A Mirror for Japanese Archaeology
Kenneth AITCHISON1
ABSTRACTThis paper reports what the author experienced about Japanese Archaeological daily practices
with speciﬁc focus upon their organisational and legal aspects when he visited Japan in 2012.
Critical and sympathetic comments are made in comparison with the picture on the ground inEurope.
KEYWORDS: Japanese archaeology, European archaeology, Archaeological practice, Rescuearchaeology, Cultural resource management“You don’t need me. What you really need is a mirror. Because any stranger is for you
simply a mirror in which to reﬂect yourself.” (The Face of Another [Tanin No Kao],
Kōbō Abe 1964)

1.

Introduction

In the mid-1980s, a young British archaeologist named Alan Saville visited Japan.
His recollections and views (Saville 1986) simultaneously painted a picture of appliedarchaeology in both Japan and Britain at that time. He was impressed by the positive
atmosphere in Japanese archaeology and Japan as a whole, which he saw as a marked
contrast to the then prevailing situation in Britain, and he was very impressed by thesheer scale of operations in terms of the number of ﬁeld projects and the facilities todeliver them. Saville saw imperfections too—an over-emphasis on ﬁeldwork and rapid,
brief technical publication that he thought lacked synthesis and discussion, but again
could contrast this positively with the situation in Britain, where projects funded by the
Manpower Services Commission (a governmental unemployment reduction scheme) wereleading to a backlog of unpublished material which would later take more than 20 years
to clear.
After his return from Japan, Alan Saville went on to have a distinguished career in
British archaeology, becoming Senior Curator Earliest Prehistory (Palaeolithic/Mesolithic)
in the Department of Scottish History and Archaeology at the National Museum of
1 c/o Landward Research Ltd, 120 Bradley Street, Shefﬁeld S10 1PB, United Kingdom(kenneth.aitchison@landward.eu)
Category: Original Article (Solicited) Accepted: 22 July 2016

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A MIRROR FOR JAPANESE ARCHAEOLOGY

Scotland and President of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland. British archaeology
changed signiﬁcantly from 1990 onwards after the publication of “PPG 16” (DoE 1990),
government guidance that led to the adoption of ‘polluter-pays’ ﬁnancing, meaning thatdevelopers were responsible for funding archaeological investigations and would not get
permission to build if they did not. This also led directly to the expansion of privatesector archaeology companies in the UK, and the demise of many of the organisations
set up on the pre-1990 model, such as the now defunct Western Archaeological Trust that
Alan Saville worked for at the time of his visit to Japan.

2.

Background to my visit

In August 2012, I was kindly invited by Katsuyuki Okamura of Osaka City Cultural
Properties Association to visit Osaka to present a lecture on the history of archaeologicalpractice in the UK, to meet Japanese archaeologists and to visit sites and organisations
involved in archaeological practice in the Kansai region. This gave me the opportunity
to strengthen my contacts with Japanese archaeologists and to see applied archaeology
as it is delivered in Japan. This paper is my account of my experiences—and how they
compare with Saville’s, nearly 30 years before.
I was once a ﬁeld archaeologist, working in the UK, Europe and south-west Asia,
but then spent ten years working for the Chartered Institute for Archaeologists, theprofessional association for archaeologists in the UK before establishing my own
consultancy company. My interests are very much in the professional structure ofarchaeology, how it is undertaken and delivered, and this has led to me coordinating aseries of studies of the labour market in archaeology in the UK (carried out every ﬁve
years since 1997–98) with comparative studies across Europe. I was awarded my PhD
by the University of Edinburgh in 2011 for this work, and am now actively interested inharvesting comparable data from around the world.
Going to Japan gave me the opportunity to compare my knowledge of how British
archaeology is delivered with my perceptions of Japanese archaeological practice and so
to cast an outsider’s eyes over what I thought was good and where I could see potential
risks facing the Japanese system. My impressions are based on what I was told, what
I saw and what I have read in a limited range of sources that have been published in
English.

3.

