Resource extraction and landscape transformation in Otaki

Eric John Cunningham

Graduate School of Human and Environmental Studies,

Kyoto University

Department of Anthropology,

University of Hawai‘i

Today, many of Japan’s rural areas are in a state of crisis. Rapid depopulation,

lack of capital investment, and the withdrawal of government assistance have

left rural communities with few options; many have amalgamated with

neighboring municipalities under a program meant to simplify the national

bureaucracy. Those communities that have been unwilling or unable to

amalgamate have, for the most part, been left on their own to maintain basic

services while trying to find sustainable paths into the future. The situation has

left these communities economically and politically disadvantaged, as well as

environmentally and socially vulnerable. The historic presence of these

asymmetric relationships has ensured that the phenomenon of extraction of

both natural and human resources from rural communities has been a common

occurrence during the formation of capitalist modes of production in modern

Japan.

In this paper I use data collected since October 2007 to examine this

phenomenon at the local level in the mountain village of Otaki. By briefly

outlining a history of resource extraction I argue that Otaki’s socio-natural

environment has been transformed, both materially and ideationally, into a

“resource landscape”. Furthermore, I suggest that this transformation has

implications for the long-term viability of Otaki’s socio-natural environment,

which embodies a long history of human-nature interactions. I conclude, that in

Japan the ongoing loss of human communities like Otaki is causing

unprecedented ecological shifts. Finally, I propose that new ideological, social,

economic, and political structures capable of empowering residents to reclaim

local landscapes might provide a starting point for developing new

arrangements for better management of socio-natural environments.

A history of resource extraction in Otaki has restructured the area, both

materialistically and ideationally, into a “resource landscape” whose value is

determined at external locations, often in terms of flows of goods and materials.

This is not to say that Otaki’s landscape holds no intrinsic value, rather I argue

that resource extraction has resulted in the concealing and reworking of these

intrinsic values for people both inside and outside the landscape. Tracing a

brief history of resource extraction will help illuminate the process of

transformation in the Otaki landscape.

Heavy resource extraction in the Otaki region began in the sixteenth century

when Toyotomi Hideyoshi seized forestlands to secure timber for monumental

construction projects, such as Inuyama Castle. Throughout the Edo Period,

Otaki’s forests were controlled by powerful clans and elites as sources of

timber. Cutting appears to have been at times intense. However, during this

period reforestation techniques were also advanced in order to combat erosion

and ensure future stocks of timber. While these efforts helped to maintain

forests, trees used for reforestation activities tended to be pine varieties for

timber production, rather than broadleaf varieties that provide crucial ecological

services (Totman 1989). Thus began a long-term trend of conversion away

from natural mixed forest to human-managed forest dominated by timber

varieties, such as hinoki, sawara, (both cypress varieties) and later karamatsu

(a larch variety).

With the restoration of the Meiji Emperor in 1868, the majority of forestland in

Otaki became the property of the imperial family. Regulation of forest resources

was tightened and restrictions against forest utilization by local residents were

strengthened. Beginning in December of 1889, a network of forestry offices

was set up in the Kiso Valley to manage cutting activities and protect against

illegal incursions. Timber was an essential resource to the modernist projects

undertaken by the government of the new Japanese nation-state. As a result,

forests in Otaki and elsewhere began to be heavily exploited. From 1913 a

series of forest rail-lines began being constructed in the Kiso Valley, allowing for

a greater volume of trees to be taken from the deepest parts of the mountains

(Morishita 1998).

Heavy cutting continued in Otaki until the end of WWII. The phenomenon of

bald mountains, known as hageyama　はげ山 , garnered a response from

Japan’s newly formed democratic government and it’s rinyakyoku 林野局 , or

forestry office. Reforestation became a priority, yet the stubborn use of timber

varieties for replanting continued. Karamatsu, a particularly fast growing timber

tree with shallow roots, was heavily planted across Nagano prefecture, creating

monoculture forests with negative ecological repercussions, such as habitat

loss, hillside instability, and a loss of overall biodiversity.

