Geographies of Scale/Rescaling and Their Application to Japan

Abstract

This paper explores the theoretical development in geographical studies on scale and rescaling and demonstrates how the concepts of scale and rescaling can be applied to cases in Japan. The concept of ‘geographical scale’ was created in the 1980s by Anglophone political and economic geographers to show how various spatial units in which human activities extend were socially produced and interrelated in capitalist society. Those geographers interpreted such socio-spatial processes as being multilayered and nested from a global scale to a local, even bodily, scale and examined how inter-scalar relations affected human/corporate/ state activities and were utilized for specific political economic purposes. Ever since, a number of theoretical, empirical, and critical studies have been conducted on the production and politics of scale. One of the new research trends is studies on ‘rescaling.’ Rescaling points to specific aspects of shifts in inter-scalar relations under the contemporary global political economic restructuring. Two elements are considered important in the shifts: globalization and the retreat of the state. Thus, studies on rescaling illustrate the way the external and internal spaces of the state are transformed in neoliberal reforms and the way actors at various scales attempt to survive globalizing economic competition. Compared to European studies, however, the number of studies on Asia, including Japan, is still limited. Drawing on the above-mentioned scholarship, this paper applies the concept of scale and rescaling to the cases of Okinawa and Osaka Prefectures in Japan. Using strategic rescaling, governors of both prefectures attempted to decentralize state power to revitalize their own locality. The processes of rescaling in these two cases are compared to show how the role of each locality in relation to the state can condition success in such rescaling attempts in Japan.