Archaeology in Europe

The core of my company’s research work has been labour market intelligence projects,
with a particular focus on archaeology. Our work has gathered trend data on the numbers© Japanese Archaeological Association

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Kenneth AITCHISONof people working in British archaeology, their ages, genders, skills and qualiﬁcations,salaries earned together with information about the kinds of organisations that they workfor.
I have also led work which gathered and shared information on archaeologicalemployment across twenty-one European countries. The results of this project,
Discovering the Archaeologists of Europe 2012–14, have now been published as
Aitchison et al. (2014). Key results from this European work include:・ it is estimated that nearly 25,000 people work as professional archaeologists in the
21 participating states, where a total of over 1 billion Euro (135 billion Yen) with an
overall estimated total of 33,000 archaeologists working across Europe as a whole;・ a slight majority (50.3% to 49.7%) of European archaeologists are women;
・ it is normal for people working in archaeology to hold a degree—on aggregate, 94%
of European archaeologists are graduates and the majority (69%) have postgraduate
qualiﬁcations;・ in twelve of the 21 participating states, archaeologists were paid less than thenational average for all workers—a ﬁgure of 24,901 Euro (3,360,000 Yen) was
calculated as the mean salary earned by European archaeologists across all
participating states;
・ archaeological practice in the participating states is organised on different
models, with varying levels of commercial activity balanced against state agency
engagement

4.

The organisation of archaeological practice

When visiting several excavations and archaeological organisations in Kansai, it became
clear to me that when seen from a European perspective, archaeological practice in Japanis organised differently. This is manifest both on the ground (in term of workforce andrecording methodologies) and off-site.
On site in Japan, there are relatively few people. Archaeological practice in the UK
is much more labour-intensive—and it was particularly interesting to see belt conveyors
in use in Japan, something that doesn’t happen in the UK, where wheelbarrows will
always be used to remove spoil. Furthermore, the work on archaeological sites in the
UK (with the exception of operating mechanical excavators) is undertaken by people
who are considered to be archaeologists—graduates who have responsibilities forinterpreting and recording as well as physical excavation. By contrast, in Japan thenumber of archaeologist (or cultural heritage specialists) is very few, as the majority ofpeople on site are workmen, who have responsibility for physical work while the cultural
heritage specialists oversee their work. It also appeared—in my brief visits to only four
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sites in Kansai—that relatively little on-site recording and interpretation of deposits andarchaeological context was undertaken, in contrast with the UK norm of intensive singlecontext recording.
On- and off-site (in post-excavation processes), the workforce in Japanese archaeology
appears to be more hierarchical than in the UK, where there are much ﬂatter structuresof responsibility. It was also noticeable that, whereas very nearly half of British
archaeologists are women, only a very small number of Japanese ﬁeldworkers are—but
almost all of the post-excavation ﬁnds analysis and pottery reconstruction work is done
by women.

5.

Legal frameworks

My interpretation of Japanese archaeological practice, and of potential risks that it faces,
has to be structured around the way that archaeological heritage management is managed
legally—and it has to be considered that the Japanese approach to predevelopment
archaeological intervention has evolved in response to economic growth rather than
through legislation (Okamura & Matsuda, 2010)—the legal frameworks have followed
economic imperatives, rather than being primarily concerned with cultural matters.
This is not a criticism—indeed, it has been the norm in industrialised countries in thelast 30 years, starting from the point that archaeological remains have been treated asenvironmental as well as cultural resources.
While they are being managed as fragile and non-renewable environmental assets(to be evaluated as part of the environmental impact assessment process), Japanesearchaeological resources are formally described under The Law for the Protection ofCultural Properties in cultural terms—archaeological materials buried in the ground are“buried cultural properties” (maizo bunkazai), and then excavated archaeological objects
can be designated as “important cultural properties” or “national treasures” under the
category of “tangible cultural properties.” After excavation and interpretation, sites thatare considered to be of signiﬁcant value may be designated as “historic sites” or “special
historic sites” under the category of “monuments” (Matsuda 2014).