In addition to its rich forest resources, because of its location in a deep valley on

the southeastern slope of Mt. Ontake, Otaki is also valued for its water

resources. Accordingly, the village is also home to two major dams. The first,

Miura dam, is a hydroelectric dam completed in 1945 to supply energy to the

Kansai Region. The reservoir created by the dam flooded 280 hectares of

forestland. The second dam, Makio, was completed in 1961 as a part of the

Aichi-yousui 愛知用水 project, undertaken to supply drinking and agricultural

water to residents in Gifu prefecture and Aichi prefecture’s Nagoya metropolitan

area. The dam’s construction displaced 645 residents from 137 homes and

flooded 247 hectares of Otaki’s most scenic and agriculturally productive land.

Together, these two dams are capable of holding 137,216,000 cubic meters of

water.

In addition to the heavy exploitation of Otaki’s natural resources, the area’s

human resources have also been significantly depleted. Though I hesitate to

use the term “extraction” in terms of human resources, it seems clear that

Japan’s modernity has brought structural changes significant enough to make

population decline a serious crisis facing rural communities like Otaki. The

national government was first to heavily utilize the human resources of Japan’s

rural areas, doing so to support colonial projects in China and Korea. In

contrast, the flow of human resources that has ensued in the latter part of the

20th century has been less intentional, but no less structured, and far more

destructive. Since 1940 Otaki’s population has dropped by 78%, and currently

stands at 986 people. Though it’s difficult to point to specific drivers of this

population shift, major factors alluded to by many Otaki residents are the

rigidity of Japan’s national education system, which creates a lack of

educational opportunity in rural communities, as well as the pooling of profitable

employment in metropolitan areas coupled with a lack of industry in the

countryside. Needless to say, such massive population shifts have brought

about existential crises to communities like Otaki.

I argue that through this history of extraction Otaki’s landscape has been

transformed in a process of envisioning, embodying, and transcribing onto the

physical environment a model of resource extraction and use based on a

paradigm rooted in the larger political economy of the Japanese nation-state.

Furthermore, I contend that this transformation to “resource landscape” has

obfuscated a range of embedded historical, cultural, spiritual, ecological, and

other values, subverting them to meet the needs of Japan’s larger political

economy. As a result, communities located in these landscapes are at a loss in

terms of what they can offer—socially, politically, and economically—to the

larger nation. In addition, environmentally speaking, rural areas like Otaki are

currently undergoing profound ecological change as human communities and

their associated patterns of activity, which often have great historical longevity,

continue to disappear from the landscape (Fukamachi et al 2001; Ichikawa et al

2006).

In materialist terms, the Otaki landscape has been transformed through physical

acts of resource extraction. Forest resources, for example, have for some time

now been felled and then replenished with the goal of future timber harvesting,

resulting in a general trend away from mixed, multi-storied forest to simpler,

often single-storied forests dominated by pine varieties. It’s hard to know

exactly how much forest land has been converted in Otaki, but the ecological

impacts are evident. For example, numerous informants have commented that

wildlife pestilence has increased considerably since they were young. The

cause has been explained to me as a loss of habitat due to forest conversion,

which has led wildlife closer to villages in search of food. K-san, a lifetime

resident of Otaki who maintains his own forest, made the following statement:

Fundamentally, because there is no food in the mountains

[animals] come to the village. Yeah. And then once they

remember the flavor of delicious food, it’s a matter of course

that they will come again. Yeah. Without humans knowing

it they made it so that animals come. That’s what I myself

think. It’s because when they plant trees in the mountains,

it’s trees that can turn into money [timber trees]. So, I mean

they don’t plant trees that aren’t . . . like that, you know,

[they don’t plant] various kinds? I’ve always thought that,

yeah. So, with this thinking that you can just do as you

please with natural power and create nature the way you

think, there’s no way you can do it (Personnel interview

05/21/08).

Indeed, for some wildlife, such as certain troops of macaques, utilization of

cultivated land has become an adaptive strategy (see Izumiyama et al 2003).

