power. As a result, working within one’s home country alone can limit options in life. For young people from such a country, working abroad is one way to improve their future prospects in life. If they can also acquire the citizenship of another country, they will have the freedom to cross borders even further. Many of the citizens of countries that have survived on the margins of major powers have a high level of understanding of different cultures and are multilingual. It seems that Europe is making the most of such talent from small countries.

More than One Passport

International Civil Servants are granted a blue diplomatic passport with diplomatic privileges by the United Nations, in addition to their own passport. Japanese international civil servants travel abroad with both a Japanese passport and a diplomatic passport. A former Vietnamese international civil servant had four passports. She spent high school in Canada and college in the USA, had both Canadian and U.S. passports. As she now lives in Switzerland, she also has a Swiss passport. She uses a different passport depending on which country she visits.

Multiple Nationalities: Brazil

Brazil is a place-of-birth-based country, meaning that one can acquire Brazilian citizenship if born in Brazil. As a nation of immigrants, it is not unusual for Brazilians to have more than one nationality. Even among the same immigrants, for example, Italy and Germany have a much lower threshold for granting nationality to the descendants of Brazilian-born immigrants than Japan. This is because, for example, the contribution of German immigrants to Brazil is evident in the Gramado City, which was established by German immigrants in southern Brazil, and the descendants of German immigrants have even produced a president. The descendants of German immigrants are a major presence in Brazil that cannot be overlooked.

Gramado City, Brazil, famous for its German-style streetscape

Multiple Nationalities: South Korea

South Korea, which had the world’s lowest birth rate at 0.78 in 2022, revised its nationality law in 2011 and shifted from the “sole nationality” principle, which does not allow multiple nationalities. The country has given up on improving the birth rate of its own citizens and has made it clear that it intends to increase the number of its citizens by naturalizing foreign-born citizens. There was a Korean in Brazil who unexpectedly benefited from this revision of the nationality law. He immigrated to Brazil in 1970 and five years later had to give up his Korean nationality when he needed to be naturalized in order to buy a farm in Brazil. He was born and raised in Japan before World War II and returned to Pusan, South Korea after the war ended. He studied in Japan during his elementary and junior high school years and still maintains contact with the friends he made at that time even after immigrating to Brazil. He often returned to South Korea from Brazil, but as he became a Brazilian citizen, he could no longer enter Japan without applying for a visa (from September 30, 2023, a reciprocal visa waiver was applied to Brazilian citizens for short-term stays; at this stage, the visa is valid for three years). There were several times during his stay in South Korea when he had the idea of going back and forth by boat from Pusan to see his Japanese friends, but he gave up the idea. However, due to the revision of the Nationality Law, he became eligible to acquire Korean nationality while maintaining the nationality of another country, and in 2013 he was granted dual Korean-Brazilian citizenship and the right to vote in both countries. In addition, he can now travel to Japan without a visa. It was a moment when his life, which had been at the mercy of the Korean War and Vietnam War, was rewarded in some small way.

More Choices in Life

Today, with globalization advancing and the future difficult to see, people want to have many options in life. In Japan, too, the shortage of human resources is a serious problem. In the same way that South Korea has addressed the issue, it is time for Japan to seriously consider granting multiple nationalities.