Anxieties and expectations for Geoparks from a viewpoint of Ecomuseums

Abstract

Now Geoparks seems getting popular in Japan. Only four years have passed since the first Geoparks appeared in this country (2008) but Japan has already 20 Japanese Geoparks (includes 5 Global Geoparks) and 16 candidate sites (2012). However we also have some anxieties there because these movement in Japan really looks like that of Ecomuseums about ten years ago. We need reexamination of the Ecomuseums here not to make same mistakes of them and make Geoparks sustainable. I'll show five major problems of Japanese Ecomuseums (scientific basis, referencability, monetization, augmentability, ethics and philosophy), refer to the anxieties and expectations of Geoparks from these points of view.