This pattern of timber production has also contributed to forest fragmentation

and simplification, with a resulting loss in overall species diversity (Iida &

Nakashizuka 1995). Additionally, it has left many mountainsides in the Otaki

region with inadequate vegetation cover to deal with the seasonal rains that are

a staple of the Japanese climate. In turn, increased run-off from bare

mountainsides has detrimentally impacted Otaki’s river system. Several

residents have commented on changes in fish populations in Otaki’s rivers,

suggesting that numbers were much more plentiful in the past. For example, T-

san, an avid fisherman and lifetime resident of Otaki commented:

So, the rivers have changed a lot. I guess you’d say

change. I don’t really know about water plants, but anyway

the forest roads, for example, have opened up spaces [on

the hillsides] more and more. So that kind of thing, um, like,

road surfaces, so . . . what do you call it? Like, gravel, you

know, it’s like sand; more and more comes [down]. Then, of

course places the fish can’t live, like, more and more it’s

like, um, places where fish live become filled (Personal

interview, 05/30/08).

Perhaps the most overt expressions of Otaki’s transformation into a resource

landscape are the Miura and Makio dams. Both of these massive projects

literally converted land that was culturally, ecologically, and economically

important to Otaki residents into water and electricity resources that can be

extracted and moved to external markets. It’s difficult to quantify the impact

these two dam projects have had on Otaki’s residents and the socio-natural

environment. The words of S-san, a lifetime resident who was born and raised in one

of the hamlets submerged after the completion of Makio Dam, spoken during a

conference focused on Otaki as a source-water region, begin to give some sense of the

effect the dam has had. S-san spoke of the extraordinary beauty of his hamlet and

lamented that when he was young the fishing was amazing, with varieties of fish that

aren’t there now. He added that there were many varieties of bugs, frogs, and such

(Fieldnotes 10.24.08). In monetary terms, the Makio Dam project was worth

210,000,000 yen, which is the amount paid to the Otaki village government as

compensation. This was an enormous amount of money at the time, much

more than the village needed for its regular annual budget, and so the funds

were put to use developing Mt. Ontake, a historically sacred mountain, as a

tourism resource.

The willingness of village residents and government officials to participate in the

conversion to resource of Mt. Ontake, a sacred part of the Otaki landscape,

points to the ideational transformations that have accompanied, and are

intertwined with, material transformations. Bourdieu and others have discussed

the role that actors play in creating and recreating social structures through their

enactment of practices while dwelling within a particular landscape (Bourdieu

1977). Through practice, social structures, in turn, are carved onto and become

manifest in the landscape—what might be labeled a “socializing” of the natural

world (Bennett 1976). Conversely, the transformed material landscape gives

shape, as a vessel shapes its contents, to the social lives of actors dwelling in it.

In this sense, the social and ideational lives of human actors shape and become

embedded in the landscape, while at the same time being shaped by the

landscape, in both it’s material and ideational aspects (Ingold 1993). In Otaki,

material and ideational transformations have served to limit the activities, both

physical and ideological, of local actors within the landscape. We can think of

this process in terms of a limiting of human activity from sections of the

landscape; and conversely as a restricting of these landscapes from the socio-

cultural space of local residents. In other words, local actors become limited in

their ability to move through, or perhaps even thinking meaningfully about,

these sections of the landscape. As a result, there is a decrease in human

interactions with the natural environment, accompanied by a decline in sets of

environmental knowledge and customs. In Otaki, a sense of disconnection from

the national forests that make up the majority of Otaki’s land-area has been

expressed to me by residents and is symptomatic of this phenomenon.

When I first arrived in Otaki and began approaching residents about my

research, I was often met with odd-looks when suggesting that villagers might

have some claim over local forests. I was told, quite frankly, that because the

forests belong to the nation, decisions concerning them were made outside of

Otaki and there was little connection to the villagers’ lives (Field notes

04/23/08). This was intriguing to say the least. However, as I dug deeper I

found that there is indeed a sense among some people of the stake and claim

that residents have in and over local forests. However, often these sentiments

are tempered by references to a long history of external control over Otaki’s

forestland and the famous phrase ki-ippon-kubi-hitotsu木一本首一つ, denoting

the purported rigidity with which forests in the area have long been regulated,

as if there’s nothing that can be done about it. In other words, even among

those residents who recognize the asymmetric power structures that limit local

participation in the governance and management of local forests, there appears

to be a feeling of acceptance concerning these structures, which is legitimized

through references to their historical longevity. Interestingly, this sense of

acceptance and lack of entitlement on the part of many village members is

contradicted by written materials (Totman 1989; Ushiomi 1968) and

conversations with older residents which suggest that in the past control was

much more fluid and that local people often utilized forests for a variety of

resources, including firewood and building materials (Personal communication

2008).

