Abstract
The nain object of this article is to give an overall picture of the internal migraion which Japan has been experiencing recently, and to draw ro the attention of social scientists, particularly of sociologists, the remarkable significance of the migration behavior of Japanese. Migration movement is really the nodal point of behavioral science in which sociology and economics, and also especially geography could and should be comprehensive studied closely with demography.
However, economic, social and cultural factors affeecting migration movement, which are very interesting for social scientists, are not discussed here mostly because of space limitation.
Beginning from the observation of the national magnitude of internal migration, the inter-and intra-prefectural migration and also the regional migration stream and counterstream are discussed. Then, migration movement in large cities and metropolitan areas is taken up, which may be helpful in finding out predicative suggestions for metropolitan development.
Lastly, drastic urbanward migration from rural and agricultural sectors is discussed, and demographic and socioeconomic influences are pointed out.