6. Comments
The frameworks and processes put in place mean that in Japan there are now very nearlyno archaeological sites destroyed through development without investigation, and thus
destruction is controlled and managed through the excavation process. And this is my
ﬁrst query—is it appropriate that every site should be treated as having equal value,that every site should be completely excavated and that every pot should be reﬁtted in© Japanese Archaeological Association

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Kenneth AITCHISON

the post-excavation process? Is this the best use of resources to add to our knowledge
about human life in the past? Even with the long-term economic changes since the
Asian Financial Crisis of 1997, ﬁeld archaeologists in Japan have continued to be busy,
thoroughly excavating sites and accumulating cultural material in the way that Savilledescribed in 1986. It could be argued that introducing an element of selectivity—putting
more resources into the excavation and, crucially, the interpretation of the most valuable
sites while accepting that, beyond knowing that they existed at a particular time andplace, some sites will simply not add value to the sum total of knowledge about life in
the past.
Conceptually, this is a difﬁcult issue to address. Japanese archaeological practice isvery good at conducting excavations, but information overload means that these are notadding to knowledge in a way that is proportional to the effort being expended. Buried
cultural properties are protected for cultural reasons, but their applied interpretation
is ﬁrmly in the ﬁeld of environmental economics (whether this is openly recognised
or not), and engaging with some of the concepts there—particularly of sampling andsigniﬁcance—could lead to better understanding.
Financially, The Law for the Protection of Cultural Properties has not precisely
required archaeological investigations to be funded under the principle of “the polluterpays” (Tanaka 1984, p. 84), but the commissioner of the Agency for Cultural Affairs
can specify “necessary measures to be taken” (Matsuda 2014), after a court ruled thatdevelopers should cover the cost of excavation but with the condition that there shouldbe the limit deﬁned by an “appropriate level of investigation” (Nakanishi 2014)—without
what would be “appropriate” remaining unspeciﬁed.
Without the details being precisely established in law, there is a risk of this model
being overturned or realigned in favour of the developers’ interests—and they haveﬁnancial might and so lobbying power behind their arguments. This forms a particularrisk to archaeological practice when Okamura (2014) considers that many individual
Japanese archaeologists don’t actually like the concept of “commercial archaeology”—
working for the developers’ money—and many consider the social value of the workthat they do, which they (and the law as it currently stands) see as investigating andpreserving cultural remains on behalf of local communities and the nation to be more
important. But, as already discussed, this is actually an environmental resource that thedevelopers are putting at risk, and so they should be mitigating the damage they cause—and that mitigation should be achieved through requiring the funding of archaeologicalexcavation and interpretation.
“And interpretation” is emphasised because of another potential weak-spot in thesystem of practice. Currently, the amount developers have to pay is “is usually calculated
according to the volume of soil to be removed or the numbers of workdays required”© Japanese Archaeological Association

