These two countries have many political, economic and social differences yet they share one major challenge: a shortage of labour. Both have attempted to resist high levels of migration, yet now accept that future prosperity depends on international labour migration. Post-Brexit the UK expects to move beyond the EU for its migrant labour whilst at the same time Japan, housing relatively small numbers of migrants compared to the UK, is opening its doors to labour migrants.

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Our new academic network brings social sciences, arts and humanities academics from the UK and Japan together to develop new knowledge and insight about diversification and integration resulting from old and new migrations. The network offers opportunities for new directions of scholarly work comparing migration in Japan and UK.  Our approach is highly original in its fusion of East/West intellectual traditions and knowledge that is both interdisciplinary and comparative.