1996 Volume 51 Issue 2 Pages 81-90
The aim of this paper is to make clear the changing structure of Japanese urban systems through the relationships between urban growth and firm activities in main cities by analyzing the Establishment Census 1981 and 1991. We can employ the statistic data of establishments on main cities with more than 300, 000 inhabitants and all prefectural capitals ; they are consisted of 74 cities in 1981 and 81 in 1991. Hino (1995) already clarified the changing features of firm activities by analyzing the same statistic data in detail. But it seems that there still remain other research areas on the relations between firm activities and urban systems. The main results obtained in this paper are summarized as follows : (1) Since more than 40 percent of workers are engaged in branch establishments of these main cities, we can consider them as an important element of urban economy, as Hino (1995) pointed out. (2) Aside from the case of small and medium-sized cities, there are no close relationships between the percent of branch establishment workers and the population size in these cities. Similarly, the growth rates of firm employees, especially branch establishment workers, are not necessarily higher in larger cities in the 1980s, though we can recognize such a tendency in the 1960s and 1970s. (3) We cannot reveal a tendency to have somewhat higher rates of local firm workers in main cities located in the peripheral areas of Japan except for Asahikawa and Naha. In the main cities of these areas, however, the rates of branch establishment workers headquartered in three metropolitan cities are lower, while those headquartered in regional metropolises are relatively high. The job rates of secondary industry are also lower, because regional metropolises such as Fukuoka, Sapporo, Sendai and Hiroshima cannot play a role to controll secondary industry of the main cities in these areas in place of three metropolitan cities. (4) In these 74 cities there is a tendency to increase the worker rates of the firms headquartered in other prefectures, especially in Tokyo, in the period 1981 to 1991. It is noticeable that the growth rates are higher in main cities of prefectural capital class than in regional metropolises which already have close linkages to Tokyo firms. In this period the firm employees grew more rapidly in regional metropolises and suburban areas of Tokyo than in Tokyo itself, apart from capital relations of firms ; it means that Tokyo firms have developed their linkage network to main cities rather than firm activities in Tokyo itself. It will be not considered that such changing features of firm activities have not caused the rapid decline of net-in-migrations in the Tokyo metropolitan area in the 1990s. Although a little time lag can be recognized in the changing features between firm activities and urban population in Tokyo, the changing process of urban population to the deconcentration may already begin on a full scale.
