Legal adult age to change from 20 to 18 in Japan
 

Currently in Japan legal adult age is 20. Japanese Paraliment has passed the resolution to change legal adult age to 18.

Once become a law voting will be 18, marriage without parental consent will be 18, credit cards without guardian cosign will be 18.

However, drinking alcohlic beverage, smoking and gambling (such as horce racing, Japan does not have casinos) will remain as 20 years old or older.

How about the deadline for Japanese kids with dual nationality. Is that changing?

Will there be a seijin shiki for three year groups next year?
That will be mortal... except, I guess, it won't because most of them won't be allowed to drink.

Currently Japan does not recognize dual citizenship.

According to Mainich newspaper, currently once a person reaches age 20 then a person has to choose one citizenship by age is 22. Under new law once a person reaches age of 18 then a person has to choose a citizenship by age if 20.

I am no expert in the area but has a family friend where their kids are in this situation and asked their friend who is an university law professor knowledgable in the area. According to this professor no dual citizenship is not that actively enforced law in Japan.

If the person is from a country where Japan does not have totally friendly relationship (don't want to go OMNI but you have an idea of those countries) then Japan may enforce no dual citizenship policy.

However, according to this professor many people from western Europe and the U.S. maintain dual citizenship without much problem with Japan.

So far it's been fine. But I was hoping the situation would get better, not worse. Sigh...

On a totally unrelated note, the latest Karuizawa edition of Terrace House has a 19-year old, and the others regularly use まだ子供じゃない？ or まだガキじゃん when they're talking about him. Was interesting to find out (from this thread) that that's literally and legally true :p

Past performance is not always indicative of future results :(

What documentation is it that you think tells one or the other country of the second nationality? It is not recorded on a Koseki Tohon nor a Birth Certificate. Parents' nationalities may be but that has zero correlation to the child's nationality given one can choose either.

Unnecessary worrying.

I'll admit, it's not high up the scale of things to worry about as a parent, but it's there - It has a little peeping voice you can just about hear on the rare occasions when everything else is quiet.
World is changing (anyone with a British passport is keenly aware of this) and there will always be reasons for governments to swap and share information on their own citizens.
That there is the potential for a future government to strip away a nationality isn't something I can just fuggeddabout. It was something I thought could be pushed aside for the next 12/14 years, not for the next 10/12 years.
The little nagging concern is compounded by a father who will never get British (or Spanish) Citizenship.
I know that it's rather different when a Japanese adult CHOOSES to become the citizen of another country, rather than a child not eventually renouncing citizenship they already had.

As I said, two less years of not worrying at all.

Snake bites are much higher up that parental worry list.

Here's an interesting article on the topic. I'm sure that there are many others. I'm not qualified to comment on whether Japan *can* legally strip someone of their Japanese citizenship. But plenty of dual citizens "fly under the radar," with no consequences:
Yosha Bunko

I have a feeling that those who reside outside of Japan might be a little more anxious about the legal situation than those who reside in Japan. I've spoken with Japanese people who reside in the UK and have acquired UK citizenship without renouncing Japanese citizenship, it seems that some of them feel a little nervous when they visit Japan. One person told me that a Japanese immigration agent observed that she had been away from Japan for over a year but didn't have any stamps in her Japanese passport. I don't know how she replied, but nothing came of it. She wasn't required to make a choice about her nationality.

The UK is very tolerant of dual citizenship. In the unlikely event that Japan were to get serious about making its citizens actually renounce UK citizenship, the UK policy would allow such people to resume UK citizenship by providing documentary evidence that they had to give it up to avoid losing their Japanese citizenship:
https://www.gov.uk/renounce-british-...sh-nationality

I guess we should all be aware that situations can change. Countries can become less tolerant. Perhaps, one day, Japan will perceive a risk to national security from people whose loyalties are divided between the UK and Japan. If that happens, they might require suspected Brits to trample on fumie pictures of the queen.

Thank you, jib71. The "Yosha Bunko" link is excellent and addresses pretty much all of my concerns.

In Japan, you have to disclose any foreign nationality you have every time you apply for a passport (there is a space on the application form for this. If you fail to disclose, you have committed a crime. That said, as far as I know, they can't do much if you disclose a foreign nationality as long as you are in compliance with the Japanese Nationality Act.