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A MIRROR FOR JAPANESE ARCHAEOLOGY(Nakanishi 2014)—a mechanical calculation that is not based on the archaeologicalcomplexity of a site and its interpretation, but a model that predicts and restricts cost(not unlike the hypothecated taxation system adopted in France since 2001 and discussed
by Schlanger & Rossenbach [2010]). This funding model suits the developers more than
the archaeological organisations—and it minimises scope for negotiation on the basis ofarchaeological considerations.
Most of the actual, physical ﬁeldwork is undertaken by workmen, rather than byprofessional archaeologists (or cultural heritage specialists). The workmen are expert at
physically excavating sites and recovering artefacts, but not at recording or interpretingthe sites, nor at planning activities such as recovering palaeoenvironmental data.
And the workmen are typically contracted directly by the developer to work with thearchaeological organisation leading the excavation—and so, in theory, if the obligation on
the developers was reduced to simply fund excavation and artefact recovery, not recording
and interpretation, then they could only employ workmen and the archaeologists could be
cut out of the system. If this were to happen, then developers would continue to pay formaterial to be recovered, but no longer for interpretative, archaeological work.
In addition to these two very real risks—loss of the funding source by legislativechange, and loss of access to market by developers using workmen only, there is another,largely unrecognised risk facing applied archaeological practice in Japan.
“Archaeologists working at the boards of education and semi-public archaeologicalfoundations are not only in charge of the implementation of rescue excavations but also
the protection and restoration of archaeological sites in each prefecture or municipality,
as well as the dissemination and publication of information gained from archaeologicalinvestigations for educational purposes” (Matsuda 2014).
Matsuda identiﬁed this in terms of the educational beneﬁts that this brings—but it
could also bring up a potentially negative issue. If the same people (or organisations)are deciding on implementing policy—whether or not ﬁeldwork projects should takeplace—are also the same people (or organisations) that then carry out the ﬁeldwork,
then there could be a signiﬁcant conﬂict of interest. They are acting as both curators(of the archaeological record, on behalf of the public) and contractors (commercialisedﬁeldworkers, responsible to their developer clients). Developers could be confronted byan organisation that ﬁrst compels them to pay for an archaeological investigation, andthen that informs them that it is the same organisation that they must pay to do the work.
Because those organisations have multiple interests—in ensuring that ﬁeldwork takes
place to record archaeological remains (for the public beneﬁt); and in ensuring ﬁnancial
continuity (whether technically for proﬁt or not) by carrying out ﬁeldwork—there is very
deﬁnitely the potential for a conﬂict of interest, when professional judgement on thenecessity of ﬁeldwork might be inﬂuenced by the desire to do the commercial work that
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it brings.
Until the 1980s (and later in some places), it was normal for municipalities in the
United Kingdom to have a single archaeological “team” that both provided advice andundertook ﬁeldwork. With the advent of new regulations from 1990—which ensured
that developers were compelled to pay for archaeological ﬁeldwork, but they could alsochoose who would do that work for them—these local authorities largely withdrew fromcommercial ﬁeldwork, partly in response to the potential for there being conﬂict ofinterest issues, but also because these services were being more efﬁciently delivered byprivate sector organisations.
Finally, there are risks that are feared but that are not in fact real threats to archaeology.
These ‘imaginary fears’ are fears of change associated with the increasing role ofthe private sector, and are remarkably similar to ‘anti-privatisation’ arguments in UK
archaeology in the 1990s—that local knowledge is always superior, meaning thatoutsiders from another part of the country won’t understand the archaeology here, andthat competition is a bad thing that will somehow drive down standards.
Okamura (2014) presents widely held views that “The biggest challenge the current
AHM [Archaeological Heritage Management] system is faced with is the growth andexpansion of private archaeological units,” and speciﬁes fears over quality, geographicalcoverage and reduction in the number of locally based archaeological units.
In the UK, complaints that were made on the basis of the territoriality argument
did not come from developers or the public, but came from archaeologists protesting
about other archaeologists. Many confused local knowledge with quality of work, whichlead to some to “. . . view competition as leading to a decline in standards. However,distance travelled does not equate to loss of competence and by 2002, any perception of‘territoriality’ was economically determined, rather than politically—this is the frictionof distance, as it costs more to operate further from the centre (it can lead to increased
costs, but does not affect quality)” (Aitchison 2012).
With ﬁeldwork costs in Japan being calculated on the basis of cubic metres of soil tobe removed, archaeology is already a commodity market—there is not competition on
price, because the prices are already set.

7.

Conclusions

So I consider that there are some real risks facing Japanese archaeology—that developers
will outsmart the legislation, and that the workmen could be commissioned directly
without archaeological involvement. There is a currently unrecognised risk, of thepotential for conﬂicts of interest to arise. And there is an imagined, politicised fear, thatcompetition is a bad thing.
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If these risks are recognised, then the ﬁrst step has been taken to mitigate them andto maintain an active, (ﬁnancially) healthy and (publically) valued applied archaeology
sector in Japan.

Postscript

The nature of archaeological practice in Japan is fascinating, and more detailed
comparative work could be extremely valuable. Currently, plans are being made to
expand the scope of the studies of the archaeological labour market discussed for the
UK and Europe—ﬁrstly, by continuing to repeat those studies in order to build up timeseries datasets that allow trends to be identiﬁed over time—and secondly, by launchingcomparative studies in other parts of the world.
This global Discovering the Archaeologists of the World initiative has been discussed
in a recent special issue of Archaeologies, the Journal of the World Archaeological
Congress (Aitchison 2014), and a pilot project to start work in North and SouthAmerica has begun during 2016. There is potential for a comparable Discovering theArchaeologists of (East) Asia project to compare employment and working practices inJapanese, Korean, south-east Asian and Chinese archaeology and which can then feedin to the global project, gathering data that would support archaeologists, archaeologicalemployers and educators in Japan; if methodologies and results are shared, then a truly
global picture can begin to be built.

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