This conceptual removal of local human actors from Otaki’s forest landscapes

also occurs at the institutional level, within the forest management agencies of

the prefecture (rinyachou 林野庁) and the Kiso region (shinrin-kanri-kyoku 森林管理局 ). Within various planning reports and public relations documents

produced by these agencies, forestlands under their jurisdiction are discussed

in deceivingly simplistic and universalized terms directed at (and perhaps meant

to mystify?) a homogenized citizenry—Japan’s kokumin 国民—without giving

mention to the complex sets of socio-ecological needs that exist on the ground

(Chuubu-shinrin-kanri-kyoku/中部森林管理局 2007; Scott 1998). Also, without

mentioning the human communities that live in and near national forests, the

authors define human-forest interactions as simply one use, akin to resource

cycling or water storage, for which forests are managed. Local socio-ecological

communities, such as Otaki, and the histories, needs, and desires of their

human and non-human residents are often not an overt part of management

structures. In other words, the forests are resources, the nation’s resources,

and there are bureaucratic institutions tasked with managing them unilaterally

as they see fit.

I argue that now, in the face of a failed attempt at amalgamation and financial

crisis, the contradictions of Otaki as a resource landscape, as well as the

potential for local residents to reclaim and take greater stake in the landscapes,

are becoming apparent. During my time in Otaki I’ve seen this potential begin

to be developed by residents in a variety of ways. For example, residents have

taken initiative to form a group to think about and promote historical, cultural,

and ecological aspects of the Otaki landscape. The group, known as zukudaso-

ouentai ずくだそ応援隊 , has organized several conferences, lectures, and

other events focused on Otaki and the natural environment. The group strives

to promote learning about and spending time in Otaki’s landscapes—a

resocializing of the landscape, we might call it.

While there has been progress made, through my role as an observer, I have

also gained insights into areas where increased efforts may contribute to

greater empowerment among Otaki’s residents and to the development of new

arrangements for better management of the socio-natural environment. First

and foremost, there is a need for greater participation by more residents in

village activities. Second, it is vital that residents be recognized as primary

stakeholders in Otaki’s natural environment and allowed greater participation in

management decisions. This is of course and ideal that may not be realized for

many years to come, but now is a good time to begin thinking about ways of

bringing the ideal about. Finally, it is vital that Otaki find a way to maintain

population numbers by offering incentives for younger residents to stay in the

village, or to return after leaving, or by attracting new residents. Towards this

end, Otaki residents are beginning to look at new, environmentally-friendly

industries—mainly eco-tourism. However, I would suggest that there is also a

need to look at educational practices. To this end, I am currently exploring the

role of environmental education in the village’s school and working with

students to map out and explore their local landscapes more.

A long history of resource extraction has had transformative effects on the

landscape of Otaki, creating what I have labeled a “resource landscape”. This

transformation has created a state of crisis in Otaki, which faces an ever

shrinking population, a lack of viable industry, and financial hardship. The

situation has implications for the long-term health of Otaki’s socio-natural

environment, which is undergoing unprecedented change. Though I’ve touched

on them only briefly in this paper, I argue that a new set of ideological, social,

economic, and political structures for thinking about and managing rural

landscapes like Otaki’s is crucial for their future health. As my ongoing research

points to, a sense of crisis in Otaki has spurred new efforts on the part of

residents to rediscover, recover, and reclaim landscape elements that have

been obscured within the larger paradigm of Japan’s modernity. My hope is that

efforts made now will be the beginnings of virtuous cycles that will contribute to

a new process of transformation within Otaki’s landscape, one that ensures a

more equitable and sustainable future.

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